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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 122,
+December, 1867, 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 20, No. 122, December, 1867
+
+Author: Various
+
+Release Date: April 28, 2009 [EBook #28630]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Joshua Hutchinson, Josephine Paolucci and the
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net.
+(This file was produced from images generously made
+available by Cornell University Digital Collections.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+THE
+
+ATLANTIC MONTHLY.
+
+_A Magazine of Literature, Science, Art, and Politics._
+
+
+VOL. XX.--DECEMBER, 1867.--NO. CXXII.
+
+Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1867, by TICKNOR AND
+FIELDS, in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of
+Massachusetts.
+
+
+
+
+THE GUARDIAN ANGEL.
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIV.
+
+MURRAY BRADSHAW PLAYS HIS LAST CARD.
+
+"How can I see that man this evening, Mr. Lindsay?"
+
+"May I not be _Clement_, dearest? I would not see him at all, Myrtle. I
+don't believe you will find much pleasure in listening to his fine
+speeches."
+
+"I cannot endure it. Kitty, tell him I am engaged, and cannot see him
+this evening. No, no! don't say engaged, say very much occupied."
+
+Kitty departed, communing with herself in this wise:--"Ockipied, is it?
+An' that's what ye cahl it when ye're kapin' company with one young
+gintleman an' don't want another young gintleman to come in an' help the
+two of ye? Ye won't get y'r pigs to market to-day, Mr. Bridshaw,--no,
+nor to-morrow, nayther, Mr. Bridshaw. It's Mrs. Lindsay that Miss Myrtle
+is goin' to be,--an' a big cake there'll be at the weddin', frosted all
+over,--won't ye be plased with a slice o' that, Mr. Bridshaw?"
+
+With these reflections in her mind, Mistress Kitty delivered her
+message, not without a gleam of malicious intelligence in her look that
+stung Mr. Bradshaw sharply. He had noticed a hat in the entry, and a
+little stick by it which he remembered well as one he had seen carried
+by Clement Lindsay. But he was used to concealing his emotions, and he
+greeted the two older ladies, who presently came into the library, so
+pleasantly, that no one who had not studied his face long and carefully
+would have suspected the bitterness of heart that lay hidden far down
+beneath his deceptive smile. He told Miss Silence, with much apparent
+interest, the story of his journey. He gave her an account of the
+progress of the case in which the estate of which she inherited the
+principal portion was interested. He did not tell her that a final
+decision which would settle the right to the great claim might be
+expected at any moment, and he did not tell her that there was very
+little doubt that it would be in favor of the heirs of Malachi Withers.
+He was very sorry he could not see Miss Hazard that evening,--hoped he
+should be more fortunate to-morrow forenoon, when he intended to call
+again,--had a message for her from one of her former school friends,
+which he was anxious to give her. He exchanged certain looks and hints
+with Miss Cynthia, which led her to withdraw and bring down the papers
+he had intrusted to her. At the close of his visit, she followed him
+into the entry with a lamp, as was her common custom.
+
+"What's the meaning of all this, Cynthia? Is that fellow making love to
+Myrtle?"
+
+"I'm afraid so, Mr. Bradshaw. He's been here several times, and they
+seem to be getting intimate. I couldn't do anything to stop it."
+
+"Give me the papers,--quick!"
+
+Cynthia pulled the package from her pocket. Murray Bradshaw looked
+sharply at it. A little crumpled,--crowded into her pocket. Seal
+unbroken. All safe.
+
+"I shall come again to-morrow forenoon. Another day and it will be all
+up. The decision of the court will be known. It won't be my fault if one
+visit is not enough.--You don't suppose Myrtle is in love with this
+fellow?"
+
+"She acts as if she might be. You know he's broke with Susan Posey, and
+there's nothing to hinder. If you ask my opinion, I think it's your last
+chance: she isn't a girl to half do things, and if she has taken to this
+man it will be hard to make her change her mind. But she's young, and
+she has had a liking for you, and if you manage it well there's no
+telling."
+
+Two notes passed between Myrtle Hazard and Master Byles Gridley that
+evening. Mistress Kitty Fagan, who had kept her ears pretty wide open,
+carried them.
+
+Murray Bradshaw went home in a very desperate state of feeling. He had
+laid his plans, as he thought, with perfect skill, and the certainty of
+their securing their end. These papers were to have been taken from the
+envelope, and found in the garret just at the right moment, either by
+Cynthia herself or one of the other members of the family, who was to be
+led on, as it were accidentally, to the discovery. The right moment must
+be close at hand. He was to offer his hand--and heart, of course--to
+Myrtle, and it was to be accepted. As soon as the decision of the land
+case was made known, or not long afterwards, there was to be a search in
+the garret for papers, and these were to be discovered in a certain
+dusty recess, where, of course, they would have been placed by Miss
+Cynthia.
+
+And now the one condition which gave any value to these arrangements
+seemed like to fail. This obscure youth--this poor fool, who had been on
+the point of marrying a simpleton to whom he had made a boyish
+promise--was coming between him and the object of his long pursuit,--the
+woman who had every attraction to draw him to herself. It had been a
+matter of pride with Murray Bradshaw that he never lost his temper so as
+to interfere with the precise course of action which his cool judgment
+approved; but now he was almost beside himself with passion. His labors,
+as he believed, had secured the favorable issue of the great case so
+long pending. He had followed Myrtle through her whole career, if not as
+her avowed lover, at least as one whose friendship promised to flower in
+love in due season. The moment had come when the scene and the
+characters in this village drama were to undergo a change as sudden and
+as brilliant as in those fairy spectacles where the dark background
+changes to a golden palace and the sober dresses are replaced by robes
+of regal splendor. The change was fast approaching; but he, the
+enchanter, as he had thought himself, found his wand broken, and his
+power given to another.
+
+He could not sleep during that night. He paced his room, a prey to
+jealousy and envy and rage, which his calm temperament had kept him from
+feeling in their intensity up to this miserable hour. He thought of all
+that a maddened nature can imagine to deaden its own intolerable
+anguish. Of revenge. If Myrtle rejected his suit, should he take her
+life on the spot, that she might never be another's,--that neither man
+nor woman should ever triumph over him,--the proud, ambitious man,
+defeated, humbled, scorned? No! that was a meanness of egotism which
+only the most vulgar souls could be capable of. Should he challenge her
+lover? It was not the way of the people and time, and ended in absurd
+complications, if anybody was foolish enough to try it. Shoot him? The
+idea floated through his mind, for he thought of everything; but he was
+a lawyer, and not a fool, and had no idea of figuring in court as a
+criminal. Besides, he was not a murderer,--cunning was his natural
+weapon, not violence. He had a certain admiration of desperate crime in
+others, as showing nerve and force, but he did not feel it to be his own
+style of doing business.
+
+During the night he made every arrangement for leaving the village the
+next day, in case he failed to make any impression on Myrtle Hazard and
+found that his chance was gone. He wrote a letter to his partner,
+telling him that he had left to join one of the regiments forming in the
+city. He adjusted all his business matters so that his partner should
+find as little trouble as possible. A little before dawn he threw
+himself on the bed, but he could not sleep; and he rose at sunrise, and
+finished his preparations for his departure to the city.
+
+The morning dragged along slowly. He would not go to the office, not
+wishing to meet his partner again. After breakfast he dressed himself
+with great care, for he meant to show himself in the best possible
+aspect. Just before he left the house to go to The Poplars, he took the
+sealed package from his trunk, broke open the envelope, took from it a
+single paper,--it had some spots on it which distinguished it from all
+the rest,--put it separately in his pocket, and then the envelope
+containing the other papers.
+
+The calm smile he wore on his features as he set forth cost him a
+greater effort than he had ever made before to put it on. He was
+moulding his face to the look with which he meant to present himself;
+and the muscles had been sternly fixed so long that it was a task to
+bring them to their habitual expression in company,--that of ingenuous
+good-nature.
+
+He was shown into the parlor at The Poplars; and Kitty told Myrtle that
+he had called and inquired for her, and was waiting down stairs.
+
+"Tell him I will be down presently," she said. "And, Kitty, now mind
+just what I tell you. Leave your kitchen door open, so that you can hear
+anything fall in the parlor. If you hear a book fall,--it will be a
+heavy one, and will make some noise,--run straight up here to my little
+chamber, and hang this red scarf out of the window. The _left-hand
+side-sash_, mind, so that anybody can see it from the road. If Mr.
+Gridley calls, show him into the parlor, no matter who is there."
+
+Kitty Fagan looked amazingly intelligent, and promised that she would do
+exactly as she was told. Myrtle followed her down stairs almost
+immediately, and went into the parlor, where Mr. Bradshaw was waiting.
+
+Never in his calmest moments had he worn a more insinuating smile on his
+features than that with which he now greeted Myrtle. So gentle, so
+gracious, so full of trust, such a completely natural expression of a
+kind, genial character did it seem, that to any but an expert it would
+have appeared impossible that such an effect could be produced by the
+skilful balancing of half a dozen pairs of little muscles that manage
+the lips and the corners of the mouth. The tones of his voice were
+subdued into accord with the look of his features; his whole manner was
+fascinating, as far as any conscious effort could make it so. It was
+just one of those artificially pleasing effects that so often pass with
+such as have little experience of life for the genuine expression of
+character and feeling. But Myrtle had learned the look that shapes
+itself on the features of one who loves with a love that seeketh not its
+own, and she knew the difference between acting and reality. She met his
+insinuating approach with a courtesy so carefully ordered that it was of
+itself a sentence without appeal. Artful persons often interpret sincere
+ones by their own standard. Murray Bradshaw thought little of this
+somewhat formal address,--a few minutes would break this thin film to
+pieces. He was not only a suitor with a prize to gain, he was a
+colloquial artist about to employ all the resources of his specialty.
+
+He introduced the conversation in the most natural and easy way, by
+giving her the message from a former schoolmate to which he had
+referred, coloring it so delicately, as he delivered it, that it became
+an innocent-looking flattery. Myrtle found herself in a rose-colored
+atmosphere, not from Murray Bradshaw's admiration, as it seemed, but
+only reflected by his mind from another source. That was one of his
+arts,--always, if possible, to associate himself incidentally, as it
+appeared, and unavoidably, with an agreeable impression.
+
+So Myrtle was betrayed into smiling and being pleased before he had said
+a word about himself or his affairs. Then he told her of the adventures
+and labors of his late expedition; of certain evidence which at the very
+last moment he had unearthed, and which was very probably the
+turning-point in the case. He could not help feeling that she must
+eventually reap some benefit from the good fortune with which his
+efforts had been attended. The thought that it might yet be so had been
+a great source of encouragement to him,--it would always be a great
+happiness to him to remember that he had done anything to make her
+happy.
+
+Myrtle was very glad that he had been so far successful,--she did not
+know that it made much difference to her, but she was obliged to him for
+the desire of serving her that he had expressed.
+
+"My services are always yours, Miss Hazard. There is no sacrifice I
+would not willingly make for your benefit. I have never had but one
+feeling toward you. You cannot be ignorant of what that feeling is."
+
+"I know, Mr. Bradshaw, it has been one of kindness. I have to thank you
+for many friendly attentions, for which I hope I have never been
+ungrateful."
+
+"Kindness is not all that I feel towards you, Miss Hazard. If that were
+all, my lips would not tremble as they do now in telling you my
+feelings. I love you."
+
+He sprang the great confession on Myrtle a little sooner than he had
+meant. It was so hard to go on making phrases! Myrtle changed color a
+little, for she was startled.
+
+The seemingly involuntary movement she made brought her arm against a
+large dictionary, which lay very near the edge of the table on which it
+was resting. The book fell with a loud noise to the floor.
+
+There it lay. The young man awaited her answer; he did not think of
+polite forms at such a moment.
+
+"It cannot be, Mr. Bradshaw,--it must not be. I have known you long, and
+I am not ignorant of all your brilliant qualities, but you must not
+speak to me of love. Your regard,--your friendly interest,--tell me that
+I shall always have these, but do not distress me with offering more
+than these."
+
+"I do not ask you to give me your love in return; I only ask you not to
+bid me despair. Let me believe that the time may come when you will
+listen to me,--no matter how distant. You are young,--you have a tender
+heart,--you would not doom one who only lives for you to wretchedness.
+So long that we have known each other! It cannot be that any other has
+come between us--"
+
+Myrtle blushed so deeply that there was no need of his finishing his
+question.
+
+"Do you mean, Myrtle Hazard, that you have cast me aside for
+another?--for this stranger--this artist--who was with you yesterday
+when I came, bringing with me the story of all I had done for you,--yes,
+for you,--and was ignominiously refused the privilege of seeing you?"
+Rage and jealousy had got the better of him this time. He rose as he
+spoke, and looked upon her with such passion kindling in his eyes that
+he seemed ready for any desperate act.
+
+"I have thanked you for any services you may have rendered me, Mr.
+Bradshaw." Myrtle answered, very calmly, "and I hope you will add one
+more to them by sparing me this rude questioning. I wished to treat you
+as a friend; I hope you will not render that impossible."
+
+He had recovered himself for one more last effort. "I was impatient:
+overlook it, I beg you. I was thinking of all the happiness I have
+labored to secure for you, and of the ruin to us both it would be if you
+scornfully rejected the love I offer you,--if you refuse to leave me any
+hope for the future,--if you insist on throwing yourself away on this
+man, so lately pledged to another. I hold the key of all your earthly
+fortunes in my hand. My love for you inspired me in all that I have
+done, and, now that I come to lay the result of my labors at your feet,
+you turn from me, and offer my reward to a stranger. I do not ask you to
+say this day that you will be mine,--I would not force your
+inclinations,--but I do ask you that you will hold yourself free of all
+others, and listen to me as one who may yet be more than a friend. Say
+so much as this, Myrtle, and you shall have such a future as you never
+dreamed of. Fortune, position, all that this world can give, shall be
+yours!"
+
+"Never! never! If you could offer me the whole world, or take away from
+me all that the world can give, it would make no difference to me. I
+cannot tell what power you hold over me, whether of life and death, or
+of wealth and poverty; but after talking to me of love, I should not
+have thought you would have wronged me by suggesting any meaner motive.
+It is only because we have been on friendly terms so long that I have
+listened to you as I have done. You have said more than enough, and I
+beg you will allow me to put an end to this interview."
+
+She rose to leave the room. But Murray Bradshaw had gone too far to
+control himself,--he listened only to the rage which blinded him.
+
+"Not yet!" he said. "Stay one moment, and you shall know what your pride
+and self-will have cost you!"
+
+Myrtle stood, arrested, whether by fear, or curiosity, or the passive
+subjection of her muscles to his imperious will, it would be hard to
+say.
+
+Murray Bradshaw took out the spotted paper from his breast pocket, and
+held it up before her. "Look here!" he exclaimed. "This would have made
+you rich,--it would have crowned you a queen in society,--it would have
+given you all, and more than all, that you ever dreamed of luxury, of
+splendor, of enjoyment; and I, who won it for you, would have taught you
+how to make life yield every bliss it had in store to your wishes. You
+reject my offer unconditionally?"
+
+Myrtle expressed her negative only by a slight contemptuous movement.
+
+Murray Bradshaw walked deliberately to the fireplace, and laid the
+spotted paper upon the burning coals. It writhed and curled, blackened,
+flamed, and in a moment was a cinder dropping into ashes. He folded his
+arms, and stood looking at the wreck of Myrtle's future, the work of his
+cruel hand. Strangely enough, Myrtle herself was fascinated, as it were,
+by the apparent solemnity of this mysterious sacrifice. She had kept her
+eyes steadily on him all the time, and was still gazing at the altar on
+which her happiness had been in some way offered up, when the door was
+opened by Kitty Fagan, and Master Byles Gridley was ushered into the
+parlor.
+
+"Too late, old man!" Murray Bradshaw exclaimed in a hoarse and savage
+voice, as he passed out of the room, and strode through the entry and
+down the avenue. It was the last time the old gate of The Poplars was to
+open or close for him. That same day he left the village; and the next
+time his name was mentioned it was as an officer in one of the regiments
+just raised and about marching to the seat of war.
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXV.
+
+THE SPOTTED PAPER.
+
+What Master Gridley may have said to Myrtle Hazard that served to calm
+her after this exciting scene cannot now be recalled. That Murray
+Bradshaw thought he was inflicting a deadly injury on her was plain
+enough. That Master Gridley did succeed in convincing her that no great
+harm had probably been done her is equally certain.
+
+Like all bachelors who have lived a lonely life, Master Gridley had his
+habits, which nothing short of some terrestrial convulsion--or perhaps,
+in his case, some instinct that drove him forth to help somebody in
+trouble--could possibly derange. After his breakfast, he always sat and
+read awhile,--the paper, if a new one came to hand, or some pleasant old
+author,--if a little neglected by the world of readers, he felt more at
+ease with him, and loved him all the better.
+
+But on the morning after his interview with Myrtle Hazard, he had
+received a letter which made him forget newspapers, old authors, almost
+everything, for the moment. It was from the publisher with whom he had
+had a conversation, it may be remembered, when he visited the city, and
+was to this effect:--That Our Firm propose to print and stereotype the
+work originally published under the title of "Thoughts on the Universe";
+said work to be remodelled according to the plan suggested by the
+Author, with the corrections, alterations, omissions, and additions
+proposed by him; said work to be published under the following title, to
+wit: ---- ----; said work to be printed in 12mo, on paper of good
+quality, from new types, etc., etc., and for every copy thereof printed
+the author to receive, etc., etc.
+
+Master Gridley sat as in a trance, reading this letter over and over, to
+know if it could be really so. So it really was. His book had
+disappeared from the market long ago, as the elm seeds that carpet the
+ground and never germinate disappear. At last it had got a certain value
+as a curiosity for book-hunters. Some one of them, keener-eyed than the
+rest, had seen that there was a meaning and virtue in this unsuccessful
+book, for which there was a new audience educated since it had tried to
+breathe before its time. Out of this had grown at last the publisher's
+proposal. It was too much: his heart swelled with joy, and his eyes
+filled with tears.
+
+How could he resist the temptation? He took down his own particular copy
+of the book, which was yet to do him honor as its parent, and began
+reading. As his eye fell on one paragraph after another, he nodded
+approval of this sentiment or opinion, he shook his head as if
+questioning whether this other were not to be modified or left out, he
+condemned a third as being no longer true for him as when it was
+written, and he sanctioned a fourth with his hearty approval. The reader
+may like a few specimens from this early edition, now a rarity. He shall
+have them, with Master Gridley's verbal comments. The book, as its name
+implied, contained "Thoughts" rather than consecutive trains of
+reasoning or continuous disquisitions. What he read and remarked upon
+were a few of the more pointed statements which stood out in the
+chapters he was turning over. The worth of the book must not be judged
+by these almost random specimens.
+
+"_The best thought, like the most perfect digestion, is done
+unconsciously._--Develop that--Ideas at compound interest in the
+mind.--Be aye sticking in _an idea_,--while you're sleeping it'll be
+growing. Seed of a thought to-day,--flower to-morrow--next week--ten
+years from now, etc.--Article by and by for the....
+
+"_Can the Infinite be supposed to shift the responsibility of the
+ultimate destiny of any created thing to the finite? Our theologians
+pretend that it can. I doubt._--Heretical. _Stet._
+
+"_Protestantism means None of your business. But it is afraid of its own
+logic._--_Stet._ No logical resting-place short of None of your
+business.
+
+"_The supreme self-indulgence is to surrender the will to a spiritual
+director._--Protestantism gave up a great luxury.--Did it, though?
+
+"_Asiatic modes of thought and speech do not express the relations in
+which the American feels himself to stand to his Superiors in this or
+any other sphere of being. Republicanism must have its own religious
+phraseology, which is not that borrowed from Oriental despotisms._
+
+"_Idols and dogmas in place of character; pills and theories in place of
+wholesome living. See the histories of theology and medicine_
+passim.--Hits 'em.
+
+"'_Of such is the kingdom of heaven.' Do you mean to say, Jean Chauvin,
+that_
+
+     _'Heaven_ LIES _about us in our infancy'?_
+
+"_Why do you complain of your organization? Your soul was in a hurry,
+and made a rush for a body. There are patient spirits that have waited
+from eternity, and never found parents fit to be born of._--How do you
+know anything about all that? _Dele._
+
+"_What sweet, smooth voices the negroes have! A hundred generations fed
+on bananas.--Compare them with our apple-eating-white folks!_--It won't
+do. Bananas came from the West Indies.
+
+"_To tell a man's temperament by his handwriting. See if the dots of his
+i's run ahead or not, and if they do, how far._--I've tried that--on
+myself.
+
+"_Marrying into some families is the next thing to being
+canonized._--Not so true now as twenty or thirty years ago. As many
+bladders, but more pins.
+
+"_Fish and dandies only keep on ice._--Who will take? Explain in note
+how all warmth approaching blood-heat spoils fops and flounders.
+
+"_Flying is a lost art among men and reptiles. Bats fly, and men ought
+to. Try a light turbine. Rise a mile straight, fall half a mile
+slanting,--rise half a mile straight, fall half a mile slanting, and so
+on. Or slant up and slant down._--Poh! You ain't such a fool as to think
+that is new,--are you?
+
+"Put in my telegraph project. Central station. Cables with insulated
+wires running to it from different quarters of the city. These form the
+centripetal system. From central station, wires to all the livery
+stables, messenger stands, provision shops, etc., etc. These form the
+centrifugal system. Any house may have a wire in the nearest cable at
+small cost.
+
+"_Do you want to be remembered after the continents have gone under, and
+come up again, and dried, and bred new races? Have your name stamped on
+all your plates and cups and saucers. Nothing of you or yours will last
+like those. I never sit down at my table without looking at the china
+service, and saying, 'Here are my monuments. That butter-dish is my urn.
+This soup-plate is my memorial tablet.'--No need of a skeleton at my
+banquets! I feed from my tombstone and read my epitaph at the bottom, of
+every teacup._--Good."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+He fell into a revery as he finished reading this last sentence. He
+thought of the dim and dread future,--all the changes that it would
+bring to him, to all the living, to the face of the globe, to the order
+of earthly things. He saw men of a new race, alien to all that had ever
+lived, excavating with strange, vast engines the old ocean-bed, now
+become habitable land. And as the great scoops turned out the earth they
+had fetched up from the unexplored depths, a relic of a former simple
+civilization revealed the fact that here a tribe of human beings had
+lived and perished.--Only the coffee-cup he had in his hand half an hour
+ago.--Where would he be then? and Mrs. Hopkins, and Gifted, and Susan,
+and everybody? and President Buchanan? and the Boston State-House? and
+Broadway?--O Lord, Lord, Lord! And the sun perceptibly smaller,
+according to the astronomers, and the earth cooled down a number of
+degrees, and inconceivable arts practised by men of a type yet undreamed
+of, and all the fighting creeds merged in one great universal--
+
+A knock at his door interrupted his revery. Miss Susan Posey informed
+him that a gentleman was waiting below who wished to see him.
+
+"Show him up to my study, Susan Posey, if you please," said Master
+Gridley.
+
+Mr. Penhallow presented himself at Mr. Gridley's door, with a
+countenance expressive of a very high state of excitement.
+
+"You have heard the news, Mr. Gridley, I suppose?"
+
+"What news, Mr. Penhallow?"
+
+"First, that my partner has left very unexpectedly to enlist in a
+regiment just forming. Second, that the great land-case is decided in
+favor of the heirs of the late Malachi Withers."
+
+"Your partner must have known about it yesterday?"
+
+"He did, even before I knew it. He thought himself possessed of a very
+important document, as you know, of which he has made, or means to make,
+some use. You are aware of the artifice I employed to prevent any
+possible evil consequences from any action of his. I have the genuine
+document, of course. I wish you to go over with me to The Poplars, and I
+should be glad to have good old Father Pemberton go with us; for it is a
+serious matter, and will be a great surprise to more than one of the
+family."
+
+They walked together to the old house, where the old clergyman had lived
+for more than half a century. He was used to being neglected by the
+people who ran after his younger colleague; and the attention paid him
+in asking him to be present on an important occasion, as he understood
+this to be, pleased him greatly. He smoothed his long white locks, and
+called a grand-daughter to help make him look fitly for such an
+occasion, and, being at last got into his grandest Sunday aspect, took
+his faithful staff, and set out with the two gentlemen for The Poplars.
+On the way, Mr. Penhallow explained to him the occasion of their visit,
+and the general character of the facts he had to announce. He wished the
+venerable minister to prepare Miss Silence Withers for a revelation
+which would materially change her future prospects. He thought it might
+be well, also, if he would say a few words to Myrtle Hazard, for whom a
+new life, with new and untried temptations, was about to open. His
+business was, as a lawyer, to make known to these parties the facts just
+come to his own knowledge affecting their interests. He had asked Mr.
+Gridley to go with him, as having intimate relations with one of the
+parties referred to, and as having been the principal agent in securing
+to that party the advantages which were to accrue to her from the new
+turn of events. "You are a second parent to her, Mr. Gridley," he said.
+"Your vigilance, your shrewdness, and your--spectacles have saved her. I
+hope she knows the full extent of her obligations to you, and that she
+will always look to you for counsel in all her needs. She will want a
+wise friend, for she is to begin the world anew."
+
+What had happened, when she saw the three grave gentlemen at the door
+early in the forenoon, Mistress Kitty Fagan could not guess. Something
+relating to Miss Myrtle, no doubt: she wasn't goin' to be married right
+off to Mr. Clement,--was she,--and no church, nor cake, nor anything?
+The gentlemen were shown into the parlor. "Ask Miss Withers to go into
+the library, Kitty," said Master Gridley. "Dr. Pemberton wishes to speak
+with her." The good old man was prepared for a scene with Miss Silence.
+He announced to her, in a kind and delicate way, that she must make up
+her mind to the disappointment of certain expectations which she had
+long entertained, and which, as her lawyer, Mr. Penhallow, had come to
+inform her and others, were to be finally relinquished from this hour.
+
+To his great surprise, Miss Silence received this communication almost
+cheerfully. It seemed more like a relief to her than anything else. Her
+one dread in this world was her "responsibility"; and the thought that
+she might have to account for ten talents hereafter, instead of one, had
+often of late been a positive distress to her. There was also in her
+mind a secret disgust at the thought of the hungry creatures who would
+swarm round her if she should ever be in a position to bestow patronage.
+This had grown upon her as the habits of lonely life gave her more and
+more of that fastidious dislike to males in general, as such, which is
+not rare in maidens who have seen the roses of more summers than
+politeness cares to mention.
+
+Father Pemberton then asked if he could see Miss Myrtle Hazard a few
+moments in the library before they went into the parlor, where they were
+to meet Mr. Penhallow and Mr. Gridley, for the purpose of receiving the
+lawyer's communication.
+
+What change was this which Myrtle had undergone since love had touched
+her heart, and her visions of worldly enjoyment had faded before the
+thought of sharing and ennobling the life of one who was worthy of her
+best affections,--of living for another, and of finding her own noblest
+self in that divine office of woman? She had laid aside the bracelet
+which she had so long worn as a kind of charm as well as an ornament.
+One would have said her features had lost something of that look of
+imperious beauty which had added to her resemblance to the dead woman
+whose glowing portrait hung upon her wall. And if it could be that,
+after so many generations, the blood of her who had died for her faith
+could show in her descendant's veins, and the soul of that elect lady of
+her race look out from her far-removed offspring's dark eyes, such a
+transfusion of the martyr's life and spiritual being might well seem to
+manifest itself in Myrtle Hazard.
+
+The large-hearted old man forgot his scholastic theory of human nature
+as he looked upon her face. He thought he saw in her the dawning of that
+grace which some are born with; which some, like Myrtle, only reach
+through many trials and dangers; which some seem to show for a while and
+then lose; which too many never reach while they wear the robes of
+earth, but which speaks of the kingdom of heaven already begun in the
+heart of a child of earth. He told her simply the story of the
+occurrences which had brought them together in the old house, with the
+message the lawyer was to deliver to its inmates. He wished to prepare
+her for what might have been too sudden a surprise.
+
+But Myrtle was not wholly unprepared for some such revelation. There was
+little danger that any such announcement would throw her mind from its
+balance after the inward conflict through which she had been passing.
+For her lover had left her almost as soon as he had told her the story
+of his passion, and the relation in which he stood to her. He, too, had
+gone to answer his country's call to her children, not driven away by
+crime and shame and despair, but quitting all--his new-born happiness,
+the art in which he was an enthusiast, his prospects of success and
+honor--to obey the higher command of duty. War was to him, as to so many
+of the noble youth who went forth, only organized barbarism, hateful
+but for the sacred cause which alone redeemed it from the curse that
+blasted the first murderer. God only knew the sacrifice such young men
+as he made.
+
+How brief Myrtle's dream had been! She almost doubted, at some moments,
+whether she would not awake from it, as from her other visions, and find
+it all unreal. There was no need of fearing any undue excitement of her
+mind after the alternations of feeling she had just experienced. Nothing
+seemed of much moment to her which could come from without,--her real
+world was within, and the light of its day and the breath of its life
+came from her love, made holy by the self-forgetfulness on both sides
+which was born with it.
+
+Only one member of the household was in danger of finding the excitement
+more than she could bear. Miss Cynthia knew that all Murray Bradshaw's
+plans, in which he had taken care that she should have a personal
+interest, had utterly failed. What he had done with the means of revenge
+in his power,--if, indeed, they were still in his power,--she did not
+know. She only knew that there had been a terrible scene, and that he
+had gone, leaving it uncertain whether he would ever return. It was with
+fear and trembling that she heard the summons which went forth, that the
+whole family should meet in the parlor to listen to a statement from Mr.
+Penhallow. They all gathered as requested, and sat round the room, with
+the exception of Mistress Kitty Fagan, who knew her place too well to be
+sittin' down with the likes o' them, and stood with attentive ears in
+the doorway.
+
+Mr. Penhallow then read from a printed paper the decision of the Supreme
+Court in the land-case so long pending, where the estate of the late
+Malachi Withers was the claimant, against certain parties pretending to
+hold under an ancient grant. The decision was in favor of the estate.
+
+"This gives a great property to the heirs," Mr. Penhallow remarked,
+"and the question as to who these heirs are has to be opened. For the
+will under which Silence Withers, sister of the deceased, has inherited,
+is dated some years previously to the decease, and it was not very
+strange that a will of later date should be discovered. Such a will has
+been discovered. It is the instrument I have here."
+
+Myrtle Hazard opened her eyes very widely, for the paper Mr. Penhallow
+held looked exactly like that which Murray Bradshaw had burned, and,
+what was curious, had some spots on it just like some she had noticed on
+that.
+
+"This will," Mr. Penhallow said, "signed by witnesses dead or absent
+from this place, makes a disposition of the testator's property in some
+respects similar to that of the previous one, but with a single change,
+which proves to be of very great importance."
+
+Mr. Penhallow proceeded to read the will. The important change in the
+disposition of the property was this. In case the land-claim was decided
+in favor of the estate, then, in addition to the small provision made
+for Myrtle Hazard, the property so coming to the estate should all go to
+her. There was no question about the genuineness and the legal
+sufficiency of this instrument. Its date was not very long after the
+preceding one, at a period when, as was well known, he had almost given
+up the hope of gaining his case, and when the property was of little
+value compared to that which it had at present.
+
+A long silence followed this reading. Then, to the surprise of all, Miss
+Silence Withers rose, and went to Myrtle Hazard, and wished her joy with
+every appearance of sincerity. She was relieved of a great
+responsibility. Myrtle was young and could bear it better. She hoped
+that her young relative would live long to enjoy the blessings
+Providence had bestowed upon her, and to use them for the good of the
+community, and especially the promotion of the education of deserving
+youth. If some fitting person could be found to advise Myrtle, whose
+affairs would require much care, it would be a great relief to her.
+
+They all went up to Myrtle and congratulated her on her change of
+fortune. Even Cynthia Badlam got out a phrase or two which passed muster
+in the midst of the general excitement. As for Kitty Fagan, she could
+not say a word, but caught Myrtle's hand and kissed it as if it belonged
+to her own saint, and then, suddenly applying her apron to her eyes,
+retreated from a scene which was too much for her, in a state of
+complete mental beatitude and total bodily discomfiture.
+
+Then Silence asked the old minister to make a prayer, and he stretched
+his hands up to Heaven, and called down all the blessings of Providence
+upon all the household, and especially upon this young handmaiden, who
+was to be tried with prosperity, and would need all aid from above to
+keep her from its dangers.
+
+Then Mr. Penhallow asked Myrtle if she had any choice as to the friend
+who should have charge of her affairs.
+
+Myrtle turned to Master Byles Gridley, and said, "You have been my
+friend and protector so far,--will you continue to be so hereafter?"
+
+Master Gridley tried very hard to begin a few words of thanks to her for
+her preference, but, finding his voice a little uncertain, contented
+himself with pressing her hand and saying, "Most willingly, my dear
+daughter!"
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVI.
+
+CONCLUSION.
+
+The same day the great news of Myrtle Hazard's accession to fortune came
+out, the secret was told that she had promised herself in marriage to
+Mr. Clement Lindsay. But her friends hardly knew how to congratulate her
+on this last event. Her lover was gone, to risk his life, not improbably
+to lose it, or to come home a wreck, crippled by wounds, or worn out
+with disease.
+
+Some of them wondered to see her so cheerful in such a moment of trial.
+They could not know how the manly strength of Clement's determination
+had nerved her for womanly endurance. They had not learned that a great
+cause makes great souls, or reveals them to themselves,--a lesson taught
+by so many noble examples in the times that followed. Myrtle's only
+desire seemed to be to labor in some way to help the soldiers and their
+families. She appeared to have forgotten everything for these duties;
+she had no time for regrets, if she were disposed to indulge them, and
+she hardly asked a question as to the extent of the fortune which had
+fallen to her.
+
+The next number of the "Banner and Oracle" contained two announcements
+which she read with some interest when her attention was called to them.
+They were as follows:--
+
+     "A fair and accomplished daughter of this village comes, by the
+     late decision of the Supreme Court, into possession of a
+     property estimated at a million of dollars or more. It consists
+     of a large tract of land purchased many years ago by the late
+     Malachi Withers, now become of immense value by the growth of a
+     city in its neighborhood, the opening of mines, etc., etc. It
+     is rumored that the lovely and highly educated heiress has
+     formed a connection looking towards matrimony with a certain
+     distinguished artist."
+
+     "Our distinguished young townsman, William Murray Bradshaw,
+     Esq., has been among the first to respond to the call of the
+     country for champions to defend her from traitors. We
+     understand that he has obtained a captaincy in the --th
+     Regiment, about to march to the threatened seat of war. May
+     victory perch on his banners!"
+
+The two lovers, parted by their own self-sacrificing choice in the very
+hour that promised to bring them so much happiness, labored for the
+common cause during all the terrible years of warfare, one in the camp
+and the field, the other in the not less needful work which the good
+women carried on at home, or wherever their services were needed.
+Clement--now Captain Lindsay--returned at the end of his first campaign
+charged with a special office. Some months later, after one of the great
+battles, he was sent home wounded. He wore the leaf on his shoulder
+which entitled him to be called Major Lindsay. He recovered from his
+wound only too rapidly, for Myrtle had visited him daily in the military
+hospital where he had resided for treatment; and it was bitter parting.
+The telegraph wires were thrilling almost hourly with messages of death,
+and the long pine boxes came by almost every train,--no need of asking
+what they held!
+
+Once more he came, detailed on special duty, and this time with the
+eagle on his shoulder,--he was Colonel Lindsay. The lovers could not
+part again of their own free will. Some adventurous women had followed
+their husbands to the camp, and Myrtle looked as if she could play the
+part of the Maid of Saragossa on occasion. So Clement asked her if she
+would return with him as his wife; and Myrtle answered, with as much
+willingness to submit as a maiden might fairly show under such
+circumstances, that she would do his bidding. Thereupon, with the
+shortest possible legal notice, Father Pemberton was sent for, and the
+ceremony was performed in the presence of a few witnesses in the large
+parlor at The Poplars, which was adorned with flowers, and hung round
+with all the portraits of the dead members of the family, summoned as
+witnesses to the celebration. One witness looked on with unmoved
+features, yet Myrtle thought there was a more heavenly smile on her
+faded lips than she had ever seen before beaming from the canvas,--it
+was Ann Holyoake, the martyr to her faith, the guardian spirit of
+Myrtle's visions, who seemed to breathe a holier benediction than any
+words--even those of the good old Father Pemberton himself--could
+convey.
+
+They went back together to the camp. From that period until the end of
+the war, Myrtle passed her time between the life of the tent and that of
+the hospital. In the offices of mercy which she performed for the sick
+and the wounded and the dying, the dross of her nature seemed to be
+burned away. The conflict of mingled lives in her blood had ceased. No
+lawless impulses usurped the place of that serene resolve which had
+grown strong by every exercise of its high prerogative. If she had been
+called now to die for any worthy cause, her race would have been
+ennobled by a second martyr, true to the blood of her who died under the
+cruel Queen.
+
+Many sad sights she saw in the great hospital where she passed some
+months at intervals,--one never to be forgotten. An officer was brought
+into the ward where she was in attendance. "Shot through the
+lungs,--pretty nearly gone."
+
+She went softly to his bedside. He was breathing with great difficulty;
+his face was almost convulsed with the effort, but she recognized him in
+a moment: it was Murray Bradshaw,--Captain Bradshaw,--as she knew by the
+bars on his coat flung upon the bed where he had just been laid.
+
+She addressed him by name, tenderly as if he had been a dear brother;
+she saw on his face that hers were to be the last kind words he would
+ever hear.
+
+He turned his glazing eyes upon her. "Who are you?" he said in a feeble
+voice.
+
+"An old friend," she answered; "you knew me as Myrtle Hazard."
+
+He started. "You by my bedside! You caring for me!--for me, that burned
+the title to your fortune to ashes before your eyes! You can't forgive
+that,--I won't believe it! Don't you hate me, dying as I am?"
+
+Myrtle was used to maintaining a perfect calmness of voice and
+countenance, and she held her feelings firmly down. "I have nothing to
+forgive you, Mr. Bradshaw. You may have meant to do me wrong, but
+Providence raised up a protector for me. The paper you burned was not
+the original,--it was a copy substituted for it--"
+
+"And did the old man outwit me after all?" he cried out, rising suddenly
+in bed, and clasping his hands behind his head to give him a few more
+gasps of breath. "I knew he was cunning, but I thought I was his match.
+It must have been Byles Gridley,--nobody else. And so the old man beat
+me after all, and saved you from ruin! Thank God that it came out so!
+Thank God! I can die now. Give me your hand, Myrtle."
+
+She took his hand, and held it until it gently loosed its hold, and he
+ceased to breathe. Myrtle's creed was a simple one, with more of trust
+and love in it than of systematized articles of belief. She cherished
+the fond hope that these last words of one who had erred so miserably
+were a token of some blessed change which the influences of the better
+world might carry onward until he should have outgrown the sins and the
+weaknesses of his earthly career.
+
+Soon after this she rejoined her husband in the camp. From time to time
+they received stray copies of the "Banner and Oracle," which, to Myrtle
+especially, were full of interest, even to the last advertisement. A few
+paragraphs may be reproduced here which relate to persons who have
+figured in this narrative.
+
+                    "TEMPLE OF HYMEN.
+
+     "Married, on the 6th instant, Fordyce Hurlbut, M. D., to Olive,
+     only daughter of the Rev. Ambrose Eveleth. The editor of this
+     paper returns his acknowledgments for a bountiful slice of the
+     wedding-cake. May their shadows never be less!"
+
+Not many weeks after this appeared the following:--
+
+     "Died in this place, on the 28th instant, the venerable Lemuel
+     Hurlbut, M. D., at the great age of XCVI years.
+
+     "'With the ancient is wisdom, and in length of days
+     understanding.'"
+
+Myrtle recalled his kind care of her in her illness, and paid the
+tribute of a sigh to his memory,--there was nothing in a death like his
+to call for any aching regret.
+
+The usual routine of small occurrences was duly recorded in the village
+paper for some weeks longer, when she was startled and shocked by
+receiving a number containing the following paragraph:--
+
+                    "CALAMITOUS ACCIDENT!
+
+     "It is known to our readers that the steeple of the old
+     meeting-house was struck by lightning about a month ago. The
+     frame of the building was a good deal jarred by the shock, but
+     no danger was apprehended from the injury it had received. On
+     Sunday last the congregation came together as usual. The Rev.
+     Mr. Stoker was alone in the pulpit, the Rev. Doctor Pemberton
+     having been detained by slight indisposition. The sermon was
+     from the text, '_The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and
+     the leopard shall lie down with the kid_. (Isaiah xi. 6.) The
+     pastor described the millennium as the reign of love and peace,
+     in eloquent and impressive language. He was in the midst of the
+     prayer which follows the sermon, and had just put up a petition
+     that the spirit of affection and faith and trust might grow up
+     and prevail among the flock of which he was the shepherd, more
+     especially those dear lambs whom he gathered with his arm, and
+     carried in his bosom, when the old sounding-board, which had
+     hung safely for nearly a century,--loosened, no doubt, by the
+     bolt which had fallen on the church,--broke from its
+     fastenings, and fell with a loud crash upon the pulpit,
+     crushing the Rev. Mr. Stoker under its ruins. The scene that
+     followed beggars description. Cries and shrieks resounded
+     through the house. Two or three young women fainted entirely
+     away. Mr. Penhallow, Deacon Rumrill, Gifted Hopkins, Esq., and
+     others, came forward immediately, and after much effort
+     succeeded in removing the wreck of the sounding-board, and
+     extricating their unfortunate pastor. He was not fatally
+     injured, it is hoped; but, sad to relate, he received such a
+     violent blow upon the spine of the back, that palsy of the
+     lower extremities is like to ensue. He is at present lying
+     entirely helpless. Every attention is paid to him by his
+     affectionately devoted family."
+
+Myrtle had hardly got over the pain which the reading of this
+unfortunate occurrence gave her, when her eyes were gladdened by the
+following pleasing piece of intelligence, contained in a subsequent
+number of the village paper:--
+
+                    "IMPOSING CEREMONY.
+
+     "The Reverend Doctor Pemberton performed the impressive rite of
+     baptism upon the first-born child of our distinguished
+     townsman, Gifted Hopkins, Esq., the Bard of Oxbow Village, and
+     Mrs. Susan P. Hopkins, his amiable and respected lady. The babe
+     conducted himself with singular propriety on this occasion. He
+     received the Christian name of Byron Tennyson Browning. May he
+     prove worthy of his name and his parentage!"
+
+The end of the war came at last, and found Colonel Lindsay among its
+unharmed survivors. He returned with Myrtle to her native village, and
+they established themselves, at the request of Miss Silence Withers, in
+the old family mansion. Miss Cynthia, to whom Myrtle made a generous
+allowance, had gone to live in a town not many miles distant, where she
+had a kind of home on sufferance, as well as at The Poplars. This was a
+convenience just then, because Nurse Byloe was invited to stay with them
+for a month or two; and one nurse and two single women under the same
+roof keep each other in a stew all the time, as the old dame somewhat
+sharply remarked.
+
+Master Byles Gridley had been appointed Myrtle's legal protector, and,
+with the assistance of Mr. Penhallow, had brought the property she
+inherited into a more manageable and productive form; so that, when
+Clement began his fine studio behind the old mansion, he felt that at
+least he could pursue his art, or arts, if he chose to give himself to
+sculpture, without that dreadful hag, Necessity, standing by him to
+pinch the features of all his ideals, and give them something of her own
+likeness.
+
+Silence Withers was more cheerful now that she had got rid of her
+responsibility. She embellished her spare person a little more than in
+former years. These young people looked so happy! Love was not so
+unendurable, perhaps, after all.--No woman need despair,--especially if
+she has a house over her, and a snug little property. A worthy man, a
+former missionary, of the best principles, but of a slightly jocose and
+good-humored habit, thought that he could piece his widowed years with
+the not insignificant fraction of life left to Miss Silence, to their
+mutual advantage. He came to the village, therefore, where Father
+Pemberton was very glad to have him supply the pulpit in the place of
+his unfortunate disabled colleague. The courtship soon began, and was
+brisk enough; for the good man knew there was no time to lose at his
+period of life,--or hers either, for that matter. It was a rather odd
+specimen of love-making; for he was constantly trying to subdue his
+features to a gravity which they were not used to, and she was as
+constantly endeavoring to be as lively as possible, with the innocent
+desire of pleasing her light-hearted suitor.
+
+"_Vieille fille fait jeune mariée._" Silence was ten years younger as a
+bride than she had seemed as a lone woman. One would have said she had
+got out of the coach next to the hearse, and got into one some half a
+dozen behind it,--where there is often good and reasonably cheerful
+conversation going on about the virtues of the deceased, the probable
+amount of his property, or the little slips he may have committed, and
+where occasionally a subdued pleasantry at his expense sets the four
+waistcoats shaking that were lifting with sighs a half-hour ago in the
+house of mourning. But Miss Silence, that was, thought that two
+families, with all the possible complications which time might bring,
+would be better in separate establishments. She therefore proposed
+selling The Poplars to Myrtle and her husband, and removing to a house
+in the village, which would be large enough for them, at least for the
+present. So the young folks bought the old house, and paid a mighty good
+price for it, and enlarged it, and beautified and glorified it, and one
+fine morning went together down to the Widow Hopkins's, whose residence
+seemed in danger of being a little crowded,--for Gifted lived there with
+his Susan,--and what had happened might happen again,--and gave Master
+Byles Gridley a formal and most persuasively worded invitation to come
+up and make his home with them at The Poplars.
+
+Now Master Gridley has been betrayed into palpable and undisguised
+weakness at least once in the presence of this assembly, who are looking
+upon him almost for the last time before they part from him, and see his
+face no more. Let us not inquire too curiously, then, how he received
+this kind proposition. It is enough, that, when he found that a new
+study had been built on purpose for him, and a sleeping-room attached to
+it so that he could live there without disturbing anybody if he chose,
+he consented to remove there for a while, and that he was there
+established amidst great rejoicing.
+
+Cynthia Badlam had fallen of late into poor health. She found at last
+that she was going; and as she had a little property of her own,--as
+almost all poor relations have, only there is not enough of it,--she was
+much exercised in her mind as to the final arrangements to be made
+respecting its disposition. The Rev. Dr. Pemberton was one day surprised
+by a message, that she wished to have an interview with him. He rode
+over to the town in which she was residing, and there had a long
+conversation with her upon this matter. When this was settled, her mind
+seemed to be more at ease. She died with a comfortable assurance that
+she was going to a better world, and with a bitter conviction that it
+would be hard to find one that would offer her a worse lot than being a
+poor relation in this.
+
+Her little property was left to Rev. Eliphalet Pemberton and Jacob
+Penhallow, Esq., to be by them employed for such charitable purposes as
+they should elect, educational or other. Father Pemberton preached an
+admirable funeral sermon, in which he praised her virtues, known to this
+people among whom she had long lived, and especially that crowning act
+by which she devoted all she had to purposes of charity and benevolence.
+
+The old clergyman seemed to have renewed his youth since the misfortune
+of his colleague had incapacitated him from labor. He generally preached
+in the _forenoon_ now, and to the great acceptance of the people,--for
+the truth was that the honest minister who had married Miss Silence was
+not young enough or good-looking enough to be an object of personal
+attentions like the Rev. Joseph Bellamy Stoker,--and the old minister
+appeared to great advantage contrasted with him in the pulpit. Poor Mr.
+Stoker was now helpless, faithfully and tenderly waited upon by his own
+wife, who had regained her health and strength,--in no small measure,
+perhaps, from the great need of sympathy and active aid which her
+unfortunate husband now experienced. It was an astonishment to herself
+when she found that she who had so long been served was able to serve
+another. Some who knew his errors thought his accident was a judgment;
+but others believed that it was only a mercy in disguise,--it snatched
+him roughly from his sin, but it opened his heart to gratitude towards
+her whom his neglect could not alienate, and through gratitude to
+repentance and better thoughts. Bathsheba had long ago promised herself
+to Cyprian Eveleth; and, as he was about to become the rector of a
+parish in the next town, the marriage was soon to take place.
+
+How beautifully serene Master Byles Gridley's face was growing! Clement
+loved to study its grand lines, which had so much strength and fine
+humanity blended in them. He was so fascinated by their noble expression
+that he sometimes seemed to forget himself, and looked at him more like
+an artist taking his portrait than like an admiring friend. He
+maintained that Master Gridley had a bigger bump of benevolence and as
+large a one of cautiousness as the two people most famous for the size
+of these organs on the phrenological chart he showed him, and proved it,
+or nearly proved it, by careful measurements of his head. Master Gridley
+laughed, and read him a passage on the pseudo-sciences out of his book.
+
+The disposal of Miss Cynthia's bequest was much discussed in the
+village. Some wished the trustees would use it to lay the foundations of
+a public library. Others thought it should be applied for the relief of
+the families of soldiers who had fallen in the war. Still another set
+would take it to build a monument to the memory of those heroes. The
+trustees listened with the greatest candor to all these gratuitous
+hints. It was, however, suggested, in a well-written anonymous article
+which appeared in the village paper, that it was desirable to follow the
+general lead of the testator's apparent preference. The trustees were at
+liberty to do as they saw fit; but, other things being equal, some
+educational object should be selected. If there were any orphan
+children in the place, it would seem to be very proper to devote the
+moderate sum bequeathed to educating them. The trustees recognized the
+justice of this suggestion. Why not apply it to the instruction and
+maintenance of those two pretty and promising children, virtually
+orphans, whom the charitable Mrs. Hopkins had cared for so long without
+any recompense, and at a cost which would soon become beyond her means?
+The good people of the neighborhood accepted this as the best solution
+of the difficulty. It was agreed upon at length by the trustees, that
+the Cynthia Badlam Fund for Educational Purposes should be applied for
+the benefit of the two foundlings known as Isosceles and Helminthia
+Hopkins.
+
+Master Byles Gridley was greatly exercised about the two "preposterous
+names," as he called them, which in a moment of eccentric impulse he had
+given to these children of nature. He ventured to hint as much to Mrs.
+Hopkins. The good dame was vastly surprised. She thought they was about
+as pooty names as anybody had had given 'em in the village. And they was
+so handy, spoke short,--Sossy and Minthy,--she never should know how to
+call 'em anything else.
+
+"But, my dear Mrs. Hopkins," Master Gridley urged, "if you knew the
+meaning they have to the ears of scholars, you would see that I did very
+wrong to apply such absurd names to my little fellow-creatures, and that
+I am bound to rectify my error. More than that, my dear madam, I mean to
+consult you as to the new names; and if we can fix upon proper and
+pleasing ones, it is my intention to leave a pretty legacy in my will to
+these interesting children."
+
+"Mr. Gridley," said Mrs. Hopkins, "you're the best man I ever see, or
+ever shall see,... except my poor dear Ammi.... I'll do jest as you say
+about that, or about anything else in all this livin' world."
+
+"Well, then, Mrs. Hopkins, what shall be the boy's name?"
+
+"Byles Gridley Hopkins!" she answered instantly.
+
+"Good Lord!" said Mr. Gridley, "think a minute, my dear madam. I will
+not say one word,--only think a minute, and mention some name that will
+not suggest quite so many winks and whispers."
+
+She did think something less than a minute, and then said aloud,
+"Abraham Lincoln Hopkins."
+
+"Fifteen thousand children have been so christened the past year, on a
+moderate computation."
+
+"Do think of some name yourself, Mr. Gridley; I shall like anything that
+you like. To think of those dear babes having a fund--if that's the
+right name--on purpose for 'em, and a promise of a legacy,--I hope they
+won't get _that_ till they're a hundred year old!"
+
+"What if we change Isosceles to Theodore, Mrs. Hopkins? That means _the
+gift of God_, and the child has been a gift from Heaven, rather than a
+burden."
+
+Mrs. Hopkins seized her apron, and held it to her eyes. She was weeping.
+"Theodore!" she said,--"Theodore! My little brother's name, that I
+buried when I was only eleven year old. Drownded. The dearest little
+child that ever you see. I have got his little mug with Theodore on it
+now. Kep' o' purpose. Our little Sossy shall have it. Theodore P.
+Hopkins,--sha'n't it be, Mr. Gridley?"
+
+"Well, if you say so; but why that P., Mrs. Hopkins? Theodore Parker, is
+it?"
+
+"Doesn't P. stand for Pemberton, and isn't Father Pemberton the best man
+in the world--next to you, Mr. Gridley?"
+
+"Well, well, Mrs. Hopkins, let it be so, if you like; if you are suited,
+I am. Now about Helminthia; there can't be any doubt about what we ought
+to call her,--surely the friend of orphans should be remembered in
+naming one of the objects of her charity."
+
+"Cynthia Badlam Fund Hopkins," said the good woman triumphantly,--"is
+that what you mean?"
+
+"Suppose we leave out one of the names,--four are too many. I think the
+general opinion will be that Helminthia should unite the names of her
+two benefactresses,--Cynthia Badlam Hopkins."
+
+"Why, law! Mr. Gridley, isn't that nice?--Minthy and Cynthy,--there
+ain't but one letter of difference! Poor Cynthy would be pleased if she
+could know that one of our babes was to be called after her. She was
+dreadful fond of children."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+On one of the sweetest Sundays that ever made Oxbow Village lovely, the
+Rev. Dr. Eliphalet Pemberton was summoned to officiate at three most
+interesting; ceremonies,--a wedding and two christenings, one of the
+latter a double one.
+
+The first was celebrated at the house of the Rev. Mr. Stoker, between
+the Rev. Cyprian Eveleth and Bathsheba, daughter of the first-named
+clergyman. He could not be present on account of his great infirmity,
+but the door of his chamber was left open that he might hear the
+marriage service performed. The old, white-haired minister, assisted, as
+the papers said, by the bridegroom's father, conducted the ceremony
+according to the Episcopal form. When he came to those solemn words in
+which the husband promises fidelity to the wife so long as they both
+shall live, the nurse, who was watching near the poor father, saw him
+bury his face in his pillow, and heard him murmur the words, "God be
+merciful to me a sinner!"
+
+The christenings were both to take place at the same service, in the old
+meeting-house. Colonel Clement Lindsay and Myrtle his wife came in, and
+stout Nurse Byloe bore their sturdy infant in her arms. A slip of paper
+was handed to the Reverend Doctor on which these words were
+written:--"The name is Charles Hazard."
+
+The solemn and touching rite was then performed; and Nurse Byloe
+disappeared with the child, its forehead glistening with the dew of its
+consecration.
+
+Then, hand in hand, like the babes in the wood, marched up the broad
+aisle--marshalled by Mrs. Hopkins in front, and Mrs. Gifted Hopkins
+bringing up the rear--the two children hitherto known as Isosceles and
+Helminthia. They had been well schooled, and, as the mysterious and to
+them incomprehensible ceremony was enacted, maintained the most stoical
+aspect of tranquillity. In Mrs. Hopkins's words, "They looked like
+picters, and behaved like angels."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+That evening, Sunday evening as it was, there was a quiet meeting of
+some few friends at The Poplars. It was such a great occasion that the
+Sabbatical rules, never strict about Sunday evening,--which was,
+strictly speaking, secular time,--were relaxed. Father Pemberton was
+there, and Master Byles Gridley, of course, and the Rev. Ambrose
+Eveleth, with his son and his daughter-in-law, Bathsheba, and her
+mother, now in comfortable health, Aunt Silence and her husband, Doctor
+Hurlbut and his wife (Olive Eveleth that was), Jacob Penhallow, Esq.,
+Mrs. Hopkins, her son and his wife (Susan Posey that was), the senior
+deacon of the old church (the admirer of the great Scott), the
+Editor-in-chief of the "Banner and Oracle," and, in the background,
+Nurse Byloe and the privileged servant, Mistress Kitty Fagan, with a few
+others whose names we need not mention.
+
+The evening was made pleasant with sacred music, and the fatigues of two
+long services repaired by such simple refections as would not turn the
+holy day into a day of labor. A large-paper copy of the new edition of
+Byles Gridley's remarkable work was lying on the table. He never looked
+so happy,--could anything fill his cup fuller? In the course of the
+evening Clement spoke of the many trials through which they had passed
+in common with vast numbers of their countrymen, and some of those
+peculiar dangers which Myrtle had had to encounter in the course of a
+life more eventful, and attended with more risks, perhaps, than most of
+them imagined. But Myrtle, he said, had always been specially cared for.
+He wished them to look upon the semblance of that protecting spirit who
+had been faithful to her in her gravest hours of trial and danger. If
+they would follow him into one of the lesser apartments up stairs they
+would have an opportunity to do so.
+
+Myrtle wondered a little, but followed with the rest. They all ascended
+to the little projecting chamber, through the window of which her
+scarlet jacket caught the eyes of the boys paddling about on the river
+in those early days when Cyprian Eveleth gave it the name of the
+Fire-hang-bird's Nest.
+
+The light fell softly but clearly on the dim and faded canvas from which
+looked the saintly features of the martyred woman, whose continued
+presence with her descendants was the old family legend. But underneath
+it Myrtle was surprised to see a small table with some closely covered
+object upon it. It was a mysterious arrangement, made without any
+knowledge on her part.
+
+"Now, then, Kitty!" Mr. Lindsay said.
+
+Kitty Fagan, who had evidently been taught her part, stepped forward,
+and removed the cloth which concealed the unknown object. It was a
+lifelike marble bust of Master Byles Gridley.
+
+"And this is what you have been working at so long,--is it, Clement?"
+Myrtle said.
+
+"Which is the image of your protector, Myrtle?" he answered, smiling.
+
+Myrtle Hazard Lindsay walked up to the bust, and kissed its marble
+forehead, saying, "This is the face of my Guardian Angel!"
+
+
+
+
+A MYSTERIOUS PERSONAGE.
+
+
+From the first, our country has been a refuge, not only for kings and
+princes and statesmen and warriors, but for all sorts of adventurers and
+impostors. Following hard after Kosciuszko, General Charles Lee, Baron
+Steuben, Baron de Kalb, Lord Stirling, and Lafayette, we had Talleyrand,
+Louis Philippe, and Jerome Bonaparte, and Joseph, king of Spain; and,
+but for a sudden change of wind, might have had Napoleon the Great
+himself--after the affair of Waterloo. We have always been, and must
+continue to be, overrun with pretenders, mountebanks, blood relations of
+Charles Fox, Lord Byron, and the Guelphs, who are always in the market.
+
+Never, at any time, however, have we had a more puzzling or mysterious
+visitant than Major-General Bratish--Baron Fratelin--Count Eliovich. I
+knew him well,--better, I believe, than others who had known him longer,
+but under less trying circumstances. I stood by him through thick and
+thin. I fought his battles for a long while, and almost always
+single-handed, against a cloud of enemies, at a time when he appeared to
+be hunted for his life by a band of conspirators, and was undoubtedly
+beset by eavesdroppers and spies at every turn.
+
+All at once, after a dazzling career in the political and literary world
+beyond seas, continuing for many years, and followed by a course here
+which kept him always before the public, and for something more than two
+years made it almost a distinction for anybody to be acquainted with
+him, this General Bratish--Count Eliovich--found himself an outcast,
+helpless and hopeless, obliged to live from hand to mouth.
+
+That he was greatly belied, I had reason to know. That he was cruelly
+misunderstood, and wickedly misrepresented by the whole newspaper press
+of our country, I had reason to believe, upon evidence not to be
+questioned; but we are anticipating.
+
+One day, in the summer or fall of 1839, Colonel Bouchette of Quebec, son
+of the late Surveyor-General of Canada, brought a stranger to see me,
+whom he introduced as Major-General Bratish, late in the service of her
+Catholic Majesty, the Queen of Spain, and associate of General De Lacy
+Evans, of the Auxiliary Legion. They were both (Bouchette and Bratish)
+living in Portland at the time, and occupied chambers in the same
+building; and I inferred from what passed in this or in a subsequent
+interview that the Colonel had known the General in Quebec or Montreal,
+about the time of the outbreak there in which they were implicated.
+
+The object they had in view, on their first visit, was to open a way for
+General Bratish to lecture in Portland, upon some one--or more--of many
+subjects,--on Greece, Hungary, Poland, the war in Spain, South America,
+our own Revolutionary War, modern languages, or matters and things in
+general.
+
+The appearance and deportment of the gentleman were much in his favor.
+He seemed both frank and fearless, with a mixture of modesty and
+self-reliance quite captivating. He looked to be about five-and-thirty,
+according to my present recollection, stood five feet nine or ten, with
+a broad chest and good figure. He had not much of military
+bearing,--certainly not more than we see in General Grant,--and on the
+whole bore the appearance of a young, handsome, healthy, well-bred
+Englishman, accustomed to good society. He was neither talkative nor
+reserved, but natural and free; speaking our language with uncommon
+propriety, French and German still better, and Italian like a native,
+and often expressing himself with singular strength and
+picturesqueness,--reminding me of the Italian poet and critic, Ugo
+Foscolo,--whom I saw at the time he was furnishing the papers translated
+by Mrs. Sarah Austin for the Edinburgh Review.
+
+Arrangements were soon made for a first appearance; and the result was
+all that could have been hoped for, and much more than could reasonably
+have been expected. His manner was dignified, unpretending, and earnest;
+and he had a sort of unstudied natural eloquence, quite wonderful in a
+foreigner, unacquainted with our idioms and unaccustomed to platform
+speaking. Whatever might be the subject, he always talked with an air of
+modest truthfulness, and gave the most dramatic and startling
+narratives, like an eyewitness on the stand, testifying under oath.
+Never shall I forget Warsaw, nor the battle of Navarino, as rapidly
+sketched by him in a sort of parenthesis, while he was lecturing upon a
+very different subject; he wanted an illustration, and both of these
+pictures flashed suddenly out upon us. The other lectures that followed
+his first seemed, up to the very last, to grow better and better, until
+we had faith, not only in his representations, but in the man himself.
+
+Instead of shunning, he rather invited inquiry; and at an interview with
+the late Mr. Edward Preble, son of the Commodore, when that gentleman
+was questioning him about Tripoli, and was preparing to show him the
+very charts used by the Commodore, the General refused to look at them,
+and instantly drew a sketch of the harbor, with the castles, batteries,
+and fortifications, and gave the soundings and approaches; and all
+these, upon a careful examination, proved to be correct in every
+particular, according to the testimony of Mr. Preble himself.
+
+About this time, in consequence of the favorable notices that appeared
+in our Portland papers, the Philadelphia Ledger, the Saturday Courier,
+and some other journals of that city, opened upon him in full cry,
+followed by the American press generally; the Courier declaring that he
+had taken _leg bail_ and escaped from Canada,--that he had run away from
+Rochester, after obtaining five hundred dollars from Henry McIlvaine,
+Esq., of the Philadelphia bar, in the shape of fees for constituting
+that gentleman "Consul-General of Greece"! By others he was charged with
+being a tin-pedler, a horse-thief, and a leech-doctor, who had assumed
+the title of Count long after his arrival in this country. Among many
+anonymous letters--letters addressed to strangers in Portland--came one
+from Henry McIlvaine himself, saying: "I see by the Portland papers,
+that a man calling himself _sometimes_ General Bratish, at others
+General Eliovich, Count Eliovich, Baron Fratelin and Walbeck, and
+claiming to have been a general in the Polish, Spanish, Mexican, and
+other armies, is now in your town; and I should suppose, from the papers
+_who_ have noticed him, imposing upon respectable people. Having seen
+something of this person, and been _myself a victim_, I have felt it due
+to my friends in Portland to put them on their guard. He is the son of a
+merchant in Trieste, driven from his home and his friends in consequence
+of his crimes. His pretension to any of the titles he claims is
+altogether without foundation. After _exhausting Europe_, he has within
+a few years turned his talents to good account in our country. He made
+his appearance here about two years ago as Consul-General and Envoy from
+Greece, in which capacity he was very free with his commissions of
+vice-consulships in New York and Philadelphia. He was indicted here for
+forgery,--_convicted_,--obtained a new trial by the false oaths of his
+associates, some of whom are now in the state prison (one for
+horse-stealing), and gave bail for his appearance at the next term. The
+pretence for a new trial was the absence of a witness _who never
+existed_, but who was expected to prove his innocence. Before the next
+term, the Consul-General took wing, leaving his bail, a simple
+Frenchman, to pay the forfeit. It would be impossible for me to give
+anything like a history of his crimes in a letter. Suffice it to say
+that he is a notorious swindler, the most unblushing and inexhaustible
+liar and the most finished rascal I ever saw."
+
+If this were true, how happened it that the notorious swindler, the
+horse-thief, the convicted forger, and the escaped convict was still at
+large,--and not only at large, but always before the public, and _always
+without a change of name_? Why was he not surrendered by his bail? Why
+not followed by a bench warrant, or a requisition from the Governor of
+Pennsylvania? Of course, the story could not be true, as told by Mr.
+McIlvaine. It was too absurd on the face of it.
+
+But was any part of the story true? and, if so, how much? Having been
+frequently imposed upon, both at home and abroad, by adventurers and
+pretenders, I determined to go to the bottom of this case before I
+committed myself, and I must say that, for a while, the stories told by
+General Bratish, and the explanations he gave, seemed to me still more
+absurd and preposterous.
+
+According to his story--to give one example out of a score--he had been
+obliged to apply for the benefit of the Insolvent Act, in Philadelphia,
+owing to losses he had sustained by lending money to distressed
+compatriots, and eleemosynary outcasts, and had been opposed in the
+Court of Insolvency by Colonel John Stille, Jr. and Mr. Henry McIlvaine,
+who threatened him with a prosecution for the forgery of consular
+papers, if he dared to appear. He declared that he did appear,
+nevertheless, and was honorably discharged; that his claims and
+evidences of debt, handed over to Mr. McIlvaine, the assignee, amounted
+to $7,620 for cash lent, while his debts altogether amounted to less
+than $1,000; that he was arrested while in court, on a warrant for
+forgery, and there subjected to a long and rigorous examination by
+Messrs. McIlvaine and Stille, who had got possession of all the claims
+against him; that the offence charged consisted in issuing a commission
+as Vice-Consul of Greece, _with General Bratish's own signature_! that
+McIlvaine went before Mr. Alderman Binns to get the warrant for forgery,
+and employed Colonel John Stille, Jr., his coadjutor, to appear as
+public prosecutor in the Mayor's Court of Philadelphia; that he, General
+Bratish, was put upon trial before a bench of aldermen, not a man of the
+whole except the Recorder being acquainted with the rudiments of law;
+that, on being arraigned, he refused to plead, and called no witnesses
+himself, though some were called by his counsel,--when the Recorder
+directed the plea of "Not guilty" to be entered, and the trial to
+proceed; that he claimed to be a foreign consul provisionally appointed,
+entered a formal protest, which appeared in the papers of the day, and
+never deigned to open his mouth, until, to the consternation and
+amazement of all who understood the case, the jury found him _guilty_,
+under the direction of the Recorder,--a direction which amounted to
+this, namely, that, while General Bratish could not be legally convicted
+of the offence charged, he might be convicted of another offence _not
+charged!_ that a motion for a new trial was entered at the suggestion of
+the Recorder himself, and was finally argued in a burst of indignation
+by General Bratish, who thrust aside his counsel, and refused to be
+delivered on technical grounds; that the motion was opposed by Messrs.
+McIlvaine and Stille, but prevailed; that the verdict was set aside, a
+new trial granted, and General Bratish was allowed to go at large, on
+greatly reduced bail, every member of the court concurring, except Mr.
+Alderman McKean; that no sooner was the trial over, and the proceedings
+published, than a public meeting was called through the National
+Gazette, the Public Ledger, the United States Gazette, and the
+Pennsylvanian, and all persons were invited to appear, and bring
+forward their charges--if any they had--against him; that such a
+meeting, both large and respectable, was held at the College of
+Pharmacy, and resolutions were adopted, declaring the character of
+General Bratish to be "_unimpeached and unimpeachable_" his authority
+from Greece to be fully proved, and his identity to have been
+established by the testimony of "several highly respectable gentlemen
+present"; that, before he could have another trial, the court was
+abolished; and that, after waiting two months for the prosecutor to
+move, for want of something better to do, General Bratish betook himself
+to Canada; that he was followed there, watched, arrested for a
+horse-thief, immediately and honorably discharged, re-arrested upon a
+suspicion of high treason, put beyond the reach of a _habeas corpus_
+writ, and confined for seven months, in the citadel of Quebec and
+elsewhere, _as a prisoner of state_, &c., &c.
+
+Such was a part of his story; and astonishing as it may
+appear--incredible, I might say--I found it, after a most careful
+investigation, to be not only substantially true, but scrupulously
+exact. The evidence came to me through unwilling or prejudiced
+witnesses,--my friend, Henry C. Carey of Philadelphia, among the
+number,--and was corroborated throughout by official documents and
+published proceedings. And here I may as well add, that Mr. Arnold
+Buffum was chairman, and J. Griffith, M. D. secretary, of the meeting
+above referred to, of March 6th, 1838.
+
+While this unhappy controversy was raging, and our people were dividing
+upon the questions involved, a little incident occurred which had a very
+wholesome effect upon our misgivings. The General happened to be in
+conversation with a stranger one day, when the subject of Unitarianism,
+as it existed in the North of Europe, came up. Something was then said
+about the great Unitarian Convention held at Cork, Ireland, two or three
+years before. General Bratish said he was in attendance, and had let
+fall some remarks there. A by-stander, who had very little faith in our
+hero, caught at the ravelling thus dropped. If what the General said
+were true, surely some evidence might be found by diligent search. And,
+sure enough! the gentleman found a copy of the Christian Pioneer, in
+Boston, giving an account of that very Convention. He acknowledged to me
+that he opened the journal with fear and trembling, but soon came upon
+what purported to be an abstract of a speech by General Bratish, and
+what furnished abundant confirmation of his highest pretensions as a
+soldier, as a writer, as a patriot, and as a philanthropist. I saw the
+Pioneer myself. It was a monthly journal, published in Glasgow,
+Scotland, July, 1835. The speech, as reported, was eminently
+characteristic, and the summary that followed was in the following
+words:--
+
+"The society was gratified on this occasion by the presence of the Rev.
+George Harris of Glasgow, whose visit to Cork the committee gladly
+availed themselves of, earnestly requesting his attendance; and of Mr.
+Bratish, _a native of Hungary, and a member of the Hungarian Diet, who,
+in consequence of his intrepid advocacy of the cause of much-injured
+Poland, both in his place in the legislature, and subsequently with his
+pen and his sword, has been obliged to fly his country, and take refuge
+in this kingdom_."
+
+Among the most damaging allegations was one to this effect, that Mr.
+Forsyth, our Secretary of State, had contradicted the story of General
+Bratish about his consular authority and proceedings in every
+particular. So far was this from being true, that Mr. Forsyth
+_confirmed_ the story of General Bratish in substance, acknowledging to
+me that he _knew_ nothing to his prejudice, and that General Bratish had
+held such communications with him as he had represented.
+
+Yet more, while I was patiently and quietly pursuing these
+investigations, Colonel Bouchette handed me a copy of the Bath (Me.)
+Telegraph Extra, of July 19, 1839, containing a report of the
+proceedings at a public meeting held there, in consequence of the
+newspaper charges and anonymous letters which had followed our
+adventurer to that city. It was headed "General Bratish Eliovich (Baron
+Fratelin)," and was signed by Judge Clapp (Ebenezer), and by Henry
+Masters, Secretary. The resolutions were brief but conclusive; and the
+committee that drew them up, after a thorough investigation, were chosen
+from among the most respectable citizens of the place. "Every specific
+charge brought forward by responsible persons," they say, "was most
+completely refuted, and the truth was found entirely in accordance with
+the statements and accounts of the transactions given beforehand by
+General Bratish"; and they declare him "entitled to the confidence and
+respect of the community at large," saying that "his conduct in this
+State has been that of a gentleman and man of honor."
+
+I found too, that, go where he would, behave as he might, the moment his
+name appeared in the papers, anonymous letters and paragraphs followed,
+denouncing him as a "pedler," as a "native Yankee," as a thief who had
+robbed a fellow-boarder at Bedford Springs and then run away, taking one
+of the most unfrequented roads "across the country to Cumberland, upon
+which no public conveyance runs"; and yet I found, upon further inquiry,
+that he went off by the regular mail coach direct to Philadelphia, drove
+straight to the Marshall House, where he had always put up, (one of the
+largest and most respectable establishments in the city,) and _entered
+his name at length on the travellers' book in the usual way_, and was
+received by McIlvaine himself and others he had met with at Bedford
+Springs, on a footing of the most friendly intimacy, for over two months
+after the alleged robbery and exposure.
+
+I ascertained further, that he came to this country in the summer of
+1836 on board the Statesman, Captain Mansfield, from Gothenburg to
+Salem, with letters from Christopher Hughes, our _Chargé d'Affaires_ at
+Stockholm, to his son at New York, and with a Swedish passport to North
+America, duly authenticated, in which he was called "the Honorable John
+Bratish de Fratelin"; that he had many other letters, bills of credit,
+and drafts, and a large amount of money in gold,--some "thousands of
+dollars" according to the testimony of Captain N. B. Mansfield himself,
+with whom I communicated by letter; that he was brought on board in the
+Governor's barge, and was known to have been treated with great
+distinction by the Swedish nobility, and to have been so well received
+by Bernadotte himself, the king of Sweden, as to give rise to a report
+that he was a son of Murat, the late king of Naples, whose queen he
+certainly resembled, as he did others of the Bonaparte family; that on
+the passage he put on no airs, claimed no title, but chose to be called
+plain Mr. Bratish, until his rank was discovered, and he came to be
+known as General John Bratish Eliovich (the son of Elias), Baron
+Fratelin; that after a twelve-month's residence at Boston and Salem,
+holding intercourse with what is there called the best society, he went
+to Washington, where he passed the winter of 1837-38 among the
+fashionables and upper-tens; that, while there, he received the
+provisional appointment of Consul-General for the United States from the
+Regency of Greece, dated February 15, 1837, upon which he threw up an
+engagement he had entered into with General Duff Greene, which secured
+him a respectable support, and set about seeing the country; that after
+travelling from New York to New Orleans, he returned to the North, and
+stopped for a month or two at Bedford Springs, _about a day's journey
+from Philadelphia_; that being disappointed in remittances and receipts,
+and unable to collect moneys he had lent to his compatriots, he could
+not pay his bill for six weeks' board, amounting to fifty dollars, and
+went to Philadelphia, leaving with Mr. Brown, the landlord, a part of
+his baggage and books, after trying in vain to dispose of a valuable
+platina medal; that in Philadelphia, Mr. McIlvaine--notwithstanding the
+alleged robbery--lent him one hundred and sixty-five dollars, and was
+constituted Vice-Consul of Greece _ad interim_, that is, "until the
+pleasure of his Majesty, the king of Greece, should be known."
+
+Here then was the foundation of all the attacks made upon the unhappy
+General; but was there not something behind,--something _below_ this
+foundation? The extraordinary case of Dr. Follen, who was hunted from
+pillar to post, year after year, and wellnigh lied into his grave, shows
+what may be done by conspirators and spies and slanderers, when a
+respectable man grows obnoxious to a foreign power. If he is at all
+headstrong or imprudent, nothing can save him. Oddly enough, it happens
+that one of the very papers which followed Dr. Follen whithersoever he
+went, like a sleuth-hound,--the Philadelphia Gazette,--was among the
+bitterest and most unrelenting, of those that assailed General Bratish.
+
+While pursuing these investigations, I learned from what I regarded as
+high authority, that General Bratish had presented an address to Lord
+Normanby, at the head of the whole consular body, having been chosen for
+that special purpose; and I was referred to the Irish Royal Cork Almanac
+for 1835, where, under the head of Foreign Consuls, I read, "Colonel
+John Bratish (d'Elias) Eliovich, K. C. C., S. S., L. H., Consul-General
+of Greece, Mexico, Buenos Ayres, and Switzerland, Consular Agent of
+Turkey."
+
+How were these contradictions to be reconciled,--the facts proved with
+the stories told? If General Bratish was the swindler and impostor they
+pretended, the sooner he was exposed, and the more publicly, the better.
+On the contrary, if he was an honest man--a man greatly wronged and
+belied, like Dr. Follen--he ought to be defended,--but how? He was poor
+and friendless, and the whole newspaper press of the country was either
+against him, or wholly indifferent. Had he been on trial in a court of
+justice, any lawyer would have defended him,--nay, for that matter, he
+might have defended himself. But if he entered the field as a writer,
+alone against a host, volumes would have to be written,--and who would
+publish them,--who read them?
+
+That I might bring the matter to issue at once, knowing well, and from
+long experience, that, when people are accused through the newspaper
+press of our country, they are always believed to be guilty until they
+have _established their innocence_, I sent a communication to the
+Portland Advertiser of October 15, 1839, with my name, charging upon Mr.
+Henry McIlvaine and Colonel John Stille, Jr. all that I afterwards
+repeated with more distinctness and solemnity in "The New World," for
+which I was then writing (and from which I withdrew in consequence of
+what I then regarded as unfairness toward General Bratish on the part of
+my coadjutors, Messrs. Park Benjamin and Epes Sargent), and arraigning
+both McIlvaine and Stille, as conspirators and libellers.
+
+One day, while this controversy was raging, the General called upon me,
+and begged me, for my own satisfaction, to inquire of Baron de
+Mareschal, the Austrian Minister, respecting certain charges that had
+just appeared against him. I consented, and immediately despatched the
+following letter to the care of my friend, the Honorable George Evans,
+our Representative in Congress, requesting him to see the Baron for me.
+
+     "_To_ HIS EXCELLENCY GENERAL BARON DE MARESCHAL, _Envoy
+     Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary from his Majesty the
+     Emperor of Austria._
+
+     "The undersigned is led to apply to your Excellency in behalf
+     of a gentleman here, who has been assailed by a great variety
+     of newspaper slanders, most of which have been triumphantly
+     refuted. The gentleman referred to is known here, by his
+     passports and other credentials, as John Bratish Eliovich, late
+     a general in the service of her most Catholic Majesty, the
+     Queen of Spain, and is now an American citizen.
+
+     "He states--and he bids me trust confidently to the character
+     of your Excellency for an early reply--that in 1828 he was at
+     Rio Janeiro; that instead of 'running away,' as reported, with
+     a large amount of funds belonging to his uncle, Christopher
+     Bratish, he left Rio Janeiro in consequence of being appointed
+     by the Emperor, Dom Pedro, Brazilian Consul to Austria, with
+     the approbation and consent of your Excellency, manifested by a
+     regular passport, granted by your Excellency's legation.
+
+     "The friends of General Bratish in this region are numerous and
+     respectable, and they beg your Excellency's reply to the
+     following questions:--
+
+     "Is the statement above made by General Bratish true?
+
+     "And if your Excellency would be so kind as to say whether, in
+     your opinion, there can be any foundation for the story
+     respecting the 'large amount of money' said to have been
+     carried off by General Bratish, when he is reported to have run
+     away from Rio Janeiro, your Excellency would gladly oblige, not
+     only the undersigned, but a number of other persons deeply
+     interested in the character of General Bratish.
+
+     "Meanwhile, I am with respect your Excellency's most obedient
+     servant,
+
+                              "---- ----.
+
+     "PORTLAND, ME., April, 1840."
+
+     "That your Excellency may know who has taken this liberty, the
+     undersigned begs leave to refer you to the Hon. George Evans,
+     Henry Clay, Daniel Webster, General Scott, or to any member of
+     Congress from the Northern or Middle States."
+
+Through some oversight in the transcribing, the full date of this letter
+does not appear; but I soon received the following from Mr. Evans:--
+
+              HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, WASHINGTON,
+
+                                    April 20, 1840.
+
+     "MY DEAR SIR,--Your favor of ----, enclosing letter for General
+     Mareschal was duly received, and I immediately despatched a
+     messenger to deliver it to the General, with a note in your
+     behalf. Yesterday the General called upon me to say that he
+     felt constrained, from various circumstances, to decline a
+     reply to it. He wishes you to understand that he does this with
+     entire respect for yourself, whom he should be very happy
+     personally to oblige. He said, if the information you seek was
+     desirable for any personal or private purposes of your
+     own,--such as, for instance, if any alliance was in
+     contemplation with any of your friends,--he should feel bound
+     to give you a reply. But he does not think that he ought to be
+     drawn into a newspaper discussion, or to become the subject of
+     comment or remark in such a matter. He wished me to explain his
+     feelings, and hopes you will not impute his declining to any
+     want of regard for you, and that you will appreciate the
+     motives which govern him. I am not at liberty to detail a
+     conversation I held with him on the general subject of your
+     letter. He did not show it to me, though he spoke of its
+     contents.
+
+                        "Very faithfully yours,
+
+                            "GEO. EVANS."
+
+Very adroit and very diplomatic, to be sure, on the part of the Baron;
+but surely he might have answered yes or no to the first question,
+without committing himself. And why not show my letter to Mr. Evans?
+Taking the ground he did, however, he forced me to the following
+conclusion, namely, that he could not answer _No_, and was afraid, for
+reasons of state, perhaps, to answer _Yes_.
+
+And now, what was to be done? Should I prepare a memoir, setting forth
+all these charges, with such refutations and such explanations as had
+occurred, and appeal to the public. There seemed to be no other way
+left.
+
+While I was preparing this memoir, which made a pamphlet of forty-eight
+large octavo pages, with the documentary evidence in small print,
+General Bratish was at my elbow; and one evening, after I had read over
+to him what I had written, I happened to say that I was exceedingly
+sorry for the loss of his orders and decorations in Canada,--they would
+have been such a corroboration of his story.
+
+"Lost!" said he, "they are not lost."
+
+"Where are they?"
+
+"In the bank, with some other valuables."
+
+"In the bank! When can you get them for me?"
+
+"To-morrow, when the bank is open."
+
+Shall I confess the truth? So sudden and so startling was this
+declaration, after what I had seen in the papers about the loss of these
+badges and orders in Canada, that I began, for the first time, to have
+uncomfortable suspicions. But, sure enough, the next day he brought them
+all to me, together with the original contract entered into between
+Colonel De Lacy Evans (afterward General Evans) and General Bratish,
+with the approbation of Alva, the Spanish Ambassador at the Court of St.
+James, whereby it was provided that "John Bratish Eliovich, Esquire, K.
+C. C., V. S. S., V. L. H., &c., &c.," should enjoy the rank, pay, and
+emoluments of a Major-General in the Auxiliary Legion then raising for
+the Queen of Spain. This document, signed by Colonel De Lacy Evans and
+Carbonel, and approved by Alva, styled him "Major-General John Bratish
+Eliovich, K. C. C., V. L. H., &c., &c.," and bore the signature of
+General Bratish, whereby his identity was established; and the
+decorations and orders put into my hands were the following: "Knight
+Commander of Christ," the "Tower and Sword" of Portugal, the "Saviour"
+of Greece, and the "South Star" of Brazil.
+
+Here, certainly, was pretty strong confirmation; and yet on this very
+evening, my wife, who sat where she could see all the changes of his
+countenance while I was writing the memoir and occasionally asking a
+question without looking up, saw enough to satisfy her that Bratish was
+making a fool of her husband, and, the moment his back was turned,
+expressed her astonishment that a man of sense--meaning me--could be so
+easily imposed upon. So much for the instinct of a woman; but more of
+this hereafter.
+
+Not long after this, the General rushed into my office in a paroxysm of
+rage,--the only time I ever saw him disturbed. His honor had been
+questioned, and by whom, of all the world? Why,--would I believe it?--by
+his friend, Colonel Bouchette! Upon further inquiry, I found that he had
+received a draft from his sister, which had to pass through a secret
+channel to him, lest their estates should be confiscated in Hungary;
+that, after two or three disappointments, he had succeeded in getting it
+cashed here without endangering a certain friend in New York; that on
+mentioning the circumstance to Colonel Bouchette, who had counselled him
+not to attempt the negotiation here, that gentleman had laughed in his
+face; whereupon the General turned his back on him, and hurried off to
+my office. A friend was with me at the time. "Ach, mein Freund!" said
+the General, as he finished the story, "he doubted my word, he
+questioned my honor, he asked to see the money; but I refused to show
+him the money,--I was indignant, outraged; but I have it here,--_here_!"
+slapping his breast-pocket, "and I am ready to show it to you." I
+declined; he persisted; until at last, afraid of the impression he might
+make upon my friend Winslow, who was present, I consented. But he only
+talked the louder and the faster, without producing the money; and when
+I grew serious, and insisted on seeing it, he acknowledged that he
+hadn't it with him!
+
+"Where is it, sir?" said I.
+
+"At my lodgings."
+
+"And how long will it take you to produce it?"
+
+"Ten minutes."
+
+"Very well,"--taking out my watch,--"I will wait fifteen, and my friend
+here will stay with me, and be a witness."
+
+Away went the General, and, to my amazement, I must acknowledge, within
+the fifteen minutes he returned, bringing with him a cigar-box
+containing about five hundred dollars in bills and specie, which I
+counted.
+
+Here was a narrow escape,--a matter of life or death to him, certainly,
+if not to me. But where had he got the money? He was very poor, judging
+by appearances. The lecturing was over for a time, and there was no
+field for conjecture. To this hour the whole affair is a mystery.
+Unlikely as it was that he should have obtained it from his sister,
+there seemed to be no other explanation possible.
+
+Other perplexing and contradictory evidence for and against the General
+began to appear. I never saw him on horseback but once, and then I was
+frightened for him. As a general, he ought, of course, to know how to
+ride. As a native Hungarian, he must have been born _to_ the saddle, if
+not _in_ it. Nevertheless, I trembled for him, though the creature he
+had mounted was far from being either vicious or spirited; and then,
+too, when he tried waltzing, he reminded me, and others I am afraid, of
+"the man a-mowing."
+
+On the other hand, he was well-bred and self-possessed, full of accurate
+information, and never obtrusive. And here I am reminded of another
+singular circumstance, which went far in confirmation of the story he
+told. He gave J. S. Buckingham, Esq., M. P., whom I had known in London
+as the Oriental traveller, a letter to me, in which he speaks of him as
+a member of the British-Polish Committee in London,--thereby endangering
+the whole superstructure he had been rearing with so much care. Mr.
+Buckingham wrote me from New York, but failed to see me.
+
+Worn out and wellnigh discouraged by these persecutions, the General now
+left us, and went to New York, from which place he wrote me, under date
+of October 9, 1840, as follows. I give his own orthography, to show
+that, although acquainted with our language to such a degree that he was
+able to lecture in it, as Kossuth did, and to speak it with uncommon
+readiness, he must have learnt it by _ear_, like many others with which
+he was familiar enough for ordinary purposes.
+
+"One of my last occupation upon American soil is one of a painful, and
+at the same times pleasant nature, to wit, to address you, my noble, my
+chivalerouse, my excellent friend. My God revard you and may he for the
+benefit of mankind scater many such persons trought the world--it would
+prevent misantropy and it would serve as the best antidote against
+crimes and deceptions, persecutions and sufferings. O could you know all
+what I suffered in my eventful life, you would indead belive that no
+romance is equal to reality. But--basta--God is great and merciful, and
+I never yit and I hope never will find occassion to doubt the wundaful
+ways of his mercy.... Perhaps no times since I cam to America, I had
+occassion for more patience than during the first days of my arrival in
+N. Y. Harshed by law, cut by some friends, findig once more by European
+new a change in Greece, with my funds low, I began indeed to feel
+bitterly my sad fate--when by one of this suden fricks which I offen
+prouve that man must never despair all changed quit casualy it was
+raported to the German Association that I am her--immediately I was
+invited to ther mittings, the French Lafayette Club followed suit, and
+yesterday evning your humble servant was by acclamation apointed
+Vice-President of the General Union of all the forign assotiations of
+the city of New York (the German Tepcanoe Club 30 pers. excepted)....
+
+"I am very sorry that I cannot tell you where I go--I sail in the cliper
+armed brig Fairfield for the West India unter very avantageouse
+circumstances a eccelent pay rang and emoluments you may guess the rest
+be assured it is a honorable a very honorable employment. My next for
+the South wia Havanna or New York or New Orleans will inform you of the
+rest."
+
+Accompanying this letter was a slip from one of the large New York
+dailies confirming his story, and reporting the resolutions passed at a
+great public meeting, of which A. Sarony was President and Chairman,
+John Bratish, Vice-President, and George Sonne, Secretary. "The call of
+the meeting was read and adopted," says the report, "when General
+Bratish addressed the assemblage in the English, French, and German
+languages, in the most patriotic and eloquent manner. His speech was
+received with enthusiastic and repeated applause."
+
+And here for a long season we lost sight of the General, though two or
+three circumstances occurred, each trivial in itself, but all tending to
+give a new aspect to the affair, just before he left us, we had a small
+party at our house, where, among other amusements, a game called "The
+Four Elements" was introduced. When it was all over, and our visitors
+were gone, a costly handkerchief, with a lace border, was not to be
+found. It had been last seen in the hands of General Bratish. Having no
+idea that, if he had pocketed it by mistake, it would not be returned,
+we waited patiently,--very patiently,--supposing he might have thrown
+aside his company dress-coat without examining the pockets, and that
+when he put it on again the handkerchief would be forthcoming, of
+course. But no,--nothing was heard of it, until one evening at a lecture
+my wife suddenly caught my arm, and, pointing to a white handkerchief
+the General was flourishing within reach, said, "There's Aunt Mary's
+handkerchief, now!"--"Nonsense, my dear!"--"It is, I tell you; I can see
+where he has ripped off the lace." I thought her beside herself; but
+still--why the sudden substitution of a large red Spitalfields for the
+white handkerchief? "Perhaps," said I to my wife,--"perhaps the
+handkerchief was not marked, and he did not know where to find the
+owner."--"But it was marked, and he knows the owner as well as you do,"
+was the reply. Of course, I had nothing more to say; and so I laughed
+the exhibition off, as a sort of _pas de mouchoir_, like that which
+brought Forrest into a controversy with Macready.
+
+And then something else happened. I missed the only copy I had in the
+world of "Niagara and Goldau," which he had borrowed of me and returned,
+with emphasis; and many months after he had disappeared, I received a
+volume of poems from the heart of Germany, entitled, "Der Heimathgruss,
+Eine Pfingstgabe von Mathilde von Tabouillot, geborene Giester,"
+published at Wesel, 1840, with a letter from the lady herself, thanking
+me with great warmth and earnestness for my pamphlet in defence of
+General Bratish. Putting that and that together, I began to have a
+suspicion that my copy of "Niagara and Goldau" had been presented to the
+authoress by my friend, the General,--perhaps in the name of the author.
+
+Yet more. While these little incidents were accumulating and seething
+and simmering, I received a letter from Louis Bratish, in beautiful
+French, dated Birmingham, 7th October, 1841, in which he thanked me most
+heartily for what I had done as the friend of his brother, "John
+Bratish,"--withholding the "General,"--and begging me to consider it as
+coming from the family; and about the same time, another letter, and the
+last I ever received, from the General himself. It was dated "Torrington
+House, near London, 12th October, 1841," and contained the following
+passages:--
+
+"I cannot account for the very extraordinary silence in speite of all my
+request that you would at leas be so kind as to inform me if you realy
+don't wish to hear more from me. I know your Hart too well not to be
+persuaded that it must be some mistake or some intrigue.
+
+"At last my family begin to understand how much they did wrong me and I
+have the pleasure to enclose you a letter of my yungest brother, which
+is now at the house of Messrs. Toniola brothers, a volunteer partner, to
+learn the english....
+
+"Mr. Josua Dodge, late Special Agent of the U. S. in Germany, is
+returning in one or two days to America; this gentleman in consequence
+of his mission crossed and recrossed all Germany and Belgium. I met him
+in Germany; he was present at Stuttgard in a most critical moment, when,
+denunced by the Germanic Federation (in the name of Austria) I was in
+iminent peril. He acted as a true American, boldly stepped forward,
+asked the way and the werfore and united with my firmness, the American
+passports where respected, and Mr. Dodge succeded to get an official
+acknowledgment that nothing was known against my moral character, and
+they took refuge upon some little irregularity in the passport.... He,
+my friends and my family wished very much that I should at lease for
+some times rethurn to America (_pour reson bien juste_) but the
+recollection is too bitter yet.... Several Americans are now visiting my
+sister and her husband in Belgium--among them Mr. Bishop of Cont. and
+Mr. Rowly, C. S. of N. Y.--What would I give to see J. N and his amable
+family!...
+
+"My address is Monsieur Le General Bratish (Eliovich), raccommandé à
+Mons. Latard, Vervois Belgique.
+
+"P. S. Great excitement at London. The Morning Chronicle is out upon me
+for having done I don't know what in North America and Germany. All
+fidle-stik. I send you the paper to see how eassy John Bull is gulled. I
+could send you some important news. Attention!!! keep your powder dray!"
+
+Nothing more was heard of our mysterious General until a letter fell
+into my hands, purporting to be written by his brother Luigi. It was in
+choice Italian, and dated Birmingham, 16th April, 1842, charging the
+"Caro Fratello" with having deceived him about Mr. Everett, complaining
+of his behavior to Dr. Sleigh and others who had befriended him; telling
+him that Dr. Sleigh, to whom he referred, doubted his Spanish
+commission, and believed him to have been a member of the "Hunter's
+Association,"--a band of horse-thieves in Canada,--and signifying, in
+language not to be misunderstood, that the family had given up all hope
+of him.
+
+The next information we had was that the General had turned up at Havre,
+and was about being married to the daughter of a wealthy banker, and
+carried a commission as Major-General from the Governor of Maine! And
+then, after a lapse of two years, that he had been travelling with a
+British nobleman, whose baggage he had run away with,--that he was
+arrested for the offence, and tried in Malta, I do not know with what
+result; but I have now before me a supplement of the Malta Times of
+October 9, 1844, in Italian, Spanish, and English, wherein he refers to
+the testimonials of my friend, Albert Smith, Ex-M. C, and Levi Cutter,
+Mayor of Portland; complains bitterly of the late Mr. Carr, Minister of
+the United States at Constantinople; and says, among other things, what
+of itself were enough to show that he had claimed to be a General of the
+State of Maine, and thereby settling the question most conclusively and
+forever. His language is: "To one charge of Mr. Everett, I plead guilty;
+to wit, to have usurped, or succeeded to gain the good opinion of
+respectable people in the United States, and here I am glad, at the same
+time, to put Mr. Everett's mind at rest; _he thinks it possible that I
+may be a General of the State of Maine_, but he admits _only_ the
+possibility, and expresses the hope that it may not be so,--this, after
+the pretension to know my birthplace, life, death, and miracles, and an
+assertion on his part to have had, or seen, a correspondence with the
+Executive of Maine, in my regard, is very diplomatic--_very!_--but his
+Excellency may be easy on this head. I do not share _now_ the military
+glory and honor of fellowship with that very numerous body of generals
+of the United States Militia; and if evidence may be produced that I was
+attended by a staff, I assure his Excellency, that it was only to have
+my boots cleaned by a captain, to be shaved by a major, to be helped by
+a colonel, and to get my meals at the private personal head-quarters of
+a _Gineral_ at one dollar per day."
+
+And here I stop. From that day to this, nothing has been heard of
+General Bratish; but I should not be surprised to have him reappear, as
+if he had risen from the dead, in some new character, and so managing as
+to deceive the very elect. No such pretender has appeared since
+Cagliostro; and nobody ever succeeded so well in misleading public
+opinion, and embroiling so many persons of consideration, both in this
+country and in Europe, not excepting the Chevalier d'Éon, and the
+Princess Cariboo. Many other strange things might be related of Bratish,
+as, for example, his great speech in the Hungarian Diet, reported in the
+_Allgemeine Zeitung_,--the most impudent forgery of our day. But this
+paper is already longer than I intended; and I have only to add, that I
+have reason to believe now that he was indeed a native of Trieste, and
+that Colonel Stille and Mr. McIlvaine were right in saying what they did
+of him _generally_, though wrong in many of the particulars upon which
+they chiefly relied.
+
+
+
+
+A TOUR IN THE DARK.
+
+
+One February evening, more than a year ago, after a drive of fourteen
+miles over a lonely Kentucky road, I drew rein in front of a huge,
+rambling wooden building, standing solitary in the midst of the forest.
+
+There was no village in sight to account for the presence of so large a
+structure, no adjacent farms, and, except a little patch in front of the
+house, no fields,--nothing but the solemn woods which nearly shut it in
+on every side.
+
+I did not ask if this was the Mammoth Cave Hotel. I knew it without
+asking.
+
+Here I was, then, at last,--about to see what I had desired to see ever
+since I was a boy!
+
+But delay frequently comes with the certainty of accomplishing any
+long-cherished desire; and though I had driven with a hasty whip from
+the railway station fourteen miles away, and though the hotel proprietor
+offered to procure me a guide that evening, my haste to see the cave was
+unaccountably over. I ordered a fire in my room, and concluded to wait
+until morning.
+
+It was too early in the season for the usual summer visitors, and I
+found myself the sole guest in this big, lonesome caravansary, that
+looked as though a dozen old-fashioned Dutch farm-houses had been placed
+in the midst of a wood-lot, and then connected by the roofs, the whole
+forming one straggling, weather-stained, labyrinthine building, full of
+little nests of rooms, high-pitched gables, cumbrous outside
+chimney-stacks, cavernous fireplaces, and low, wide corridors open at
+either end, where were uncertain shadows, and draughts of damp air that
+whispered and moaned all night long.
+
+In the evening, as I sat before the blazing pile of logs in the
+fireplace, some one knocked at my door, and a negro servant looked in.
+Would I like to see the guide?
+
+"Certainly. What is his name?"
+
+"Nicholas, sah, Nicholas! But we all calls him Ole Nick."
+
+Rather an ominous name, to be sure! but then, if one goes to the regions
+below, what guide so appropriate?
+
+On presentation, his Majesty proved to be an interesting black man,
+considerably past middle age; wrinkled, as none but a genuine negro ever
+becomes; a short, broad, strong man, with a grizzled beard and mustache,
+quiet but steady eyes, grave in his demeanor, and concise in his
+conversation. He tells me of two routes by which I can make a tour
+through his dominions. The shortest one will require six hours to
+travel, and at the farthest will take me to the banks of the river Styx,
+six miles from the entrance to the cave. The other route will take the
+whole day, and will lead as far as the so-called "Maelström,"--a
+singular pit, a hundred and seventy-five feet deep,--and place nine
+miles of gloom between me and this outer world. And with these facts to
+be juggled and distorted in ridiculous combinations with remembrances of
+many persons and places in the vagaries of dreams, I went to bed and to
+sleep.
+
+As the sun came up, we went down,--my guide and I,--down a rocky path
+along the side of a ravine that grew narrower and deeper until we came
+to a dilapidated house where the ravine seemed to end. Stepping upon the
+rotting piazza of this old house and facing "right about," there opened
+before us, as broad and lofty as the entrance to some ancient Egyptian
+temple, the mouth of the cave. From where we stood, a path, as wide as
+an ordinary city sidewalk and as smooth, sloped gently downward through
+the portal.
+
+Turning to the right to avoid the drip of a limpid stream,--that falls
+over the entrance like a perpetual libation to Pluto,--a few minutes'
+walk places us many hundred feet vertically beneath the surface, and in
+the "Rotunda," an enlargement of the cave, which looks about as large as
+the interior of Trinity Church, but is in reality larger; being quite as
+lofty, and measuring at its greatest diameter a hundred and seventy-five
+feet.
+
+Here, as we paused to look, with our flaring lamps poised above our
+heads, a strange squeaking noise was heard, which seemed to come from
+everywhere and nowhere in particular. I glanced inquiringly at my guide,
+in answer to which he simply replied, "Bats," and pointed to the walls,
+where, on closer inspection, I found these creatures clinging by
+thousands, literally blackening the wall, and hanging in festoons a foot
+or two in length. The manner of forming these festoons was curious
+enough: three or four bats having first taken hold of some sharp
+projecting ledge with their hindmost claws, and hanging thereby with
+their heads downward, others had seized their leathery wings at the
+second joint, and they too, hanging with downward heads, had offered
+their wings as holding-places for still others; and so the unsightly
+pendent mass had grown, until in some instances it contained as many as
+twenty or thirty bats. The wonder seemed that four or five pairs of
+little claws not so large as those of a mouse could sustain a weight
+that must have been in some instances as much as three pounds.
+
+The mysterious influence of the approaching spring had penetrated even
+into these abodes of darkness, and aroused in the bats a little life
+after their long hibernation; and their weak, plaintive squeak, which
+had something impish in it withal, came from every shadowy recess, and
+from the dark vault overhead. This "Rotunda" should have been called the
+"Bower of Bats."
+
+As they all hung too high to reach by other means, I flung my stick at
+random upward against the wall, and brought down two of the black
+masses, that writhed helpless upon the stony floor of the cave. Poor,
+palpitating things, unable to loose their clutch upon each other's
+wings, it was hard to say whether they were more disgusting or pitiful.
+What Eshcol clusters these, to bear back from this Canaan of darkness,
+saying, "This is the fruit of it!"
+
+Such an immense number of bats had harbored and died here from time
+immemorial, that more than a hundred acres of the earthy floor of the
+cave had, from their decomposing remains, become impregnated with nitre;
+and during the years 1812 to 1814, a party of saltpetre-makers took up
+their residence here. They made great vats in the cave, in which they
+lixiviated the impregnated earth, and by wooden pipes conveyed it to a
+place where they boiled the water drawn from the vats. Their rude
+mechanical contrivances are standing yet, in the same positions in which
+they were left so long ago; and so dry and pure is the air of the cave,
+that, though more than half a century has passed, these wooden pipes and
+vats show no more indication of decay than they did when first put in.
+In one place my guide dug up from the clayey floor--where it was their
+custom to feed the oxen employed in drawing the materials to and
+fro--some corn-cobs, very dry and light, but as perfect as though they
+were only a few months old.
+
+The footprints of the oxen, made in the earth that was then moist, are
+plainly visible in many places; and the clay has since become almost as
+hard as stone, so that I found it difficult to make any impression in it
+with the point of my pocket-knife.
+
+A few minutes' walk brought us in front of the "Giant's Coffin," an
+enormous rock forty feet in length, which has fallen from the ceiling.
+The resemblance to a coffin is so strangely exact, that, having heard
+mention of it before coming in, I recognized it at the first glance. The
+upper part of the rock is composed of a stratum whiter than the rest,
+and gives it the appearance of having a border of white ornamentation
+around it, just below the lid. It rests upon a gigantic bier about ten
+feet high, and a little longer than the coffin, and the effect is as
+though some kingly son of Anak were lying in state in this huge
+sepulchral vault.
+
+Near at hand is a cluster of objects, not carved out by the accidents of
+time or the long attrition of subterranean rivers, as is the case with
+almost everything else in the cave, but shaped by human hands into a
+mournful resemblance to cottages; the likeness being all the more
+pathetic when one learns the fact that for many months a number of
+benighted human beings made their home here, under the delusion that the
+air of the cave, which is chemically pure and dry, would cure their
+pulmonary diseases; and that here, like plants shut out from the
+generous, fostering sun, they paled and died.
+
+The appearance of those who came out after two or three months'
+residence in the cave is described as frightful. "Their faces," says one
+who saw them, "were entirely bloodless, eyes sunken, and pupils dilated
+to such a degree that the iris ceased to be visible; so that, no matter
+what the original color of the eye might have been, it appeared entirely
+black."
+
+These cottages, if by a great stretch of courtesy I may call them such,
+are very small, consisting each of but one room about ten feet square;
+they had been built of stones collected in the cave, and laid loosely in
+the wall without mortar; they had fireplaces and chimneys, good wooden
+floors, and doors, but no windows, as there was neither light to let in
+nor prospect to view without. As there was neither rain nor snow fall,
+neither midday heat nor dew of night, beneath that stony cope, roofs
+also were useless; so that the structures were only cells that strongly
+reminded one of sepulchres. I can conceive of nothing more melancholy
+than the existence of the seven or eight consumptives, who I am told
+occupied these _ante mortem_ tombs at one time about fifteen years ago.
+Three died there, and every one of the others who had resided in the
+cave for a period of two months died within two or three weeks after
+coming out.
+
+Near to these monuments of ignorance and despair, I noticed a monument
+of another sort, and of later date,--a tribute to one of the most
+gallant and genial of men, in whom it was fully demonstrated that "the
+bravest are the tenderest." It was a pyramidal pile, about eight feet
+high, of carefully selected stones, laid without mortar, but with
+mathematical precision; and on one stone near the top was scratched a
+name dear to every soldier's heart,--"McPherson."
+
+The cells where the living died, and this pile which tells how the
+memory of the dead yet lives, are the last objects on our route that
+have any association with the things of this outer world; these are the
+pillars that mark the beginning of a realm devoid of human
+association,--its Pillars of Hercules, beyond which is a silent waste
+whose darkness breeds the wildest mysteries.
+
+Walking continuously through the gloom, one loses to some extent the
+idea of progression. Here he can get no look ahead, no backward view. He
+is the centre of a little circle of light, beyond which is immeasurable
+darkness, whence objects seem to come to him like apparitions, changing
+form as the first and last rays of light fall upon them, as though the
+shape in which they appear under the full light of the lamp were only
+some disguise of assumed innocence, which they cast off as they glide
+silently into the dark again, to take on some semblance too awful for
+mortal eyes. Farther and farther we went along these arched, crypt-like
+ways; passing frequently through lofty chambers where the roof could not
+be discovered, each with some fanciful and often inappropriate name
+assigned to it, until we came at length to what looked like a window in
+the side wall of the cave. Peering through this, and holding my lamp
+high over my head, I could see neither roof nor sides nor bottom,--only
+the wall in which was the window through which I looked. Upward it was
+lost in the darkness, and from my breast it descended, perpendicular as
+a plummet line, until it vanished in the gulf below, from which arose a
+sound of dripping water. This, my guide informed me, was "Gorin's Dome."
+Taking then from his haversack a Bengal light, he ignited it and threw
+it into the dark void. The sulphurous light shot up and up into a dome
+unlike anything built by human hands, unless it might be the interior of
+some tremendous tower, eighty feet in width, and nearly two hundred in
+height, which the beholder viewed from without, looking inwards through
+a window placed at two thirds of the entire height from the bottom.
+
+The inaccessible floor of this place is nearly level, and the walls
+strictly perpendicular from base to summit; the whole cavern having been
+hollowed out by the constant dripping of water holding carbonic acid in
+solution, which cuts the rock as ordinary water channels the ice of a
+glacier or the mural face of an iceberg into a semblance of columns, and
+sometimes into the folds of an immense curtain.
+
+The brief light fell upon the distant floor; flashed up once, bringing
+into strong relief every salient angle in the wonderful walls, and then
+died out; the awful prospect vanishing like a nightmare vision, and
+leaving nothing to the sense but the sound of the water dripping into
+the depths below. The light had burned only half a minute; but so
+strange was the scene, that this glimpse sufficed to photograph it
+indelibly in my memory.
+
+Gorin's Dome is not the largest of this class of sub-cavities in the
+cave, being smaller than Mammoth Dome; but it is the first of its class
+that the tourist sees, and it is viewed from so singular a stand-point
+that it makes the most startling impression.
+
+Five minutes' farther walk brought us to a wooden footbridge,--a narrow,
+shaky contrivance, with a treacherous footing and a slender hand-rail.
+Here the bottom of the cave seemed to have dropped out, and the roof to
+have gone in search of it; and but for the dim glimpse of the rock on
+the other side one might have suspected that this bridge would launch
+him into that ungeographical locality called, in the old Norse
+mythology, "Ginnunga Gap,"--a place where there was neither side, edge,
+nor bottom to anything.
+
+The vault overhead is called "Minerva's Dome"; the gulf below is called
+the "Side-Saddle Pit," though I failed to discover any degree of
+appropriateness in the odd name.
+
+Standing in the middle of the bridge, my guide flung one of his Bengal
+lights far upward, in the midst of the slow-falling drops that had
+already carved out this tremendous well and were still making it larger.
+The light turned them for an instant into a shower of diamonds; then
+down it fell, down, down! As in its descent it passed the bridge on
+which we stood, the shadows of our two figures rushed up the opposite
+wall, like a pair of demons scared out of their abode by the hissing
+flame; and Nick, the guide, as he leaned over, looking downward after
+it,--every one of the innumerable wrinkles in his black face made more
+distinct, with his white beard and mustache, and the whites of his eyes
+seeming to glow in the blue elfish light,--was a caricature, half
+grotesque, almost terrible, of Satan himself.
+
+Minerva's Dome and Side-Saddle Pit, both being one place and formed by
+the same dripping water, correspond to Gorin's Dome and the pit beneath
+it; that part which has been hollowed out above the roof of the cave
+being called the dome, and the part below the floor of the cave the pit.
+The only difference between the two is that in the case of Gorin's Dome
+the dripping waters have bored their huge shaft on one side of the track
+of the cave, only just piercing the wall of it in one spot, to make the
+window through which it is viewed; while in the case of the Side-Saddle
+Pit the vertical shaft cuts directly across the track of the cave, or,
+to speak more correctly, across the tunnel which was once the bed of a
+subterranean river, but which is now a broad, smooth, dry path.
+
+The topography of this underground realm may be divided into three
+departments, as follows:--
+
+First,--as being greatest in extent,--the "avenues," or tunnels, which
+present conclusive evidence of having once been the channels of a
+subterranean stream, whose waters, having some peculiar solvent
+property, wore their bed lower and lower in the rock, until they cut
+through into some lower opening, through which they were drawn off,
+leaving the old channels dry. Imagine one of the narrow, crooked streets
+in the old part of Boston, spanned by a continuous stone archway from
+the summits of the buildings on either hand; then close with solid
+masonry every window and loop-hole by which a ray of light could
+struggle in, and you have for proportions and sinuosity not a bad
+semblance of these tunnels, which constitute four fifths of the extent
+of the Mammoth Cave.
+
+The second and next largest department is that of the "chambers." These
+are places in the general course of the former river where the roof fell
+in before the withdrawal of the waters, opening great spaces upward; the
+fallen mass forming a sort of island in the centre of the stream, and
+crowding the waters on either side of it against the walls of the cave,
+so that they were worn out to twice the average width, and finally
+itself disappearing under the combined action of the current and the
+solvent properties of the water.
+
+The air in all these tunnels and chambers is remarkably dry and pure.
+Wood seems never to decay here; as is instanced in the wooden pipes and
+vats of the saltpetre-makers, upon which the lapse of a half-century has
+not had any visible effect.
+
+The general width of the tunnels or avenues is about forty or fifty
+feet, and the average height about thirty feet; but this uniformity is
+broken every few hundred yards by chambers, varying in width from eighty
+to two hundred feet, and in height from seventy to two hundred and
+fifty feet. The floor is formed in some places of sand, but generally of
+indurated mud, so hard that it is impossible to make any indentation in
+it with the heel of the boot, and remarkably even and smooth, so that
+almost anywhere one can walk with as much ease as on city sidewalks. The
+walls also are clean and smooth, as in the arched crypts of some mighty
+cathedral. A cross section of almost any one of these tunnels would show
+an elliptic outline, the vertical diameter being the shortest, and the
+bottom being filled with indurated mud or sand to a sufficient depth to
+make a level floor.
+
+The third division or class of openings is that of the "domes" and
+"pits." These were formed by the same kind of agency as the tunnels and
+chambers, namely, by the action of water holding carbonic acid in
+solution; but acting in a different manner, and at a period long after
+the subterranean river had ceased to flow through its tunnels.
+
+The solvent acid of the water must be acquired in percolating through
+the several hundreds of feet of superincumbent earth and sandstone, as
+there is but one of these domes, "Sandstone Dome," that extends upward
+to the sandstone. The solvent water then, after finding its way into the
+vertical crevices of the limestone, gradually rounded them out like
+wells, until the pieces which occasionally fell from the top formed a
+sort of floor. Through the interstices of this floor, the dissolved
+substance of the rock is carried into some deeper and yet undiscovered
+cavities beneath. The floor itself gradually sinks, the domes grow
+higher, and the walls recede as long as the water continues to drip into
+them.
+
+It is not unreasonable to suppose that the substratum of limestone in
+all the country for many miles in the vicinity is perforated with these
+tremendous shafts; as those which are seen in the cave are only such as
+happened to be in the course of the tunnels composing the Mammoth Cave.
+It is not improbable that there are many others on every side, close to
+the line of the tunnels, but not yet connected with them.
+
+In any one of the above-mentioned departments, the description of one
+place answers for most others, except in dimensions. The following are a
+few out of many hundreds of measurements taken in as many different
+places:--
+
+The "Rotunda," the first chamber from the entrance of the cave, is about
+one hundred feet high, and one hundred and seventy-five in diameter.
+
+The "Methodist Church," eighty feet in diameter, and forty in height.
+
+"Wright's Rotunda" is four hundred feet in its shortest diameter, being
+nearly circular; the roof seems perfectly level, and is about forty-five
+feet high.
+
+"Kinney's Arena" is a hundred feet in diameter, and is fifty feet high.
+
+"Proctor's Arcade" is one hundred feet in width and three quarters of a
+mile in length. The walls, which are about forty-five feet high, are
+nearly perpendicular throughout the whole length of the arcade, joining
+the roof nearly at right angles, and are so smooth that they look like
+hammer-dressed stone.
+
+"Silliman's Avenue" is a mile and a half in length and about forty feet
+in height, its width varying from twenty to two hundred feet.
+
+"Shelby's Dome" and the pit beneath it are two hundred and thirty-five
+feet in height, and about twenty-five in diameter.
+
+"Mammoth Dome" is two hundred and fifty feet high, and nearly one
+hundred in diameter.
+
+"Lucy's Dome," the highest in the cave, is sixty feet in diameter, and
+three hundred in height.
+
+Nine miles from the entrance of the cave is the "Maelström," a dry pit
+or well, one hundred and seventy-five feet deep, and about twenty in
+diameter; and from the bottom of this shaft may be seen the openings to
+three other avenues, which lead farther into this Plutonian labyrinth
+than mortal foot has ever trod.
+
+Although the distance of nine miles is about as far as tourists usually
+get from the entrance, that is by no means the measure of its extent,
+but only the extent of the direct route; there being a number of other
+tunnels branching off from it on either side, some of which connect with
+it again at a distance of several miles, and some of which have not been
+explored to their connection, if they have any.
+
+The total length of all the explored avenues is estimated at over one
+hundred miles. If a single day's experience in the cave were sufficient
+ground for offering an opinion, I should say that this was a large
+over-estimate; but I have no doubt that, like all other great works of
+both art and nature, it grows upon the sense of the beholder. But even
+setting down its extent at half the foregoing estimate, none can tread
+these hollow chambers, thinking of others unexplored, and extending not
+only from that distant nine-mile-station, but on every hand, into the
+unknown, without a feeling of awe and fear.
+
+Thus on and on through the echoing avenues, where the reverberation of
+our footsteps seemed to follow stealthily far behind us, through chamber
+and hall, where my guide in the advance flung up his lights, revealing
+for an instant the grim and distant vaults,--through "Star Chamber,"
+five hundred feet long, seventy in width, and sixty in height, "Cloud
+Room," a quarter of a mile in length, sixty feet in height, "Deserted
+Chamber," "River Hall," "Revellers' Hall," "The Great Walk,"--through
+all these, and a dozen more, we wandered, until, after two hours' walk,
+and at a distance of four and a half miles from the entrance to the
+cave, I paused upon the muddy banks of the "Styx," and, stooping, dipped
+up in my hands a draught from its cold, sunless waters.
+
+Here my guide would willingly have played Charon to my Ulysses, but as
+no one had penetrated thus far into the cave for several months, the
+boat used to carry visitors over, and to voyage up and down the short
+river (only a hundred and fifty yards in length), had sunk, and we
+found it impossible to raise it.
+
+The river is about twenty-five feet in width, its course crossing that
+of the cave at right angles, and its channel being simply another avenue
+or tunnel on a little lower level than the one by which the visitor
+approaches it.
+
+In this stream, as well as in "Echo River," are found the famous eyeless
+fish. We dipped in vain, for a long time, in hopes of capturing some of
+these. At last I was fortunate enough to secure one tiny specimen, about
+two inches long, which was shaped like other minnows, but had no eyes,
+and was perfectly white, there being not the slightest shade of coloring
+on the back. The upper part of its head was as translucent as agate,
+through which could be seen opaque spots imbedded in the head where the
+base of the eye-sockets should have been. The specimen I obtained was
+one of the smallest, as the guide told me these fishes frequently
+attained the length of six or seven inches.
+
+I secured also an eyeless crawfish about three inches in length. This
+forlorn little creature, like the fish, was entirely colorless. It had
+two slightly protuberant spots in its head where the eyes should be; but
+they were dull and opaque, and did not seem to differ in texture from
+the rest of its body, which had not the translucence of that of the
+fish, but looked as though carved out of white marble.
+
+The fish are found also in "Lake Lethe," a quarter of a mile from the
+Styx, as well as in "Echo River," the largest and most interesting body
+of water in the cave. This last flows out of a tunnel which has such a
+low roof that the volume of water nearly fills it, and from here to
+where it enters the rocks again is three quarters of a mile. Here the
+blind white creatures that inhabit its dark, slow-flowing waters are
+more plentiful, but are as unlike those nimble, glistening fellows which
+inhabit the streams of the outer world, as the cavern's atmosphere of
+darkness and death is different from our atmosphere of light and life.
+They refuse to bite at any bait; they move sluggishly, and, when caught
+in a net, flop languidly, and die. The only food they are known to have
+is the smaller ones of their own kind; and, oddest of all, they, as well
+as the crawfish, give birth to their young alive, instead of spawning
+the eggs to be hatched by the sun. Last and remotest of these sunless
+streams is "Roaring River," the margin of whose solemn waters is nine
+miles from the entrance of the cave. This should be Acheron, which hated
+the light, and ran sighing down into a cave; for from this stream too
+comes a perpetual moan.
+
+The region where the several rivers mentioned are grouped is lower than
+the rest of the cave, and much more gloomy in appearance than the high,
+dry chambers through which one passes in coming back toward the
+entrance.
+
+I was somewhat disappointed in the display of stalactites and other
+similar formations of the protocarbonate of lime found in the cave. For
+a number of years I had been familiar with mines and mining operations
+in the lead-mining districts of Illinois, Wisconsin, and Missouri, and
+had there seen some of the most beautiful, though not the largest,
+specimens of calcareous spar known to exist. The lime in these
+localities being in most instances perfectly pure, the stalactites, to
+the length of three feet sometimes, are as free from coloring as
+icicles. Sometimes the miners' drift (which compared with the Mammoth
+Cave is as a rabbit's burrow to a railway tunnel) is opened into small,
+low-roofed caves; and in these, in addition to the translucent
+stalactites, there are little hollows in the floor covered with thin
+sheets of protocarbonate of lime, no thicker than a pane of
+window-glass, and as white as snow. From beneath these the water has
+sunk away, leaving a hollow space, and giving the whole precisely the
+appearance of those little pools which every one has noticed when a
+muddy road suddenly congeals: the pools of water freeze over, and the
+water disappears, leaving the ice only a shell over a cavity.
+
+Nothing of this kind, however, is found in the Mammoth Cave. The lime of
+which the stalactites are formed being mixed with various oxides and
+other impurities, they are all of a dark brown, or gray, or muddy color.
+With the exception of some stalactite columns in the "Gothic Arcade,"
+which form a fine alcove called the "Gothic Chapel," there are no
+stalactites of extraordinary size. There is a stalactite mass (or was
+some years ago) in "Uhrig's Cave," in the suburbs of the city of St.
+Louis, about twelve feet in height and four feet in diameter, which
+exceeds in size anything I saw in the Mammoth Cave.
+
+The gypsum or alabaster flowers are the crowning beauty of the Mammoth
+Cave. These are an entirely different formation from the stalactites,
+being formed only in a perfectly dry atmosphere, while the stalactites
+are necessarily formed in a moist one.
+
+The gypsum is formed by crystallization, and in that process exerts the
+same expansive force as ice. Wherever it forms in crevices it fractures
+the rocks that enclose it, and protrudes from the crevice; its own bulk
+divides, or splits, and curves open, and outward, with much more
+tenacity than ice. It seems to have a fibrous texture, in the direction
+of which the split always opens.
+
+I found in the "Snowball Room" and in a large chamber called
+"Cleveland's Cabinet," a beautiful display of these flowers. In the
+Snowball Room, the likeness to winter appears again, in the knots
+strongly resembling snowballs stuck all over the ceiling. And in
+Cleveland's Cabinet I found some singularly beautiful specimens of
+alabaster formations. One kind seemed to be literally growing from the
+ceiling as a vegetable would, and looked more than anything else like
+short, thick stalks of celery. If an ordinary stalk of celery were
+split, so that its natural tendency to curl over backward could be
+freely exercised, it would give a very good idea of the shape of some
+of the gypsum flowers, except that these are not often longer than four
+inches, and in that length frequently curl so as to make a complete
+circle. They have the same fibrous appearance as celery, and are as
+white as snow.
+
+When five or six of these stalks--if I may call them so--start from one
+point, and curve outward in different directions from a common centre,
+they frequently form beautiful rosettes. Imagine one of the common
+tiger-lilies, which, instead of its thin, red curving petals, has stalks
+of celery, curving as much, but broken off square at the ends; then
+imagine the celery to be of the purest conceivable white; and you have a
+tolerable conception of one of these beautiful alabaster flowers.
+
+This alabaster growth is found only in a few places throughout the cave;
+when it is in chambers or spaces in which the atmosphere is very dry, it
+invariably has a beautiful fibrous texture like wood or celery, and the
+curved form; but if the atmosphere is damp, it forms on the ceiling in
+round nodules, from two to three inches in diameter, as in the Snowball
+Room.
+
+In the Gothic Arcade there is a sort of colonnade formed along the side
+of the tunnel by the meeting of the down-growing stalactites and the
+upward-growing stalagmites; the two together having formed slender
+columns of spar, from three to six feet in height. One group of these,
+about eight feet high, which is the most beautiful in the cave, is
+called the Gothic Chapel. In many of the formations, it is very
+difficult to trace even the remotest resemblance to the objects after
+which they have been named; but in one instance, that of a stalactite
+called the "Elephant's Head," the resemblance is remarkable.
+
+Ordinarily it is the custom for one guide to conduct a party of four or
+five persons into the cave. I dislike over-officious guides and the
+hackneyed comparisons and wordy wonder of gabbling tourists in grand
+and solemn places like this; therefore, in the morning, before
+starting, I congratulated myself that I should be alone, with the
+exception of the guide, who fortunately seemed thoroughly imbued with
+the spirit of the place in which he had spent the greater portion of his
+time for seventeen years.
+
+He was as grave and taciturn as some cave-keeping anchorite. During our
+inward progress, he had carefully pointed out every place and object of
+interest, and hurled his blue-lights here and there into domes and pits
+and cavernous retreats of darkness. But now, on our backward course, he
+stalked silently and abstractedly before, though he seemed to listen to
+every step of my feet; for, if I paused or made a misstep, he instantly
+looked round.
+
+At last he turned, and, looking me curiously in the face, asked whether
+I thought I should be afraid if left in the dark there a little while.
+Some people could not bear it, he said, and one gentleman who had
+consented to the ordeal of darkness had been half crazed by it, and when
+the guide, who had withdrawn and concealed himself, with his light,
+returned, the traveller tried first to run away into the darkness, and
+then, under some strange hallucination, fired his pistol in the guide's
+face.
+
+I had a suspicion that the effect of the obscurity was exaggerated; I
+was disposed, moreover, to "try the dark," from curiosity. But I must
+acknowledge that, when the guide, with that doubting look, repeated his
+inquiry, I hesitated, asking, "Is there any danger? and from what?"
+
+"Nobody knows, massa," said he seriously; "only some people's nerve
+can't stan' it, dat 's all."
+
+The mention of that odious word, "nerve" sounded so much like the
+familiar solicitation, "Try your nerves, gentlemen?" from the
+electrical-machine man,--who is found on the curbstone of some
+thoroughfare in every city,--that for one brief instant the prestige of
+the great cave was gone.
+
+Poh! I thought, so it is only claptrap after all? "Here, take the
+lamps, all of them, matches too, and go away so far that I cannot hear
+you halloo, even at your loudest. I will sit here until you come back!"
+So saying, I sat down upon a rock in the Star Chamber; and he, taking
+the lights, walked away toward the entrance of the cave.
+
+"So then," I thought, "this is the perfect darkness, the total absence
+of light, which is seldom if ever known above ground; for even in the
+darkest night and the darkest house there are some wandering rays of
+light; though they may not be sufficient to enable the eye to
+distinguish anything, they are there; they penetrate, reflected in a
+hundred zigzags, into the darkest places of the outer world. But here
+there are miles between me and the utmost limits of their influence!"
+
+I held my hand before my face, but could not distinguish by sight that
+it was there. A few pale, phosphorescent gleams, that seemed to be
+wandering in the air, I was convinced were only the remembrances of the
+optic nerve,--eidolons of the retina; but they seemed to some extent
+plastic to my thoughts, and ready to become the subjective creations of
+the brain, outlined in the dark. I could conceive then how the brain,
+excited by fear, or stimulated by emotion, might multiply these
+phantasms, moulding them into the likeness of objects and beings that
+never had any existence in reality. My sense of hearing, too, seemed
+preternaturally sharpened; I could hear the ticking of the watch in my
+pocket, the throbbing of my own heart, the murmur of the air in my
+lungs. I held my breath so that the slightest sound from any other
+source than my own organism should not escape me; the ringing vacancy in
+my ears grew more and more painful. Not the remotest breath of any
+sound, except a faint dropping of water in some distant place! (I could
+think of none but in that awful place called Gorin's Dome.) It seemed to
+whisper, "Hush! hush! hush!" Sometimes I could not hear the dropping;
+for just the same reason that, if one listens intently to the ticking of
+a clock for ten minutes, there are intervals when his ear cannot detect
+it, because of its regular monotonous sound.
+
+In such intervals the tympanum of the ear, aching with the dead collapse
+of its world, made sounds for itself; and it required the exercise of
+reason to convince myself, sometimes, that I did not hear distant
+babbling voices.
+
+But hark! There _is_ a sound! Not distant, but near! Here!--There! A
+sound like large, soft feet treading cautiously. No, not that,
+but--something breathing. Pshaw! I believe it was only the sound of my
+own respiration after all!
+
+I did not exactly "whistle to keep my courage up," but, feeling that I
+must do something to assert my vitality, my antagonism to this
+overpowering dark, I cleared my throat vehemently, defiantly,--AHEM!
+AHEM! AHEM!! But it sounded so incongruous, so impertinent I might say,
+in the midst of that awful silence! Besides, it woke such queer echoes
+from unexpected quarters, that I stopped to listen, and heard the
+water-drops again in Gorin's Dome, whispering, "Hush! hush! hush!" And
+from all the gloomy chambers and tunnels came the echo, breathing,
+"Hush! hash! hush!"
+
+It began to be terrifying to think that release from this hell of
+silence was dependent upon one man's will, and he too a man I had never
+seen until within a few hours. Where was he now, my dark-faced guide?
+What if he should not be able to find me again in the midst of this
+hundred miles of tunnels that look so much alike? What if he should not
+intend to come? What if--But, thank Heaven! there he is at last! That is
+the firm, substantial sound of a mortal footstep; not those stealthy,
+phantom steps I seemed to hear before! There too is the distant glinting
+of the red lamplight on the sides of the cave! How long it takes him to
+get here! There he is at last! Blessed be his black face! how unlike the
+pale, phosphorescent forms I fancied just a little while ago! How
+foolish seem all those dreadful fancies now, so terribly real then!
+
+
+
+
+AN AUTUMN SONG.
+
+
+    Below the headland with its cedar-plumes
+      A lapse of spacious water twinkles keen,
+    An ever-shifting play of gleams and glooms
+         And flashes of clear green.
+
+    The sumac's garnet pennons where I lie
+      Are mingled with the tansy's faded gold;
+    Fleet hawks are screaming in the light-blue sky,
+         And fleet airs rushing cold.
+
+    The plump peach steals the dying rose's red;
+      The yellow pippin ripens to its fall;
+    The dusty grapes, to purple fulness fed,
+         Droop from the garden-wall.
+
+    And yet, where rainbow foliage crowns the swamp,
+      I hear in dreams an April robin sing,
+    And memory, amid this Autumn pomp,
+         Strays with the ghost of Spring.
+
+
+
+
+BY-WAYS OF EUROPE.
+
+A VISIT TO THE BALEARIC ISLANDS.
+
+
+I.
+
+As the steamer Mallorca slowly moved out of the harbor of Barcelona, I
+made a rapid inspection of the passengers gathered on deck, and found
+that I was the only foreigner among them. Almost without exception they
+were native Majorcans, returning from trips of business or pleasure to
+the Continent. They spoke no language except Spanish and Catalan, and
+held fast to all the little habits and fashions of their insular life.
+If anything more had been needed to show me that I was entering upon
+untrodden territory, it was supplied by the joyous surprise of the
+steward when I gave him a fee. This fact reconciled me to my isolation
+on board, and its attendant awkwardness.
+
+I knew not why I should have chosen to visit the Balearic Islands,
+unless for the simple reason that they lie so much aside from the
+highways of travel, and are not represented in the journals and
+sketch-books of tourists. If any one had asked me what I expected to
+see, I should have been obliged to confess my ignorance; for the few dry
+geographical details which I possessed were like the chemical analysis
+of a liquor wherefrom no one can reconstruct the taste. The _flavor_ of
+a land is a thing quite apart from its statistics. There is no special
+guide-book for the islands, and the slight notices in the works on Spain
+only betray the haste of the authors to get over a field with which they
+are unacquainted. But this very circumstance, for me, had grown into a
+fascination. One gets tired of studying the bill of fare in advance of
+the repast. When the sun and the Spanish coast had set together behind
+the placid sea, I went to my berth with the delightful certainty that
+the sun of the morrow, and of many days thereafter, would rise upon
+scenes and adventures which could not be anticipated.
+
+The distance from Barcelona to Palma is about a hundred and forty miles;
+so the morning found us skirting the southwestern extremity of
+Majorca,--a barren coast, thrusting low headlands, of gray rock into the
+sea, and hills covered with parched and stunted chaparral in the rear.
+The twelfth century, in the shape of a crumbling Moorish watch-tower,
+alone greeted us. As we advanced eastward into the Bay of Palma,
+however, the wild shrubbery melted into plantations of olive, solitary
+houses of fishermen nestled in the coves, and finally a village, of
+those soft ochre-tints which are a little brighter than the soil,
+appeared on the slope of a hill. In front, through the pale morning mist
+which still lay upon the sea, I saw the cathedral of Palma, looming
+grand and large beside the towers of other churches, and presently,
+gliding past a mile or two of country villas and gardens, we entered the
+crowded harbor.
+
+Inside the mole there was a multitude of the light craft of the
+Mediterranean,--xebecs, feluccas, speronaras, or however they may be
+termed,--with here and there a brigantine which had come from beyond the
+Pillars of Hercules. Our steamer drew into her berth beside the quay,
+and after a very deliberate review by the port physician we were allowed
+to land. I found a porter, Arab in everything but costume, and followed
+him through the water-gate into the half-awake city. My destination was
+the Inn of the Four Nations, where I was cordially received, and
+afterwards roundly swindled, by a French host. My first demand was for a
+native attendant, not so much from any need of guide as simply to
+become more familiar with the people through him; but I was told that
+no such serviceable spirit was to be had in the place. Strangers are so
+rare that a class of people who live upon them has not yet been created.
+
+"But how shall I find the Palace of the Government, or the monastery of
+San Domingo, or anything else?" I asked.
+
+"O, we will give you directions, so that you cannot miss them," said the
+host; but he laid before me such a confusion of right turnings and left
+turnings, ups and downs, that I became speedily bewildered, and set
+forth, determined to let the "spirit in my feet" guide me. A
+labyrinthine place is Palma, and my first walks through the city were so
+many games of chance. The streets are very narrow, changing their
+direction, it seemed to me, at every tenth step; and whatever landmark
+one may select at the start is soon shut from view by the high, dark
+houses. At first, I was quite astray, but little by little I regained
+the lost points of the compass.
+
+After having had the Phoenicians, Greeks, Carthaginians, Romans,
+Vandals, and Saracens as masters, Majorca was first made Spanish by King
+Jaime of Aragon, the Conquistador, in the year 1235. For a century after
+the conquest it was an independent kingdom, and one of its kings was
+slain by the English bowmen at the battle of Crecy. The Spanish element
+has absorbed, but not yet entirely obliterated, the characteristics of
+the earlier races who inhabited the island. Were ethnology a more
+positively developed science, we might divide and classify this confused
+inheritance of character; as it is, we vaguely feel the presence of
+something quaint, antique, and unusual, in walking the streets of Palma,
+and mingling with the inhabitants. The traces of Moorish occupation are
+still noticeable everywhere. Although the Saracenic architecture no
+longer exists in its original forms, its details may be detected in
+portals, court-yards, and balconies, in almost every street. The
+conquerors endeavored to remodel the city, but in doing so they
+preserved the very spirit which they sought to destroy.
+
+My wanderings, after all, were not wholly undirected. I found an
+intelligent guide, who was at the same time an old acquaintance. The
+whirligig of time brings about, not merely its revenges, but also its
+compensations and coincidences. Twenty-two years ago, when I was
+studying German as a boy in the old city of Frankfort, guests from the
+South of France came to visit the amiable family with whom I was
+residing. There were M. Laurens, a painter and a musical enthusiast, his
+wife, and Mademoiselle Rosalba, a daughter as fair as her name. Never
+shall I forget the curious letter which the artist wrote to the manager
+of the theatre, requesting that Beethoven's _Fidelio_ might be given
+(and it was!) for his own especial benefit, nor the triumphant air with
+which he came to us one day, saying, "I have something of most
+precious," and brought forth, out of a dozen protecting envelopes, a
+single gray hair from Beethoven's head. Nor shall I forget how Madame
+Laurens taught us French plays, and how the fair Rosalba declaimed André
+Chénier to redeem her pawns; but I might have forgotten all these
+things, had it not been for an old volume[A] which turned up at need,
+and which gave me information, at once clear, precise, and attractive,
+concerning the streets and edifices of Palma. The round, solid head,
+earnest eyes, and abstracted air of the painter came forth distinct from
+the limbo of things overlaid but never lost, and went with me through
+the checkered blaze and gloom of the city.
+
+The monastery of San Domingo, which was the head-quarters of the
+Inquisition, was spared by the progressive government of Mendizabal, but
+destroyed by the people. Its ruins must have been the most picturesque
+sight of Palma; but since the visit of M. Laurens they have been
+removed, and their broken vaults and revealed torture-chambers are no
+longer to be seen. There are, however, two or three buildings of more
+than ordinary interest. The _Casa Consistorial_, or City Hall, is a
+massive Palladian pile of the sixteenth century, resembling the old
+palaces of Pisa and Florence, except in the circumstance that its roof
+projects at least ten feet beyond the front, resting on a massive
+cornice of carved wood with curious horizontal caryatides in the place
+of brackets. The rich burnt-sienna tint of the carvings contrasts finely
+with the golden-brown of the massive marble walls,--a combination which
+is shown in no other building of the Middle Ages. The sunken rosettes,
+surrounded by raised arabesque borders, between the caryatides, are
+sculptured with such a careful reference to the distance at which they
+must be seen, that they appear as firm and delicate as if near the
+spectator's eye.
+
+The Cathedral, founded by the Conquistador, and built upon, at
+intervals, for more than three centuries, is not yet finished. It stands
+upon a natural platform of rock, overhanging the sea, where its grand
+dimensions produce the greatest possible effect. In every view of Palma,
+it towers solidly above the houses and bastioned walls, and insists upon
+having the sky as a background for the light Gothic pinnacles of its
+flying buttresses. The government has recently undertaken its
+restoration, and a new front of very admirable and harmonious design is
+about half completed. The soft amber-colored marble of Majorca is
+enriched in tint by exposure to the air, and even when built in large,
+unrelieved masses retains a bright and cheerful character. The new
+portion of the cathedral, like the old, has but little sculpture, except
+in the portals; but that little is so elegant that a greater profusion
+of ornament would seem out of place.
+
+Passing from the clear, dazzling day into the interior, one finds
+himself, at first, in total darkness; and the dimensions of the
+nave--nearly three hundred feet in length by one hundred and forty in
+height--are amplified by the gloom. The wind, I was told, came through
+the windows on the sea side with such force as to overturn the chalices,
+and blow out the tapers on the altar, whereupon every opening was walled
+up, except a rose at the end of the chancel, and a few slits in the
+nave, above the side-aisles. A sombre twilight, like that of a stormy
+day, fills the edifice. Here the rustling of stoles and the muttering of
+prayers suggest incantation rather than worship; the organ has a hollow,
+sepulchral sound of lamentation; and there is a spirit of mystery and
+terror in the stale, clammy air. The place resembles an antechamber of
+Purgatory much more than of Heaven. The mummy of Don Jaime II., son of
+the Conquistador and first king of Majorca, is preserved in a
+sarcophagus of black marble. This is the only historic monument in the
+Cathedral, unless the stranger chooses to study the heraldry of the
+island families from their shields suspended in the chapels.
+
+When I returned to the Four Nations for breakfast, I found at the table
+a gentleman of Palma, who invited me to sit down and partake of his
+meal. For the first time this Spanish custom, which really seems
+picturesque and fraternal when coming from shepherds or muleteers in a
+mountain inn, struck me as the hollowest of forms. The gentleman knew
+that I would not accept his invitation, nor he mine; he knew, moreover,
+that I knew he did not wish me to accept it. The phrase, under such
+conditions, becomes a cheat which offends the sacred spirit of
+hospitality. How far the mere form may go was experienced by George
+Sand, who, having accepted the use of a carriage most earnestly offered
+to her by a Majorcan count, found the equipage at her door, it is true,
+but with it a letter expressing so much vexation, that she was forced to
+withdraw her acceptance of the favor at once, and to apologize for it! I
+have always found much hospitality among the common people of Spain,
+and I doubt not that the spirit exists in all classes; but it requires
+some practice to distinguish between empty phrase and the courtesy which
+comes from the heart. A people who boast of some special virtue
+generally do not possess it.
+
+My own slight intercourse with the Majorcans was very pleasant. On the
+day of my arrival, I endeavored to procure a map of the island, but none
+of the bookstores possessed the article. It could be found in one house
+in a remote street, and one of the shopmen finally sent a boy with me to
+the very door. When I offered money for the service, my guide smiled,
+shook his head, and ran away. The map was more than fifty years old, and
+drawn in the style of two centuries ago, with groups of houses for the
+villages, and long files of conical peaks for the mountains. The woman
+brought it down, yellow and dusty, from a dark garret over the shop, and
+seemed as delighted with the sale as if she had received money for
+useless stock. In the streets, the people inspected me curiously, as a
+stranger, but were always ready to go out of their way to guide me. The
+ground-floor being always open, all the features of domestic life and of
+mechanical labor are exposed to the public. The housewives, the masters,
+and apprentices, busy as they seem, manage to keep one eye disengaged,
+and no one passes before them without notice. Cooking, washing, sewing,
+tailoring, shoemaking, coopering, rope and basket making, succeed each
+other, as one passes through the narrow streets. In the afternoon, the
+mechanics frequently come forth and set up their business in the open
+air, where they can now and then greet a country acquaintance or a city
+friend or sweetheart.
+
+When I found that the ruins of San Domingo had been removed, and a
+statue of Isabella II. erected on the Alameda, I began to suspect that
+the reign of old things was over in Majorca. A little observation of the
+people made this fact more evident. The island costume is no longer
+worn by the young men, even in the country; they have passed into a very
+comical transition state. Old men, mounted on lean asses or mules, still
+enter the gates of Palma, with handkerchiefs tied over their shaven
+crowns, and long gray locks falling on their shoulders,--with short,
+loose jackets, shawls around the waist, and wide Turkish trousers
+gathered at the knee. Their gaunt brown legs are bare, and their feet
+protected by rude sandals. Tall, large-boned, and stern of face, they
+hint both of Vandal and of Moslem blood. The younger men are of inferior
+stature, and nearly all bow-legged. They have turned the flowing
+trousers into modern pantaloons, the legs of which are cut like the
+old-fashioned _gigot_ sleeve, very big and baggy at the top, and tied
+with a drawing-string around the waist. My first impression was, that
+the men had got up in a great hurry, and put on their trousers
+hinder-end foremost. It would be difficult to invent a costume more
+awkward and ungraceful than this.
+
+In the city the young girls wear a large triangular piece of white or
+black lace, which covers the hair, and tightly encloses the face, being
+fastened under the chin and the ends brought down to a point on the
+breast. Their almond-shaped eyes are large and fine, but there is very
+little positive beauty among them. Most of the old country-women are
+veritable hags, and their appearance is not improved by the
+broad-brimmed stove-pipe hats which they wear. Seated astride on their
+donkeys, between panniers of produce, they come in daily from the plains
+and mountains, and you encounter them on all the roads leading out of
+Palma. Few of the people speak any other language than the _Mallorquin_,
+a variety of the Catalan, which, from the frequency of the terminations
+in _ch_ and _tz_, constantly suggests the old Provençal literature. The
+word _vitch_ (son) is both Celtic and Slavonic. Some Arabic terms are
+also retained, though fewer, I think, than in Andalusia.
+
+In the afternoon I walked out into the country. The wall, on the land
+side, which is very high and massive, is pierced by five guarded gates.
+The dry moat, both wide and deep, is spanned by wooden bridges, after
+crossing which one has the choice of a dozen highways, all scantily
+shaded with rows of ragged mulberry-trees, glaring white in the sun and
+deep in impalpable dry dust. But the sea-breeze blows freshening across
+the parched land; shadows of light clouds cool the arid mountains in the
+distance; the olives roll into silvery undulations; a palm in full,
+rejoicing plumage rustles over your head; and the huge spatulate leaves
+of a banana in the nearest garden twist and split into fringes. There is
+no languor in the air, no sleep in the deluge of sunshine; the landscape
+is active with signs of work and travel. Wheat, wine, olives, almonds,
+and oranges are produced, not only side by side, but from the same
+fields, and the painfully thorough system of cultivation leaves not a
+rood of the soil unused.
+
+I had chosen, at random, a road which led me west toward the nearest
+mountains, and in the course of an hour I found myself at the entrance
+of a valley. Solitary farm-houses, each as massive as the tower of a
+fortress and of the color of sunburnt gold, studded the heights,
+overlooking the long slopes of almond-orchards. I looked about for
+water, in order to make a sketch of the scene; but the bed of the brook
+was as dry as the highway. The nearest house toward the plain had a
+splendid sentinel palm beside its door,--a dream of Egypt, which
+beckoned and drew me towards it with a glamour I could not resist. Over
+the wall of the garden the orange-trees lifted their mounds of
+impenetrable foliage; and the blossoms of the pomegranates, sprinkled
+against such a background, were like coals of fire. The fig-bearing
+cactus grew about the house in clumps twenty feet high, covered with
+pale-yellow flowers. The building was large and roomy, with a
+court-yard, around which ran a shaded gallery. The farmer who was
+issuing therefrom as I approached wore the shawl and Turkish trousers
+of the old generation, while his two sons, reaping in the adjoining
+wheat-fields, were hideous in the modern _gigots_. Although I was
+manifestly an intruder, the old man greeted me respectfully, and passed
+on to his work. Three boys tended a drove of black hogs in the stubble,
+and some women were so industriously weeding and hoeing in the field
+beyond, that they scarcely stopped to cast a glance upon the stranger.
+There was a grateful air of peace, order, and contentment about the
+place; no one seemed to be suspicious, or even surprised, when I seated
+myself upon a low wall, and watched the laborers.
+
+The knoll upon which the farm-house stood sloped down gently into the
+broad, rich plain of Palma, extending many a league to the eastward. Its
+endless orchards made a dim horizon-line, over which rose the solitary
+double-headed mountain of Felaniche, and the tops of some peaks near
+Arta. The city wall was visible on my right, and beyond it a bright arc
+of the Mediterranean. The features of the landscape, in fact, were so
+simple, that I fear I cannot make its charm evident to the reader.
+Looking over the nearer fields, I observed two peculiarities of Majorca,
+upon which depends much of the prosperity of the island. The wheat is
+certainly, as it is claimed to be, the finest of any Mediterranean land.
+Its large, perfect grains furnish a flour of such fine quality that the
+whole produce of the island is sent to Spain for the pastry and
+confectionery of the cities, while the Majorcans import a cheap,
+inferior kind in its place. Their fortune depends on their abstinence
+from the good things which Providence has given them. Their pork is
+greatly superior to that of Spain, and it leaves them in like manner;
+their best wines are now bought up by speculators and exported for the
+fabrication of sherry; and their oil, which might be the finest in the
+world, is so injured by imperfect methods of preservation that it might
+pass for the worst. These things, however, give them no annoyance.
+Southern races are sometimes indolent, but rarely Epicurean in their
+habits; it is the Northern man who sighs for his flesh-pots.
+
+I walked forward between the fields toward another road, and came upon a
+tract which had just been ploughed and planted for a new crop. The soil
+was ridged in a labyrinthine pattern, which appeared to have been drawn
+with square and rule. But more remarkable than this was the difference
+of level, so slight that the eye could not possibly detect it, by which
+the slender irrigating streams were conducted to every square foot of
+the field, without a drop being needlessly wasted. The system is an
+inheritance from the Moors, who were the best natural engineers the
+world has ever known. Water is scarce in Majorca, and thus every stream,
+spring, rainfall,--even the dew of heaven,--is utilized. Channels of
+masonry, often covered to prevent evaporation, descend from the
+mountains, branch into narrower veins, and visit every farm on the
+plain, whatever may be its level. Where these are not sufficient, the
+rains are added to the reservoir, or a string of buckets, turned by a
+mule, lifts the water from a well. But it is in the economy of
+distributing water to the fields that the most marvellous skill is
+exhibited. The grade of the surface must not only be preserved, but the
+subtle, tricksy spirit of water so delicately understood and humored
+that the streams shall traverse the greatest amount of soil with the
+least waste or wear. In this respect, the most skilful application of
+science could not surpass the achievements of the Majorcan farmers.
+
+Working my way homeward through the tangled streets, I was struck with
+the universal sound of wailing which filled the city. All the tailors,
+shoemakers, and basket-makers, at work in the open air, were singing,
+rarely in measured strains, but with wild, irregular, lamentable cries,
+exactly in the manner of the Arabs. Sometimes the song was antiphonal,
+flung back and forth from the farthest visible corners of a street; and
+then it became a contest of lungs, kept up for an hour at a time. While
+breakfasting, I had heard, as I supposed, a _miserere_ chanted by some
+procession of monks, and wondered when the doleful strains would cease.
+I now saw that they came from the mouths of some cheerful coopers, who
+were heading barrels a little farther down the street. The Majorcans
+still have their troubadours, who are hired by languishing lovers to
+improvise strains of longing or reproach under the windows of the fair,
+and perhaps the latter may listen with delight; but I know of no place
+where the Enraged Musician would so soon become insane. The isle is full
+of noises, and a Caliban might say that they hurt not; for me they
+murdered sleep, both at midnight and at dawn.
+
+I had decided to devote my second day to an excursion to the mountain
+paradise of Valdemosa, and sallied forth early, to seek the means of
+conveyance. Up to this time I had been worried--tortured, I may say,
+without exaggeration--by desperate efforts to recover the Spanish
+tongue, which I had not spoken for fourteen years. I still had the sense
+of possessing it, but in some old drawer of memory, the lock of which
+had rusted and would not obey the key. Like Mrs. Dombey, I felt as if
+there were Spanish words somewhere in the room, but I could not
+positively say that I had them,--a sensation which, as everybody knows,
+is far worse than absolute ignorance. I had taken a carriage for
+Valdemosa, after a long talk with the proprietor, a most agreeable
+fellow, when I suddenly stopped, and exclaimed to myself, "You are
+talking Spanish,--did you know it?" It was even so: as much of the
+language as I ever knew was suddenly and unaccountably restored to me.
+On my return to the Four Nations, I was still further surprised to find
+myself repeating songs, without the failure of a line or word, which I
+had learned from a Mexican as a school-boy, and had not thought of for
+twenty years. The unused drawer had somehow been unlocked or broken
+open while I slept.
+
+Valdemosa is about twelve miles north of Palma, in the heart of the only
+mountain-chain of the island, which forms its western, or rather
+northwestern coast. The average altitude of these mountains will not
+exceed three thousand feet; but the broken, abrupt character of their
+outlines, and the naked glare of their immense precipitous walls, give
+them that intrinsic grandeur which does not depend on measurement. In
+their geological formation they resemble the Pyrenees; the rocks are of
+that _palombino_, or dove-colored limestone, so common in Sicily and the
+Grecian islands,--pale bluish-gray, taking a soft orange tint on the
+faces most exposed to the weather. Rising directly from the sea on the
+west, they cease almost as suddenly on the land side, leaving all the
+central portion of the island a plain, slightly inclined toward the
+southeast, where occasional peaks or irregular groups of hills interrupt
+its monotony.
+
+In due time my team made its appearance,--an omnibus of basket-work,
+with a canvas cover, drawn by two horses. It had space enough for twelve
+persons, yet was the smallest vehicle I could discover. There appears to
+be nothing between it and the two-wheeled cart of the peasant, which, on
+a pinch, carries six or eight. For an hour and a half we traversed the
+teeming plain, between stacks of wheat worthy to be laid on the altar at
+Eleusis, carob-trees with their dark, varnished foliage, almond-orchards
+bending under the weight of their green nuts, and the country-houses
+with their garden clumps of orange, cactus, and palm. As we drew near
+the base of the mountains, olive-trees of great size and luxuriance
+covered the earth with a fine sprinkle of shade. Their gnarled and
+knotted trunks, a thousand years old, were frequently split into three
+or four distinct and separate trees, which in the process assumed forms
+so marvellously human in their distortion, that I could scarcely believe
+them to be accidental. Doré never drew anything so weird and grotesque.
+Here were two club-headed individuals righting, with interlocked knees,
+convulsed shoulders, and fists full of each other's hair; yonder a bully
+was threatening attack, and three cowards appeared to be running away
+from him with such speed that they were tumbling over one another's
+heels. In one place a horrible dragon was devouring a squirming,
+shapeless animal; in another, a drunken man, with whirling arms and
+tangled feet, was pitching forward upon his face. The living wood in
+Dante was tame beside these astonishing trees.
+
+We now entered a wild ravine, where, nevertheless, the mountain-sides,
+sheer and savage as they were, had succumbed to the rule of man, and
+nourished an olive or a carob tree on every corner of earth between the
+rocks. The road was built along the edge of the deep, dry bed of a
+winter stream, so narrow that a single arch carried it from side to
+side, as the windings of the glen compelled. After climbing thus for a
+mile in the shadows of threatening masses of rock, an amphitheatre of
+gardens, enframed by the spurs of two grand, arid mountains, opened
+before us. The bed of the valley was filled with vines and orchards,
+beyond which rose long terraces, dark with orange and citron trees,
+obelisks of cypress and magnificent groups of palm, with the long white
+front and shaded balconies of a hacienda between. Far up, on a higher
+plateau between the peaks, I saw the church-tower of Valdemosa. The
+sides of the mountains were terraced with almost incredible labor, walls
+massive as the rock itself being raised to a height of thirty feet, to
+gain a shelf of soil two or three yards in breadth. Where the olive and
+the carob ceased, box and ilex took possession of the inaccessible
+points, carrying up the long waves of vegetation until their
+foam-sprinkles of silver-gray faded out among the highest clefts. The
+natural channels of the rock were straightened and made to converge at
+the base, so that not a wandering cloud could bathe the wild growths of
+the summit without being caught and hurried into some tank below. The
+wilderness was forced, by pure toil, to become a Paradise; and each
+stubborn feature, which toil could not subdue, now takes its place as a
+contrast and an ornament in the picture. Verily, there is nothing in all
+Italy so beautiful as Valdemosa!
+
+Lest I should be thought extravagant in my delight, let me give you some
+words of George Sand, which I have since read. "I have never seen," she
+says, "anything so bright, and at the same time so melancholy, as these
+perspectives where the ilex, the carob, pine, olive, poplar, and cypress
+mingle their various hues in the hollows of the mountain,--abysses of
+verdure, where the torrent precipitates its course under mounds of
+sumptuous richness and an inimitable grace.... While you hear the sound
+of the sea on the northern coast, you perceive it only as a faint
+shining line beyond the sinking mountains and the great plain which is
+unrolled to the southward;--a sublime picture, framed in the foreground
+by dark rocks covered with pines; in the middle distance by mountains of
+boldest outline, fringed with superb trees; and beyond these by rounded
+hills which the setting sun gilds with burning colors, where the eye
+distinguishes, a league away, the microscopic profile of trees, fine as
+the antennæ of butterflies, black and clear as pen-drawings of India-ink
+on a ground of sparkling gold. It is one of those landscapes which
+oppress you because they leave nothing to be desired, nothing to be
+imagined. Nature has here created that which the poet and the painter
+behold in their dreams. An immense _ensemble_, infinite details,
+inexhaustible variety, blended forms, sharp contours, dim, vanishing
+depths,--all are present, and art can suggest nothing further. Majorca
+is one of the most beautiful countries of the world for the painter, and
+one of the least known. It is a green Helvetia under the sky of
+Calabria, with the solemnity and silence of the Orient."
+
+The village of Valdemosa is a picturesque, rambling place, brown with
+age, and buried in the foliage of fig and orange trees. The highest part
+of the narrow plateau where it stands is crowned by the church and
+monastery of the Trappists (_Cartusa_), now deserted. My coachman drove
+under the open roof of a venta, and began to unharness his horses. The
+family, who were dining at a table so low that they appeared to be
+sitting on the floor, gave me the customary invitation to join them, and
+when I asked for a glass of wine brought me one which held nearly a
+quart. I could not long turn my back on the bright, wonderful landscape
+without; so, taking books and colors, I entered the lonely cloisters of
+the monastery. Followed first by one small boy, I had a retinue of at
+least fifteen children before I had completed the tour of the church,
+court-yard, and the long-drawn, shady corridors of the silent monks; and
+when I took my seat on the stones at the foot of the towers, with the
+very scene described by George Sand before my eyes, a number of older
+persons added themselves to the group. A woman brought me a chair, and
+the children then planted themselves in a dense row before me, while I
+attempted to sketch under such difficulties as I had never known before.
+Precisely because I am no artist, it makes me nervous to be watched
+while drawing; and the remarks of the young men on this occasion were
+not calculated to give me courage.
+
+When I had roughly mapped out the sky with its few floating clouds, some
+one exclaimed, "He has finished the mountains, there they are!" and they
+all crowded around me, saying, "Yes, there are the mountains!" While I
+was really engaged upon the mountains, there was a violent discussion as
+to what they might be; and I don't know how long it would have lasted,
+had I not turned to some cypresses nearer the foreground. Then a young
+man cried out: "O, that's a cypress! I wonder if he will make them
+all,--how many are there? One, two, three, four, five,--yes, he makes
+five!" There was an immediate rush, shutting out earth and heaven from
+my sight, and they all cried in chorus, "One, two, three, four,
+five,--yes, he has made five!" "Cavaliers and ladies," I said, with
+solemn politeness, "have the goodness not to stand before me." "To be
+sure! Santa Maria! How do you think he can see?" yelled an old woman,
+and the children were hustled away. But I thereby won the ill-will of
+those garlic-breathing and scratching imps, for very soon a shower of
+water-drops fell upon my paper. Next a stick, thrown from an upper
+window, dropped on my head, and more than once my elbow was
+intentionally jogged from behind. The older people scolded and
+threatened, but young Majorca was evidently against me. I therefore made
+haste to finish my impotent mimicry of air and light, and get away from
+the curious crowd.
+
+Behind the village there is a gleam of the sea, near, yet at an unknown
+depth. As I threaded the walled lanes, seeking some point of view, a
+number of lusty young fellows, mounted on unsaddled mules, passed me
+with a courteous greeting. On one side rose a grand pile of rock,
+covered with ilex-trees,--a bit of scenery so admirable, that I fell
+into a new temptation. I climbed a little knoll and looked around me.
+Far and near no children were to be seen; the portico of an unfinished
+house offered both shade and seclusion. I concealed myself behind a
+pillar, and went to work. For half an hour I was happy; then around
+black head popped up over a garden-wall, a small brown form crept
+towards me, beckoned, and presently a new multitude had assembled. The
+noise they made provoked a sound of cursing from the interior of a
+stable adjoining the house. They only made a louder tumult in answer;
+the voice became more threatening, and at the end of five minutes the
+door burst open. An old man, with wrath flashing from his eyes, came
+forth. The children took to their heels; I greeted the new-comer
+politely, but he hardly returned the salutation. He was a very fountain
+of curses, and now hurled stones with them after the fugitives. When
+they had all disappeared behind the walls, he went back to his den,
+grumbling and muttering. It was not five minutes, however, before the
+children were back again, as noisy as before; so, at the first thunder
+from the stable, I shut up my book, and returned to the inn.
+
+While the horses were being harnessed, I tried to talk with an old
+native, who wore the island costume, and was as grim and grizzly as
+Ossawatomie Brown. A party of country people from the plains, who seemed
+to have come up to Valdemosa on a pleasure trip, clambered into a
+two-wheeled cart drawn by one mule, and drove away. My old friend gave
+me the distances of various places, the state of the roads, and the
+quality of the wine; but he seemed to have no conception of the world
+outside of the island. Indeed, to a native of the village, whose fortune
+has simply placed him beyond the reach of want, what is the rest of the
+world? Around and before him spread one of its loveliest pictures; he
+breathes its purest air; and he may enjoy its best luxuries, if he heeds
+or knows how to use them.
+
+Up to this day the proper spice and flavor had been wanting. Palma had
+only interested me, but in Valdemosa I found the inspiration, the heat
+and play of vivid, keen sensation, which one (often somewhat
+unreasonably) expects from a new land. As my carriage descended, winding
+around the sides of the magnificent mountain amphitheatre, in the
+alternate shadows of palm and ilex, pine and olive, I looked back,
+clinging to every marvellous picture, and saying to myself, over and
+over again, "I have not come hither in vain." When the last shattered
+gate of rock closed behind me, and the wood of insane olive-trunks was
+passed, with what other eyes I looked upon the rich orchard-plain! It
+had now become a part of one superb whole; as the background of my
+mountain view, it had caught a new glory, and still wore the bloom of
+the invisible sea.
+
+In the evening I reached the Four Nations, where I was needlessly
+invited to dinner by certain strangers, and dined alone, on meats cooked
+in rancid oil. When the cook had dished the last course, he came into a
+room adjoining the dining apartment, sat down to a piano in his white
+cap, and played loud, long, and badly. The landlord had papered this
+room with illustrations from all the periodicals of Europe:
+dancing-girls pointed their toes under cardinals' hats, and bulls were
+baited before the shrines of saints. Mixed with the woodcuts were the
+landlord's own artistic productions, wonderful to behold. All the house
+was proud of this room, and with reason; for there is assuredly no other
+room like it in the world. A notice in four languages, written with
+extraordinary flourishes, announced in the English division that
+travellers will find "confortation and modest prices." The former
+advantage, I discovered, consisted in the art of the landlord, the music
+and oil of the cook, and the attendance of a servant so distant that it
+was easier to serve myself than seek him; the latter may have been
+"modest" for Palma, but in any other place they would have been
+considered brazenly impertinent. I should therefore advise travellers to
+try the "Three Pigeons," in the same street, rather than the Four
+Nations.
+
+The next day, under the guidance of my old friend, M. Laurens, I
+wandered for several hours through the streets, peeping into
+court-yards, looking over garden-walls, or idling under the trees of the
+Alameda. There are no pleasant suburban places of resort, such as are to
+be found in all other Spanish cities; the country commences on the other
+side of the moat. Three small cafés exist, but cannot be said to
+flourish, for I never saw more than one table occupied. A theatre has
+been built, but is only open during the winter, of course. Some placards
+on the walls, however, announced that the national (that is, Majorcan)
+diversion of baiting bulls with dogs would be given in a few days.
+
+The noblesse appear to be even haughtier than in Spain, perhaps on
+account of their greater poverty; and much more of the feudal spirit
+lingers among them, and gives character to society, than on the
+main-land. Each family has still a crowd of retainers, who perform a
+certain amount of service on the estates, and are thenceforth entitled
+to support. This custom is the reverse of profitable; but it keeps up an
+air of lordship, and is therefore retained. Late in the afternoon, when
+the new portion of the Alameda is in shadow, and swept by a delicious
+breeze from the sea, it begins to be frequented by the people; but I
+noticed that very few of the upper class made their appearance. So grave
+and sombre are these latter, that one would fancy them descended from
+the conquered Moors, rather than the Spanish conquerors.
+
+M. Laurens is of the opinion that the architecture of Palma cannot be
+ascribed to an earlier period than the beginning of the sixteenth
+century. I am satisfied, however, either that many fragments of Moorish
+sculpture must have been used in the erection of the older buildings, or
+that certain peculiarities of Moorish art have been closely imitated.
+For instance, that Moorish combination of vast, heavy masses of masonry
+with the lightest and airiest style of ornament, which the Gothic
+sometimes attempts, but never with the same success, is here found at
+every step. I will borrow M. Laurens's words, descriptive of the
+superior class of edifices, both because I can find no better of my own,
+and because this very characteristic has been noticed by him. "Above the
+ground-floor," he says, "there is only one story and a low garret. The
+entrance is a semi-circular portal without ornament; but the number and
+dimensions of the stones, disposed in long radii, give it a stately
+aspect. The grand halls of the main story are lighted by windows
+divided by excessively slender columns, which are entirely Arabic in
+appearance. This character is so pronounced, that I was obliged to
+examine more than twenty houses constructed in the same manner, and to
+study all the details of their construction, in order to assure myself
+that the windows had not really been taken from those fairy Moresque
+palaces, of which the Alhambra is the only remaining specimen. Except in
+Majorca, I have nowhere seen columns which, with a height of six feet,
+have a diameter of only three inches. The fine grain of the marble of
+which they are made, as well as the delicacy of the capitals, led me to
+suppose them to be of Saracenic origin."
+
+I was more impressed by the _Lonja_, or Exchange, than any other
+building in Palma. It dates from the first half of the fifteenth
+century, when the kings of the island had built up a flourishing
+commerce, and expected to rival Genoa and Venice. Its walls, once
+crowded with merchants and seamen, are now only opened for the Carnival
+balls and other festivals sanctioned by religion. It is a square
+edifice, with light Gothic towers at the corners, displaying little
+ornamental sculpture, but nevertheless a taste and symmetry, in all its
+details, which are very rare in Spanish architecture. The interior is a
+single vast hall, with a groined roof, resting on six pillars of
+exquisite beauty. They are sixty feet high, and fluted spirally from top
+to bottom, like a twisted cord, with a diameter of not more than two
+feet and a half. It is astonishing how the airy lightness and grace of
+these pillars relieve the immense mass of masonry, spare the bare walls
+the necessity of ornament, and make the ponderous roof light as a tent.
+There is here the trace of a law of which our modern architects seem to
+be ignorant. Large masses of masonry are always oppressive in their
+effect; they suggest pain and labor, and the Saracens, even more than
+the Greeks, seem to have discovered the necessity of introducing a
+sportive, fanciful element, which shall express the delight of the
+workman in his work.
+
+In the afternoon, I sallied forth from the western coast-gate, and found
+there, sloping to the shore, a village inhabited apparently by sailors
+and fishermen. The houses were of one story, flat-roofed, and
+brilliantly whitewashed. Against the blue background of the sea, with
+here and there the huge fronds of a palm rising from among them, they
+made a truly African picture. On the brown ridge above the village were
+fourteen huge windmills, nearly all in motion. I found a road leading,
+along the brink of the overhanging cliffs, toward the castle of Belver,
+whose brown mediæval turrets rose against a gathering thunder-cloud.
+This fortress, built as a palace for the kings of Majorca immediately
+after the expulsion of the Moors, is now a prison. It has a superb
+situation, on the summit of a conical hill, covered with umbrella-pines.
+In one of its round, massive towers, Arago was imprisoned for two months
+in 1808. He was at the time employed in measuring an arc of the
+meridian, when news of Napoleon's violent measures in Spain reached
+Majorca. The ignorant populace immediately suspected the astronomer of
+being a spy and political agent, and would have lynched him at once.
+Warned by a friend, he disguised himself as a sailor, escaped on board a
+boat in the harbor, and was then placed in Belver by the authorities, in
+order to save his life. He afterwards succeeded in reaching Algiers,
+where he was seized by order of the Bey, and made to work as a slave.
+Few men of science have known so much of the romance of life.
+
+I had a long walk to Belver, but I was rewarded by a grand view of the
+Bay of Palma, the city, and all the southern extremity of the island. I
+endeavored to get into the fields, to seek other points of view; but
+they were surrounded by such lofty walls that I fancied the owners of
+the soil could only get at them by scaling-ladders. The grain and trees
+on either side of the road were hoary with dust, and the soil of the
+hue of burnt chalk, seemed never to have known moisture. But while I
+loitered on the cliffs the cloud in the west had risen and spread; a
+cold wind blew over the hills, and the high gray peaks behind Valdemosa
+disappeared, one by one, in a veil of rain. A rough _tartana_, which
+performed the service of an omnibus, passed me returning to the city,
+and the driver, having no passengers, invited me to ride. "What is your
+fare?" I asked. "Whatever people choose to give," said he,--which was
+reasonable enough: and I thus reached the Four Nations in time to avoid
+a deluge.
+
+The Majorcans are fond of claiming their island as the birthplace of
+Hannibal. There are some remains supposed to be Carthaginian near the
+town of Alcudia, but, singularly enough, not a fragment to tell of the
+Roman domination, although their _Balearis Major_ must have been then,
+as now, a rich and important possession. The Saracens, rather than the
+Vandals, have been the spoilers of ancient art. Their religious
+detestation of sculpture was at the bottom of this destruction. The
+Christians could consecrate the old temple to a new service, and give
+the names of saints to the statues of the gods; but to the Moslem every
+representation of the human form was worse than blasphemy. For this
+reason, the symbols of the most ancient faith, massive and
+unintelligible, have outlived the monuments of those which followed.
+
+In a forest of ancient oaks near the village of Arta, there still exists
+a number of Cyclopean constructions, the character of which is as
+uncertain as the date of their erection. They are cones of huge,
+irregular blocks, the jambs and lintels of the entrances being of single
+stones. In a few the opening is at the top, with rude projections
+resembling a staircase to aid in the descent. Cinerary urns have been
+found in some of them, yet they do not appear to have been originally
+constructed as tombs. The Romans may have afterwards turned them to that
+service. In the vicinity there are the remains of a Druid circle, of
+large upright monoliths. These singular structures were formerly much
+more numerous, the people (who call them "the altars of the Gentiles")
+having destroyed a great many in building the village and the
+neighboring farm-houses.
+
+I heard a great deal about a cavern on the eastern coast of the island,
+beyond Arta. It is called the Hermit's Cave, and the people of Palma
+consider it the principal thing to be seen in all Majorca. Their
+descriptions of the place, however, did not inspire me with any very
+lively desire to undertake a two days' journey for the purpose of
+crawling on my belly through a long hole, and then descending a shaky
+rope-ladder for a hundred feet or more. When one has performed these
+feats, they said, he finds himself in an immense hall, supported by
+stalactitic pillars, the marvels of which cannot be described. Had the
+scenery of the eastern part of the island been more attractive, I should
+have gone as far as Arta; but I wished to meet the steamer Minorca at
+Alcudia, and there were but two days remaining.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[A] _Souvenirs d'un Voyage d'Art à l'Isle de Majorque._ Par J.-B.
+Laurens.
+
+
+
+
+MINOR ELIZABETHAN DRAMATISTS.
+
+
+In the present paper we propose to consider six dramatists who were more
+immediately the contemporaries of Shakespeare and Jonson, and who have
+the precedence in time, and three of them, if we may believe some
+critics, not altogether without claim to the precedence in merit, of
+Beaumont and Fletcher, Massinger, and Ford. These are Heywood,
+Middleton, Marston, Dekkar, Webster, and Chapman.
+
+They belong to the school of dramatists of which Shakespeare was the
+head, and which is distinguished from the school of Jonson by essential
+differences of principle. Jonson constructed his plays on definite
+external rules, and could appeal confidently to the critical
+understanding, in case the regularity of his plot and the keeping of his
+characters were called in question. Shakespeare constructed his, not
+according to any rules which could be drawn from the practice of other
+dramatists, but according to those interior laws which the mind, in its
+creative action, instinctively divines and spontaneously obeys. In his
+case, the appeal is not to the understanding alone, but to the feelings
+and faculties which were concerned in producing the work itself; and the
+symmetry of the whole is felt by hundreds who could not frame an
+argument to sustain it. The laws to which his genius submitted were
+different from those to which other dramatists had submitted, because
+the time, the circumstances, the materials, the purpose aimed at, were
+different. The time demanded a drama which should represent human life
+in all its diversity, and in which the tragic and comic, the high and
+the low, should be in juxtaposition, if not in combination. The
+dramatists of whom we are about to speak represented them in
+juxtaposition, and rarely succeeded in vitally combining them so as to
+produce symmetrical works. Their comedy and tragedy, their humor and
+passion, move in parallel rather than in converging lines. They have
+diversity; but as their diversity neither springs from, nor tends to, a
+central principle of organization or of order, the result is often a
+splendid anarchy of detached scenes, more effective as detached than as
+related. Shakespeare alone had the comprehensive energy of impassioned
+imagination to fuse into unity the almost unmanageable materials of his
+drama, to organize this anarchy into a new and most complex order, and
+to make a world-wide variety of character and incident consistent with
+oneness of impression. Jonson, not pretending to give his work this
+organic form, put forth his whole strength to give it mechanical
+regularity; every line in his solidest plays costing him, as the wits
+said, "a cup of sack." But the force implied in a Shakespearian drama, a
+force that crushes and dissolves the resisting materials into their
+elements, and recombines or fuses them into a new substance, is a force
+so different in kind from Jonson's, that it would of course be idle to
+attempt an estimate of its superiority in degree. And in regard to those
+minor dramatists who will be the subjects of the present paper, if they
+fall below Jonson in general ability, they nearly all afford scenes and
+passages superior to his best in depth of passion, vigor of imagination,
+and audacious self-committal to the primitive instincts of the heart.
+
+The most profuse, but perhaps the least poetic of these dramatists, was
+Thomas Heywood, of whom little is known, except that he was one of the
+most prolific writers the world has ever seen. In 1598 he became an
+actor, or, as Henslowe, who employed him, phrases it, "came and hired
+himself to me as a covenanted servant for two years." The date of his
+first published drama is 1601; that of his last published work, a
+"General History of Women," is 1657. As early as 1633 he represents
+himself as having had an "entire hand, or at least a main finger," in
+two hundred and twenty plays, of which only twenty-three were printed.
+"True it is," he says, "that my plays are not exposed to the world in
+volumes, to bear the title of Works, as others: one reason is, that many
+of them, by shifting and change of companies, have been negligently
+lost; others of them are still retained in the hands of some actors, who
+think it against their peculiar profit to have them come in print; and a
+third, that it was never any great ambition in me to be in this kind
+voluminously read." It was said of him, by a contemporary, that he "not
+only acted every day, but also obliged himself to write a sheet every
+day for several years; but many of his plays being composed loosely in
+taverns, occasions them to be so mean." Besides his labors as a
+playwright, he worked as translator, versifier, and general maker of
+books. Late in life he conceived the design of writing the lives of all
+the poets of the world, including his contemporaries. Had this project
+been carried out, we should have known something about the external life
+of Shakespeare; for Heywood must have carried in his brain many of those
+facts which we of this age are most curious to know.
+
+Heywood's best plays evince large observation, considerable dramatic
+skill, a sweet and humane spirit, and an easy command of language. His
+style, indeed, is singularly simple, pure, clear, and straightforward;
+but it conveys the impression of a mind so diffused as almost to be
+characterless, and incapable of flashing its thoughts through the images
+of imaginative passion. He is more prosaic, closer to ordinary life and
+character, than his contemporaries. Two of his plays, and the best of
+them all, "A Woman killed with Kindness," and "The English Traveller,"
+are thoroughly domestic dramas, the first, and not the worst, of their
+class. The plot of "The English Traveller" is specially good; and in
+reading few works of fiction do we receive a greater shock of surprise
+than in Geraldine's discovery of the infidelity of Wincott's wife, whom
+he loves with a Platonic devotion. It is as unanticipated as the
+discovery, in Jonson's "Silent Woman," that Epicæne is no woman at all,
+while at the same time it has less the appearance of artifice, and is
+more the result of natural causes.
+
+With less fluency of diction, less skill in fastening the reader's
+interest to his fable, harsher in versification, and generally clumsier
+in construction, the best plays of Thomas Middleton are still superior
+to Heywood's in force of imagination, depth of passion, and fulness of
+matter. It must, however, be admitted that the sentiments which direct
+his powers are not so fine as Heywood's. He depresses the mind, rather
+than invigorates it. The eye he cast on human life was not the eye of a
+sympathizing poet, but rather that of a sagacious cynic. His
+observation, though sharp, close, and vigilant, is somewhat ironic and
+unfeeling. His penetrating, incisive intellect cuts its way to the heart
+of a character as with a knife; and if he lays bare its throbs of guilt
+and weakness, and lets you into the secrets of its organization, he
+conceives his whole work is performed. This criticism applies even to
+his tragedy of "Women beware Women," a drama which shows a deep study of
+the sources of human frailty, considerable skill in exhibiting the
+passions in their consecutive, if not in their conflicting action, and a
+firm hold upon character; but it lacks pathos, tenderness, and humanity;
+its power is out of all proportion to its geniality; the characters,
+while they stand definitely out to the eye, are seen through no
+visionary medium of sentiment and fancy; and the reader feels the force
+of Leantio's own agonizing complaint, that his affliction is
+
+    "Of greater weight than youth was made to bear,
+    As if a punishment of after-life
+    Were fall'n upon man here, so new it is
+    To flesh and blood, so strange, so insupportable."
+
+There is, indeed, no atmosphere to Middleton's mind; and the hard, bald
+caustic peculiarity of his genius, which is unpleasingly felt in
+reading any one of his plays, becomes a source of painful weariness as
+we plod doggedly through the five thick volumes of his works. Like the
+incantations of his own witches, it "casts a thick scurf over life." It
+is most powerfully felt in his tragedy of "The Changeling," at once the
+most oppressive and impressive effort of his genius. The character of De
+Flores in this play has in it a strangeness of iniquity, such as we
+think is hardly paralleled in the whole range of the Elizabethan drama.
+The passions of this brute imp are not human. They are such as might be
+conceived of as springing from the union of animal with fiendish
+impulses, in a nature which knew no law outside of its own lust, and was
+as incapable of a scruple as of a sympathy.
+
+But of all the dramatists of the time, the most disagreeable in
+disposition, though by no means the least powerful in mind, was John
+Marston. The time of his birth is not known; his name is entangled in
+contemporary records with that of another John Marston; and we may be
+sure that his mischief-loving spirit would have been delighted could he
+have anticipated that the antiquaries, a century after his death, would
+be driven to despair by the difficulty of discriminating one from the
+other. It is more than probable, however, that he was the John Marston
+who was of a respectable family in Shropshire; who took his bachelor's
+degree at Oxford in 1592; and who was afterwards married to a daughter
+of the chaplain of James the First. Whatever may have been Marston's
+antecedents, they were such as to gratify his tastes as a cynical
+observer of the crimes and follies of men,--an observer whose hatred of
+evil sprang from no love of good, but to whom the sight of depravity and
+baseness was welcome, inasmuch as it afforded him me occasion to wreak
+his own scorn and pride. His ambition was to be the English Juvenal; and
+it must be conceded that he had the true Iago-like disposition "to spy
+out abuses." Accordingly, in 1598, he published a series of venomous
+satires called "The Scourge of Villanie," rough in versification,
+condensed in thought, tainted in matter, evincing a cankered more than a
+caustic spirit, and producing an effect at once indecent and inhuman. To
+prove that this scourging of villany, which would have put
+Mephistopheles to the blush, was inspired by no respect for virtue, he
+soon followed it up with a poem so licentious that, before it was
+circulated to any extent, it was suppressed by order of Archbishop
+Whitgift, and nearly all the copies destroyed. A writer could not be
+thus dishonored without being brought prominently into notice, and old
+Henslowe, the manager, was after him at once to secure his libellous
+ability for the Rose. Accordingly, we learn from Henslowe's diary, under
+date of September 28, 1599, that he had lent to William Borne "to lend
+unto John Mastone," "the new poete," "the sum of forty shillings," in
+earnest of some work not named. There is an undated letter of Marston to
+Henslowe, written probably in reference to this matter, which is
+characteristic in its disdainfully confident tone. Thus it runs:--
+
+     "MR. HENSLOWE, at the Rose on the Bankside.
+
+     "If you like my playe of Columbus, it is verie well, and you
+     shall give me noe more than twentie poundes for it, but If
+     nott, lett me have it by the Bearer againe, as I know the
+     kinges men will freelie give me as much for it, and the
+     profitts of the third daye moreover.
+
+                            "Soe I rest yours,
+
+                                "JOHN MARSTON."
+
+He seems not to have been popular among the band of dramatists he now
+joined, and it is probable that his insulting manners were not sustained
+by corresponding courage. Ben Jonson had many quarrels with him, both
+literary and personal, and mentions one occasion on which he beat him,
+and took away his pistol. His temper was Italian rather than English,
+and one would conceive of him as quicker with the stiletto than the
+fist. His connection with the stage ceased in 1613, after he had
+produced a number of dramas, of which nine have been preserved. He died
+about twenty years afterwards, in 1634, seemingly in comfortable
+circumstances.
+
+Marston's plays, whether comedies or tragedies, all bear the mark of his
+bitter and misanthropic spirit,--a spirit that seemed cursed by the
+companionship of its own thoughts, and forced them out through a
+well-grounded fear that they would fester if left within. His comedies
+of "The Malcontent," "The Fawn," and "What You Will," have no genuine
+mirth, though an abundance of scornful wit,--of wit which, in his own
+words, "stings, blisters, galls off the skin, with the acrimony of its
+sharp quickness." The baser its objects, the brighter its gleam. It is
+stimulated by the desire to give pain, rather than the wish to
+communicate pleasure. Marston is not without sprightliness, but his
+sprightliness is never the sprightliness of the kid, though it is
+sometimes that of the hyena, and sometimes that of the polecat. In his
+Malcontent he probably drew a nattering likeness of his inner self: yet
+the most compassionate reader of the play would experience little pity
+in seeing the Malcontent hanged. So much, indeed, of Marston's satire is
+directed at depravity, that Ben Jonson used to say that "Marston wrote
+his father-in-law's preachings, and his father-in-law his comedies." It
+is to be hoped, however, that the spirit of the chaplain's tirades
+against sins was not, like his son-in-law's, worse than the sins
+themselves.
+
+If Marston's comic vein is thus, to use one of Dekkar's phrases, that of
+"a thorny-toothed rascal," it may be supposed that his tragic is a still
+fiercer libel on humanity. His tragedies, indeed, though not without a
+gloomy power, are extravagant and horrible in conception and conduct.
+Even when he copies, he makes the thing his own by caricaturing it. Thus
+the plot of "Antonio's Revenge" is plainly taken from "Hamlet," but it
+is "Hamlet" passed through Marston's intellect and imagination, and so
+debased as to look original. Still, the intellect in Marston's tragedies
+strikes the reader as forcible in itself, and as capable of achieving
+excellence, if it could only be divorced from the bad disposition and
+deformed conscience which direct its exercise. He has fancy, and he
+frequently stutters into imagination; but the imp that controls his
+heart corrupts his taste and taints his sense of beauty, and the result
+is that he has a malicious satisfaction in deliberately choosing words
+whose uncouthness finds no extenuation in their expressiveness, and in
+forging elaborate metaphors which disgust rather than delight. His
+description of a storm at sea is among the least unfavorable specimens
+of this perversion of his poetical powers:--
+
+         "The sea grew mad:
+
+       *   *   *   *
+
+    Strait swarthy darkness _popt out_ Phoebus' eye,
+    And blurred the jocund face of bright-cheek'd day;
+    Whilst cruddled fogs masked even darkness' brow;
+    Heaven bade's good night, and the rocks groaned
+    At the intestine uproar of the main."
+
+It must be allowed that both his tragedies and comedies are full of
+strong and striking thoughts, which show a searching inquisition into
+the worst parts of human nature. Occasionally he expresses a general
+truth with great felicity, as when he says,
+
+                       "Pygmy cares
+    Can shelter under patience' shield; but giant griefs
+    Will burst all covert."
+
+His imagination is sometimes stimulated into unusual power in expressing
+the fiercer and darker passions; as, for example, in this image:--
+
+               "O, my soul's enthroned
+    In the triumphant chariot of revenge!"
+
+And in this:--
+
+    "Ghastly amazement! with upstarted hair,
+    Shall hurry on before, and usher us,
+    Whilst trumpets clamor with a sound of death."
+
+He has three descriptions of morning, which seem to have been written in
+emulation of Shakespeare's in "Hamlet"; two of them being found in the
+tragedy which "Hamlet" suggested.
+
+    "Is not yon gleam the shuddering morn that flakes
+    With silver tincture the east verge of heaven?
+
+       *   *   *   *
+
+    For see the dapple-gray coursers of the morn
+    Beat up the light with their bright silver hoofs,
+    And chase it through the sky.
+
+       *   *   *   *
+
+    Darkness is fled: look; look, infant morn hath drawn
+    Bright silver curtains 'bout the couch of night;
+    And now Aurora's house trots azure rings,
+    Breathing fair light about the firmament."
+
+These last two lines appear feeble enough as contrasted with the
+beautiful intensity of imagination in Emerson's picturing of the same
+scene:--
+
+    "O, tenderly the haughty Day
+    _Fills his blue urn with fire_."
+
+The most beautiful passage in Marston's plays is the lament of a father
+over the dead body of his son, who has been defamed. It is so apart from
+his usual style, as to breed the suspicion that the worthy chaplain's
+daughter, whom he made Mrs. Marston, must have given it to him from her
+purer imagination:--
+
+                           "Look on those lips,
+    Those now lawn pillows, on whose tender softness
+    Chaste modest speech, stealing from out his breast,
+    Had wont to rest itself, as loath to post
+    From out so fair an inn: look, look, they seem
+    To stir.
+    And breathe defiance to black obloquy."
+
+If among the dramatists of the period any person could be selected who
+in disposition was the opposite of Marston, it would be Thomas
+Dekkar,--a man whose inborn sweetness and gleefulness of soul carried
+him through vexations and miseries which would have crushed a spirit
+less hopeful, cheerful, and humane. He was probably born about the year
+1575; commenced his career as player and playwright before 1598; and for
+forty years was an author by profession, that is, was occupied in
+fighting famine with his pen. The first intelligence we have of him is
+characteristic of his whole life. It is from Henslowe's Diary, under
+date of February, 1598: "Lent unto the company, to discharge Mr. Decker
+out of the counter in the powltry, the sum of 40 shillings." Oldys tells
+us that "he was in King's Bench Prison from 1613 to 1616"; and the
+antiquary adds ominously, "how much longer I know not." Indeed, Dr.
+Johnson's celebrated condensation of the scholar's life would stand for
+a biography of Dekkar:--
+
+    "Toil, envy, want, the patron, and the jail."
+
+This forced familiarity with poverty and distress does not seem to have
+imbittered his feelings or weakened the force and elasticity of his
+mind. He turned his calamities into commodities. If indigence threw him
+into the society of the ignorant, the wretched, and the depraved, he
+made the knowledge of low life lie thus obtained serve his purpose as
+dramatist or pamphleteer. Whatever may have been the effect of his
+vagabond habits on his principles, they did not stain the sweetness and
+purity of his sentiments. There is an innocency in his very coarseness,
+and a brisk, bright good-nature chirps in his very scurrility. In the
+midst of distresses of all kinds, he still seems, like his own
+Fortunatus, "all felicity up to the brims"; but that his content with
+Fortune is not owing to an unthinking ignorance of her caprice and
+injustice is proved by the words he puts into her mouth:--
+
+    "This world is Fortune's ball wherewith she sports.
+    Sometimes I strike it up into the air,
+    And then create I emperors and kings;
+    Sometimes I spurn it, at which spurn crawls out
+    The wild beast multitude: curse on, you fools,
+    'Tis I that tumble princes from their thrones,
+    And gild false brows with glittering diadems;
+    'T is I that tread on necks of conquerors,
+    And when like semi-gods they have been drawn
+    In ivory chariots to the Capitol,
+    Circled about with wonder of all eyes,
+    The shouts of every tongue, love of all hearts,
+    Being swoln with their own greatness, I have pricked
+    The bladder of their pride, and made them die
+    As water-bubbles (without memory):
+    Whilst the true-spirited soldier stands by
+    Bareheaded, and all bare, whilst at his scars
+    They scoff, that ne'er durst view the face of wars.
+    I set an idiot's cap on virtue's head,
+    Turn learning out of doors, clothe wit in rags,
+    And paint ten thousand images of loam
+    In gaudy silken colors: on the backs
+    Of mules and asses I make asses ride.
+    Only for sport to see the apish world
+    Worship such beasts with sound idolatry.
+    She sits and smiles to hear some curse her name,
+    And some with adoration crown her fame."
+
+The boundless beneficence of Dekkar's heart is specially embodied in
+the character of the opulent lord, Jacomo Gentili, in his play of "The
+Wonder of a Kingdom." When Gentili's steward brings him the book in
+which the amount of his charities is recorded, he exclaims
+impatiently:--
+
+    "Thou vain vainglorious fool, go burn that book;
+    No herald needs to blazon charity's arms.
+
+       *   *   *   *
+
+    I launch not forth a ship, with drums and guns
+    And trumpets, to proclaim my gallantry;
+    He that will read the wasting of my gold
+    Shall find it writ in ashes, which the wind
+    Will scatter ere he spells it."
+
+He will have neither wife nor children. When, he says,
+
+         "I shall have one hand in heaven,
+    To write my happiness in leaves of stars,
+    A wife would pluck me by the other down.
+    This bark has thus long sailed about the world,
+    My soul the pilot, and yet never listened
+    To such a mermaid's song.
+
+       *   *   *   *
+
+    My heirs shall be poor children fed on alms;
+    Soldiers that want limbs; scholars poor and scorned;
+    And these will be a sure inheritance
+    Not to decay; manors and towns will fall,
+    Lordships and parks, pastures and woods, be sold;
+    But this land still continues to the lord:
+    No tricks of law can me beguile of this.
+    But of the beggar's dish, I shall drink healths
+    To last forever; whilst I live, my roof
+    Shall cover naked wretches; when I die,
+    'T is dedicated to St. Charity."
+
+We should not do justice to Dekkar's disposition, even after these
+quotations, did we omit that enumeration of positives and negatives
+which, in his view, make up the character of the happy man:--
+
+    "He that in the sun is neither beam nor moat,
+    He that's not mad after a petticoat,
+    He for whom poor men's curse dig no grave,
+    He that is neither lord's nor lawyer's slave,
+    He that makes This his sea and That his shore,
+    He that in 's coffin is richer than before,
+    He that counts Youth his sword and Age his staff.
+    He that upon his death-bed is a swan.
+    And dead no crow,--he is a Happy Man."
+
+As Dekkar wrote under the constant goad of necessity, he seems to have
+been indifferent to the requirements of art. That "wet-eyed wench,
+Care," was as absent from his ink as from his soul. Even his best plays,
+"Old Fortunatus," "The Wonder of a Kingdom," and another whose title
+cannot be mentioned, are good in particular scenes and characters rather
+than good as wholes. Occasionally, as in the character of Signior
+Orlando Friscobaldo, he strikes off a fresh, original, and masterly
+creation, consistently sustained throughout, and charming us by its
+lovableness, as well as thrilling us by its power; but generally his
+sentiment and imagination break upon us in unexpected felicities,
+strangely better than what surrounds them. These have been culled by the
+affectionate admiration of Lamb, Hunt, and Hazlitt, and made familiar to
+all English readers. To prove how much finer, in its essence, his genius
+was than the genius of so eminent a dramatist as Massinger, we only need
+to compare Massinger's portions of the play of "The Virgin Martyr" with
+Dekkar's. The scene between Dorothea and Angelo, in which she recounts
+her first meeting with him as a "sweet-faced beggar-boy," and the scene
+in which Angelo brings to Theophilus the basket of fruits and flowers
+which Dorothea has plucked in Paradise, are inexpressibly beautiful in
+their exquisite subtlety of imagination and artless elevation of
+sentiment. It is difficult to understand how a writer capable of such
+refinements as these should have left no drama which is a part of the
+classical literature of his country.
+
+One of these scenes--that between Dorothea, the Virgin Martyr, and
+Angelo, an angel who waits upon her in the disguise of a page--we cannot
+refrain from quoting, familiar as it must be to many readers:--
+
+    "_Dor._ My book and taper.
+
+    "_Ang._ Here, most holy mistress.
+
+    "_Dor._ Thy voice bends forth such music, that I never
+    Was ravished with a more celestial sound.
+    Were every servant in the world like thee,
+    So full of goodness, angels would come down
+    To dwell with us; thy name is Angelo,
+    And like that name thou art. Get thee to rest;
+    Thy youth with too much watching is oppressed.
+
+    "_Ang._ No, my dear lady; I could weary stars,
+    And force the wakeful moon to lose her eyes,
+    By my late watching, but to wait on you.
+    When at your prayers you kneel before the altar,
+    Methinks I'm singing with some quire in heaven,
+    So blest I hold me in your company.
+    Therefore, my most loved mistress, do not bid
+    Your boy, so serviceable, to get hence,
+    For then you break his heart.
+
+    "_Dor._ Be nigh me still then.
+    In golden letters down I'll set that day
+    Which gave thee to me. Little did I hope
+    To meet such worlds of comfort in thyself,
+    This little pretty body, when I, coming
+    Forth of the temple, heard my beggar-boy,
+    My sweet-faced, godly beggar-boy, crave an alms,
+    Which with glad hand I gave,--with lucky hand!
+    And when I took thee home, my most chaste bosom
+    Methought was filled with no hot wanton fire,
+    But with a holy flame, mounting since higher,
+    On wings of cherubim, than it did before.
+
+    "_Ang._ Proud am I that my lady's modest eye
+    So likes so poor a servant.
+
+    "_Dor._                 I have offered
+    Handfuls of gold but to behold thy parents.
+    I would leave kingdoms, were I queen of some,
+    To dwell with thy good father....
+                           Show me thy parents;
+    Be not ashamed.
+
+    "_Angelo._ I am not: I did never
+    Know who my mother was; but by yon palace,
+    Filled with bright heavenly courtiers, I dare assure you,
+    And pawn these eyes upon it, and this hand,
+    My father is in heaven; and, pretty mistress,
+    If your illustrious hour-glass spend his sand,
+    No worse than yet it does upon my life,
+    You and I both shall meet my father there,
+    And he shall bid you welcome.
+
+    "_Dor._                 O blessed day!
+    We all long to be there, but lose the way."
+
+But the passage in all Dekkar's works which will be most likely to
+immortalize his name is that often-quoted one, taken from a play whose
+very name is unmentionable to prudish ears:--
+
+    "Patience, my lord! why, 't is the soul of peace;
+    It makes men look like gods--The best of men
+    That e'er wore earth about him was a Sufferer,
+    A soft, meek, patient, humble, tranquil spirit;
+    The first true gentleman that ever breathed."
+
+A more sombre genius than Dekkar, though a genius more than once
+associated with his own in composition, was John Webster, of whose
+biography nothing is certainly known, except that he was a member of the
+Merchant Tailors' Company. His works have been thrice republished within
+thirty years; but the perusal of the whole does not add to the
+impression left on the mind by his two great tragedies. His comic talent
+was small; and for all the mirth in his comedies of "Westward Hoe" and
+"Northward Hoe" we are probably indebted to his associate, Dekkar. His
+play of "Appius and Virginia" is far from being an adequate rendering of
+one of the most beautiful and affecting fables that ever crept into
+history. "The Devil's Law Case," a tragi-comedy, has not sufficient
+power to atone for the want of probability in the plot and want of
+nature in the characters. The historical play of "Sir Thomas Wyatt" can
+only be fitly described by using the favorite word in which Ben Jonson
+was wont to condense his critical opinions,--"It is naught." But "The
+White Devil" and "The Duchess of Malfy" are tragedies which even so rich
+and varied a literature as the English could not lose without a sensible
+diminution of its treasures.
+
+Webster was one of those writers whose genius consists in the expression
+of special moods, and who, outside of those moods, cannot force their
+creative faculties into vigorous action. His mind by instinctive
+sentiment was directed to the contemplation of the darker aspects of
+life. He brooded over crime and misery until his imagination was
+enveloped in their atmosphere, found a fearful joy in probing their
+sources and tracing their consequences, became strangely familiar with
+their physiognomy and psychology, and felt a shuddering sympathy with
+their "deep groans and terrible ghastly looks." There was hardly a
+remote corner of the soul, which hid a feeling capable of giving mental
+pain, into which this artist in agony had not curiously peered; and his
+meditations on the mysterious disorder produced in the human
+consciousness by the rebound of thoughtless or criminal deeds might have
+found fit expression in the lines of the great poet of our own times:--
+
+                     "Action is momentary,--
+    The motion of a muscle, this way or that.
+    Suffering is long, obscure, and infinite."
+
+With this proclivity of his imagination, Webster's power as a dramatist
+consists in confining the domain of his tragedy within definite limits,
+in excluding all variety of incident and character which could interfere
+with his main design of awaking terror and pity, and in the intensity
+with which he arrests, and the tenacity with which he holds the
+attention, as he drags the mind along the pathway which begins in
+misfortune or guilt, and ends in death. He is such a spendthrift of his
+stimulants, and accumulates horror on horror, and crime on crime, with
+such fatal facility, that he would render the mind callous to his
+terrors, were it not that what is acted is still less than what is
+suggested, and that the souls of his characters are greater than their
+sufferings or more terrible than their deeds. The crimes and the
+criminals belong to Italy as it was in the sixteenth century, when
+poisoning and assassination were almost in the fashion; the feelings
+with which they are regarded are English; and the result of the
+combination is to make the poisoners and assassins more fiendishly
+malignant in spirit than they actually were. Thus Ferdinand, in "The
+Duchess of Malfy," is the conception formed by an honest, deep-thoughted
+Englishman of an Italian duke and politician, who had been educated in
+those maxims of policy which were generalized by Machiavelli. Webster
+makes him a devil, but a devil with a soul to be damned. The Duchess,
+his sister, is discovered to be secretly married to her steward; and in
+connection with his brother, the Cardinal, the Duke not only resolves on
+her death, but devises a series of preliminary mental torments to madden
+and break down her proud spirit. The first is an exhibition of wax
+figures, representing her husband and children as they appeared in
+death. Then comes a dance of madmen, with dismal howls and songs and
+speeches. Then a tomb-maker whose talk is of the charnel-house, and who
+taunts her with her mortality. She interrupts his insulting homily with
+the exclamation, "Am I not thy Duchess?" "Thou art," he scornfully
+replies, "some great woman sure, for riot begins to sit on thy forehead
+(clad in gray hairs) twenty years sooner than on a merry milkmaid's.
+Thou sleepest worse than if a mouse should be forced to take up her
+lodging in a cat's ear; a little infant that breeds its teeth, should
+it lie with thee, would cry out, as if thou wert the more unquiet
+bedfellow." This mockery only brings from her firm spirit the proud
+assertion, "I am Duchess of Malfy still." Indeed, her mind becomes
+clearer and calmer as the tortures proceed. At first she had imprecated
+curses on her brothers, and cried,
+
+    "Plagues that make lanes through largest families,
+    Consume them!"
+
+But now, when the executioners appear, when her dirge is sung,
+containing those tremendous lines,
+
+    "Of what is 't fools make such vain keeping?
+    Sin their conception, their birth weeping,
+    Their life a general mist of error,
+    Their death a hideous storm of terror,"--
+
+when all that malice could suggest for her torment has been expended,
+and the ruffians who have been sent to murder her approach to do their
+office, her attitude is that of quiet dignity, forgetful of her own
+sufferings, solicitous for others. Her attendant, Cariola, screams out:
+
+    "Hence, villains, tyrants, murderers: alas!
+    What will you do with my lady? Call for help.
+
+    "_Duchess._ To whom,--to our next neighbors?
+    They are mad folks.
+
+    "_Bosola._ Remove that noise.
+
+    "_Duchess._ Farewell, Cariola.
+    In my last will I have not much to give:
+    A many hungry guests have fed upon me;
+    Thine will be a poor reversion.
+
+    "_Cariola._ I will die with her.
+
+    "_Duchess._ I pray thee, look thou giv'st my little boy
+    Some syrup for his cold, and let the girl
+    Say her prayers ere she sleep. Now what you please:
+    What death?
+
+    "_Bosola._ Strangling; here are your executioners.
+
+       *   *   *   *
+
+    "_Duchess._ Pull, and pull strongly, for your able strength
+    Must pull down heaven upon me:
+    Yet stay, heaven-gates are not so highly arched
+    As princes' palaces; they that enter there
+    Must go upon their knees. Come, violent death.
+    Serve for mandragora to make me sleep.
+    Go, tell my brothers; when I am laid out,
+    They then may feed in quiet."
+
+The strange, unearthly stupor which precedes the remorse of Ferdinand
+for her murder is true to nature, and especially his nature. Bosola,
+pointing to the dead body of the Duchess, says:
+
+    "Fix your eye here.
+
+    "_Ferd._ Constantly.
+
+    "_Bosola._             Do you not weep?
+    Other sins only speak; murther shrieks out:
+    The element of water moistens the earth,
+    But blood flies upwards and bedews the heavens.
+
+    "_Ferd._ Cover her face; mine eyes dazzle;
+    She died young.
+
+    "_Bosola._     I think not so; her infelicity
+    Seemed to have years too many.
+
+    "_Ferd._     She and I were twins:
+    And should I die this instant, I had lived
+    Her time to a minute."
+
+We have said that Webster's peculiarity is the tenacity of his hold on
+the mental and moral constitution of his characters. We know of their
+appetites and passions only by their effects on their souls. He has
+properly no sensuousness. Thus in "The White Devil," his other great
+tragedy, the events proceed from the passion of Brachiano for Vittoria
+Corombona,--a passion so intense as to lead one to order the murder of
+his wife, and the other the murder of her husband. If either Fletcher or
+Ford had attempted the subject, the sensual and emotional motives to the
+crime would have been represented with overpowering force, and expressed
+in the most alluring images, so that wickedness would have been almost
+resolved into weakness; but Webster lifts the wickedness at once from
+the senses into the region of the soul, exhibits its results in
+spiritual depravity, and shows the Satanic energy of purpose which may
+spring from the ruins of the moral will. There is nothing lovable in
+Vittoria. She seems, indeed, almost without sensations; and the
+affection between her and Brachiano is simply the magnetic attraction
+which one evil spirit has for another evil spirit. Francisco, the
+brother of Brachiano's wife, says to him:
+
+    "Thou hast a wife, our sister; would I had given
+    Both her white hands to death, bound and locked fast
+    In her last winding-sheet, when I gave thee
+    But one."
+
+This is the language of the intensest passion, but as applied to the
+adulterous lover of Vittoria it seems little more than the utterance of
+reasonable regret; for devil can only truly mate with devil, and
+Vittoria is Brachiano's real "affinity."
+
+The moral confusion they produce by their deeds is traced with more than
+Webster's usual steadiness of nerve and clearness of vision. The evil
+they inflict is a cause of evil in others; the passion which leads to
+murder rouses the fiercer passion which aches for vengeance; and at
+last, when the avengers of crime have become morally as bad as the
+criminals, they are all involved in a common destruction. Vittoria is
+probably Webster's most powerful delineation. Bold, bad, proud,
+glittering in her baleful beauty, strong in that evil courage which
+shrinks from crime as little as from danger, she meets her murderers
+with the same self-reliant scorn with which she met her judges. "Kill
+her attendant first," exclaimed one of them.
+
+    "_Vittoria._ You shall not kill her first; behold my breast:
+    I will be waited on in death; my servant
+    Shall never go before me.
+
+    "_Gasparo._     Are you so brave!
+
+    "_Vittoria._ Yes, I shall welcome death,
+    As princes do some great ambassadors;
+    I'll meet thy weapon half-way.
+
+    "_Lodovico._     Strike, strike,
+    With a joint motion.
+
+    "_Vittoria._     'T was a manly blow;
+    The next thou giv'st, murder some sucking infant,
+    And then thou wilt be famous."
+
+Webster tells us, in the Preface to "The White Devil," that he does not
+"write with a goose-quill winged with two feathers"; and also hints that
+the play failed in representation through its being acted in winter in
+"an open and black theatre," and because it wanted "a full and
+understanding auditory." "Since that time," he sagely adds, "I have
+noted most of the people that come to the playhouse resemble those
+ignorant asses who, visiting stationers' shops, their use is not to
+inquire for good books, but new books." And then comes the
+ever-recurring wail of the playwright, Elizabethan as well as Georgian,
+respecting the taste of audiences. "Should a man," he says, "present to
+such an auditory the most sententious tragedy that ever was written,
+observing all the critical laws, as height of style, and gravity of
+person, enrich it with the sententious chorus, and, as it were, enliven
+death in the passionate and weighty _Nuntius_; yet after all this divine
+rapture, _O dura messorum ilia_, the breath that comes from the
+uncapable multitude is able to poison it."
+
+Of all the contemporaries of Shakespeare, Webster is the most
+Shakespearian. His genius was not only influenced by its contact with
+one side of Shakespeare's many-sided mind, but the tragedies we have
+been considering abound in expressions and situations either suggested
+by or directly copied from the tragedies of him he took for his model.
+Yet he seems to have had no conception of the superiority of Shakespeare
+to all other dramatists; and in his Preface to "The White Devil," after
+speaking of the "full and heightened style of Master Chapman, the
+labored and understanding works of Master Jonson, the no less worthy
+composures of the both worthily excellent Master Beaumont and Master
+Fletcher," he adds his approval, "without wrong last to be named," of
+"the right happy and copious industry of Master Shakespeare, Master
+Dekkar, and Master Heywood." This is not half so felicitous a
+classification as would be made by a critic of our century, who should
+speak of the "right happy and copious industry" of Master Goethe, Master
+Dickens, and Master G. P. R. James.
+
+Webster's reference, however, to "the full and heightened style of
+Master Chapman" is more appropriate; for no writer of that age impresses
+us more by a certain rude heroic height of character than George
+Chapman. Born in 1559, and educated at the University of Oxford, he
+seems, on his first entrance into London life, to have acquired the
+patronage of the noble, and the friendship of all who valued genius and
+scholarship. He was among the few men whom Ben Jonson said he loved. His
+greatest performance, and it was a gigantic one, was his translation of
+Homer, which, in spite of obvious faults, excels all other translations
+in the power to rouse and lift and inflame the mind. Some eminent
+painter, we believe Barry, said that, when he went into the street after
+reading it, men seemed ten feet high. Pope averred that the translation
+of the Iliad might be supposed to have been written by Homer before he
+arrived at years of discretion; and Coleridge declares the version of
+the Odyssey to be as truly an original poem as the Faery Queen. Chapman
+himself evidently thought that he was the first translator who had been
+admitted into intimate relations with Homer's soul, and caught by direct
+contact the sacred fury of his inspiration. He says finely of those who
+had attempted his work in other languages:
+
+    "They failed to search his deep and treasures heart.
+    The cause was, since they wanted the fit key
+    Of Nature, in their downright strength of art,
+           With Poesy to open Poesy."
+
+Chapman was also a voluminous dramatist, and of his many comedies and
+tragedies some sixteen were printed. It is to be feared that the last
+twenty years of his long and honorable life were passed in a desperate
+struggle for the means of subsistence. But his ideas of the dignity of
+his art were so inwoven into his character that he probably met calamity
+bravely. Poesy he early professed to prefer above all worldly wisdom,
+being composed, in his own words, of the "sinews and souls of all
+learning, wisdom, and truth." "We have example sacred enough," he said,
+"that true Poesy's humility, poverty, and contempt are badges of
+divinity, not vanity. Bray then, and bark against it, ye wolf-faced
+worldlings, that nothing but riches, honors, and magistracy" can content
+"I (for my part) shall ever esteem it much more manly and sacred, in
+this harmless and pious study, to sit until I sink into my grave, than
+shine in your vainglorious bubbles and impieties; all your poor
+policies, wisdoms, and their trappings, at no more valuing than a musty
+nut." These sentiments were probably fresh in his heart when, in 1634,
+friendless and poor, at the age of seventy-five, he died. Anthony Wood
+describes him as "a person of most reverend aspect, religious and
+temperate; qualities," he spitefully adds, "rarely meeting in a poet."
+
+Chapman was a man with great elements in his nature, which were so
+imperfectly harmonized that what he was found but a stuttering
+expression in what he wrote and did. There were gaps in his mind; or, to
+use Victor Hugo's image, "his intellect was a book with some leaves torn
+out." His force, great as it was, was that of an Ajax, rather than that
+of an Achilles. Few dramatists of the time afford nobler passages of
+description and reflection. Few are wiser, deeper, manlier in their
+strain of thinking. But when we turn to the dramas from which these
+grand things have been detached, we find extravagance, confusion, huge
+thoughts lying in helpless heaps, sublimity in parts conducing to no
+general effect of sublimity, the movement lagging and unwieldy, and the
+plot urged on to the catastrophe by incoherent expedients. His
+imagination partook of the incompleteness of his intellect. Strong
+enough to clothe the ideas and emotions of a common poet, it was plainly
+inadequate to embody the vast, half-formed conceptions which gasped for
+expression in his soul in its moments of poetic exaltation. Often we
+feel his meaning, rather than apprehend it. The imagery has the
+indefiniteness of distant objects seen by moonlight. There are whole
+passages in his works in which he seems engaged in expressing Chapman to
+Chapman, like the deaf egotist who only placed his trumpet to his ear
+when he himself talked.
+
+This criticism applies more particularly to his tragedies, and to his
+expression of great sentiments and passions. His comedies, though
+over-informed with thought, reveal him to us as a singularly sharp,
+shrewd, and somewhat cynical observer, sparkling with worldly wisdom,
+and not deficient in airiness any more than wit. Hazlitt, we believe,
+was the first to notice that Monsieur D'Olive, in the comedy of that
+name, is "the undoubted prototype of that light, flippant, gay, and
+infinitely delightful class of character, of the professed men of wit
+and pleasure about town, which we have in such perfection in Wycherly
+and Congreve, such as Sparkish, Witwond, Petulant, &c., both in the
+sentiments and the style of writing"; and Tharsalio in "The Widow's
+Tears," and Ludovico in "May-Day," have the hard impudence and cynical
+distrust of virtue, the arrogant and glorying self-_un_righteousness,
+that distinguish another class of characters which the dramatists of the
+age of Charles and Anne were unwearied in providing with insolence and
+repartees. Occasionally we have a jest which Falstaff would not disown.
+Thus in "May-Day," when Cuthbert, a barber, approaches Quintiliano, to
+get, if possible, "certain odd crowns" the latter owes him, Quintiliano
+says, "I think thou 'rt newly married?" "I am indeed, sir," is the
+reply. "I thought so; keep on thy hat, man, 't will be the less
+perceived." Chapman, in his comedies generally, shows a kind of
+philosophical contempt for woman, as a frailer and flimsier, if fairer,
+creature than man, and he sustains his bad judgment with infinite
+ingenuity of wilful wit and penetration of ungracious analysis. In "The
+Widow's Tears" this unpoetic infidelity to the sex pervades the whole
+plot and incidents, as well as gives edge to many an incisive sarcasm.
+My sense, says Tharsalio, "tells me how short-lived widows' tears are,
+that their weeping is in truth but laughing under a mask, that they
+mourn in their gowns and laugh in their sleeves; all of which I believe
+as a Delphian oracle, and am resolved to burn in that faith." "He," says
+Lodovico, in "May-Day,"--he "that holds religious and sacred thought of
+a woman, he that holds so reverend a respect to her that he will not
+touch her but with a kist hand and a timorous heart, he that adores her
+like his goddess, let him be sure she will shun him like her slave....
+Whereas nature made" women "but half fools, we make 'em all fool: and
+this is our palpable flattery of them, where they had rather have plain
+dealing." In all Chapman's comic writing there is something of Ben
+Jonson's mental self-assertion and disdainful glee in his own
+superiority to the weakness he satirizes.
+
+In passing from a comedy like "May-Day" to a tragedy like "Bussy
+D'Ambois," we find some difficulty in recognizing the features of the
+same nature. "Bussy D'Ambois" represents a mind not so much in creation
+as in eruption, belching forth smoke, ashes, and stones, no less than
+flame. Pope speaks of it as full of fustian; but fustian is rant in the
+words when there is no corresponding rant in the soul; whilst Chapman's
+tragedy, like Marlowe's "Tamburlaine," indicates a greater swell in the
+thoughts and passions of his characters than in their expression. The
+poetry is to Shakespeare's what gold ore is to gold. Veins and lumps of
+the precious metal gleam on the eye from the duller substance in which
+it is imbedded. Here are specimens:--
+
+    "_Man is torch borne in the wind; a dream
+    But of a shadow_, summed with all his substance;
+    And as great seamen, using all their wealth
+    And skills in Neptune's deep invisible paths,
+    In tall ships richly built and ribbed with brass,
+    To put a girdle round about the world,
+    When they have done it (coming near their haven)
+    Are fain to give a warning piece, and call
+    A poor stayed fisherman, that never past
+    His country's sight, to waft and guide them in:
+    So when we wander furthest through the waves
+    _Of glassy glory and the gulfs of state_,
+    Topped with all titles, spreading all our reaches,
+    As if each private arm would sphere the earth,
+    We must to Virtue for her guide resort,
+    Or we shall shipwreck in our safest port."
+
+              "In a king
+    All places are contained. His words and looks
+    Are like the flashes and the bolts of Jove;
+    His deeds inimitable, _like the sea
+    That shuts still as it opes_, and leaves no tracks,
+    _Nor prints of precedent for mean men's acts._"
+
+    "His great heart will not down: 't is like the sea
+    That partly by his own internal heat,
+    Partly the stars' daily and nightly motion,
+    Their heat and light, and partly of the place
+    The divers frames, but chiefly by the moon
+    Bristled with surges, never will be won,
+    (No, not when th' hearts of all those powers are burst,)
+    To make retreat into his settled home,
+    Till he be crowned with his own quiet foam."
+
+    "Now, all ye peaceful regents of the night,
+    Silently gliding exhalations,
+    _Languishing winds, and murmuring falls of waters,
+    Sadness of heart, and ominous secureness,
+    Enchantments, dead sleeps_, all the friends of rest
+    That ever wrought upon the life of man,
+    Extend your utmost strengths; and this charmed hour
+    Fix like the centre."
+
+              "There is One
+    That wakes above, whose eye no sleep can bind:
+    He sees through doors and darkness and our thoughts."
+
+            "O, the dangerous siege
+    Sin lays about us! and the tyranny
+    He exercises when he hath expugned:
+    Like to the horror of a winter's thunder,
+    Mixed with a gushing storm, that suffer nothing
+    To stir abroad on earth but their own rages,
+    Is sin, when it hath gathered head above us."
+
+    "Terror of darkness! O thou king of flames!
+    That with thy music-footed horse doth strike
+    The clear light out of crystal, on dark earth,
+    And hurl'st instinctive fire about the world,
+    Wake, wake, the drowsy and enchanted night,
+    That sleeps with dead eyes in this heavy riddle:
+    O thou great prince of shades, where never sun
+    Sticks his far-darted beams, whose eyes are made
+    To shine in darkness, and see ever best
+    Where men are blindest! open now the heart
+    Of thy abashed oracle, that for fear
+    Of some ill it includes would feign lie hid,
+    And rise thou with it in thy greater light."
+
+It is hardly possible to read Chapman's serious verse without feeling
+that he had in him the elements of a great nature, and that he was a
+magnificent specimen of what is called "irregular genius." And one of
+his poems, the dedication of his translation of the Iliad to Prince
+Henry, is of so noble a strain, and from so high a mood, that, while
+borne along with its rapture, we are tempted to place him in the first
+rank of poets and of men. You can feel and hear the throbs of the grand
+old poet's heart in such lines as these:--
+
+              "O, 't is wondrous much,
+    Though nothing prized, that the right virtuous touch
+    Of a well-written soul to virtue moves;
+    Nor have we souls to purpose, if their loves
+    Of fitting objects be not so inflamed.
+    How much were then this kingdom's main soul maimed,
+    To want this great inflamer of all powers
+    That move in human souls.
+
+       *   *   *   *
+
+    Through all the pomp of kingdoms still he shines,
+    And graceth all his gracers.
+
+       *   *   *   *
+
+    A prince's statue, or in marble carved,
+    Or steel, or gold, and shrined, to be preserved,
+    Aloft on pillars and pyramides,
+    Time into lowest ruins may depress;
+    _But drawn with all his virtues in learned verse,
+    Fame shall resound them on oblivion's hearse,
+    Till graves gasp with their blasts, and dead men rise._"
+
+
+
+
+OUR PACIFIC RAILROADS.
+
+
+Two thirds of the United States lie west of the Mississippi River. This
+vast domain has already exercised a tremendous influence over our
+political destiny. The Territories were the immediate occasion of our
+civil war. During an entire generation they furnished the arena for the
+prelusive strife of that war. The Missouri Compromise was to us of the
+East a flag of truce. But neither nature nor the men who populated the
+Western Territories recognized this flag. The vexed question of party
+platforms and sectional debate, the right and the reason of slavery,
+solved itself in the West with a freedom and rough rapidity natural to
+the soil and its population. Climatic limitations and prohibitions went
+hand in hand with the inflow of an emigration mainly from the Northern
+States,--an emigration fostered by political emotions and fevered by
+political injustice. While the South was menacing and the North
+deprecating war, far removed from this tumult of words the conflict was
+going on, and was being decided. And it was because slavery was doomed
+in the great West, and therefore in the nation, that rebellion ensued.
+
+It is worthy of note that the same generation which witnessed the growth
+of the Calhoun school of politics in the South, and of the Free Soil and
+(afterward) the Republican party in the North, and which followed with
+intense interest the stages of the Territorial struggle, witnessed also
+the employment of steam and electricity as agents of human progress.
+These agents, these organs of velocity, abbreviating time and space,
+said, Let the West be East; and before the locomotive the West fled from
+Buffalo to Chicago, across the prairies, the Rocky Mountains, the desert
+steppes beyond, and down the Pacific slope, until it stared the Orient
+into a self-contradiction.
+
+It was on the part of our government a sublime recognition of the power
+of steam, that, while it was struggling for existence, it gave its
+sanction to the Pacific Railroad enterprise. Curiously enough, it is
+through Kansas and Nebraska--the Epidaurus of our Peloponnesian
+war--that the two great rival Pacific Railroad routes are to run.
+
+In the summer of 1861, the project of a trans-continental railway
+connecting our Pacific communities with the older population of the East
+first assumed a practical aspect. For nearly three decades the nation
+had been dreaming of the scheme, but it had done little more than dream.
+Almost with the earliest track-laying in America, a visionary New-Yorker
+startled a sceptical generation by proclaiming the age of steam, and
+pointing at the locomotive as the instrument whereby men should yet
+penetrate the mysterious depths of the Far West, and secure for our
+growing commerce the prize of Asiatic wealth. Curious readers will find
+in the New York Courier and Enquirer of 1837 an article by Dr. Hartley
+Carver, advocating a Pacific Railroad; and in view of how little was
+known at this time of the country beyond the Alleghanies,--so little,
+indeed, that the Territories of the extreme West had no definite
+outline, but were measured from the crest of the Rocky Mountains,--the
+audacity of the proposition might justly have inspired suspicions of the
+sanity of its author. But if Dr. Carver was chimerical, he was at least
+courageous in his persistence. Ten years later, this lineal descendant
+of old John Carver transferred the question from the arena of newspaper
+discussion, and boldly memorialized Congress. Here he found a rival
+advocate in Asa Whitney, whose brain throbbed with the glowing
+possibilities of the Chinese trade, while his specious statistics and
+contagious eloquence arrested public attention. Neither of these
+projectors, however, found the atmosphere of Washington propitious.
+Failing there, they once more had recourse to the press. The discovery
+of gold in California gave fresh vigor to the agitation. In 1850, that
+notable railroad king, William B. Ogden, lent his name to the
+enterprise, and by his cogent and well-considered appeals excited
+confidence in statesmen and capitalists. Three years after, Congress
+yielded to the popular pressure, and ordered those surveys, the result
+of which lies in eleven bulky departmental volumes, and bears the name
+of "Pacific Railroad Reports." Then came the Fremont campaign, with its
+burning enthusiasm, the Pacific Railroad plank in the Republican
+platform, and the defeat which was almost a victory. The succeeding year
+a strong effort was made to secure a national charter; but though
+supported by the Senate, the measure failed to carry in the Lower House.
+
+This disastrous rebuff at Washington produced a profound indignation
+throughout wide sections; yet it may be questioned whether the arguments
+on which the railway scheme was based were sufficiently solid to justify
+such encouragement to the investment of floating capital as the passage
+of the bill would have implied. Beyond the Missouri River, even on the
+line of Western travel, population was as sparsely scattered as in an
+Indian reservation. Neither the gold reaches of Colorado nor the
+silver-bearing "leads" of the Washoe district had as yet been
+discovered. California was known only as a region of placer-digging, and
+its agricultural capacities were very inadequately comprehended. Nor had
+the Pacific Steamship Company ventured to create its China line. A
+railroad certain to cost one hundred and forty millions, as the War
+Department asserted, had in prospect for an immediate revenue only the
+meagre trade of Salt Lake City, and the freightage of bullion from the
+Pacific shore. Indeed, the prevailing faith in the enterprise almost
+passes belief, when it is remembered that no satisfactory survey had
+been made of the Sierra Nevada. That terrible pile of snow-crowned
+peaks, of deep-sunk ravines, of jagged ridges and perilous chasms, where
+the winding bridle-track scarcely permits a driver to walk beside his
+mule, seemed to defy the skill of our boldest engineers. Overland
+travellers reported depths of snow varying from twenty to fifty feet.
+Fearful stories were narrated of luckless wagon-trains caught in the
+narrow defiles by sudden mountain storms, and perishing helplessly amid
+these Alpine rigors. It was surely a legitimate question whether a
+railroad were possible in the face of such embarrassments; and it is
+fair to attribute the adverse action of Congress to these
+considerations, rather than to occult and scarcely explicable sectional
+motives.
+
+At the commencement of the next decade, all this, however, was changed.
+California had developed into a rich grape-producing country. Its
+cereals were beyond the demands of local consumption. A considerable
+trade had sprung up with Oregon, the Sandwich Islands, and latterly with
+China. The production of quicksilver was on the increase. Valuable
+copper mines had recently been opened. Moreover, the immense gold seams
+of Colorado, the vast silver deposits in Nevada, and the auriferous
+quartz of Idaho, were disclosed almost simultaneously, diverting
+population to the interior table-lands, and calling loudly for an
+economical method of transit. Upon the Pacific shore, the desire for a
+through road suddenly became intensified, while the profitableness of a
+railway, at least to the Humboldt Sink, became more and more apparent.
+If only the Sierra might be pierced! That appalling obstacle still threw
+its shadow over the enterprise. Fortunately, at this very crisis there
+wandered down from the mountain, in the pleasant summer days, a railway
+surveyor and engineer, Theodore D. Judah, who had had extensive Eastern
+experiences, and Californian as well. He was a thin, short,
+light-haired Massachusetts man, enthusiastic, conscientious, cautious,
+and with a quick eye for discovering the opportunities of science amid
+the obstacles of nature,--a trait which in an engineer is rightly named
+genius. While engaged in the survey of private claims, he had worked out
+what appeared, on a hurried examination, to be a perfectly feasible
+route through the hills. At Sacramento he modestly stated this belief;
+and in a resident merchant, Mr. C. P. Huntington, he found a willing
+listener. Mr. Huntington, who is to the California end of the Pacific
+Railroad what Durant is to the co-operating Nebraska branch, describes
+in graphic language the earnest consultations, prolonged for several
+weeks, which he and a few other friends held in Leland Stanford's store
+after the day's business was through. There were seven of these men all
+told, not one of them worth less than half a million, and each ready to
+stake his entire property in the enterprise, if it promised success. The
+maps of the new-comer were consulted, the lines carefully studied, and
+the result of their deliberations was the temporary organization of what
+is now known as the Central Pacific Railroad Company of California. The
+engineer in whose representations so much confidence was placed soon
+proved that he was worthy of that confidence; money was forthcoming; an
+adequate surveying party was sent out; and in the summer months of 1861,
+Judah demonstrated the existence of a route by the South Yuba River and
+the Donner Pass greatly superior to all other projected lines, with no
+insuperable engineering difficulties, and capable of defence against all
+interruption by freshet or snow. In the mean while the State Legislature
+had granted a charter to the incorporators in July; and at the first
+stockholders' meeting Stanford was elected president and Huntington
+vice-president of the company. It was evident, however, that an
+undertaking of such vast dimensions could not be completed without
+government help; and the Sacramento party, confident that in Mr. Judah's
+surveys lay the solution of the Pacific problem, repaired at once to
+Washington, and opened anew the railroad agitation.
+
+While the energy of the West was still engaged in penetrating the
+secrets of the formidable Sierra, a movement meaning work began to
+develop itself on the Eastern border. As a general statement, and
+without reference to individual routes, it may be said that in the
+Northern cis-Mississippi States there are two separate railroad systems,
+running in lines about parallel from east to west; the upper combination
+of routes debouching at Chicago, the lower, or central, at St. Louis.
+These lines are slightly entangled with the roads concentrating at
+Cincinnati and Indianapolis; but the division into an upper and lower
+route is sufficiently preserved to admit of distinct classification. The
+capitalists of both the great cities which form the terminal points of
+these systems had long been equally alive to the vast possibilities of
+the Pacific trade, and were eager, not only from local pride, but also
+from knowledge of the simplest principles of commercial policy, to
+secure to their respective communities the main bulk of this immense
+prospective traffic. With this view, Chicago had projected three lines
+across the State of Iowa, all of which were ultimately to converge at
+Council Bluffs. Thence across the coffee-colored Missouri, over rolling
+prairies, and up the slowly curving line of the Platte, stretched an
+easily rising ascent, which, engineers affirmed, had been graduated by
+nature as the most direct and practicable route for the interoceanic
+railroad. As yet no one of these Iowa lines was complete; but they all
+had a corporate existence, and their stockholders formed a nucleus for a
+distinct Pacific movement.
+
+St Louis, on the other hand, aided by the State of which it was the
+commercial capital, had as early as 1851 commenced the construction of
+the Missouri Pacific Railway, whose line shot straight as an arrow
+westward across the State, curving slightly to the north at its
+terminus, which was fixed at Kansas City. Four years later, the
+Territorial government of Kansas incorporated the Leavenworth, Pawnee,
+and Western Railroad, with privilege to build from Leavenworth to Fort
+Riley, and thence westerly. It is apparent that the two companies might
+readily connect, and thus form a rival grand trunk Pacific road.
+
+Both the upper and the lower-enterprises, however, remained for many
+years after their inception in a quiescent state, serving simply as
+topics of newspaper discussion, or of buncombe addresses from local
+rostrums. But in 1860-61 the unexpected discovery of large deposits of
+the precious metals in Colorado and in Nevada gave an enormous impulse
+to the carrying trade of the plains, and the same argument which proved
+so cogent in California aroused the Western capitalists from their
+lethargy. Rumors of the new line over the Sierra also found their way
+East; and the Legislature of Kansas, now a young and vigorous State,
+passed a joint resolution in March, 1862, urging on Congress the
+immediate creation of a national Pacific Railroad Company. In
+anticipation of this action, the agents of the lower route had already
+proceeded to Washington, where they found themselves suddenly in the
+presence, not only of the representatives of the Central Company of
+California, but also of the Chicago projectors and their New York
+friends.
+
+It will scarcely be profitable at the present time to descend into the
+particulars of the rivalry which interests in many respects so divergent
+necessarily entailed. A gentleman who had singular opportunities for
+arriving at an unprejudiced judgment recently informed the writer of
+this article that one company alone employed the element of "influence"
+to the extent of three millions of dollars, or its supposed equivalent.
+Facts of this nature, however, are outside of our purpose; and we shall
+limit our illustration of the character of the struggle to a brief
+glance at the curious tangle of compromises which the charter itself
+presents. Passed in the Lower House by a catch vote, and pushed with
+difficulty through the Senate by appeals to party pledges, by
+unimpeachable proofs of the feasibility of the scheme and the financial
+integrity of its advocates, and above all by intimations amounting
+almost to threats of a possible secession of the Pacific communities,
+the act of 1862 bears the evidence of a conflict of purposes in almost
+every one of its sections. It is evident, for example, that, with the
+tide of civil war beating fiercely around the national capital, Congress
+was still under the spell of the past, and severely distrustful of any
+avoidable increase of public obligations. Bonds were loaned to the
+enterprise at the rate of sixteen thousand dollars per mile for the easy
+work, with treble aid for the mountain division and double for the Salt
+Lake Valley; but this loan was made a first mortgage, twenty-five per
+cent, was reserved till the completion of the road, and the transit
+business of government was to be paid solely by the extinguishment of
+the bonded debt. The land grant also was but six thousand four hundred
+acres per mile. The clashing interests of St. Louis and Chicago are
+shown in the ignoring of any special eastern terminus, and the location
+of the initial point of a new trunk road upon the one hundredth
+meridian, at some equidistant station, to be designated by the
+President. As the Kansas party was already possessed of an organization,
+the charter modified this advantage by incorporating the Nebraska
+line[B], under the name of the Union Pacific Company, and gave it a
+predominant place in the specifications of the act. The aid of
+government, however, was proffered in equal degree to the road which
+was to cross the mountains from Sacramento, and to both the Eastern
+lines; the last two being required to complete a hundred miles each
+within two years after they had respectively filed their assent to the
+terms of the act, while the Central was to build at the rate of
+twenty-five miles a year up the ridges of the Sierra.
+
+In hard-currency times, and with the labor and iron market easy, these
+terms might have been sufficient to invite the ready aid of capital. But
+the close of 1862 and the year succeeding were the darkest periods of
+the war. Gold vibrated from 140 to 180. Iron, which in 1859, sold for
+$35 a ton, was now selling for $130. Moreover, while money was tight,
+labor was also scarce. The two great agencies on which a vast public
+work like this must inevitably depend proved utterly inadequate to the
+emergency. Nevertheless, both the companies which had already an organic
+existence bent themselves with no inconsiderable vigor to their task.
+The Central Pacific accepted the responsibilities and obligations of the
+charter six months after its passage, and commenced the work of grading
+in the succeeding February. Rails, chairs, and rolling stock were
+forwarded by sea, involving heavy expenditures for freightage, and a ten
+per cent war risk on insurance. The company endured further
+embarrassments from the lack of capital, and the fact that in California
+a metallic currency formed the only circulating medium. Nor was it the
+least of its difficulties that the enterprise met with an ambiguous
+reception in many portions of the State, San Francisco especially
+regarding it with cold indifference. The zeal with which the road was
+pushed amid these embarrassments is a striking evidence of the thorough
+faith of its projectors. Although it soon became apparent that further
+legislation would be needed to relieve them from the disabilities
+inherent in the meagreness of the government subsidy, they nevertheless
+succeeded by the 6th of June, 1864, in cutting their line through to
+New Castle, and in laying thereon a solid and continuous track.
+
+In Kansas, the Leavenworth, Pawnee, and Western Railroad Company or, as
+they were beginning to style themselves the Union Pacific Railway,
+Eastern Division, had contracted for an immediate and rapid construction
+of their line as early as September 30th. By the spring of 1863, the
+contractors, Messrs. Ross, Steele, & Co., had involved themselves to the
+extent of five millions, of dollars, and were in full operation with an
+adequate corps of laborers, grading, quarrying stone, building culverts,
+etc. Suddenly, however, all this busy movement ceased. By one of those
+strange revolutions that occasionally occur in the management of
+corporations, a man notorious throughout the whole border, familiarly
+called Sam Hallet, assumed control of the company, denounced the
+contract as in nowise valid, and peremptorily ordered the agents of the
+contracting party to abandon the work. The agents refused. Affairs now
+assumed the aspect of war. Hallet procured a company of United States
+dragoons from Fort Leavenworth, and rode down upon the contumacious
+contractors. The result of this cavalry dash is rather picturesquely
+described in a letter of this novel railroad general, dated August 15,
+1863:--
+
+"I have had an awful row with Carter, a battle on the works, and a sharp
+'pitch in' to get possession; we drove them back, and into the river,
+until they cried enough. S. S. Sharp, my foreman Section No. 1, led
+Carter to the river-bank by the collar; and but for his begging, he
+would have ducked him. I expect Steele and Carter on again with
+reinforcements. Let them come! We will put them into the river the next
+time. We have had to use _strong force_, _quick_ and _bold_. We have
+taken all their ties, houses, and works, and shall hold them."
+
+Triumphant on the battle-field, Hallet now made a rapid
+counter-movement, and effected a transfer of the ownership of the
+company to a new set of capitalists, putting them into immediate
+possession of the entire property of the old corporation. Of the legal
+merits of this singular manoeuvre we are not prepared to give an
+opinion; but it is proper for us to add, that it met with vigorous
+resistance on the part of the former stockholders, at the head of whom
+stood Fremont. Sharp litigations and stormy altercations ensued; and for
+many months most vital to its interests the whole Kansas enterprise was
+shut from view.
+
+While these two companies were moving forward, the one steadily
+overcoming financial and engineering difficulties, the other plunging
+into an inexplicable imbroglio of contested management and contested
+contracts, that great combination of capitalists which held the
+destinies of the Union Pacific met at Chicago in September, 1862, and
+took the preliminary steps for the formation of a company. Books for
+stock subscriptions were opened in every loyal State and Territory. In
+June of the next year the acceptance of the charter by a provisional
+direction was filed at Washington. Nevertheless, an annoying apathy
+filled the public mind. Capital was shy of the enterprise. The terms of
+the act of 1862 were deemed unsatisfactory. Up to August, 1863, only
+about eighty thousand dollars had been subscribed.
+
+At this point, Thomas C. Durant, whose connection with Western roads had
+inspired so much faith in the Pacific project, threw the weight of his
+capital and influence so determinately into the scale, that by October
+the subscriptions had reached two millions, and the company was in a
+condition to organize. Major-General John A. Dix was elected president,
+Dr. Durant became vice-president and general manager, and the
+preliminary survey which he had ordered at his personal expense was
+approved and officially adopted by the direction. As, however, a
+wide-spread feeling existed, not only that additional legislation was
+necessary, but that it might also be obtained, the company contented
+itself that year with the selection of its eastern terminus. President
+Lincoln was consulted; and, acting upon his unofficial sanction, the
+Union Pacific broke ground for the railroad at Omaha, then a struggling
+village in Nebraska Territory, nearly opposite Council Bluffs. The
+inaugural ceremony took place December 2d, and with this event the year
+closed.
+
+For the next few months the efforts of all the companies converged upon
+Congress. The Union Pacific Company appeared at Washington in great
+force. The Central, equally urgent, presented arguments that amounted to
+demonstration; the chief points being the energy with which they had
+striven to comply with the terms of the charter, and the painful failure
+that had attended their endeavor,--a failure clearly imputable to the
+insufficiency of the original bill. The Kansas Company, though rent in
+twain by rival boards of directors, was also on the ground, animated by
+very ambitious purposes, and with a determination to win its ends in
+spite of internal complications. The vigor with which the latter body
+took the field gave a complex character to the struggle, and very much
+prolonged it. On vital points, however, all parties were in accord, and
+in the main results of the campaign each achieved a splendid success.
+The supplementary bill, approved July 2, 1864, as much surpassed the
+legislation of two years previous as the sixteen hundred million
+national debt of 1864 exceeded the five-hundred million debt of 1862;
+The colossal expenditures of the war had led Congressmen to accept the
+estimates of railroad men with implicit credence, and to second their
+demands with generosity. The land grant was doubled, the government
+bonds were made a second lien to the roads under construction, the
+twenty-five per cent reservation was removed, and one half of government
+business was to be paid in money.
+
+The Union Pacific Company effected an important modification of the
+charter in respect to their particular interests. Their maximum capital
+was still fixed at one hundred millions, but individual shares were
+lowered from a thousand to a hundred dollars each. Furthermore, the
+hitherto unwieldy board of direction was limited to fifteen members. On
+the other hand, the Kansas organization obtained the privilege of making
+their own road the grand trunk route, connecting with the Central
+Pacific, in case they should anticipate the Nebraska line in reaching
+the one hundredth meridian, and the latter road should not appear to be
+proceeding in good faith.
+
+As the act which bestowed such signal favors had granted an extension of
+a year for the completion of the first division of each road, the Union
+Pacific was under no absolute compulsion to hasten its work.
+Nevertheless, surveying parties were kept in the field, and the contract
+for the construction of the road to the one hundredth meridian was
+signed in August. This agreement, though nominally known, as the Hoxie
+contract, derived the guaranty of its performance from the Credit
+Mobilier,--an organization with an actual capital of two millions and a
+half, recently created upon the model of the great Paris corporation,
+and in the hands of a few moneyed men whose enterprise and energy were
+admirably proportioned to their large wealth. Its heaviest capitalists
+were also stockholders in the projected road; and as payment was to be
+made in bonds and shares, the Credit Mobilier at once became an
+over-shadowing stockholder in the Union Pacific. The arrangement at a
+subsequent period may not have been wholly beneficial; but at the date
+of the contract the alliance was of incalculable importance. Although
+two millions of stock had been subscribed, the Nebraska line had in
+reality only twenty thousand dollars in its treasury. Without the Credit
+Mobilier, it would have faltered on the threshold of success. Even with
+this powerful auxiliary, it was not yet strong enough to prevent an
+unexpected and vexatious delay.
+
+The first forty miles west from Omaha had been intrusted to Peter A.
+Dey, an engineer of some experience in the West. This gentleman, whose
+ideas seem to have been limited to a straight line, had constructed a
+track satisfactory in its alignments, but with a maximum grade of eighty
+feet per mile, and involving temporary grading of one hundred and
+sixteen feet at several points of the route. A later survey, made under
+the supervision of Colonel Seymour, demonstrated the existence of a far
+better line with forty-feet grades and but nine miles longer. Placed
+upon abstract grounds, there was no question of the relative advantage
+of the two routes. The combined opinion of several of the most skilful
+railroad managers in the country was unanimous for the lower grade, as
+essential to rapid and economical transportation. But there was another
+element in the case which gave a different aspect to the affair. Dey's
+line terminated at Omaha; Seymour's, at Bellevue. If the new route were
+selected, all the magnificent dreams of the Omaha land speculators would
+be summarily dispelled. The territorial population caught the alarm.
+Public meetings were called. A committee was sent post to Washington. It
+was asserted, on grounds that were not destitute of plausibility, that
+the change was attributable quite as much to motives of a stock-jobbing
+order, as to economic considerations. To this charge Dr. Durant
+indignantly replied, but this did not appease the clamor. Nor was the
+dispute ended until after five months of tedious investigation, and a
+guaranteed promise on the part of the company, that, in adopting the new
+line, there should be no alteration of terminus.
+
+While Omaha was still in the white-heat of excitement, the contractors
+had been steadily employed in collecting material for a grand industrial
+campaign. Distant, in the line of travel then open to them, more than
+sixteen hundred miles from New York, with the Missouri River as their
+main avenue for the transportation of rolling stock and machinery west
+of St. Louis, the men who had undertaken to build the road bent
+themselves to the task with a vigor and celerity heretofore
+unequalled in railroad history. Iron from New England, shipped in
+coasting-vessels, and working its slow way through the Gulf of Mexico
+and up the knotted bends of the Mississippi; iron, from Pennsylvania by
+the lower route, and from New York by upper lines; iron in all
+conditions and shapes, from rails, chains, and spikes, to car-wheels and
+steam-engines,--came pouring in week by week, a tonnage beyond all
+estimate or comparison, and involving, from the want of rail
+connections, unparalleled expenditures. The transportation of one class
+of freight alone cost thirteen hundred thousand dollars. All other
+expenses were upon the same magnificent scale. Nebraska, though
+admirably adapted for agriculture, is singularly destitute of woodland.
+The lumber for building, and the cross-ties for track-laying, could only
+be obtained in small quantities and at great distances. Many of the
+sleepers travelled two hundred miles before they found repose on the
+road-bed. The labor market also was but scantily supplied, and agents
+for procuring navvies were despatched east, west, and south. But the
+splendid energy of the contractors had been fruitful of success. A vast
+aggregate of forces stood ready at the melting of the winter's snow and
+the click of the telegraph key to spring into enormous activity.
+
+About the middle of April, 1866, the message came, and the work began.
+Along the dead level of the Platte Valley, through endless reaches of
+prairie, and behind the meagre shelter of outlying hills, the rails are
+still falling in place,--a continuous belt of iron out-rolled over black
+loam and arid sand,--mile after mile, day after day; and with the close
+of the present year there will stretch an unbroken line of five hundred
+and twenty miles of rail across the Plains to the foot of the Black
+Hills. There is no occasion to dilate upon the wonderful systemization
+of labor which has characterized the work of construction. The public is
+already well apprised of the details, from the pens of industrious and
+graphic newspaper correspondents. The company itself has been by no
+means laggard in celebrating its enterprise. Excursion parties of
+capitalists, editors, and Congressmen have severally given in their
+testimony; but, after all, the one fact that in less than twenty months
+American energy has brought the Rocky Mountains within two and one half
+days' journey of New York--though the distance is two thousand
+miles--tells the whole story. One of the chief difficulties of this
+Nebraska route has been, as we have intimated, the scarcity of suitable
+material for cross-ties, and of fuel for the engines. The employment of
+Burnetized cottonwood, and the discovery of a very considerable quantity
+of cedar in the interior, have, however, effectually solved one phase of
+this problem; while for the production of steam science now offers
+petroleum as a practical substitute for wood and coal. But independently
+of this, the road has already reached the bituminous beds of the Black
+Hills, where it will probably find a plentiful supply for its
+necessities. Water also is obtained in sufficient quantities by digging
+from ten to twenty feet down, to the sand which filters the waters of
+the Platte.
+
+Shortly after the Nebraska Company had thrown off the drag-weight of
+local embarrassment, the Kansas line began to disentangle itself from
+legal complications; and on July 1, 1865, the enterprise passed into the
+hands of a management which, if powerless to retrieve the past, was at
+least determined to make the future secure. At the head of this new
+organization was John D. Perry of St Louis; and associated with him were
+a body of capitalists in Missouri and Pennsylvania whose financial
+ability was unquestioned, and who have since evinced a vigor and
+commercial prescience which elevate them to the level of their Eastern
+rivals. Perceiving that the miserable Fremont-Hallet quarrel had
+effectually frustrated all rivalry in the construction of a track to the
+one hundredth meridian, they made application to Congress for an
+extension of their line to Denver, by the Smoky Hill Fork, with the
+privilege of connecting at that point with the Union Pacific. The
+request was readily granted, and the usual land gift of twelve thousand
+eight hundred acres per mile accorded for the entire route. No further
+issue of government bonds was allowed; but as the company was now
+possessed of adequate capital, and as the loans to the other companies
+must all eventually be paid back, there was really very little
+difference in financial advantage on the side of the Nebraska line.
+Moreover, the slight balance against the Kansas route was quite made up
+in the greater fertility of the soil which it would traverse, and the
+large preponderance of its local business, the population along the line
+being treble that of the upper road. These considerations gave an
+elasticity to the Kansas project, and under the new management the work
+of construction has gone on rapidly. The present year will probably find
+the road halting at not less than three hundred and fifty miles west of
+Wyandotte, now the junction-point of the Union Pacific, Eastern
+Division, with the Missouri Pacific Railroad. But this company is not
+satisfied with a simple connection with the Nebraska road. It proposes,
+after making this connection, to continue its main line to San Francisco
+by an extensive detour southward, avoiding the difficult mountain
+systems between Denver and Sacramento, and at the same time availing
+itself of that immense trade which lies visible or latent throughout
+Arizona, New Mexico, and Southern California. Escaping the overwhelming
+snows of the Rocky Mountains, this route will pass through a salubrious
+region abounding in timber and bituminous coal.[C] By intersecting the
+Rio Grande at Albuquerque, it will hold out to the Southern States a
+tempting invitation to form connections, and share to the fullest extent
+in the benefits of this great national enterprise. In this way the
+Pacific Railroad stands ready to second Congress in the work of
+"reconstruction."
+
+Of the Central Pacific Road we have not as yet spoken adequately, and
+shall now be compelled to give the history of its achievements in a
+wholly insufficient space. Unlike the Eastern roads, it has allowed no
+pause in its work from the day of the first track-laying to the present
+moment. Unlike these roads, also, it has had to contend with great
+engineering difficulties from the start, while the material for its
+construction required to be brought over distances to which the
+transportation annoyances of the other lines offer no parallel. All the
+rolling stock, rails, etc. doubled Cape Horn. The timber for the
+trestle-work of bridges was brought from Puget's Sound. For laborers it
+had recourse to China. To reach the crest of the Sierra, they were
+obliged to pierce the hillsides fifteen times, the tunnelling alone
+amounting in continuous line to 6,262 feet. The eight-hour labor
+movement was an additional embarrassment. Embankments built up with
+incalculable labor, and protected by every device of engineering
+science, settled in many cases, and were repaired only after much delay
+and vast expense. Nevertheless, the indomitable projectors of the
+enterprise have proved themselves equal to their task. The Summit Tunnel
+was cut through in August of this year; and by November the road will
+have been extended, not only to the crest of the mountains, but far down
+the eastern slope. Hunter's, which is the wagon depot of the Nevada
+miners, two hundred and seventy-four miles from San Francisco, and one
+hundred and fifty miles from Sacramento, is the point which the
+locomotive is certain to reach by the close of 1867.[D]
+
+Thus far there have been built six hundred and fifty miles of completed
+road. Adding the water route to San Francisco, there are about eight
+hundred miles of continuous steam communication. Despite also the
+bleakness of the Plains in winter, and the protracted rigors of the
+Sierra, it is demonstrated that snow can be no more an obstacle to the
+railroads than icebergs have proved to the Atlantic cable. Including the
+Eastern connections with New York as the Atlantic terminus, we have,
+therefore, two thousand two hundred and fifty miles of the interoceanic
+railroad already in actual operation.
+
+From Hunter's, in Nevada, to the eastern base of the Rocky Mountains,
+stretches the long space of unfinished work, ten hundred and fifty-four
+miles of railroad line, with three sharp crests and a gently rolling
+intra-mountain desert, where the dew never falls, where the twilight
+lingers long into the evening, and the eye wearies of the wastes of
+sage-bush, and the tracts of scant grass between arid breadths of
+dazzling white alkaline sand. A glance at the grades discloses one of
+the difficulties with which the Union Pacific has now to grapple. From
+the Black Hills, within thirty miles the track must rise to its first
+and loftiest ascent, 8,242 feet above the sea-level. Then comes a
+descent of a thousand feet for the same distance, succeeded by equal
+alternations of rise and fall for eight successive points. Beyond Bear
+River, however, these gigantic mountain waves lengthen, and the vast
+interior basin rolls broadly and heavily, with an average level of
+forty-five hundred feet, past Weber Canon and Humboldt Wells. Here the
+line strikes Humboldt River, and runs southwesterly to the Big Bend of
+the Truckee River, along a region singularly favorable in its
+alignments, and described as well supplied with wood and water. In this
+respect recent surveys essentially corroborate the testimony of Fremont.
+
+The difficulties to be overcome by the Central Pacific in its route over
+and through the mountains to meet its eastern branches have already been
+described. But, notwithstanding these, the company claims that it can
+readily construct its line at the rate of one mile per day for five
+hundred working-days. It has nearly ten thousand laborers at work, most
+of them Chinese. The portion of the road completed, with its excellent
+rails, its ties of red-wood and tamarack, and its granite culverts, has
+elicited praise from government commissioners for the thoroughness of
+its execution.
+
+Though none of the routes are as yet completed, the net earnings of each
+of the three companies, over and above the interest on its bonds, have
+surpassed all expectation. In 1865 and 1866 the net earnings of the
+Central Road amounted to $936,000 in gold, and in 1867 they are
+estimated at one million dollars; and this surplus is applied to the
+construction of the road. The net earnings of the Union Pacific
+(Nebraska) Road for the quarter ending July 31, 1867, were $376,589 in
+currency. Those of the Eastern or Kansas branch, for the month of
+August alone, $235,000. Of course these estimates of the profit of the
+roads under the present circumstances are but faint indications of the
+wealth which must accrue to them upon their completion, and after the
+fuller development of the resources upon which they depend. At the
+sources of this future wealth we shall glance presently.
+
+There can be no possible occasion for rivalry between these three
+companies. Each road will take its place in the great work of
+interoceanic communication, and each will find its capacities meagre as
+compared with the commerce which awaits it. But apart from a merely
+commercial view, there are certain points of comparison between the
+various routes which demand a brief notice. The Kansas route will
+probably prove most attractive to the tourists, especially in the event
+of its making the detour through New Mexico above alluded to. The
+Nebraska route will be more monotonous, running across the level and
+treeless valley of the Platte for three hundred miles. To the traveller
+there will always be presented the same swift but shallow river at his
+side, the same bare, misty hills along the horizon, the same limitless
+stretch of the plain before and behind, and the same solitary sky above,
+save as it is varied by sunrise and sunset, until the Black Hills come
+to his relief, and he enters upon the snow-whelmed Sierra. The Central
+route is more picturesque, and also has more elements of grandeur, than
+either of the others. The Nebraska Road, on account of the character of
+the country through which it passes, will probably derive its main
+revenue from the through trade; while the Kansas--if its present purpose
+be carried out--will depend upon the local trade and its multifarious
+connections.
+
+Having traced the history of these Pacific roads, the difficulties which
+they have met and in a large degree conquered, and their general
+features, our consideration of them must from this point grow out of
+their national importance and world-wide significance. For the Pacific
+Railroad is not simply a gigantic public work, it is the world's great
+highway. The world has had several grand routes, along the line of
+which, for certain periods of time, the life-blood and intelligence of
+humanity have coursed. Such was the route which history discloses as the
+most ancient from India overland to the Mediterranean, whence it was
+continued by that old Phoenician Coast Navigation Company to the
+shores of Britain. Along this overland line grew up the great cities of
+Asia, depending upon it for their wealth, refinement, and power; and
+when commerce was diverted from the inland, and the riches of India took
+the ocean path westward, the glory of these cities departed. Such also
+was that later route which gave the Italian cities their opulence and
+strength in the Middle Ages. When the Cape of Good Hope was doubled,
+these Italian centres grew comparatively weak and lustreless. The Roman
+road to Britain laid the foundation of that power, the full development
+of which has given to London its present position as the European
+metropolis. New York City also owes her rapid and stupendous growth to
+that peculiar conjunction of circumstances which has secured her the
+control of the grand Transatlantic commercial route of present times.
+The railroads leading westward from that city, converging upon the
+termini of the Pacific lines, continue this world-route of the incoming
+era to San Francisco, and there, through the Golden Gate, we grasp the
+wealth of Eastern Asia, whence the first great world-route started.
+Events more powerful than tradition have thus revolutionized the old
+system of travel and commerce, calling them eastward. America becomes at
+once interoceanic and mediterranean, commanding the two oceans, and
+mediating between Europe and Asia. By the Pacific Railroad, Hong Kong
+via New York is only forty days distant from London. The tea and silks
+of China and the products of the Spice Islands must pass through America
+to Europe. In this connection, also, there is a profound significance
+in our alliance, every year growing stronger, with Russia, whose extreme
+southern boundary joins Japan, our latest and warmest Asiatic ally.
+
+But the development of American commercial power as against the world is
+secondary to the internal development of our own resources, and to the
+indissoluble bond of national union afforded by this inland route from
+the Atlantic to the Pacific, and by its future connections with every
+portion of our territory. In thirty years, California will have a
+population equal to that of New York to-day, and yet not be half full,
+and the city of St. Louis will number a million of souls. New York City
+and San Francisco, as the two great _entrepôts_ of trade; Chicago and
+St. Louis as its two vital centres; and New Orleans at the mouth of our
+great national canal, the Mississippi,--will become nations rather than
+cities, out-stripping all the great cities of ancient and modern
+history. As far as the resources of the West are concerned, one Pacific
+railroad, with two or three branches, will not suffice; we may need a
+road along every parallel. The West is still in a large degree _terra
+incognita_. We know it only in parts. We are indeed aware that
+California is already competing with Russia and the cis-Mississippi
+States in the production of cereals, and that the mineral region of the
+West now annually yields gold and silver worth one hundred millions of
+dollars. But California's agricultural resources are almost untouched;
+while the best "leads" of the vast mineral region are not worked, from
+the fear of a savage race. Missouri extends over thirty-five millions of
+acres of arable land, two millions of which are the alluvial margins of
+rivers, and twenty thousand high rolling prairie; but five sevenths of
+the soil is yet fallow. We see Denver and other cities of the Far West
+spring up in a day; but their growth, marvellous as it is, arises from
+the circumstance that they are great mineral centres, and is cramped and
+partial, depending upon a wearisome and insecure overland route,
+extending over hundreds of miles, via Salt Lake, to Atchison. The
+Pacific Railroad will quicken this development to its full
+possibilities; it will populate the West in a few years; and along its
+lines will spring up a hundred cities, which will advance in the swift
+march of national progress just in proportion to their opportunities for
+rapid communication with the older centres of opulence and culture.
+
+The Indians also, whose sad plaint against the inevitable civilization
+of the locomotive is still ringing in all ears, must succumb before the
+presence of this new power. When we reflect that a single regiment of
+soldiers costs a million a year, we must see that the railroad as a
+peace instrument will render more than an equivalent for all government
+assistance given to it. Moreover, our frontier posts must soon be
+rendered unnecessary by the operation of commerce. The same influence
+will also dissipate the power which the Mormons have gained solely by
+their isolation.
+
+But beyond these immediate considerations arise the magnificent
+commercial certainties which the logic of history reveals. Space fails
+us at this point of fruitful speculation; but it will suffice to say
+that the corollary of the Pacific railroads is the transfer of the
+world's commerce to America, and the substitution of New York for Paris
+and London as the world's exchange. In the train of these immeasurable
+events must come the wealth and the culture which have hitherto been
+limited to Europe. With the year 1866 began the _rapid_ work of this
+revolutionizing enterprise. The year of grace 1870 will witness its
+completion. The four years' civil war is followed by the four years'
+victory of peace. Already the Western cities are tremulous with the
+aspirations which it excites; and the metropolis of the East, with its
+new steamship lines to Brazil, its Cuban cable, and its hundred
+prospective enterprises, awaits the moment which shall lift it to
+imperial importance.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[B] The use of this phrase requires explanation. It has been previously
+stated that Council Bluffs was the point on which the Chicago lines were
+concentrating. It is now to be added, that beyond this growing
+settlement, across the Missouri River, lies Nebraska, and the proposed
+route would necessarily pass through the whole length of this State. At
+the rival roads are connected to a greater or less degree with the
+interests of the States in which are their respective eastern termini,
+and as the legal titles of the two roads are at once ambiguous and
+disagreeably long, we have preferred to designate them simply as the
+Kansas and Nebraska lines.
+
+[C] The point suggested for this divergence southward is in the vicinity
+of Pond Creek, four hundred and twenty miles west of the Missouri River.
+Thence it will deflect to the southwest, touching the base of the
+mountains one hundred and seventy miles beyond Pond Creek, near the
+boundary-line between Colorado and New Mexico. Thus, having passed
+through Southeastern Colorado, New Mexico, and Arizona, it finds its way
+northward, through the marvellously fertile region of Southern
+California, to San Francisco. It is noteworthy that this project offers
+to Mexico immediate participation in our commerce, affording the basis
+of a far more enduring annexation. It is possible that in no far-distant
+future, if this scheme is achieved, San Francisco will find a rival in
+San Diego,--four hundred and fifty-six miles southeast of the former,
+and a much nearer port for the purposes of this route. The project of a
+mountain line from Denver to Salt Lake City, connecting at that point
+with the Central Railroad, is also said to be entertained by the Kansas
+company.
+
+[D] Up to the present time, the Nebraska line has expended about
+twenty-five millions; the Central Railroad, twenty-two millions. On two
+hundred and fifty-nine miles of the Kansas Road there were also
+expended, in cost and equipment, eleven millions. All this has been
+obtained from the sale of bonds, paid-in stock, and the net earnings of
+the roads. The bonds have been made a popular loan, sold by New York
+agents, and chiefly taken in New England, New York State, and Eastern
+Pennsylvania. The purchasing clasp, though largely composed of heavy
+capitalists, consists also of those who have small sums of money to
+invest, and who seek this means as especially secure.
+
+The stockholders of the Union Pacific number from one to two hundred,
+but most of the shares are in a few hands; the Credit Mobilier, Durant,
+and the Ameses being the principal owners. The Central Railroad also
+exhibits the same phenomenon of few shareholders; all of them, of
+course, large capitalists. This gives great power in pushing the work
+on, and illustrates the tendency of the day toward consolidation.
+Hereafter, when the Central and Nebraska lines shall have combined, this
+commanding influence of a comparatively few men will make itself
+signally felt in our politics.
+
+
+
+
+GRANDMOTHER'S STORY: THE GREAT SNOW.
+
+
+It had been snowing all day, and when father came in at dark he said
+that the wind was rising, and the storm gathering power every moment,
+and that before morning all the roads would be fast locked.
+
+Grandmother is a gentle, sweet old lady, whom I remember always with the
+same serene face, bearing all earthly troubles with such holy patience
+as lifts this common life to heaven; she waits for hours in unbroken
+silence, while her face wears the rapt, mystical look of one who talks
+with angels, and then we move softly about her, and not one of us would
+by words of our own call her down from the mount of vision. Within a
+year or two she has grown quite deaf, and since this her life seems yet
+more isolated; sometimes, however, like most deaf persons, she hears
+words spoken in low tones that are not meant for her, perhaps because at
+times the spirit is vividly awake, and more than usually quick to catch
+at and interpret what else might beat in vain upon the dull, corporeal
+sense.
+
+She put by her knitting at father's words, and rose and walked feebly to
+the window, where she stood a long time looking out at the death-white
+waste, shut in by the morose, ominous sky. Then, turning slowly, her
+face alight and beautiful with that beauty which is fairer than youth,
+she said, "It puts me in mind of the Great Snow, Ephraim,--it puts me in
+mind of a good many things!"
+
+Then she came back to the fire, and sat down again in her corner. Memory
+was stirring, the Past unfolding its scroll. The knitting-work fell
+unheeded from the old, trembling fingers. She was a girl again, and the
+story of that far-off girlhood fell softly upon the evening silence.
+
+"I was only eighteen years old, Ephraim, when your grandfather moved
+down from the new State. I had lived up there in the wilderness all my
+life; and I was as shy as a wild rabbit, and, in my own fashion, proud.
+Father was poor in those days, for there were six of us children to feed
+and clothe, and mother was delicate and often ill; so we moved into a
+low, one-story house, that was old too, as well as small; but as we had
+always lived in a log-house, and this was a frame one, we were more than
+satisfied. We did not mind if the snow blew in at the cracks in the
+roof, and nestled in little drifts on the counterpane, for we were used
+to it. I remember that one bright star always peeped down at me in the
+winter through the open spaces between the boards, and shone so calm and
+clear that I used to fancy it was God's home, and somehow my prayers
+seemed surer of getting to him when I said them in the pure light of
+this star. But that was while we were in the new State. When we moved
+down country, I was a grown-up girl, able to turn my hand to any chore
+about the house; and I went to meeting in the meeting-house at the
+Corner, and had got over my childish notions.
+
+"Elder Crane was a very pious man, and he always preached long sermons
+and made long prayers. The sermons were easier to bear than the prayers,
+for the people sat through the sermon; but if you had sat down during
+the prayer, you would have been thought dreadfully wicked, and the Elder
+might have called your name right out the next Sabbath, and prayed for
+you as a poor sinner whom Satan was tempting. And so you stood up, of
+course, though the children sometimes got asleep and fell down, and
+often the girls used to faint away and be carried out. Semantha Lee did,
+at one time, almost as regularly as the Sabbath came round, until at
+last a church committee was sent to labor with her. But Semantha was a
+very free-spoken girl, and she said some hard things against Elder
+Crane's prayers. I always thought that it was more her corsets than the
+length of the prayers.
+
+"I never fainted; for up in the new State I had run wild in the woods,
+and, though I was a frail thing to look at, I had a deal of strength in
+me. But my thoughts rambled a great deal too often; and sometimes I
+doubted if I was as near God in Elder Crane's church as I used to be
+lying on my bed in the chamber of the log-house, and saying my prayers
+to the bright star that looked down so friendly. I asked mother about it
+one day, and she said that surely God was about us everywhere; but she
+added that the church was the appointed means of grace, and that I must
+follow Elder Crane closely, and try to make my heart feel the words. I
+did try, but there was so much about the Israelites in the house of
+bondage, and Moses, and the sacrifices, that, do what I would, I always
+lost myself in the Red Sea, and the chosen people entered the Promised
+Land without me. At such times, when my thoughts went wandering, my eyes
+followed them, and most frequently they went right over to Mr. Jacob
+Allen's pew. I could not well help it, indeed, for his was a wall pew,
+directly opposite ours. Mr. Allen seldom came to meeting, being old and
+rheumatic, but his wife and girls came, and his son, Ephraim.
+
+"At first I noticed Ephraim Allen just as I did the cobwebs upon the
+walls, and the yellow streaks in the wainscoting; afterward I began to
+see what a fine figure he had,--a whole head above his companions,--and
+how broad-shouldered and erect and manly he was; the narrow-backed,
+short-waisted coat that made the rest look so pinched and uncomfortable
+sat gracefully and easily upon him. He had a wide, white
+forehead,--though I did not notice this for a long time,--and short
+curly hair, that looked very black beside the fair skin. Then his cheeks
+were as bright as a rose, and his eyes--but I seldom got so far as his
+eyes, because by some chance they always met mine, and then I was much
+confused and ashamed. But always, in going out of meeting, he used to
+bow to me in passing, and say, 'Good morning, Mercy'; and then I saw
+that his eyes were a clear, dark blue, and I thought they were very
+honest, tender ones. They said that Semantha Lee had been setting her
+cap at him a good while, and I wondered if he liked her.
+
+"This was all the acquaintance we had for two years and more. There was
+not much chance for young people to meet in those days, especially where
+they were strictly brought up, as I was; for father and mother were both
+very pious, and at that time church-members thought it was sinful to
+join in the profane amusements of the world. So when an invitation came
+for me to a husking-frolic, or a paring-bee, or a dance, I was not
+allowed to go. I was shy, as I told you, but I had a girl's natural
+longing for company; and many were the bitter tears I shed up in my
+garret because I could not go with the rest. Mother used to look at me
+as if she pitied me, and once she ventured to speak up in favor of my
+going; but father said sternly that these sports were the means Satan
+used to win away souls from God,--and father was a good deal set in his
+way, and mother gave up to him, as she always did.
+
+"Once or twice Ephraim Allen came to our house, but somehow my shyness
+came over me when I heard his voice at the door, and I hid myself in the
+pantry, and pretended to be very busy turning the cheeses; and so I was,
+for I turned them over and over again, till mother came and said I
+mustn't waste any more butter. Ephraim stayed and stayed, and kept
+talking about the oxbow he had come to see about a great deal longer
+than I thought there was any need of; and I could not get courage enough
+to go out, though I was sore ashamed and vexed at my foolish shyness.
+
+"So the whole two years slipped away, and good morning was all we had
+ever said to each other. About this time I began to notice that Deacon
+Lee got in the way of looking at me in meeting, and his face was very
+sober, as if something displeased him. Semantha, too, would push past me
+in going in and out, and didn't speak to me as she always used to do
+before she went down to Boston to make that long visit among her
+relations. Deacon Lee had a brother living in Boston who was said to be
+a very rich man. Father was at his house once when he went down to sell
+the butter and wool,--as he did every winter,--and he said we could not
+imagine how beautiful it was,--carpets on all the floors, and even in
+the entry, which mother thought must make a deal of work with people
+coming in and out, especially in wet weather. But then father said the
+Lees had negro servants to do the work, and that Mrs. Lee and her
+daughters had nothing to do but sit in the parlor all day long. When
+Semantha came back after her long visit, she brought a great many fine
+things that her cousins had given her. She used to come into meeting,
+her high-heeled slippers clattering, and her clocked stockings showing
+clear down to the peaked toe; she wore a pink crape gown, and over that
+a white muslin cape that came just down to the waist in the back, and
+crossed over in front, and was pinned to her gown at the corners; it was
+bound around with blue lutestring, and her bonnet had a blue bow on it.
+It was a Navarino bonnet, and cost an extravagant price, seeing that it
+couldn't be done over.
+
+"None of us had ever seen such fine things before; and when Semantha
+came in, Elder Crane might as well have sat down, for everybody looked
+at Semantha. I thought it was well that her bonnet hid her face; for if
+she was like me, it must have been crimson. I am sure I should have died
+of mortification to have been so stared at.
+
+"Mother said she feared it was sinful for a deacon's daughter to make
+such a display, and wondered if Semantha remembered what the Apostle
+Paul says of the ornaments that women ought to wear.
+
+"But in talking of Semantha, I have forgotten Deacon Lee's queer
+behavior. He would look at me awhile, and then at Ephraim Allen. It was
+so curious, I began to fear that he was deranged. But at last I found
+out what it meant.
+
+"One day as I was coming out of meeting, and Ephraim had just said,
+'Good morning,' I looked around and there was Deacon Lee close beside
+us, watching us with a severe expression in his face. 'Young man,' said
+he, and the tone was so awful that I trembled all over,--'young man, I
+have noticed for some time past your attempts to attract the attention
+of this young woman, who, I am grieved to say,'--turning to me,--'does
+not receive this notice as she ought. Instead of assuming an expression
+of severe reproof, she blushes from time to time, and casts down her
+eyes, and I cannot discover from her face that this ungodly conduct is
+displeasing to her.'
+
+"I was so overwhelmed by this rebuke that I could not look up or speak,
+and in a minute more I should have cried in good earnest It was
+Ephraim's voice that stopped me. 'I am sure I beg Mercy's pardon and
+yours, Deacon, if I have done anything improper. I suppose I looked at
+her because my eye couldn't find a pleasanter resting-place. You won't
+pretend that Elder Crane is handsome enough to make it a pleasure to
+look at _him_.'
+
+"I was astonished, and Deacon Lee looked horrified, but Ephraim's face
+glowed all over with smiles.
+
+"'Ephraim Allen,' said the Deacon sternly, 'if you were a professor, I
+should present you to the church for irreverence. As it is, I have done
+my duty';--and with that he went away.
+
+"Most of the people had left the meeting-house by this time, but a good
+many of them were turning back to look at me where I stood near Deacon
+Lee and Ephraim Allen. I suppose they didn't know what it could mean;
+for in those days we always Walked soberly home from service, not
+profaning the holy day by common talk. And this was the reason that I
+was surprised and frightened when Ephraim, instead of going away by
+himself, walked down the steps with me, and along the road at my side.
+It was a good two miles home, and I had happened to come alone that day,
+father being laid up with a cut in his foot, and mother staying at home
+to nurse him.
+
+"The path was a beautiful one, leading through deep, still woods, now
+coming out into the edge of a clearing, and now running along a
+brookside where there were flowers nodding over the water, and
+bird's-nests in the thick grass on the bank; I thought sometimes that
+the walk did me as much good as going to church, particularly if I came
+alone, and stopped now and then to read my Bible by the way.
+
+"So we walked along, Ephraim and I; and presently we passed a great
+clump of witch-hazel bushes that were in all their bridal white, and
+Ephraim picked a bunch of the flowers, and gave them to me. He had not
+spoken a word since we started, but now he said, 'Are you very much put
+out with Deacon Lee, Mercy?'
+
+"This made me feel very much ashamed again, but I said I hoped I knew
+better than to bear anger against anybody; and then--quite excited and
+eager--I said I wanted him to forgive me if I had looked his way more
+than was proper, and not think I meant to be forward or unmaidenly. And
+Ephraim made reply that he would never believe any ill of me, no, not if
+all the deacons in the world were to testify to it; and he said that he
+owed Deacon Lee thanks for so bringing us together, for he should never
+have had the courage to come to me, though he longed for a sight of my
+face every day, and was constant at church, never missing a Sunday, so
+that he might see me. All this he said in such an earnest, sincere
+manner, and his voice was so gentle that I could not rebuke him, though
+I feared that his heart was in a dark, unregenerate state, if he cared
+so much more for me than for Elder Crane's sermons.
+
+"You won't care to have an old woman tell any more of her love-story.
+Now-a-days these things are all written in novels, and I should think
+the bloom of a girl's delicacy must be long gone before she hears such
+words said to herself. Then it was different. I had never dreamed of
+anything so beautiful.
+
+"The woods were very still all around us, only once in a while a bird
+would sing out, and then the silence fall again all the sweeter for the
+song. When the woods opened we caught glimpses of the green grain-fields
+and orchards in blossom. A chipmonk darted across the path, and,
+scampering up into a beech-tree, clung to the great brown hole, and
+looked down at us, perking his head so mischievously that I could not
+help thinking he knew our secret. And so on and on. I've often thought
+that walk was like the life we lived together, and a prophecy of
+it,--bright, and full of songs and flowers and sweetness, leading
+sometimes through shady places, but never losing sight of God's sweet
+heaven, never missing the warm winds of its inspiration and its hope.
+
+"But before this a dark time was to come.
+
+"We must have been a good while going home, for when we came in sight of
+the house there was mother standing in the door, shading her eyes with
+her hand, and watching for us, and all at once I remembered that she
+must have been anxious; there were bears in those woods, and the next
+winter one was killed in the very path where we walked.
+
+"When mother saw us coming, she smiled, and came down to the road to
+meet us, and shook hands with Ephraim in such a friendly way that my
+heart danced; I had been thinking what if father and mother should not
+approve of him.
+
+"Father was friendly too, and while they sat in the fore-room, and
+talked, mother made some of her cream biscuits for tea. Now I knew by
+this that Ephraim would find favor in her eyes, because in our house
+all unnecessary labor was forbidden on the Sabbath, and no small thing
+could have tempted mother to break over this rule. When I went to call
+them to supper, I knew that Ephraim had been speaking to father, and
+that he was kindly disposed towards Ephraim. Father named me in asking
+the blessing, and Ephraim also, speaking of him so tenderly that it
+brought the tears to my eyes.
+
+"All the rest of that summer is very dear to remember. When I think over
+my life, much of it seems misty and far away; but that summer is as
+distinct to my mind as it was when its roses had but just faded, just as
+sweet and wonderful in its sunshine, its blue skies, its fresh-blowing
+winds, its birds and flowers, as it seemed to me then,--only now I know
+what it was that so glorified it.
+
+"Ephraim had a much greater flow of spirits than I had. I was grave
+beyond my years. But I caught the love of fun from him, and mother and
+father wondered at the change in me. I think a girl always changes when
+she is engaged. A whole world of feeling that has slept is now awakened.
+Even shallow women bloom out for a brief time, and sparkle and shine
+wonderfully. To be sure they fade full soon oftentimes, and only the dry
+leaves are left of all the charm and fragrance.
+
+"And so autumn came, and winter, and with the winter the frolics which
+Ephraim was so fond of, and which he persisted stoutly were as innocent
+as church-going. But father was so disturbed when I spoke of going that
+I gave it up at once, and told Ephraim that, as long as I lived at home,
+I couldn't feel right to disobey father. So at first Ephraim stayed
+contentedly with me, but by and by the old love stirred. A bit of
+dance-music would start his color, and set his feet in motion, and it
+was plain to see where his heart was. I was sorely grieved at this; nay,
+I was more than grieved. I wanted him all to myself. I could not bear
+that he should need anything but me. Ephraim said I was exacting, and I
+thought him cold and unkind. And so there gradually grew up a coldness
+between us; and yet the coldness was all on my side. Ephraim was always
+gentle, even when I was pettish and cross. For so I was. It was partly
+physical. I was not well that winter. I did not sleep, or when I did by
+fits and starts, I woke frightened and crying. Now, my doctor would call
+it nervous sensitiveness; but then people did not give fine names to
+their humors, and mother only looked sorry, and said she was afraid I
+was growing ill-tempered.
+
+"While things were in this state, Ephraim's mother invited me to come
+and spend a week with them. I didn't feel acquainted, and I was shy
+about going; but Ephraim urged it, and mother advised it, and so at last
+I consented to go.
+
+"I was a good deal mortified that I had nothing nice to wear. My best
+gown had been in use two winters, and there were only three breadths in
+the skirt, and Semantha Lee said that nobody in Boston thought of making
+up less than four. But mother's wise counsel reconciled me. She said
+that the Allens knew we had no money to spend on fine clothes, and would
+only expect me to be clean and neat and well-behaved.
+
+"Ephraim, too, praised me boldly to my face, and pretended to think that
+nothing could be so becoming as my faded hood. It was yellow silk, and
+was made out of a turban that mother had worn when she was a girl.
+
+"After I was in the sleigh with Ephraim, all my unhappiness and anxiety
+fled, and I enjoyed every bit of the ride. It was a lonely road, and
+part of the way it went through the woods where the lately fallen snow
+lay in pure white sheets that were written all over with the tracks of
+birds, and rabbits and other wild animals; and the stillness of the
+great woods was so deep and solemn that our love-talk was silenced, and
+we rode on singing hymns. Then out of the woods, and sweeping down into
+a hollow where pleasant farms were nestled snugly together, and so up
+to Ephraim's door. Mr. Jacob Allen was a forehanded farmer, and the
+house was by far the best in town.
+
+"When we drove up to the door, Mary Allen was at the window, watching
+for us. She ran out to the sleigh, and when Ephraim told her here was
+her sister Mercy, she laughed, and shook hands,--women did not kiss each
+other then,--and said she was glad I was come to stay a week. So my
+meeting her was not at all dreadful.
+
+"While Ephraim went around to put up the horse, Mary took me into the
+fore-room, where there was a fire, and helped me with my things, and was
+as sociable as if she had known me all her life.
+
+"The room was a great deal nicer than anything I had ever seen. I was
+almost afraid to step on the carpet at first; but then I remembered that
+it must have been meant to be stepped on, or it wouldn't have been laid
+on the floor.
+
+"Pretty soon Mrs. Allen and Prudence came in. Mrs. Allen was a very
+notable woman, and when she had told me how she made her cheese, and
+that she put down her butter in cedar firkins,--she seemed to think that
+pine ones were not fit for a Christian to use, and that my mother must
+be a terribly shiftless person to put up with them,--she said she must
+go and see to the pies that were baking. I don't think she was still
+five minutes at a time while I was there, but just driving about the
+house from morning till night. And yet there were her two girls to help
+her, and mother and I did the work for eight, and took in spinning all
+the year round.
+
+"I think Prudence didn't like housework. She was very intimate with
+Semantha Lee; and what Semantha said and did and wore was pretty much
+all her talk. All that week she was at work on old gowns, altering them
+to be like Semantha's. Prudence didn't seem to fancy me at the very
+first; and though I don't want to speak evil of her, she was certainly
+rather a hard person to get along with.
+
+"One day she would remark that I would be quite good-looking if my nose
+wasn't such a pug. And another day that it was a pity I had red hair,
+for really my other features were not so bad; and she said that my gown
+was just like one she had hung up in the garret; and so in this way she
+picked me to pieces, until it seemed as if she couldn't find a good
+thing in me. But this was not as bad as the way in which she talked to
+me about Semantha.
+
+"Nobody was so handsome or so good or so smart as Semantha; and Deacon
+Lee was the most forehanded man in town. As a great secret, she told me
+that Ephraim and Semantha were once as good as engaged, and she didn't
+doubt, if anything should happen to break up the match between Ephraim
+and me, that Ephraim would go back to Semantha.
+
+"I was terribly angry at this, and I felt my lips stiffen, and it was as
+much as I could do to say, 'What could happen to break our engagement?
+Ephraim is solemnly promised to me, and it is just the same in God's
+sight as if we were married.'
+
+"Prudence looked at me a minute, and then said she 'had no idea I had
+such a temper. She had heard that I talked of uniting with the church,
+but after what she had seen, she shouldn't think--' And here she
+stopped, and it was as much what was not said as what she did say that
+vexed me so. I was heartily thankful that she was only a half-sister to
+Ephraim, for I began to fear I should hate her.
+
+"With all this Mary did not seem to dare to be her own pleasant self,
+and even Ephraim acted as if he wasn't quite at his ease. I began to be
+sadly homesick. I almost hated the sight of the carpet on the floor, and
+the high-curtained bedstead, and the tall chimney-glass, and I longed
+for the love and peace of my humble home.
+
+"I had been at Mrs. Allen's three days, when Semantha Lee came over to
+spend the day. She came in the morning, and sent back the hired man
+with the sleigh, because she meant to stay all night with Prudence.
+
+"Semantha was dressed very elegantly. She had a scarlet cloth cloak that
+came down to the bottom of her gown, and the gown itself was green silk,
+with great bishop sleeves lined with buckram, so that they stood out,
+and rattled like a drum when they hit against anything. Mary laughed at
+her because she could not go through our chamber door without turning
+sidewise; but Semantha said they were all the fashion in Boston.
+
+"She was very lively and full of fun that day, though she didn't take
+much notice of me. In the evening we had popped corn and apples, and
+when we pared the apples and threw down the long coils of peel,
+Semantha's took the shape of a letter E. She laughed and blushed, and
+pretended to be very much vexed, but she was really as pleased as she
+could be. Mary whispered to me not to mind, and said Prudence had given
+the peel a sly push with her foot to shape the E; but for all that I
+could hardly help crying.
+
+"That night all of us girls slept in the great double-bedded room.
+Semantha was with Prudence; and long after Mary was asleep I could hear
+them whispering, and every minute or two I would catch Ephraim's name.
+
+"I did not sleep much that night, and in the morning I was almost sick.
+Ephraim was very kind, and when Prudence said she was going to invite in
+some of the young people of the neighborhood that evening, he wanted her
+to put it off; but Prudence said she guessed I would be better,--she
+thought people could throw off sickness if they tried to do so. At this
+Semantha laughed so disagreeably, and looked over at Ephraim in so
+significant a way, that I am afraid I almost hated her.
+
+"The company came in the evening,--five or six merry young girls and
+young men. If my head and heart had been right, I could have enjoyed it
+too. But my head ached, and for the rest you would have thought it was
+Semantha who was engaged to Ephraim, and not I.
+
+"There was a young man there named Elihu Parsons. He was very
+handsome,--too handsome for a man,--and what with this and his pleasant
+ways he was a great favorite with the girls. I had only seen him once or
+twice, but he remembered me, and came and sat by me while the games were
+going on. I thought this was very good of him, for nobody was so much
+called for as he; but he would not leave me, and was so sociable and
+pleasant that I tried to brighten up and entertain him as well as I
+could. We were in the midst of our talk, when I happened to glance up
+and saw Ephraim looking over at us,--looking, too, as I had never seen
+him. All at once it flashed upon me that I could make him suffer as he
+had made me. From that moment an evil spirit possessed me. I felt my
+cheeks flush; my heart beat fast; I was full of wild gayety. I sang
+songs when they asked me. Elihu asked me to dance, and I danced,--I, who
+had never taken a step before in my life. I felt as light as air; I
+seemed to float through the figure.
+
+"Ephraim never came near me the whole evening, but Elihu kept close to
+me, and we had a great deal of talk that I am glad to have forgotten.
+But I remember that he laughed at Semantha Lee, and made fun of her hair
+that he said was like tow, and her eyes that squinted, and her mincing
+gait; and I listened, and felt a malicious pleasure in this dispraise of
+Semantha. Through it all my head ached terribly, and I stupidly wondered
+how I dared be such a wicked girl, and what my mother would say if she
+knew it.
+
+"By and by it was ten o'clock, and then Semantha suddenly discovered
+that she must go home. Mrs. Allen tried to persuade her to stay. But no!
+It was going to snow, she said, and she would not stay. Then Prudence
+said, if she _must_ go, Ephraim would take her home in the sleigh,
+which, of course, was just what Semantha wanted.
+
+"I don't know what made me do it, but upon this I rose and went over to
+where they were standing, and said that Elihu Parsons was going directly
+past Deacon Lee's, and would be happy to take Semantha, and that I would
+rather Ephraim should not go.
+
+"Prudence lifted up both hands, as if she was too horrified to speak,
+and looked at Semantha. Semantha giggled. She was one of those girls who
+are always laughing foolishly.
+
+"As for Ephraim, his face was dark, and his voice was cold and hard, as
+he said, 'From what we have seen tonight, Mercy, I don't think it can
+make much difference to you what I do'; and then, without another word,
+went out.
+
+"Presently I heard the sleigh-bells, and in a moment Ephraim came in at
+the front door. I hurried out to him. I would make one more effort, I
+thought.
+
+"He stopped on seeing me.
+
+"'Are you going to leave me for Semantha? You are very unkind to me!' I
+said passionately.
+
+"'You are foolish, Mercy. Semantha is our guest, and I have shown her no
+more attention than she has a right to.'
+
+"'Can't you see, Ephraim?' I cried. 'Don't you know that she came here
+on purpose to make trouble between you and me, and that Prudence is
+helping her?'
+
+"He looked surprised, then wholly incredulous. 'You are mistaken, Mercy.
+You are prejudiced against Semantha.'
+
+"I grew angry. I did not know that many men, acute enough to all else,
+are stone-blind where the wiles of a woman are concerned. 'You may go
+then, if you like. I see you don't care for me,' I said bitterly.
+
+"'You know I do care for you,' said Ephraim. His voice was softer. I
+might have won him then, if I would have stooped to persuade. But I
+would not. My pride was hurt. I turned away from him.
+
+"Presently Semantha came out and they drove off.
+
+"Pretty soon Elihu Parsons brought his sleigh round, flung down the
+reins, and came in to say good night. He held my hand and lingered,
+talking, when I was eager for his going. My gayety had fled, and every
+word cost me a pang. At last he said, 'I am going by your house. Can I
+carry any message for you?'
+
+"A wild thought darted into my mind, 'Going by our house? O, if I might
+go too!'
+
+"'You can!' he said eagerly. 'I will take you with the greatest
+pleasure.'
+
+"In an instant I had resolved to go. It seemed to me that I should die
+if I stayed under that roof another night. So I begged him to wait a
+minute, ran up stairs, packed my things; and came down and told the
+family that I was going home. They seemed thunderstruck. Only Prudence
+spoke.
+
+"'Very well,' said she. 'But I suppose you know it is all over between
+you and Ephraim if you go off in this way.'
+
+"I told her that I knew it was all over, thanks to her, and I hoped it
+was a pleasure to her to reflect that she had separated two persons who
+would never have had a hard thought of each other but for her. Mary came
+out into the entry to me crying, and said she hoped we should make it
+up. But I told her that was not likely. And so we drove away.
+
+"I was dull enough now, and Elihu had the talk mostly to himself. It was
+not till we were almost home that he said something which roused me up.
+And then I was angry with him, and asked him what he thought of me to
+suppose I would so readily on with the new love before I was off with
+the old. But I had no sooner made this speech than I burst into tears,
+and prayed him to forgive me, for I knew I had done wrong, and not say
+any more to me, since I was so wretched. I do not know well what reply
+he made, for before I had done speaking I was at home. There was the
+dear old house I had so longed for,--the little, homely, unpainted
+house, with the well-sweep taller than itself, and the great clump of
+lilacs by the front door.
+
+"I went up the path unsteadily; my head was swimming, and there was a
+curious noise in my ears. I pushed open the door. There was father with
+the open Bible before him, and his spectacles lying upon it; the room
+was bright with the fire and the light of the pine-knot, and mother was
+spinning on the little wheel, as she frequently did in the evening. Her
+face wore its own sweet, peaceful look, but when she saw me the
+expression changed to one of alarm. She said afterward that I looked
+more like a ghost than anything else.
+
+"Why, Mercy!' she cried.
+
+"Father turned slowly round, and beyond that I remember nothing. I fell
+on the floor in a dead faint.
+
+"Mother said I talked all night about what had been troubling me.
+Through all my delirium, I had an aching consciousness that Ephraim was
+lost to me forever. I would rise to go to him, as I thought, but when I
+reached the place where he had been, there was only Prudence or
+Semantha.
+
+"In the morning the doctor came, and said it was scarlet fever. The
+other children had got over it in childhood, but it had waited for me
+till now.
+
+"I was very sick for a whole month. All that time mother was an angel of
+goodness to me. When I was able to sit up, she told me that Ephraim had
+been to inquire for me often. But she said no more, and I could not tell
+her the trouble then.
+
+"I was wasted to a shadow, and was as weak as an hour-old babe. Mother
+used to tuck me up in the great arm-chair, and then the boys would push
+the chair to the window, where I could look out.
+
+"A great snow had fallen during my sickness. It had begun the night I
+came home, as Semantha predicted, and the roads had been almost
+impassable. But they were quite good again now, and father said the time
+had come for him to go down below. It was late in February, and he said
+we should not have a great deal more snow, he thought, and if he waited
+till the spring thaws came, there would be no getting to Boston.
+
+"It was arranged that the oldest boy at home should go with father, so
+that there would be nobody left with mother and me but Jem and David.
+Jem was eight years old, and David six come May; but they were both
+smart, and we thought, with their help, we could take care of the cattle
+till father came back.
+
+"I could not do much yet, and I sat in my arm-chair while mother fried
+doughnuts, and baked great loaves of bread, and made puddings, and
+roasted chickens, for them to take for food on the journey. Father's way
+was to carry his own provisions, and stay at night with friends and
+relations along the road; even if the sleighing was good, and nothing
+happened, he would be a week or more in going to Boston. So, of course,
+the supply must be pretty generous.
+
+"It was a still, bright morning when they set off, with a sky so clear
+that father thought there would be no storm for many days. After the
+excitement of their starting passed away, it seemed very quiet and
+lonesome; for you remember, though I have not said anything about it,
+that my heart was aching for its lost love.
+
+"I had said nothing about it to mother yet, but after they were gone,
+and the chores done up for the night, and the boys playing with their
+cob-houses in the corner, she sat down beside me, saying, 'Now, Mercy,
+tell me all about the trouble between you and Ephraim.' As well as I
+could for crying, I told her, feeling very much ashamed when I came to
+the part about Elihu. But mother was very gentle, and only said, 'I
+fear, my child, that savors of an unregenerate heart.'
+
+"That was true. But while I had been sick I had thought very seriously,
+and I was thankful I had not been taken away while my heart was in such
+a state. I did not dare to tell mother how God's goodness had shone down
+upon me while I lay ill in my bed, but I hoped and prayed that it would
+not leave me.
+
+"It was a relief as well as pain to see that mother blamed Ephraim. She
+said he should not have allowed himself to be deceived and influenced by
+Prudence. I told her I was sure he could not have loved me as he ought,
+and that I thought I would send back to him the little presents he had
+made me, and say that I did not hold him to his promise.
+
+"Mother agreed with me, and the next day I made up the package. There
+was a string of gold beads, and a pair of silver shoe-buckles, and a
+Chinese fan, and a hymn-book, the bunch of witch-hazel blossoms he
+picked for me that day in the woods, and, more precious than all the
+rest, a letter, six foolscap pages in length, that he had written in the
+fall, while I was visiting my cousin in Keene.
+
+"I could not help crying-while I was putting them up, and I took out the
+letter twice, thinking I might keep that. But mother said, if we were
+indeed to be separated, it was my duty to forget my love for Ephraim,
+else it would darken all my life; and life, she said, was given us for
+cheerful praise, and work, which is also praise.
+
+"After I had sent my package by the mail-rider, who passed Mr. Allen's
+house every other day, I thought my trouble would be easier to bear. But
+every day made it harder. I fell into a miserable torpid state, taking
+no interest in anything, and feeling only my misery acutely. I could not
+even pray for help, for prayer itself was a cross.
+
+"Mother was very good to me; she gave me light, pleasant work to do,
+thinking to keep me busy. But however busy my hands were, my thoughts
+were free, and used their freedom to make me suffer.
+
+"Father had been gone eight days, when one afternoon mother came in from
+the barn, where she had been to shake down some hay for the cows, with a
+face so sober that I was frightened at once.
+
+"'Why, mother! what is the matter?' I cried.
+
+"'I'm worried about your father, child,' she said, and then she went to
+the window and looked out.
+
+"'Why, mother, if he started for home yesterday--'
+
+"'He would be just in season to be caught in the snow,' she interrupted,
+with a vehemence unnatural to her.
+
+"'Snow, mother!'
+
+"I rose, and went to the window. The sky was full of great masses of
+gray clouds, that sometimes parted, and showed a steel-colored
+background, intense and cold, and immeasurably distant. Wide before us
+spread the waste, white, uninhabited fields,--the nearest house a mile
+away, and its chimney only visible above the hills which hid it. A
+tawny, brazen belt of light lying along the west, where the sun had gone
+down, illuminated the snow, and gave a weird character to the whole
+scene. There was a high wind swaying the tops of the tall trees before
+the house; and once in a while you would see a fragment of cloud caught
+from the great gray curtain, and torn into shreds, or ravelled into a
+thin web, which seemed for a moment to shut close down upon us. It was a
+strange night, a strange sky.
+
+"I felt a vague alarm. But I tried to speak cheerfully. 'It is too cold
+to snow, mother!'
+
+"She pointed to the window. Even as I spoke the air was suddenly
+darkened by a multitude of fine flakes, that crowded faster and faster,
+and were swirled about by the wind, and quickly built up a wall around
+the door.
+
+"As it grew dark the storm increased. The wind, which had been blowing
+steadily all day, rose to a gale. It tugged at the doors and windows; it
+thundered down the chimney; it caught the little house, and shook it
+till the timbers creaked; the noise was truly awful. We got the boys
+into the trundle-bed as soon as we could, and then mother brought out
+her wheel, and I took my knitting. There was a great blazing fire on the
+hearth, and the room was so warm that the yarn ran beautifully. Mother
+made out her stint that night; she was a famous spinner, and the wheel
+went as fast and the yarn was as even as if she had not been so
+dreadfully worried about father. But every few minutes she would stop
+and say she hoped he had not started, or that, having set out, he would
+be warned in time, and stop by the way.
+
+"It was so strange to see mother, who was usually calm, so put about
+that I got very nervous, and was glad when she stopped the wheel, and
+twisted up the yarn she had spun. But as she turned around toward me
+with it in her hand, she looked so strange that I cried out to know what
+was the matter.
+
+"'It is nothing,' she whispered; but I took hold of her, and steadied
+her down into the arm-chair, and then ran for the camphor. That brought
+her round; but now she looked feverish, and was shaking all over, and I
+knew that she was going to have one of her ill turns,--possibly
+lung-fever,--for her lungs were but weak, and she rarely got over the
+winter without a fever. The thought made me half wild, but I dared not
+wait to cry or fret. I knew there was no time to be lost, and I hurried
+around, and gave her a warm foot-bath, and kept hot flannels on her
+chest, and made her drink a nice bowl of herb tea as soon as she was in
+bed; for I thought when the perspiration started she would be relieved.
+I was glad enough when the great drops stood on her forehead. Yet the
+hard breathing and the rattling in the chest were not cured. I kept
+renewing the steaming flannels, as the doctor always directed, till she
+fell asleep. She slept almost all night, and I sat in the chair by her,
+occasionally rousing up to put more wood on the fire, and listen to the
+wind, which still held as fierce as it was at sundown.
+
+"By and by I dozed,--I don't know how long, but I was wakened by hearing
+Jem call out, 'Mercy! why don't it come day?'
+
+"I started up. My fire had gone down, and the room was dark. Mother was
+breathing heavily beside me.
+
+"'I say, Mercy, isn't it morning? Why don't we get up?' persisted Jem.
+
+"I begged him to be still, and, rising, made my way to the clock. I
+could not see the face, but by touching the hands I made out that it
+was eight o'clock. I knew now that we were snowed up, and that was the
+reason why it was so dark.
+
+"I kindled up the fire and lighted a pine knot. Jem and David came up to
+the hearth to dress, half crying and fretting for mother. But I pacified
+them with a breakfast of bread and milk, and while they were eating it I
+ventured to open a door. There was a solid wall of snow, I looked into
+the fore-room,--it was as dark as a cellar. Then I ran up my stairs, and
+here the little courage I had forsook me, and I grew weak and sick. For
+the snow was already even with the ledge of the chamber window, and all
+the outbuildings were as completely hidden as if the earth had swallowed
+them in the night.
+
+"I ran down stairs hastily, for I heard mother call.
+
+"She looked up at me anxiously. 'How is it, Mercy?'
+
+"'I'm afraid, mother, we are snowed up,' I said.
+
+"'And I'm sick!'
+
+"Mother was sick. That was the worst side of the trouble. It was a
+settled fever by this time, I was sure. We both knew it, we both knew
+that no help was to be had, and that she might die for want of it. We
+were both silent, neither daring to speak, not knowing how to encourage
+and strengthen the other.
+
+"Mother grew worse all day, in spite of all that I could do for her. The
+darkness in the house was most depressing, and made the situation
+tenfold more painful; though I kept a fire and a light burning as at
+evening, I had to be economical of both, for there was only a small
+stock of fuel and a handful of pine knots in the house. It was painful
+to hear the poor cows at the barn lowing for food, and to know that it
+was impossible to reach them. I might, perhaps, have gone out on
+snow-shoes and managed to get into the barn by the window in the loft;
+but father's shoes were loaned to a neighbor, and, even if they had
+been at hand, I should hardly dare to risk my strength, not yet
+renovated after my sickness, and, which was so essential to mother's
+safety, in an effort that might fail.
+
+"So the hours went on, and the day that was like night wore to a close.
+In the evening mother brightened up a little. She was calm now, and for
+the time free from pain. There was an unearthly beauty in the large,
+bright hollow eyes, and the thin cheeks, where the rose of fever burned.
+The disease had worked swiftly. Even this revival might be only a
+forerunner of death.
+
+"'I want to tell you, dear,' she said, 'what to do in case I should not
+get well.'
+
+"I hid my face in the quilt, and tried not to sob, while she went on, in
+a sweet, calm, thoughtful way, to tell me of the things that in my
+inexperience I might forget. I must not be wasteful of food or fuel; if
+the snow--which was still falling--should cover the chimney so that I
+could not make a fire, I must wrap myself and the children in all the
+warm things I could find,--there were some new blankets in the chest in
+the chamber, she said, that she had meant for me. I must get those if I
+needed them. 'And if I am not here to encourage you, my child,' she said
+tenderly, 'don't give up hoping. Help cannot be very far off. Some of
+the neighbors will come to us, or father will work his way through the
+snow, and get home. And, Mercy, don't be afraid of the poor body that I
+shall leave behind me. Think of it as the empty house that I have used
+for a little while, and be sure it can do you no harm.'
+
+"I promised all she asked, and hid my tears as well as I could. While
+she slept, and I could do nothing for her, I kept the children quiet
+with playthings and stories. I cooked bread and meat, and made a great
+kettle of porridge against the time when we might not be able to have a
+fire; I hunted in the garret for bits of old boards and broken
+furniture that might serve for fuel.
+
+"For two days the wind held, and then there fell an awful silence as of
+the grave.
+
+"Sometimes I read from the Psalms, or from the Gospel of John, which
+mother dearly loved; and though she did not take much notice, but lay in
+a stupor most of the time, the holy words were comfort and company to
+me. At other times I sat in mute grief, watching her painful breathing,
+and the gradual pinching and sharpening of her features as the
+relentless disease worked upon them. O, it was hard! I don't think many
+lives know so much and such utter misery. In my anxiety and grief, and
+the mental bewilderment resulting from loss of sleep, I forgot to reckon
+the days as they passed.
+
+"But one day, as I sat by mother's pillow, my mind full of the dread
+that seemed now as if it might any moment be realized,--of the awfulness
+of being left alone in that living tomb with the marble image of what
+was and yet was not my mother, the clock struck nine in the morning.
+Somewhere the sun was shining, I thought. Somewhere there were happy
+lovers, merry-makings in divers places, wedding-bells ringing.
+
+"A faint sound disturbed my revery. I started up and listened intently;
+but the noise did not recur, and I dropped my head again, thinking my
+fancy had cheated me.
+
+"I don't know why it was that what failed to reach my strained ear found
+its way to mother's; but all at once, from having been in a stupid state
+from which I could hardly rouse her, she opened her eyes, and said,
+'What is that?'
+
+"'Do you hear anything?' I asked, trembling. But before she could
+answer, I too heard a shout.
+
+"Help was at hand! And mother might yet be saved!
+
+"I burst into tears, and Jem and David set up a loud cry for company.
+Those outside heard it, for the next instant there was a great halloo.
+They were cutting their way through the drift,--they came every minute
+nearer and nearer. Pretty soon I heard a voice that set my heart beating
+and made me sob again. It was Ephraim's.
+
+"'Are you all alive?' he cried.
+
+"'We are all alive, but mother is very sick.'
+
+"I don't know how long it took to tunnel that huge snow-drift. I sat
+holding mother's hand till there was a noise at the door. I sprang up
+then, and the next instant stood face to face with Ephraim. And we did
+not meet as we had parted.
+
+"I was glad to think that we owed our deliverance to him. He had roused
+up the neighbors, and they came over that trackless waste on snow-shoes.
+On snow-shoes Ephraim went for the doctor, and mother began to mend from
+the time of his coming.
+
+"It was a week before father got home. Yet he had come as fast as the
+roads would let him, travelling night and day in his eagerness to reach
+us. He told us of houses snowed up, and people and animals perishing
+miserably. And by God's grace we were saved, even to the cows, which in
+their hunger had broken loose from their stalls, and eaten the hay from
+the mow.
+
+"And so my life's greatest joy and pain came to me by the storm. It gave
+Ephraim back to me. For forty years as man and wife we had never a hard
+word.
+
+"'Tis thirty years since he went,--thirty years of Heaven's peace for
+him. I did not think to wait so long when he went. The children have
+been very good to me, but I've missed their father always. But I shall
+go to him soon. Son Ephraim, I am ninety-two to-morrow!"
+
+
+
+
+TOUJOURS AMOUR.
+
+
+    Prithee tell me, Dimple-Chin,
+    At what age does Love begin?
+    Your blue eyes have scarcely seen
+    Summers three, my fairy queen,
+    But a miracle of sweets,
+    Soft approaches, sly retreats,
+    Show the little archer there,
+    Hidden in your pretty hair:
+    When didst learn a heart to win?
+    Prithee tell me, Dimple-Chin!
+
+        "Oh!" the rosy lips reply,
+        "I can't tell you if I try!
+      'Tis so long I can't remember:
+        Ask some younger Miss than I!"
+
+    Tell, O tell me, Grizzled-Face,
+    Do your heart and head keep pace?
+    When does hoary Love expire,
+    When do frosts put out the fire?
+    Can its embers burn below
+    All that chill December snow?
+    Care you still soft hands to press,
+    Bonny heads to smooth and bless?
+    When does Love give up the chase?
+    Tell, O tell me, Grizzled-Face!
+
+        "Ah!" the wise old lips reply,
+        "Youth may pass and strength may die;
+      But of Love I can't foretoken:
+        Ask some older Sage than I!"
+
+
+
+
+AMONG THE WORKERS IN SILVER.
+
+
+Excursionists to Lake Superior, when they get away up in the northern
+part of Lake Huron, where are those "four thousand islands" lying flat
+and green in the sun, without a tree or a hut upon them, see at length,
+in the distance, a building like a large storehouse, evidently not made
+by Indian hands. The thing is neither rich nor rare; the only wonder is,
+how it got there. For many hours before coming in sight of this
+building, no sign of human life is visible, unless, perchance, the
+joyful passengers catch sight of a dug-out canoe, with a blanket for a
+sail, in which an Indian fisherman sits solitary and motionless, as
+though he too were one of the inanimate features of the scene. On
+drawing near this most unexpected structure, the curiosity of the
+travellers is changed into wild wonder. It is a storehouse with all the
+modern improvements, and over the door is a well-painted sign, bearing
+the words,
+
+                    RASPBERRY JAM.
+
+If the present writer, when he first beheld this sign, had read thereon,
+"Opera-Glasses for hire," or "Kid Gloves cleaned by a new and improved
+method," he could not have been more surprised or more puzzled. The
+explanation, however, was very simple. Many years ago, it seems, a
+Yankee visiting that region discovered thousands upon thousands of acres
+of raspberry-bushes hanging full of fruit, and all going to waste. He
+also observed that Indian girls and squaws in considerable numbers lived
+near by. Putting this and that together, he conceived the idea of a
+novel speculation. In the summer following he returned to the place,
+with a copper kettle, many barrels of sugar, and plenty of large stone
+jars. For one cent a pail he had as many raspberries picked as he could
+use; and he kept boiling and jarring until he had filled all his vessels
+with jam, when he put them on board a sloop, took them down to Detroit,
+and sold them. The article being approved, and the speculation being
+profitable, he returned every year to the raspberry country, and the
+business grew to an extent which warranted the erection of this large
+and well-appointed building. In the Western country, the raspberry jam
+made in the region of Lake Huron has been for twenty years an
+established article of trade. We had the curiosity once to taste tarts
+made of it, and can testify that it was as bad as heart could wish. It
+appeared to be a soggy mixture of melted brown sugar and small seeds.
+
+But that is neither here nor there. The oddity of our adventure was in
+discovering such an establishment in such a place. Since that time we
+have often had similar surprises, especially in New England, where
+curious industries have established themselves in the most
+out-of-the-way nooks. In a hamlet of three or four houses and a church,
+we see such signs as "Melodeon Manufactory." At a town in Northern
+Vermont we find four hundred men busy, the year round, in making those
+great Fairbanks Scales, which can weigh an apple or a train of cars.
+There is nothing in St. Johnsbury which marks it out as the town in the
+universe fittest to produce huge scales for mankind. The business exists
+there because, forty years ago, there were three excellent heads in the
+place upon the shoulders of three brothers, who put those heads
+together, and learned how to make and how to sell scales. All over New
+England, industries have rooted themselves which appear to have no
+congruity with the places in which they are found. We heard the other
+day of a village in which are made every year three bushels of gold
+rings. We ourselves passed, some time ago, in a remarkably plain New
+England town, a manufactory of fine diamond jewelry. In another
+town--Providence--there are seventy-two manufactories of common jewelry.
+Now what is there in the character or in the situation of this city of
+Roger Williams, that should have invited thither so many makers of cheap
+trinkets? It is a solid town, that makes little show for its great
+wealth, and contains less than the average number of people capable of
+wearing tawdry ornaments. Nevertheless, along with machine-shops of
+Titanic power, and cotton-mills of vast extent, we find these
+seventy-two manufactories of jewelry. The reason is, that, about the
+year 1795, one man, named Dodge, prospered in Providence by making such
+jewelry as the simple people of those simple old times would buy of the
+passing pedler. His prosperity lured others into the business, until it
+has grown to its present proportions, and supplies half the country with
+the glittering trash which we all despise upon others and love upon
+ourselves.
+
+But there is something at Providence less to be expected even than
+seventy-two manufactories of jewelry: it is the largest manufactory of
+solid silver-ware in the world! In a city so elegant and refined as
+Providence, where wealth is so real and stable, we should naturally
+expect to find on the sideboards plenty of silver plate; but we were
+unprepared to discover there three or four hundred skilful men making
+silver-ware for the rest of mankind, and all in one establishment,--that
+of the Gorham Manufacturing Company. This is not only the largest
+concern of the kind in existence, but it is the most complete. Every
+operation of the business, from the melting of the coin out of which the
+ware is made, to the making of the packing-boxes in which it is conveyed
+to New York, takes place in this one congregation of buildings. Nor do
+we hesitate to say, after an attentive examination of the products of
+European taste, that the articles bearing the stamp of this American
+house are not equalled by those imported. There is a fine simplicity and
+boldness of outline about the forms produced here, together with an
+absence of useless and pointless ornament, which render them at once
+more pleasing and more useful than any others we have seen.
+
+It was while going over this interesting establishment, that the
+raspberry-jam incident recurred to us. _This_ thing, however, is both
+rich and rare; and yet the wonder remains how it got there. It got there
+because, forty years ago, an honest man began there a business which has
+grown steadily to this day. It got there just as all the rooted
+businesses of New England got where we find them now. In the brief
+history of this one enterprise we may read the history of the industry
+of New England. Not the less, however, ought the detailed history to be
+written; for it would be a book full of every kind of interest and
+instruction.
+
+It was an honest man, we repeat, who founded this establishment. We
+believe there is no house of business of the first class in the world,
+of thirty years' standing, the success of which is not clearly traceable
+to its serving the public with fidelity. An old clerk of Mr. A. T.
+Stewart of New York informed us that, in the day of small things, many
+years ago, when Mr. Stewart had only a retail dry-goods store of
+moderate extent, one of the rules of the establishment was this: "_Don't
+recommend goods; but never fail to point out defects_." Now a man
+struggling with the difficulties of a new business, who lays down a rule
+of that nature, must be either a very honest or a very able man. He is
+likely to be both, for sterling ability is necessarily honest. It is not
+surprising, therefore, that Mr. Stewart is now the monarch of the
+dry-goods trade in the world; and we fully believe that the history of
+all _lasting_ success would disclose a similar root of honesty. In all
+the businesses which have to do with the precious metals and precious
+stones, honesty is the prime necessity; because in them, though it is
+the easiest thing in the world to cheat, the cheat is always capable of
+being detected and proved. A great silver-house holds itself bound to
+take back an article of plate made forty years ago, if it is discovered
+that the metal is not equal in purity to the standard of the silver coin
+of the country in which it was made. The entire and perfect natural
+honesty, therefore, of Jabez Gorham, was the direct cause of the
+prosperity of the house which he founded. He is now a serene and healthy
+man of eighty-two, long ago retired from business. He walks about the
+manufactory, mildly wondering at the extent to which its operations have
+extended. "It is grown past me," he says with a smile; "I know nothing
+about all this."
+
+In the year 1805, this venerable old man was an apprentice to that Mr.
+Dodge who began in Providence the manufacture of ear-rings, breastpins,
+and rings,--the only articles made by the Providence jewellers for many
+years. In due time Jabez Gorham set up for himself; and he added to the
+list of articles the important item of watch-chains of a peculiar
+pattern, long known in New England as the "Gorham chain." The old
+gentleman gives an amusing account of the simple manner in which
+business was done in those days. When he had manufactured a trunkful of
+jewelry, he would jog away with it to Boston, where, after depositing
+the trunk in his room, he would go round to all the jewellers in the
+city to inform them of his arrival, and to say that his jewelry would be
+ready in his room for inspection on the following morning at ten
+o'clock, and not before. Before the appointed hour every jeweller in the
+town would be at his door; but as it was a point of honor to give them
+all an equal chance, no one was admitted till the clock struck, when all
+pushed in in a body. The jewelry was spread out on the bed, around which
+all the jewellers of Boston, in 1820, could gather without crowding.
+Each man began by placing his hat in some convenient place, and it was
+in his hat that he deposited the articles selected by him for purchase.
+When the whole stock had been transferred from the bed to the several
+hats, Mr. Gorham took a list of the contents of each; whereupon the
+jewellers packed their purchases, and carried them home. In the course
+of the day, the bills were made out; and the next morning Mr. Gorham
+went his rounds and collected the money. The business being thus happily
+concluded, he returned to Providence, to work uninterruptedly for
+another six months. In this manner, Jabez Gorham conducted business for
+sixteen years, before he ever thought of attempting silver-ware. Such
+was his reputation for scrupulous honesty, that, for many years before
+he left the business, none of his customers ever subjected his work to
+any test whatever, not even to that of a pair of scales. It is his
+boast, that, during the whole of his business career of more than half
+a century, he never sold an article of a lower standard of purity than
+the one established by law or by the nature of the precious metals.
+
+About the year 1825, some Boston people discovered that a tolerable
+silver spoon could be made much thinner than the custom of the trade had
+previously permitted, and that these thin spoons could be sold by
+pedlers very advantageously. The consequence of this discovery was, that
+silver spoons became an article of manufacture in Boston, whence pedlers
+conveyed them to the remotest nooks of New England. One day, in 1830,
+the question occurred to Jabez Gorham, Why not make spoons in
+Providence, and sell them to the pedlers who buy our jewelry? The next
+time he took his trunk of trinkets to Boston, he looked about him for a
+man who knew something of the art of spoon-making. One such he found, a
+young man just "out of his time," whom he took back with him to
+Providence, where he established him in an odd corner of his jewelry
+shop. In this small way, thirty-seven years ago, the business began
+which has grown to be the largest and most complete manufactory of
+silver-ware in the world. For the first ten years he made nothing but
+spoons, thimbles, and silver combs, with an occasional napkin-ring, if
+any one in Providence was bold enough to order one. Businesses grew very
+slowly in those days. It was thought a grand success when Jabez Gorham,
+after nearly twenty years' exertion, had fifteen men employed in making
+spoons, forks, thimbles, napkin-rings, children's mugs, and such small
+ware. Nor would Mr. Gorham, of his own motion, have ever carried the
+business much farther; certainly not to the point of producing articles
+that approach the rank of works of art. We have heard the old gentleman
+say, that he often stood at a store-window in Boston, wondering by what
+process certain operations were performed in silver, the results of
+which he saw before him in the form of pitchers and teapots.
+
+But in due course of time Mr. John Gorham, the present head of the
+house, eldest son of the founder, came upon the scene,--an aspiring,
+ingenious young man, whose nature it was to excel in anything in which
+he might chance to engage. The silversmith's art was then so little
+known in the United States that neither workmen nor information could be
+obtained here in its higher branches. Mr. John Gorham crossed the ocean
+soon after coming of age, and examined every leading silver
+establishment in Europe. He was freely admitted everywhere, as no one in
+the business had ever thought of America as a possible competitor; still
+less did any one see in this quiet Yankee youth the person who was to
+annihilate the American demand for European, silver-ware, and produce
+articles which famous European houses would servilely copy. From the
+time of Mr. John Gorham's return dates the eminence of the present
+company, and of the production of the costlier kinds of silver-ware, on
+a great scale, in the United States. From first to last, the company
+have induced sixty-three accomplished workmen to come from Europe and
+settle in Providence, some of whom might not unjustly be enrolled in the
+list of artists.
+
+The war gave an amazing development to this business, as it did to all
+others ministering to pleasure or the sense of beauty. When the war
+began, in 1861, the Gorham Company employed about one hundred and fifty
+men; and in 1864 this number had increased to four hundred, all engaged
+in making articles of solid silver. Even with this great force the
+company were sometimes unable to supply the demand for their beautiful
+products. On Christmas morning, 1864, there was left in the store in
+Maiden Lane, New York, but seven dollars' worth of ware, out of an
+average stock of one hundred thousand dollars' worth. Perhaps we ought
+not to be surprised at this. Consider our silver weddings. It is not
+unusual for several thousands of dollars' worth of silver to be
+presented on these occasions,--in one recent instance, sixteen thousand
+dollars' worth was given. And what lady can be married, now-a-days,
+without having a few pounds of silver given to her? For Christmas
+presents, of course, silver-ware is always among the objects dangerous
+to the sanity of those who go forth, just before the holidays, with a
+limited purse and unlimited desires.
+
+What particularly surprises the visitor to the Gorham works at
+Providence is to see labor-saving machinery--the ponderous steam-hammer,
+the stamping and rolling apparatus--employed in silver work, instead of
+the baser metals to which they are usually applied. Nothing is done by
+hand which can be done by machinery; so that the three hundred men
+usually employed in solid ware are in reality doing the work of a
+thousand. The first operation is to buy silver coin in Wall Street. In a
+bag of dollars there are always some bad pieces; and as the company
+embark their reputation in every silver vessel that leaves the factory,
+and are always responsible for its purity, each dollar is wrenched
+asunder and its goodness positively ascertained before it is thrown into
+the crucible. The subsequent operations, by which these spoiled dollars
+are converted into objects of brilliant and enduring beauty, can better
+be imagined than described.
+
+New forms of beauty are the constant study of the artist in silver. One
+large apartment in the Gorham establishment--the artists' room--is a
+kind of magazine or storehouse of beautiful forms, which have been
+gathered in the course of years by Mr. George Wilkinson, the member of
+the company who has charge of the designing, and who is himself a
+designer of singular taste, fertility, and judgment. Here are deposited
+copies or drawings of all the former products of the establishment. Here
+is a large and most costly library of illustrated works in every
+department of art and science. Mr. Wilkinson gets ideas from works upon
+botany, sculpture, landscape,--from ancient bas-reliefs and modern
+porcelain; but, more frequently, from those large volumes which exhibit
+the glories of architecture. "The first requisite," he maintains, "of a
+good piece of silver-plate is that it be _well built_." The artist in
+silver has also to keep constantly in view the practical and commercial
+limitations of his art. The forms which he designs must be such as can
+be executed with due economy of labor and material, such as can be
+easily cleaned, and such as will please the taste of the
+silver-purchasing public. It is by his skill in complying with these
+inexorable conditions, while producing forms of real excellence, that
+Mr. Wilkinson has given such celebrity to the articles made by the
+company to which he belongs.
+
+Few of us, however, will ever be able to buy the dinner-sets, the
+tea-sets, the gorgeous salvers, and the tall épergnes with which the
+warerooms of this manufactory are filled. A silver salver of large size
+costs a thousand dollars. A complete dinner-set for a party of
+twenty-four costs twelve thousand dollars. The price of a nice tea-set
+can easily run into three thousand dollars. We noticed one small vase
+(six or eight inches high) exquisitely chased on two sides, which Mr.
+Wilkinson assured us it cost the company about seven hundred dollars to
+produce. There are, as yet, but two or three persons in all America who
+would be likely to become purchasers of the articles in silver which
+rank in Europe as works of art, and which are strictly entitled to that
+distinction. The wonder is who buys the massive utilities that are
+stacked away in such profusion in Maiden Lane. The Gorham Company have
+always in course of manufacture about three tons of silver, and usually
+have a ton of finished work for sale.
+
+An important branch of their business is one recently introduced,--the
+manufacture of a very superior kind of plated ware, intended to combine
+the strength of baser metal with the beauty of silver. The manufacture
+of such ware has attained great development in England of late years,
+owing chiefly to the application of the mysterious power of electricity
+to the laying-on of the silver. We must discourse a little upon this
+admirable application of science to the arts.
+
+Hamlet amused his friend Horatio by tracing the noble dust of Alexander
+till he found it stopping a bunghole. If we trace the course of
+discovery that resulted in this beautiful art, we shall have to reverse
+Hamlet's order: we must begin with the homely object, and end with
+magnificent ones. Electroplating, electrotyping, the electric telegraph,
+and many other arts and wonders, all go back to that dish of frogs which
+the amiable and fond Professor Galvani was preparing for his sick wife's
+dinner one day, about the year 1787. It was a curious reflection, when
+we were illuminating our houses to celebrate the laying of the first
+Atlantic cable, that this bewildering and unique triumph of man over
+nature had no more illustrious origin than the legs of an Italian frog.
+We are aware that the honor _has_ been claimed for a Neapolitan mouse.
+There _is_ a story in the books of a mouse in Naples that had the
+impudence, in 1786, to bite the leg of a professor of medicine, and was
+caught in the act by the professor himself, who punished his audacity by
+dissecting him. While doing so, he observed that, when he touched a
+nerve of the creature with his knife, its limbs were slightly convulsed.
+The professor was struck with the circumstance, was puzzled by it,
+mentioned it, and it was recorded; but as nothing further came of it, no
+connection can be established between that mouse and the splendors of
+silver-plated ware and the wonders of the telegraph. The claims of
+Professor Galvani's frog rest upon a sure foundation of fact. Signora
+Galvani--so runs one version of the story--lay sick upon a couch in a
+room in which there was that chaos of domestic utensils and
+philosophical apparatus that may still be observed sometimes in the
+abodes of men addicted to science. The Professor himself had prepared
+the frogs for the stew-pan, and left them upon a table near the
+conductor of an electrical machine. A student, while experimenting with
+the machine, chanced to touch with a steel instrument one of the frogs
+at the intersection of the legs. The sick lady observed that, as often
+as he did so, the legs were convulsed, or, as we now say, were
+_galvanized_. Upon her husband's return to the room, she mentioned this
+strange thing to him, and he immediately repeated the experiment.
+
+From 1760 to 1790, as the reader is probably aware, all the scientific
+world was on the _qui vive_ with regard to electricity. The most
+brilliant reputations of that century had been won by electric
+discoveries. Franklin was still alive, to reward with his benignant
+approval those who should contribute anything valuable after his own
+immense additions to man's knowledge of this alluring and baffling
+element. It was, therefore, as much the spirit of the time as the genius
+of the man, that made Galvani seize this new fact with eagerness, and
+investigate it with untiring enthusiasm. It was a sad day for the frogs
+of the Pope's dominions when Signora Galvani observed those two naked
+legs fly apart and crook themselves with so much animation. There was
+slaughter in the swamps of Bologna for many a month thereafter. For
+mankind, however, it was a day to be held in everlasting remembrance,
+since it was then that was taken the first step toward the galvanic
+battery!
+
+As fortune favors the brave, so accident aids the ingenious. After
+Professor Galvani had touched the muscles and nerves of many frogs with
+the spark drawn from the electrical machine, another accident occurred
+which led directly to the discovery of the galvanic battery. Having
+skinned a frog, he chanced to hang it by a _copper_ hook upon an _iron_
+nail; and thus, without knowing it, he brought together the elements of
+a battery,--two metals and a wet frog. His object in hanging up this
+frog was to see if the electricity of the atmosphere would produce any
+effects, however slight, similar to those produced when the spark of
+the machine was applied to the creature. It did not. After watching his
+frog awhile, the Professor was proceeding to take it down, and while in
+the act of doing so the legs were convulsed! Struck with this
+occurrence, he replaced the frog, took it down again, put it back, took
+it down, until he discovered that, as often as the damp frog (still
+hanging upon its copper hook) touched the iron nail, the contraction of
+the muscles took place, as if the frog had been touched by a conductor
+connected with an electrical machine. This experiment was repeated
+hundreds of times, and varied in as many ways as mortal ingenuity could
+devise. Galvani at length settled down upon the method following: he
+wrapped the nerves taken from the loins of a frog in a leaf of tin, and
+placed the legs of the frog upon a plate of copper; then, as often as
+the leaf of tin was brought in contact with the plate of copper, the
+legs of the frog were convulsed.
+
+People regard Charles Lamb's story of the discovery of roast pig as a
+most extravagant and impossible fiction; but, really, Professor Galvani
+comported himself very much in the manner of that great discoverer. It
+was no more necessary to employ the frog's nerves in the production of
+the electricity, than it was necessary to burn down a house in roasting
+pig for dinner. The poor frog contributed nothing to it but his
+dampness,--as every boy in a telegraph office now perceives. He was
+merely the _wet_ in the small galvanic battery. Professor Galvani,
+however, exulting in his discovery, leaped to the conclusion that this
+electricity was not the same as that produced by friction. He thought he
+had discovered the long-sought something by which the muscles move
+obedient to the will. "All creatures," he wrote, "have an electricity
+inherent in their economy, which resides specially in the nerves, and is
+by the nerves communicated to the whole body. It is secreted by the
+brain. The interior substance of the nerves is endowed with a
+conducting power for this electricity, and facilitates its movement and
+its passage from one part of the nervous system to another; while the
+oily coating of these organs hinders the dissipation of the fluid, and
+permits its accumulation." He also thought that the muscles were the
+Leyden jars of the animal system, in which the electricity generated by
+the brain and conducted by the nerves was hoarded up for use. When a man
+was tired, he had merely used his electricity too fast; when he was
+fresh, his Leyden jars were all full.
+
+The publication of these experiments in 1791, accompanied by Galvani's
+theory of animal electricity, produced a sensation in scientific circles
+only inferior to that caused by Franklin's demonstration of the identity
+of lightning with electricity, thirty years before. The murder of
+innocent frogs extended from the marshes of Bologna to the swamps of all
+Christendom. "Wherever," says a writer of the time, "frogs were to be
+found and two different metals could be procured, every one was anxious
+to see the mangled limbs of frogs brought to life in this wonderful
+way." Or, as Lamb says, in the dissertation upon Roast Pig: "The thing
+took wing, and now there was nothing to be seen but fire in every
+direction." At first the facts and the theory of Galvani were equally
+accepted; and a grateful world insisted upon styling the new science, as
+it was deemed, "Galvanism." Thus a word was added to all the languages,
+which has been found useful in its literal sense, and forcible in its
+figurative. Whatever we may think of Galvani's philosophy, we cannot
+deny that he immortalized his name. He died a few years after, fully
+satisfied with his theory, but having no suspicion of the many, the
+peculiar, the marvellous results that were to flow from the chance
+discovery of the fact, that a moist frog placed between two different
+metals was a kind of electrical machine.
+
+Among the Italians who caught at Galvani's discovery, the most skilful
+and learned was Professor Volta, of Como, who had been an ardent
+electrician from his youth. Many of our readers have seen this year the
+colossal statue of that great man, which adorns his native city on the
+southern shore of the lake. The statue was worthily decreed, because the
+matt who contributes ever so little to a grand discovery in
+science--provided that little is essential to it--ranks among the
+greatest benefactors of his species. And what did the admirable Volta
+discover? Reducing the labors of his long life to their simplest
+expression, we should say that his just claim to immortality consists in
+this,--he found out that the frog had nothing to do with the production
+of electricity in Galvani's experiment, but that a wet card or rag would
+do as well. This discovery was the central fact of his scientific career
+of sixty-four years. It took all of his familiar knowledge of
+electricity, acquired in twenty-seven years of entire devotion to the
+study, to enable him to interpret Galvani's apparatus so far as to get
+rid of the frog; and he spent the remaining thirty-seven years of his
+existence in varying the experiment thus freed from that "demd, damp,
+moist, unpleasant body." It was a severe affliction to the followers of
+Galvani and to the University of Bologna to have their darling theory of
+the nervous electricity so rudely yet so unanswerably refuted. "I do not
+need your frog!" exclaimed the too impetuous Volta. "Give me two metals
+and a moist rag, and I will produce your animal electricity. Your frog
+is nothing but a moist conductor, and in this respect is not as good as
+a wet rag." This was a decisive fact, and it silenced all but a few of
+the disciples of the dead Galvani.
+
+Volta was led to discard the frog by observing that no electric results
+followed when the two plates were of the same metal. Suspecting from
+this that the frog was merely a conductor (instead of the generator) of
+the electric fluid, he tried the experiment with a wet card placed
+between two pairs of plates, and thus discovered that the secret lay in
+the metals being heterogeneous. But it cost thousands of experiments to
+reach this result, and ten years of ceaseless thought and exertion to
+arrive at the invention of the "pile," which merely consists of many
+pairs of heterogeneous plates, each separated by a moist substance. The
+weight of so much metal squeezed the wet cloth dry, and this led to
+various contrivances for keeping it wet, resulting at last in the
+invention of the familiar "trough-battery," now employed in all
+telegraph offices and manufactories of electro-anything. Instead of
+Galvani's frog or Volta's wet rag, the conductor is a solution of
+sulphuric acid, which Volta himself suggested and employed. The negative
+electricity is conveyed to the earth by a wire, and the positive is
+conducted from pair to pair, increasing as it goes, until, if the
+battery is large enough, it may have the force to send a message round
+the world. And the current is continuous. The galvanic battery is an
+electrical machine that goes without turning a handle. By the galvanic
+battery, electricity is made subservient to man. Among other things, it
+sends his messages, faces his type with copper, silvers his coffee-pot,
+and coats the inside of his baby's silver mug with shining gold.
+
+The old methods of covering metals with a plating of silver were so
+difficult and laborious, that durable ware could never have been
+produced by them except at an expense which would have defeated the
+object. In those slow and costly ways plated articles were made as late
+as the year 1840; and thus they might be made at the present moment, if
+Signora Galvani had been looking the other way when the student touched
+the frog with his knife. More than fifty years elapsed before that
+chance discovery was made available in the art we are considering. For
+many years the discoveries of Galvani and Volta did not appear to add
+much to the resources of man, though they excited his "special wonder,"
+Elderly readers can perhaps remember the appalling accounts that used to
+be published, forty years ago or more, of the galvanizing of criminals
+after execution. In 1811, at Glasgow, a noted chemist tried the effect
+of a voltaic "pile" of two hundred and seventy pairs of plates upon the
+body of a murderer. As the various parts of the nervous system were
+subjected to the current, the most startling results followed. The whole
+body shuddered as with cold; one of the legs nearly kicked an attendant
+over; the chest heaved, and the lungs inhaled and exhaled. At one time,
+when all the power of the instrument was exerted, we are told that
+"every muscle of the countenance was simultaneously thrown into fearful
+action. Rage, horror, despair and anguish, and ghastly smiles, united
+their hideous expression on the murderer's face, surpassing far the
+wildest representations of a Fuseli or a Kean. At this period several of
+the spectators were obliged to leave the room from terror or sickness,
+and one gentleman fainted." The bodies of horses, oxen, and sheep were
+galvanized, with results the most surprising. Five men were unable to
+hold the leg of a horse subjected to the action of a powerful battery.
+
+So far as we know, nothing of much importance has yet been inferred from
+such experiments as these. Davy and Faraday, however, and their pupils,
+did not confine their attention to these barren wonders. Sir Humphry
+Davy took the "pile" as invented by Volta, in 1800, and founded by its
+assistance what may be styled a new science, and developed it to the
+point where it became available for the arts and utilities of man. The
+simple and easy process by which silver and gold are decomposed, and
+then deposited upon metallic surfaces, is only one of many ways in which
+the galvanic battery ministers to our convenience and pleasure. If the
+reader will step into a manufactory of plated ware, he will see, in the
+plating-room, a trough containing a liquid resembling tea as it comes
+from the teapot. Avoiding scientific terms, we may say that this liquid
+is a solution of silver, and contains about four ounces of silver to a
+gallon of water. There are also thin plates of silver hanging along the
+sides of the trough into the liquid. The galvanic battery which is to
+set this apparatus in motion is in a closet near by. The vessels to be
+plated, after being thoroughly cleaned and exactly weighed, are
+suspended in the liquid by a wire running along the top of the trough.
+When all is ready, the current of electricity generated by the small
+battery in the closet is made to pass through the trough, and along all
+the metallic surfaces therein contained. When this has been done, the
+spectator may look with all his eyes, but he cannot perceive that
+anything is going on. There is no bubbling, nor fizzing, nor any other
+noise or motion. The long row of vessels hang silently at their wire,
+immersed in their tea, and nobody appears to pay any attention to them.
+And so they continue to hang for hours,--for five or six or seven hours,
+if the design is to produce work which will answer some other purpose
+than selling. All this time a most wonderful and mysterious process is
+going on. That gentle current of electricity, noiseless and invisible as
+it is, is taking the silver held in the solution, and laying it upon the
+surfaces of those vessels, within and without; and at the same time it
+is decomposing the plates of silver hanging along the sides of the
+trough in such a way as to keep up the strength of the solution. We
+cannot recover from the wonder into which the contemplation of this
+process threw us. There are some things which the outside and occasional
+observer can never be done marvelling at. For our part, we never hear
+the click of a telegraphic apparatus without experiencing the same spasm
+of astonishment as when we were first introduced to that mystery. The
+beautiful manner, too, in which this silvering work is done! The most
+delicate brush in the most sympathetic hand could not lay on the colors
+of the palette so evenly, nor could a crucible melt the metals into a
+completer oneness.
+
+And here is the opportunity for fraud. In five minutes an article is
+coated with silver in every part, inside and out; and that mere "blush"
+of silver, as the platers term it, will receive as brilliant a polish,
+and look as well (for a month) as if it were solid plate. Nay, it will
+look rather better; since the silver deposited by this exquisite process
+is perfectly pure, while the silver employed in solid ware is of the
+coin standard,--one tenth alloy. The plater can deposit upon his work as
+little silver as he chooses, either by weakening his solution, or by
+leaving the articles in it for a very short time; and no man can detect
+the cheat with certainty except by an expensive and troublesome process.
+Nor will it suffice for the operator to attend to the strength of his
+solutions, and keep his eye upon the clock. As in certain conditions of
+the atmosphere we can scarcely get a spark from the electrical machine,
+so there are times when the galvanic battery works feebly, and when the
+silvering goes on much more slowly than usual. To guard against errors
+from this cause, there is no sure resource but a system of careful
+weighings. In such establishments as that of the Gorham Company of
+Providence, Tiffany's or Haughwout's of New York, Bailey's of
+Philadelphia, and Bigelow Brothers and Kennard's, or Palmer and
+Batchelder's, of Boston, each article is weighed before it is immersed
+in the solution, its weight is recorded, and it is allowed to remain in
+the solution until it has taken on the whole of the precious metal it
+was designed to receive.
+
+There was a lawsuit the other day in New York, which turned upon the
+quantity of silver deposited upon sundry gross of forks and spoons. The
+plater agreed to put upon them twelve ounces of silver to the gross,
+which is about as much as is ever deposited upon spoons or forks. If he
+had performed his contract, he would have spread over each table-spoon
+about as much silver as there is in a ten-cent piece; and such is the
+nature of silver that these spoons would have worn well for five or six
+years. In fact, there are no better plated spoons yet in use than these
+were designed to be. The plater meant to comply with the usages of the
+trade. He meant to put upon those spoons the quantity of silver which,
+in the trade, _stands_ for twelve ounces to the gross, which is about
+ten ounces to the gross. Such, was probably his virtuous intention, and
+he supposed he had carried out that intention. But when the spoons were
+put to the test, it was discovered that upon one hundred and forty-four
+table-spoons there were but three ounces and a half of silver. It came
+out on the trial that the plater never weighed his work, and trusted
+wholly to the length of time he left it in the solution. He appeared to
+be honestly indignant at the testimony showing that his spoons, which
+had been left four hours subject to the action of the battery, had
+acquired only a film of silver. To the eye of the purchaser, these
+spoons would have presented precisely the same appearance as the best
+plated ware in existence. For two or three months, or even for six
+months, they would have retained their brilliancy. What their appearance
+would have been at the end of a year or two we need not say, for most
+readers have encountered the spectacle in their pilgrimage through a
+world which is said to resemble plated articles of this quality in being
+"all a fleeting show."
+
+Every one is familiar with the gold lining that is now so generally seen
+in silver vessels. This is laid on by the same process as that which
+covers the outside with silver. The vessel is filled with a solution of
+gold, and in this solution a thin plate of gold is suspended. The
+electric current being made to pass through the interior thus prepared,
+the liquid bubbles up like soda-water, and in three or four minutes
+enough gold is deposited upon the inside surface for the purpose
+designed. When this is accomplished, nothing remains but to polish the
+vessel, within and without, and we have a piece of ware which is silver
+when we look at it, and golden when we drink from it.
+
+The obstacle to the introduction of the superior plated ware now made by
+the Gorham Company is its costliness. The best plated ware costs five
+times as much as the worst, and one fourth as much as solid silver. We
+saw the other day three large salvers, which, at a distance of six feet,
+looked very nearly alike. All of them bore a most brilliant polish, and
+all were elaborately decorated. One of them was a trashy article, made
+of an alloy of lead and tin, covered with a "blush" of silver. It had
+been stamped out and shaped at one blow by a stamping-machine, and left
+in the silver solution subject to the action of the battery for perhaps
+fifteen minutes. It was very heavy, and when it was suspended and struck
+it gave forth a dull leaden sound. The price of this abomination was
+thirty-seven dollars and a half, and it would last, with careful
+occasional usage, for a year. Daily use would disclose its real quality
+in a few weeks. Another of these salvers was of solid silver, to which
+no objection could be made except that its price was nine hundred and
+fifty dollars. The third was of that superior plated ware introduced
+recently by the Gorham Company of Providence. The base of this article
+was the metal now called nickel silver,--a mixture of copper, nickel,
+and zinc,--3 very hard and ringing compound, perfectly white, and
+capable of a high polish. Upon this hard surface as much silver had been
+deposited as upon the best Sheffield plated ware, which is about as
+much as can be smoothly put upon it by the electro-plating process. When
+this salver was struck, it rang like a bell, and it would not bend under
+the weight of a man. Such a salver, used continually, will retain its
+lustre for a whole generation, and when, after that long period, it
+begins to lose its silver coating, it can be re-silvered and made as
+good as ever. But the price of this article was two hundred
+dollars,--more than five times the cost of the leaden trash, and a
+fourth of the price of the solid salver. Nevertheless, plated ware of
+this quality is the only kind which it is good economy to buy. There are
+few more extravagant purchases we can make in housekeeping than lead and
+brass ware, covered with a film of silver so thin that one ounce of the
+precious metal can actually be spread over two acres of it.
+
+One fact can easily be borne in mind: good serviceable plated articles
+cost, and _must_ cost, from one fourth to one third as much as similar
+articles of solid silver. Anything of a much lower standard than this is
+trash and vulgarity.
+
+For our part, we prefer good plated ware to solid plate. In plated ware
+we can now have all the beauty of form, all the brilliancy of surface,
+all the durability and utility of solid silver, without its excessive
+costliness, without appearing to be guilty of ostentation, without
+putting our neighbors to shame, and without offering a perpetual
+temptation to burglars.
+
+
+
+
+WHAT WE FEEL.
+
+
+It would seem to be folly for any one to maintain that grass is not
+green, that sugar is not sweet, that the rose has no odor and the
+trumpet no tone. A man would seem to be out of his senses deliberately
+to doubt what the world thinks to be simple truths. Yet this paper will
+deliberately question these truths. It will endeavor to demonstrate that
+the greenness, the sweetness, the fragrance, the music, are not inherent
+qualities of the objects themselves, but are cerebral sensations, whose
+existence is limited to the senses of organized beings.
+
+Is grass green? First let us inquire what green is,--what color is.
+Light is now understood to be an undulation of the interstellar ether,
+that inconceivably rare, elastic expanse of matter which occupies all
+space,--an undulation communicated by the incandescent envelope of suns.
+It moves with such wondrous rapidity as to traverse hundreds of
+thousands of miles in a second. Such is the generally received
+explanation of the phenomenon of light; but there is much yet to be
+explained for which this simple undulation of matter seems to be an
+insufficient cause. These waves of motion have different lengths and
+rates of velocity; but the union of them all gives to the human eye the
+impression of white light. When a prism intercepts their flow, it, so to
+speak, assorts these differing waves; and, being separated, they then
+impress the eye with the color of the spectrum, the retina being
+differently affected by the differing velocities with which it is
+touched by the ethereal waves. Color, then, is the sensation of the
+brain, responsive to the touch of the motion of ether; and the brain is
+only thus affected when these waves are thrown back from some object to
+the eye. The multiplicity of tints and hues are reflections from the
+objects which appear to possess them as structural characters. Some of
+the waves pass into the objects and through them, others are arrested by
+them and absorbed, others rebound from them like a ball from a wall; and
+these last, breaking upon the optic nerve, give to it certain sensations
+which we designate as colors. A wave of a certain velocity and length
+gives us a certain sensation which we call blue; another awakens the
+sensation we call yellow. The two series of waves, mingling, produce a
+new sensation which we call green. The necessity of reflection for the
+production of these sensations is evident. The mingled waves have no
+color in their incident flow; but, striking some object, these waves
+become separated, some being absorbed, and the reflected ones produce
+the peculiar sensation we call color.
+
+We know that these varying conditions of light which affect us as color
+have an absolute being. The photographer carries on his nice operations
+behind a yellow screen undisturbed, when the substitution of a pink one
+would at once allow of the chemical action of the other rays of light on
+his plate, to the destruction of his image. Still, the pink and the
+yellow, as colors, are brain sensations. We feel them with our eyes, and
+the feeling they awaken we call color. The optic nerve receives the
+undulations of ether thrown back from grass, and the peculiar sensation
+thus awakened by their touch is called green. The color is not a part of
+the grass, not a quantitative constituent, like its carbon or silex. The
+grass has no color, because color is something existent in the eye of
+the beholder, not in the object awakening that something by its peculiar
+mode of reflecting light. A looking-glass does not possess, as a
+constituent part, the image of a human face; but that face, when put
+before it, appears to be a part of the glass; and if no looking-glass
+had ever existed except with a certain face before it, that face would
+be just as much a part of the glass as the color green is of grass. They
+both reflect. Some people are color-blind. They cannot perceive any
+difference between the rose and the leaves around it. Color is
+inconceivable to them. Let us suppose, then, that all men were
+color-blind. They would be fully cognizant of light, shadow, darkness;
+but the nicer sensations of the brain which we call colors would be
+utterly unknown to senses unable to feel their delicate touch. At the
+same time, the different undulations of the different colors might have
+been detected by other means than the sense of sight, as unseen gases
+have been discovered by the chemist. And we cannot say that Nature may
+not possess an inconceivable variety of influences inappreciable by our
+senses. We say grass is green; but is it always so? What varying colors
+does it possess under the varying light to which it is exposed. The same
+grass is light green in the sun, dark green in the shadow, almost black
+in the twilight, and at night what color is it? We may say that it is
+green, but that we cannot see it. By no means. If greenness were an
+inherent attribute, it would be persistent. The weight, density,
+chemical construction, and size of the plant do not change from midday
+to midnight. They are identical in the dark and the light. But the color
+depends entirely on the character of light poured upon it; as that color
+is only a peculiar reflection of that light, or part of it, and that
+reflection is only green when it stimulates an optic nerve to a
+sensation peculiar to its touch. The same grass becomes yellow or brown
+in autumn, possessing then new powers of absorption and reflection. The
+very limited capacity of the eye to receive sensation from light rays is
+proved by the discovery that the spectrum possesses other rays, called
+heat-rays, which the eye cannot perceive. Only about a third of the
+spectrum is visible to the eye. The other portion appears in the form of
+heat, inappreciable by the optic nerve as light.
+
+Color, therefore, is not a physical thing,--a quantity in Nature. Her
+beauty and glory, visible in her tints and hues, are in the brain of the
+observer,--a play of light reflected from the myriad objects upon which
+it breaks in infinite diversity of ethereal wavelet's. One may see
+colors which do not exist as undulations. For example, let one look
+fixedly at a brilliant red object for a while, and then close his eyes.
+He will behold an image of the same object of a green color. This green
+color, then, is a sensation in the optic nerve, which, being powerfully
+stimulated by the red, undergoes a reaction, resulting in a sensation
+similar to that which it would experience were it looking at the object
+in green. The color green, in this case, is certainly only nervous
+sensation. As light is now known to be the motion of matter, color, as
+the result of light, must inevitably be limited by it. The touch of the
+light-waves upon our nerves causes certain contractions which we call
+color, the contractions ceasing when the touch is withdrawn. A pane of
+green glass will cast upon a white marble a green light. Let us suppose
+that this play of light had always existed, so far as those two objects
+were concerned. The marble would appear to be permanently green, and not
+white; and if we had not a simple way of removing the light, we should
+certainly say it was green marble. Could we as effectually change the
+play of light which causes grass to appear green, we should at once
+demonstrate as readily, that its color was an appearance to the eye, not
+a part of the grass itself. It is very probable that we are extensively
+deceived in this way,--that many appearances in nature are only
+simulations which we have no means of detecting. Isomerism in minerals
+has been discovered,--a state in which quite different physical
+properties are coexistent with identity of component parts. What we
+always see, and what seems to be permanent, we naturally accept as a
+physical fact; and yet we can understand that our senses may, in many
+instances, be the sport of appearances which, because permanent, we
+conceive to be reality. Thus color is a cerebral sensation only, and
+grass is not green.
+
+Is sugar sweet? That sugar has certain chemical constituents which go to
+make up a saccharine compound we know. But what evidence have we of its
+sweetness, except that the nerves of taste are peculiarly affected when
+brought in contact with it. Its sweetness is not measurable in the
+chemist's scales. It can be analyzed, and its constituent elements
+accurately defined. But sweetness is not one of those elements. The test
+of that is the tongue. Pure sugar of milk has scarce any sweetness at
+all; nevertheless, it is pure sugar. The influence which it has on the
+nerves of taste is only different from that of cane-sugar. Destroy the
+nice nervous connection between the tongue and the brain, and sweetness
+disappears. A severe cold will accomplish this, and while the touch of
+the sugar is felt, the delicate sympathy which is awakened by the sugar
+and is felt in the brain as sweetness is destroyed. The sweetness, like
+the color, is a nervous sensation. We can conceive of a development of
+the nerves of taste which might receive a host of new impressions from
+contact with objects now tasteless. The saccharine compound does exist
+as a chemical quantity, and has a special effect on the nerves of taste,
+exciting them peculiarly, the result of the excitement being the idea of
+sweetness.
+
+Is the rose fragrant? The sense of smell is indeed only a continuation
+of that of taste. In smelling, the nerves are touched by only
+infinitesimally small particles of the substances reaching them, and are
+only able to receive an impression from this excessive distribution.
+This is also true of taste, to a certain degree, as it is impossible to
+fully perceive a flavor until the substance is tolerably comminuted, as
+we smack our lips to obtain it. Indeed, it may be questioned whether
+the whole of taste may not lie in the capabilities of different
+substances for great subdivision of particles. If quartz could be made
+to dissolve into excessively minute particles as readily as sugar, it
+might have its own special flavor. Some odors are offensive in dense
+quantities which are highly agreeable when wafted to us in delicate
+atoms,--musk, for instance. The rose secretes a volatile oil, the
+wonderfully small atoms of which, on touching the nerves of smell,
+communicate a peculiar sensation. This odor, like the sweetness, exists
+only in the nerves affected; and a trifling disaffection of the nerves
+suffices to destroy it entirely. The chemist can also analyze the oil,
+but he does not enumerate in its elements odor. In fact, we have no
+words to express the sensation of smell. We say sweet, sour, bitter; but
+have no terms to express the differing sensations produced on us by the
+rose, lily, violet, and pink. Their oily atoms awaken different
+sensations in the delicate nerves they touch. The sensation awakened may
+be due to chemical action induced by them in the system. But whether
+chemical or physical, the result of their touch is a motion of matter,
+an impulse communicated to the brain, the sensation of the organ
+being--the reception of this initiative force being--what we designate
+as odor. The fragrance of the rose lies, then, in the contractions of
+special nerves, which thus respond to the touch of the oily particles
+that are blown against them.
+
+Does the trumpet sound? A vibration of matter causes the surrounding air
+to vibrate in consonance with it; and the waves of air thus created,
+breaking against the auditory nerve, awaken a peculiar sensation which
+we call sound. The trumpet, vibrating variously, as the valves are moved
+and the air forced through it, initiates waves of air of different
+lengths; and as they are communicated to the surrounding air with
+amazing rapidity, they successively strike the listener's ear. As the
+waves of light touch the optic nerve, so do the grosser waves of air
+touch the auditory nerve. But sound is only a recognized sensation when
+the waves of air are within a certain measurement, a maximum and minimum
+of length. The rush of a whirlwind has no sound, except when arrested by
+some object, and smaller waves of the vast billows of rolling air are
+created. We say that the wind roars. But the tremendous currents above
+us, which sweep along the vast masses of vapor, are noiseless until they
+touch the earth, and some little trifling eddies are made in their lower
+sweep by hills and trees and houses. It is then only noise. The ear
+requires yet smaller waves of air to experience the sensation of tone.
+The lowest note of a piano has barely enough of it to give a definite
+idea. As the waves become shorter, the ear begins to be pleasantly
+affected, and the realm of music is reached. Within a certain restricted
+length of air-waves lies all of the pleasurable sensation which we call
+musical tone. But as we rise in the scale the tone begins to become
+uncertain, until the highest note of the instrument is again indefinite
+noise. The attenuated tone-waves of Nature are also inappreciable by the
+auditory nerves, and an obscure hum or buzz is all that can be
+perceived, until, finally, the eye detects motion which the ear utterly
+fails to perceive as sound. The results of the air-waves are appreciable
+by sight and feeling; but the waves which are heard are not those which
+create the disturbance in nature we see and feel. The wild gust which
+seizes a tree and bows it to the earth is only heard when the branches
+it sways, or the leaves which it rustles, give out a secondary and far
+more attenuate series of waves. A locust, on a warm, sunny day, will
+agitate the air around him with a series of waves which affect the ear
+far more powerfully than the wind which sighs in the waving trees above
+him. Thus sound is the answering sensation of the auditory nerve to the
+touch of air-waves; and these waves must be within certain
+circumscribed limits of magnitude to awaken that sensation at all. The
+greater or less violence with which they strike the ear causes them to
+appear loud or soft. We can imagine a development of the nerves, or of
+the ear apparatus, which might allow them to be influenced by waves of
+greater volume and less rapid flow, and also by those of diminished size
+and accelerated movement The trumpet then does not sounds the ear
+sounds, and in the ear alone lies the music that it makes. The deaf man,
+whose auditory nerves are not sensitive to air-waves, sees the clouds
+move and the trees sway, the brook ripple and the trumpeter with his
+tube at his lips; but the air-waves they all create pass by him, and
+sound is inconceivable. That sound is a mere nervous sensation is
+further proved by the fact that we have disturbances of the auditory
+nerve which we call singing in the ears. No waves of air create this
+disagreeable music. It arises from some affection of the nerve, which
+irritates it to a vibration similar to that which it undergoes when
+air-waves of a certain intensity reach it.
+
+We say the sound rolled on, the odor was wafted, the color was printed,
+our language and our thoughts implying that the sound, the odor, the
+color, are things, when in reality they are all mere sensations,
+answering to the touch of physical agents. All sensation is
+nerve-motion. Outer stimulus, applied to the nerves, causes contractions
+which, communicating with the brain, give the idea of color or taste or
+sound.
+
+The sense of feeling is a recognition of the existence of objects by a
+duller perception than the others, though all of the senses attain their
+perceptions by feeling, in the strict meaning of the word. We say things
+feel hard or soft, the varying density of the objects being the cause of
+the varying sensations they awaken. Smoothness and roughness are varying
+outlines of surface, existing as physical conformation; the pleasurable
+or disagreeable sensations awakened in us by contact being due to the
+greater or less irritation of the nerves of feeling that attrition with
+it occasions. Motion is absolutely necessary to give us an ides of the
+density or configuration of an object. The mere touch of that object is
+insufficient to possess us with its nature. Iron and down are
+indistinguishable, unless we, to a certain extent, manipulate them.
+Glass would be indistinguishable from sand-paper did we not to a certain
+extent pass our fingers over the different surfaces. Mere touch would
+not suffice. We have the evidence of all of our senses to prove to us
+the nature of an object. It tastes or smells or vibrates or is colored;
+the varied sensations thus awakened combining to give us our totality of
+conception. The rose reflects light-waves which the eye feels red; it
+emits oil-particles which the nose feels fragrant; it touches our
+tongue, and feels pleasantly; it touches our fingers, and feels soft and
+smooth. It exists in nature as a physical structure, and its existence
+is evident to us through the various sensations it creates in different
+nerves of our bodies, and through them alone.
+
+One of the ancient philosophies maintained that all Nature is but the
+phantasm of our senses. Had it, after first granting that the senses
+themselves were evidences of matter and motion, maintained that Nature
+was only evident to us through them, it would have been simple truth.
+Our perceptions of Nature are limited to the capacity of our nervous
+structure. We frequently make the mistake of endowing matter with
+attributes which it does not possess, and which are resident only in the
+impression communicated to us by forces emanating from it, the forces
+being we know not what. And we can understand that there may be forces
+in nature as powerful as those which we perceive by our senses, but
+which are utterly unrecognized by them. We can understand that it were
+possible for organized beings to possess fifty instead of five senses,
+which might receive from nature other impressions and awaken other
+emotions as beautiful and as beneficent as those arising from sight and
+hearing.
+
+
+
+
+SONNET.
+
+
+    Rather, my people, let thy youths parade
+      Their woolly flocks before the rising sun;
+      With curds and oat-cakes, when their work is done,
+      By frugal handmaids let the board be laid;
+    Let them refresh their vigor in the shade,
+      Or deem their straw as down to lie upon,
+      Ere the great nation which our sires begun
+      Be rent asunder by hell's minion, Trade!
+    If jarring interests and the greed of gold,
+      The corn-rick's envy of the minéd hill,
+      The steamer's grudge against the spindle's skill,--
+    If things so mean our country's fate can mould,
+      O, let me hear again the shepherds trill
+      Their reedy music to the drowsing fold!
+
+
+
+
+LITERATURE AS AN ART.
+
+
+As one looks forward to the America of fifty years hence, the main
+source of anxiety appears to be in a probable excess of prosperity, and
+in the want of a good grievance. We seem nearly at the end of those
+great public wrongs which require a special moral earthquake to end
+them. Except to secure the ballot for woman,--a contest which is thus
+far advancing very peaceably,--there seems nothing left which need be
+absolutely fought for; no great influence to keep us from a commonplace
+and perhaps debasing success. There will, no doubt, be still need of the
+statesman to adjust the details of government, and of the clergyman to
+keep an eye on private morals, including his own. There will also be
+social and religious changes, perhaps great ones; but there are no omens
+of any very fierce upheaval. And seeing the educational value to this
+generation of the reforms for which it has contended, and especially of
+the antislavery enterprise, one must feel an impulse of pity for our
+successors, who seem likely to have no convictions that they can
+honestly be mobbed for.
+
+Can we spare these great tonics? It is the experience of history that
+all religious bodies are purified by persecution, and materialized by
+peace. No amount of accumulated virtue has thus far saved the merely
+devout communities from deteriorating, when let alone, into
+comfort and good dinners. This is most noticeable in detached
+organizations,--Moravians, Shakers, Quakers, Roman Catholics,--they all
+go the same way at last; when persecution and missionary toil are over,
+they enter on a tiresome millennium of meat and pudding. To guard
+against this spiritual obesity, this carnal Eden, what has the next age
+in reserve for us? Suppose forty million perfectly healthy and virtuous
+Americans, what is to keep them from being as uninteresting as so many
+Chinese?
+
+I know of nothing but that aim which is the climax and flower of all
+civilization, without which purity itself grows dull and devotion
+tedious,--the pursuit of Science and Art. Give to all this nation peace,
+freedom, prosperity, and even virtue, still there must be some absorbing
+interest, some career. That career can be sought only in two
+directions,--more and yet more material prosperity on the one side.
+Science and Art on the other. Every man's aim must either be riches, or
+something better than riches. Now the wealth is to be respected and
+desired, nor need anything be said against it. And certainly nothing
+need be said in its behalf, there is such a vast chorus of voices
+steadily occupied in proclaiming it. The Instincts of the American mind
+will take care of that; but to advocate the alternative career, the
+striving of the whole nature after something utterly apart from this
+world's wealth,--it is for this end that a stray voice is needed. It
+will not take long; the clamor of the market will re-absorb us
+to-morrow.
+
+It can scarcely be said that Science and Art have as yet any place in
+America; or if they have, it is by virtue of their prospective value, as
+with the bonds of a Pacific railway. I use the ordinary classification,
+Science and Art, though it is literature only of which I now aim to
+speak. For under one of these two heads all literature must fall; it may
+be either a contribution to science through its matter, or to art
+through its form. The _form_ of literature is usually called _style_ and
+of the highest kind of literature, called poetry or _belles-lettres_,
+the style is an essential, and almost the essential part. It is in this
+aspect that the matter is now to be considered,--literature as an art.
+
+The latest French traveller, Ernest Duvergier de Hauranne, says well,
+that, for what he calls the academic class--or class devoted to pure
+literature--there is as yet no place in America. Such a class must
+conceal itself, he says, beneath the politician's garb, or the
+clergyman's cravat. We may observe that, when our people speak of
+literature, they are very apt to mean a newspaper article, or perhaps a
+sermon, or a legal plea. One editor said that it could be no more
+asserted that literature was ill paid in America, since Governor Andrew
+received ten thousand dollars for an argument against the prohibitory
+liquor law. Even in our largest cities, there are scarcely the rudiments
+of a literary class, apart from the newspapers. Now, journalism is an
+invaluable outlet for the leisure time of a literary man; but his main
+work must be given to something else, or his vocation must change its
+name. He needs the experience of journalism, as he needs that of the
+lyceum and the caucus,--nay, as he needs the gymnasium and the
+wherry,--to keep himself healthy and sound. But when he gives the main
+energy of his life to either, though he may not cease to be useful, he
+ceases to be a literary man.
+
+It is useless to complain that, in America, Science is preceding Art;
+that is inevitable. As yet there is a shrinking even from pure
+science,--that is, from all science which is not directly marketable;
+and while this is so, art must be still further postponed. We have
+hitherto valued science for its applications, natural history as a
+branch of agriculture, mathematics for the sake of life-assurance
+tables, and even a college education as a training for members of
+Congress. Just so far as any of these departments have failed of these
+ends, there is a tendency to disparage them. We are a little like the
+President Dupaty of the French Assembly, who told the astronomer Laplace
+that he considered the discovery of a new planet to be far less
+important than that of a new pudding, as we have already more planets
+than we know what to do with, while we never can have puddings enough.
+We are now outgrowing this limited view of science, but in regard to
+literature the delusion still remains; if it is anything more than an
+amusement, it must afford solid information; it is not yet owned that it
+has value for itself, as an art. Of course, all true instruction,
+however conveyed, is palatable; to a healthy mind the _Mécanique
+Céleste_ is good reading; so is Mill's "Political Economy," or De
+Morgan's "Formal Logic." But words are available for something which is
+more than knowledge. Words afford a more delicious music than the chords
+of any instrument; they are susceptible of richer colors than any
+painter's palette; and that they should be used merely for the
+transportation of intelligence, as a wheelbarrow carries brick, is not
+enough. The highest aspect of literature assimilates it to painting and
+music. Beyond and above all the domain of use lies beauty, and to aim at
+this makes literature an art.
+
+A book without art is simply a commodity; it may be exceedingly valuable
+to the consumer, very profitable to the producer, but it does not come
+within the domain of pure literature. It is said that some high legal
+authority on copyright thus cites a case: "One Moore had written a book
+which he called 'Irish Melodies,'" and so on. Now, as Aristotle defined
+the shipbuilder's art to be all of the ship but the wood, so the
+literary art displayed in Moore's Melodies was precisely the thing
+ignored in this citation.
+
+To pursue literature as an art is not therefore to be a mathematician
+nor a political economist; still less to be a successful journalist,
+like Greeley, or a lecturer with a thousand annual invitations, like
+Gough. These careers have really no more to do with literature than has
+the stage or the bar. Indeed, a man may earn twenty thousand dollars a
+year by writing "sensation stories," and have nothing to do with
+literature as an art. But to devote one's life to perfecting the manner,
+as well as the matter, of one's work; to expatriate one's self long
+years for it, like Motley; to overcome vast physical obstacles for it,
+like Prescott or Parkman; to live and die only to transfuse external
+nature into human words, like Thoreau; to chase dreams for a lifetime,
+like Hawthorne; to labor tranquilly and see a nation imbued with one's
+thoughts, like Emerson,--this it is to pursue literature as an art.
+
+There is apparently something in the Anglo-Saxon mind which causes a
+slight shrinking from art as such, perhaps associating it with deception
+or frivolity,--which tolerates it, and, strange to say, even produces it
+in verse, but really shrinks from it in prose. Across the water, this
+tendency seems to increase. Just as an Englishman is ashamed to speak
+well, and pooh-poohs all oratory, so he is growing ashamed even to write
+well, at least in anything beyond a newspaper; and we on this side have
+emancipated our tongues more than our pens. What stands between
+Americans and good writing is usually want of culture; we write as well
+as we know how, while in England the obstacle seems to be merely a
+boorish whim. The style of English books and magazines is growing far
+less careful than ours,--less finished, less harmonious, more slipshod,
+more slangy. What second-rate American writer would see any wit in
+describing himself, like Dean Alford in his recent book on language, as
+"an old party in a shovel"? These bad examples are to be regretted; for
+doubtless ten times as many original works are annually published in
+England as in America, and we have an hereditary right to seek from that
+nation those models of culture for which we must now turn to France.
+
+In a late English magazine, there is an elaborate attempt to prove the
+inferiority in manliness of the French mind as compared with the
+English. "Frenchmen are less manly, and Frenchwomen less womanly, than
+English men and women." And one of the illustrations seriously offered
+is this: "In literature they think much of the method, style, and what
+they themselves call the art of making a book."
+
+The charge is true. In France alone among living nations is literature
+habitually pursued as an art; and, in consequence of this, despite the
+seeds of all decay which imperialism sows, French prose-writing has no
+rival in contemporary literature. We cannot fully recognize this fact
+through translations, because only the most sensational French books
+appear to be translated. But as French painters and actors now
+habitually surpass all others even in what are claimed as the English
+qualities,--simplicity and truth,--so do French prose-writers excel. To
+be set against the brutality of Carlyle and the shrill screams of
+Ruskin, there is to be seen across the Channel the extraordinary fact of
+an actual organization of good writers, the French Academy, whose
+influence all nations feel. Under their authority we see introduced into
+literary work an habitual grace and perfection, a clearness and
+directness, a light and pliable strength, and a fine shading of
+expression, such as no other tongue can even define. We see the same
+high standard in their criticism, in their works of research, in the
+_Revue des Deux Mondes_, and, in short, throughout literature. What is
+there in any other language, for instance, to be compared with the
+voluminous writings of Sainte-Beuve, ranging over all history and
+literature, and carrying into all that incomparable style, so delicate,
+so brilliant, so equable, so strong,--touching all themes, not with the
+blacksmith's hand of iron, but with the surgeon's hand of steel?
+
+In the average type of French novels, one feels the superiority to the
+English in quiet power, in the absence of the sensational and
+exaggerated, and in keeping close to the level of real human life. They
+rely for success upon perfection of style and the most subtile analysis
+of human character; and therefore they are often painful,--just as
+Thackeray is painful,--because they look at artificial society, and
+paint what they see. Thus they dwell often on unhappy marriages, because
+such things grow naturally from the false social system in France. On
+the other hand, in France there is very little house-breaking, and
+bigamy is almost impossible, so that we hear delightfully little about
+them; whereas, if you subtract these from the current English novels,
+what is there left?
+
+Germany furnishes at present no models of prose style; and all her past
+models, except perhaps Goethe and Heine, seem to be already losing their
+charm. Yet for knowledge we still go to Germany, and there is a certain
+exuberant wealth that can even impart fascination to a bad style, as to
+that of Jean Paul. Such an author may therefore be very useful to a
+student who can withstand him, which poor Carlyle could not. There was a
+time, it is said, when English and American literature seemed to be
+expiring of conventionalism. Carlyle was the Jenner who inoculated and
+saved us all by this virus from Germany, and then died of his own
+disease. It now seems a privilege, perhaps, to be able to remember the
+time when all literature was in the inflammatory stage of this
+superinduced disorder; but does any one now read Carlyle's French
+Revolution? Every year now shows that the whole trick of style with
+which it was written was false from beginning to end. For surely no
+style can be permanently attractive that is not simple.
+
+_Simplicity_ must be the first element of literary art. This assertion
+will no doubt run counter to the common belief. Most persons have an
+impression of something called style in writing,--as they have an
+impression of something called architecture in building,--as if it were
+external, superadded, whereas it is in truth the very basis and law of
+the whole. There is the house, they think, and, if you can afford it,
+you put on some architecture; there is the writing, and a college-bred
+man is expected to put on some style. The assumption is, that he is less
+likely to write simply. This shows our school-boy notions of culture. A
+really cultivated person is less likely to waste words on mere
+ornamentation, just as he is less likely to have gingerbread-work on his
+house. Good taste simplifies. Men whose early culture was deficient are
+far more apt to be permanently sophomoric than those who lived through
+the sophomore at the proper time and place. The reason is, that the
+habit of expression, in a cultivated person, matures as his life and
+thought mature; but when a man has had much life and very little
+expression, he is confused by his own thoughts, and does not know how
+much to attempt or how to discriminate. When such a person falls on
+honest slang, it is usually a relief, for then he uses language which is
+fresh and real to him; whereas such phrases in a cultivated person
+usually indicate mere laziness and mental undress. Indeed, almost all
+slang is like parched corn, and should be served up hot, or else not at
+all.
+
+But it is evident that mere simplicity of style is not enough, for there
+is a manner of writing which does not satisfy us, though it may be
+simple and also carefully done. Such, for instance, is the prose style
+of Southey, which was apparently the model for all American writing in
+its day. We see the result in the early volumes of the North American
+Review, whose traditions of rather tame correctness were what enabled us
+to live through the Carlyle epoch with safety. The aim of this style was
+to avoid all impulse, brilliancy, or surprise,--to be perfectly
+colorless; it was a highly polished smoothness, on which the thoughts
+slid like balls. But style is capable of something more than smoothness
+and clearness; you see this something more when you turn from Prescott
+to Motley, for instance; there is a new quality in the page,--it has
+become alive. _Freshness_ is perhaps the best word to describe this
+additional element; it is a style that has blood in it. This may come
+from various sources,--good health, animal spirits, outdoor habits, or
+simply an ardent nature. It is hard to describe this quality, or to give
+rules for it; the most obvious way to acquire it is to keep one's life
+fresh and vigorous, to write only what presses to be said, and to utter
+that as if the world waited for the saying. Where lies the extraordinary
+power of "Jane Eyre," for instance? In the intense earnestness which
+vitalizes every line; each atom of the author's life appears to come
+throbbing and surging through it; every sentence seems endowed with a
+soul of its own, and looks up at you with human eyes.
+
+The next element of literary art may be said to be _structure_. So
+strong in the American mind is the demand for system and completeness,
+that the logical element of style, which is its skeleton, is not rare
+among us. But this is only the basis; besides the philosophical
+structure of a statement which comes by thought, there is an artistic
+structure which implies the education of the taste. So, in the human
+body, there is a symmetry of the bony frame, and there is a further
+symmetry of the rounded flesh which should cover it; and in literature
+it is not enough to have a perfectly framed logical skeleton,--there
+should be also a well-proportioned beauty of utterance, which is the
+flesh. Unless this inward and outward structure exist, although a book
+may be never so valuable, it hardly comes within the domain of literary
+art.
+
+These different types of structure may perhaps be illustrated by three
+different books, all belonging to the intermediate ground between
+science and art. I should say that Buckle's "History of Civilization,"
+with all its wealth and vigor, is exceedingly loose-jointed in all its
+logical structure, and also very defective in its literary structure,
+although it happens to have an element of freshness which is rare in
+such a work, and carries the reader along. Darwin's "Origin of Species"
+is better; that has at the bottom a strong logic, whether conclusive or
+otherwise, but is so rambling and confused in its merely literary
+statement, that it does itself no justice. A third book, Huxley's
+"Lectures," combines with its logic a power of clear and symmetrical
+statement that gives it a rare charm, and makes it a contribution, not
+to science alone, but to literature.
+
+In what is called poetry, _belles-lettres_ or pure literature, the
+osseous structure is of course hidden; and the symmetry suggested is
+always that of taste rather than of logic, though logic must be always
+implied, or at least never violated. In some of the greatest modern
+authors, however, there are limitations or drawbacks to this symmetry.
+Margaret Fuller said admirably of her favorite Goethe, that he had the
+artist's hand, but not the artist's love of structure; and in all his
+prose writings one sees a certain divergent and centrifugal habit, which
+completely overpowers him before the end of "Wilhelm Meister," and shows
+itself even in the "Elective Affinities," which is, so far as I know,
+his most perfect prose work.
+
+In Emerson, again, one observes a similar defect; his unit of structure
+is the sentence, and the periods seem combined merely by the accident of
+juxtaposition; each sentence is a pearl, and the whole essay is so much
+clipped from the necklace; but it is fastened at neither end, and the
+beads roll off.
+
+Yet it is not enough for human beauty to possess symmetry of structure,
+within and without: there must be a beautiful coloring also, wealth of
+complexion, fineness of texture. So the next element of literary art
+lies in the _choice of words_. Style must have richness and felicity.
+Words in a master's hands seem more than words; he can double or
+quadruple their power by skill in using; and this is a result so
+delightful, as to give to certain authors a value out of all proportion
+to their thought. There are books which are luxuries, _livres de luxe_,
+whose pages seem builded of more potent words than those of common life.
+Keats, for example, in poetry, and Landor in prose, are illustrations of
+this; and perhaps the representative instance, in all English
+literature, of the prismatic resources of mere words is the poem of "The
+Eve of St. Agnes." But thus to be crowned monarch of the sunset, to
+trust one's self with full daring in these realms of glory, demands
+such a balance of endowments as no one in English literature save
+Shakespeare has attained.
+
+In choosing words, it is to be remembered that there is not a really
+poor one in any language; each had originally some vivid meaning, but
+most of them have been worn smooth by passing from hand to hand, and
+hence the infinite care required in their use. "Language," says Max
+Müller, "is a dictionary of faded metaphors"; and every writer who
+creates a new image, or even reproduces an old one by passing it through
+a fresh mind, enlarges this vast treasure-house. And this applies not
+only to words of beauty, but to words of wit. "All wit," said Mr. Pitt,
+"is true reasoning "; and Rogers, who preserved this saying, added, that
+he himself had lived long before making the discovery that wit was
+truth.
+
+A final condition of literary art is _thoroughness_, which must be shown
+both in the preparation and in the revision of one's work. The most
+brilliant mind yet needs a large accumulated capital of facts and
+images, before it can safely enter on its business, Coleridge went to
+Davy's chemical lectures, he said, to get a new stock of metaphors.
+Addison, before beginning the Spectator, had accumulated three folio
+volumes of notes. "The greater part of an author's time," said Dr.
+Johnson, "is spent in reading in order to write; a man will turn over
+half a library to make one book." Unhappily, with these riches comes the
+chance of being crushed by them, of which the agreeable Roman Catholic
+writer, Digby, is a striking recent example. There is no satisfaction in
+being told, as Charles Lamb told Godwin, that "you have read more books
+that are not worth reading than any other man"; nor in being described,
+as was Southey by Shelley, as "a talking album, filled with long
+extracts from forgotten books on unimportant subjects." One must not
+have more knowledge than one can keep in subjection; but every literary
+man needs to accumulate a whole tool-chest in his memory, and another
+in his study, before he can be more than a journeyman at his trade.
+
+Yet the labor of preparation is not, after all, more important than that
+of final revision. The feature of literary art which is always least
+appreciated by the public, and even by young authors, is the amount of
+toil it costs. But all the standards, all the precedents of every art,
+show that the greatest gifts do not supersede the necessity of work. The
+most astonishing development of native genius in any direction, so far
+as I know, is that of Mozart in music; yet it is he who has left the
+remark, that, if few equalled him in his vocation, few had studied it
+with such persevering labor and such unremitting zeal. There is still
+preserved at Ferrara the piece of paper on which Ariosto wrote in
+sixteen different ways one of his most famous stanzas. The novel which
+Hawthorne left unfinished--and whose opening chapters when published
+proved so admirable--had been begun by him, as it appeared, in five
+different ways. Yet how many young collegians have at this moment in
+their desks the manuscript of their first novel, and have considered it
+a piece of heroic toil if they have once revised it!
+
+It is to rebuke this literary indolence, and to afford a perpetual
+standard of high art, that the study of Greek ought to be retained in
+our schools. The whole future of our literature may depend upon it; to
+abandon it is deliberately to forego the very highest models. There is
+no other literature which so steadily reproaches a young
+writer,--nothing else by which he may sustain himself till he forms a
+high standard of his own. Not that he should attempt direct imitations,
+which are almost always failures as such, however attractive in other
+respects; witness Swinburne's "Atalanta." But the true use of Greek
+literature is perpetually to remind us what a wondrous thing literary
+art may be,--capable of what range of resources, of what thoroughness in
+structure, of what perfection in detail. It is a remarkable fact, that
+the most penetrating and fearless of all our writers, Thoreau,--he who
+made Nature his sole mistress, and shook himself utterly free from human
+tradition,--yet clung to Greek literature as the one achievement of man
+that seemed worthy to take rank with Nature, pronouncing it "as refined,
+as solidly done, and as beautiful almost as the morning itself."
+
+These are the qualities of style that seem most obviously
+important,--simplicity, freshness, structure, choice of words, and
+thoroughness both of preparation and of finish. Yet, in aiming at
+literary art, it must be remembered that all the cardinal virtues go
+into a good style, while each of the seven deadly sins tends to vitiate
+a bad one. What a charm in the merit of humility, for instance, as it is
+sometimes seen in style, leading to a certain self-restraint and
+moderation of tone, however weighty the argument! How great the power of
+an habitual under-statement, on which in due season one strong thought
+rises like an ocean-crest, and breaks, and sweeps onward, lavishing
+itself in splendor! What a glorious gift of heaven would have been the
+style of Ruskin, for instance, could he but have contained himself, and
+put forth only half his strength, instead of always planting, in the
+words of old Fuller, "a piece of ordnance to batter down an aspen-leaf"!
+
+It would be hardly safe to illustrate what has been said by any
+multiplication of examples from our own literature. Yet perhaps there
+will be no danger in saying that America has as yet produced but two
+authors of whom we may claim that their style is in all respects
+adequate to their wants, and the perfect vehicle of their thought. It is
+not always the greatest writers of whom this is true, for one's demands
+upon the vehicle of thought are in proportion to his thoughts, and great
+ideas strain language more than small ones. We cannot say of either
+Emerson or Thoreau, for instance, that his style is adequate to his
+needs, because the needs are immense, and Thoreau, at least, sometimes
+disdains effort. But the only American authors, perhaps, whose style is
+an elastic garment that fits all the uses of the body, are Irving and
+Hawthorne.
+
+This has no reference to the quality of their thought, as to which in
+Irving we feel a slight mediocrity; no matter, there is the agreeable
+style, and it does him all the service he needs. By its aid he reached
+his limit of execution, and we can hardly imagine him, with his
+organization, as accomplishing more. But in Hawthorne we see astonishing
+power, always answered by the style, and capable of indefinite expansion
+within certain lateral limits. His early solitude narrowed his
+affinities, and gave a kind of bloodlessness to his style; clear in hue,
+fine in texture, it is apt to want the mellow tinge which indicates a
+robust and copious life. Even such a criticism seems daring, in respect
+to anything so beautiful; and I can conceive of no other defect in the
+style of Hawthorne.
+
+Perhaps the conclusion of the whole matter may seem to be that literary
+art is so lofty a thing as to be beyond the reach of any of us; as the
+sage in Rasselas, discoursing on poetry, only convinces his hearers that
+no one ever can be a poet. After so much in the way of discouragement,
+it should be added,--what the most limited experience may teach us
+all,--that there is no other pursuit so unceasingly delightful. As some
+one said of love, "all other pleasures are not worth its pains." But the
+literary man must love his art, as the painter must love painting, out
+of all proportion to its rewards; or rather, the delight of the work
+must be its own reward. Any praise or guerdon hurts him, if it bring any
+other pleasure to eclipse this. The reward of a good sentence is to have
+written it; if it bring fame or fortune, very well, so long as this
+recompense does not intoxicate. The peril is, that all temporary
+applause is vitiated by uncertainty, and may be leading you right or
+wrong. Goethe wrote to Schiller, "We make money by our poor books."
+
+The impression is somehow conveyed to the young, that there exists
+somewhere a circle of cultivated minds, gifted with discernment, who can
+distinguish at a glance between Shakespeare and Tupper. One may doubt
+the existence of any such contemporary tribunal. Certainly there is none
+such in America. Provided an author says something noticeable, and obeys
+the ordinary rules of grammar and spelling, his immediate public asks
+little more; and if he attempts more, it is an even chance that it leads
+him away from favor. Indeed, within the last few years, it has come to
+be a sign of infinite humor to dispense with even these few rules, and
+spell as badly as possible. Yet even if you went to London or to Paris
+in search of this imaginary body of critics, you would not find them;
+there also you would find the transient and the immortal confounded
+together, and the transient often uppermost. Even a foreign country is
+not always, as has been said, a contemporaneous posterity. It is said
+that no American writer was ever so warmly received in England as
+Artemus Ward. It is only the slow alembic of the years that finally
+eliminates from this vast mass of literature its few immortal drops, and
+leaves the rest to perish.
+
+I know of no tonic more useful for a young writer than to read
+carefully, in the English Reviews of sixty or seventy years ago, the
+crushing criticisms on nearly every author of that epoch who has
+achieved lasting fame. What cannot there be read, however, is the
+sterner history of those who were simply neglected. Look, for instance,
+at the career of Charles Lamb, who now seems to us a writer who must
+have disarmed opposition, and have been a favorite from the first.
+Lamb's "Rosamond Gray" was published in 1798, and for two years was not
+even reviewed. His poems appeared during the same year. In 1815 he
+introduced Talfourd to Wordsworth as his own "only admirer." In 1819 the
+series of "Essays of Elia" began, and Shelley wrote to Leigh Hunt that
+year: "When I think of such a mind as Lamb's, when I see how unnoticed
+remain things of such exquisite and complete perfection, what should I
+hope for myself, if I had not higher objects in view than fame?" These
+Essays were published in a volume in 1823; and Willis records that when
+he was in Europe, ten years later, and just before Lamb's death, "it was
+difficult to light upon a person who had read Elia."
+
+This brings us to a contemporary instance. Willis and Hawthorne wrote
+early, side by side, in "The Token," about 1827, forty years ago. Willis
+rose at once to notoriety, but Mr. S. G. Goodrich, the editor of the
+work, states in his autobiography, that Hawthorne's contributions "did
+not attract the slightest attention." Ten years later, in 1837, these
+same sketches were collected in a volume, as "Twice-Told Tales"; but it
+was almost impossible to find a publisher for them, and when published
+they had no success. I well remember the apathy with which even the
+enlarged edition of 1842 was received, in spite of the warm admiration
+of a few; nor was it until the publication of "The Scarlet Letter," in
+1850, that its author could fairly be termed famous. For twenty years he
+was, in his own words, "the obscurest man of letters in America"; and it
+is the thought to which the mind must constantly recur, in thinking of
+Hawthorne, How could any combination of physical and mental vigor enable
+a man to go on producing works of such a quality in an atmosphere so
+chilling?
+
+Probably the truth is, that art precedes criticism, and that every great
+writer creates or revives the taste by which he is appreciated. True, we
+are wont to claim that "one touch of nature makes the whole world kin";
+but it sometimes takes the world a good while to acknowledge its poor
+relations. It seems hard for most persons to recognize a touch of nature
+when they see it. The trees have formed their buds in autumn every year
+since trees first waved; but you will find that the great majority of
+persons have never made that discovery, and suppose that Nature gets up
+those ornaments in spring. And if we are thus blind to what hangs
+conspicuously before our eyes for the whole long winter of every year,
+how unobservant must we be of the rarer phases of earthly beauty and of
+human life? Keep to the conventional, and you have something which all
+have seen, even if they disapprove; copy Nature, and her colors make art
+appear incredible. If you could paint the sunset before your window as
+gorgeous as it is, your picture would be hooted from the walls of the
+exhibition. If you were to write into fiction the true story of the man
+or woman you met yesterday, it would be scouted as too wildly unreal.
+Indeed, the literary artist may almost say, as did the Duke of
+Wellington when urged to write his memoirs, "I should like to speak the
+truth; but if I did, I should be torn in pieces."
+
+Therefore the writer, when he adopts a high aim, must be a law to
+himself, bide his time, and take the risk of discovering, at last, that
+his life has been a failure. His task is one in which failure is easy,
+when he must not only depict the truths of Nature, but must do this with
+such verisimilitude as to vindicate its truth to other eyes, And since
+this recognition may not even begin till after his death, we can see
+what Rivarol meant by his fine saying, that "genius is only great
+patience," and Buffon, by his more guarded definition of genius as the
+aptitude for patience.
+
+Of all literary qualities, this patience has thus far been rarest in
+America. Therefore, there has been in our literature scarcely any quiet
+power; if effects are produced, they must, in literature as in painting,
+be sensational, and cover acres of canvas. As yet, the mass of our
+writers seek originality in mere externals; we think, because we live in
+a new country, we are unworthy of ourselves if we do not Americanize the
+grammar and spelling-book. In a republic, must the objective case be
+governed by a verb? We shall yet learn that it is not new literary forms
+we need, but only, fresh inspiration, combined with cultivated taste.
+The standard of good art is always much the same; modifications are
+trifling. Otherwise we could not enjoy any foreign literature. A fine
+phrase in Æschylus or Dante affects us as if we had read it in Emerson.
+A structural completeness in a work of art seems the same in the
+_Oedipus Tyrannus_ as in "The Scarlet Letter." Art has therefore its
+law; and eccentricity, though sometimes promising as a mere trait of
+youth, is only a disfigurement to maturer years. It is no discredit to
+Walt Whitman that he wrote "Leaves of Grass," only that he did not burn
+it afterwards. A young writer must commonly plough in his first crop, as
+the farmer does, to enrich the soil. Is it luxuriant, astonishing, the
+wonder of the neighborhood; so much the better,--in let it go!
+
+Sydney Smith said, in 1818, "There does not appear to be in America, at
+this moment, one man of any considerable talents." Though this might not
+now be said, we still stand before the world with something of the Swiss
+reputation, as a race of thrifty republicans, patriotic and courageous,
+with a decided turn for mechanical invention. What we are actually
+producing, even to-day, in any domain of pure art, is very little; it is
+only the broad average intelligence of the masses that does us any
+credit. And even this is easily exaggerated. The majority of members of
+Congress talk bad grammar; so do the majority of public-school teachers.
+I do not mean merely that they speak without elegance, but that in
+moments of confidence they say "We was," and "Them things," and "I done
+it." With the present predominance of merely scientific studies, and the
+increasing distaste for the study of language, I do not see how this is
+to diminish. For all that, there are already visible, in the American
+temperament, two points of great promise in respect to art in general,
+and literary art above all.
+
+First, there is in this temperament a certain pliability and
+impressibility, as compared with the rest of the Anglo-Saxon race; it
+shows a finer grain and a nicer touch. If this is not yet shown in the
+way of literature, it is only because the time has not come. It is
+visible everywhere else. The aim which Bonaparte avowed as his highest
+ambition for France, to convert all trades into arts, is being rapidly
+fulfilled all around us. There is a constant tendency to supersede brute
+muscle by the fibres of the brain, and thus to assimilate the rudest
+toil to what Bacon calls "sedentary and within-door arts, that require
+rather the finger than the arm." It is clear that this same impulse, in
+higher and higher applications, must culminate in the artistic creation
+of beauty.
+
+And to fortify this fine instinct, we may trust, secondly, in the
+profound earnestness which still marks our people. With all this
+flexibility, there is yet a solidity of principle beneath, that makes
+the subtile American mind as real and controlling as that of the robust
+race from which it sprang. Though the present tendency of our art is
+towards foreign models, this is but a temporary thing. We must look at
+these till we have learned what they can teach, but a race in which the
+moral nature is strongest will be its own guide at last.
+
+And it is a comfort thus to end in the faith that, as the foundation of
+all true greatness is in the conscience, so we are safe if we can but
+carry into science and art the same earnestness of spirit which has
+fought through the great civil war and slain slavery. As "the Puritan
+has triumphed" in this stern contest, so must the Puritan triumph in the
+more graceful emulations that are to come; but it must be the Puritanism
+of Milton, not of Cromwell only. The invigorating air of great moral
+principles must breathe through all our literature; it is the expanding
+spirit of the seventeenth century by which we must conquer now.
+
+It is worth all that has been sacrificed in New England to vindicate
+this one fact, the supremacy of the moral nature. All culture, all art,
+without this, must be but rootless flowers, such as flaunt round a
+nation's decay. All the long, stern reign of Plymouth Rock and Salem
+Meeting-House was well spent, since it had this for an end,--to plough
+into the American race the tradition of absolute righteousness, as the
+immutable foundation of all. This was the purpose of our fathers. There
+should be here no European frivolity, even if European grace went with
+it. For the sake of this great purpose, history will pardon all their
+excesses,--overwork, grim Sabbaths, prohibition of innocent amusements,
+all were better than to be frivolous. And so, in these later years, the
+arduous reforms into which the life-blood of Puritanism has passed have
+all helped to train us for art, because they have trained us in
+earnestness, even while they seemed to run counter to that spirit of joy
+in which art has its being. For no joy is joyous which has not its root
+in something noble. In what awful lines of light has this truth been
+lately written against the sky! What graces might there not have been in
+that Southern society before the war? It had ease, affluence, leisure,
+polished manners, European culture,--all worthless; it produced not a
+book, not a painting, not a statue; it concentrated itself on politics,
+and failed; then on war, and failed; it is dead and vanished, leaving
+only memories of wrong behind. Let us not be too exultant; the hasty
+wealth of New York may do as little. Intellect in this age is not to be
+found in the circles of fashion; it is not found in such society in
+Europe, it is not here. Even in Paris, the world's capital, imperialism
+taints all it touches; and it is the great traditions of a noble nation
+which make that city still the home of art. We, a younger and cruder
+race, yet need to go abroad for our standard of execution, but our ideal
+and our faith must be our own.
+
+
+
+
+A YOUNG DESPERADO.
+
+
+When Johnny is all snugly curled up in bed, with his rosy cheek resting
+on one of his scratched and grimy little hands, forming altogether a
+perfect picture of peace and innocence, it seems hard to realize what a
+busy, restive, pugnacious, badly ingenious little wretch he is! There is
+something so comical in those funny little shoes and stockings sprawling
+on the floor,--they look as if they could jump up and run off, if they
+wanted to,--there is something so laughable about those little trousers,
+which appear to be making vain attempts to climb up into the
+easy-chair,--the said trousers still retaining the shape of Johnny's
+little legs, and refusing to go to sleep,--there is something, I say,
+about these things, and about Johnny himself, which makes it difficult
+for me to remember that, when Johnny is awake, he not unfrequently
+displays traits of character not to be compared with anything but the
+cunning of an Indian warrior, combined with the combative qualities of a
+trained prize-fighter.
+
+I'm sure I don't know how he came by such unpleasant propensities. I am
+myself the meekest of men. Of course, I don't mean to imply that Johnny
+inherited his warlike disposition from his mother. She is the gentlest
+of women. But when you come to Johnny--he's the terror of the whole
+neighborhood.
+
+He was meek enough at first,--that is to say, for the first six or seven
+days of his existence. But I verily believe that he wasn't more than
+eleven days old when he showed a degree of temper that shocked
+me,--shocked me in one so young. On that occasion he turned very red in
+the face,--he was quite red before,--doubled up his ridiculous hands in
+the most threatening manner, and finally, in the impotency of rage,
+punched himself in the eye. When I think of the life he led his mother
+and Susan during the first eighteen months after his arrival, I shrink
+from the responsibility of allowing Johnny to call me father.
+
+Johnny's aggressive disposition was not more early developed than his
+duplicity. By the time he was two years of age, I had got the following
+maxim by heart: "Whenever J. is particularly quiet, look out for
+squalls." He was sure to be in some mischief. And I must say there was a
+novelty, an unexpectedness, an ingenuity, in his badness that constantly
+astonished me. The crimes he committed could be arranged alphabetically.
+He never repeated himself. His evil resources were inexhaustible. He
+never did the thing I expected he would. He never failed to do the thing
+I was unprepared for. I am not thinking so much of the time when he
+painted my writing-desk with raspberry jam, as of the occasion when he
+perpetrated an act of original cruelty on Mopsey, a favorite kitten in
+the household. We were sitting in the library. Johnny was playing in the
+front hall. In view of the supernatural stillness that reigned, I
+remarked, suspiciously, "Johnny is very quiet, my dear." At that moment
+a series of pathetic _mews_ was heard in the entry, followed by a
+violent scratching on the oil-cloth. Then Mopsey bounded into the room
+with three empty spools strung upon her tail. The spools were removed
+with great difficulty, especially the last one, which fitted remarkably
+tight. After that, Mopsey never saw a work-basket without arching her
+tortoise-shell back, and distending her tail to three times its natural
+thickness. Another child would have squeezed the kitten, or stuck a pin
+in it, or twisted her tail; but it was reserved for the superior genius
+of Johnny to string rather small spools upon it. He never did the
+obvious thing.
+
+It was this fertility and happiness, if I may say so, of invention, that
+prevented me from being entirely dejected over my son's behavior at this
+period. Sometimes the temptation to seize him and shake him was too
+strong for poor human nature. But I always regretted it afterwards. When
+I saw him asleep in his tiny bed, with one tear dried on his plump
+velvety cheek and two little mice-teeth visible through the parted lips,
+I couldn't help thinking what a little bit of a fellow he was, with his
+funny little fingers and his funny little nails; and it didn't seem to
+me that he was the sort of person to be pitched into by a great strong
+man like me.
+
+"When Johnny grows older," I used to say to his mother, "I'll reason
+with him."
+
+Now I don't know when Johnny will grow old enough to be reasoned with.
+When I reflect how hard it is to reason with wise grown-up people, if
+they happen to be unwilling to accept your view of matters, I am
+inclined to be very patient with Johnny, whose experience is rather
+limited, after all, though he is six years and a half old, and naturally
+wants to know why and wherefore. Somebody says something about the duty
+of "blind obedience," I can't expect Johnny to have more wisdom than
+Solomon, and to be more philosophic than the philosophers.
+
+At times, indeed, I have been led to expect this from him. He has shown
+a depth of mind that warranted me in looking for anything. At times he
+seems as if he were a hundred years old. He has a quaint, bird-like way
+of cocking his head on one side, and asking a question that appears to
+be the result of years of study. If I could answer some of those
+questions, I should solve the darkest mysteries of life and death. His
+inquiries, however, generally have a grotesque flavor. One night, when
+the mosquitoes were making lively raids on his person, he appealed to
+me, suddenly: "How does the moon feel when a skeeter bites it?" To his
+meditative mind, the broad, smooth surface of the moon presented a
+temptation not to be resisted by any stray skeeter.
+
+I freely confess that Johnny is now and then too much for me. I wish I
+could read him as cleverly as he reads me. He knows all my weak points;
+he sees right through me, and makes me feel that I am a helpless infant
+in his adroit hands. He has an argumentative, oracular air, when things
+have gone wrong, which always upsets my dignity. Yet how cunningly he
+uses his power! It is only in the last extremity that he crosses his
+legs, puts his hands into his trousers-pockets, and argues the case with
+me. One day last week he was very near coming to grief. By my
+directions, kindling-wood and coal are placed every morning in the
+library grate, in order that I may have a fire the moment I return at
+night. Master Johnny must needs apply a lighted match to this
+arrangement early in the forenoon. The fire was not discovered until the
+blower was one mass of red-hot iron, and the wooden mantelpiece was
+smoking with the intense heat.
+
+When I came home, Johnny was led from the store-room, where he had been
+imprisoned from an early period, and where he had employed himself in
+eating about two dollars' worth of preserved pears.
+
+"Johnny," said I, in as severe a tone as one could use in addressing a
+person whose forehead glistened with syrup,--"Johnny, don't you remember
+that I have always told you never to meddle with matches?"
+
+It was something delicious to see Johnny trying to remember. He cast one
+eye meditatively up to the ceiling, then he fixed it abstractedly on the
+canary-bird, then he rubbed his ruffled brows with a sticky hand; but
+really, for the life of him, he couldn't recall any injunctions
+concerning matches.
+
+"I can't, papa, truly, truly," said Johnny at length. "I guess I must
+have forgot it."
+
+"Well, Johnny, in order that you may not forget it in future--"
+
+Here Johnny was seized with an idea. He interrupted me.
+
+"I'll tell you what you do, papa,--_you just put it down in writin_'."
+
+With the air of a man who has settled a question definitely, but at the
+same time is willing to listen politely to any crude suggestions that
+you may have to throw out, Johnny crossed his legs, and thrust his hands
+into those wonderful trousers-pockets. I turned my face aside, for I
+felt a certain weakness creeping into the corners of my mouth. I was
+lost. In an instant the little head, covered all over with yellow curls,
+was laid upon my knee, and Johnny was crying, "I'm so very, very sorry!"
+
+I have said that Johnny is the terror of the neighborhood. I think I
+have not done the young gentleman an injustice. If there is a window
+broken within the radius of two miles from our house, Johnny's ball, or
+a stone known to come from his dexterous hand, is almost certain to be
+found in the battered premises. I never hear the musical jingling of
+splintered glass, but my _porte-monnaie_ gives a convulsive throb in my
+breast-pocket. There is not a doorstep in our street that hasn't borne
+evidences in red chalk of his artistic ability; there isn't a bell that
+he hasn't rung and run away from at least three hundred times. Scarcely
+a day passes but he falls out of something, or over something, or into
+something. A ladder running up to the dizzy roof of an unfinished
+building is no more to be resisted by him than the back platform of a
+horse-car, when the conductor is collecting his fare in front.
+
+I should not like to enumerate the battles that Johnny has fought during
+the past eight months. It is a physical impossibility, I should judge,
+for him to refuse a challenge. He picks his enemies out of all ranks of
+society. He has fought the ash-man's boy, the grocer's boy, the rich
+boys over the way, and any number of miscellaneous boys who chanced to
+stray into our street.
+
+I can't say that this young desperado is always victorious. I have known
+the tip of his nose to be in a state of unpleasant redness for weeks
+together. I have known him to come home frequently with no brim to his
+hat; once he presented himself with only one shoe, on which occasion
+his jacket was split up the back in a manner that gave him the
+appearance of an over-ripe chestnut bursting out of its bur. How he will
+fight! But this I can say,--if Johnny is as cruel as Caligula, he is
+every bit as brave as Agamemnon. I never knew him to strike a boy
+smaller than himself. I never knew him to tell a lie when a lie would
+save him from disaster.
+
+At present the General, as I sometimes call him, is in hospital. He was
+seriously wounded at the battle of The Little Go-Cart, on the 9th
+instant. On returning from my office yesterday evening, I found that
+scarred veteran stretched upon a sofa in the sitting-room, with a patch
+of brown paper stuck over his left eye, and a convicting smell of
+vinegar about him.
+
+"Yes," said his mother, dolefully, "Johnny's been fighting again. That
+horrid Barnabee boy (who is eight years old, if he is a day) won't let
+the child alone."
+
+"Well," said I, "I hope Johnny gave that Barnabee boy a thrashing."
+
+"Didn't I, though?" cries Johnny, from the sofa. "_I_ bet!"
+
+"O Johnny!" says his mother.
+
+Now, several days previous to this, I had addressed the General in the
+following terms:--
+
+"Johnny, if I ever catch you in another fight of your own seeking, I
+shall cane you."
+
+In consequence of this declaration, it became my duty to look into the
+circumstances of the present affair, which will be known in history as
+the battle of The Little Go-Cart. After going over the ground very
+carefully, I found the following to be the state of the case.
+
+It seems that the Barnabee Boy--I speak of him as if he were the Benicia
+Boy--is the oldest pupil in the Primary Military School (I think it
+_must_ be a military school) of which Johnny is a recent member. This
+Barnabee, having whipped every one of his companions, was sighing for
+new boys to conquer, when Johnny joined the institution. He at once
+made friendly overtures of battle to Johnny, who, oddly enough, seemed
+indisposed to encourage his advances. Then Barnabee began a series of
+petty persecutions, which had continued up to the day of the fight.
+
+On the morning of that eventful day the Barnabee Boy appeared in the
+school-yard with a small go-cart. After running down on Johnny several
+times with this useful vehicle, he captured Johnny's cap, filled it with
+sand, and dragged it up and down the yard triumphantly in the go-cart.
+This made the General very angry, of course, and he took an early
+opportunity of kicking over the triumphal car, in doing which he kicked
+one of the wheels so far into space that it has not been seen since.
+
+This brought matters to a crisis. The battle would have taken place then
+and there; but at that moment the school-bell rang, and the gladiators
+were obliged to give their attention to Smith's Speller. But a gloom
+hung over the morning's exercises,--a gloom that was not dispelled in
+the back row, when the Barnabee Boy stealthily held up to Johnny's
+vision a slate, whereon was inscribed this fearful message:--
+
+[Illustration]
+
+Johnny got it "put down in writin'" this time!
+
+After a hasty glance at the slate, the General went on with his studies
+composedly enough. Eleven o'clock came, and with it came recess, and
+with recess the inevitable battle.
+
+Now I do not intend to describe the details of this brilliant action,
+for the sufficient reason that, though there were seven young gentlemen
+(connected with the Primary School) on the field as war correspondents,
+their accounts of the engagement are so contradictory as to be utterly
+worthless. On one point they all agree,--that the contest was sharp,
+short, and decisive. The truth is, the General is a quick, wiry,
+experienced old hero; and it didn't take him long to rout the Barnabee
+Boy, who was in reality a coward, as all bullies and tyrants ever have
+been, and always will be.
+
+I don't approve of boys fighting; I don't defend Johnny; but if the
+General wants an extra ration or two of preserved pear, he shall have
+it!
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+I am well aware that, socially speaking, Johnny is a Black Sheep. I know
+that I have brought him up badly, and that there is not an unmarried man
+or woman in the United States who wouldn't have brought him up very
+differently. It's a great pity that the only people who know how to
+manage children never have any! At the same time, Johnny is not a black
+sheep all over. He has some white spots. His sins--if wiser folks had no
+greater!--are the result of too much animal life. They belong to his
+evanescent youth, and will pass away; but his honesty, his generosity,
+his bravery, belong to his character, and are enduring qualities. The
+quickly crowding years will tame him. A good large pane of glass, or a
+seductive bell-knob, ceases in time to have attractions for the most
+reckless spirit. And I am quite confident that Johnny will be a great
+statesman, or a valorous soldier, or, at all events, a good citizen,
+after he has got over being A Young Desperado.
+
+
+
+
+REVIEWS AND LITERARY NOTICES.
+
+
+     _The First Canticle_ [_Inferno_] _of the Divine Comedy of_
+     DANTE ALIGHIERI. Translated by THOMAS WILLIAM PARSONS. Boston:
+     De Vries, Ibarra, and Company.
+
+While we must own that we have no sympathy with the theory of free
+translation, we recognize the manifold merits of execution in this work,
+and accept it as one which, together with Mr. Longfellow's version of
+the whole of Dante's _Divina Commedia_, and Mr. Norton's translation of
+the _Vita Nuova_, will make the present year memorable in our
+literature. It does not necessarily stand in antagonism to works
+executed in a spirit entirely different, and we shall make no comparison
+of it with the "Inferno" by Mr. Longfellow, the admirers of which will
+be among the first to feel its characteristic and very striking
+excellences.
+
+In substituting the decasyllabic quatrain for the triple rhyme of the
+Italian, we suppose Dr. Parsons desired rather to please the reader's
+ear with a familiar stanza, than to avoid the difficulties (exaggerated,
+we think, by critics) of the _terza rima_, and he could certainly have
+chosen no more felicitous form after once departing from that of his
+original. He has almost re-created the stanza for his purpose, giving it
+new movement, and successfully adapting to the exigencies of dialogue
+and of narrative what has hitherto chiefly been associated with elegiac
+and didactic poetry. Something of this may be seen in the following
+passages (from the description of the transit through the frozen circle
+of Caina), which moreover appear to us among the best sustained of the
+version.
+
+    "And as a frog squats croaking from a stream,
+      With nose put forth, what time the village maid
+      Oft in her slumber doth of gleaning dream,
+      Stood in the ice there every doleful shade.
+    Livid as far as where shame paints the cheek,
+      And doomed their faces downward still to hold.
+      Chattering like storks, their weeping eyes bespeak
+      Their aching hearts, their mouths the biting cold."
+
+      "A thousand visages I saw, by cold
+    Turned to dog-faces; horror chills me through
+      Whenever of those frozen fords I think.
+      And as we nearer to the centre drew,
+      Towards which all bodies by their weight must sink,
+    There, as I shivered in the eternal chill,
+      Trampling among the heads, it happed, by luck,
+      Or destiny--or, it may be, my will--
+      Hard in the face of one my foot I struck.
+    Weeping he cried, 'What brings thee bruising us?
+      Unless on me fresh vengeance thou wouldst pile
+      For Mont' Aperti, why torment me thus?'
+      And I: 'My Master, wait for me awhile,
+    That I through him may set one doubt at rest;
+      Then, if thou bid me hasten on, I will.'
+      My leader stopped; and I the shade addressed
+      Who kept full bitterly blaspheming still,
+    'Say, who art thou whose tongue so foully speaks?'
+      'Nay, who art thou that walk'st the withering air
+      Of Antemora, smiting others' cheeks
+      That, wert thou living, 't were too much to bear?'
+    'Living I am; and thou, if craving fame,
+      Mayst count it precious,'--this was my reply,--
+      'That I with other notes record thy name.'
+      He answered thus: 'Far other wish have I.
+    Trouble me now no longer,--get thee gone:
+      Thine is cold flattery in this waste of Hell.'
+      At this his hindmost hairs I fastened on,
+      And cried, 'Thy name! I'll force thee now to tell.
+    Or not one hair upon thy head shall grow.'
+      He answered thus: 'Although thou pluck me bare,
+      I'll neithertell my name, nor visage show;
+      Nay, though a thousand times thou rend my hair,'
+
+    "I held his tresses in my fingers wound,
+      And more than one tuft had I twitched away
+      As he, with eyes bent down, howled like a hound;
+      When one cried out, 'What ails thee, Bocca? say,--
+    Canst thou not make enough clack with thy jaws,
+      But thou must bark too! What fiend pricks thee now?'
+      'Aha!' said I, 'henceforth I have no cause
+      To bid thee speak, thou cursed traitor thou!
+    I'll shame thee, bearing truth of thee to men.'
+      'Away!' he answered: 'what thou wilt, relate:
+      But, shouldst thou get from hence with breath again,
+      Mention him too so ready with his prate."
+
+The encounter of Dante with Farinata and Cavalcante in their fiery tombs
+is also painted with such animated and fortunate strokes that we must
+reproduce some of them here:--
+
+    "'O Tuscan! thou who com'st with gentle speech.
+      Through Hell's hot city, breathing from the earth,
+      Stop in this place one moment, I beseech:
+      Thy tongue betrays the country of thy birth.
+    Of that illustrious land I know thee sprung,
+      Which in my day perchance I somewhat vexed.'
+      Forth from one vault these sudden accents rung,
+      So that I trembling stood with fear perplexed.
+    Then as I closer to my master drew.
+      'Turn back! what dost thou?' he exclaimed in haste;
+      'See! Farinata rises to thy view;
+      Now mayst behold him upward from his waist.'
+
+    "Full in his face already I was gazing,
+      While his front lowered, and his proud bosom swelled,
+      As though even there, amid his burial blazing,
+      The infernal realm in high disdain he held."
+
+In this scene, however, the radical defect of Dr. Parsons's work
+appears: it is unequal, and unsustained even in some of its best parts.
+It seems scarcely credible that the poet who could produce the grand
+lines just given, could also mar the whole effect of the father's
+frantic appeal to know if his son Guido be no longer alive, by putting
+in his mouth the melodramatic words,
+
+    "Sayest thou, 'he had'? _what mean ye!_ is he dead?"
+
+But our translator does this, and he makes Ugolino report little Anselm
+as saying,
+
+    "Thou look'st so, father! what's the matter, what?"
+
+--a line that Melpomene herself could not read with tragic effect,--for,
+
+    "Disse; tu guardi si, padre; che hai?"
+
+As he likewise causes Francesca to say,
+
+    "Love quick to kindle every gentler breast
+    _Fired this fond being with the lovely shape_
+    Bereft me so!"
+
+for,
+
+    "Amor, che al cor gentil ratto s'apprende;
+    Prese costui della bella persona
+    Che mi fu tolta ";
+
+and,
+
+    "Where Po descends in Adria's peace to rest
+       _Raging with all his rivulets no more,"_
+
+for,
+
+    "Su la marina dove 'l Po descende
+    Per aver pace co' seguaci sui,"
+
+Indeed, we have to confess that the present is on the whole not a
+satisfactory translation of the episode of Francesca da Rimini. The
+inscription on the gate of hell, also, is rendered in a manner scarcely
+to be called successful, and not bearing comparison with that of the
+other rhyming translators,--Ford, Wright, and Cayley. As to the
+beginning of the seventh canto, we must think that Dr. Parsons was
+chiefly moved by the prevailing sentiment of mankind to translate
+
+    "Pape Satan! pape Satan aleppe!"
+
+into
+
+    "Ho! Satan! Popes--more Popes--head Satan here!"
+
+These and other blemishes arrest the most casual glance. The merits of
+any work are harder to prove than its faults, though they are quite as
+deeply felt; and, as we have already intimated, it is the misfortune of
+Dr. Parsons that some of his greatest defects are in passages otherwise
+the most generally successful. There are probably few pages of the
+translation which do not offend by some lapse; but at the same time
+there is no page which will not command admiration by sublime and
+striking lines. We think the whole of the following passage from the
+thirteenth canto (it is the well-known description of the sentient wood
+into which the self-violent are turned) has a peculiar strength and
+dignity:--
+
+    "Amid the branches of this dismal grove,
+      Their loathsome nests the brutal Harpies build,
+      Who from the Strophades the Trojans drove
+      With woful auguries erelong fulfilled.
+    Huge wings they have, men's faces, human throats,
+      Feet armed with claws, vast bellies clothed with plumes:
+      From those strange trees they pour their doleful notes.
+      'Now, ere thou further penetrate these glooms,'
+    Said my good master, 'thou shouldst understand
+      Thou'rt in the second circlet, and shall be,
+      Until thou come upon the horrid sand.
+      Give good heed then: more wonders thou shall see,
+    Yea, to confirm all stories I have told.'
+      On every side I heard heart-rending cries,
+      But not a person could I there behold:
+      Wherefore I stopped, bewildered with surprise.
+    Methinks he thought I thought the voices came
+      From some that, hiding, in the thicket lay:
+      Because the Master said, 'If thou but maim
+      One of these plants, yen, pluck a branch away,
+    Then shall thy judgment be more just than now.'
+      Therefore my hand I slightly forward reached;
+      And while I wrenched away a little bough
+      From a huge bush, 'Why mangle me?' it screeched.
+    Then, as the dingy drops began to start,
+      'Why dost thou tear me?' shrieked the trunk again,
+      'Hast thou no touch of pity in thy heart?
+      We that now here are planted, once were men;
+    But, were we serpents' souls, thy hand might shame
+      To have no more compassion on our woes';
+      Like a green log, that hisses in the flame,
+      Groaning at one end, as the other glows,--
+    Even as the wind comes sputtering forth, I say,
+      Thus oozed together from the splintered wood
+      Both words and blood. I dropped the broken spray,
+      And, like a coward, faint and trembling stood."
+
+This picture, also, of the apparition of the angel who opens the gates
+of Dis is done with a hand as firm as it is free:--
+
+    "As frogs before their enemy, the snake,
+      Quick scattering through the pool in timid shoals,
+      On the dankooze a huddling cluster makes'
+      I saw above a thousand mined souls
+    Flying from one who passed the Stygian bog,
+      With feet unmoistened by the sludgy wave;
+      Oft from his face his left hand brushed the fog
+      Whose weight alone, it seemed, annoyance gave.
+    At once the messenger of Heaven I kenned,
+      And toward my master turned, who made a sign
+      That hushed I should remain, and lowly bend.
+      Ah me, how full he looked of scorn divine!"
+
+
+     _Ornithology and Oölogy of New England: containing full
+     Descriptions of the Birds of New England, and adjoining States
+     and Provinces, arranged by a long-approved Classification and
+     Nomenclature; together with a complete History of their Habits,
+     Times of Arrival and Departure, their Distribution, Food, Song,
+     Time of Breeding, and a careful and accurate Description of
+     their Nests and Eggs; with Illustrations of many Species of the
+     Birds, and accurate Figures of their Eggs_. By EDWARD A.
+     SAMUELS, Curator of Zoölogy in the Massachusetts State Cabinet.
+     Boston: Nichols and Noyes.
+
+The strong point of this book is, that it monopolizes the ground, and
+has no rivals. While no branch of natural history has called forth in
+America such arduous research as ornithology, or such eloquent writing,
+there has yet been for many years no popular manual in print. Audubon,
+Wilson, Nuttall, are all practically inaccessible to the ordinary
+purchaser. Moreover, there have been great advances in scientific
+classification, and also in field knowledge, since those earlier works
+appeared. There is therefore an admirable field for any new writer.
+
+Mr. Samuels frankly acknowledges on his first page that he is mainly
+indebted to Professor Baird of the Smithsonian Institute for what is by
+far the most valuable portion of his book,--the classification, the
+nomenclature, and the generic and specific descriptions. He is only
+responsible for the popular descriptions; but even these consist so very
+largely of quotations that the whole book must evidently be judged
+rather as a compilation than as an original work.
+
+Considered as a compilation, it is valuable, though its title-page
+unfortunately promises more than any work on natural history ever yet
+performed, and so prepares the way for disappointment. Mr. Samuels
+appears to be a zealous and accurate ornithologist, with plenty of
+field-knowledge, but very little descriptive power. Being apparently
+conscious of this, he is shy of delineating the rarer birds, because he
+does not personally know them, while he passes hastily over the more
+familiar, because "their habits are known to all." This last piece of
+abstinence is greatly to be regretted. For a local manual has two main
+objects, to furnish to young students the means of identifying species,
+and to give remote students the means of comparing species. For both
+purposes the commonest birds are most important, since everybody begins
+with these. A boy wishes, for instance, to identify the wood-thrush; or
+a Southern naturalist wishes to compare its traits with those of the
+mocking-bird. He finds that in this book the wood-thrush is dismissed
+with two pages, while there is a quotation from Wilson seven pages long
+upon the habits of the mocking-bird. When will naturalists learn that
+the first duty of each observer is to make a thorough study of his own
+locality, and meanwhile to let the rest of the world alone?
+
+One looks in vain in these pages for any good description of the
+song-sparrow, the blue-bird, the blue-jay, the kingfisher, or the
+oriole. These birds are allowed but a page or two each, although, for
+some reason, more liberal space is given to the robin and the crow. But
+there is no bird so familiar that it does not offer subjects for
+interesting speculation and study. The pretty nocturnal trill of the
+hairbird; the remarkable change which civilization has wrought in the
+habits of the cliff-swallow; the disputed question whether the cat-bird
+is or is not a mocker;--these and a hundred similar points relate to
+very common birds, and are accordingly unnoticed by Mr. Samuels. Eggs
+really interest him, and his descriptions and measurements of these
+constitute the most original part of the book, and are highly valuable.
+On the other hand, the notes of birds are very inadequately described,
+and sometimes not at all; he does not mention that the loon has a voice.
+
+Again, he does full justice to the chronology of bird biography, and
+gives ample dates as to their coming and going, nesting and hatching.
+But as to their geographical distribution the information is scanty, and
+not always quite reliable. Thus the snowy-owl is described (p. 78) as
+occurring "principally on the sea-coast," whereas it is tolerably
+abundant in the very heart of Massachusetts, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois,
+etc.; the snow-bird is described as nesting in the White Mountains (p.
+314), while the more remarkable fact that it nests on Monadnock is
+omitted; the meadow-lark is described as only remaining in New England
+through "mild winters" (p. 344), whereas near Newport it remains during
+the coldest seasons, more abundantly than any other conspicuous bird.
+These, however, are subordinate points, and there is no important matter
+in which we have seen any reason to impugn the author's accuracy.
+
+The inequality which marks the internal execution of this book marks
+also its externals. The plates of eggs--four in number, comprising
+thirty eggs--are admirable; while the plates representing birds are Of
+the most mediocre description, and do discredit to the work. With all
+these merits and demerits, the book is of much value, because an
+unsatisfactory manual is far better than none. It does not take the
+place of that revised edition of Nuttall, which is still the great
+desideratum, but we may use meanwhile an eminently ornithological
+proverb, and say that a Samuels in the hand is worth two Nuttalls in the
+bush.
+
+
+     _Richmond during the War. Four Years of Personal Observation_.
+     By a Richmond Lady. New York: G. W. Carleton and Company.
+
+Mr. Curtis, in his charming book, "Prue and I," speaks of the novel
+effect of landscape which Mr. Titbottom got by putting down his head,
+and regarding the prospect between his knees; and we suppose that most
+ingenious boys, young and old, have similarly contemplated nature, and
+will understand what we mean when we say that the world shows to much
+the same advantage through the books of Southern writers. Especially in
+Southern histories of the late war is the effect noticeable. The general
+outline is the same as when viewed in the more conventional manner, with
+ideas and principles right side up; the objects are the same, the events
+and results are the same; but there is a curious glamour over all, and
+the spectator has a mystical feeling of topsy-turvy, ending in vertigo
+and a disordered stomach.
+
+The present book is in the spirit of all other subjugated literature
+concerning the war,--a vainglorious and boastful spirit as to events
+that led only to the destruction of the political power of the South; a
+wronged and forgiving, if not quite cheerful, spirit as to the end
+itself. Vivid and powerful presentation of facts would not perhaps be
+expected of an author who calls herself "A Richmond Lady," and there is
+nothing of the sort in the book. It contains sketches of public Rebels
+in civil and military station, washed in with the raw yellows, reds, and
+blues of Southern eulogy; and there is a great deal of gossip concerning
+private life in Richmond, where everybody appears to have spoken and
+acted during the four years of the war as if in the presence of the
+photographers and short-hand writers, and with an eye single to the
+impression upon posterity. It is an eloquent book, and--need we say?--a
+dull one.
+
+
+     _Kathrina: her Life and mine, in a Poem_, By J. G. HOLLAND,
+     Author of "Bitter-Sweet." New York: Charles Scribner and
+     Company.
+
+Let us tell without any caricature of ours, in prose that shall be just
+if not generous, the story of Mr. Holland's hero as we have gathered it
+from the work which the author, for reasons of his own, calls a poem.
+
+The petted son of a rich widow in Northampton, Massachusetts, whose
+father has killed himself in a moment of insanity, reaches the age of
+fourteen years without great event, when his mother takes him to visit a
+lady friend living on the other side of the Connecticut River. In this
+lady's door-yard the hero finds a little lamb tethered in the grass, and
+decked with a necklace of scarlet ribbon, and, having a mind for a
+frolic with the pretty animal, the boy unties it. Instantly it slips its
+tether from his hand, leaps the fence, and runs to the top of the
+nearest mountain, whither he follows it, and where, exalted by the
+magnificence of the landscape, he is for the first time conscious of
+being a poet. Returning to his anxious mother, she too is aware of some
+wondrous change in him, and says:
+
+    "My Paul has climbed the noblest mountain height
+    In all his little world, and gazed on scenes
+    As beautiful as rest beneath the sun.
+    I trust he will remember all his life
+    That to his best achievement, and the spot
+    Nearest to heaven his youthful feet have trod,
+    He has been guided by a guileless lamb.
+    It is an omen which his mother's heart
+    Will treasure with her jewels."
+
+Resolved to give him the best educational advantages his mother sends
+him to Mr. Bancroft's school; or, as Mr. Holland sings, permits him
+
+    "To climb the goodly eminence where he
+    In whose profound and stately pages live
+    His country's annals, ruled his little realm."
+
+Here the hero surpasses all the other boys in everything, and but
+repeats his triumphs later when he goes to Amherst College. His mother
+lives upon the victories which he despises; but at last she yields to
+the taint which was in her own blood as well as her husband's, and
+destroys herself. The son, who was aware of her suicidal tendency, and
+had once overheard her combating it in prayer, curses the God who would
+not listen to her and help her, and rejects Him from his scheme of life.
+
+In due time he falls in love with Kathrina, a young lady whom he first
+sees on the occasion of her public reception into the Congregational
+Church at Hadley. Later he learns that she is staying with the lady
+whose pet lamb led him such a chase,--that she is in fact her niece, and
+that she has seen better days. We must say that this good lady does
+everything in her power to make a match between the young people; and
+she is more pleased than surprised at the success of her efforts. It has
+been the hero's idea that human love will fill up the void left in his
+life by the rejection of God and religion; but he soon finds himself
+vaguely unhappy and unsatisfied, and he determines to glut his heart
+with literary fame. He goes, therefore, to New York, and succeeds as a
+poet beyond all his dreams of success. For ten years he is the most
+popular of authors; but he sickens of his facile triumph, and imagines
+that to be happy he must write to please himself, and not the multitude.
+He writes with this idea, but pleases nobody, and is as unhappy as ever.
+
+Meanwhile, Kathrina has fallen into a decline. On her death-bed she
+tells him that it is religion alone which can appease and satisfy him;
+but she pleads with him in vain, till one day, when he enters her room,
+and is startled by a strange coincidence: the lamb, which led him to the
+mountain-top and the consciousness of poetic power, had a scarlet ribbon
+on its neck, and now he finds this ribbon
+
+              "at her throat
+    Repeated in a bright geranium-flower!"
+
+Then Kathrina tells him that his mother's spirit has talked with her,
+and bidden her say to him this:--
+
+    "The lamb has slipped the leash by which his hand
+    Held her in thrall, and seeks the mountain-height;
+    And he, if he reclaim her to his grasp,
+    Must follow where she leads, and kneel at last
+    Upon the summit by her side. And more,
+    Give him my promise that, if he do this,
+    He shall receive from that fair altitude
+    Such a vision of the realm that lies around,
+    Cleft by the river of immortal life,
+    As shall so lift him from his selfishness,
+    And so enlarge his soul, that he shall stand
+    Redeemed from all unworthiness, and saved
+    To happiness and heaven."
+
+Whereupon, having delivered her message, Kathrina bids him kneel. It is
+the supreme moment of her life. He hears his mother's voice, and the
+voice of the innumerable heavenly host, and even the voice of God
+repeating her mandate. He kneels, and she bids him pray, and, as before,
+all the celestial voices repeat her bidding. He prays and is saved.
+
+Such is the story of Kathrina, or rather of Kathrina's husband, for she
+is herself scarcely other than a name for a series of arguments, with
+little of the flesh and blood of a womanly personality. We have too much
+reverence for high purposes in literature not to applaud Mr. Holland's
+good intent in this work, and we accept fully his theory of letters and
+of life. Both are meagre and unsatisfactory as long as their motive is
+low; both must yield unhappiness and self-despite till religion inform
+them. This is the common experience of man; this is the burden of the
+sayings of the sage from the time of Solomon to the time of Mr. Holland;
+and we can all acknowledge its truth, however we may differ as to the
+essence of religion itself. But we conceive that repetition of this
+truth in a long poem demands of the author an excellence, or of the
+reader a patience, all but superhuman.
+
+How Mr. Holland has met the extraordinary demand upon his powers is
+partly evident from the outline of the poem as we have given it. It must
+be owned that it is rather a feeble fancy which unites two vital epochs
+by the incident of the truant lambkin, and that the plot of the poem
+does not in any way reveal a great faculty of invention. A parable,
+moreover, teaches only so far as it is true to life; and in a tale
+professing to deal with persons of our own day and country, we have a
+right to expect some fidelity to our contemporaries and neighbors. But
+we find nothing of this in "Kathrina,"--not even in the incident of a
+young gentleman of fourteen sporting with a lambkin; or in the talk of
+young people who make love in long arguments concerning the nature and
+office of genius and the intermediary functions of the teacher.
+Polemically considered, there is nothing very wrong in the discussions
+between those metaphysical lovers, and no one need raise the question as
+to how far Kathrina's peculiar ideas are applicable to the work of
+genius bearing her name.
+
+    "The greatest artists speak to fewest souls,
+    ... The bread that comes from heaven
+    Needs finest breaking. Some there doubtless are,
+    Some ready souls, that take the morsel pure
+    Divided to their need; but multitudes
+    Must have it in admixtures, menstruums,
+    And forms that human hands or human life
+    Have moulded."
+
+Such passages, though they add nothing to the verisimilitude of
+Kathrina's character, help to make her appear consistent in not laughing
+at a certain weird poem which her lover reads to her. Few ladies in real
+life, however great a tenderness they might feel for a morbid young
+poet, could practise Kathrina's self-control, when, depicting himself as
+a godless youth imprisoned by phantoms "among the elves of the silent
+land," he sings:
+
+    "Under the charred and ghastly gloom,
+      Over the flinty stones,
+    They led him forth to his terrible doom,
+    And, plunged in a deep and noisome tomb,
+      They sat him among the bones."
+
+Where, crouching, he beholds, through a "loop" in the wall, "a sweet
+angel from the skies":--
+
+    "Could she not loose him from his thrall,
+      And lead him into the light?
+    'Ah me!' he murmured, 'I dare not call,
+    Lest she may doubt it a goblin's waul,
+      And leave me in swift affright!'"
+
+The question is of the poet himself, immersed in his own gloomy
+thoughts, and of Kathrina, who could rescue him from them; but she has
+heard "only a wild, weird story," and her lover is obliged to explain
+it, and still we are to suppose that she did not laugh. Nay, we are told
+that she instantly accepted the poet, who exclaims:
+
+    "Are there not lofty moments when the soul
+    Leaps to the front of being, casting off
+    The robes and clumsy instruments of sense,
+    And, postured in its immortality,
+    Reveals its independence of the clod
+    In which it dwells?--moments in which the earth
+    And all material things, all sights and sounds,
+    All signals, ministries, interpreters,
+    Relapse to nothing, and the interflow
+    Of thought and feeling, love and life, go on
+    Between two spirits, raised to sympathy
+    The body dust, within an orb outlined,
+    It shall go on forever?"
+
+We have no reason to suppose that this is not thought a fine passage by
+the author, who will doubtless find readers enough to agree with him, if
+he should not care to accept our estimate of his whole poem.
+Nevertheless, we must confess that it appears to us puerile in
+conception, destitute of due motive, and crude and inartistic in
+treatment. But we should be unjust both to ourselves and our author, if
+we left his work without some allusion to its highly embellished style,
+or, having failed to approve the whole design, refused to notice at all
+the elaborate ornamentation of the parts. Not to be guilty, then, of
+this unfairness, let us cull here some of the fanciful tropes and
+figures which enamel these flowery pages. The oriole is "a torch of
+downy flame"; the "reiterant katydids rasp the mysterious silence"; a
+mother's loss and sorrow are "twin leeches at her heart"; the frosty
+landscape is "fulgent with downy crystals"; Kathrina wears a "pale-blue
+muslin robe," which the hero fancies "dyed with forget-me-nots"; and the
+landscape has usually some effect of dry-goods to the poet's eye. We
+might almost believe that this passage,
+
+          "We touched the hem
+    Of the dark mountain's robe, that falls in folds
+    Of emerald sward around his feet, and there
+    Upon its tufted velvet we sat down,"
+
+was inspired by perusal of Dr. Holmes's ode to "Evening--by a Tailor":--
+
+    "Day hath put on his jacket, and around
+    His burning bosom buttoned it with stars
+    Here will I lay me on the velvet grass,
+    That is like padding to earth's meagre ribs."
+
+But Mr. Holland's fancy is of a quality which transcends all feigning in
+others. Whatever it touches it figures in gross material substance,
+preferably wood or some sort of upholstery. When, however, his hero
+first stood in Broadway, he seems to have found no fabric of the looms,
+no variety of plumage, no sort of precious wood or dye-stuff equal to
+the allegory, and he wreaks himself in the following tremendous
+hydraulic image;--
+
+    "I saw the waves of life roll up the steps
+    Of great cathedrals and retire; and break
+    In charioted grandeur at the feet
+    Of marble palaces, and toss their spray
+    Of feathered beauty through the open doors,
+    To pile the restless foam within; and burst
+    On crowded caravansaries, to fall
+    In quick return; and in dark currents glide
+    Through sinuous alleys, and the grimy loops
+    Of reeking cellars, and with softest plash
+    Assail the gilded shrines of opulence,
+    And slide in musical relapse away."
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No.
+122, December, 1867, by Various
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY ***
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+      The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 122, December, 1867.
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+<pre>
+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 122,
+December, 1867, 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 20, No. 122, December, 1867
+
+Author: Various
+
+Release Date: April 28, 2009 [EBook #28630]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Joshua Hutchinson, Josephine Paolucci and the
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net.
+(This file was produced from images generously made
+available by Cornell University Digital Collections.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+</pre>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_641" id="Page_641">[Pg 641]</a></span></p>
+
+
+<h4>THE</h4>
+
+<h1>ATLANTIC MONTHLY.</h1>
+
+<h2><i>A Magazine of Literature, Science, Art, and Politics.</i></h2>
+
+
+<h3>VOL. XX.&mdash;DECEMBER, 1867.&mdash;NO. CXXII.</h3>
+
+<p>Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1867, by <span class="smcap">Ticknor and
+Fields</span>, in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of
+Massachusetts.</p>
+
+<p class="notes">Transcriber's Note: Minor typos have been corrected and footnotes moved
+to the end of the article. Table of contents has been created for the HTML version.</p>
+
+<h2>Contents</h2>
+
+<!-- Autogenerated TOC. Modify or delete as required. -->
+<p>
+<a href="#THE_GUARDIAN_ANGEL"><b>THE GUARDIAN ANGEL.</b></a><br />
+<a href="#A_MYSTERIOUS_PERSONAGE"><b>A MYSTERIOUS PERSONAGE.</b></a><br />
+<a href="#A_TOUR_IN_THE_DARK"><b>A TOUR IN THE DARK.</b></a><br />
+<a href="#AN_AUTUMN_SONG"><b>AN AUTUMN SONG.</b></a><br />
+<a href="#BY-WAYS_OF_EUROPE"><b>BY-WAYS OF EUROPE.</b></a><br />
+<a href="#MINOR_ELIZABETHAN_DRAMATISTS"><b>MINOR ELIZABETHAN DRAMATISTS.</b></a><br />
+<a href="#OUR_PACIFIC_RAILROADS"><b>OUR PACIFIC RAILROADS.</b></a><br />
+<a href="#GRANDMOTHERS_STORY_THE_GREAT_SNOW"><b>GRANDMOTHER'S STORY: THE GREAT SNOW.</b></a><br />
+<a href="#TOUJOURS_AMOUR"><b>TOUJOURS AMOUR.</b></a><br />
+<a href="#AMONG_THE_WORKERS_IN_SILVER"><b>AMONG THE WORKERS IN SILVER.</b></a><br />
+<a href="#WHAT_WE_FEEL"><b>WHAT WE FEEL.</b></a><br />
+<a href="#SONNET"><b>SONNET.</b></a><br />
+<a href="#LITERATURE_AS_AN_ART"><b>LITERATURE AS AN ART.</b></a><br />
+<a href="#A_YOUNG_DESPERADO"><b>A YOUNG DESPERADO.</b></a><br />
+<a href="#REVIEWS_AND_LITERARY_NOTICES"><b>REVIEWS AND LITERARY NOTICES.</b></a><br />
+</p>
+<!-- End Autogenerated TOC. -->
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="THE_GUARDIAN_ANGEL" id="THE_GUARDIAN_ANGEL"></a>THE GUARDIAN ANGEL.</h2>
+
+
+<h3>CHAPTER XXXIV.</h3>
+
+<h4>MURRAY BRADSHAW PLAYS HIS LAST CARD.</h4>
+
+<p>"How can I see that man this evening, Mr. Lindsay?"</p>
+
+<p>"May I not be <i>Clement</i>, dearest? I would not see him at all, Myrtle. I
+don't believe you will find much pleasure in listening to his fine
+speeches."</p>
+
+<p>"I cannot endure it. Kitty, tell him I am engaged, and cannot see him
+this evening. No, no! don't say engaged, say very much occupied."</p>
+
+<p>Kitty departed, communing with herself in this wise:&mdash;"Ockipied, is it?
+An' that's what ye cahl it when ye're kapin' company with one young
+gintleman an' don't want another young gintleman to come in an' help the
+two of ye? Ye won't get y'r pigs to market to-day, Mr. Bridshaw,&mdash;no,
+nor to-morrow, nayther, Mr. Bridshaw. It's Mrs. Lindsay that Miss Myrtle
+is goin' to be,&mdash;an' a big cake there'll be at the weddin', frosted all
+over,&mdash;won't ye be plased with a slice o' that, Mr. Bridshaw?"</p>
+
+<p>With these reflections in her mind, Mistress Kitty delivered her
+message, not without a gleam of malicious intelligence in her look that
+stung Mr. Bradshaw sharply. He had noticed a hat in the entry, and a
+little stick by it which he remembered well as one he had seen carried
+by Clement Lindsay. But he was used to concealing his emotions, and he
+greeted the two older ladies, who presently came into the library, so
+pleasantly, that no one who had not studied his face long and carefully
+would have suspected the bitterness of heart that lay hidden far down
+beneath his deceptive smile. He told Miss Silence, with much apparent
+interest, the story of his journey. He gave her an account of the
+progress of the case in which the estate of which she inherited the
+principal portion was interested. He did not tell her that a final
+decision which would settle the right to the great claim might be
+expected at any moment, and he did not tell her that there was very
+little doubt that it would be in favor of the heirs of Malachi Withers.
+He was very sorry he could not see Miss Hazard that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_642" id="Page_642">[Pg 642]</a></span> evening,&mdash;hoped he
+should be more fortunate to-morrow forenoon, when he intended to call
+again,&mdash;had a message for her from one of her former school friends,
+which he was anxious to give her. He exchanged certain looks and hints
+with Miss Cynthia, which led her to withdraw and bring down the papers
+he had intrusted to her. At the close of his visit, she followed him
+into the entry with a lamp, as was her common custom.</p>
+
+<p>"What's the meaning of all this, Cynthia? Is that fellow making love to
+Myrtle?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm afraid so, Mr. Bradshaw. He's been here several times, and they
+seem to be getting intimate. I couldn't do anything to stop it."</p>
+
+<p>"Give me the papers,&mdash;quick!"</p>
+
+<p>Cynthia pulled the package from her pocket. Murray Bradshaw looked
+sharply at it. A little crumpled,&mdash;crowded into her pocket. Seal
+unbroken. All safe.</p>
+
+<p>"I shall come again to-morrow forenoon. Another day and it will be all
+up. The decision of the court will be known. It won't be my fault if one
+visit is not enough.&mdash;You don't suppose Myrtle is in love with this
+fellow?"</p>
+
+<p>"She acts as if she might be. You know he's broke with Susan Posey, and
+there's nothing to hinder. If you ask my opinion, I think it's your last
+chance: she isn't a girl to half do things, and if she has taken to this
+man it will be hard to make her change her mind. But she's young, and
+she has had a liking for you, and if you manage it well there's no
+telling."</p>
+
+<p>Two notes passed between Myrtle Hazard and Master Byles Gridley that
+evening. Mistress Kitty Fagan, who had kept her ears pretty wide open,
+carried them.</p>
+
+<p>Murray Bradshaw went home in a very desperate state of feeling. He had
+laid his plans, as he thought, with perfect skill, and the certainty of
+their securing their end. These papers were to have been taken from the
+envelope, and found in the garret just at the right moment, either by
+Cynthia herself or one of the other members of the family, who was to be
+led on, as it were accidentally, to the discovery. The right moment must
+be close at hand. He was to offer his hand&mdash;and heart, of course&mdash;to
+Myrtle, and it was to be accepted. As soon as the decision of the land
+case was made known, or not long afterwards, there was to be a search in
+the garret for papers, and these were to be discovered in a certain
+dusty recess, where, of course, they would have been placed by Miss
+Cynthia.</p>
+
+<p>And now the one condition which gave any value to these arrangements
+seemed like to fail. This obscure youth&mdash;this poor fool, who had been on
+the point of marrying a simpleton to whom he had made a boyish
+promise&mdash;was coming between him and the object of his long pursuit,&mdash;the
+woman who had every attraction to draw him to herself. It had been a
+matter of pride with Murray Bradshaw that he never lost his temper so as
+to interfere with the precise course of action which his cool judgment
+approved; but now he was almost beside himself with passion. His labors,
+as he believed, had secured the favorable issue of the great case so
+long pending. He had followed Myrtle through her whole career, if not as
+her avowed lover, at least as one whose friendship promised to flower in
+love in due season. The moment had come when the scene and the
+characters in this village drama were to undergo a change as sudden and
+as brilliant as in those fairy spectacles where the dark background
+changes to a golden palace and the sober dresses are replaced by robes
+of regal splendor. The change was fast approaching; but he, the
+enchanter, as he had thought himself, found his wand broken, and his
+power given to another.</p>
+
+<p>He could not sleep during that night. He paced his room, a prey to
+jealousy and envy and rage, which his calm temperament had kept him from
+feeling<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_643" id="Page_643">[Pg 643]</a></span> in their intensity up to this miserable hour. He thought of all
+that a maddened nature can imagine to deaden its own intolerable
+anguish. Of revenge. If Myrtle rejected his suit, should he take her
+life on the spot, that she might never be another's,&mdash;that neither man
+nor woman should ever triumph over him,&mdash;the proud, ambitious man,
+defeated, humbled, scorned? No! that was a meanness of egotism which
+only the most vulgar souls could be capable of. Should he challenge her
+lover? It was not the way of the people and time, and ended in absurd
+complications, if anybody was foolish enough to try it. Shoot him? The
+idea floated through his mind, for he thought of everything; but he was
+a lawyer, and not a fool, and had no idea of figuring in court as a
+criminal. Besides, he was not a murderer,&mdash;cunning was his natural
+weapon, not violence. He had a certain admiration of desperate crime in
+others, as showing nerve and force, but he did not feel it to be his own
+style of doing business.</p>
+
+<p>During the night he made every arrangement for leaving the village the
+next day, in case he failed to make any impression on Myrtle Hazard and
+found that his chance was gone. He wrote a letter to his partner,
+telling him that he had left to join one of the regiments forming in the
+city. He adjusted all his business matters so that his partner should
+find as little trouble as possible. A little before dawn he threw
+himself on the bed, but he could not sleep; and he rose at sunrise, and
+finished his preparations for his departure to the city.</p>
+
+<p>The morning dragged along slowly. He would not go to the office, not
+wishing to meet his partner again. After breakfast he dressed himself
+with great care, for he meant to show himself in the best possible
+aspect. Just before he left the house to go to The Poplars, he took the
+sealed package from his trunk, broke open the envelope, took from it a
+single paper,&mdash;it had some spots on it which distinguished it from all
+the rest,&mdash;put it separately in his pocket, and then the envelope
+containing the other papers.</p>
+
+<p>The calm smile he wore on his features as he set forth cost him a
+greater effort than he had ever made before to put it on. He was
+moulding his face to the look with which he meant to present himself;
+and the muscles had been sternly fixed so long that it was a task to
+bring them to their habitual expression in company,&mdash;that of ingenuous
+good-nature.</p>
+
+<p>He was shown into the parlor at The Poplars; and Kitty told Myrtle that
+he had called and inquired for her, and was waiting down stairs.</p>
+
+<p>"Tell him I will be down presently," she said. "And, Kitty, now mind
+just what I tell you. Leave your kitchen door open, so that you can hear
+anything fall in the parlor. If you hear a book fall,&mdash;it will be a
+heavy one, and will make some noise,&mdash;run straight up here to my little
+chamber, and hang this red scarf out of the window. The <i>left-hand
+side-sash</i>, mind, so that anybody can see it from the road. If Mr.
+Gridley calls, show him into the parlor, no matter who is there."</p>
+
+<p>Kitty Fagan looked amazingly intelligent, and promised that she would do
+exactly as she was told. Myrtle followed her down stairs almost
+immediately, and went into the parlor, where Mr. Bradshaw was waiting.</p>
+
+<p>Never in his calmest moments had he worn a more insinuating smile on his
+features than that with which he now greeted Myrtle. So gentle, so
+gracious, so full of trust, such a completely natural expression of a
+kind, genial character did it seem, that to any but an expert it would
+have appeared impossible that such an effect could be produced by the
+skilful balancing of half a dozen pairs of little muscles that manage
+the lips and the corners of the mouth. The tones of his voice were
+subdued into accord with the look of his features; his whole manner was
+fascinating, as far as any conscious effort could make it so.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_644" id="Page_644">[Pg 644]</a></span> It was
+just one of those artificially pleasing effects that so often pass with
+such as have little experience of life for the genuine expression of
+character and feeling. But Myrtle had learned the look that shapes
+itself on the features of one who loves with a love that seeketh not its
+own, and she knew the difference between acting and reality. She met his
+insinuating approach with a courtesy so carefully ordered that it was of
+itself a sentence without appeal. Artful persons often interpret sincere
+ones by their own standard. Murray Bradshaw thought little of this
+somewhat formal address,&mdash;a few minutes would break this thin film to
+pieces. He was not only a suitor with a prize to gain, he was a
+colloquial artist about to employ all the resources of his specialty.</p>
+
+<p>He introduced the conversation in the most natural and easy way, by
+giving her the message from a former schoolmate to which he had
+referred, coloring it so delicately, as he delivered it, that it became
+an innocent-looking flattery. Myrtle found herself in a rose-colored
+atmosphere, not from Murray Bradshaw's admiration, as it seemed, but
+only reflected by his mind from another source. That was one of his
+arts,&mdash;always, if possible, to associate himself incidentally, as it
+appeared, and unavoidably, with an agreeable impression.</p>
+
+<p>So Myrtle was betrayed into smiling and being pleased before he had said
+a word about himself or his affairs. Then he told her of the adventures
+and labors of his late expedition; of certain evidence which at the very
+last moment he had unearthed, and which was very probably the
+turning-point in the case. He could not help feeling that she must
+eventually reap some benefit from the good fortune with which his
+efforts had been attended. The thought that it might yet be so had been
+a great source of encouragement to him,&mdash;it would always be a great
+happiness to him to remember that he had done anything to make her
+happy.</p>
+
+<p>Myrtle was very glad that he had been so far successful,&mdash;she did not
+know that it made much difference to her, but she was obliged to him for
+the desire of serving her that he had expressed.</p>
+
+<p>"My services are always yours, Miss Hazard. There is no sacrifice I
+would not willingly make for your benefit. I have never had but one
+feeling toward you. You cannot be ignorant of what that feeling is."</p>
+
+<p>"I know, Mr. Bradshaw, it has been one of kindness. I have to thank you
+for many friendly attentions, for which I hope I have never been
+ungrateful."</p>
+
+<p>"Kindness is not all that I feel towards you, Miss Hazard. If that were
+all, my lips would not tremble as they do now in telling you my
+feelings. I love you."</p>
+
+<p>He sprang the great confession on Myrtle a little sooner than he had
+meant. It was so hard to go on making phrases! Myrtle changed color a
+little, for she was startled.</p>
+
+<p>The seemingly involuntary movement she made brought her arm against a
+large dictionary, which lay very near the edge of the table on which it
+was resting. The book fell with a loud noise to the floor.</p>
+
+<p>There it lay. The young man awaited her answer; he did not think of
+polite forms at such a moment.</p>
+
+<p>"It cannot be, Mr. Bradshaw,&mdash;it must not be. I have known you long, and
+I am not ignorant of all your brilliant qualities, but you must not
+speak to me of love. Your regard,&mdash;your friendly interest,&mdash;tell me that
+I shall always have these, but do not distress me with offering more
+than these."</p>
+
+<p>"I do not ask you to give me your love in return; I only ask you not to
+bid me despair. Let me believe that the time may come when you will
+listen to me,&mdash;no matter how distant. You are young,&mdash;you have a tender
+heart,&mdash;you would not doom one who only lives for you to wretchedness.
+So long that we have known each other! It cannot be that any other has
+come between us&mdash;"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_645" id="Page_645">[Pg 645]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Myrtle blushed so deeply that there was no need of his finishing his
+question.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you mean, Myrtle Hazard, that you have cast me aside for
+another?&mdash;for this stranger&mdash;this artist&mdash;who was with you yesterday
+when I came, bringing with me the story of all I had done for you,&mdash;yes,
+for you,&mdash;and was ignominiously refused the privilege of seeing you?"
+Rage and jealousy had got the better of him this time. He rose as he
+spoke, and looked upon her with such passion kindling in his eyes that
+he seemed ready for any desperate act.</p>
+
+<p>"I have thanked you for any services you may have rendered me, Mr.
+Bradshaw." Myrtle answered, very calmly, "and I hope you will add one
+more to them by sparing me this rude questioning. I wished to treat you
+as a friend; I hope you will not render that impossible."</p>
+
+<p>He had recovered himself for one more last effort. "I was impatient:
+overlook it, I beg you. I was thinking of all the happiness I have
+labored to secure for you, and of the ruin to us both it would be if you
+scornfully rejected the love I offer you,&mdash;if you refuse to leave me any
+hope for the future,&mdash;if you insist on throwing yourself away on this
+man, so lately pledged to another. I hold the key of all your earthly
+fortunes in my hand. My love for you inspired me in all that I have
+done, and, now that I come to lay the result of my labors at your feet,
+you turn from me, and offer my reward to a stranger. I do not ask you to
+say this day that you will be mine,&mdash;I would not force your
+inclinations,&mdash;but I do ask you that you will hold yourself free of all
+others, and listen to me as one who may yet be more than a friend. Say
+so much as this, Myrtle, and you shall have such a future as you never
+dreamed of. Fortune, position, all that this world can give, shall be
+yours!"</p>
+
+<p>"Never! never! If you could offer me the whole world, or take away from
+me all that the world can give, it would make no difference to me. I
+cannot tell what power you hold over me, whether of life and death, or
+of wealth and poverty; but after talking to me of love, I should not
+have thought you would have wronged me by suggesting any meaner motive.
+It is only because we have been on friendly terms so long that I have
+listened to you as I have done. You have said more than enough, and I
+beg you will allow me to put an end to this interview."</p>
+
+<p>She rose to leave the room. But Murray Bradshaw had gone too far to
+control himself,&mdash;he listened only to the rage which blinded him.</p>
+
+<p>"Not yet!" he said. "Stay one moment, and you shall know what your pride
+and self-will have cost you!"</p>
+
+<p>Myrtle stood, arrested, whether by fear, or curiosity, or the passive
+subjection of her muscles to his imperious will, it would be hard to
+say.</p>
+
+<p>Murray Bradshaw took out the spotted paper from his breast pocket, and
+held it up before her. "Look here!" he exclaimed. "This would have made
+you rich,&mdash;it would have crowned you a queen in society,&mdash;it would have
+given you all, and more than all, that you ever dreamed of luxury, of
+splendor, of enjoyment; and I, who won it for you, would have taught you
+how to make life yield every bliss it had in store to your wishes. You
+reject my offer unconditionally?"</p>
+
+<p>Myrtle expressed her negative only by a slight contemptuous movement.</p>
+
+<p>Murray Bradshaw walked deliberately to the fireplace, and laid the
+spotted paper upon the burning coals. It writhed and curled, blackened,
+flamed, and in a moment was a cinder dropping into ashes. He folded his
+arms, and stood looking at the wreck of Myrtle's future, the work of his
+cruel hand. Strangely enough, Myrtle herself was fascinated, as it were,
+by the apparent solemnity of this mysterious sacrifice. She had kept her
+eyes steadily on him all the time, and was still gazing at the altar on
+which her happiness had been in some way offered up, when the door was
+opened by Kitty Fagan, and Master<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_646" id="Page_646">[Pg 646]</a></span> Byles Gridley was ushered into the
+parlor.</p>
+
+<p>"Too late, old man!" Murray Bradshaw exclaimed in a hoarse and savage
+voice, as he passed out of the room, and strode through the entry and
+down the avenue. It was the last time the old gate of The Poplars was to
+open or close for him. That same day he left the village; and the next
+time his name was mentioned it was as an officer in one of the regiments
+just raised and about marching to the seat of war.</p>
+
+
+<h3>CHAPTER XXXV.</h3>
+
+<h4>THE SPOTTED PAPER.</h4>
+
+<p>What Master Gridley may have said to Myrtle Hazard that served to calm
+her after this exciting scene cannot now be recalled. That Murray
+Bradshaw thought he was inflicting a deadly injury on her was plain
+enough. That Master Gridley did succeed in convincing her that no great
+harm had probably been done her is equally certain.</p>
+
+<p>Like all bachelors who have lived a lonely life, Master Gridley had his
+habits, which nothing short of some terrestrial convulsion&mdash;or perhaps,
+in his case, some instinct that drove him forth to help somebody in
+trouble&mdash;could possibly derange. After his breakfast, he always sat and
+read awhile,&mdash;the paper, if a new one came to hand, or some pleasant old
+author,&mdash;if a little neglected by the world of readers, he felt more at
+ease with him, and loved him all the better.</p>
+
+<p>But on the morning after his interview with Myrtle Hazard, he had
+received a letter which made him forget newspapers, old authors, almost
+everything, for the moment. It was from the publisher with whom he had
+had a conversation, it may be remembered, when he visited the city, and
+was to this effect:&mdash;That Our Firm propose to print and stereotype the
+work originally published under the title of "Thoughts on the Universe";
+said work to be remodelled according to the plan suggested by the
+Author, with the corrections, alterations, omissions, and additions
+proposed by him; said work to be published under the following title, to
+wit: &mdash;&mdash; &mdash;&mdash;; said work to be printed in 12mo, on paper of good
+quality, from new types, etc., etc., and for every copy thereof printed
+the author to receive, etc., etc.</p>
+
+<p>Master Gridley sat as in a trance, reading this letter over and over, to
+know if it could be really so. So it really was. His book had
+disappeared from the market long ago, as the elm seeds that carpet the
+ground and never germinate disappear. At last it had got a certain value
+as a curiosity for book-hunters. Some one of them, keener-eyed than the
+rest, had seen that there was a meaning and virtue in this unsuccessful
+book, for which there was a new audience educated since it had tried to
+breathe before its time. Out of this had grown at last the publisher's
+proposal. It was too much: his heart swelled with joy, and his eyes
+filled with tears.</p>
+
+<p>How could he resist the temptation? He took down his own particular copy
+of the book, which was yet to do him honor as its parent, and began
+reading. As his eye fell on one paragraph after another, he nodded
+approval of this sentiment or opinion, he shook his head as if
+questioning whether this other were not to be modified or left out, he
+condemned a third as being no longer true for him as when it was
+written, and he sanctioned a fourth with his hearty approval. The reader
+may like a few specimens from this early edition, now a rarity. He shall
+have them, with Master Gridley's verbal comments. The book, as its name
+implied, contained "Thoughts" rather than consecutive trains of
+reasoning or continuous disquisitions. What he read and remarked upon
+were a few of the more pointed statements which stood out in the
+chapters he was turning over. The worth of the book must not be judged
+by these almost random specimens.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_647" id="Page_647">[Pg 647]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"<i>The best thought, like the most perfect digestion, is done
+unconsciously.</i>&mdash;Develop that&mdash;Ideas at compound interest in the
+mind.&mdash;Be aye sticking in <i>an idea</i>,&mdash;while you're sleeping it'll be
+growing. Seed of a thought to-day,&mdash;flower to-morrow&mdash;next week&mdash;ten
+years from now, etc.&mdash;Article by and by for the....</p>
+
+<p>"<i>Can the Infinite be supposed to shift the responsibility of the
+ultimate destiny of any created thing to the finite? Our theologians
+pretend that it can. I doubt.</i>&mdash;Heretical. <i>Stet.</i></p>
+
+<p>"<i>Protestantism means None of your business. But it is afraid of its own
+logic.</i>&mdash;<i>Stet.</i> No logical resting-place short of None of your
+business.</p>
+
+<p>"<i>The supreme self-indulgence is to surrender the will to a spiritual
+director.</i>&mdash;Protestantism gave up a great luxury.&mdash;Did it, though?</p>
+
+<p>"<i>Asiatic modes of thought and speech do not express the relations in
+which the American feels himself to stand to his Superiors in this or
+any other sphere of being. Republicanism must have its own religious
+phraseology, which is not that borrowed from Oriental despotisms.</i></p>
+
+<p>"<i>Idols and dogmas in place of character; pills and theories in place of
+wholesome living. See the histories of theology and medicine</i>
+passim.&mdash;Hits 'em.</p>
+
+<p>"'<i>Of such is the kingdom of heaven.' Do you mean to say, Jean Chauvin,
+that</i></p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p><i>'Heaven</i> <span class="smcap">lies</span> <i>about us in our infancy'?</i></p></div>
+
+<p>"<i>Why do you complain of your organization? Your soul was in a hurry,
+and made a rush for a body. There are patient spirits that have waited
+from eternity, and never found parents fit to be born of.</i>&mdash;How do you
+know anything about all that? <i>Dele.</i></p>
+
+<p>"<i>What sweet, smooth voices the negroes have! A hundred generations fed
+on bananas.&mdash;Compare them with our apple-eating-white folks!</i>&mdash;It won't
+do. Bananas came from the West Indies.</p>
+
+<p>"<i>To tell a man's temperament by his handwriting. See if the dots of his
+i's run ahead or not, and if they do, how far.</i>&mdash;I've tried that&mdash;on
+myself.</p>
+
+<p>"<i>Marrying into some families is the next thing to being
+canonized.</i>&mdash;Not so true now as twenty or thirty years ago. As many
+bladders, but more pins.</p>
+
+<p>"<i>Fish and dandies only keep on ice.</i>&mdash;Who will take? Explain in note
+how all warmth approaching blood-heat spoils fops and flounders.</p>
+
+<p>"<i>Flying is a lost art among men and reptiles. Bats fly, and men ought
+to. Try a light turbine. Rise a mile straight, fall half a mile
+slanting,&mdash;rise half a mile straight, fall half a mile slanting, and so
+on. Or slant up and slant down.</i>&mdash;Poh! You ain't such a fool as to think
+that is new,&mdash;are you?</p>
+
+<p>"Put in my telegraph project. Central station. Cables with insulated
+wires running to it from different quarters of the city. These form the
+centripetal system. From central station, wires to all the livery
+stables, messenger stands, provision shops, etc., etc. These form the
+centrifugal system. Any house may have a wire in the nearest cable at
+small cost.</p>
+
+<p>"<i>Do you want to be remembered after the continents have gone under, and
+come up again, and dried, and bred new races? Have your name stamped on
+all your plates and cups and saucers. Nothing of you or yours will last
+like those. I never sit down at my table without looking at the china
+service, and saying, 'Here are my monuments. That butter-dish is my urn.
+This soup-plate is my memorial tablet.'&mdash;No need of a skeleton at my
+banquets! I feed from my tombstone and read my epitaph at the bottom, of
+every teacup.</i>&mdash;Good."</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>He fell into a revery as he finished reading this last sentence. He
+thought of the dim and dread future,&mdash;all the changes that it would
+bring to him, to all the living, to the face of the globe, to the order
+of earthly things. He saw men of a new race, alien to all that had ever
+lived, excavating with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_648" id="Page_648">[Pg 648]</a></span> strange, vast engines the old ocean-bed, now
+become habitable land. And as the great scoops turned out the earth they
+had fetched up from the unexplored depths, a relic of a former simple
+civilization revealed the fact that here a tribe of human beings had
+lived and perished.&mdash;Only the coffee-cup he had in his hand half an hour
+ago.&mdash;Where would he be then? and Mrs. Hopkins, and Gifted, and Susan,
+and everybody? and President Buchanan? and the Boston State-House? and
+Broadway?&mdash;O Lord, Lord, Lord! And the sun perceptibly smaller,
+according to the astronomers, and the earth cooled down a number of
+degrees, and inconceivable arts practised by men of a type yet undreamed
+of, and all the fighting creeds merged in one great universal&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>A knock at his door interrupted his revery. Miss Susan Posey informed
+him that a gentleman was waiting below who wished to see him.</p>
+
+<p>"Show him up to my study, Susan Posey, if you please," said Master
+Gridley.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Penhallow presented himself at Mr. Gridley's door, with a
+countenance expressive of a very high state of excitement.</p>
+
+<p>"You have heard the news, Mr. Gridley, I suppose?"</p>
+
+<p>"What news, Mr. Penhallow?"</p>
+
+<p>"First, that my partner has left very unexpectedly to enlist in a
+regiment just forming. Second, that the great land-case is decided in
+favor of the heirs of the late Malachi Withers."</p>
+
+<p>"Your partner must have known about it yesterday?"</p>
+
+<p>"He did, even before I knew it. He thought himself possessed of a very
+important document, as you know, of which he has made, or means to make,
+some use. You are aware of the artifice I employed to prevent any
+possible evil consequences from any action of his. I have the genuine
+document, of course. I wish you to go over with me to The Poplars, and I
+should be glad to have good old Father Pemberton go with us; for it is a
+serious matter, and will be a great surprise to more than one of the
+family."</p>
+
+<p>They walked together to the old house, where the old clergyman had lived
+for more than half a century. He was used to being neglected by the
+people who ran after his younger colleague; and the attention paid him
+in asking him to be present on an important occasion, as he understood
+this to be, pleased him greatly. He smoothed his long white locks, and
+called a grand-daughter to help make him look fitly for such an
+occasion, and, being at last got into his grandest Sunday aspect, took
+his faithful staff, and set out with the two gentlemen for The Poplars.
+On the way, Mr. Penhallow explained to him the occasion of their visit,
+and the general character of the facts he had to announce. He wished the
+venerable minister to prepare Miss Silence Withers for a revelation
+which would materially change her future prospects. He thought it might
+be well, also, if he would say a few words to Myrtle Hazard, for whom a
+new life, with new and untried temptations, was about to open. His
+business was, as a lawyer, to make known to these parties the facts just
+come to his own knowledge affecting their interests. He had asked Mr.
+Gridley to go with him, as having intimate relations with one of the
+parties referred to, and as having been the principal agent in securing
+to that party the advantages which were to accrue to her from the new
+turn of events. "You are a second parent to her, Mr. Gridley," he said.
+"Your vigilance, your shrewdness, and your&mdash;spectacles have saved her. I
+hope she knows the full extent of her obligations to you, and that she
+will always look to you for counsel in all her needs. She will want a
+wise friend, for she is to begin the world anew."</p>
+
+<p>What had happened, when she saw the three grave gentlemen at the door
+early in the forenoon, Mistress Kitty Fagan could not guess. Something
+relating to Miss Myrtle, no doubt:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_649" id="Page_649">[Pg 649]</a></span> she wasn't goin' to be married right
+off to Mr. Clement,&mdash;was she,&mdash;and no church, nor cake, nor anything?
+The gentlemen were shown into the parlor. "Ask Miss Withers to go into
+the library, Kitty," said Master Gridley. "Dr. Pemberton wishes to speak
+with her." The good old man was prepared for a scene with Miss Silence.
+He announced to her, in a kind and delicate way, that she must make up
+her mind to the disappointment of certain expectations which she had
+long entertained, and which, as her lawyer, Mr. Penhallow, had come to
+inform her and others, were to be finally relinquished from this hour.</p>
+
+<p>To his great surprise, Miss Silence received this communication almost
+cheerfully. It seemed more like a relief to her than anything else. Her
+one dread in this world was her "responsibility"; and the thought that
+she might have to account for ten talents hereafter, instead of one, had
+often of late been a positive distress to her. There was also in her
+mind a secret disgust at the thought of the hungry creatures who would
+swarm round her if she should ever be in a position to bestow patronage.
+This had grown upon her as the habits of lonely life gave her more and
+more of that fastidious dislike to males in general, as such, which is
+not rare in maidens who have seen the roses of more summers than
+politeness cares to mention.</p>
+
+<p>Father Pemberton then asked if he could see Miss Myrtle Hazard a few
+moments in the library before they went into the parlor, where they were
+to meet Mr. Penhallow and Mr. Gridley, for the purpose of receiving the
+lawyer's communication.</p>
+
+<p>What change was this which Myrtle had undergone since love had touched
+her heart, and her visions of worldly enjoyment had faded before the
+thought of sharing and ennobling the life of one who was worthy of her
+best affections,&mdash;of living for another, and of finding her own noblest
+self in that divine office of woman? She had laid aside the bracelet
+which she had so long worn as a kind of charm as well as an ornament.
+One would have said her features had lost something of that look of
+imperious beauty which had added to her resemblance to the dead woman
+whose glowing portrait hung upon her wall. And if it could be that,
+after so many generations, the blood of her who had died for her faith
+could show in her descendant's veins, and the soul of that elect lady of
+her race look out from her far-removed offspring's dark eyes, such a
+transfusion of the martyr's life and spiritual being might well seem to
+manifest itself in Myrtle Hazard.</p>
+
+<p>The large-hearted old man forgot his scholastic theory of human nature
+as he looked upon her face. He thought he saw in her the dawning of that
+grace which some are born with; which some, like Myrtle, only reach
+through many trials and dangers; which some seem to show for a while and
+then lose; which too many never reach while they wear the robes of
+earth, but which speaks of the kingdom of heaven already begun in the
+heart of a child of earth. He told her simply the story of the
+occurrences which had brought them together in the old house, with the
+message the lawyer was to deliver to its inmates. He wished to prepare
+her for what might have been too sudden a surprise.</p>
+
+<p>But Myrtle was not wholly unprepared for some such revelation. There was
+little danger that any such announcement would throw her mind from its
+balance after the inward conflict through which she had been passing.
+For her lover had left her almost as soon as he had told her the story
+of his passion, and the relation in which he stood to her. He, too, had
+gone to answer his country's call to her children, not driven away by
+crime and shame and despair, but quitting all&mdash;his new-born happiness,
+the art in which he was an enthusiast, his prospects of success and
+honor&mdash;to obey the higher command of duty. War was to him, as to so many
+of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_650" id="Page_650">[Pg 650]</a></span> the noble youth who went forth, only organized barbarism, hateful
+but for the sacred cause which alone redeemed it from the curse that
+blasted the first murderer. God only knew the sacrifice such young men
+as he made.</p>
+
+<p>How brief Myrtle's dream had been! She almost doubted, at some moments,
+whether she would not awake from it, as from her other visions, and find
+it all unreal. There was no need of fearing any undue excitement of her
+mind after the alternations of feeling she had just experienced. Nothing
+seemed of much moment to her which could come from without,&mdash;her real
+world was within, and the light of its day and the breath of its life
+came from her love, made holy by the self-forgetfulness on both sides
+which was born with it.</p>
+
+<p>Only one member of the household was in danger of finding the excitement
+more than she could bear. Miss Cynthia knew that all Murray Bradshaw's
+plans, in which he had taken care that she should have a personal
+interest, had utterly failed. What he had done with the means of revenge
+in his power,&mdash;if, indeed, they were still in his power,&mdash;she did not
+know. She only knew that there had been a terrible scene, and that he
+had gone, leaving it uncertain whether he would ever return. It was with
+fear and trembling that she heard the summons which went forth, that the
+whole family should meet in the parlor to listen to a statement from Mr.
+Penhallow. They all gathered as requested, and sat round the room, with
+the exception of Mistress Kitty Fagan, who knew her place too well to be
+sittin' down with the likes o' them, and stood with attentive ears in
+the doorway.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Penhallow then read from a printed paper the decision of the Supreme
+Court in the land-case so long pending, where the estate of the late
+Malachi Withers was the claimant, against certain parties pretending to
+hold under an ancient grant. The decision was in favor of the estate.</p>
+
+<p>"This gives a great property to the heirs," Mr. Penhallow remarked,
+"and the question as to who these heirs are has to be opened. For the
+will under which Silence Withers, sister of the deceased, has inherited,
+is dated some years previously to the decease, and it was not very
+strange that a will of later date should be discovered. Such a will has
+been discovered. It is the instrument I have here."</p>
+
+<p>Myrtle Hazard opened her eyes very widely, for the paper Mr. Penhallow
+held looked exactly like that which Murray Bradshaw had burned, and,
+what was curious, had some spots on it just like some she had noticed on
+that.</p>
+
+<p>"This will," Mr. Penhallow said, "signed by witnesses dead or absent
+from this place, makes a disposition of the testator's property in some
+respects similar to that of the previous one, but with a single change,
+which proves to be of very great importance."</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Penhallow proceeded to read the will. The important change in the
+disposition of the property was this. In case the land-claim was decided
+in favor of the estate, then, in addition to the small provision made
+for Myrtle Hazard, the property so coming to the estate should all go to
+her. There was no question about the genuineness and the legal
+sufficiency of this instrument. Its date was not very long after the
+preceding one, at a period when, as was well known, he had almost given
+up the hope of gaining his case, and when the property was of little
+value compared to that which it had at present.</p>
+
+<p>A long silence followed this reading. Then, to the surprise of all, Miss
+Silence Withers rose, and went to Myrtle Hazard, and wished her joy with
+every appearance of sincerity. She was relieved of a great
+responsibility. Myrtle was young and could bear it better. She hoped
+that her young relative would live long to enjoy the blessings
+Providence had bestowed upon her, and to use them for the good of the
+community, and especially the promotion of the education of deserving<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_651" id="Page_651">[Pg 651]</a></span>
+youth. If some fitting person could be found to advise Myrtle, whose
+affairs would require much care, it would be a great relief to her.</p>
+
+<p>They all went up to Myrtle and congratulated her on her change of
+fortune. Even Cynthia Badlam got out a phrase or two which passed muster
+in the midst of the general excitement. As for Kitty Fagan, she could
+not say a word, but caught Myrtle's hand and kissed it as if it belonged
+to her own saint, and then, suddenly applying her apron to her eyes,
+retreated from a scene which was too much for her, in a state of
+complete mental beatitude and total bodily discomfiture.</p>
+
+<p>Then Silence asked the old minister to make a prayer, and he stretched
+his hands up to Heaven, and called down all the blessings of Providence
+upon all the household, and especially upon this young handmaiden, who
+was to be tried with prosperity, and would need all aid from above to
+keep her from its dangers.</p>
+
+<p>Then Mr. Penhallow asked Myrtle if she had any choice as to the friend
+who should have charge of her affairs.</p>
+
+<p>Myrtle turned to Master Byles Gridley, and said, "You have been my
+friend and protector so far,&mdash;will you continue to be so hereafter?"</p>
+
+<p>Master Gridley tried very hard to begin a few words of thanks to her for
+her preference, but, finding his voice a little uncertain, contented
+himself with pressing her hand and saying, "Most willingly, my dear
+daughter!"</p>
+
+
+<h3>CHAPTER XXXVI.</h3>
+
+<h4>CONCLUSION.</h4>
+
+<p>The same day the great news of Myrtle Hazard's accession to fortune came
+out, the secret was told that she had promised herself in marriage to
+Mr. Clement Lindsay. But her friends hardly knew how to congratulate her
+on this last event. Her lover was gone, to risk his life, not improbably
+to lose it, or to come home a wreck, crippled by wounds, or worn out
+with disease.</p>
+
+<p>Some of them wondered to see her so cheerful in such a moment of trial.
+They could not know how the manly strength of Clement's determination
+had nerved her for womanly endurance. They had not learned that a great
+cause makes great souls, or reveals them to themselves,&mdash;a lesson taught
+by so many noble examples in the times that followed. Myrtle's only
+desire seemed to be to labor in some way to help the soldiers and their
+families. She appeared to have forgotten everything for these duties;
+she had no time for regrets, if she were disposed to indulge them, and
+she hardly asked a question as to the extent of the fortune which had
+fallen to her.</p>
+
+<p>The next number of the "Banner and Oracle" contained two announcements
+which she read with some interest when her attention was called to them.
+They were as follows:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"A fair and accomplished daughter of this village comes, by the
+late decision of the Supreme Court, into possession of a
+property estimated at a million of dollars or more. It consists
+of a large tract of land purchased many years ago by the late
+Malachi Withers, now become of immense value by the growth of a
+city in its neighborhood, the opening of mines, etc., etc. It
+is rumored that the lovely and highly educated heiress has
+formed a connection looking towards matrimony with a certain
+distinguished artist."</p>
+
+<p>"Our distinguished young townsman, William Murray Bradshaw,
+Esq., has been among the first to respond to the call of the
+country for champions to defend her from traitors. We
+understand that he has obtained a captaincy in the &mdash;th
+Regiment, about to march to the threatened seat of war. May
+victory perch on his banners!"</p></div>
+
+<p>The two lovers, parted by their own self-sacrificing choice in the very
+hour that promised to bring them so much happiness, labored for the
+common cause during all the terrible years of warfare, one in the camp
+and the field, the other in the not less needful work which the good
+women carried on at home, or wherever their services were needed.
+Clement&mdash;now Captain Lindsay&mdash;returned at the end of his first campaign
+charged with a special office. Some months later, after one of the great
+battles, he was sent home wounded. He wore the leaf on his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_652" id="Page_652">[Pg 652]</a></span> shoulder
+which entitled him to be called Major Lindsay. He recovered from his
+wound only too rapidly, for Myrtle had visited him daily in the military
+hospital where he had resided for treatment; and it was bitter parting.
+The telegraph wires were thrilling almost hourly with messages of death,
+and the long pine boxes came by almost every train,&mdash;no need of asking
+what they held!</p>
+
+<p>Once more he came, detailed on special duty, and this time with the
+eagle on his shoulder,&mdash;he was Colonel Lindsay. The lovers could not
+part again of their own free will. Some adventurous women had followed
+their husbands to the camp, and Myrtle looked as if she could play the
+part of the Maid of Saragossa on occasion. So Clement asked her if she
+would return with him as his wife; and Myrtle answered, with as much
+willingness to submit as a maiden might fairly show under such
+circumstances, that she would do his bidding. Thereupon, with the
+shortest possible legal notice, Father Pemberton was sent for, and the
+ceremony was performed in the presence of a few witnesses in the large
+parlor at The Poplars, which was adorned with flowers, and hung round
+with all the portraits of the dead members of the family, summoned as
+witnesses to the celebration. One witness looked on with unmoved
+features, yet Myrtle thought there was a more heavenly smile on her
+faded lips than she had ever seen before beaming from the canvas,&mdash;it
+was Ann Holyoake, the martyr to her faith, the guardian spirit of
+Myrtle's visions, who seemed to breathe a holier benediction than any
+words&mdash;even those of the good old Father Pemberton himself&mdash;could
+convey.</p>
+
+<p>They went back together to the camp. From that period until the end of
+the war, Myrtle passed her time between the life of the tent and that of
+the hospital. In the offices of mercy which she performed for the sick
+and the wounded and the dying, the dross of her nature seemed to be
+burned away. The conflict of mingled lives in her blood had ceased. No
+lawless impulses usurped the place of that serene resolve which had
+grown strong by every exercise of its high prerogative. If she had been
+called now to die for any worthy cause, her race would have been
+ennobled by a second martyr, true to the blood of her who died under the
+cruel Queen.</p>
+
+<p>Many sad sights she saw in the great hospital where she passed some
+months at intervals,&mdash;one never to be forgotten. An officer was brought
+into the ward where she was in attendance. "Shot through the
+lungs,&mdash;pretty nearly gone."</p>
+
+<p>She went softly to his bedside. He was breathing with great difficulty;
+his face was almost convulsed with the effort, but she recognized him in
+a moment: it was Murray Bradshaw,&mdash;Captain Bradshaw,&mdash;as she knew by the
+bars on his coat flung upon the bed where he had just been laid.</p>
+
+<p>She addressed him by name, tenderly as if he had been a dear brother;
+she saw on his face that hers were to be the last kind words he would
+ever hear.</p>
+
+<p>He turned his glazing eyes upon her. "Who are you?" he said in a feeble
+voice.</p>
+
+<p>"An old friend," she answered; "you knew me as Myrtle Hazard."</p>
+
+<p>He started. "You by my bedside! You caring for me!&mdash;for me, that burned
+the title to your fortune to ashes before your eyes! You can't forgive
+that,&mdash;I won't believe it! Don't you hate me, dying as I am?"</p>
+
+<p>Myrtle was used to maintaining a perfect calmness of voice and
+countenance, and she held her feelings firmly down. "I have nothing to
+forgive you, Mr. Bradshaw. You may have meant to do me wrong, but
+Providence raised up a protector for me. The paper you burned was not
+the original,&mdash;it was a copy substituted for it&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"And did the old man outwit me after all?" he cried out, rising suddenly
+in bed, and clasping his hands behind his head to give him a few<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_653" id="Page_653">[Pg 653]</a></span> more
+gasps of breath. "I knew he was cunning, but I thought I was his match.
+It must have been Byles Gridley,&mdash;nobody else. And so the old man beat
+me after all, and saved you from ruin! Thank God that it came out so!
+Thank God! I can die now. Give me your hand, Myrtle."</p>
+
+<p>She took his hand, and held it until it gently loosed its hold, and he
+ceased to breathe. Myrtle's creed was a simple one, with more of trust
+and love in it than of systematized articles of belief. She cherished
+the fond hope that these last words of one who had erred so miserably
+were a token of some blessed change which the influences of the better
+world might carry onward until he should have outgrown the sins and the
+weaknesses of his earthly career.</p>
+
+<p>Soon after this she rejoined her husband in the camp. From time to time
+they received stray copies of the "Banner and Oracle," which, to Myrtle
+especially, were full of interest, even to the last advertisement. A few
+paragraphs may be reproduced here which relate to persons who have
+figured in this narrative.</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p class="center">"TEMPLE OF HYMEN.</p>
+
+<p>"Married, on the 6th instant, Fordyce Hurlbut, M. D., to Olive,
+only daughter of the Rev. Ambrose Eveleth. The editor of this
+paper returns his acknowledgments for a bountiful slice of the
+wedding-cake. May their shadows never be less!"</p></div>
+
+<p>Not many weeks after this appeared the following:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"Died in this place, on the 28th instant, the venerable Lemuel
+Hurlbut, M. D., at the great age of XCVI years.</p>
+
+<p>"'With the ancient is wisdom, and in length of days
+understanding.'"</p></div>
+
+<p>Myrtle recalled his kind care of her in her illness, and paid the
+tribute of a sigh to his memory,&mdash;there was nothing in a death like his
+to call for any aching regret.</p>
+
+<p>The usual routine of small occurrences was duly recorded in the village
+paper for some weeks longer, when she was startled and shocked by
+receiving a number containing the following paragraph:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p class="center">"CALAMITOUS ACCIDENT!</p>
+
+<p>"It is known to our readers that the steeple of the old
+meeting-house was struck by lightning about a month ago. The
+frame of the building was a good deal jarred by the shock, but
+no danger was apprehended from the injury it had received. On
+Sunday last the congregation came together as usual. The Rev.
+Mr. Stoker was alone in the pulpit, the Rev. Doctor Pemberton
+having been detained by slight indisposition. The sermon was
+from the text, '<i>The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and
+the leopard shall lie down with the kid</i>. (Isaiah xi. 6.) The
+pastor described the millennium as the reign of love and peace,
+in eloquent and impressive language. He was in the midst of the
+prayer which follows the sermon, and had just put up a petition
+that the spirit of affection and faith and trust might grow up
+and prevail among the flock of which he was the shepherd, more
+especially those dear lambs whom he gathered with his arm, and
+carried in his bosom, when the old sounding-board, which had
+hung safely for nearly a century,&mdash;loosened, no doubt, by the
+bolt which had fallen on the church,&mdash;broke from its
+fastenings, and fell with a loud crash upon the pulpit,
+crushing the Rev. Mr. Stoker under its ruins. The scene that
+followed beggars description. Cries and shrieks resounded
+through the house. Two or three young women fainted entirely
+away. Mr. Penhallow, Deacon Rumrill, Gifted Hopkins, Esq., and
+others, came forward immediately, and after much effort
+succeeded in removing the wreck of the sounding-board, and
+extricating their unfortunate pastor. He was not fatally
+injured, it is hoped; but, sad to relate, he received such a
+violent blow upon the spine of the back, that palsy of the
+lower extremities is like to ensue. He is at present lying
+entirely helpless. Every attention is paid to him by his
+affectionately devoted family."</p></div>
+
+<p>Myrtle had hardly got over the pain which the reading of this
+unfortunate occurrence gave her, when her eyes were gladdened by the
+following pleasing piece of intelligence, contained in a subsequent
+number of the village paper:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p class="center">"IMPOSING CEREMONY.</p>
+
+<p>"The Reverend Doctor Pemberton performed the impressive rite of
+baptism upon the first-born child of our distinguished
+townsman, Gifted Hopkins, Esq., the Bard of Oxbow Village, and
+Mrs. Susan P. Hopkins, his amiable and respected lady. The babe
+conducted himself with singular propriety on this occasion. He
+received the Christian name of Byron Tennyson Browning. May he
+prove worthy of his name and his parentage!"</p></div>
+
+<p>The end of the war came at last, and found Colonel Lindsay among its
+unharmed survivors. He returned with Myrtle to her native village, and
+they established themselves, at the request of Miss Silence Withers, in
+the old family mansion. Miss Cynthia, to whom Myrtle made a generous
+allowance,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_654" id="Page_654">[Pg 654]</a></span> had gone to live in a town not many miles distant, where she
+had a kind of home on sufferance, as well as at The Poplars. This was a
+convenience just then, because Nurse Byloe was invited to stay with them
+for a month or two; and one nurse and two single women under the same
+roof keep each other in a stew all the time, as the old dame somewhat
+sharply remarked.</p>
+
+<p>Master Byles Gridley had been appointed Myrtle's legal protector, and,
+with the assistance of Mr. Penhallow, had brought the property she
+inherited into a more manageable and productive form; so that, when
+Clement began his fine studio behind the old mansion, he felt that at
+least he could pursue his art, or arts, if he chose to give himself to
+sculpture, without that dreadful hag, Necessity, standing by him to
+pinch the features of all his ideals, and give them something of her own
+likeness.</p>
+
+<p>Silence Withers was more cheerful now that she had got rid of her
+responsibility. She embellished her spare person a little more than in
+former years. These young people looked so happy! Love was not so
+unendurable, perhaps, after all.&mdash;No woman need despair,&mdash;especially if
+she has a house over her, and a snug little property. A worthy man, a
+former missionary, of the best principles, but of a slightly jocose and
+good-humored habit, thought that he could piece his widowed years with
+the not insignificant fraction of life left to Miss Silence, to their
+mutual advantage. He came to the village, therefore, where Father
+Pemberton was very glad to have him supply the pulpit in the place of
+his unfortunate disabled colleague. The courtship soon began, and was
+brisk enough; for the good man knew there was no time to lose at his
+period of life,&mdash;or hers either, for that matter. It was a rather odd
+specimen of love-making; for he was constantly trying to subdue his
+features to a gravity which they were not used to, and she was as
+constantly endeavoring to be as lively as possible, with the innocent
+desire of pleasing her light-hearted suitor.</p>
+
+<p>"<i>Vieille fille fait jeune mari&eacute;e.</i>" Silence was ten years younger as a
+bride than she had seemed as a lone woman. One would have said she had
+got out of the coach next to the hearse, and got into one some half a
+dozen behind it,&mdash;where there is often good and reasonably cheerful
+conversation going on about the virtues of the deceased, the probable
+amount of his property, or the little slips he may have committed, and
+where occasionally a subdued pleasantry at his expense sets the four
+waistcoats shaking that were lifting with sighs a half-hour ago in the
+house of mourning. But Miss Silence, that was, thought that two
+families, with all the possible complications which time might bring,
+would be better in separate establishments. She therefore proposed
+selling The Poplars to Myrtle and her husband, and removing to a house
+in the village, which would be large enough for them, at least for the
+present. So the young folks bought the old house, and paid a mighty good
+price for it, and enlarged it, and beautified and glorified it, and one
+fine morning went together down to the Widow Hopkins's, whose residence
+seemed in danger of being a little crowded,&mdash;for Gifted lived there with
+his Susan,&mdash;and what had happened might happen again,&mdash;and gave Master
+Byles Gridley a formal and most persuasively worded invitation to come
+up and make his home with them at The Poplars.</p>
+
+<p>Now Master Gridley has been betrayed into palpable and undisguised
+weakness at least once in the presence of this assembly, who are looking
+upon him almost for the last time before they part from him, and see his
+face no more. Let us not inquire too curiously, then, how he received
+this kind proposition. It is enough, that, when he found that a new
+study had been built on purpose for him, and a sleeping-room attached to
+it so that he could live there without disturbing anybody if he chose,
+he consented to remove there for a while, and that he was there
+established amidst great rejoicing.</p>
+
+<p>Cynthia Badlam had fallen of late into<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_655" id="Page_655">[Pg 655]</a></span> poor health. She found at last
+that she was going; and as she had a little property of her own,&mdash;as
+almost all poor relations have, only there is not enough of it,&mdash;she was
+much exercised in her mind as to the final arrangements to be made
+respecting its disposition. The Rev. Dr. Pemberton was one day surprised
+by a message, that she wished to have an interview with him. He rode
+over to the town in which she was residing, and there had a long
+conversation with her upon this matter. When this was settled, her mind
+seemed to be more at ease. She died with a comfortable assurance that
+she was going to a better world, and with a bitter conviction that it
+would be hard to find one that would offer her a worse lot than being a
+poor relation in this.</p>
+
+<p>Her little property was left to Rev. Eliphalet Pemberton and Jacob
+Penhallow, Esq., to be by them employed for such charitable purposes as
+they should elect, educational or other. Father Pemberton preached an
+admirable funeral sermon, in which he praised her virtues, known to this
+people among whom she had long lived, and especially that crowning act
+by which she devoted all she had to purposes of charity and benevolence.</p>
+
+<p>The old clergyman seemed to have renewed his youth since the misfortune
+of his colleague had incapacitated him from labor. He generally preached
+in the <i>forenoon</i> now, and to the great acceptance of the people,&mdash;for
+the truth was that the honest minister who had married Miss Silence was
+not young enough or good-looking enough to be an object of personal
+attentions like the Rev. Joseph Bellamy Stoker,&mdash;and the old minister
+appeared to great advantage contrasted with him in the pulpit. Poor Mr.
+Stoker was now helpless, faithfully and tenderly waited upon by his own
+wife, who had regained her health and strength,&mdash;in no small measure,
+perhaps, from the great need of sympathy and active aid which her
+unfortunate husband now experienced. It was an astonishment to herself
+when she found that she who had so long been served was able to serve
+another. Some who knew his errors thought his accident was a judgment;
+but others believed that it was only a mercy in disguise,&mdash;it snatched
+him roughly from his sin, but it opened his heart to gratitude towards
+her whom his neglect could not alienate, and through gratitude to
+repentance and better thoughts. Bathsheba had long ago promised herself
+to Cyprian Eveleth; and, as he was about to become the rector of a
+parish in the next town, the marriage was soon to take place.</p>
+
+<p>How beautifully serene Master Byles Gridley's face was growing! Clement
+loved to study its grand lines, which had so much strength and fine
+humanity blended in them. He was so fascinated by their noble expression
+that he sometimes seemed to forget himself, and looked at him more like
+an artist taking his portrait than like an admiring friend. He
+maintained that Master Gridley had a bigger bump of benevolence and as
+large a one of cautiousness as the two people most famous for the size
+of these organs on the phrenological chart he showed him, and proved it,
+or nearly proved it, by careful measurements of his head. Master Gridley
+laughed, and read him a passage on the pseudo-sciences out of his book.</p>
+
+<p>The disposal of Miss Cynthia's bequest was much discussed in the
+village. Some wished the trustees would use it to lay the foundations of
+a public library. Others thought it should be applied for the relief of
+the families of soldiers who had fallen in the war. Still another set
+would take it to build a monument to the memory of those heroes. The
+trustees listened with the greatest candor to all these gratuitous
+hints. It was, however, suggested, in a well-written anonymous article
+which appeared in the village paper, that it was desirable to follow the
+general lead of the testator's apparent preference. The trustees were at
+liberty to do as they saw fit; but, other things being equal, some
+educational object<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_656" id="Page_656">[Pg 656]</a></span> should be selected. If there were any orphan
+children in the place, it would seem to be very proper to devote the
+moderate sum bequeathed to educating them. The trustees recognized the
+justice of this suggestion. Why not apply it to the instruction and
+maintenance of those two pretty and promising children, virtually
+orphans, whom the charitable Mrs. Hopkins had cared for so long without
+any recompense, and at a cost which would soon become beyond her means?
+The good people of the neighborhood accepted this as the best solution
+of the difficulty. It was agreed upon at length by the trustees, that
+the Cynthia Badlam Fund for Educational Purposes should be applied for
+the benefit of the two foundlings known as Isosceles and Helminthia
+Hopkins.</p>
+
+<p>Master Byles Gridley was greatly exercised about the two "preposterous
+names," as he called them, which in a moment of eccentric impulse he had
+given to these children of nature. He ventured to hint as much to Mrs.
+Hopkins. The good dame was vastly surprised. She thought they was about
+as pooty names as anybody had had given 'em in the village. And they was
+so handy, spoke short,&mdash;Sossy and Minthy,&mdash;she never should know how to
+call 'em anything else.</p>
+
+<p>"But, my dear Mrs. Hopkins," Master Gridley urged, "if you knew the
+meaning they have to the ears of scholars, you would see that I did very
+wrong to apply such absurd names to my little fellow-creatures, and that
+I am bound to rectify my error. More than that, my dear madam, I mean to
+consult you as to the new names; and if we can fix upon proper and
+pleasing ones, it is my intention to leave a pretty legacy in my will to
+these interesting children."</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Gridley," said Mrs. Hopkins, "you're the best man I ever see, or
+ever shall see,... except my poor dear Ammi.... I'll do jest as you say
+about that, or about anything else in all this livin' world."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, then, Mrs. Hopkins, what shall be the boy's name?"</p>
+
+<p>"Byles Gridley Hopkins!" she answered instantly.</p>
+
+<p>"Good Lord!" said Mr. Gridley, "think a minute, my dear madam. I will
+not say one word,&mdash;only think a minute, and mention some name that will
+not suggest quite so many winks and whispers."</p>
+
+<p>She did think something less than a minute, and then said aloud,
+"Abraham Lincoln Hopkins."</p>
+
+<p>"Fifteen thousand children have been so christened the past year, on a
+moderate computation."</p>
+
+<p>"Do think of some name yourself, Mr. Gridley; I shall like anything that
+you like. To think of those dear babes having a fund&mdash;if that's the
+right name&mdash;on purpose for 'em, and a promise of a legacy,&mdash;I hope they
+won't get <i>that</i> till they're a hundred year old!"</p>
+
+<p>"What if we change Isosceles to Theodore, Mrs. Hopkins? That means <i>the
+gift of God</i>, and the child has been a gift from Heaven, rather than a
+burden."</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Hopkins seized her apron, and held it to her eyes. She was weeping.
+"Theodore!" she said,&mdash;"Theodore! My little brother's name, that I
+buried when I was only eleven year old. Drownded. The dearest little
+child that ever you see. I have got his little mug with Theodore on it
+now. Kep' o' purpose. Our little Sossy shall have it. Theodore P.
+Hopkins,&mdash;sha'n't it be, Mr. Gridley?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, if you say so; but why that P., Mrs. Hopkins? Theodore Parker, is
+it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Doesn't P. stand for Pemberton, and isn't Father Pemberton the best man
+in the world&mdash;next to you, Mr. Gridley?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, well, Mrs. Hopkins, let it be so, if you like; if you are suited,
+I am. Now about Helminthia; there can't be any doubt about what we ought
+to call her,&mdash;surely the friend of orphans should be remembered in
+naming one of the objects of her charity."</p>
+
+<p>"Cynthia Badlam Fund Hopkins,"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_657" id="Page_657">[Pg 657]</a></span> said the good woman triumphantly,&mdash;"is
+that what you mean?"</p>
+
+<p>"Suppose we leave out one of the names,&mdash;four are too many. I think the
+general opinion will be that Helminthia should unite the names of her
+two benefactresses,&mdash;Cynthia Badlam Hopkins."</p>
+
+<p>"Why, law! Mr. Gridley, isn't that nice?&mdash;Minthy and Cynthy,&mdash;there
+ain't but one letter of difference! Poor Cynthy would be pleased if she
+could know that one of our babes was to be called after her. She was
+dreadful fond of children."</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>On one of the sweetest Sundays that ever made Oxbow Village lovely, the
+Rev. Dr. Eliphalet Pemberton was summoned to officiate at three most
+interesting; ceremonies,&mdash;a wedding and two christenings, one of the
+latter a double one.</p>
+
+<p>The first was celebrated at the house of the Rev. Mr. Stoker, between
+the Rev. Cyprian Eveleth and Bathsheba, daughter of the first-named
+clergyman. He could not be present on account of his great infirmity,
+but the door of his chamber was left open that he might hear the
+marriage service performed. The old, white-haired minister, assisted, as
+the papers said, by the bridegroom's father, conducted the ceremony
+according to the Episcopal form. When he came to those solemn words in
+which the husband promises fidelity to the wife so long as they both
+shall live, the nurse, who was watching near the poor father, saw him
+bury his face in his pillow, and heard him murmur the words, "God be
+merciful to me a sinner!"</p>
+
+<p>The christenings were both to take place at the same service, in the old
+meeting-house. Colonel Clement Lindsay and Myrtle his wife came in, and
+stout Nurse Byloe bore their sturdy infant in her arms. A slip of paper
+was handed to the Reverend Doctor on which these words were
+written:&mdash;"The name is Charles Hazard."</p>
+
+<p>The solemn and touching rite was then performed; and Nurse Byloe
+disappeared with the child, its forehead glistening with the dew of its
+consecration.</p>
+
+<p>Then, hand in hand, like the babes in the wood, marched up the broad
+aisle&mdash;marshalled by Mrs. Hopkins in front, and Mrs. Gifted Hopkins
+bringing up the rear&mdash;the two children hitherto known as Isosceles and
+Helminthia. They had been well schooled, and, as the mysterious and to
+them incomprehensible ceremony was enacted, maintained the most stoical
+aspect of tranquillity. In Mrs. Hopkins's words, "They looked like
+picters, and behaved like angels."</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>That evening, Sunday evening as it was, there was a quiet meeting of
+some few friends at The Poplars. It was such a great occasion that the
+Sabbatical rules, never strict about Sunday evening,&mdash;which was,
+strictly speaking, secular time,&mdash;were relaxed. Father Pemberton was
+there, and Master Byles Gridley, of course, and the Rev. Ambrose
+Eveleth, with his son and his daughter-in-law, Bathsheba, and her
+mother, now in comfortable health, Aunt Silence and her husband, Doctor
+Hurlbut and his wife (Olive Eveleth that was), Jacob Penhallow, Esq.,
+Mrs. Hopkins, her son and his wife (Susan Posey that was), the senior
+deacon of the old church (the admirer of the great Scott), the
+Editor-in-chief of the "Banner and Oracle," and, in the background,
+Nurse Byloe and the privileged servant, Mistress Kitty Fagan, with a few
+others whose names we need not mention.</p>
+
+<p>The evening was made pleasant with sacred music, and the fatigues of two
+long services repaired by such simple refections as would not turn the
+holy day into a day of labor. A large-paper copy of the new edition of
+Byles Gridley's remarkable work was lying on the table. He never looked
+so happy,&mdash;could anything fill his cup fuller? In the course of the
+evening Clement spoke of the many trials through which they had passed
+in common with vast numbers of their countrymen, and some of those
+peculiar dangers which<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_658" id="Page_658">[Pg 658]</a></span> Myrtle had had to encounter in the course of a
+life more eventful, and attended with more risks, perhaps, than most of
+them imagined. But Myrtle, he said, had always been specially cared for.
+He wished them to look upon the semblance of that protecting spirit who
+had been faithful to her in her gravest hours of trial and danger. If
+they would follow him into one of the lesser apartments up stairs they
+would have an opportunity to do so.</p>
+
+<p>Myrtle wondered a little, but followed with the rest. They all ascended
+to the little projecting chamber, through the window of which her
+scarlet jacket caught the eyes of the boys paddling about on the river
+in those early days when Cyprian Eveleth gave it the name of the
+Fire-hang-bird's Nest.</p>
+
+<p>The light fell softly but clearly on the dim and faded canvas from which
+looked the saintly features of the martyred woman, whose continued
+presence with her descendants was the old family legend. But underneath
+it Myrtle was surprised to see a small table with some closely covered
+object upon it. It was a mysterious arrangement, made without any
+knowledge on her part.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, then, Kitty!" Mr. Lindsay said.</p>
+
+<p>Kitty Fagan, who had evidently been taught her part, stepped forward,
+and removed the cloth which concealed the unknown object. It was a
+lifelike marble bust of Master Byles Gridley.</p>
+
+<p>"And this is what you have been working at so long,&mdash;is it, Clement?"
+Myrtle said.</p>
+
+<p>"Which is the image of your protector, Myrtle?" he answered, smiling.</p>
+
+<p>Myrtle Hazard Lindsay walked up to the bust, and kissed its marble
+forehead, saying, "This is the face of my Guardian Angel!"</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="A_MYSTERIOUS_PERSONAGE" id="A_MYSTERIOUS_PERSONAGE"></a>A MYSTERIOUS PERSONAGE.</h2>
+
+
+<p>From the first, our country has been a refuge, not only for kings and
+princes and statesmen and warriors, but for all sorts of adventurers and
+impostors. Following hard after Kosciuszko, General Charles Lee, Baron
+Steuben, Baron de Kalb, Lord Stirling, and Lafayette, we had Talleyrand,
+Louis Philippe, and Jerome Bonaparte, and Joseph, king of Spain; and,
+but for a sudden change of wind, might have had Napoleon the Great
+himself&mdash;after the affair of Waterloo. We have always been, and must
+continue to be, overrun with pretenders, mountebanks, blood relations of
+Charles Fox, Lord Byron, and the Guelphs, who are always in the market.</p>
+
+<p>Never, at any time, however, have we had a more puzzling or mysterious
+visitant than Major-General Bratish&mdash;Baron Fratelin&mdash;Count Eliovich. I
+knew him well,&mdash;better, I believe, than others who had known him longer,
+but under less trying circumstances. I stood by him through thick and
+thin. I fought his battles for a long while, and almost always
+single-handed, against a cloud of enemies, at a time when he appeared to
+be hunted for his life by a band of conspirators, and was undoubtedly
+beset by eavesdroppers and spies at every turn.</p>
+
+<p>All at once, after a dazzling career in the political and literary world
+beyond seas, continuing for many years, and followed by a course here
+which kept him always before the public, and for something more than two
+years made it almost a distinction for anybody to be acquainted with
+him, this General Bratish&mdash;Count Eliovich&mdash;found<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_659" id="Page_659">[Pg 659]</a></span> himself an outcast,
+helpless and hopeless, obliged to live from hand to mouth.</p>
+
+<p>That he was greatly belied, I had reason to know. That he was cruelly
+misunderstood, and wickedly misrepresented by the whole newspaper press
+of our country, I had reason to believe, upon evidence not to be
+questioned; but we are anticipating.</p>
+
+<p>One day, in the summer or fall of 1839, Colonel Bouchette of Quebec, son
+of the late Surveyor-General of Canada, brought a stranger to see me,
+whom he introduced as Major-General Bratish, late in the service of her
+Catholic Majesty, the Queen of Spain, and associate of General De Lacy
+Evans, of the Auxiliary Legion. They were both (Bouchette and Bratish)
+living in Portland at the time, and occupied chambers in the same
+building; and I inferred from what passed in this or in a subsequent
+interview that the Colonel had known the General in Quebec or Montreal,
+about the time of the outbreak there in which they were implicated.</p>
+
+<p>The object they had in view, on their first visit, was to open a way for
+General Bratish to lecture in Portland, upon some one&mdash;or more&mdash;of many
+subjects,&mdash;on Greece, Hungary, Poland, the war in Spain, South America,
+our own Revolutionary War, modern languages, or matters and things in
+general.</p>
+
+<p>The appearance and deportment of the gentleman were much in his favor.
+He seemed both frank and fearless, with a mixture of modesty and
+self-reliance quite captivating. He looked to be about five-and-thirty,
+according to my present recollection, stood five feet nine or ten, with
+a broad chest and good figure. He had not much of military
+bearing,&mdash;certainly not more than we see in General Grant,&mdash;and on the
+whole bore the appearance of a young, handsome, healthy, well-bred
+Englishman, accustomed to good society. He was neither talkative nor
+reserved, but natural and free; speaking our language with uncommon
+propriety, French and German still better, and Italian like a native,
+and often expressing himself with singular strength and
+picturesqueness,&mdash;reminding me of the Italian poet and critic, Ugo
+Foscolo,&mdash;whom I saw at the time he was furnishing the papers translated
+by Mrs. Sarah Austin for the Edinburgh Review.</p>
+
+<p>Arrangements were soon made for a first appearance; and the result was
+all that could have been hoped for, and much more than could reasonably
+have been expected. His manner was dignified, unpretending, and earnest;
+and he had a sort of unstudied natural eloquence, quite wonderful in a
+foreigner, unacquainted with our idioms and unaccustomed to platform
+speaking. Whatever might be the subject, he always talked with an air of
+modest truthfulness, and gave the most dramatic and startling
+narratives, like an eyewitness on the stand, testifying under oath.
+Never shall I forget Warsaw, nor the battle of Navarino, as rapidly
+sketched by him in a sort of parenthesis, while he was lecturing upon a
+very different subject; he wanted an illustration, and both of these
+pictures flashed suddenly out upon us. The other lectures that followed
+his first seemed, up to the very last, to grow better and better, until
+we had faith, not only in his representations, but in the man himself.</p>
+
+<p>Instead of shunning, he rather invited inquiry; and at an interview with
+the late Mr. Edward Preble, son of the Commodore, when that gentleman
+was questioning him about Tripoli, and was preparing to show him the
+very charts used by the Commodore, the General refused to look at them,
+and instantly drew a sketch of the harbor, with the castles, batteries,
+and fortifications, and gave the soundings and approaches; and all
+these, upon a careful examination, proved to be correct in every
+particular, according to the testimony of Mr. Preble himself.</p>
+
+<p>About this time, in consequence of the favorable notices that appeared
+in our Portland papers, the Philadelphia<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_660" id="Page_660">[Pg 660]</a></span> Ledger, the Saturday Courier,
+and some other journals of that city, opened upon him in full cry,
+followed by the American press generally; the Courier declaring that he
+had taken <i>leg bail</i> and escaped from Canada,&mdash;that he had run away from
+Rochester, after obtaining five hundred dollars from Henry McIlvaine,
+Esq., of the Philadelphia bar, in the shape of fees for constituting
+that gentleman "Consul-General of Greece"! By others he was charged with
+being a tin-pedler, a horse-thief, and a leech-doctor, who had assumed
+the title of Count long after his arrival in this country. Among many
+anonymous letters&mdash;letters addressed to strangers in Portland&mdash;came one
+from Henry McIlvaine himself, saying: "I see by the Portland papers,
+that a man calling himself <i>sometimes</i> General Bratish, at others
+General Eliovich, Count Eliovich, Baron Fratelin and Walbeck, and
+claiming to have been a general in the Polish, Spanish, Mexican, and
+other armies, is now in your town; and I should suppose, from the papers
+<i>who</i> have noticed him, imposing upon respectable people. Having seen
+something of this person, and been <i>myself a victim</i>, I have felt it due
+to my friends in Portland to put them on their guard. He is the son of a
+merchant in Trieste, driven from his home and his friends in consequence
+of his crimes. His pretension to any of the titles he claims is
+altogether without foundation. After <i>exhausting Europe</i>, he has within
+a few years turned his talents to good account in our country. He made
+his appearance here about two years ago as Consul-General and Envoy from
+Greece, in which capacity he was very free with his commissions of
+vice-consulships in New York and Philadelphia. He was indicted here for
+forgery,&mdash;<i>convicted</i>,&mdash;obtained a new trial by the false oaths of his
+associates, some of whom are now in the state prison (one for
+horse-stealing), and gave bail for his appearance at the next term. The
+pretence for a new trial was the absence of a witness <i>who never
+existed</i>, but who was expected to prove his innocence. Before the next
+term, the Consul-General took wing, leaving his bail, a simple
+Frenchman, to pay the forfeit. It would be impossible for me to give
+anything like a history of his crimes in a letter. Suffice it to say
+that he is a notorious swindler, the most unblushing and inexhaustible
+liar and the most finished rascal I ever saw."</p>
+
+<p>If this were true, how happened it that the notorious swindler, the
+horse-thief, the convicted forger, and the escaped convict was still at
+large,&mdash;and not only at large, but always before the public, and <i>always
+without a change of name</i>? Why was he not surrendered by his bail? Why
+not followed by a bench warrant, or a requisition from the Governor of
+Pennsylvania? Of course, the story could not be true, as told by Mr.
+McIlvaine. It was too absurd on the face of it.</p>
+
+<p>But was any part of the story true? and, if so, how much? Having been
+frequently imposed upon, both at home and abroad, by adventurers and
+pretenders, I determined to go to the bottom of this case before I
+committed myself, and I must say that, for a while, the stories told by
+General Bratish, and the explanations he gave, seemed to me still more
+absurd and preposterous.</p>
+
+<p>According to his story&mdash;to give one example out of a score&mdash;he had been
+obliged to apply for the benefit of the Insolvent Act, in Philadelphia,
+owing to losses he had sustained by lending money to distressed
+compatriots, and eleemosynary outcasts, and had been opposed in the
+Court of Insolvency by Colonel John Stille, Jr. and Mr. Henry McIlvaine,
+who threatened him with a prosecution for the forgery of consular
+papers, if he dared to appear. He declared that he did appear,
+nevertheless, and was honorably discharged; that his claims and
+evidences of debt, handed over to Mr. McIlvaine, the assignee, amounted
+to $7,620 for cash lent, while his debts altogether amounted to less
+than $1,000; that he was arrested while in court, on a warrant for
+forgery, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_661" id="Page_661">[Pg 661]</a></span> there subjected to a long and rigorous examination by
+Messrs. McIlvaine and Stille, who had got possession of all the claims
+against him; that the offence charged consisted in issuing a commission
+as Vice-Consul of Greece, <i>with General Bratish's own signature</i>! that
+McIlvaine went before Mr. Alderman Binns to get the warrant for forgery,
+and employed Colonel John Stille, Jr., his coadjutor, to appear as
+public prosecutor in the Mayor's Court of Philadelphia; that he, General
+Bratish, was put upon trial before a bench of aldermen, not a man of the
+whole except the Recorder being acquainted with the rudiments of law;
+that, on being arraigned, he refused to plead, and called no witnesses
+himself, though some were called by his counsel,&mdash;when the Recorder
+directed the plea of "Not guilty" to be entered, and the trial to
+proceed; that he claimed to be a foreign consul provisionally appointed,
+entered a formal protest, which appeared in the papers of the day, and
+never deigned to open his mouth, until, to the consternation and
+amazement of all who understood the case, the jury found him <i>guilty</i>,
+under the direction of the Recorder,&mdash;a direction which amounted to
+this, namely, that, while General Bratish could not be legally convicted
+of the offence charged, he might be convicted of another offence <i>not
+charged!</i> that a motion for a new trial was entered at the suggestion of
+the Recorder himself, and was finally argued in a burst of indignation
+by General Bratish, who thrust aside his counsel, and refused to be
+delivered on technical grounds; that the motion was opposed by Messrs.
+McIlvaine and Stille, but prevailed; that the verdict was set aside, a
+new trial granted, and General Bratish was allowed to go at large, on
+greatly reduced bail, every member of the court concurring, except Mr.
+Alderman McKean; that no sooner was the trial over, and the proceedings
+published, than a public meeting was called through the National
+Gazette, the Public Ledger, the United States Gazette, and the
+Pennsylvanian, and all persons were invited to appear, and bring
+forward their charges&mdash;if any they had&mdash;against him; that such a
+meeting, both large and respectable, was held at the College of
+Pharmacy, and resolutions were adopted, declaring the character of
+General Bratish to be "<i>unimpeached and unimpeachable</i>" his authority
+from Greece to be fully proved, and his identity to have been
+established by the testimony of "several highly respectable gentlemen
+present"; that, before he could have another trial, the court was
+abolished; and that, after waiting two months for the prosecutor to
+move, for want of something better to do, General Bratish betook himself
+to Canada; that he was followed there, watched, arrested for a
+horse-thief, immediately and honorably discharged, re-arrested upon a
+suspicion of high treason, put beyond the reach of a <i>habeas corpus</i>
+writ, and confined for seven months, in the citadel of Quebec and
+elsewhere, <i>as a prisoner of state</i>, &amp;c., &amp;c.</p>
+
+<p>Such was a part of his story; and astonishing as it may
+appear&mdash;incredible, I might say&mdash;I found it, after a most careful
+investigation, to be not only substantially true, but scrupulously
+exact. The evidence came to me through unwilling or prejudiced
+witnesses,&mdash;my friend, Henry C. Carey of Philadelphia, among the
+number,&mdash;and was corroborated throughout by official documents and
+published proceedings. And here I may as well add, that Mr. Arnold
+Buffum was chairman, and J. Griffith, M. D. secretary, of the meeting
+above referred to, of March 6th, 1838.</p>
+
+<p>While this unhappy controversy was raging, and our people were dividing
+upon the questions involved, a little incident occurred which had a very
+wholesome effect upon our misgivings. The General happened to be in
+conversation with a stranger one day, when the subject of Unitarianism,
+as it existed in the North of Europe, came up. Something was then said
+about the great Unitarian Convention held at Cork, Ireland, two or three
+years before.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_662" id="Page_662">[Pg 662]</a></span> General Bratish said he was in attendance, and had let
+fall some remarks there. A by-stander, who had very little faith in our
+hero, caught at the ravelling thus dropped. If what the General said
+were true, surely some evidence might be found by diligent search. And,
+sure enough! the gentleman found a copy of the Christian Pioneer, in
+Boston, giving an account of that very Convention. He acknowledged to me
+that he opened the journal with fear and trembling, but soon came upon
+what purported to be an abstract of a speech by General Bratish, and
+what furnished abundant confirmation of his highest pretensions as a
+soldier, as a writer, as a patriot, and as a philanthropist. I saw the
+Pioneer myself. It was a monthly journal, published in Glasgow,
+Scotland, July, 1835. The speech, as reported, was eminently
+characteristic, and the summary that followed was in the following
+words:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The society was gratified on this occasion by the presence of the Rev.
+George Harris of Glasgow, whose visit to Cork the committee gladly
+availed themselves of, earnestly requesting his attendance; and of Mr.
+Bratish, <i>a native of Hungary, and a member of the Hungarian Diet, who,
+in consequence of his intrepid advocacy of the cause of much-injured
+Poland, both in his place in the legislature, and subsequently with his
+pen and his sword, has been obliged to fly his country, and take refuge
+in this kingdom</i>."</p>
+
+<p>Among the most damaging allegations was one to this effect, that Mr.
+Forsyth, our Secretary of State, had contradicted the story of General
+Bratish about his consular authority and proceedings in every
+particular. So far was this from being true, that Mr. Forsyth
+<i>confirmed</i> the story of General Bratish in substance, acknowledging to
+me that he <i>knew</i> nothing to his prejudice, and that General Bratish had
+held such communications with him as he had represented.</p>
+
+<p>Yet more, while I was patiently and quietly pursuing these
+investigations, Colonel Bouchette handed me a copy of the Bath (Me.)
+Telegraph Extra, of July 19, 1839, containing a report of the
+proceedings at a public meeting held there, in consequence of the
+newspaper charges and anonymous letters which had followed our
+adventurer to that city. It was headed "General Bratish Eliovich (Baron
+Fratelin)," and was signed by Judge Clapp (Ebenezer), and by Henry
+Masters, Secretary. The resolutions were brief but conclusive; and the
+committee that drew them up, after a thorough investigation, were chosen
+from among the most respectable citizens of the place. "Every specific
+charge brought forward by responsible persons," they say, "was most
+completely refuted, and the truth was found entirely in accordance with
+the statements and accounts of the transactions given beforehand by
+General Bratish"; and they declare him "entitled to the confidence and
+respect of the community at large," saying that "his conduct in this
+State has been that of a gentleman and man of honor."</p>
+
+<p>I found too, that, go where he would, behave as he might, the moment his
+name appeared in the papers, anonymous letters and paragraphs followed,
+denouncing him as a "pedler," as a "native Yankee," as a thief who had
+robbed a fellow-boarder at Bedford Springs and then run away, taking one
+of the most unfrequented roads "across the country to Cumberland, upon
+which no public conveyance runs"; and yet I found, upon further inquiry,
+that he went off by the regular mail coach direct to Philadelphia, drove
+straight to the Marshall House, where he had always put up, (one of the
+largest and most respectable establishments in the city,) and <i>entered
+his name at length on the travellers' book in the usual way</i>, and was
+received by McIlvaine himself and others he had met with at Bedford
+Springs, on a footing of the most friendly intimacy, for over two months
+after the alleged robbery and exposure.</p>
+
+<p>I ascertained further, that he came to this country in the summer of
+1836 on board the Statesman, Captain Mansfield,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_663" id="Page_663">[Pg 663]</a></span> from Gothenburg to
+Salem, with letters from Christopher Hughes, our <i>Charg&eacute; d'Affaires</i> at
+Stockholm, to his son at New York, and with a Swedish passport to North
+America, duly authenticated, in which he was called "the Honorable John
+Bratish de Fratelin"; that he had many other letters, bills of credit,
+and drafts, and a large amount of money in gold,&mdash;some "thousands of
+dollars" according to the testimony of Captain N. B. Mansfield himself,
+with whom I communicated by letter; that he was brought on board in the
+Governor's barge, and was known to have been treated with great
+distinction by the Swedish nobility, and to have been so well received
+by Bernadotte himself, the king of Sweden, as to give rise to a report
+that he was a son of Murat, the late king of Naples, whose queen he
+certainly resembled, as he did others of the Bonaparte family; that on
+the passage he put on no airs, claimed no title, but chose to be called
+plain Mr. Bratish, until his rank was discovered, and he came to be
+known as General John Bratish Eliovich (the son of Elias), Baron
+Fratelin; that after a twelve-month's residence at Boston and Salem,
+holding intercourse with what is there called the best society, he went
+to Washington, where he passed the winter of 1837-38 among the
+fashionables and upper-tens; that, while there, he received the
+provisional appointment of Consul-General for the United States from the
+Regency of Greece, dated February 15, 1837, upon which he threw up an
+engagement he had entered into with General Duff Greene, which secured
+him a respectable support, and set about seeing the country; that after
+travelling from New York to New Orleans, he returned to the North, and
+stopped for a month or two at Bedford Springs, <i>about a day's journey
+from Philadelphia</i>; that being disappointed in remittances and receipts,
+and unable to collect moneys he had lent to his compatriots, he could
+not pay his bill for six weeks' board, amounting to fifty dollars, and
+went to Philadelphia, leaving with Mr. Brown, the landlord, a part of
+his baggage and books, after trying in vain to dispose of a valuable
+platina medal; that in Philadelphia, Mr. McIlvaine&mdash;notwithstanding the
+alleged robbery&mdash;lent him one hundred and sixty-five dollars, and was
+constituted Vice-Consul of Greece <i>ad interim</i>, that is, "until the
+pleasure of his Majesty, the king of Greece, should be known."</p>
+
+<p>Here then was the foundation of all the attacks made upon the unhappy
+General; but was there not something behind,&mdash;something <i>below</i> this
+foundation? The extraordinary case of Dr. Follen, who was hunted from
+pillar to post, year after year, and wellnigh lied into his grave, shows
+what may be done by conspirators and spies and slanderers, when a
+respectable man grows obnoxious to a foreign power. If he is at all
+headstrong or imprudent, nothing can save him. Oddly enough, it happens
+that one of the very papers which followed Dr. Follen whithersoever he
+went, like a sleuth-hound,&mdash;the Philadelphia Gazette,&mdash;was among the
+bitterest and most unrelenting, of those that assailed General Bratish.</p>
+
+<p>While pursuing these investigations, I learned from what I regarded as
+high authority, that General Bratish had presented an address to Lord
+Normanby, at the head of the whole consular body, having been chosen for
+that special purpose; and I was referred to the Irish Royal Cork Almanac
+for 1835, where, under the head of Foreign Consuls, I read, "Colonel
+John Bratish (d'Elias) Eliovich, K. C. C., S. S., L. H., Consul-General
+of Greece, Mexico, Buenos Ayres, and Switzerland, Consular Agent of
+Turkey."</p>
+
+<p>How were these contradictions to be reconciled,&mdash;the facts proved with
+the stories told? If General Bratish was the swindler and impostor they
+pretended, the sooner he was exposed, and the more publicly, the better.
+On the contrary, if he was an honest man&mdash;a man greatly wronged and
+belied, like Dr. Follen&mdash;he ought to be defended,&mdash;but how? He was poor
+and friendless,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_664" id="Page_664">[Pg 664]</a></span> and the whole newspaper press of the country was either
+against him, or wholly indifferent. Had he been on trial in a court of
+justice, any lawyer would have defended him,&mdash;nay, for that matter, he
+might have defended himself. But if he entered the field as a writer,
+alone against a host, volumes would have to be written,&mdash;and who would
+publish them,&mdash;who read them?</p>
+
+<p>That I might bring the matter to issue at once, knowing well, and from
+long experience, that, when people are accused through the newspaper
+press of our country, they are always believed to be guilty until they
+have <i>established their innocence</i>, I sent a communication to the
+Portland Advertiser of October 15, 1839, with my name, charging upon Mr.
+Henry McIlvaine and Colonel John Stille, Jr. all that I afterwards
+repeated with more distinctness and solemnity in "The New World," for
+which I was then writing (and from which I withdrew in consequence of
+what I then regarded as unfairness toward General Bratish on the part of
+my coadjutors, Messrs. Park Benjamin and Epes Sargent), and arraigning
+both McIlvaine and Stille, as conspirators and libellers.</p>
+
+<p>One day, while this controversy was raging, the General called upon me,
+and begged me, for my own satisfaction, to inquire of Baron de
+Mareschal, the Austrian Minister, respecting certain charges that had
+just appeared against him. I consented, and immediately despatched the
+following letter to the care of my friend, the Honorable George Evans,
+our Representative in Congress, requesting him to see the Baron for me.</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"<i>To</i> <span class="smcap">His Excellency General Baron de Mareschal</span>, <i>Envoy
+Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary from his Majesty the
+Emperor of Austria.</i></p>
+
+<p>"The undersigned is led to apply to your Excellency in behalf
+of a gentleman here, who has been assailed by a great variety
+of newspaper slanders, most of which have been triumphantly
+refuted. The gentleman referred to is known here, by his
+passports and other credentials, as John Bratish Eliovich, late
+a general in the service of her most Catholic Majesty, the
+Queen of Spain, and is now an American citizen.</p>
+
+<p>"He states&mdash;and he bids me trust confidently to the character
+of your Excellency for an early reply&mdash;that in 1828 he was at
+Rio Janeiro; that instead of 'running away,' as reported, with
+a large amount of funds belonging to his uncle, Christopher
+Bratish, he left Rio Janeiro in consequence of being appointed
+by the Emperor, Dom Pedro, Brazilian Consul to Austria, with
+the approbation and consent of your Excellency, manifested by a
+regular passport, granted by your Excellency's legation.</p>
+
+<p>"The friends of General Bratish in this region are numerous and
+respectable, and they beg your Excellency's reply to the
+following questions:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Is the statement above made by General Bratish true?</p>
+
+<p>"And if your Excellency would be so kind as to say whether, in
+your opinion, there can be any foundation for the story
+respecting the 'large amount of money' said to have been
+carried off by General Bratish, when he is reported to have run
+away from Rio Janeiro, your Excellency would gladly oblige, not
+only the undersigned, but a number of other persons deeply
+interested in the character of General Bratish.</p>
+
+<p>"Meanwhile, I am with respect your Excellency's most obedient
+servant,</p>
+<p class="right">
+"&mdash;&mdash; &mdash;&mdash;.
+</p>
+</div>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p><span class="smcap">"Portland, Me.</span>, April, 1840."</p>
+
+<p>"That your Excellency may know who has taken this liberty, the
+undersigned begs leave to refer you to the Hon. George Evans,
+Henry Clay, Daniel Webster, General Scott, or to any member of
+Congress from the Northern or Middle States."</p></div>
+
+<p>Through some oversight in the transcribing, the full date of this letter
+does not appear; but I soon received the following from Mr. Evans:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_665" id="Page_665">[Pg 665]</a></span>&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p class="right"><span class="smcap">House of Representatives, Washington</span>,</p>
+
+
+<p class="right">April 20, 1840.</p>
+
+
+<p>"<span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>,&mdash;Your favor of &mdash;&mdash;, enclosing letter for General
+Mareschal was duly received, and I immediately despatched a
+messenger to deliver it to the General, with a note in your
+behalf. Yesterday the General called upon me to say that he
+felt constrained, from various circumstances, to decline a
+reply to it. He wishes you to understand that he does this with
+entire respect for yourself, whom he should be very happy
+personally to oblige. He said, if the information you seek was
+desirable for any personal or private purposes of your
+own,&mdash;such as, for instance, if any alliance was in
+contemplation with any of your friends,&mdash;he should feel bound
+to give you a reply. But he does not think that he ought to be
+drawn into a newspaper discussion, or to become the subject of
+comment or remark in such a matter. He wished me to explain his
+feelings, and hopes you will not impute his declining to any
+want of regard for you, and that you will appreciate the
+motives which govern him. I am not at liberty to detail a
+conversation I held with him on the general subject of your
+letter. He did not show it to me, though he spoke of its
+contents.</p>
+
+
+<p class="right">"Very faithfully yours,<br /><br />
+
+"Geo. Evans."
+</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Very adroit and very diplomatic, to be sure, on the part of the Baron;
+but surely he might have answered yes or no to the first question,
+without committing himself. And why not show my letter to Mr. Evans?
+Taking the ground he did, however, he forced me to the following
+conclusion, namely, that he could not answer <i>No</i>, and was afraid, for
+reasons of state, perhaps, to answer <i>Yes</i>.</p>
+
+<p>And now, what was to be done? Should I prepare a memoir, setting forth
+all these charges, with such refutations and such explanations as had
+occurred, and appeal to the public. There seemed to be no other way
+left.</p>
+
+<p>While I was preparing this memoir, which made a pamphlet of forty-eight
+large octavo pages, with the documentary evidence in small print,
+General Bratish was at my elbow; and one evening, after I had read over
+to him what I had written, I happened to say that I was exceedingly
+sorry for the loss of his orders and decorations in Canada,&mdash;they would
+have been such a corroboration of his story.</p>
+
+<p>"Lost!" said he, "they are not lost."</p>
+
+<p>"Where are they?"</p>
+
+<p>"In the bank, with some other valuables."</p>
+
+<p>"In the bank! When can you get them for me?"</p>
+
+<p>"To-morrow, when the bank is open."</p>
+
+<p>Shall I confess the truth? So sudden and so startling was this
+declaration, after what I had seen in the papers about the loss of these
+badges and orders in Canada, that I began, for the first time, to have
+uncomfortable suspicions. But, sure enough, the next day he brought them
+all to me, together with the original contract entered into between
+Colonel De Lacy Evans (afterward General Evans) and General Bratish,
+with the approbation of Alva, the Spanish Ambassador at the Court of St.
+James, whereby it was provided that "John Bratish Eliovich, Esquire, K.
+C. C., V. S. S., V. L. H., &amp;c., &amp;c.," should enjoy the rank, pay, and
+emoluments of a Major-General in the Auxiliary Legion then raising for
+the Queen of Spain. This document, signed by Colonel De Lacy Evans and
+Carbonel, and approved by Alva, styled him "Major-General John Bratish
+Eliovich, K. C. C., V. L. H., &amp;c., &amp;c.," and bore the signature of
+General Bratish, whereby his identity was established; and the
+decorations and orders put into my hands were the following: "Knight
+Commander of Christ," the "Tower and Sword" of Portugal, the "Saviour"
+of Greece, and the "South Star" of Brazil.</p>
+
+<p>Here, certainly, was pretty strong confirmation; and yet on this very
+evening, my wife, who sat where she could see all the changes of his
+countenance<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_666" id="Page_666">[Pg 666]</a></span> while I was writing the memoir and occasionally asking a
+question without looking up, saw enough to satisfy her that Bratish was
+making a fool of her husband, and, the moment his back was turned,
+expressed her astonishment that a man of sense&mdash;meaning me&mdash;could be so
+easily imposed upon. So much for the instinct of a woman; but more of
+this hereafter.</p>
+
+<p>Not long after this, the General rushed into my office in a paroxysm of
+rage,&mdash;the only time I ever saw him disturbed. His honor had been
+questioned, and by whom, of all the world? Why,&mdash;would I believe it?&mdash;by
+his friend, Colonel Bouchette! Upon further inquiry, I found that he had
+received a draft from his sister, which had to pass through a secret
+channel to him, lest their estates should be confiscated in Hungary;
+that, after two or three disappointments, he had succeeded in getting it
+cashed here without endangering a certain friend in New York; that on
+mentioning the circumstance to Colonel Bouchette, who had counselled him
+not to attempt the negotiation here, that gentleman had laughed in his
+face; whereupon the General turned his back on him, and hurried off to
+my office. A friend was with me at the time. "Ach, mein Freund!" said
+the General, as he finished the story, "he doubted my word, he
+questioned my honor, he asked to see the money; but I refused to show
+him the money,&mdash;I was indignant, outraged; but I have it here,&mdash;<i>here</i>!"
+slapping his breast-pocket, "and I am ready to show it to you." I
+declined; he persisted; until at last, afraid of the impression he might
+make upon my friend Winslow, who was present, I consented. But he only
+talked the louder and the faster, without producing the money; and when
+I grew serious, and insisted on seeing it, he acknowledged that he
+hadn't it with him!</p>
+
+<p>"Where is it, sir?" said I.</p>
+
+<p>"At my lodgings."</p>
+
+<p>"And how long will it take you to produce it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Ten minutes."</p>
+
+<p>"Very well,"&mdash;taking out my watch,&mdash;"I will wait fifteen, and my friend
+here will stay with me, and be a witness."</p>
+
+<p>Away went the General, and, to my amazement, I must acknowledge, within
+the fifteen minutes he returned, bringing with him a cigar-box
+containing about five hundred dollars in bills and specie, which I
+counted.</p>
+
+<p>Here was a narrow escape,&mdash;a matter of life or death to him, certainly,
+if not to me. But where had he got the money? He was very poor, judging
+by appearances. The lecturing was over for a time, and there was no
+field for conjecture. To this hour the whole affair is a mystery.
+Unlikely as it was that he should have obtained it from his sister,
+there seemed to be no other explanation possible.</p>
+
+<p>Other perplexing and contradictory evidence for and against the General
+began to appear. I never saw him on horseback but once, and then I was
+frightened for him. As a general, he ought, of course, to know how to
+ride. As a native Hungarian, he must have been born <i>to</i> the saddle, if
+not <i>in</i> it. Nevertheless, I trembled for him, though the creature he
+had mounted was far from being either vicious or spirited; and then,
+too, when he tried waltzing, he reminded me, and others I am afraid, of
+"the man a-mowing."</p>
+
+<p>On the other hand, he was well-bred and self-possessed, full of accurate
+information, and never obtrusive. And here I am reminded of another
+singular circumstance, which went far in confirmation of the story he
+told. He gave J. S. Buckingham, Esq., M. P., whom I had known in London
+as the Oriental traveller, a letter to me, in which he speaks of him as
+a member of the British-Polish Committee in London,&mdash;thereby endangering
+the whole superstructure he had been rearing with so much care. Mr.
+Buckingham wrote me from New York, but failed to see me.</p>
+
+<p>Worn out and wellnigh discouraged by these persecutions, the General now
+left us, and went to New York, from<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_667" id="Page_667">[Pg 667]</a></span> which place he wrote me, under date
+of October 9, 1840, as follows. I give his own orthography, to show
+that, although acquainted with our language to such a degree that he was
+able to lecture in it, as Kossuth did, and to speak it with uncommon
+readiness, he must have learnt it by <i>ear</i>, like many others with which
+he was familiar enough for ordinary purposes.</p>
+
+<p>"One of my last occupation upon American soil is one of a painful, and
+at the same times pleasant nature, to wit, to address you, my noble, my
+chivalerouse, my excellent friend. My God revard you and may he for the
+benefit of mankind scater many such persons trought the world&mdash;it would
+prevent misantropy and it would serve as the best antidote against
+crimes and deceptions, persecutions and sufferings. O could you know all
+what I suffered in my eventful life, you would indead belive that no
+romance is equal to reality. But&mdash;basta&mdash;God is great and merciful, and
+I never yit and I hope never will find occassion to doubt the wundaful
+ways of his mercy.... Perhaps no times since I cam to America, I had
+occassion for more patience than during the first days of my arrival in
+N. Y. Harshed by law, cut by some friends, findig once more by European
+new a change in Greece, with my funds low, I began indeed to feel
+bitterly my sad fate&mdash;when by one of this suden fricks which I offen
+prouve that man must never despair all changed quit casualy it was
+raported to the German Association that I am her&mdash;immediately I was
+invited to ther mittings, the French Lafayette Club followed suit, and
+yesterday evning your humble servant was by acclamation apointed
+Vice-President of the General Union of all the forign assotiations of
+the city of New York (the German Tepcanoe Club 30 pers. excepted)....</p>
+
+<p>"I am very sorry that I cannot tell you where I go&mdash;I sail in the cliper
+armed brig Fairfield for the West India unter very avantageouse
+circumstances a eccelent pay rang and emoluments you may guess the rest
+be assured it is a honorable a very honorable employment. My next for
+the South wia Havanna or New York or New Orleans will inform you of the
+rest."</p>
+
+<p>Accompanying this letter was a slip from one of the large New York
+dailies confirming his story, and reporting the resolutions passed at a
+great public meeting, of which A. Sarony was President and Chairman,
+John Bratish, Vice-President, and George Sonne, Secretary. "The call of
+the meeting was read and adopted," says the report, "when General
+Bratish addressed the assemblage in the English, French, and German
+languages, in the most patriotic and eloquent manner. His speech was
+received with enthusiastic and repeated applause."</p>
+
+<p>And here for a long season we lost sight of the General, though two or
+three circumstances occurred, each trivial in itself, but all tending to
+give a new aspect to the affair, just before he left us, we had a small
+party at our house, where, among other amusements, a game called "The
+Four Elements" was introduced. When it was all over, and our visitors
+were gone, a costly handkerchief, with a lace border, was not to be
+found. It had been last seen in the hands of General Bratish. Having no
+idea that, if he had pocketed it by mistake, it would not be returned,
+we waited patiently,&mdash;very patiently,&mdash;supposing he might have thrown
+aside his company dress-coat without examining the pockets, and that
+when he put it on again the handkerchief would be forthcoming, of
+course. But no,&mdash;nothing was heard of it, until one evening at a lecture
+my wife suddenly caught my arm, and, pointing to a white handkerchief
+the General was flourishing within reach, said, "There's Aunt Mary's
+handkerchief, now!"&mdash;"Nonsense, my dear!"&mdash;"It is, I tell you; I can see
+where he has ripped off the lace." I thought her beside herself; but
+still&mdash;why the sudden substitution of a large red Spitalfields for the
+white handkerchief? "Perhaps," said I to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_668" id="Page_668">[Pg 668]</a></span> my wife,&mdash;"perhaps the
+handkerchief was not marked, and he did not know where to find the
+owner."&mdash;"But it was marked, and he knows the owner as well as you do,"
+was the reply. Of course, I had nothing more to say; and so I laughed
+the exhibition off, as a sort of <i>pas de mouchoir</i>, like that which
+brought Forrest into a controversy with Macready.</p>
+
+<p>And then something else happened. I missed the only copy I had in the
+world of "Niagara and Goldau," which he had borrowed of me and returned,
+with emphasis; and many months after he had disappeared, I received a
+volume of poems from the heart of Germany, entitled, "Der Heimathgruss,
+Eine Pfingstgabe von Mathilde von Tabouillot, geborene Giester,"
+published at Wesel, 1840, with a letter from the lady herself, thanking
+me with great warmth and earnestness for my pamphlet in defence of
+General Bratish. Putting that and that together, I began to have a
+suspicion that my copy of "Niagara and Goldau" had been presented to the
+authoress by my friend, the General,&mdash;perhaps in the name of the author.</p>
+
+<p>Yet more. While these little incidents were accumulating and seething
+and simmering, I received a letter from Louis Bratish, in beautiful
+French, dated Birmingham, 7th October, 1841, in which he thanked me most
+heartily for what I had done as the friend of his brother, "John
+Bratish,"&mdash;withholding the "General,"&mdash;and begging me to consider it as
+coming from the family; and about the same time, another letter, and the
+last I ever received, from the General himself. It was dated "Torrington
+House, near London, 12th October, 1841," and contained the following
+passages:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"I cannot account for the very extraordinary silence in speite of all my
+request that you would at leas be so kind as to inform me if you realy
+don't wish to hear more from me. I know your Hart too well not to be
+persuaded that it must be some mistake or some intrigue.</p>
+
+<p>"At last my family begin to understand how much they did wrong me and I
+have the pleasure to enclose you a letter of my yungest brother, which
+is now at the house of Messrs. Toniola brothers, a volunteer partner, to
+learn the english....</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Josua Dodge, late Special Agent of the U. S. in Germany, is
+returning in one or two days to America; this gentleman in consequence
+of his mission crossed and recrossed all Germany and Belgium. I met him
+in Germany; he was present at Stuttgard in a most critical moment, when,
+denunced by the Germanic Federation (in the name of Austria) I was in
+iminent peril. He acted as a true American, boldly stepped forward,
+asked the way and the werfore and united with my firmness, the American
+passports where respected, and Mr. Dodge succeded to get an official
+acknowledgment that nothing was known against my moral character, and
+they took refuge upon some little irregularity in the passport.... He,
+my friends and my family wished very much that I should at lease for
+some times rethurn to America (<i>pour reson bien juste</i>) but the
+recollection is too bitter yet.... Several Americans are now visiting my
+sister and her husband in Belgium&mdash;among them Mr. Bishop of Cont. and
+Mr. Rowly, C. S. of N. Y.&mdash;What would I give to see J. N and his amable
+family!...</p>
+
+<p>"My address is Monsieur Le General Bratish (Eliovich), raccommand&eacute; &agrave;
+Mons. Latard, Vervois Belgique.</p>
+
+<p>"P. S. Great excitement at London. The Morning Chronicle is out upon me
+for having done I don't know what in North America and Germany. All
+fidle-stik. I send you the paper to see how eassy John Bull is gulled. I
+could send you some important news. Attention!!! keep your powder dray!"</p>
+
+<p>Nothing more was heard of our mysterious General until a letter fell
+into my hands, purporting to be written by his brother Luigi. It was in
+choice Italian, and dated Birmingham, 16th April, 1842, charging the
+"Caro Fratello"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_669" id="Page_669">[Pg 669]</a></span> with having deceived him about Mr. Everett, complaining
+of his behavior to Dr. Sleigh and others who had befriended him; telling
+him that Dr. Sleigh, to whom he referred, doubted his Spanish
+commission, and believed him to have been a member of the "Hunter's
+Association,"&mdash;a band of horse-thieves in Canada,&mdash;and signifying, in
+language not to be misunderstood, that the family had given up all hope
+of him.</p>
+
+<p>The next information we had was that the General had turned up at Havre,
+and was about being married to the daughter of a wealthy banker, and
+carried a commission as Major-General from the Governor of Maine! And
+then, after a lapse of two years, that he had been travelling with a
+British nobleman, whose baggage he had run away with,&mdash;that he was
+arrested for the offence, and tried in Malta, I do not know with what
+result; but I have now before me a supplement of the Malta Times of
+October 9, 1844, in Italian, Spanish, and English, wherein he refers to
+the testimonials of my friend, Albert Smith, Ex-M. C, and Levi Cutter,
+Mayor of Portland; complains bitterly of the late Mr. Carr, Minister of
+the United States at Constantinople; and says, among other things, what
+of itself were enough to show that he had claimed to be a General of the
+State of Maine, and thereby settling the question most conclusively and
+forever. His language is: "To one charge of Mr. Everett, I plead guilty;
+to wit, to have usurped, or succeeded to gain the good opinion of
+respectable people in the United States, and here I am glad, at the same
+time, to put Mr. Everett's mind at rest; <i>he thinks it possible that I
+may be a General of the State of Maine</i>, but he admits <i>only</i> the
+possibility, and expresses the hope that it may not be so,&mdash;this, after
+the pretension to know my birthplace, life, death, and miracles, and an
+assertion on his part to have had, or seen, a correspondence with the
+Executive of Maine, in my regard, is very diplomatic&mdash;<i>very!</i>&mdash;but his
+Excellency may be easy on this head. I do not share <i>now</i> the military
+glory and honor of fellowship with that very numerous body of generals
+of the United States Militia; and if evidence may be produced that I was
+attended by a staff, I assure his Excellency, that it was only to have
+my boots cleaned by a captain, to be shaved by a major, to be helped by
+a colonel, and to get my meals at the private personal head-quarters of
+a <i>Gineral</i> at one dollar per day."</p>
+
+<p>And here I stop. From that day to this, nothing has been heard of
+General Bratish; but I should not be surprised to have him reappear, as
+if he had risen from the dead, in some new character, and so managing as
+to deceive the very elect. No such pretender has appeared since
+Cagliostro; and nobody ever succeeded so well in misleading public
+opinion, and embroiling so many persons of consideration, both in this
+country and in Europe, not excepting the Chevalier d'&Eacute;on, and the
+Princess Cariboo. Many other strange things might be related of Bratish,
+as, for example, his great speech in the Hungarian Diet, reported in the
+<i>Allgemeine Zeitung</i>,&mdash;the most impudent forgery of our day. But this
+paper is already longer than I intended; and I have only to add, that I
+have reason to believe now that he was indeed a native of Trieste, and
+that Colonel Stille and Mr. McIlvaine were right in saying what they did
+of him <i>generally</i>, though wrong in many of the particulars upon which
+they chiefly relied.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_670" id="Page_670">[Pg 670]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="A_TOUR_IN_THE_DARK" id="A_TOUR_IN_THE_DARK"></a>A TOUR IN THE DARK.</h2>
+
+
+<p>One February evening, more than a year ago, after a drive of fourteen
+miles over a lonely Kentucky road, I drew rein in front of a huge,
+rambling wooden building, standing solitary in the midst of the forest.</p>
+
+<p>There was no village in sight to account for the presence of so large a
+structure, no adjacent farms, and, except a little patch in front of the
+house, no fields,&mdash;nothing but the solemn woods which nearly shut it in
+on every side.</p>
+
+<p>I did not ask if this was the Mammoth Cave Hotel. I knew it without
+asking.</p>
+
+<p>Here I was, then, at last,&mdash;about to see what I had desired to see ever
+since I was a boy!</p>
+
+<p>But delay frequently comes with the certainty of accomplishing any
+long-cherished desire; and though I had driven with a hasty whip from
+the railway station fourteen miles away, and though the hotel proprietor
+offered to procure me a guide that evening, my haste to see the cave was
+unaccountably over. I ordered a fire in my room, and concluded to wait
+until morning.</p>
+
+<p>It was too early in the season for the usual summer visitors, and I
+found myself the sole guest in this big, lonesome caravansary, that
+looked as though a dozen old-fashioned Dutch farm-houses had been placed
+in the midst of a wood-lot, and then connected by the roofs, the whole
+forming one straggling, weather-stained, labyrinthine building, full of
+little nests of rooms, high-pitched gables, cumbrous outside
+chimney-stacks, cavernous fireplaces, and low, wide corridors open at
+either end, where were uncertain shadows, and draughts of damp air that
+whispered and moaned all night long.</p>
+
+<p>In the evening, as I sat before the blazing pile of logs in the
+fireplace, some one knocked at my door, and a negro servant looked in.
+Would I like to see the guide?</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly. What is his name?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nicholas, sah, Nicholas! But we all calls him Ole Nick."</p>
+
+<p>Rather an ominous name, to be sure! but then, if one goes to the regions
+below, what guide so appropriate?</p>
+
+<p>On presentation, his Majesty proved to be an interesting black man,
+considerably past middle age; wrinkled, as none but a genuine negro ever
+becomes; a short, broad, strong man, with a grizzled beard and mustache,
+quiet but steady eyes, grave in his demeanor, and concise in his
+conversation. He tells me of two routes by which I can make a tour
+through his dominions. The shortest one will require six hours to
+travel, and at the farthest will take me to the banks of the river Styx,
+six miles from the entrance to the cave. The other route will take the
+whole day, and will lead as far as the so-called "Maelstr&ouml;m,"&mdash;a
+singular pit, a hundred and seventy-five feet deep,&mdash;and place nine
+miles of gloom between me and this outer world. And with these facts to
+be juggled and distorted in ridiculous combinations with remembrances of
+many persons and places in the vagaries of dreams, I went to bed and to
+sleep.</p>
+
+<p>As the sun came up, we went down,&mdash;my guide and I,&mdash;down a rocky path
+along the side of a ravine that grew narrower and deeper until we came
+to a dilapidated house where the ravine seemed to end. Stepping upon the
+rotting piazza of this old house and facing "right about," there opened
+before us, as broad and lofty as the entrance to some ancient Egyptian
+temple, the mouth of the cave. From where we stood, a path, as wide as
+an ordinary city sidewalk and as smooth, sloped gently downward through
+the portal.</p>
+
+<p>Turning to the right to avoid the drip of a limpid stream,&mdash;that falls
+over the entrance like a perpetual libation<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_671" id="Page_671">[Pg 671]</a></span> to Pluto,&mdash;a few minutes'
+walk places us many hundred feet vertically beneath the surface, and in
+the "Rotunda," an enlargement of the cave, which looks about as large as
+the interior of Trinity Church, but is in reality larger; being quite as
+lofty, and measuring at its greatest diameter a hundred and seventy-five
+feet.</p>
+
+<p>Here, as we paused to look, with our flaring lamps poised above our
+heads, a strange squeaking noise was heard, which seemed to come from
+everywhere and nowhere in particular. I glanced inquiringly at my guide,
+in answer to which he simply replied, "Bats," and pointed to the walls,
+where, on closer inspection, I found these creatures clinging by
+thousands, literally blackening the wall, and hanging in festoons a foot
+or two in length. The manner of forming these festoons was curious
+enough: three or four bats having first taken hold of some sharp
+projecting ledge with their hindmost claws, and hanging thereby with
+their heads downward, others had seized their leathery wings at the
+second joint, and they too, hanging with downward heads, had offered
+their wings as holding-places for still others; and so the unsightly
+pendent mass had grown, until in some instances it contained as many as
+twenty or thirty bats. The wonder seemed that four or five pairs of
+little claws not so large as those of a mouse could sustain a weight
+that must have been in some instances as much as three pounds.</p>
+
+<p>The mysterious influence of the approaching spring had penetrated even
+into these abodes of darkness, and aroused in the bats a little life
+after their long hibernation; and their weak, plaintive squeak, which
+had something impish in it withal, came from every shadowy recess, and
+from the dark vault overhead. This "Rotunda" should have been called the
+"Bower of Bats."</p>
+
+<p>As they all hung too high to reach by other means, I flung my stick at
+random upward against the wall, and brought down two of the black
+masses, that writhed helpless upon the stony floor of the cave. Poor,
+palpitating things, unable to loose their clutch upon each other's
+wings, it was hard to say whether they were more disgusting or pitiful.
+What Eshcol clusters these, to bear back from this Canaan of darkness,
+saying, "This is the fruit of it!"</p>
+
+<p>Such an immense number of bats had harbored and died here from time
+immemorial, that more than a hundred acres of the earthy floor of the
+cave had, from their decomposing remains, become impregnated with nitre;
+and during the years 1812 to 1814, a party of saltpetre-makers took up
+their residence here. They made great vats in the cave, in which they
+lixiviated the impregnated earth, and by wooden pipes conveyed it to a
+place where they boiled the water drawn from the vats. Their rude
+mechanical contrivances are standing yet, in the same positions in which
+they were left so long ago; and so dry and pure is the air of the cave,
+that, though more than half a century has passed, these wooden pipes and
+vats show no more indication of decay than they did when first put in.
+In one place my guide dug up from the clayey floor&mdash;where it was their
+custom to feed the oxen employed in drawing the materials to and
+fro&mdash;some corn-cobs, very dry and light, but as perfect as though they
+were only a few months old.</p>
+
+<p>The footprints of the oxen, made in the earth that was then moist, are
+plainly visible in many places; and the clay has since become almost as
+hard as stone, so that I found it difficult to make any impression in it
+with the point of my pocket-knife.</p>
+
+<p>A few minutes' walk brought us in front of the "Giant's Coffin," an
+enormous rock forty feet in length, which has fallen from the ceiling.
+The resemblance to a coffin is so strangely exact, that, having heard
+mention of it before coming in, I recognized it at the first glance. The
+upper part of the rock is composed of a stratum whiter than the rest,
+and gives it the appearance of having a border of white ornamentation
+around it, just below the lid. It<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_672" id="Page_672">[Pg 672]</a></span> rests upon a gigantic bier about ten
+feet high, and a little longer than the coffin, and the effect is as
+though some kingly son of Anak were lying in state in this huge
+sepulchral vault.</p>
+
+<p>Near at hand is a cluster of objects, not carved out by the accidents of
+time or the long attrition of subterranean rivers, as is the case with
+almost everything else in the cave, but shaped by human hands into a
+mournful resemblance to cottages; the likeness being all the more
+pathetic when one learns the fact that for many months a number of
+benighted human beings made their home here, under the delusion that the
+air of the cave, which is chemically pure and dry, would cure their
+pulmonary diseases; and that here, like plants shut out from the
+generous, fostering sun, they paled and died.</p>
+
+<p>The appearance of those who came out after two or three months'
+residence in the cave is described as frightful. "Their faces," says one
+who saw them, "were entirely bloodless, eyes sunken, and pupils dilated
+to such a degree that the iris ceased to be visible; so that, no matter
+what the original color of the eye might have been, it appeared entirely
+black."</p>
+
+<p>These cottages, if by a great stretch of courtesy I may call them such,
+are very small, consisting each of but one room about ten feet square;
+they had been built of stones collected in the cave, and laid loosely in
+the wall without mortar; they had fireplaces and chimneys, good wooden
+floors, and doors, but no windows, as there was neither light to let in
+nor prospect to view without. As there was neither rain nor snow fall,
+neither midday heat nor dew of night, beneath that stony cope, roofs
+also were useless; so that the structures were only cells that strongly
+reminded one of sepulchres. I can conceive of nothing more melancholy
+than the existence of the seven or eight consumptives, who I am told
+occupied these <i>ante mortem</i> tombs at one time about fifteen years ago.
+Three died there, and every one of the others who had resided in the
+cave for a period of two months died within two or three weeks after
+coming out.</p>
+
+<p>Near to these monuments of ignorance and despair, I noticed a monument
+of another sort, and of later date,&mdash;a tribute to one of the most
+gallant and genial of men, in whom it was fully demonstrated that "the
+bravest are the tenderest." It was a pyramidal pile, about eight feet
+high, of carefully selected stones, laid without mortar, but with
+mathematical precision; and on one stone near the top was scratched a
+name dear to every soldier's heart,&mdash;"McPherson."</p>
+
+<p>The cells where the living died, and this pile which tells how the
+memory of the dead yet lives, are the last objects on our route that
+have any association with the things of this outer world; these are the
+pillars that mark the beginning of a realm devoid of human
+association,&mdash;its Pillars of Hercules, beyond which is a silent waste
+whose darkness breeds the wildest mysteries.</p>
+
+<p>Walking continuously through the gloom, one loses to some extent the
+idea of progression. Here he can get no look ahead, no backward view. He
+is the centre of a little circle of light, beyond which is immeasurable
+darkness, whence objects seem to come to him like apparitions, changing
+form as the first and last rays of light fall upon them, as though the
+shape in which they appear under the full light of the lamp were only
+some disguise of assumed innocence, which they cast off as they glide
+silently into the dark again, to take on some semblance too awful for
+mortal eyes. Farther and farther we went along these arched, crypt-like
+ways; passing frequently through lofty chambers where the roof could not
+be discovered, each with some fanciful and often inappropriate name
+assigned to it, until we came at length to what looked like a window in
+the side wall of the cave. Peering through this, and holding my lamp
+high over my head, I could see neither roof nor sides nor bottom,&mdash;only
+the wall in which was the window through which<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_673" id="Page_673">[Pg 673]</a></span> I looked. Upward it was
+lost in the darkness, and from my breast it descended, perpendicular as
+a plummet line, until it vanished in the gulf below, from which arose a
+sound of dripping water. This, my guide informed me, was "Gorin's Dome."
+Taking then from his haversack a Bengal light, he ignited it and threw
+it into the dark void. The sulphurous light shot up and up into a dome
+unlike anything built by human hands, unless it might be the interior of
+some tremendous tower, eighty feet in width, and nearly two hundred in
+height, which the beholder viewed from without, looking inwards through
+a window placed at two thirds of the entire height from the bottom.</p>
+
+<p>The inaccessible floor of this place is nearly level, and the walls
+strictly perpendicular from base to summit; the whole cavern having been
+hollowed out by the constant dripping of water holding carbonic acid in
+solution, which cuts the rock as ordinary water channels the ice of a
+glacier or the mural face of an iceberg into a semblance of columns, and
+sometimes into the folds of an immense curtain.</p>
+
+<p>The brief light fell upon the distant floor; flashed up once, bringing
+into strong relief every salient angle in the wonderful walls, and then
+died out; the awful prospect vanishing like a nightmare vision, and
+leaving nothing to the sense but the sound of the water dripping into
+the depths below. The light had burned only half a minute; but so
+strange was the scene, that this glimpse sufficed to photograph it
+indelibly in my memory.</p>
+
+<p>Gorin's Dome is not the largest of this class of sub-cavities in the
+cave, being smaller than Mammoth Dome; but it is the first of its class
+that the tourist sees, and it is viewed from so singular a stand-point
+that it makes the most startling impression.</p>
+
+<p>Five minutes' farther walk brought us to a wooden footbridge,&mdash;a narrow,
+shaky contrivance, with a treacherous footing and a slender hand-rail.
+Here the bottom of the cave seemed to have dropped out, and the roof to
+have gone in search of it; and but for the dim glimpse of the rock on
+the other side one might have suspected that this bridge would launch
+him into that ungeographical locality called, in the old Norse
+mythology, "Ginnunga Gap,"&mdash;a place where there was neither side, edge,
+nor bottom to anything.</p>
+
+<p>The vault overhead is called "Minerva's Dome"; the gulf below is called
+the "Side-Saddle Pit," though I failed to discover any degree of
+appropriateness in the odd name.</p>
+
+<p>Standing in the middle of the bridge, my guide flung one of his Bengal
+lights far upward, in the midst of the slow-falling drops that had
+already carved out this tremendous well and were still making it larger.
+The light turned them for an instant into a shower of diamonds; then
+down it fell, down, down! As in its descent it passed the bridge on
+which we stood, the shadows of our two figures rushed up the opposite
+wall, like a pair of demons scared out of their abode by the hissing
+flame; and Nick, the guide, as he leaned over, looking downward after
+it,&mdash;every one of the innumerable wrinkles in his black face made more
+distinct, with his white beard and mustache, and the whites of his eyes
+seeming to glow in the blue elfish light,&mdash;was a caricature, half
+grotesque, almost terrible, of Satan himself.</p>
+
+<p>Minerva's Dome and Side-Saddle Pit, both being one place and formed by
+the same dripping water, correspond to Gorin's Dome and the pit beneath
+it; that part which has been hollowed out above the roof of the cave
+being called the dome, and the part below the floor of the cave the pit.
+The only difference between the two is that in the case of Gorin's Dome
+the dripping waters have bored their huge shaft on one side of the track
+of the cave, only just piercing the wall of it in one spot, to make the
+window through which it is viewed; while in the case of the Side-Saddle
+Pit the vertical shaft cuts directly across the track of the cave, or,
+to speak more correctly,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_674" id="Page_674">[Pg 674]</a></span> across the tunnel which was once the bed of a
+subterranean river, but which is now a broad, smooth, dry path.</p>
+
+<p>The topography of this underground realm may be divided into three
+departments, as follows:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>First,&mdash;as being greatest in extent,&mdash;the "avenues," or tunnels, which
+present conclusive evidence of having once been the channels of a
+subterranean stream, whose waters, having some peculiar solvent
+property, wore their bed lower and lower in the rock, until they cut
+through into some lower opening, through which they were drawn off,
+leaving the old channels dry. Imagine one of the narrow, crooked streets
+in the old part of Boston, spanned by a continuous stone archway from
+the summits of the buildings on either hand; then close with solid
+masonry every window and loop-hole by which a ray of light could
+struggle in, and you have for proportions and sinuosity not a bad
+semblance of these tunnels, which constitute four fifths of the extent
+of the Mammoth Cave.</p>
+
+<p>The second and next largest department is that of the "chambers." These
+are places in the general course of the former river where the roof fell
+in before the withdrawal of the waters, opening great spaces upward; the
+fallen mass forming a sort of island in the centre of the stream, and
+crowding the waters on either side of it against the walls of the cave,
+so that they were worn out to twice the average width, and finally
+itself disappearing under the combined action of the current and the
+solvent properties of the water.</p>
+
+<p>The air in all these tunnels and chambers is remarkably dry and pure.
+Wood seems never to decay here; as is instanced in the wooden pipes and
+vats of the saltpetre-makers, upon which the lapse of a half-century has
+not had any visible effect.</p>
+
+<p>The general width of the tunnels or avenues is about forty or fifty
+feet, and the average height about thirty feet; but this uniformity is
+broken every few hundred yards by chambers, varying in width from eighty
+to two hundred feet, and in height from seventy to two hundred and
+fifty feet. The floor is formed in some places of sand, but generally of
+indurated mud, so hard that it is impossible to make any indentation in
+it with the heel of the boot, and remarkably even and smooth, so that
+almost anywhere one can walk with as much ease as on city sidewalks. The
+walls also are clean and smooth, as in the arched crypts of some mighty
+cathedral. A cross section of almost any one of these tunnels would show
+an elliptic outline, the vertical diameter being the shortest, and the
+bottom being filled with indurated mud or sand to a sufficient depth to
+make a level floor.</p>
+
+<p>The third division or class of openings is that of the "domes" and
+"pits." These were formed by the same kind of agency as the tunnels and
+chambers, namely, by the action of water holding carbonic acid in
+solution; but acting in a different manner, and at a period long after
+the subterranean river had ceased to flow through its tunnels.</p>
+
+<p>The solvent acid of the water must be acquired in percolating through
+the several hundreds of feet of superincumbent earth and sandstone, as
+there is but one of these domes, "Sandstone Dome," that extends upward
+to the sandstone. The solvent water then, after finding its way into the
+vertical crevices of the limestone, gradually rounded them out like
+wells, until the pieces which occasionally fell from the top formed a
+sort of floor. Through the interstices of this floor, the dissolved
+substance of the rock is carried into some deeper and yet undiscovered
+cavities beneath. The floor itself gradually sinks, the domes grow
+higher, and the walls recede as long as the water continues to drip into
+them.</p>
+
+<p>It is not unreasonable to suppose that the substratum of limestone in
+all the country for many miles in the vicinity is perforated with these
+tremendous shafts; as those which are seen in the cave are only such as
+happened to be in the course of the tunnels composing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_675" id="Page_675">[Pg 675]</a></span> the Mammoth Cave.
+It is not improbable that there are many others on every side, close to
+the line of the tunnels, but not yet connected with them.</p>
+
+<p>In any one of the above-mentioned departments, the description of one
+place answers for most others, except in dimensions. The following are a
+few out of many hundreds of measurements taken in as many different
+places:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>The "Rotunda," the first chamber from the entrance of the cave, is about
+one hundred feet high, and one hundred and seventy-five in diameter.</p>
+
+<p>The "Methodist Church," eighty feet in diameter, and forty in height.</p>
+
+<p>"Wright's Rotunda" is four hundred feet in its shortest diameter, being
+nearly circular; the roof seems perfectly level, and is about forty-five
+feet high.</p>
+
+<p>"Kinney's Arena" is a hundred feet in diameter, and is fifty feet high.</p>
+
+<p>"Proctor's Arcade" is one hundred feet in width and three quarters of a
+mile in length. The walls, which are about forty-five feet high, are
+nearly perpendicular throughout the whole length of the arcade, joining
+the roof nearly at right angles, and are so smooth that they look like
+hammer-dressed stone.</p>
+
+<p>"Silliman's Avenue" is a mile and a half in length and about forty feet
+in height, its width varying from twenty to two hundred feet.</p>
+
+<p>"Shelby's Dome" and the pit beneath it are two hundred and thirty-five
+feet in height, and about twenty-five in diameter.</p>
+
+<p>"Mammoth Dome" is two hundred and fifty feet high, and nearly one
+hundred in diameter.</p>
+
+<p>"Lucy's Dome," the highest in the cave, is sixty feet in diameter, and
+three hundred in height.</p>
+
+<p>Nine miles from the entrance of the cave is the "Maelstr&ouml;m," a dry pit
+or well, one hundred and seventy-five feet deep, and about twenty in
+diameter; and from the bottom of this shaft may be seen the openings to
+three other avenues, which lead farther into this Plutonian labyrinth
+than mortal foot has ever trod.</p>
+
+<p>Although the distance of nine miles is about as far as tourists usually
+get from the entrance, that is by no means the measure of its extent,
+but only the extent of the direct route; there being a number of other
+tunnels branching off from it on either side, some of which connect with
+it again at a distance of several miles, and some of which have not been
+explored to their connection, if they have any.</p>
+
+<p>The total length of all the explored avenues is estimated at over one
+hundred miles. If a single day's experience in the cave were sufficient
+ground for offering an opinion, I should say that this was a large
+over-estimate; but I have no doubt that, like all other great works of
+both art and nature, it grows upon the sense of the beholder. But even
+setting down its extent at half the foregoing estimate, none can tread
+these hollow chambers, thinking of others unexplored, and extending not
+only from that distant nine-mile-station, but on every hand, into the
+unknown, without a feeling of awe and fear.</p>
+
+<p>Thus on and on through the echoing avenues, where the reverberation of
+our footsteps seemed to follow stealthily far behind us, through chamber
+and hall, where my guide in the advance flung up his lights, revealing
+for an instant the grim and distant vaults,&mdash;through "Star Chamber,"
+five hundred feet long, seventy in width, and sixty in height, "Cloud
+Room," a quarter of a mile in length, sixty feet in height, "Deserted
+Chamber," "River Hall," "Revellers' Hall," "The Great Walk,"&mdash;through
+all these, and a dozen more, we wandered, until, after two hours' walk,
+and at a distance of four and a half miles from the entrance to the
+cave, I paused upon the muddy banks of the "Styx," and, stooping, dipped
+up in my hands a draught from its cold, sunless waters.</p>
+
+<p>Here my guide would willingly have played Charon to my Ulysses, but as
+no one had penetrated thus far into the cave for several months, the
+boat used to carry visitors over, and to voyage up and down the short
+river (only a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_676" id="Page_676">[Pg 676]</a></span> hundred and fifty yards in length), had sunk, and we
+found it impossible to raise it.</p>
+
+<p>The river is about twenty-five feet in width, its course crossing that
+of the cave at right angles, and its channel being simply another avenue
+or tunnel on a little lower level than the one by which the visitor
+approaches it.</p>
+
+<p>In this stream, as well as in "Echo River," are found the famous eyeless
+fish. We dipped in vain, for a long time, in hopes of capturing some of
+these. At last I was fortunate enough to secure one tiny specimen, about
+two inches long, which was shaped like other minnows, but had no eyes,
+and was perfectly white, there being not the slightest shade of coloring
+on the back. The upper part of its head was as translucent as agate,
+through which could be seen opaque spots imbedded in the head where the
+base of the eye-sockets should have been. The specimen I obtained was
+one of the smallest, as the guide told me these fishes frequently
+attained the length of six or seven inches.</p>
+
+<p>I secured also an eyeless crawfish about three inches in length. This
+forlorn little creature, like the fish, was entirely colorless. It had
+two slightly protuberant spots in its head where the eyes should be; but
+they were dull and opaque, and did not seem to differ in texture from
+the rest of its body, which had not the translucence of that of the
+fish, but looked as though carved out of white marble.</p>
+
+<p>The fish are found also in "Lake Lethe," a quarter of a mile from the
+Styx, as well as in "Echo River," the largest and most interesting body
+of water in the cave. This last flows out of a tunnel which has such a
+low roof that the volume of water nearly fills it, and from here to
+where it enters the rocks again is three quarters of a mile. Here the
+blind white creatures that inhabit its dark, slow-flowing waters are
+more plentiful, but are as unlike those nimble, glistening fellows which
+inhabit the streams of the outer world, as the cavern's atmosphere of
+darkness and death is different from our atmosphere of light and life.
+They refuse to bite at any bait; they move sluggishly, and, when caught
+in a net, flop languidly, and die. The only food they are known to have
+is the smaller ones of their own kind; and, oddest of all, they, as well
+as the crawfish, give birth to their young alive, instead of spawning
+the eggs to be hatched by the sun. Last and remotest of these sunless
+streams is "Roaring River," the margin of whose solemn waters is nine
+miles from the entrance of the cave. This should be Acheron, which hated
+the light, and ran sighing down into a cave; for from this stream too
+comes a perpetual moan.</p>
+
+<p>The region where the several rivers mentioned are grouped is lower than
+the rest of the cave, and much more gloomy in appearance than the high,
+dry chambers through which one passes in coming back toward the
+entrance.</p>
+
+<p>I was somewhat disappointed in the display of stalactites and other
+similar formations of the protocarbonate of lime found in the cave. For
+a number of years I had been familiar with mines and mining operations
+in the lead-mining districts of Illinois, Wisconsin, and Missouri, and
+had there seen some of the most beautiful, though not the largest,
+specimens of calcareous spar known to exist. The lime in these
+localities being in most instances perfectly pure, the stalactites, to
+the length of three feet sometimes, are as free from coloring as
+icicles. Sometimes the miners' drift (which compared with the Mammoth
+Cave is as a rabbit's burrow to a railway tunnel) is opened into small,
+low-roofed caves; and in these, in addition to the translucent
+stalactites, there are little hollows in the floor covered with thin
+sheets of protocarbonate of lime, no thicker than a pane of
+window-glass, and as white as snow. From beneath these the water has
+sunk away, leaving a hollow space, and giving the whole precisely the
+appearance of those little pools which every one has noticed when a
+muddy road suddenly congeals: the pools of water freeze over, and the
+water<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_677" id="Page_677">[Pg 677]</a></span> disappears, leaving the ice only a shell over a cavity.</p>
+
+<p>Nothing of this kind, however, is found in the Mammoth Cave. The lime of
+which the stalactites are formed being mixed with various oxides and
+other impurities, they are all of a dark brown, or gray, or muddy color.
+With the exception of some stalactite columns in the "Gothic Arcade,"
+which form a fine alcove called the "Gothic Chapel," there are no
+stalactites of extraordinary size. There is a stalactite mass (or was
+some years ago) in "Uhrig's Cave," in the suburbs of the city of St.
+Louis, about twelve feet in height and four feet in diameter, which
+exceeds in size anything I saw in the Mammoth Cave.</p>
+
+<p>The gypsum or alabaster flowers are the crowning beauty of the Mammoth
+Cave. These are an entirely different formation from the stalactites,
+being formed only in a perfectly dry atmosphere, while the stalactites
+are necessarily formed in a moist one.</p>
+
+<p>The gypsum is formed by crystallization, and in that process exerts the
+same expansive force as ice. Wherever it forms in crevices it fractures
+the rocks that enclose it, and protrudes from the crevice; its own bulk
+divides, or splits, and curves open, and outward, with much more
+tenacity than ice. It seems to have a fibrous texture, in the direction
+of which the split always opens.</p>
+
+<p>I found in the "Snowball Room" and in a large chamber called
+"Cleveland's Cabinet," a beautiful display of these flowers. In the
+Snowball Room, the likeness to winter appears again, in the knots
+strongly resembling snowballs stuck all over the ceiling. And in
+Cleveland's Cabinet I found some singularly beautiful specimens of
+alabaster formations. One kind seemed to be literally growing from the
+ceiling as a vegetable would, and looked more than anything else like
+short, thick stalks of celery. If an ordinary stalk of celery were
+split, so that its natural tendency to curl over backward could be
+freely exercised, it would give a very good idea of the shape of some
+of the gypsum flowers, except that these are not often longer than four
+inches, and in that length frequently curl so as to make a complete
+circle. They have the same fibrous appearance as celery, and are as
+white as snow.</p>
+
+<p>When five or six of these stalks&mdash;if I may call them so&mdash;start from one
+point, and curve outward in different directions from a common centre,
+they frequently form beautiful rosettes. Imagine one of the common
+tiger-lilies, which, instead of its thin, red curving petals, has stalks
+of celery, curving as much, but broken off square at the ends; then
+imagine the celery to be of the purest conceivable white; and you have a
+tolerable conception of one of these beautiful alabaster flowers.</p>
+
+<p>This alabaster growth is found only in a few places throughout the cave;
+when it is in chambers or spaces in which the atmosphere is very dry, it
+invariably has a beautiful fibrous texture like wood or celery, and the
+curved form; but if the atmosphere is damp, it forms on the ceiling in
+round nodules, from two to three inches in diameter, as in the Snowball
+Room.</p>
+
+<p>In the Gothic Arcade there is a sort of colonnade formed along the side
+of the tunnel by the meeting of the down-growing stalactites and the
+upward-growing stalagmites; the two together having formed slender
+columns of spar, from three to six feet in height. One group of these,
+about eight feet high, which is the most beautiful in the cave, is
+called the Gothic Chapel. In many of the formations, it is very
+difficult to trace even the remotest resemblance to the objects after
+which they have been named; but in one instance, that of a stalactite
+called the "Elephant's Head," the resemblance is remarkable.</p>
+
+<p>Ordinarily it is the custom for one guide to conduct a party of four or
+five persons into the cave. I dislike over-officious guides and the
+hackneyed comparisons and wordy wonder of gabbling tourists in grand
+and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_678" id="Page_678">[Pg 678]</a></span> solemn places like this; therefore, in the morning, before
+starting, I congratulated myself that I should be alone, with the
+exception of the guide, who fortunately seemed thoroughly imbued with
+the spirit of the place in which he had spent the greater portion of his
+time for seventeen years.</p>
+
+<p>He was as grave and taciturn as some cave-keeping anchorite. During our
+inward progress, he had carefully pointed out every place and object of
+interest, and hurled his blue-lights here and there into domes and pits
+and cavernous retreats of darkness. But now, on our backward course, he
+stalked silently and abstractedly before, though he seemed to listen to
+every step of my feet; for, if I paused or made a misstep, he instantly
+looked round.</p>
+
+<p>At last he turned, and, looking me curiously in the face, asked whether
+I thought I should be afraid if left in the dark there a little while.
+Some people could not bear it, he said, and one gentleman who had
+consented to the ordeal of darkness had been half crazed by it, and when
+the guide, who had withdrawn and concealed himself, with his light,
+returned, the traveller tried first to run away into the darkness, and
+then, under some strange hallucination, fired his pistol in the guide's
+face.</p>
+
+<p>I had a suspicion that the effect of the obscurity was exaggerated; I
+was disposed, moreover, to "try the dark," from curiosity. But I must
+acknowledge that, when the guide, with that doubting look, repeated his
+inquiry, I hesitated, asking, "Is there any danger? and from what?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nobody knows, massa," said he seriously; "only some people's nerve
+can't stan' it, dat 's all."</p>
+
+<p>The mention of that odious word, "nerve" sounded so much like the
+familiar solicitation, "Try your nerves, gentlemen?" from the
+electrical-machine man,&mdash;who is found on the curbstone of some
+thoroughfare in every city,&mdash;that for one brief instant the prestige of
+the great cave was gone.</p>
+
+<p>Poh! I thought, so it is only claptrap after all? "Here, take the
+lamps, all of them, matches too, and go away so far that I cannot hear
+you halloo, even at your loudest. I will sit here until you come back!"
+So saying, I sat down upon a rock in the Star Chamber; and he, taking
+the lights, walked away toward the entrance of the cave.</p>
+
+<p>"So then," I thought, "this is the perfect darkness, the total absence
+of light, which is seldom if ever known above ground; for even in the
+darkest night and the darkest house there are some wandering rays of
+light; though they may not be sufficient to enable the eye to
+distinguish anything, they are there; they penetrate, reflected in a
+hundred zigzags, into the darkest places of the outer world. But here
+there are miles between me and the utmost limits of their influence!"</p>
+
+<p>I held my hand before my face, but could not distinguish by sight that
+it was there. A few pale, phosphorescent gleams, that seemed to be
+wandering in the air, I was convinced were only the remembrances of the
+optic nerve,&mdash;eidolons of the retina; but they seemed to some extent
+plastic to my thoughts, and ready to become the subjective creations of
+the brain, outlined in the dark. I could conceive then how the brain,
+excited by fear, or stimulated by emotion, might multiply these
+phantasms, moulding them into the likeness of objects and beings that
+never had any existence in reality. My sense of hearing, too, seemed
+preternaturally sharpened; I could hear the ticking of the watch in my
+pocket, the throbbing of my own heart, the murmur of the air in my
+lungs. I held my breath so that the slightest sound from any other
+source than my own organism should not escape me; the ringing vacancy in
+my ears grew more and more painful. Not the remotest breath of any
+sound, except a faint dropping of water in some distant place! (I could
+think of none but in that awful place called Gorin's Dome.) It seemed to
+whisper, "Hush! hush! hush!" Sometimes I could not hear the dropping;
+for just the same reason that, if one listens intently to the ticking of
+a clock for ten<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_679" id="Page_679">[Pg 679]</a></span> minutes, there are intervals when his ear cannot detect
+it, because of its regular monotonous sound.</p>
+
+<p>In such intervals the tympanum of the ear, aching with the dead collapse
+of its world, made sounds for itself; and it required the exercise of
+reason to convince myself, sometimes, that I did not hear distant
+babbling voices.</p>
+
+<p>But hark! There <i>is</i> a sound! Not distant, but near! Here!&mdash;There! A
+sound like large, soft feet treading cautiously. No, not that,
+but&mdash;something breathing. Pshaw! I believe it was only the sound of my
+own respiration after all!</p>
+
+<p>I did not exactly "whistle to keep my courage up," but, feeling that I
+must do something to assert my vitality, my antagonism to this
+overpowering dark, I cleared my throat vehemently, defiantly,&mdash;<span class="smcap">Ahem!
+Ahem! Ahem!!</span> But it sounded so incongruous, so impertinent I might say,
+in the midst of that awful silence! Besides, it woke such queer echoes
+from unexpected quarters, that I stopped to listen, and heard the
+water-drops again in Gorin's Dome, whispering, "Hush! hush! hush!" And
+from all the gloomy chambers and tunnels came the echo, breathing,
+"Hush! hash! hush!"</p>
+
+<p>It began to be terrifying to think that release from this hell of
+silence was dependent upon one man's will, and he too a man I had never
+seen until within a few hours. Where was he now, my dark-faced guide?
+What if he should not be able to find me again in the midst of this
+hundred miles of tunnels that look so much alike? What if he should not
+intend to come? What if&mdash;But, thank Heaven! there he is at last! That is
+the firm, substantial sound of a mortal footstep; not those stealthy,
+phantom steps I seemed to hear before! There too is the distant glinting
+of the red lamplight on the sides of the cave! How long it takes him to
+get here! There he is at last! Blessed be his black face! how unlike the
+pale, phosphorescent forms I fancied just a little while ago! How
+foolish seem all those dreadful fancies now, so terribly real then!</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="AN_AUTUMN_SONG" id="AN_AUTUMN_SONG"></a>AN AUTUMN SONG.</h2>
+
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Below the headland with its cedar-plumes<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">A lapse of spacious water twinkles keen,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">An ever-shifting play of gleams and glooms<br /></span>
+<span class="i5">And flashes of clear green.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">The sumac's garnet pennons where I lie<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Are mingled with the tansy's faded gold;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Fleet hawks are screaming in the light-blue sky,<br /></span>
+<span class="i5">And fleet airs rushing cold.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">The plump peach steals the dying rose's red;<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">The yellow pippin ripens to its fall;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The dusty grapes, to purple fulness fed,<br /></span>
+<span class="i5">Droop from the garden-wall.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">And yet, where rainbow foliage crowns the swamp,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">I hear in dreams an April robin sing,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And memory, amid this Autumn pomp,<br /></span>
+<span class="i5">Strays with the ghost of Spring.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_680" id="Page_680">[Pg 680]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="BY-WAYS_OF_EUROPE" id="BY-WAYS_OF_EUROPE"></a>BY-WAYS OF EUROPE.</h2>
+
+<h3>A VISIT TO THE BALEARIC ISLANDS.</h3>
+
+
+<h4>I.</h4>
+
+<p>As the steamer Mallorca slowly moved out of the harbor of Barcelona, I
+made a rapid inspection of the passengers gathered on deck, and found
+that I was the only foreigner among them. Almost without exception they
+were native Majorcans, returning from trips of business or pleasure to
+the Continent. They spoke no language except Spanish and Catalan, and
+held fast to all the little habits and fashions of their insular life.
+If anything more had been needed to show me that I was entering upon
+untrodden territory, it was supplied by the joyous surprise of the
+steward when I gave him a fee. This fact reconciled me to my isolation
+on board, and its attendant awkwardness.</p>
+
+<p>I knew not why I should have chosen to visit the Balearic Islands,
+unless for the simple reason that they lie so much aside from the
+highways of travel, and are not represented in the journals and
+sketch-books of tourists. If any one had asked me what I expected to
+see, I should have been obliged to confess my ignorance; for the few dry
+geographical details which I possessed were like the chemical analysis
+of a liquor wherefrom no one can reconstruct the taste. The <i>flavor</i> of
+a land is a thing quite apart from its statistics. There is no special
+guide-book for the islands, and the slight notices in the works on Spain
+only betray the haste of the authors to get over a field with which they
+are unacquainted. But this very circumstance, for me, had grown into a
+fascination. One gets tired of studying the bill of fare in advance of
+the repast. When the sun and the Spanish coast had set together behind
+the placid sea, I went to my berth with the delightful certainty that
+the sun of the morrow, and of many days thereafter, would rise upon
+scenes and adventures which could not be anticipated.</p>
+
+<p>The distance from Barcelona to Palma is about a hundred and forty miles;
+so the morning found us skirting the southwestern extremity of
+Majorca,&mdash;a barren coast, thrusting low headlands, of gray rock into the
+sea, and hills covered with parched and stunted chaparral in the rear.
+The twelfth century, in the shape of a crumbling Moorish watch-tower,
+alone greeted us. As we advanced eastward into the Bay of Palma,
+however, the wild shrubbery melted into plantations of olive, solitary
+houses of fishermen nestled in the coves, and finally a village, of
+those soft ochre-tints which are a little brighter than the soil,
+appeared on the slope of a hill. In front, through the pale morning mist
+which still lay upon the sea, I saw the cathedral of Palma, looming
+grand and large beside the towers of other churches, and presently,
+gliding past a mile or two of country villas and gardens, we entered the
+crowded harbor.</p>
+
+<p>Inside the mole there was a multitude of the light craft of the
+Mediterranean,&mdash;xebecs, feluccas, speronaras, or however they may be
+termed,&mdash;with here and there a brigantine which had come from beyond the
+Pillars of Hercules. Our steamer drew into her berth beside the quay,
+and after a very deliberate review by the port physician we were allowed
+to land. I found a porter, Arab in everything but costume, and followed
+him through the water-gate into the half-awake city. My destination was
+the Inn of the Four Nations, where I was cordially received, and
+afterwards roundly swindled, by a French host. My first demand was for a
+native attendant, not so much from any need of guide as simply to
+become<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_681" id="Page_681">[Pg 681]</a></span> more familiar with the people through him; but I was told that
+no such serviceable spirit was to be had in the place. Strangers are so
+rare that a class of people who live upon them has not yet been created.</p>
+
+<p>"But how shall I find the Palace of the Government, or the monastery of
+San Domingo, or anything else?" I asked.</p>
+
+<p>"O, we will give you directions, so that you cannot miss them," said the
+host; but he laid before me such a confusion of right turnings and left
+turnings, ups and downs, that I became speedily bewildered, and set
+forth, determined to let the "spirit in my feet" guide me. A
+labyrinthine place is Palma, and my first walks through the city were so
+many games of chance. The streets are very narrow, changing their
+direction, it seemed to me, at every tenth step; and whatever landmark
+one may select at the start is soon shut from view by the high, dark
+houses. At first, I was quite astray, but little by little I regained
+the lost points of the compass.</p>
+
+<p>After having had the Ph&oelig;nicians, Greeks, Carthaginians, Romans,
+Vandals, and Saracens as masters, Majorca was first made Spanish by King
+Jaime of Aragon, the Conquistador, in the year 1235. For a century after
+the conquest it was an independent kingdom, and one of its kings was
+slain by the English bowmen at the battle of Crecy. The Spanish element
+has absorbed, but not yet entirely obliterated, the characteristics of
+the earlier races who inhabited the island. Were ethnology a more
+positively developed science, we might divide and classify this confused
+inheritance of character; as it is, we vaguely feel the presence of
+something quaint, antique, and unusual, in walking the streets of Palma,
+and mingling with the inhabitants. The traces of Moorish occupation are
+still noticeable everywhere. Although the Saracenic architecture no
+longer exists in its original forms, its details may be detected in
+portals, court-yards, and balconies, in almost every street. The
+conquerors endeavored to remodel the city, but in doing so they
+preserved the very spirit which they sought to destroy.</p>
+
+<p>My wanderings, after all, were not wholly undirected. I found an
+intelligent guide, who was at the same time an old acquaintance. The
+whirligig of time brings about, not merely its revenges, but also its
+compensations and coincidences. Twenty-two years ago, when I was
+studying German as a boy in the old city of Frankfort, guests from the
+South of France came to visit the amiable family with whom I was
+residing. There were M. Laurens, a painter and a musical enthusiast, his
+wife, and Mademoiselle Rosalba, a daughter as fair as her name. Never
+shall I forget the curious letter which the artist wrote to the manager
+of the theatre, requesting that Beethoven's <i>Fidelio</i> might be given
+(and it was!) for his own especial benefit, nor the triumphant air with
+which he came to us one day, saying, "I have something of most
+precious," and brought forth, out of a dozen protecting envelopes, a
+single gray hair from Beethoven's head. Nor shall I forget how Madame
+Laurens taught us French plays, and how the fair Rosalba declaimed Andr&eacute;
+Ch&eacute;nier to redeem her pawns; but I might have forgotten all these
+things, had it not been for an old volume<a name="FNanchor_A_1" id="FNanchor_A_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_A_1" class="fnanchor">[A]</a> which turned up at need,
+and which gave me information, at once clear, precise, and attractive,
+concerning the streets and edifices of Palma. The round, solid head,
+earnest eyes, and abstracted air of the painter came forth distinct from
+the limbo of things overlaid but never lost, and went with me through
+the checkered blaze and gloom of the city.</p>
+
+<p>The monastery of San Domingo, which was the head-quarters of the
+Inquisition, was spared by the progressive government of Mendizabal, but
+destroyed by the people. Its ruins must have been the most picturesque
+sight of Palma; but since the visit of M. Laurens<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_682" id="Page_682">[Pg 682]</a></span> they have been
+removed, and their broken vaults and revealed torture-chambers are no
+longer to be seen. There are, however, two or three buildings of more
+than ordinary interest. The <i>Casa Consistorial</i>, or City Hall, is a
+massive Palladian pile of the sixteenth century, resembling the old
+palaces of Pisa and Florence, except in the circumstance that its roof
+projects at least ten feet beyond the front, resting on a massive
+cornice of carved wood with curious horizontal caryatides in the place
+of brackets. The rich burnt-sienna tint of the carvings contrasts finely
+with the golden-brown of the massive marble walls,&mdash;a combination which
+is shown in no other building of the Middle Ages. The sunken rosettes,
+surrounded by raised arabesque borders, between the caryatides, are
+sculptured with such a careful reference to the distance at which they
+must be seen, that they appear as firm and delicate as if near the
+spectator's eye.</p>
+
+<p>The Cathedral, founded by the Conquistador, and built upon, at
+intervals, for more than three centuries, is not yet finished. It stands
+upon a natural platform of rock, overhanging the sea, where its grand
+dimensions produce the greatest possible effect. In every view of Palma,
+it towers solidly above the houses and bastioned walls, and insists upon
+having the sky as a background for the light Gothic pinnacles of its
+flying buttresses. The government has recently undertaken its
+restoration, and a new front of very admirable and harmonious design is
+about half completed. The soft amber-colored marble of Majorca is
+enriched in tint by exposure to the air, and even when built in large,
+unrelieved masses retains a bright and cheerful character. The new
+portion of the cathedral, like the old, has but little sculpture, except
+in the portals; but that little is so elegant that a greater profusion
+of ornament would seem out of place.</p>
+
+<p>Passing from the clear, dazzling day into the interior, one finds
+himself, at first, in total darkness; and the dimensions of the
+nave&mdash;nearly three hundred feet in length by one hundred and forty in
+height&mdash;are amplified by the gloom. The wind, I was told, came through
+the windows on the sea side with such force as to overturn the chalices,
+and blow out the tapers on the altar, whereupon every opening was walled
+up, except a rose at the end of the chancel, and a few slits in the
+nave, above the side-aisles. A sombre twilight, like that of a stormy
+day, fills the edifice. Here the rustling of stoles and the muttering of
+prayers suggest incantation rather than worship; the organ has a hollow,
+sepulchral sound of lamentation; and there is a spirit of mystery and
+terror in the stale, clammy air. The place resembles an antechamber of
+Purgatory much more than of Heaven. The mummy of Don Jaime II., son of
+the Conquistador and first king of Majorca, is preserved in a
+sarcophagus of black marble. This is the only historic monument in the
+Cathedral, unless the stranger chooses to study the heraldry of the
+island families from their shields suspended in the chapels.</p>
+
+<p>When I returned to the Four Nations for breakfast, I found at the table
+a gentleman of Palma, who invited me to sit down and partake of his
+meal. For the first time this Spanish custom, which really seems
+picturesque and fraternal when coming from shepherds or muleteers in a
+mountain inn, struck me as the hollowest of forms. The gentleman knew
+that I would not accept his invitation, nor he mine; he knew, moreover,
+that I knew he did not wish me to accept it. The phrase, under such
+conditions, becomes a cheat which offends the sacred spirit of
+hospitality. How far the mere form may go was experienced by George
+Sand, who, having accepted the use of a carriage most earnestly offered
+to her by a Majorcan count, found the equipage at her door, it is true,
+but with it a letter expressing so much vexation, that she was forced to
+withdraw her acceptance of the favor at once, and to apologize for it! I
+have always found much hospitality among the common<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_683" id="Page_683">[Pg 683]</a></span> people of Spain,
+and I doubt not that the spirit exists in all classes; but it requires
+some practice to distinguish between empty phrase and the courtesy which
+comes from the heart. A people who boast of some special virtue
+generally do not possess it.</p>
+
+<p>My own slight intercourse with the Majorcans was very pleasant. On the
+day of my arrival, I endeavored to procure a map of the island, but none
+of the bookstores possessed the article. It could be found in one house
+in a remote street, and one of the shopmen finally sent a boy with me to
+the very door. When I offered money for the service, my guide smiled,
+shook his head, and ran away. The map was more than fifty years old, and
+drawn in the style of two centuries ago, with groups of houses for the
+villages, and long files of conical peaks for the mountains. The woman
+brought it down, yellow and dusty, from a dark garret over the shop, and
+seemed as delighted with the sale as if she had received money for
+useless stock. In the streets, the people inspected me curiously, as a
+stranger, but were always ready to go out of their way to guide me. The
+ground-floor being always open, all the features of domestic life and of
+mechanical labor are exposed to the public. The housewives, the masters,
+and apprentices, busy as they seem, manage to keep one eye disengaged,
+and no one passes before them without notice. Cooking, washing, sewing,
+tailoring, shoemaking, coopering, rope and basket making, succeed each
+other, as one passes through the narrow streets. In the afternoon, the
+mechanics frequently come forth and set up their business in the open
+air, where they can now and then greet a country acquaintance or a city
+friend or sweetheart.</p>
+
+<p>When I found that the ruins of San Domingo had been removed, and a
+statue of Isabella II. erected on the Alameda, I began to suspect that
+the reign of old things was over in Majorca. A little observation of the
+people made this fact more evident. The island costume is no longer
+worn by the young men, even in the country; they have passed into a very
+comical transition state. Old men, mounted on lean asses or mules, still
+enter the gates of Palma, with handkerchiefs tied over their shaven
+crowns, and long gray locks falling on their shoulders,&mdash;with short,
+loose jackets, shawls around the waist, and wide Turkish trousers
+gathered at the knee. Their gaunt brown legs are bare, and their feet
+protected by rude sandals. Tall, large-boned, and stern of face, they
+hint both of Vandal and of Moslem blood. The younger men are of inferior
+stature, and nearly all bow-legged. They have turned the flowing
+trousers into modern pantaloons, the legs of which are cut like the
+old-fashioned <i>gigot</i> sleeve, very big and baggy at the top, and tied
+with a drawing-string around the waist. My first impression was, that
+the men had got up in a great hurry, and put on their trousers
+hinder-end foremost. It would be difficult to invent a costume more
+awkward and ungraceful than this.</p>
+
+<p>In the city the young girls wear a large triangular piece of white or
+black lace, which covers the hair, and tightly encloses the face, being
+fastened under the chin and the ends brought down to a point on the
+breast. Their almond-shaped eyes are large and fine, but there is very
+little positive beauty among them. Most of the old country-women are
+veritable hags, and their appearance is not improved by the
+broad-brimmed stove-pipe hats which they wear. Seated astride on their
+donkeys, between panniers of produce, they come in daily from the plains
+and mountains, and you encounter them on all the roads leading out of
+Palma. Few of the people speak any other language than the <i>Mallorquin</i>,
+a variety of the Catalan, which, from the frequency of the terminations
+in <i>ch</i> and <i>tz</i>, constantly suggests the old Proven&ccedil;al literature. The
+word <i>vitch</i> (son) is both Celtic and Slavonic. Some Arabic terms are
+also retained, though fewer, I think, than in Andalusia.</p>
+
+<p>In the afternoon I walked out into the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_684" id="Page_684">[Pg 684]</a></span> country. The wall, on the land
+side, which is very high and massive, is pierced by five guarded gates.
+The dry moat, both wide and deep, is spanned by wooden bridges, after
+crossing which one has the choice of a dozen highways, all scantily
+shaded with rows of ragged mulberry-trees, glaring white in the sun and
+deep in impalpable dry dust. But the sea-breeze blows freshening across
+the parched land; shadows of light clouds cool the arid mountains in the
+distance; the olives roll into silvery undulations; a palm in full,
+rejoicing plumage rustles over your head; and the huge spatulate leaves
+of a banana in the nearest garden twist and split into fringes. There is
+no languor in the air, no sleep in the deluge of sunshine; the landscape
+is active with signs of work and travel. Wheat, wine, olives, almonds,
+and oranges are produced, not only side by side, but from the same
+fields, and the painfully thorough system of cultivation leaves not a
+rood of the soil unused.</p>
+
+<p>I had chosen, at random, a road which led me west toward the nearest
+mountains, and in the course of an hour I found myself at the entrance
+of a valley. Solitary farm-houses, each as massive as the tower of a
+fortress and of the color of sunburnt gold, studded the heights,
+overlooking the long slopes of almond-orchards. I looked about for
+water, in order to make a sketch of the scene; but the bed of the brook
+was as dry as the highway. The nearest house toward the plain had a
+splendid sentinel palm beside its door,&mdash;a dream of Egypt, which
+beckoned and drew me towards it with a glamour I could not resist. Over
+the wall of the garden the orange-trees lifted their mounds of
+impenetrable foliage; and the blossoms of the pomegranates, sprinkled
+against such a background, were like coals of fire. The fig-bearing
+cactus grew about the house in clumps twenty feet high, covered with
+pale-yellow flowers. The building was large and roomy, with a
+court-yard, around which ran a shaded gallery. The farmer who was
+issuing therefrom as I approached wore the shawl and Turkish trousers
+of the old generation, while his two sons, reaping in the adjoining
+wheat-fields, were hideous in the modern <i>gigots</i>. Although I was
+manifestly an intruder, the old man greeted me respectfully, and passed
+on to his work. Three boys tended a drove of black hogs in the stubble,
+and some women were so industriously weeding and hoeing in the field
+beyond, that they scarcely stopped to cast a glance upon the stranger.
+There was a grateful air of peace, order, and contentment about the
+place; no one seemed to be suspicious, or even surprised, when I seated
+myself upon a low wall, and watched the laborers.</p>
+
+<p>The knoll upon which the farm-house stood sloped down gently into the
+broad, rich plain of Palma, extending many a league to the eastward. Its
+endless orchards made a dim horizon-line, over which rose the solitary
+double-headed mountain of Felaniche, and the tops of some peaks near
+Arta. The city wall was visible on my right, and beyond it a bright arc
+of the Mediterranean. The features of the landscape, in fact, were so
+simple, that I fear I cannot make its charm evident to the reader.
+Looking over the nearer fields, I observed two peculiarities of Majorca,
+upon which depends much of the prosperity of the island. The wheat is
+certainly, as it is claimed to be, the finest of any Mediterranean land.
+Its large, perfect grains furnish a flour of such fine quality that the
+whole produce of the island is sent to Spain for the pastry and
+confectionery of the cities, while the Majorcans import a cheap,
+inferior kind in its place. Their fortune depends on their abstinence
+from the good things which Providence has given them. Their pork is
+greatly superior to that of Spain, and it leaves them in like manner;
+their best wines are now bought up by speculators and exported for the
+fabrication of sherry; and their oil, which might be the finest in the
+world, is so injured by imperfect methods of preservation that it might
+pass for the worst. These things, however,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_685" id="Page_685">[Pg 685]</a></span> give them no annoyance.
+Southern races are sometimes indolent, but rarely Epicurean in their
+habits; it is the Northern man who sighs for his flesh-pots.</p>
+
+<p>I walked forward between the fields toward another road, and came upon a
+tract which had just been ploughed and planted for a new crop. The soil
+was ridged in a labyrinthine pattern, which appeared to have been drawn
+with square and rule. But more remarkable than this was the difference
+of level, so slight that the eye could not possibly detect it, by which
+the slender irrigating streams were conducted to every square foot of
+the field, without a drop being needlessly wasted. The system is an
+inheritance from the Moors, who were the best natural engineers the
+world has ever known. Water is scarce in Majorca, and thus every stream,
+spring, rainfall,&mdash;even the dew of heaven,&mdash;is utilized. Channels of
+masonry, often covered to prevent evaporation, descend from the
+mountains, branch into narrower veins, and visit every farm on the
+plain, whatever may be its level. Where these are not sufficient, the
+rains are added to the reservoir, or a string of buckets, turned by a
+mule, lifts the water from a well. But it is in the economy of
+distributing water to the fields that the most marvellous skill is
+exhibited. The grade of the surface must not only be preserved, but the
+subtle, tricksy spirit of water so delicately understood and humored
+that the streams shall traverse the greatest amount of soil with the
+least waste or wear. In this respect, the most skilful application of
+science could not surpass the achievements of the Majorcan farmers.</p>
+
+<p>Working my way homeward through the tangled streets, I was struck with
+the universal sound of wailing which filled the city. All the tailors,
+shoemakers, and basket-makers, at work in the open air, were singing,
+rarely in measured strains, but with wild, irregular, lamentable cries,
+exactly in the manner of the Arabs. Sometimes the song was antiphonal,
+flung back and forth from the farthest visible corners of a street; and
+then it became a contest of lungs, kept up for an hour at a time. While
+breakfasting, I had heard, as I supposed, a <i>miserere</i> chanted by some
+procession of monks, and wondered when the doleful strains would cease.
+I now saw that they came from the mouths of some cheerful coopers, who
+were heading barrels a little farther down the street. The Majorcans
+still have their troubadours, who are hired by languishing lovers to
+improvise strains of longing or reproach under the windows of the fair,
+and perhaps the latter may listen with delight; but I know of no place
+where the Enraged Musician would so soon become insane. The isle is full
+of noises, and a Caliban might say that they hurt not; for me they
+murdered sleep, both at midnight and at dawn.</p>
+
+<p>I had decided to devote my second day to an excursion to the mountain
+paradise of Valdemosa, and sallied forth early, to seek the means of
+conveyance. Up to this time I had been worried&mdash;tortured, I may say,
+without exaggeration&mdash;by desperate efforts to recover the Spanish
+tongue, which I had not spoken for fourteen years. I still had the sense
+of possessing it, but in some old drawer of memory, the lock of which
+had rusted and would not obey the key. Like Mrs. Dombey, I felt as if
+there were Spanish words somewhere in the room, but I could not
+positively say that I had them,&mdash;a sensation which, as everybody knows,
+is far worse than absolute ignorance. I had taken a carriage for
+Valdemosa, after a long talk with the proprietor, a most agreeable
+fellow, when I suddenly stopped, and exclaimed to myself, "You are
+talking Spanish,&mdash;did you know it?" It was even so: as much of the
+language as I ever knew was suddenly and unaccountably restored to me.
+On my return to the Four Nations, I was still further surprised to find
+myself repeating songs, without the failure of a line or word, which I
+had learned from a Mexican as a school-boy, and had not thought of for
+twenty years. The unused<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_686" id="Page_686">[Pg 686]</a></span> drawer had somehow been unlocked or broken
+open while I slept.</p>
+
+<p>Valdemosa is about twelve miles north of Palma, in the heart of the only
+mountain-chain of the island, which forms its western, or rather
+northwestern coast. The average altitude of these mountains will not
+exceed three thousand feet; but the broken, abrupt character of their
+outlines, and the naked glare of their immense precipitous walls, give
+them that intrinsic grandeur which does not depend on measurement. In
+their geological formation they resemble the Pyrenees; the rocks are of
+that <i>palombino</i>, or dove-colored limestone, so common in Sicily and the
+Grecian islands,&mdash;pale bluish-gray, taking a soft orange tint on the
+faces most exposed to the weather. Rising directly from the sea on the
+west, they cease almost as suddenly on the land side, leaving all the
+central portion of the island a plain, slightly inclined toward the
+southeast, where occasional peaks or irregular groups of hills interrupt
+its monotony.</p>
+
+<p>In due time my team made its appearance,&mdash;an omnibus of basket-work,
+with a canvas cover, drawn by two horses. It had space enough for twelve
+persons, yet was the smallest vehicle I could discover. There appears to
+be nothing between it and the two-wheeled cart of the peasant, which, on
+a pinch, carries six or eight. For an hour and a half we traversed the
+teeming plain, between stacks of wheat worthy to be laid on the altar at
+Eleusis, carob-trees with their dark, varnished foliage, almond-orchards
+bending under the weight of their green nuts, and the country-houses
+with their garden clumps of orange, cactus, and palm. As we drew near
+the base of the mountains, olive-trees of great size and luxuriance
+covered the earth with a fine sprinkle of shade. Their gnarled and
+knotted trunks, a thousand years old, were frequently split into three
+or four distinct and separate trees, which in the process assumed forms
+so marvellously human in their distortion, that I could scarcely believe
+them to be accidental. Dor&eacute; never drew anything so weird and grotesque.
+Here were two club-headed individuals righting, with interlocked knees,
+convulsed shoulders, and fists full of each other's hair; yonder a bully
+was threatening attack, and three cowards appeared to be running away
+from him with such speed that they were tumbling over one another's
+heels. In one place a horrible dragon was devouring a squirming,
+shapeless animal; in another, a drunken man, with whirling arms and
+tangled feet, was pitching forward upon his face. The living wood in
+Dante was tame beside these astonishing trees.</p>
+
+<p>We now entered a wild ravine, where, nevertheless, the mountain-sides,
+sheer and savage as they were, had succumbed to the rule of man, and
+nourished an olive or a carob tree on every corner of earth between the
+rocks. The road was built along the edge of the deep, dry bed of a
+winter stream, so narrow that a single arch carried it from side to
+side, as the windings of the glen compelled. After climbing thus for a
+mile in the shadows of threatening masses of rock, an amphitheatre of
+gardens, enframed by the spurs of two grand, arid mountains, opened
+before us. The bed of the valley was filled with vines and orchards,
+beyond which rose long terraces, dark with orange and citron trees,
+obelisks of cypress and magnificent groups of palm, with the long white
+front and shaded balconies of a hacienda between. Far up, on a higher
+plateau between the peaks, I saw the church-tower of Valdemosa. The
+sides of the mountains were terraced with almost incredible labor, walls
+massive as the rock itself being raised to a height of thirty feet, to
+gain a shelf of soil two or three yards in breadth. Where the olive and
+the carob ceased, box and ilex took possession of the inaccessible
+points, carrying up the long waves of vegetation until their
+foam-sprinkles of silver-gray faded out among the highest clefts. The
+natural channels of the rock were straightened and made to converge at
+the base, so that not a wandering cloud could bathe the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_687" id="Page_687">[Pg 687]</a></span> wild growths of
+the summit without being caught and hurried into some tank below. The
+wilderness was forced, by pure toil, to become a Paradise; and each
+stubborn feature, which toil could not subdue, now takes its place as a
+contrast and an ornament in the picture. Verily, there is nothing in all
+Italy so beautiful as Valdemosa!</p>
+
+<p>Lest I should be thought extravagant in my delight, let me give you some
+words of George Sand, which I have since read. "I have never seen," she
+says, "anything so bright, and at the same time so melancholy, as these
+perspectives where the ilex, the carob, pine, olive, poplar, and cypress
+mingle their various hues in the hollows of the mountain,&mdash;abysses of
+verdure, where the torrent precipitates its course under mounds of
+sumptuous richness and an inimitable grace.... While you hear the sound
+of the sea on the northern coast, you perceive it only as a faint
+shining line beyond the sinking mountains and the great plain which is
+unrolled to the southward;&mdash;a sublime picture, framed in the foreground
+by dark rocks covered with pines; in the middle distance by mountains of
+boldest outline, fringed with superb trees; and beyond these by rounded
+hills which the setting sun gilds with burning colors, where the eye
+distinguishes, a league away, the microscopic profile of trees, fine as
+the antenn&aelig; of butterflies, black and clear as pen-drawings of India-ink
+on a ground of sparkling gold. It is one of those landscapes which
+oppress you because they leave nothing to be desired, nothing to be
+imagined. Nature has here created that which the poet and the painter
+behold in their dreams. An immense <i>ensemble</i>, infinite details,
+inexhaustible variety, blended forms, sharp contours, dim, vanishing
+depths,&mdash;all are present, and art can suggest nothing further. Majorca
+is one of the most beautiful countries of the world for the painter, and
+one of the least known. It is a green Helvetia under the sky of
+Calabria, with the solemnity and silence of the Orient."</p>
+
+<p>The village of Valdemosa is a picturesque, rambling place, brown with
+age, and buried in the foliage of fig and orange trees. The highest part
+of the narrow plateau where it stands is crowned by the church and
+monastery of the Trappists (<i>Cartusa</i>), now deserted. My coachman drove
+under the open roof of a venta, and began to unharness his horses. The
+family, who were dining at a table so low that they appeared to be
+sitting on the floor, gave me the customary invitation to join them, and
+when I asked for a glass of wine brought me one which held nearly a
+quart. I could not long turn my back on the bright, wonderful landscape
+without; so, taking books and colors, I entered the lonely cloisters of
+the monastery. Followed first by one small boy, I had a retinue of at
+least fifteen children before I had completed the tour of the church,
+court-yard, and the long-drawn, shady corridors of the silent monks; and
+when I took my seat on the stones at the foot of the towers, with the
+very scene described by George Sand before my eyes, a number of older
+persons added themselves to the group. A woman brought me a chair, and
+the children then planted themselves in a dense row before me, while I
+attempted to sketch under such difficulties as I had never known before.
+Precisely because I am no artist, it makes me nervous to be watched
+while drawing; and the remarks of the young men on this occasion were
+not calculated to give me courage.</p>
+
+<p>When I had roughly mapped out the sky with its few floating clouds, some
+one exclaimed, "He has finished the mountains, there they are!" and they
+all crowded around me, saying, "Yes, there are the mountains!" While I
+was really engaged upon the mountains, there was a violent discussion as
+to what they might be; and I don't know how long it would have lasted,
+had I not turned to some cypresses nearer the foreground. Then a young
+man cried out: "O, that's a cypress! I wonder if he will make them
+all,&mdash;how many are there? One, two, three, four,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_688" id="Page_688">[Pg 688]</a></span> five,&mdash;yes, he makes
+five!" There was an immediate rush, shutting out earth and heaven from
+my sight, and they all cried in chorus, "One, two, three, four,
+five,&mdash;yes, he has made five!" "Cavaliers and ladies," I said, with
+solemn politeness, "have the goodness not to stand before me." "To be
+sure! Santa Maria! How do you think he can see?" yelled an old woman,
+and the children were hustled away. But I thereby won the ill-will of
+those garlic-breathing and scratching imps, for very soon a shower of
+water-drops fell upon my paper. Next a stick, thrown from an upper
+window, dropped on my head, and more than once my elbow was
+intentionally jogged from behind. The older people scolded and
+threatened, but young Majorca was evidently against me. I therefore made
+haste to finish my impotent mimicry of air and light, and get away from
+the curious crowd.</p>
+
+<p>Behind the village there is a gleam of the sea, near, yet at an unknown
+depth. As I threaded the walled lanes, seeking some point of view, a
+number of lusty young fellows, mounted on unsaddled mules, passed me
+with a courteous greeting. On one side rose a grand pile of rock,
+covered with ilex-trees,&mdash;a bit of scenery so admirable, that I fell
+into a new temptation. I climbed a little knoll and looked around me.
+Far and near no children were to be seen; the portico of an unfinished
+house offered both shade and seclusion. I concealed myself behind a
+pillar, and went to work. For half an hour I was happy; then around
+black head popped up over a garden-wall, a small brown form crept
+towards me, beckoned, and presently a new multitude had assembled. The
+noise they made provoked a sound of cursing from the interior of a
+stable adjoining the house. They only made a louder tumult in answer;
+the voice became more threatening, and at the end of five minutes the
+door burst open. An old man, with wrath flashing from his eyes, came
+forth. The children took to their heels; I greeted the new-comer
+politely, but he hardly returned the salutation. He was a very fountain
+of curses, and now hurled stones with them after the fugitives. When
+they had all disappeared behind the walls, he went back to his den,
+grumbling and muttering. It was not five minutes, however, before the
+children were back again, as noisy as before; so, at the first thunder
+from the stable, I shut up my book, and returned to the inn.</p>
+
+<p>While the horses were being harnessed, I tried to talk with an old
+native, who wore the island costume, and was as grim and grizzly as
+Ossawatomie Brown. A party of country people from the plains, who seemed
+to have come up to Valdemosa on a pleasure trip, clambered into a
+two-wheeled cart drawn by one mule, and drove away. My old friend gave
+me the distances of various places, the state of the roads, and the
+quality of the wine; but he seemed to have no conception of the world
+outside of the island. Indeed, to a native of the village, whose fortune
+has simply placed him beyond the reach of want, what is the rest of the
+world? Around and before him spread one of its loveliest pictures; he
+breathes its purest air; and he may enjoy its best luxuries, if he heeds
+or knows how to use them.</p>
+
+<p>Up to this day the proper spice and flavor had been wanting. Palma had
+only interested me, but in Valdemosa I found the inspiration, the heat
+and play of vivid, keen sensation, which one (often somewhat
+unreasonably) expects from a new land. As my carriage descended, winding
+around the sides of the magnificent mountain amphitheatre, in the
+alternate shadows of palm and ilex, pine and olive, I looked back,
+clinging to every marvellous picture, and saying to myself, over and
+over again, "I have not come hither in vain." When the last shattered
+gate of rock closed behind me, and the wood of insane olive-trunks was
+passed, with what other eyes I looked upon the rich orchard-plain! It
+had now become a part of one superb whole; as the background of my
+mountain view, it had caught a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_689" id="Page_689">[Pg 689]</a></span> new glory, and still wore the bloom of
+the invisible sea.</p>
+
+<p>In the evening I reached the Four Nations, where I was needlessly
+invited to dinner by certain strangers, and dined alone, on meats cooked
+in rancid oil. When the cook had dished the last course, he came into a
+room adjoining the dining apartment, sat down to a piano in his white
+cap, and played loud, long, and badly. The landlord had papered this
+room with illustrations from all the periodicals of Europe:
+dancing-girls pointed their toes under cardinals' hats, and bulls were
+baited before the shrines of saints. Mixed with the woodcuts were the
+landlord's own artistic productions, wonderful to behold. All the house
+was proud of this room, and with reason; for there is assuredly no other
+room like it in the world. A notice in four languages, written with
+extraordinary flourishes, announced in the English division that
+travellers will find "confortation and modest prices." The former
+advantage, I discovered, consisted in the art of the landlord, the music
+and oil of the cook, and the attendance of a servant so distant that it
+was easier to serve myself than seek him; the latter may have been
+"modest" for Palma, but in any other place they would have been
+considered brazenly impertinent. I should therefore advise travellers to
+try the "Three Pigeons," in the same street, rather than the Four
+Nations.</p>
+
+<p>The next day, under the guidance of my old friend, M. Laurens, I
+wandered for several hours through the streets, peeping into
+court-yards, looking over garden-walls, or idling under the trees of the
+Alameda. There are no pleasant suburban places of resort, such as are to
+be found in all other Spanish cities; the country commences on the other
+side of the moat. Three small caf&eacute;s exist, but cannot be said to
+flourish, for I never saw more than one table occupied. A theatre has
+been built, but is only open during the winter, of course. Some placards
+on the walls, however, announced that the national (that is, Majorcan)
+diversion of baiting bulls with dogs would be given in a few days.</p>
+
+<p>The noblesse appear to be even haughtier than in Spain, perhaps on
+account of their greater poverty; and much more of the feudal spirit
+lingers among them, and gives character to society, than on the
+main-land. Each family has still a crowd of retainers, who perform a
+certain amount of service on the estates, and are thenceforth entitled
+to support. This custom is the reverse of profitable; but it keeps up an
+air of lordship, and is therefore retained. Late in the afternoon, when
+the new portion of the Alameda is in shadow, and swept by a delicious
+breeze from the sea, it begins to be frequented by the people; but I
+noticed that very few of the upper class made their appearance. So grave
+and sombre are these latter, that one would fancy them descended from
+the conquered Moors, rather than the Spanish conquerors.</p>
+
+<p>M. Laurens is of the opinion that the architecture of Palma cannot be
+ascribed to an earlier period than the beginning of the sixteenth
+century. I am satisfied, however, either that many fragments of Moorish
+sculpture must have been used in the erection of the older buildings, or
+that certain peculiarities of Moorish art have been closely imitated.
+For instance, that Moorish combination of vast, heavy masses of masonry
+with the lightest and airiest style of ornament, which the Gothic
+sometimes attempts, but never with the same success, is here found at
+every step. I will borrow M. Laurens's words, descriptive of the
+superior class of edifices, both because I can find no better of my own,
+and because this very characteristic has been noticed by him. "Above the
+ground-floor," he says, "there is only one story and a low garret. The
+entrance is a semi-circular portal without ornament; but the number and
+dimensions of the stones, disposed in long radii, give it a stately
+aspect. The grand halls of the main story are lighted by windows<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_690" id="Page_690">[Pg 690]</a></span>
+divided by excessively slender columns, which are entirely Arabic in
+appearance. This character is so pronounced, that I was obliged to
+examine more than twenty houses constructed in the same manner, and to
+study all the details of their construction, in order to assure myself
+that the windows had not really been taken from those fairy Moresque
+palaces, of which the Alhambra is the only remaining specimen. Except in
+Majorca, I have nowhere seen columns which, with a height of six feet,
+have a diameter of only three inches. The fine grain of the marble of
+which they are made, as well as the delicacy of the capitals, led me to
+suppose them to be of Saracenic origin."</p>
+
+<p>I was more impressed by the <i>Lonja</i>, or Exchange, than any other
+building in Palma. It dates from the first half of the fifteenth
+century, when the kings of the island had built up a flourishing
+commerce, and expected to rival Genoa and Venice. Its walls, once
+crowded with merchants and seamen, are now only opened for the Carnival
+balls and other festivals sanctioned by religion. It is a square
+edifice, with light Gothic towers at the corners, displaying little
+ornamental sculpture, but nevertheless a taste and symmetry, in all its
+details, which are very rare in Spanish architecture. The interior is a
+single vast hall, with a groined roof, resting on six pillars of
+exquisite beauty. They are sixty feet high, and fluted spirally from top
+to bottom, like a twisted cord, with a diameter of not more than two
+feet and a half. It is astonishing how the airy lightness and grace of
+these pillars relieve the immense mass of masonry, spare the bare walls
+the necessity of ornament, and make the ponderous roof light as a tent.
+There is here the trace of a law of which our modern architects seem to
+be ignorant. Large masses of masonry are always oppressive in their
+effect; they suggest pain and labor, and the Saracens, even more than
+the Greeks, seem to have discovered the necessity of introducing a
+sportive, fanciful element, which shall express the delight of the
+workman in his work.</p>
+
+<p>In the afternoon, I sallied forth from the western coast-gate, and found
+there, sloping to the shore, a village inhabited apparently by sailors
+and fishermen. The houses were of one story, flat-roofed, and
+brilliantly whitewashed. Against the blue background of the sea, with
+here and there the huge fronds of a palm rising from among them, they
+made a truly African picture. On the brown ridge above the village were
+fourteen huge windmills, nearly all in motion. I found a road leading,
+along the brink of the overhanging cliffs, toward the castle of Belver,
+whose brown medi&aelig;val turrets rose against a gathering thunder-cloud.
+This fortress, built as a palace for the kings of Majorca immediately
+after the expulsion of the Moors, is now a prison. It has a superb
+situation, on the summit of a conical hill, covered with umbrella-pines.
+In one of its round, massive towers, Arago was imprisoned for two months
+in 1808. He was at the time employed in measuring an arc of the
+meridian, when news of Napoleon's violent measures in Spain reached
+Majorca. The ignorant populace immediately suspected the astronomer of
+being a spy and political agent, and would have lynched him at once.
+Warned by a friend, he disguised himself as a sailor, escaped on board a
+boat in the harbor, and was then placed in Belver by the authorities, in
+order to save his life. He afterwards succeeded in reaching Algiers,
+where he was seized by order of the Bey, and made to work as a slave.
+Few men of science have known so much of the romance of life.</p>
+
+<p>I had a long walk to Belver, but I was rewarded by a grand view of the
+Bay of Palma, the city, and all the southern extremity of the island. I
+endeavored to get into the fields, to seek other points of view; but
+they were surrounded by such lofty walls that I fancied the owners of
+the soil could only get at them by scaling-ladders. The grain and trees
+on either side of the road were hoary with dust, and the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_691" id="Page_691">[Pg 691]</a></span> soil of the
+hue of burnt chalk, seemed never to have known moisture. But while I
+loitered on the cliffs the cloud in the west had risen and spread; a
+cold wind blew over the hills, and the high gray peaks behind Valdemosa
+disappeared, one by one, in a veil of rain. A rough <i>tartana</i>, which
+performed the service of an omnibus, passed me returning to the city,
+and the driver, having no passengers, invited me to ride. "What is your
+fare?" I asked. "Whatever people choose to give," said he,&mdash;which was
+reasonable enough: and I thus reached the Four Nations in time to avoid
+a deluge.</p>
+
+<p>The Majorcans are fond of claiming their island as the birthplace of
+Hannibal. There are some remains supposed to be Carthaginian near the
+town of Alcudia, but, singularly enough, not a fragment to tell of the
+Roman domination, although their <i>Balearis Major</i> must have been then,
+as now, a rich and important possession. The Saracens, rather than the
+Vandals, have been the spoilers of ancient art. Their religious
+detestation of sculpture was at the bottom of this destruction. The
+Christians could consecrate the old temple to a new service, and give
+the names of saints to the statues of the gods; but to the Moslem every
+representation of the human form was worse than blasphemy. For this
+reason, the symbols of the most ancient faith, massive and
+unintelligible, have outlived the monuments of those which followed.</p>
+
+<p>In a forest of ancient oaks near the village of Arta, there still exists
+a number of Cyclopean constructions, the character of which is as
+uncertain as the date of their erection. They are cones of huge,
+irregular blocks, the jambs and lintels of the entrances being of single
+stones. In a few the opening is at the top, with rude projections
+resembling a staircase to aid in the descent. Cinerary urns have been
+found in some of them, yet they do not appear to have been originally
+constructed as tombs. The Romans may have afterwards turned them to that
+service. In the vicinity there are the remains of a Druid circle, of
+large upright monoliths. These singular structures were formerly much
+more numerous, the people (who call them "the altars of the Gentiles")
+having destroyed a great many in building the village and the
+neighboring farm-houses.</p>
+
+<p>I heard a great deal about a cavern on the eastern coast of the island,
+beyond Arta. It is called the Hermit's Cave, and the people of Palma
+consider it the principal thing to be seen in all Majorca. Their
+descriptions of the place, however, did not inspire me with any very
+lively desire to undertake a two days' journey for the purpose of
+crawling on my belly through a long hole, and then descending a shaky
+rope-ladder for a hundred feet or more. When one has performed these
+feats, they said, he finds himself in an immense hall, supported by
+stalactitic pillars, the marvels of which cannot be described. Had the
+scenery of the eastern part of the island been more attractive, I should
+have gone as far as Arta; but I wished to meet the steamer Minorca at
+Alcudia, and there were but two days remaining.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_A_1" id="Footnote_A_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_A_1"><span class="label">[A]</span></a> <i>Souvenirs d'un Voyage d'Art &agrave; l'Isle de Majorque.</i> Par
+J.-B. Laurens.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_692" id="Page_692">[Pg 692]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="MINOR_ELIZABETHAN_DRAMATISTS" id="MINOR_ELIZABETHAN_DRAMATISTS"></a>MINOR ELIZABETHAN DRAMATISTS.</h2>
+
+
+<p>In the present paper we propose to consider six dramatists who were more
+immediately the contemporaries of Shakespeare and Jonson, and who have
+the precedence in time, and three of them, if we may believe some
+critics, not altogether without claim to the precedence in merit, of
+Beaumont and Fletcher, Massinger, and Ford. These are Heywood,
+Middleton, Marston, Dekkar, Webster, and Chapman.</p>
+
+<p>They belong to the school of dramatists of which Shakespeare was the
+head, and which is distinguished from the school of Jonson by essential
+differences of principle. Jonson constructed his plays on definite
+external rules, and could appeal confidently to the critical
+understanding, in case the regularity of his plot and the keeping of his
+characters were called in question. Shakespeare constructed his, not
+according to any rules which could be drawn from the practice of other
+dramatists, but according to those interior laws which the mind, in its
+creative action, instinctively divines and spontaneously obeys. In his
+case, the appeal is not to the understanding alone, but to the feelings
+and faculties which were concerned in producing the work itself; and the
+symmetry of the whole is felt by hundreds who could not frame an
+argument to sustain it. The laws to which his genius submitted were
+different from those to which other dramatists had submitted, because
+the time, the circumstances, the materials, the purpose aimed at, were
+different. The time demanded a drama which should represent human life
+in all its diversity, and in which the tragic and comic, the high and
+the low, should be in juxtaposition, if not in combination. The
+dramatists of whom we are about to speak represented them in
+juxtaposition, and rarely succeeded in vitally combining them so as to
+produce symmetrical works. Their comedy and tragedy, their humor and
+passion, move in parallel rather than in converging lines. They have
+diversity; but as their diversity neither springs from, nor tends to, a
+central principle of organization or of order, the result is often a
+splendid anarchy of detached scenes, more effective as detached than as
+related. Shakespeare alone had the comprehensive energy of impassioned
+imagination to fuse into unity the almost unmanageable materials of his
+drama, to organize this anarchy into a new and most complex order, and
+to make a world-wide variety of character and incident consistent with
+oneness of impression. Jonson, not pretending to give his work this
+organic form, put forth his whole strength to give it mechanical
+regularity; every line in his solidest plays costing him, as the wits
+said, "a cup of sack." But the force implied in a Shakespearian drama, a
+force that crushes and dissolves the resisting materials into their
+elements, and recombines or fuses them into a new substance, is a force
+so different in kind from Jonson's, that it would of course be idle to
+attempt an estimate of its superiority in degree. And in regard to those
+minor dramatists who will be the subjects of the present paper, if they
+fall below Jonson in general ability, they nearly all afford scenes and
+passages superior to his best in depth of passion, vigor of imagination,
+and audacious self-committal to the primitive instincts of the heart.</p>
+
+<p>The most profuse, but perhaps the least poetic of these dramatists, was
+Thomas Heywood, of whom little is known, except that he was one of the
+most prolific writers the world has ever seen. In 1598 he became an
+actor, or, as Henslowe, who employed him, phrases it, "came and hired
+himself to me as a covenanted servant for two years." The date of his
+first published drama is 1601; that of his last published work,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_693" id="Page_693">[Pg 693]</a></span> a
+"General History of Women," is 1657. As early as 1633 he represents
+himself as having had an "entire hand, or at least a main finger," in
+two hundred and twenty plays, of which only twenty-three were printed.
+"True it is," he says, "that my plays are not exposed to the world in
+volumes, to bear the title of Works, as others: one reason is, that many
+of them, by shifting and change of companies, have been negligently
+lost; others of them are still retained in the hands of some actors, who
+think it against their peculiar profit to have them come in print; and a
+third, that it was never any great ambition in me to be in this kind
+voluminously read." It was said of him, by a contemporary, that he "not
+only acted every day, but also obliged himself to write a sheet every
+day for several years; but many of his plays being composed loosely in
+taverns, occasions them to be so mean." Besides his labors as a
+playwright, he worked as translator, versifier, and general maker of
+books. Late in life he conceived the design of writing the lives of all
+the poets of the world, including his contemporaries. Had this project
+been carried out, we should have known something about the external life
+of Shakespeare; for Heywood must have carried in his brain many of those
+facts which we of this age are most curious to know.</p>
+
+<p>Heywood's best plays evince large observation, considerable dramatic
+skill, a sweet and humane spirit, and an easy command of language. His
+style, indeed, is singularly simple, pure, clear, and straightforward;
+but it conveys the impression of a mind so diffused as almost to be
+characterless, and incapable of flashing its thoughts through the images
+of imaginative passion. He is more prosaic, closer to ordinary life and
+character, than his contemporaries. Two of his plays, and the best of
+them all, "A Woman killed with Kindness," and "The English Traveller,"
+are thoroughly domestic dramas, the first, and not the worst, of their
+class. The plot of "The English Traveller" is specially good; and in
+reading few works of fiction do we receive a greater shock of surprise
+than in Geraldine's discovery of the infidelity of Wincott's wife, whom
+he loves with a Platonic devotion. It is as unanticipated as the
+discovery, in Jonson's "Silent Woman," that Epic&aelig;ne is no woman at all,
+while at the same time it has less the appearance of artifice, and is
+more the result of natural causes.</p>
+
+<p>With less fluency of diction, less skill in fastening the reader's
+interest to his fable, harsher in versification, and generally clumsier
+in construction, the best plays of Thomas Middleton are still superior
+to Heywood's in force of imagination, depth of passion, and fulness of
+matter. It must, however, be admitted that the sentiments which direct
+his powers are not so fine as Heywood's. He depresses the mind, rather
+than invigorates it. The eye he cast on human life was not the eye of a
+sympathizing poet, but rather that of a sagacious cynic. His
+observation, though sharp, close, and vigilant, is somewhat ironic and
+unfeeling. His penetrating, incisive intellect cuts its way to the heart
+of a character as with a knife; and if he lays bare its throbs of guilt
+and weakness, and lets you into the secrets of its organization, he
+conceives his whole work is performed. This criticism applies even to
+his tragedy of "Women beware Women," a drama which shows a deep study of
+the sources of human frailty, considerable skill in exhibiting the
+passions in their consecutive, if not in their conflicting action, and a
+firm hold upon character; but it lacks pathos, tenderness, and humanity;
+its power is out of all proportion to its geniality; the characters,
+while they stand definitely out to the eye, are seen through no
+visionary medium of sentiment and fancy; and the reader feels the force
+of Leantio's own agonizing complaint, that his affliction is</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Of greater weight than youth was made to bear,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">As if a punishment of after-life<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Were fall'n upon man here, so new it is<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">To flesh and blood, so strange, so insupportable."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>There is, indeed, no atmosphere to Middleton's mind; and the hard, bald
+caustic<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_694" id="Page_694">[Pg 694]</a></span> peculiarity of his genius, which is unpleasingly felt in
+reading any one of his plays, becomes a source of painful weariness as
+we plod doggedly through the five thick volumes of his works. Like the
+incantations of his own witches, it "casts a thick scurf over life." It
+is most powerfully felt in his tragedy of "The Changeling," at once the
+most oppressive and impressive effort of his genius. The character of De
+Flores in this play has in it a strangeness of iniquity, such as we
+think is hardly paralleled in the whole range of the Elizabethan drama.
+The passions of this brute imp are not human. They are such as might be
+conceived of as springing from the union of animal with fiendish
+impulses, in a nature which knew no law outside of its own lust, and was
+as incapable of a scruple as of a sympathy.</p>
+
+<p>But of all the dramatists of the time, the most disagreeable in
+disposition, though by no means the least powerful in mind, was John
+Marston. The time of his birth is not known; his name is entangled in
+contemporary records with that of another John Marston; and we may be
+sure that his mischief-loving spirit would have been delighted could he
+have anticipated that the antiquaries, a century after his death, would
+be driven to despair by the difficulty of discriminating one from the
+other. It is more than probable, however, that he was the John Marston
+who was of a respectable family in Shropshire; who took his bachelor's
+degree at Oxford in 1592; and who was afterwards married to a daughter
+of the chaplain of James the First. Whatever may have been Marston's
+antecedents, they were such as to gratify his tastes as a cynical
+observer of the crimes and follies of men,&mdash;an observer whose hatred of
+evil sprang from no love of good, but to whom the sight of depravity and
+baseness was welcome, inasmuch as it afforded him me occasion to wreak
+his own scorn and pride. His ambition was to be the English Juvenal; and
+it must be conceded that he had the true Iago-like disposition "to spy
+out abuses." Accordingly, in 1598, he published a series of venomous
+satires called "The Scourge of Villanie," rough in versification,
+condensed in thought, tainted in matter, evincing a cankered more than a
+caustic spirit, and producing an effect at once indecent and inhuman. To
+prove that this scourging of villany, which would have put
+Mephistopheles to the blush, was inspired by no respect for virtue, he
+soon followed it up with a poem so licentious that, before it was
+circulated to any extent, it was suppressed by order of Archbishop
+Whitgift, and nearly all the copies destroyed. A writer could not be
+thus dishonored without being brought prominently into notice, and old
+Henslowe, the manager, was after him at once to secure his libellous
+ability for the Rose. Accordingly, we learn from Henslowe's diary, under
+date of September 28, 1599, that he had lent to William Borne "to lend
+unto John Mastone," "the new poete," "the sum of forty shillings," in
+earnest of some work not named. There is an undated letter of Marston to
+Henslowe, written probably in reference to this matter, which is
+characteristic in its disdainfully confident tone. Thus it runs:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<span class="smcap">Mr. Henslowe</span>, at the Rose on the Bankside.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"If you like my playe of Columbus, it is verie well, and you
+shall give me noe more than twentie poundes for it, but If
+nott, lett me have it by the Bearer againe, as I know the
+kinges men will freelie give me as much for it, and the
+profitts of the third daye moreover.</p>
+
+<p class="right">"Soe I rest yours,<br /><br />
+
+"John Marston."</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>He seems not to have been popular among the band of dramatists he now
+joined, and it is probable that his insulting manners were not sustained
+by corresponding courage. Ben Jonson had many quarrels with him, both
+literary and personal, and mentions one occasion on which he beat him,
+and took away his pistol. His temper was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_695" id="Page_695">[Pg 695]</a></span> Italian rather than English,
+and one would conceive of him as quicker with the stiletto than the
+fist. His connection with the stage ceased in 1613, after he had
+produced a number of dramas, of which nine have been preserved. He died
+about twenty years afterwards, in 1634, seemingly in comfortable
+circumstances.</p>
+
+<p>Marston's plays, whether comedies or tragedies, all bear the mark of his
+bitter and misanthropic spirit,&mdash;a spirit that seemed cursed by the
+companionship of its own thoughts, and forced them out through a
+well-grounded fear that they would fester if left within. His comedies
+of "The Malcontent," "The Fawn," and "What You Will," have no genuine
+mirth, though an abundance of scornful wit,&mdash;of wit which, in his own
+words, "stings, blisters, galls off the skin, with the acrimony of its
+sharp quickness." The baser its objects, the brighter its gleam. It is
+stimulated by the desire to give pain, rather than the wish to
+communicate pleasure. Marston is not without sprightliness, but his
+sprightliness is never the sprightliness of the kid, though it is
+sometimes that of the hyena, and sometimes that of the polecat. In his
+Malcontent he probably drew a nattering likeness of his inner self: yet
+the most compassionate reader of the play would experience little pity
+in seeing the Malcontent hanged. So much, indeed, of Marston's satire is
+directed at depravity, that Ben Jonson used to say that "Marston wrote
+his father-in-law's preachings, and his father-in-law his comedies." It
+is to be hoped, however, that the spirit of the chaplain's tirades
+against sins was not, like his son-in-law's, worse than the sins
+themselves.</p>
+
+<p>If Marston's comic vein is thus, to use one of Dekkar's phrases, that of
+"a thorny-toothed rascal," it may be supposed that his tragic is a still
+fiercer libel on humanity. His tragedies, indeed, though not without a
+gloomy power, are extravagant and horrible in conception and conduct.
+Even when he copies, he makes the thing his own by caricaturing it. Thus
+the plot of "Antonio's Revenge" is plainly taken from "Hamlet," but it
+is "Hamlet" passed through Marston's intellect and imagination, and so
+debased as to look original. Still, the intellect in Marston's tragedies
+strikes the reader as forcible in itself, and as capable of achieving
+excellence, if it could only be divorced from the bad disposition and
+deformed conscience which direct its exercise. He has fancy, and he
+frequently stutters into imagination; but the imp that controls his
+heart corrupts his taste and taints his sense of beauty, and the result
+is that he has a malicious satisfaction in deliberately choosing words
+whose uncouthness finds no extenuation in their expressiveness, and in
+forging elaborate metaphors which disgust rather than delight. His
+description of a storm at sea is among the least unfavorable specimens
+of this perversion of his poetical powers:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i5">"The sea grew mad:<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i3">*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Strait swarthy darkness <i>popt out</i> Ph&oelig;bus' eye,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And blurred the jocund face of bright-cheek'd day;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Whilst cruddled fogs masked even darkness' brow;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Heaven bade's good night, and the rocks groaned<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">At the intestine uproar of the main."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>It must be allowed that both his tragedies and comedies are full of
+strong and striking thoughts, which show a searching inquisition into
+the worst parts of human nature. Occasionally he expresses a general
+truth with great felicity, as when he says,</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i19">"Pygmy cares<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Can shelter under patience' shield; but giant griefs<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Will burst all covert."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>His imagination is sometimes stimulated into unusual power in expressing
+the fiercer and darker passions; as, for example, in this image:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i11">"O, my soul's enthroned<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">In the triumphant chariot of revenge!"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>And in this:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Ghastly amazement! with upstarted hair,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Shall hurry on before, and usher us,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Whilst trumpets clamor with a sound of death."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>He has three descriptions of morning, which seem to have been written in
+emulation of Shakespeare's in "Hamlet"; two of them being found in the
+tragedy which "Hamlet" suggested.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_696" id="Page_696">[Pg 696]</a></span></p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Is not yon gleam the shuddering morn that flakes<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">With silver tincture the east verge of heaven?<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i3">*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*  &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; *&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;   *<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">For see the dapple-gray coursers of the morn<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Beat up the light with their bright silver hoofs,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And chase it through the sky.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i3">*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Darkness is fled: look; look, infant morn hath drawn<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Bright silver curtains 'bout the couch of night;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And now Aurora's house trots azure rings,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Breathing fair light about the firmament."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>These last two lines appear feeble enough as contrasted with the
+beautiful intensity of imagination in Emerson's picturing of the same
+scene:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"O, tenderly the haughty Day<br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><i>Fills his blue urn with fire</i>."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>The most beautiful passage in Marston's plays is the lament of a father
+over the dead body of his son, who has been defamed. It is so apart from
+his usual style, as to breed the suspicion that the worthy chaplain's
+daughter, whom he made Mrs. Marston, must have given it to him from her
+purer imagination:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i23">"Look on those lips,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Those now lawn pillows, on whose tender softness<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Chaste modest speech, stealing from out his breast,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Had wont to rest itself, as loath to post<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">From out so fair an inn: look, look, they seem<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">To stir.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And breathe defiance to black obloquy."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>If among the dramatists of the period any person could be selected who
+in disposition was the opposite of Marston, it would be Thomas
+Dekkar,&mdash;a man whose inborn sweetness and gleefulness of soul carried
+him through vexations and miseries which would have crushed a spirit
+less hopeful, cheerful, and humane. He was probably born about the year
+1575; commenced his career as player and playwright before 1598; and for
+forty years was an author by profession, that is, was occupied in
+fighting famine with his pen. The first intelligence we have of him is
+characteristic of his whole life. It is from Henslowe's Diary, under
+date of February, 1598: "Lent unto the company, to discharge Mr. Decker
+out of the counter in the powltry, the sum of 40 shillings." Oldys tells
+us that "he was in King's Bench Prison from 1613 to 1616"; and the
+antiquary adds ominously, "how much longer I know not." Indeed, Dr.
+Johnson's celebrated condensation of the scholar's life would stand for
+a biography of Dekkar:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Toil, envy, want, the patron, and the jail."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>This forced familiarity with poverty and distress does not seem to have
+imbittered his feelings or weakened the force and elasticity of his
+mind. He turned his calamities into commodities. If indigence threw him
+into the society of the ignorant, the wretched, and the depraved, he
+made the knowledge of low life lie thus obtained serve his purpose as
+dramatist or pamphleteer. Whatever may have been the effect of his
+vagabond habits on his principles, they did not stain the sweetness and
+purity of his sentiments. There is an innocency in his very coarseness,
+and a brisk, bright good-nature chirps in his very scurrility. In the
+midst of distresses of all kinds, he still seems, like his own
+Fortunatus, "all felicity up to the brims"; but that his content with
+Fortune is not owing to an unthinking ignorance of her caprice and
+injustice is proved by the words he puts into her mouth:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"This world is Fortune's ball wherewith she sports.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Sometimes I strike it up into the air,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And then create I emperors and kings;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Sometimes I spurn it, at which spurn crawls out<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The wild beast multitude: curse on, you fools,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">'Tis I that tumble princes from their thrones,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And gild false brows with glittering diadems;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">'T is I that tread on necks of conquerors,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And when like semi-gods they have been drawn<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">In ivory chariots to the Capitol,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Circled about with wonder of all eyes,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The shouts of every tongue, love of all hearts,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Being swoln with their own greatness, I have pricked<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The bladder of their pride, and made them die<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">As water-bubbles (without memory):<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Whilst the true-spirited soldier stands by<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Bareheaded, and all bare, whilst at his scars<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">They scoff, that ne'er durst view the face of wars.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">I set an idiot's cap on virtue's head,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Turn learning out of doors, clothe wit in rags,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And paint ten thousand images of loam<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">In gaudy silken colors: on the backs<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Of mules and asses I make asses ride.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Only for sport to see the apish world<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Worship such beasts with sound idolatry.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">She sits and smiles to hear some curse her name,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And some with adoration crown her fame."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>The boundless beneficence of Dekkar's heart is specially embodied in
+the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_697" id="Page_697">[Pg 697]</a></span> character of the opulent lord, Jacomo Gentili, in his play of "The
+Wonder of a Kingdom." When Gentili's steward brings him the book in
+which the amount of his charities is recorded, he exclaims
+impatiently:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Thou vain vainglorious fool, go burn that book;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">No herald needs to blazon charity's arms.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i3">*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">I launch not forth a ship, with drums and guns<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And trumpets, to proclaim my gallantry;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">He that will read the wasting of my gold<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Shall find it writ in ashes, which the wind<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Will scatter ere he spells it."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>He will have neither wife nor children. When, he says,</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i5">"I shall have one hand in heaven,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">To write my happiness in leaves of stars,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">A wife would pluck me by the other down.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">This bark has thus long sailed about the world,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">My soul the pilot, and yet never listened<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">To such a mermaid's song.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i3">*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">My heirs shall be poor children fed on alms;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Soldiers that want limbs; scholars poor and scorned;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And these will be a sure inheritance<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Not to decay; manors and towns will fall,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Lordships and parks, pastures and woods, be sold;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">But this land still continues to the lord:<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">No tricks of law can me beguile of this.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">But of the beggar's dish, I shall drink healths<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">To last forever; whilst I live, my roof<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Shall cover naked wretches; when I die,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">'T is dedicated to St. Charity."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>We should not do justice to Dekkar's disposition, even after these
+quotations, did we omit that enumeration of positives and negatives
+which, in his view, make up the character of the happy man:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"He that in the sun is neither beam nor moat,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">He that's not mad after a petticoat,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">He for whom poor men's curse dig no grave,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">He that is neither lord's nor lawyer's slave,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">He that makes This his sea and That his shore,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">He that in 's coffin is richer than before,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">He that counts Youth his sword and Age his staff.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">He that upon his death-bed is a swan.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And dead no crow,&mdash;he is a Happy Man."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>As Dekkar wrote under the constant goad of necessity, he seems to have
+been indifferent to the requirements of art. That "wet-eyed wench,
+Care," was as absent from his ink as from his soul. Even his best plays,
+"Old Fortunatus," "The Wonder of a Kingdom," and another whose title
+cannot be mentioned, are good in particular scenes and characters rather
+than good as wholes. Occasionally, as in the character of Signior
+Orlando Friscobaldo, he strikes off a fresh, original, and masterly
+creation, consistently sustained throughout, and charming us by its
+lovableness, as well as thrilling us by its power; but generally his
+sentiment and imagination break upon us in unexpected felicities,
+strangely better than what surrounds them. These have been culled by the
+affectionate admiration of Lamb, Hunt, and Hazlitt, and made familiar to
+all English readers. To prove how much finer, in its essence, his genius
+was than the genius of so eminent a dramatist as Massinger, we only need
+to compare Massinger's portions of the play of "The Virgin Martyr" with
+Dekkar's. The scene between Dorothea and Angelo, in which she recounts
+her first meeting with him as a "sweet-faced beggar-boy," and the scene
+in which Angelo brings to Theophilus the basket of fruits and flowers
+which Dorothea has plucked in Paradise, are inexpressibly beautiful in
+their exquisite subtlety of imagination and artless elevation of
+sentiment. It is difficult to understand how a writer capable of such
+refinements as these should have left no drama which is a part of the
+classical literature of his country.</p>
+
+<p>One of these scenes&mdash;that between Dorothea, the Virgin Martyr, and
+Angelo, an angel who waits upon her in the disguise of a page&mdash;we cannot
+refrain from quoting, familiar as it must be to many readers:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Dor.</i> My book and taper.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Ang.</i> Here, most holy mistress.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Dor.</i> Thy voice bends forth such music, that I never<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Was ravished with a more celestial sound.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Were every servant in the world like thee,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">So full of goodness, angels would come down<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">To dwell with us; thy name is Angelo,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And like that name thou art. Get thee to rest;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Thy youth with too much watching is oppressed.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Ang.</i> No, my dear lady; I could weary stars,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And force the wakeful moon to lose her eyes,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">By my late watching, but to wait on you.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">When at your prayers you kneel before the altar,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Methinks I'm singing with some quire in heaven,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">So blest I hold me in your company.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Therefore, my most loved mistress, do not bid<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Your boy, so serviceable, to get hence,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">For then you break his heart.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_698" id="Page_698">[Pg 698]</a></span><br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Dor.</i> Be nigh me still then.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">In golden letters down I'll set that day<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Which gave thee to me. Little did I hope<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">To meet such worlds of comfort in thyself,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">This little pretty body, when I, coming<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Forth of the temple, heard my beggar-boy,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">My sweet-faced, godly beggar-boy, crave an alms,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Which with glad hand I gave,&mdash;with lucky hand!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And when I took thee home, my most chaste bosom<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Methought was filled with no hot wanton fire,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">But with a holy flame, mounting since higher,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">On wings of cherubim, than it did before.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Ang.</i> Proud am I that my lady's modest eye<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">So likes so poor a servant.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Dor.</i>                 I have offered<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Handfuls of gold but to behold thy parents.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">I would leave kingdoms, were I queen of some,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">To dwell with thy good father....<br /></span>
+<span class="i23">Show me thy parents;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Be not ashamed.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Angelo.</i> I am not: I did never<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Know who my mother was; but by yon palace,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Filled with bright heavenly courtiers, I dare assure you,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And pawn these eyes upon it, and this hand,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">My father is in heaven; and, pretty mistress,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">If your illustrious hour-glass spend his sand,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">No worse than yet it does upon my life,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">You and I both shall meet my father there,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And he shall bid you welcome.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Dor.</i>                 O blessed day!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">We all long to be there, but lose the way."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>But the passage in all Dekkar's works which will be most likely to
+immortalize his name is that often-quoted one, taken from a play whose
+very name is unmentionable to prudish ears:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Patience, my lord! why, 't is the soul of peace;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">It makes men look like gods&mdash;The best of men<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">That e'er wore earth about him was a Sufferer,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">A soft, meek, patient, humble, tranquil spirit;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The first true gentleman that ever breathed."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>A more sombre genius than Dekkar, though a genius more than once
+associated with his own in composition, was John Webster, of whose
+biography nothing is certainly known, except that he was a member of the
+Merchant Tailors' Company. His works have been thrice republished within
+thirty years; but the perusal of the whole does not add to the
+impression left on the mind by his two great tragedies. His comic talent
+was small; and for all the mirth in his comedies of "Westward Hoe" and
+"Northward Hoe" we are probably indebted to his associate, Dekkar. His
+play of "Appius and Virginia" is far from being an adequate rendering of
+one of the most beautiful and affecting fables that ever crept into
+history. "The Devil's Law Case," a tragi-comedy, has not sufficient
+power to atone for the want of probability in the plot and want of
+nature in the characters. The historical play of "Sir Thomas Wyatt" can
+only be fitly described by using the favorite word in which Ben Jonson
+was wont to condense his critical opinions,&mdash;"It is naught." But "The
+White Devil" and "The Duchess of Malfy" are tragedies which even so rich
+and varied a literature as the English could not lose without a sensible
+diminution of its treasures.</p>
+
+<p>Webster was one of those writers whose genius consists in the expression
+of special moods, and who, outside of those moods, cannot force their
+creative faculties into vigorous action. His mind by instinctive
+sentiment was directed to the contemplation of the darker aspects of
+life. He brooded over crime and misery until his imagination was
+enveloped in their atmosphere, found a fearful joy in probing their
+sources and tracing their consequences, became strangely familiar with
+their physiognomy and psychology, and felt a shuddering sympathy with
+their "deep groans and terrible ghastly looks." There was hardly a
+remote corner of the soul, which hid a feeling capable of giving mental
+pain, into which this artist in agony had not curiously peered; and his
+meditations on the mysterious disorder produced in the human
+consciousness by the rebound of thoughtless or criminal deeds might have
+found fit expression in the lines of the great poet of our own times:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i17">"Action is momentary,&mdash;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The motion of a muscle, this way or that.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Suffering is long, obscure, and infinite."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>With this proclivity of his imagination, Webster's power as a dramatist
+consists in confining the domain of his tragedy within definite limits,
+in excluding all variety of incident and character which could interfere
+with his main design of awaking terror and pity, and in the intensity
+with which he arrests, and the tenacity with which<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_699" id="Page_699">[Pg 699]</a></span> he holds the
+attention, as he drags the mind along the pathway which begins in
+misfortune or guilt, and ends in death. He is such a spendthrift of his
+stimulants, and accumulates horror on horror, and crime on crime, with
+such fatal facility, that he would render the mind callous to his
+terrors, were it not that what is acted is still less than what is
+suggested, and that the souls of his characters are greater than their
+sufferings or more terrible than their deeds. The crimes and the
+criminals belong to Italy as it was in the sixteenth century, when
+poisoning and assassination were almost in the fashion; the feelings
+with which they are regarded are English; and the result of the
+combination is to make the poisoners and assassins more fiendishly
+malignant in spirit than they actually were. Thus Ferdinand, in "The
+Duchess of Malfy," is the conception formed by an honest, deep-thoughted
+Englishman of an Italian duke and politician, who had been educated in
+those maxims of policy which were generalized by Machiavelli. Webster
+makes him a devil, but a devil with a soul to be damned. The Duchess,
+his sister, is discovered to be secretly married to her steward; and in
+connection with his brother, the Cardinal, the Duke not only resolves on
+her death, but devises a series of preliminary mental torments to madden
+and break down her proud spirit. The first is an exhibition of wax
+figures, representing her husband and children as they appeared in
+death. Then comes a dance of madmen, with dismal howls and songs and
+speeches. Then a tomb-maker whose talk is of the charnel-house, and who
+taunts her with her mortality. She interrupts his insulting homily with
+the exclamation, "Am I not thy Duchess?" "Thou art," he scornfully
+replies, "some great woman sure, for riot begins to sit on thy forehead
+(clad in gray hairs) twenty years sooner than on a merry milkmaid's.
+Thou sleepest worse than if a mouse should be forced to take up her
+lodging in a cat's ear; a little infant that breeds its teeth, should
+it lie with thee, would cry out, as if thou wert the more unquiet
+bedfellow." This mockery only brings from her firm spirit the proud
+assertion, "I am Duchess of Malfy still." Indeed, her mind becomes
+clearer and calmer as the tortures proceed. At first she had imprecated
+curses on her brothers, and cried,</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Plagues that make lanes through largest families,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Consume them!"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>But now, when the executioners appear, when her dirge is sung,
+containing those tremendous lines,</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Of what is 't fools make such vain keeping?<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Sin their conception, their birth weeping,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Their life a general mist of error,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Their death a hideous storm of terror,"&mdash;<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>when all that malice could suggest for her torment has been expended,
+and the ruffians who have been sent to murder her approach to do their
+office, her attitude is that of quiet dignity, forgetful of her own
+sufferings, solicitous for others. Her attendant, Cariola, screams out:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Hence, villains, tyrants, murderers: alas!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">What will you do with my lady? Call for help.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Duchess.</i> To whom,&mdash;to our next neighbors?<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">They are mad folks.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Bosola.</i> Remove that noise.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Duchess.</i> Farewell, Cariola.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">In my last will I have not much to give:<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">A many hungry guests have fed upon me;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Thine will be a poor reversion.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Cariola.</i> I will die with her.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Duchess.</i> I pray thee, look thou giv'st my little boy<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Some syrup for his cold, and let the girl<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Say her prayers ere she sleep. Now what you please:<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">What death?<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Bosola.</i> Strangling; here are your executioners.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i3">*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Duchess.</i> Pull, and pull strongly, for your able strength<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Must pull down heaven upon me:<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Yet stay, heaven-gates are not so highly arched<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">As princes' palaces; they that enter there<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Must go upon their knees. Come, violent death.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Serve for mandragora to make me sleep.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Go, tell my brothers; when I am laid out,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">They then may feed in quiet."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>The strange, unearthly stupor which precedes the remorse of Ferdinand
+for her murder is true to nature, and especially his nature. Bosola,
+pointing to the dead body of the Duchess, says:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_700" id="Page_700">[Pg 700]</a></span></p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Fix your eye here.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Ferd.</i> Constantly.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Bosola.</i>             Do you not weep?<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Other sins only speak; murther shrieks out:<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The element of water moistens the earth,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">But blood flies upwards and bedews the heavens.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Ferd.</i> Cover her face; mine eyes dazzle;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">She died young.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Bosola.</i>     I think not so; her infelicity<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Seemed to have years too many.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Ferd.</i>     She and I were twins:<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And should I die this instant, I had lived<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Her time to a minute."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>We have said that Webster's peculiarity is the tenacity of his hold on
+the mental and moral constitution of his characters. We know of their
+appetites and passions only by their effects on their souls. He has
+properly no sensuousness. Thus in "The White Devil," his other great
+tragedy, the events proceed from the passion of Brachiano for Vittoria
+Corombona,&mdash;a passion so intense as to lead one to order the murder of
+his wife, and the other the murder of her husband. If either Fletcher or
+Ford had attempted the subject, the sensual and emotional motives to the
+crime would have been represented with overpowering force, and expressed
+in the most alluring images, so that wickedness would have been almost
+resolved into weakness; but Webster lifts the wickedness at once from
+the senses into the region of the soul, exhibits its results in
+spiritual depravity, and shows the Satanic energy of purpose which may
+spring from the ruins of the moral will. There is nothing lovable in
+Vittoria. She seems, indeed, almost without sensations; and the
+affection between her and Brachiano is simply the magnetic attraction
+which one evil spirit has for another evil spirit. Francisco, the
+brother of Brachiano's wife, says to him:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Thou hast a wife, our sister; would I had given<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Both her white hands to death, bound and locked fast<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">In her last winding-sheet, when I gave thee<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">But one."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>This is the language of the intensest passion, but as applied to the
+adulterous lover of Vittoria it seems little more than the utterance of
+reasonable regret; for devil can only truly mate with devil, and
+Vittoria is Brachiano's real "affinity."</p>
+
+<p>The moral confusion they produce by their deeds is traced with more than
+Webster's usual steadiness of nerve and clearness of vision. The evil
+they inflict is a cause of evil in others; the passion which leads to
+murder rouses the fiercer passion which aches for vengeance; and at
+last, when the avengers of crime have become morally as bad as the
+criminals, they are all involved in a common destruction. Vittoria is
+probably Webster's most powerful delineation. Bold, bad, proud,
+glittering in her baleful beauty, strong in that evil courage which
+shrinks from crime as little as from danger, she meets her murderers
+with the same self-reliant scorn with which she met her judges. "Kill
+her attendant first," exclaimed one of them.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Vittoria.</i> You shall not kill her first; behold my breast:<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">I will be waited on in death; my servant<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Shall never go before me.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Gasparo.</i>     Are you so brave!<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Vittoria.</i> Yes, I shall welcome death,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">As princes do some great ambassadors;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">I'll meet thy weapon half-way.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Lodovico.</i>     Strike, strike,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">With a joint motion.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Vittoria.</i>     'T was a manly blow;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The next thou giv'st, murder some sucking infant,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And then thou wilt be famous."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Webster tells us, in the Preface to "The White Devil," that he does not
+"write with a goose-quill winged with two feathers"; and also hints that
+the play failed in representation through its being acted in winter in
+"an open and black theatre," and because it wanted "a full and
+understanding auditory." "Since that time," he sagely adds, "I have
+noted most of the people that come to the playhouse resemble those
+ignorant asses who, visiting stationers' shops, their use is not to
+inquire for good books, but new books." And then comes the
+ever-recurring wail of the playwright, Elizabethan as well as Georgian,
+respecting the taste of audiences. "Should a man," he says, "present to
+such an auditory the most sententious tragedy that ever was written,
+observing all the critical laws, as height of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_701" id="Page_701">[Pg 701]</a></span> style, and gravity of
+person, enrich it with the sententious chorus, and, as it were, enliven
+death in the passionate and weighty <i>Nuntius</i>; yet after all this divine
+rapture, <i>O dura messorum ilia</i>, the breath that comes from the
+uncapable multitude is able to poison it."</p>
+
+<p>Of all the contemporaries of Shakespeare, Webster is the most
+Shakespearian. His genius was not only influenced by its contact with
+one side of Shakespeare's many-sided mind, but the tragedies we have
+been considering abound in expressions and situations either suggested
+by or directly copied from the tragedies of him he took for his model.
+Yet he seems to have had no conception of the superiority of Shakespeare
+to all other dramatists; and in his Preface to "The White Devil," after
+speaking of the "full and heightened style of Master Chapman, the
+labored and understanding works of Master Jonson, the no less worthy
+composures of the both worthily excellent Master Beaumont and Master
+Fletcher," he adds his approval, "without wrong last to be named," of
+"the right happy and copious industry of Master Shakespeare, Master
+Dekkar, and Master Heywood." This is not half so felicitous a
+classification as would be made by a critic of our century, who should
+speak of the "right happy and copious industry" of Master Goethe, Master
+Dickens, and Master G. P. R. James.</p>
+
+<p>Webster's reference, however, to "the full and heightened style of
+Master Chapman" is more appropriate; for no writer of that age impresses
+us more by a certain rude heroic height of character than George
+Chapman. Born in 1559, and educated at the University of Oxford, he
+seems, on his first entrance into London life, to have acquired the
+patronage of the noble, and the friendship of all who valued genius and
+scholarship. He was among the few men whom Ben Jonson said he loved. His
+greatest performance, and it was a gigantic one, was his translation of
+Homer, which, in spite of obvious faults, excels all other translations
+in the power to rouse and lift and inflame the mind. Some eminent
+painter, we believe Barry, said that, when he went into the street after
+reading it, men seemed ten feet high. Pope averred that the translation
+of the Iliad might be supposed to have been written by Homer before he
+arrived at years of discretion; and Coleridge declares the version of
+the Odyssey to be as truly an original poem as the Faery Queen. Chapman
+himself evidently thought that he was the first translator who had been
+admitted into intimate relations with Homer's soul, and caught by direct
+contact the sacred fury of his inspiration. He says finely of those who
+had attempted his work in other languages:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"They failed to search his deep and treasures heart.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The cause was, since they wanted the fit key<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Of Nature, in their downright strength of art,<br /></span>
+<span class="i7">With Poesy to open Poesy."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Chapman was also a voluminous dramatist, and of his many comedies and
+tragedies some sixteen were printed. It is to be feared that the last
+twenty years of his long and honorable life were passed in a desperate
+struggle for the means of subsistence. But his ideas of the dignity of
+his art were so inwoven into his character that he probably met calamity
+bravely. Poesy he early professed to prefer above all worldly wisdom,
+being composed, in his own words, of the "sinews and souls of all
+learning, wisdom, and truth." "We have example sacred enough," he said,
+"that true Poesy's humility, poverty, and contempt are badges of
+divinity, not vanity. Bray then, and bark against it, ye wolf-faced
+worldlings, that nothing but riches, honors, and magistracy" can content
+"I (for my part) shall ever esteem it much more manly and sacred, in
+this harmless and pious study, to sit until I sink into my grave, than
+shine in your vainglorious bubbles and impieties; all your poor
+policies, wisdoms, and their trappings, at no more valuing than a musty
+nut." These sentiments were probably fresh in his heart when, in 1634,
+friendless and poor, at the age of seventy-five, he died. Anthony Wood
+describes him as "a person of most reverend aspect, religious and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_702" id="Page_702">[Pg 702]</a></span>
+temperate; qualities," he spitefully adds, "rarely meeting in a poet."</p>
+
+<p>Chapman was a man with great elements in his nature, which were so
+imperfectly harmonized that what he was found but a stuttering
+expression in what he wrote and did. There were gaps in his mind; or, to
+use Victor Hugo's image, "his intellect was a book with some leaves torn
+out." His force, great as it was, was that of an Ajax, rather than that
+of an Achilles. Few dramatists of the time afford nobler passages of
+description and reflection. Few are wiser, deeper, manlier in their
+strain of thinking. But when we turn to the dramas from which these
+grand things have been detached, we find extravagance, confusion, huge
+thoughts lying in helpless heaps, sublimity in parts conducing to no
+general effect of sublimity, the movement lagging and unwieldy, and the
+plot urged on to the catastrophe by incoherent expedients. His
+imagination partook of the incompleteness of his intellect. Strong
+enough to clothe the ideas and emotions of a common poet, it was plainly
+inadequate to embody the vast, half-formed conceptions which gasped for
+expression in his soul in its moments of poetic exaltation. Often we
+feel his meaning, rather than apprehend it. The imagery has the
+indefiniteness of distant objects seen by moonlight. There are whole
+passages in his works in which he seems engaged in expressing Chapman to
+Chapman, like the deaf egotist who only placed his trumpet to his ear
+when he himself talked.</p>
+
+<p>This criticism applies more particularly to his tragedies, and to his
+expression of great sentiments and passions. His comedies, though
+over-informed with thought, reveal him to us as a singularly sharp,
+shrewd, and somewhat cynical observer, sparkling with worldly wisdom,
+and not deficient in airiness any more than wit. Hazlitt, we believe,
+was the first to notice that Monsieur D'Olive, in the comedy of that
+name, is "the undoubted prototype of that light, flippant, gay, and
+infinitely delightful class of character, of the professed men of wit
+and pleasure about town, which we have in such perfection in Wycherly
+and Congreve, such as Sparkish, Witwond, Petulant, &amp;c., both in the
+sentiments and the style of writing"; and Tharsalio in "The Widow's
+Tears," and Ludovico in "May-Day," have the hard impudence and cynical
+distrust of virtue, the arrogant and glorying self-<i>un</i>righteousness,
+that distinguish another class of characters which the dramatists of the
+age of Charles and Anne were unwearied in providing with insolence and
+repartees. Occasionally we have a jest which Falstaff would not disown.
+Thus in "May-Day," when Cuthbert, a barber, approaches Quintiliano, to
+get, if possible, "certain odd crowns" the latter owes him, Quintiliano
+says, "I think thou 'rt newly married?" "I am indeed, sir," is the
+reply. "I thought so; keep on thy hat, man, 't will be the less
+perceived." Chapman, in his comedies generally, shows a kind of
+philosophical contempt for woman, as a frailer and flimsier, if fairer,
+creature than man, and he sustains his bad judgment with infinite
+ingenuity of wilful wit and penetration of ungracious analysis. In "The
+Widow's Tears" this unpoetic infidelity to the sex pervades the whole
+plot and incidents, as well as gives edge to many an incisive sarcasm.
+My sense, says Tharsalio, "tells me how short-lived widows' tears are,
+that their weeping is in truth but laughing under a mask, that they
+mourn in their gowns and laugh in their sleeves; all of which I believe
+as a Delphian oracle, and am resolved to burn in that faith." "He," says
+Lodovico, in "May-Day,"&mdash;he "that holds religious and sacred thought of
+a woman, he that holds so reverend a respect to her that he will not
+touch her but with a kist hand and a timorous heart, he that adores her
+like his goddess, let him be sure she will shun him like her slave....
+Whereas nature made" women "but half fools, we make 'em all fool: and
+this is our palpable flattery of them, where they had rather have plain
+dealing." In all Chapman's comic writing there is something of Ben
+Jonson's<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_703" id="Page_703">[Pg 703]</a></span> mental self-assertion and disdainful glee in his own
+superiority to the weakness he satirizes.</p>
+
+<p>In passing from a comedy like "May-Day" to a tragedy like "Bussy
+D'Ambois," we find some difficulty in recognizing the features of the
+same nature. "Bussy D'Ambois" represents a mind not so much in creation
+as in eruption, belching forth smoke, ashes, and stones, no less than
+flame. Pope speaks of it as full of fustian; but fustian is rant in the
+words when there is no corresponding rant in the soul; whilst Chapman's
+tragedy, like Marlowe's "Tamburlaine," indicates a greater swell in the
+thoughts and passions of his characters than in their expression. The
+poetry is to Shakespeare's what gold ore is to gold. Veins and lumps of
+the precious metal gleam on the eye from the duller substance in which
+it is imbedded. Here are specimens:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Man is torch borne in the wind; a dream</i><br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><i>But of a shadow</i>, summed with all his substance;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And as great seamen, using all their wealth<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And skills in Neptune's deep invisible paths,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">In tall ships richly built and ribbed with brass,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">To put a girdle round about the world,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">When they have done it (coming near their haven)<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Are fain to give a warning piece, and call<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">A poor stayed fisherman, that never past<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">His country's sight, to waft and guide them in:<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">So when we wander furthest through the waves<br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><i>Of glassy glory and the gulfs of state,</i><br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Topped with all titles, spreading all our reaches,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">As if each private arm would sphere the earth,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">We must to Virtue for her guide resort,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Or we shall shipwreck in our safest port."<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i10">"In a king<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">All places are contained. His words and looks<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Are like the flashes and the bolts of Jove;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">His deeds inimitable, <i>like the sea</i><br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><i>That shuts still as it opes</i>, and leaves no tracks,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><i>Nor prints of precedent for mean men's acts.</i>"<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"His great heart will not down: 't is like the sea<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">That partly by his own internal heat,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Partly the stars' daily and nightly motion,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Their heat and light, and partly of the place<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The divers frames, but chiefly by the moon<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Bristled with surges, never will be won,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">(No, not when th' hearts of all those powers are burst,)<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">To make retreat into his settled home,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Till he be crowned with his own quiet foam."<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Now, all ye peaceful regents of the night,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Silently gliding exhalations,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><i>Languishing winds, and murmuring falls of waters,</i><br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><i>Sadness of heart, and ominous secureness,</i><br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><i>Enchantments, dead sleeps</i>, all the friends of rest<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">That ever wrought upon the life of man,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Extend your utmost strengths; and this charmed hour<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Fix like the centre."<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i10">"There is One<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">That wakes above, whose eye no sleep can bind:<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">He sees through doors and darkness and our thoughts."<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i8">"O, the dangerous siege<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Sin lays about us! and the tyranny<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">He exercises when he hath expugned:<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Like to the horror of a winter's thunder,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Mixed with a gushing storm, that suffer nothing<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">To stir abroad on earth but their own rages,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Is sin, when it hath gathered head above us."<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Terror of darkness! O thou king of flames!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">That with thy music-footed horse doth strike<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The clear light out of crystal, on dark earth,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And hurl'st instinctive fire about the world,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Wake, wake, the drowsy and enchanted night,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">That sleeps with dead eyes in this heavy riddle:<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">O thou great prince of shades, where never sun<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Sticks his far-darted beams, whose eyes are made<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">To shine in darkness, and see ever best<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Where men are blindest! open now the heart<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Of thy abashed oracle, that for fear<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Of some ill it includes would feign lie hid,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And rise thou with it in thy greater light."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>It is hardly possible to read Chapman's serious verse without feeling
+that he had in him the elements of a great nature, and that he was a
+magnificent specimen of what is called "irregular genius." And one of
+his poems, the dedication of his translation of the Iliad to Prince
+Henry, is of so noble a strain, and from so high a mood, that, while
+borne along with its rapture, we are tempted to place him in the first
+rank of poets and of men. You can feel and hear the throbs of the grand
+old poet's heart in such lines as these:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i10">"O, 't is wondrous much,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Though nothing prized, that the right virtuous touch<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Of a well-written soul to virtue moves;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Nor have we souls to purpose, if their loves<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Of fitting objects be not so inflamed.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">How much were then this kingdom's main soul maimed,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">To want this great inflamer of all powers<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">That move in human souls.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i3">*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Through all the pomp of kingdoms still he shines,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And graceth all his gracers.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i3">*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">A prince's statue, or in marble carved,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Or steel, or gold, and shrined, to be preserved,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Aloft on pillars and pyramides,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Time into lowest ruins may depress;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><i>But drawn with all his virtues in learned verse,</i><br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><i>Fame shall resound them on oblivion's hearse,</i><br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><i>Till graves gasp with their blasts, and dead men rise.</i>"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_704" id="Page_704">[Pg 704]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="OUR_PACIFIC_RAILROADS" id="OUR_PACIFIC_RAILROADS"></a>OUR PACIFIC RAILROADS.</h2>
+
+
+<p>Two thirds of the United States lie west of the Mississippi River. This
+vast domain has already exercised a tremendous influence over our
+political destiny. The Territories were the immediate occasion of our
+civil war. During an entire generation they furnished the arena for the
+prelusive strife of that war. The Missouri Compromise was to us of the
+East a flag of truce. But neither nature nor the men who populated the
+Western Territories recognized this flag. The vexed question of party
+platforms and sectional debate, the right and the reason of slavery,
+solved itself in the West with a freedom and rough rapidity natural to
+the soil and its population. Climatic limitations and prohibitions went
+hand in hand with the inflow of an emigration mainly from the Northern
+States,&mdash;an emigration fostered by political emotions and fevered by
+political injustice. While the South was menacing and the North
+deprecating war, far removed from this tumult of words the conflict was
+going on, and was being decided. And it was because slavery was doomed
+in the great West, and therefore in the nation, that rebellion ensued.</p>
+
+<p>It is worthy of note that the same generation which witnessed the growth
+of the Calhoun school of politics in the South, and of the Free Soil and
+(afterward) the Republican party in the North, and which followed with
+intense interest the stages of the Territorial struggle, witnessed also
+the employment of steam and electricity as agents of human progress.
+These agents, these organs of velocity, abbreviating time and space,
+said, Let the West be East; and before the locomotive the West fled from
+Buffalo to Chicago, across the prairies, the Rocky Mountains, the desert
+steppes beyond, and down the Pacific slope, until it stared the Orient
+into a self-contradiction.</p>
+
+<p>It was on the part of our government a sublime recognition of the power
+of steam, that, while it was struggling for existence, it gave its
+sanction to the Pacific Railroad enterprise. Curiously enough, it is
+through Kansas and Nebraska&mdash;the Epidaurus of our Peloponnesian
+war&mdash;that the two great rival Pacific Railroad routes are to run.</p>
+
+<p>In the summer of 1861, the project of a trans-continental railway
+connecting our Pacific communities with the older population of the East
+first assumed a practical aspect. For nearly three decades the nation
+had been dreaming of the scheme, but it had done little more than dream.
+Almost with the earliest track-laying in America, a visionary New-Yorker
+startled a sceptical generation by proclaiming the age of steam, and
+pointing at the locomotive as the instrument whereby men should yet
+penetrate the mysterious depths of the Far West, and secure for our
+growing commerce the prize of Asiatic wealth. Curious readers will find
+in the New York Courier and Enquirer of 1837 an article by Dr. Hartley
+Carver, advocating a Pacific Railroad; and in view of how little was
+known at this time of the country beyond the Alleghanies,&mdash;so little,
+indeed, that the Territories of the extreme West had no definite
+outline, but were measured from the crest of the Rocky Mountains,&mdash;the
+audacity of the proposition might justly have inspired suspicions of the
+sanity of its author. But if Dr. Carver was chimerical, he was at least
+courageous in his persistence. Ten years later, this lineal descendant
+of old John Carver transferred the question from the arena of newspaper
+discussion, and boldly memorialized Congress. Here he found a rival
+advocate in Asa Whitney, whose brain throbbed with the glowing
+possibilities of the Chinese trade, while his specious statistics and
+contagious eloquence arrested public attention.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_705" id="Page_705">[Pg 705]</a></span> Neither of these
+projectors, however, found the atmosphere of Washington propitious.
+Failing there, they once more had recourse to the press. The discovery
+of gold in California gave fresh vigor to the agitation. In 1850, that
+notable railroad king, William B. Ogden, lent his name to the
+enterprise, and by his cogent and well-considered appeals excited
+confidence in statesmen and capitalists. Three years after, Congress
+yielded to the popular pressure, and ordered those surveys, the result
+of which lies in eleven bulky departmental volumes, and bears the name
+of "Pacific Railroad Reports." Then came the Fremont campaign, with its
+burning enthusiasm, the Pacific Railroad plank in the Republican
+platform, and the defeat which was almost a victory. The succeeding year
+a strong effort was made to secure a national charter; but though
+supported by the Senate, the measure failed to carry in the Lower House.</p>
+
+<p>This disastrous rebuff at Washington produced a profound indignation
+throughout wide sections; yet it may be questioned whether the arguments
+on which the railway scheme was based were sufficiently solid to justify
+such encouragement to the investment of floating capital as the passage
+of the bill would have implied. Beyond the Missouri River, even on the
+line of Western travel, population was as sparsely scattered as in an
+Indian reservation. Neither the gold reaches of Colorado nor the
+silver-bearing "leads" of the Washoe district had as yet been
+discovered. California was known only as a region of placer-digging, and
+its agricultural capacities were very inadequately comprehended. Nor had
+the Pacific Steamship Company ventured to create its China line. A
+railroad certain to cost one hundred and forty millions, as the War
+Department asserted, had in prospect for an immediate revenue only the
+meagre trade of Salt Lake City, and the freightage of bullion from the
+Pacific shore. Indeed, the prevailing faith in the enterprise almost
+passes belief, when it is remembered that no satisfactory survey had
+been made of the Sierra Nevada. That terrible pile of snow-crowned
+peaks, of deep-sunk ravines, of jagged ridges and perilous chasms, where
+the winding bridle-track scarcely permits a driver to walk beside his
+mule, seemed to defy the skill of our boldest engineers. Overland
+travellers reported depths of snow varying from twenty to fifty feet.
+Fearful stories were narrated of luckless wagon-trains caught in the
+narrow defiles by sudden mountain storms, and perishing helplessly amid
+these Alpine rigors. It was surely a legitimate question whether a
+railroad were possible in the face of such embarrassments; and it is
+fair to attribute the adverse action of Congress to these
+considerations, rather than to occult and scarcely explicable sectional
+motives.</p>
+
+<p>At the commencement of the next decade, all this, however, was changed.
+California had developed into a rich grape-producing country. Its
+cereals were beyond the demands of local consumption. A considerable
+trade had sprung up with Oregon, the Sandwich Islands, and latterly with
+China. The production of quicksilver was on the increase. Valuable
+copper mines had recently been opened. Moreover, the immense gold seams
+of Colorado, the vast silver deposits in Nevada, and the auriferous
+quartz of Idaho, were disclosed almost simultaneously, diverting
+population to the interior table-lands, and calling loudly for an
+economical method of transit. Upon the Pacific shore, the desire for a
+through road suddenly became intensified, while the profitableness of a
+railway, at least to the Humboldt Sink, became more and more apparent.
+If only the Sierra might be pierced! That appalling obstacle still threw
+its shadow over the enterprise. Fortunately, at this very crisis there
+wandered down from the mountain, in the pleasant summer days, a railway
+surveyor and engineer, Theodore D. Judah, who had had extensive Eastern
+experiences, and Californian as well. He was a thin, short,
+light-haired<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_706" id="Page_706">[Pg 706]</a></span> Massachusetts man, enthusiastic, conscientious, cautious,
+and with a quick eye for discovering the opportunities of science amid
+the obstacles of nature,&mdash;a trait which in an engineer is rightly named
+genius. While engaged in the survey of private claims, he had worked out
+what appeared, on a hurried examination, to be a perfectly feasible
+route through the hills. At Sacramento he modestly stated this belief;
+and in a resident merchant, Mr. C. P. Huntington, he found a willing
+listener. Mr. Huntington, who is to the California end of the Pacific
+Railroad what Durant is to the co-operating Nebraska branch, describes
+in graphic language the earnest consultations, prolonged for several
+weeks, which he and a few other friends held in Leland Stanford's store
+after the day's business was through. There were seven of these men all
+told, not one of them worth less than half a million, and each ready to
+stake his entire property in the enterprise, if it promised success. The
+maps of the new-comer were consulted, the lines carefully studied, and
+the result of their deliberations was the temporary organization of what
+is now known as the Central Pacific Railroad Company of California. The
+engineer in whose representations so much confidence was placed soon
+proved that he was worthy of that confidence; money was forthcoming; an
+adequate surveying party was sent out; and in the summer months of 1861,
+Judah demonstrated the existence of a route by the South Yuba River and
+the Donner Pass greatly superior to all other projected lines, with no
+insuperable engineering difficulties, and capable of defence against all
+interruption by freshet or snow. In the mean while the State Legislature
+had granted a charter to the incorporators in July; and at the first
+stockholders' meeting Stanford was elected president and Huntington
+vice-president of the company. It was evident, however, that an
+undertaking of such vast dimensions could not be completed without
+government help; and the Sacramento party, confident that in Mr. Judah's
+surveys lay the solution of the Pacific problem, repaired at once to
+Washington, and opened anew the railroad agitation.</p>
+
+<p>While the energy of the West was still engaged in penetrating the
+secrets of the formidable Sierra, a movement meaning work began to
+develop itself on the Eastern border. As a general statement, and
+without reference to individual routes, it may be said that in the
+Northern cis-Mississippi States there are two separate railroad systems,
+running in lines about parallel from east to west; the upper combination
+of routes debouching at Chicago, the lower, or central, at St. Louis.
+These lines are slightly entangled with the roads concentrating at
+Cincinnati and Indianapolis; but the division into an upper and lower
+route is sufficiently preserved to admit of distinct classification. The
+capitalists of both the great cities which form the terminal points of
+these systems had long been equally alive to the vast possibilities of
+the Pacific trade, and were eager, not only from local pride, but also
+from knowledge of the simplest principles of commercial policy, to
+secure to their respective communities the main bulk of this immense
+prospective traffic. With this view, Chicago had projected three lines
+across the State of Iowa, all of which were ultimately to converge at
+Council Bluffs. Thence across the coffee-colored Missouri, over rolling
+prairies, and up the slowly curving line of the Platte, stretched an
+easily rising ascent, which, engineers affirmed, had been graduated by
+nature as the most direct and practicable route for the interoceanic
+railroad. As yet no one of these Iowa lines was complete; but they all
+had a corporate existence, and their stockholders formed a nucleus for a
+distinct Pacific movement.</p>
+
+<p>St Louis, on the other hand, aided by the State of which it was the
+commercial capital, had as early as 1851 commenced the construction of
+the Missouri Pacific Railway, whose line shot straight as an arrow
+westward across the State, curving slightly to the north at its
+terminus, which was fixed at Kansas<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_707" id="Page_707">[Pg 707]</a></span> City. Four years later, the
+Territorial government of Kansas incorporated the Leavenworth, Pawnee,
+and Western Railroad, with privilege to build from Leavenworth to Fort
+Riley, and thence westerly. It is apparent that the two companies might
+readily connect, and thus form a rival grand trunk Pacific road.</p>
+
+<p>Both the upper and the lower-enterprises, however, remained for many
+years after their inception in a quiescent state, serving simply as
+topics of newspaper discussion, or of buncombe addresses from local
+rostrums. But in 1860-61 the unexpected discovery of large deposits of
+the precious metals in Colorado and in Nevada gave an enormous impulse
+to the carrying trade of the plains, and the same argument which proved
+so cogent in California aroused the Western capitalists from their
+lethargy. Rumors of the new line over the Sierra also found their way
+East; and the Legislature of Kansas, now a young and vigorous State,
+passed a joint resolution in March, 1862, urging on Congress the
+immediate creation of a national Pacific Railroad Company. In
+anticipation of this action, the agents of the lower route had already
+proceeded to Washington, where they found themselves suddenly in the
+presence, not only of the representatives of the Central Company of
+California, but also of the Chicago projectors and their New York
+friends.</p>
+
+<p>It will scarcely be profitable at the present time to descend into the
+particulars of the rivalry which interests in many respects so divergent
+necessarily entailed. A gentleman who had singular opportunities for
+arriving at an unprejudiced judgment recently informed the writer of
+this article that one company alone employed the element of "influence"
+to the extent of three millions of dollars, or its supposed equivalent.
+Facts of this nature, however, are outside of our purpose; and we shall
+limit our illustration of the character of the struggle to a brief
+glance at the curious tangle of compromises which the charter itself
+presents. Passed in the Lower House by a catch vote, and pushed with
+difficulty through the Senate by appeals to party pledges, by
+unimpeachable proofs of the feasibility of the scheme and the financial
+integrity of its advocates, and above all by intimations amounting
+almost to threats of a possible secession of the Pacific communities,
+the act of 1862 bears the evidence of a conflict of purposes in almost
+every one of its sections. It is evident, for example, that, with the
+tide of civil war beating fiercely around the national capital, Congress
+was still under the spell of the past, and severely distrustful of any
+avoidable increase of public obligations. Bonds were loaned to the
+enterprise at the rate of sixteen thousand dollars per mile for the easy
+work, with treble aid for the mountain division and double for the Salt
+Lake Valley; but this loan was made a first mortgage, twenty-five per
+cent, was reserved till the completion of the road, and the transit
+business of government was to be paid solely by the extinguishment of
+the bonded debt. The land grant also was but six thousand four hundred
+acres per mile. The clashing interests of St. Louis and Chicago are
+shown in the ignoring of any special eastern terminus, and the location
+of the initial point of a new trunk road upon the one hundredth
+meridian, at some equidistant station, to be designated by the
+President. As the Kansas party was already possessed of an organization,
+the charter modified this advantage by incorporating the Nebraska
+line<a name="FNanchor_B_2" id="FNanchor_B_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_B_2" class="fnanchor">[B]</a>, under the name of the Union Pacific Company, and gave it a
+predominant place in the specifications of the act. The aid of
+government, however, was proffered<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_708" id="Page_708">[Pg 708]</a></span> in equal degree to the road which
+was to cross the mountains from Sacramento, and to both the Eastern
+lines; the last two being required to complete a hundred miles each
+within two years after they had respectively filed their assent to the
+terms of the act, while the Central was to build at the rate of
+twenty-five miles a year up the ridges of the Sierra.</p>
+
+<p>In hard-currency times, and with the labor and iron market easy, these
+terms might have been sufficient to invite the ready aid of capital. But
+the close of 1862 and the year succeeding were the darkest periods of
+the war. Gold vibrated from 140 to 180. Iron, which in 1859, sold for
+$35 a ton, was now selling for $130. Moreover, while money was tight,
+labor was also scarce. The two great agencies on which a vast public
+work like this must inevitably depend proved utterly inadequate to the
+emergency. Nevertheless, both the companies which had already an organic
+existence bent themselves with no inconsiderable vigor to their task.
+The Central Pacific accepted the responsibilities and obligations of the
+charter six months after its passage, and commenced the work of grading
+in the succeeding February. Rails, chairs, and rolling stock were
+forwarded by sea, involving heavy expenditures for freightage, and a ten
+per cent war risk on insurance. The company endured further
+embarrassments from the lack of capital, and the fact that in California
+a metallic currency formed the only circulating medium. Nor was it the
+least of its difficulties that the enterprise met with an ambiguous
+reception in many portions of the State, San Francisco especially
+regarding it with cold indifference. The zeal with which the road was
+pushed amid these embarrassments is a striking evidence of the thorough
+faith of its projectors. Although it soon became apparent that further
+legislation would be needed to relieve them from the disabilities
+inherent in the meagreness of the government subsidy, they nevertheless
+succeeded by the 6th of June, 1864, in cutting their line through to
+New Castle, and in laying thereon a solid and continuous track.</p>
+
+<p>In Kansas, the Leavenworth, Pawnee, and Western Railroad Company or, as
+they were beginning to style themselves the Union Pacific Railway,
+Eastern Division, had contracted for an immediate and rapid construction
+of their line as early as September 30th. By the spring of 1863, the
+contractors, Messrs. Ross, Steele, &amp; Co., had involved themselves to the
+extent of five millions, of dollars, and were in full operation with an
+adequate corps of laborers, grading, quarrying stone, building culverts,
+etc. Suddenly, however, all this busy movement ceased. By one of those
+strange revolutions that occasionally occur in the management of
+corporations, a man notorious throughout the whole border, familiarly
+called Sam Hallet, assumed control of the company, denounced the
+contract as in nowise valid, and peremptorily ordered the agents of the
+contracting party to abandon the work. The agents refused. Affairs now
+assumed the aspect of war. Hallet procured a company of United States
+dragoons from Fort Leavenworth, and rode down upon the contumacious
+contractors. The result of this cavalry dash is rather picturesquely
+described in a letter of this novel railroad general, dated August 15,
+1863:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"I have had an awful row with Carter, a battle on the works, and a sharp
+'pitch in' to get possession; we drove them back, and into the river,
+until they cried enough. S. S. Sharp, my foreman Section No. 1, led
+Carter to the river-bank by the collar; and but for his begging, he
+would have ducked him. I expect Steele and Carter on again with
+reinforcements. Let them come! We will put them into the river the next
+time. We have had to use <i>strong force</i>, <i>quick</i> and <i>bold</i>. We have
+taken all their ties, houses, and works, and shall hold them."</p>
+
+<p>Triumphant on the battle-field, Hallet now made a rapid
+counter-movement, and effected a transfer of the ownership of the
+company to a new set of capitalists, putting them into immediate
+possession<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_709" id="Page_709">[Pg 709]</a></span> of the entire property of the old corporation. Of the legal
+merits of this singular man&oelig;uvre we are not prepared to give an
+opinion; but it is proper for us to add, that it met with vigorous
+resistance on the part of the former stockholders, at the head of whom
+stood Fremont. Sharp litigations and stormy altercations ensued; and for
+many months most vital to its interests the whole Kansas enterprise was
+shut from view.</p>
+
+<p>While these two companies were moving forward, the one steadily
+overcoming financial and engineering difficulties, the other plunging
+into an inexplicable imbroglio of contested management and contested
+contracts, that great combination of capitalists which held the
+destinies of the Union Pacific met at Chicago in September, 1862, and
+took the preliminary steps for the formation of a company. Books for
+stock subscriptions were opened in every loyal State and Territory. In
+June of the next year the acceptance of the charter by a provisional
+direction was filed at Washington. Nevertheless, an annoying apathy
+filled the public mind. Capital was shy of the enterprise. The terms of
+the act of 1862 were deemed unsatisfactory. Up to August, 1863, only
+about eighty thousand dollars had been subscribed.</p>
+
+<p>At this point, Thomas C. Durant, whose connection with Western roads had
+inspired so much faith in the Pacific project, threw the weight of his
+capital and influence so determinately into the scale, that by October
+the subscriptions had reached two millions, and the company was in a
+condition to organize. Major-General John A. Dix was elected president,
+Dr. Durant became vice-president and general manager, and the
+preliminary survey which he had ordered at his personal expense was
+approved and officially adopted by the direction. As, however, a
+wide-spread feeling existed, not only that additional legislation was
+necessary, but that it might also be obtained, the company contented
+itself that year with the selection of its eastern terminus. President
+Lincoln was consulted; and, acting upon his unofficial sanction, the
+Union Pacific broke ground for the railroad at Omaha, then a struggling
+village in Nebraska Territory, nearly opposite Council Bluffs. The
+inaugural ceremony took place December 2d, and with this event the year
+closed.</p>
+
+<p>For the next few months the efforts of all the companies converged upon
+Congress. The Union Pacific Company appeared at Washington in great
+force. The Central, equally urgent, presented arguments that amounted to
+demonstration; the chief points being the energy with which they had
+striven to comply with the terms of the charter, and the painful failure
+that had attended their endeavor,&mdash;a failure clearly imputable to the
+insufficiency of the original bill. The Kansas Company, though rent in
+twain by rival boards of directors, was also on the ground, animated by
+very ambitious purposes, and with a determination to win its ends in
+spite of internal complications. The vigor with which the latter body
+took the field gave a complex character to the struggle, and very much
+prolonged it. On vital points, however, all parties were in accord, and
+in the main results of the campaign each achieved a splendid success.
+The supplementary bill, approved July 2, 1864, as much surpassed the
+legislation of two years previous as the sixteen hundred million
+national debt of 1864 exceeded the five-hundred million debt of 1862;
+The colossal expenditures of the war had led Congressmen to accept the
+estimates of railroad men with implicit credence, and to second their
+demands with generosity. The land grant was doubled, the government
+bonds were made a second lien to the roads under construction, the
+twenty-five per cent reservation was removed, and one half of government
+business was to be paid in money.</p>
+
+<p>The Union Pacific Company effected an important modification of the
+charter in respect to their particular interests. Their maximum capital
+was still fixed at one hundred millions, but individual shares were
+lowered from a thousand to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_710" id="Page_710">[Pg 710]</a></span> a hundred dollars each. Furthermore, the
+hitherto unwieldy board of direction was limited to fifteen members. On
+the other hand, the Kansas organization obtained the privilege of making
+their own road the grand trunk route, connecting with the Central
+Pacific, in case they should anticipate the Nebraska line in reaching
+the one hundredth meridian, and the latter road should not appear to be
+proceeding in good faith.</p>
+
+<p>As the act which bestowed such signal favors had granted an extension of
+a year for the completion of the first division of each road, the Union
+Pacific was under no absolute compulsion to hasten its work.
+Nevertheless, surveying parties were kept in the field, and the contract
+for the construction of the road to the one hundredth meridian was
+signed in August. This agreement, though nominally known, as the Hoxie
+contract, derived the guaranty of its performance from the Credit
+Mobilier,&mdash;an organization with an actual capital of two millions and a
+half, recently created upon the model of the great Paris corporation,
+and in the hands of a few moneyed men whose enterprise and energy were
+admirably proportioned to their large wealth. Its heaviest capitalists
+were also stockholders in the projected road; and as payment was to be
+made in bonds and shares, the Credit Mobilier at once became an
+over-shadowing stockholder in the Union Pacific. The arrangement at a
+subsequent period may not have been wholly beneficial; but at the date
+of the contract the alliance was of incalculable importance. Although
+two millions of stock had been subscribed, the Nebraska line had in
+reality only twenty thousand dollars in its treasury. Without the Credit
+Mobilier, it would have faltered on the threshold of success. Even with
+this powerful auxiliary, it was not yet strong enough to prevent an
+unexpected and vexatious delay.</p>
+
+<p>The first forty miles west from Omaha had been intrusted to Peter A.
+Dey, an engineer of some experience in the West. This gentleman, whose
+ideas seem to have been limited to a straight line, had constructed a
+track satisfactory in its alignments, but with a maximum grade of eighty
+feet per mile, and involving temporary grading of one hundred and
+sixteen feet at several points of the route. A later survey, made under
+the supervision of Colonel Seymour, demonstrated the existence of a far
+better line with forty-feet grades and but nine miles longer. Placed
+upon abstract grounds, there was no question of the relative advantage
+of the two routes. The combined opinion of several of the most skilful
+railroad managers in the country was unanimous for the lower grade, as
+essential to rapid and economical transportation. But there was another
+element in the case which gave a different aspect to the affair. Dey's
+line terminated at Omaha; Seymour's, at Bellevue. If the new route were
+selected, all the magnificent dreams of the Omaha land speculators would
+be summarily dispelled. The territorial population caught the alarm.
+Public meetings were called. A committee was sent post to Washington. It
+was asserted, on grounds that were not destitute of plausibility, that
+the change was attributable quite as much to motives of a stock-jobbing
+order, as to economic considerations. To this charge Dr. Durant
+indignantly replied, but this did not appease the clamor. Nor was the
+dispute ended until after five months of tedious investigation, and a
+guaranteed promise on the part of the company, that, in adopting the new
+line, there should be no alteration of terminus.</p>
+
+<p>While Omaha was still in the white-heat of excitement, the contractors
+had been steadily employed in collecting material for a grand industrial
+campaign. Distant, in the line of travel then open to them, more than
+sixteen hundred miles from New York, with the Missouri River as their
+main avenue for the transportation of rolling stock and machinery west
+of St. Louis, the men who had undertaken to build the road bent
+themselves to the task with a vigor and celerity heretofore
+unequalled in railroad history. Iron from New<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_711" id="Page_711">[Pg 711]</a></span> England, shipped in
+coasting-vessels, and working its slow way through the Gulf of Mexico
+and up the knotted bends of the Mississippi; iron, from Pennsylvania by
+the lower route, and from New York by upper lines; iron in all
+conditions and shapes, from rails, chains, and spikes, to car-wheels and
+steam-engines,&mdash;came pouring in week by week, a tonnage beyond all
+estimate or comparison, and involving, from the want of rail
+connections, unparalleled expenditures. The transportation of one class
+of freight alone cost thirteen hundred thousand dollars. All other
+expenses were upon the same magnificent scale. Nebraska, though
+admirably adapted for agriculture, is singularly destitute of woodland.
+The lumber for building, and the cross-ties for track-laying, could only
+be obtained in small quantities and at great distances. Many of the
+sleepers travelled two hundred miles before they found repose on the
+road-bed. The labor market also was but scantily supplied, and agents
+for procuring navvies were despatched east, west, and south. But the
+splendid energy of the contractors had been fruitful of success. A vast
+aggregate of forces stood ready at the melting of the winter's snow and
+the click of the telegraph key to spring into enormous activity.</p>
+
+<p>About the middle of April, 1866, the message came, and the work began.
+Along the dead level of the Platte Valley, through endless reaches of
+prairie, and behind the meagre shelter of outlying hills, the rails are
+still falling in place,&mdash;a continuous belt of iron out-rolled over black
+loam and arid sand,&mdash;mile after mile, day after day; and with the close
+of the present year there will stretch an unbroken line of five hundred
+and twenty miles of rail across the Plains to the foot of the Black
+Hills. There is no occasion to dilate upon the wonderful systemization
+of labor which has characterized the work of construction. The public is
+already well apprised of the details, from the pens of industrious and
+graphic newspaper correspondents. The company itself has been by no
+means laggard in celebrating its enterprise. Excursion parties of
+capitalists, editors, and Congressmen have severally given in their
+testimony; but, after all, the one fact that in less than twenty months
+American energy has brought the Rocky Mountains within two and one half
+days' journey of New York&mdash;though the distance is two thousand
+miles&mdash;tells the whole story. One of the chief difficulties of this
+Nebraska route has been, as we have intimated, the scarcity of suitable
+material for cross-ties, and of fuel for the engines. The employment of
+Burnetized cottonwood, and the discovery of a very considerable quantity
+of cedar in the interior, have, however, effectually solved one phase of
+this problem; while for the production of steam science now offers
+petroleum as a practical substitute for wood and coal. But independently
+of this, the road has already reached the bituminous beds of the Black
+Hills, where it will probably find a plentiful supply for its
+necessities. Water also is obtained in sufficient quantities by digging
+from ten to twenty feet down, to the sand which filters the waters of
+the Platte.</p>
+
+<p>Shortly after the Nebraska Company had thrown off the drag-weight of
+local embarrassment, the Kansas line began to disentangle itself from
+legal complications; and on July 1, 1865, the enterprise passed into the
+hands of a management which, if powerless to retrieve the past, was at
+least determined to make the future secure. At the head of this new
+organization was John D. Perry of St Louis; and associated with him were
+a body of capitalists in Missouri and Pennsylvania whose financial
+ability was unquestioned, and who have since evinced a vigor and
+commercial prescience which elevate them to the level of their Eastern
+rivals. Perceiving that the miserable Fremont-Hallet quarrel had
+effectually frustrated all rivalry in the construction of a track to the
+one hundredth meridian, they made application to Congress for an
+extension of their line to Denver, by the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_712" id="Page_712">[Pg 712]</a></span> Smoky Hill Fork, with the
+privilege of connecting at that point with the Union Pacific. The
+request was readily granted, and the usual land gift of twelve thousand
+eight hundred acres per mile accorded for the entire route. No further
+issue of government bonds was allowed; but as the company was now
+possessed of adequate capital, and as the loans to the other companies
+must all eventually be paid back, there was really very little
+difference in financial advantage on the side of the Nebraska line.
+Moreover, the slight balance against the Kansas route was quite made up
+in the greater fertility of the soil which it would traverse, and the
+large preponderance of its local business, the population along the line
+being treble that of the upper road. These considerations gave an
+elasticity to the Kansas project, and under the new management the work
+of construction has gone on rapidly. The present year will probably find
+the road halting at not less than three hundred and fifty miles west of
+Wyandotte, now the junction-point of the Union Pacific, Eastern
+Division, with the Missouri Pacific Railroad. But this company is not
+satisfied with a simple connection with the Nebraska road. It proposes,
+after making this connection, to continue its main line to San Francisco
+by an extensive detour southward, avoiding the difficult mountain
+systems between Denver and Sacramento, and at the same time availing
+itself of that immense trade which lies visible or latent throughout
+Arizona, New Mexico, and Southern California. Escaping the overwhelming
+snows of the Rocky Mountains, this route will pass through a salubrious
+region abounding in timber and bituminous coal.<a name="FNanchor_C_3" id="FNanchor_C_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_C_3" class="fnanchor">[C]</a> By intersecting the
+Rio Grande at Albuquerque, it will hold out to the Southern States a
+tempting invitation to form connections, and share to the fullest extent
+in the benefits of this great national enterprise. In this way the
+Pacific Railroad stands ready to second Congress in the work of
+"reconstruction."</p>
+
+<p>Of the Central Pacific Road we have not as yet spoken adequately, and
+shall now be compelled to give the history of its achievements in a
+wholly insufficient space. Unlike the Eastern roads, it has allowed no
+pause in its work from the day of the first track-laying to the present
+moment. Unlike these roads, also, it has had to contend with great
+engineering difficulties from the start, while the material for its
+construction required to be brought over distances to which the
+transportation annoyances of the other lines offer no parallel. All the
+rolling stock, rails, etc. doubled Cape Horn. The timber for the
+trestle-work of bridges was brought from Puget's Sound. For laborers it
+had recourse to China. To reach the crest of the Sierra, they were
+obliged to pierce the hillsides fifteen times, the tunnelling alone
+amounting in continuous line to 6,262 feet. The eight-hour labor
+movement was an additional embarrassment. Embankments built up with
+incalculable labor, and protected by every device of engineering
+science, settled in many cases, and were repaired only after much delay
+and vast expense. Nevertheless, the indomitable projectors of the
+enterprise have proved themselves equal to their task. The Summit Tunnel
+was cut through in August of this year; and by November the road will
+have been extended, not only to the crest of the mountains, but far down
+the eastern slope. Hunter's, which is<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_713" id="Page_713">[Pg 713]</a></span> the wagon depot of the Nevada
+miners, two hundred and seventy-four miles from San Francisco, and one
+hundred and fifty miles from Sacramento, is the point which the
+locomotive is certain to reach by the close of 1867.<a name="FNanchor_D_4" id="FNanchor_D_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_D_4" class="fnanchor">[D]</a></p>
+
+<p>Thus far there have been built six hundred and fifty miles of completed
+road. Adding the water route to San Francisco, there are about eight
+hundred miles of continuous steam communication. Despite also the
+bleakness of the Plains in winter, and the protracted rigors of the
+Sierra, it is demonstrated that snow can be no more an obstacle to the
+railroads than icebergs have proved to the Atlantic cable. Including the
+Eastern connections with New York as the Atlantic terminus, we have,
+therefore, two thousand two hundred and fifty miles of the interoceanic
+railroad already in actual operation.</p>
+
+<p>From Hunter's, in Nevada, to the eastern base of the Rocky Mountains,
+stretches the long space of unfinished work, ten hundred and fifty-four
+miles of railroad line, with three sharp crests and a gently rolling
+intra-mountain desert, where the dew never falls, where the twilight
+lingers long into the evening, and the eye wearies of the wastes of
+sage-bush, and the tracts of scant grass between arid breadths of
+dazzling white alkaline sand. A glance at the grades discloses one of
+the difficulties with which the Union Pacific has now to grapple. From
+the Black Hills, within thirty miles the track must rise to its first
+and loftiest ascent, 8,242 feet above the sea-level. Then comes a
+descent of a thousand feet for the same distance, succeeded by equal
+alternations of rise and fall for eight successive points. Beyond Bear
+River, however, these gigantic mountain waves lengthen, and the vast
+interior basin rolls broadly and heavily, with an average level of
+forty-five hundred feet, past Weber Canon and Humboldt Wells. Here the
+line strikes Humboldt River, and runs southwesterly to the Big Bend of
+the Truckee River, along a region singularly favorable in its
+alignments, and described as well supplied with wood and water. In this
+respect recent surveys essentially corroborate the testimony of Fremont.</p>
+
+<p>The difficulties to be overcome by the Central Pacific in its route over
+and through the mountains to meet its eastern branches have already been
+described. But, notwithstanding these, the company claims that it can
+readily construct its line at the rate of one mile per day for five
+hundred working-days. It has nearly ten thousand laborers at work, most
+of them Chinese. The portion of the road completed, with its excellent
+rails, its ties of red-wood and tamarack, and its granite culverts, has
+elicited praise from government commissioners for the thoroughness of
+its execution.</p>
+
+<p>Though none of the routes are as yet completed, the net earnings of each
+of the three companies, over and above the interest on its bonds, have
+surpassed all expectation. In 1865 and 1866 the net earnings of the
+Central Road amounted to $936,000 in gold, and in 1867 they are
+estimated at one million dollars; and this surplus is applied to the
+construction of the road. The net earnings of the Union Pacific
+(Nebraska) Road for the quarter ending July 31, 1867, were $376,589 in
+currency. Those of the Eastern or Kansas<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_714" id="Page_714">[Pg 714]</a></span> branch, for the month of
+August alone, $235,000. Of course these estimates of the profit of the
+roads under the present circumstances are but faint indications of the
+wealth which must accrue to them upon their completion, and after the
+fuller development of the resources upon which they depend. At the
+sources of this future wealth we shall glance presently.</p>
+
+<p>There can be no possible occasion for rivalry between these three
+companies. Each road will take its place in the great work of
+interoceanic communication, and each will find its capacities meagre as
+compared with the commerce which awaits it. But apart from a merely
+commercial view, there are certain points of comparison between the
+various routes which demand a brief notice. The Kansas route will
+probably prove most attractive to the tourists, especially in the event
+of its making the detour through New Mexico above alluded to. The
+Nebraska route will be more monotonous, running across the level and
+treeless valley of the Platte for three hundred miles. To the traveller
+there will always be presented the same swift but shallow river at his
+side, the same bare, misty hills along the horizon, the same limitless
+stretch of the plain before and behind, and the same solitary sky above,
+save as it is varied by sunrise and sunset, until the Black Hills come
+to his relief, and he enters upon the snow-whelmed Sierra. The Central
+route is more picturesque, and also has more elements of grandeur, than
+either of the others. The Nebraska Road, on account of the character of
+the country through which it passes, will probably derive its main
+revenue from the through trade; while the Kansas&mdash;if its present purpose
+be carried out&mdash;will depend upon the local trade and its multifarious
+connections.</p>
+
+<p>Having traced the history of these Pacific roads, the difficulties which
+they have met and in a large degree conquered, and their general
+features, our consideration of them must from this point grow out of
+their national importance and world-wide significance. For the Pacific
+Railroad is not simply a gigantic public work, it is the world's great
+highway. The world has had several grand routes, along the line of
+which, for certain periods of time, the life-blood and intelligence of
+humanity have coursed. Such was the route which history discloses as the
+most ancient from India overland to the Mediterranean, whence it was
+continued by that old Ph&oelig;nician Coast Navigation Company to the
+shores of Britain. Along this overland line grew up the great cities of
+Asia, depending upon it for their wealth, refinement, and power; and
+when commerce was diverted from the inland, and the riches of India took
+the ocean path westward, the glory of these cities departed. Such also
+was that later route which gave the Italian cities their opulence and
+strength in the Middle Ages. When the Cape of Good Hope was doubled,
+these Italian centres grew comparatively weak and lustreless. The Roman
+road to Britain laid the foundation of that power, the full development
+of which has given to London its present position as the European
+metropolis. New York City also owes her rapid and stupendous growth to
+that peculiar conjunction of circumstances which has secured her the
+control of the grand Transatlantic commercial route of present times.
+The railroads leading westward from that city, converging upon the
+termini of the Pacific lines, continue this world-route of the incoming
+era to San Francisco, and there, through the Golden Gate, we grasp the
+wealth of Eastern Asia, whence the first great world-route started.
+Events more powerful than tradition have thus revolutionized the old
+system of travel and commerce, calling them eastward. America becomes at
+once interoceanic and mediterranean, commanding the two oceans, and
+mediating between Europe and Asia. By the Pacific Railroad, Hong Kong
+via New York is only forty days distant from London. The tea and silks
+of China and the products of the Spice Islands must pass through America
+to Europe. In this<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_715" id="Page_715">[Pg 715]</a></span> connection, also, there is a profound significance
+in our alliance, every year growing stronger, with Russia, whose extreme
+southern boundary joins Japan, our latest and warmest Asiatic ally.</p>
+
+<p>But the development of American commercial power as against the world is
+secondary to the internal development of our own resources, and to the
+indissoluble bond of national union afforded by this inland route from
+the Atlantic to the Pacific, and by its future connections with every
+portion of our territory. In thirty years, California will have a
+population equal to that of New York to-day, and yet not be half full,
+and the city of St. Louis will number a million of souls. New York City
+and San Francisco, as the two great <i>entrep&ocirc;ts</i> of trade; Chicago and
+St. Louis as its two vital centres; and New Orleans at the mouth of our
+great national canal, the Mississippi,&mdash;will become nations rather than
+cities, out-stripping all the great cities of ancient and modern
+history. As far as the resources of the West are concerned, one Pacific
+railroad, with two or three branches, will not suffice; we may need a
+road along every parallel. The West is still in a large degree <i>terra
+incognita</i>. We know it only in parts. We are indeed aware that
+California is already competing with Russia and the cis-Mississippi
+States in the production of cereals, and that the mineral region of the
+West now annually yields gold and silver worth one hundred millions of
+dollars. But California's agricultural resources are almost untouched;
+while the best "leads" of the vast mineral region are not worked, from
+the fear of a savage race. Missouri extends over thirty-five millions of
+acres of arable land, two millions of which are the alluvial margins of
+rivers, and twenty thousand high rolling prairie; but five sevenths of
+the soil is yet fallow. We see Denver and other cities of the Far West
+spring up in a day; but their growth, marvellous as it is, arises from
+the circumstance that they are great mineral centres, and is cramped and
+partial, depending upon a wearisome and insecure overland route,
+extending over hundreds of miles, via Salt Lake, to Atchison. The
+Pacific Railroad will quicken this development to its full
+possibilities; it will populate the West in a few years; and along its
+lines will spring up a hundred cities, which will advance in the swift
+march of national progress just in proportion to their opportunities for
+rapid communication with the older centres of opulence and culture.</p>
+
+<p>The Indians also, whose sad plaint against the inevitable civilization
+of the locomotive is still ringing in all ears, must succumb before the
+presence of this new power. When we reflect that a single regiment of
+soldiers costs a million a year, we must see that the railroad as a
+peace instrument will render more than an equivalent for all government
+assistance given to it. Moreover, our frontier posts must soon be
+rendered unnecessary by the operation of commerce. The same influence
+will also dissipate the power which the Mormons have gained solely by
+their isolation.</p>
+
+<p>But beyond these immediate considerations arise the magnificent
+commercial certainties which the logic of history reveals. Space fails
+us at this point of fruitful speculation; but it will suffice to say
+that the corollary of the Pacific railroads is the transfer of the
+world's commerce to America, and the substitution of New York for Paris
+and London as the world's exchange. In the train of these immeasurable
+events must come the wealth and the culture which have hitherto been
+limited to Europe. With the year 1866 began the <i>rapid</i> work of this
+revolutionizing enterprise. The year of grace 1870 will witness its
+completion. The four years' civil war is followed by the four years'
+victory of peace. Already the Western cities are tremulous with the
+aspirations which it excites; and the metropolis of the East, with its
+new steamship lines to Brazil, its Cuban cable, and its hundred
+prospective enterprises, awaits the moment which shall lift it to
+imperial importance.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_B_2" id="Footnote_B_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_B_2"><span class="label">[B]</span></a> The use of this phrase requires explanation. It has been
+previously stated that Council Bluffs was the point on which the Chicago
+lines were concentrating. It is now to be added, that beyond this
+growing settlement, across the Missouri River, lies Nebraska, and the
+proposed route would necessarily pass through the whole length of this
+State. At the rival roads are connected to a greater or less degree with
+the interests of the States in which are their respective eastern
+termini, and as the legal titles of the two roads are at once ambiguous
+and disagreeably long, we have preferred to designate them simply as the
+Kansas and Nebraska lines.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_C_3" id="Footnote_C_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_C_3"><span class="label">[C]</span></a> The point suggested for this divergence southward is in the
+vicinity of Pond Creek, four hundred and twenty miles west of the
+Missouri River. Thence it will deflect to the southwest, touching the
+base of the mountains one hundred and seventy miles beyond Pond Creek,
+near the boundary-line between Colorado and New Mexico. Thus, having
+passed through Southeastern Colorado, New Mexico, and Arizona, it finds
+its way northward, through the marvellously fertile region of Southern
+California, to San Francisco. It is noteworthy that this project offers
+to Mexico immediate participation in our commerce, affording the basis
+of a far more enduring annexation. It is possible that in no far-distant
+future, if this scheme is achieved, San Francisco will find a rival in
+San Diego,&mdash;four hundred and fifty-six miles southeast of the former,
+and a much nearer port for the purposes of this route. The project of a
+mountain line from Denver to Salt Lake City, connecting at that point
+with the Central Railroad, is also said to be entertained by the Kansas
+company.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_D_4" id="Footnote_D_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_D_4"><span class="label">[D]</span></a> Up to the present time, the Nebraska line has expended
+about twenty-five millions; the Central Railroad, twenty-two millions.
+On two hundred and fifty-nine miles of the Kansas Road there were also
+expended, in cost and equipment, eleven millions. All this has been
+obtained from the sale of bonds, paid-in stock, and the net earnings of
+the roads. The bonds have been made a popular loan, sold by New York
+agents, and chiefly taken in New England, New York State, and Eastern
+Pennsylvania. The purchasing clasp, though largely composed of heavy
+capitalists, consists also of those who have small sums of money to
+invest, and who seek this means as especially secure.
+</p><p>
+The stockholders of the Union Pacific number from one to two hundred,
+but most of the shares are in a few hands; the Credit Mobilier, Durant,
+and the Ameses being the principal owners. The Central Railroad also
+exhibits the same phenomenon of few shareholders; all of them, of
+course, large capitalists. This gives great power in pushing the work
+on, and illustrates the tendency of the day toward consolidation.
+Hereafter, when the Central and Nebraska lines shall have combined, this
+commanding influence of a comparatively few men will make itself
+signally felt in our politics.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_716" id="Page_716">[Pg 716]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="GRANDMOTHERS_STORY_THE_GREAT_SNOW" id="GRANDMOTHERS_STORY_THE_GREAT_SNOW"></a>GRANDMOTHER'S STORY: THE GREAT SNOW.</h2>
+
+
+<p>It had been snowing all day, and when father came in at dark he said
+that the wind was rising, and the storm gathering power every moment,
+and that before morning all the roads would be fast locked.</p>
+
+<p>Grandmother is a gentle, sweet old lady, whom I remember always with the
+same serene face, bearing all earthly troubles with such holy patience
+as lifts this common life to heaven; she waits for hours in unbroken
+silence, while her face wears the rapt, mystical look of one who talks
+with angels, and then we move softly about her, and not one of us would
+by words of our own call her down from the mount of vision. Within a
+year or two she has grown quite deaf, and since this her life seems yet
+more isolated; sometimes, however, like most deaf persons, she hears
+words spoken in low tones that are not meant for her, perhaps because at
+times the spirit is vividly awake, and more than usually quick to catch
+at and interpret what else might beat in vain upon the dull, corporeal
+sense.</p>
+
+<p>She put by her knitting at father's words, and rose and walked feebly to
+the window, where she stood a long time looking out at the death-white
+waste, shut in by the morose, ominous sky. Then, turning slowly, her
+face alight and beautiful with that beauty which is fairer than youth,
+she said, "It puts me in mind of the Great Snow, Ephraim,&mdash;it puts me in
+mind of a good many things!"</p>
+
+<p>Then she came back to the fire, and sat down again in her corner. Memory
+was stirring, the Past unfolding its scroll. The knitting-work fell
+unheeded from the old, trembling fingers. She was a girl again, and the
+story of that far-off girlhood fell softly upon the evening silence.</p>
+
+<p>"I was only eighteen years old, Ephraim, when your grandfather moved
+down from the new State. I had lived up there in the wilderness all my
+life; and I was as shy as a wild rabbit, and, in my own fashion, proud.
+Father was poor in those days, for there were six of us children to feed
+and clothe, and mother was delicate and often ill; so we moved into a
+low, one-story house, that was old too, as well as small; but as we had
+always lived in a log-house, and this was a frame one, we were more than
+satisfied. We did not mind if the snow blew in at the cracks in the
+roof, and nestled in little drifts on the counterpane, for we were used
+to it. I remember that one bright star always peeped down at me in the
+winter through the open spaces between the boards, and shone so calm and
+clear that I used to fancy it was God's home, and somehow my prayers
+seemed surer of getting to him when I said them in the pure light of
+this star. But that was while we were in the new State. When we moved
+down country, I was a grown-up girl, able to turn my hand to any chore
+about the house; and I went to meeting in the meeting-house at the
+Corner, and had got over my childish notions.</p>
+
+<p>"Elder Crane was a very pious man, and he always preached long sermons
+and made long prayers. The sermons were easier to bear than the prayers,
+for the people sat through the sermon; but if you had sat down during
+the prayer, you would have been thought dreadfully wicked, and the Elder
+might have called your name right out the next Sabbath, and prayed for
+you as a poor sinner whom Satan was tempting. And so you stood up, of
+course, though the children sometimes got asleep and fell down, and
+often the girls used to faint away and be carried out. Semantha Lee did,
+at one time, almost as regularly as the Sabbath came round, until at
+last a church committee was sent to labor with her. But Semantha was a
+very free-spoken girl, and she said<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_717" id="Page_717">[Pg 717]</a></span> some hard things against Elder
+Crane's prayers. I always thought that it was more her corsets than the
+length of the prayers.</p>
+
+<p>"I never fainted; for up in the new State I had run wild in the woods,
+and, though I was a frail thing to look at, I had a deal of strength in
+me. But my thoughts rambled a great deal too often; and sometimes I
+doubted if I was as near God in Elder Crane's church as I used to be
+lying on my bed in the chamber of the log-house, and saying my prayers
+to the bright star that looked down so friendly. I asked mother about it
+one day, and she said that surely God was about us everywhere; but she
+added that the church was the appointed means of grace, and that I must
+follow Elder Crane closely, and try to make my heart feel the words. I
+did try, but there was so much about the Israelites in the house of
+bondage, and Moses, and the sacrifices, that, do what I would, I always
+lost myself in the Red Sea, and the chosen people entered the Promised
+Land without me. At such times, when my thoughts went wandering, my eyes
+followed them, and most frequently they went right over to Mr. Jacob
+Allen's pew. I could not well help it, indeed, for his was a wall pew,
+directly opposite ours. Mr. Allen seldom came to meeting, being old and
+rheumatic, but his wife and girls came, and his son, Ephraim.</p>
+
+<p>"At first I noticed Ephraim Allen just as I did the cobwebs upon the
+walls, and the yellow streaks in the wainscoting; afterward I began to
+see what a fine figure he had,&mdash;a whole head above his companions,&mdash;and
+how broad-shouldered and erect and manly he was; the narrow-backed,
+short-waisted coat that made the rest look so pinched and uncomfortable
+sat gracefully and easily upon him. He had a wide, white
+forehead,&mdash;though I did not notice this for a long time,&mdash;and short
+curly hair, that looked very black beside the fair skin. Then his cheeks
+were as bright as a rose, and his eyes&mdash;but I seldom got so far as his
+eyes, because by some chance they always met mine, and then I was much
+confused and ashamed. But always, in going out of meeting, he used to
+bow to me in passing, and say, 'Good morning, Mercy'; and then I saw
+that his eyes were a clear, dark blue, and I thought they were very
+honest, tender ones. They said that Semantha Lee had been setting her
+cap at him a good while, and I wondered if he liked her.</p>
+
+<p>"This was all the acquaintance we had for two years and more. There was
+not much chance for young people to meet in those days, especially where
+they were strictly brought up, as I was; for father and mother were both
+very pious, and at that time church-members thought it was sinful to
+join in the profane amusements of the world. So when an invitation came
+for me to a husking-frolic, or a paring-bee, or a dance, I was not
+allowed to go. I was shy, as I told you, but I had a girl's natural
+longing for company; and many were the bitter tears I shed up in my
+garret because I could not go with the rest. Mother used to look at me
+as if she pitied me, and once she ventured to speak up in favor of my
+going; but father said sternly that these sports were the means Satan
+used to win away souls from God,&mdash;and father was a good deal set in his
+way, and mother gave up to him, as she always did.</p>
+
+<p>"Once or twice Ephraim Allen came to our house, but somehow my shyness
+came over me when I heard his voice at the door, and I hid myself in the
+pantry, and pretended to be very busy turning the cheeses; and so I was,
+for I turned them over and over again, till mother came and said I
+mustn't waste any more butter. Ephraim stayed and stayed, and kept
+talking about the oxbow he had come to see about a great deal longer
+than I thought there was any need of; and I could not get courage enough
+to go out, though I was sore ashamed and vexed at my foolish shyness.</p>
+
+<p>"So the whole two years slipped away, and good morning was all we had
+ever said to each other. About this time I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_718" id="Page_718">[Pg 718]</a></span> began to notice that Deacon
+Lee got in the way of looking at me in meeting, and his face was very
+sober, as if something displeased him. Semantha, too, would push past me
+in going in and out, and didn't speak to me as she always used to do
+before she went down to Boston to make that long visit among her
+relations. Deacon Lee had a brother living in Boston who was said to be
+a very rich man. Father was at his house once when he went down to sell
+the butter and wool,&mdash;as he did every winter,&mdash;and he said we could not
+imagine how beautiful it was,&mdash;carpets on all the floors, and even in
+the entry, which mother thought must make a deal of work with people
+coming in and out, especially in wet weather. But then father said the
+Lees had negro servants to do the work, and that Mrs. Lee and her
+daughters had nothing to do but sit in the parlor all day long. When
+Semantha came back after her long visit, she brought a great many fine
+things that her cousins had given her. She used to come into meeting,
+her high-heeled slippers clattering, and her clocked stockings showing
+clear down to the peaked toe; she wore a pink crape gown, and over that
+a white muslin cape that came just down to the waist in the back, and
+crossed over in front, and was pinned to her gown at the corners; it was
+bound around with blue lutestring, and her bonnet had a blue bow on it.
+It was a Navarino bonnet, and cost an extravagant price, seeing that it
+couldn't be done over.</p>
+
+<p>"None of us had ever seen such fine things before; and when Semantha
+came in, Elder Crane might as well have sat down, for everybody looked
+at Semantha. I thought it was well that her bonnet hid her face; for if
+she was like me, it must have been crimson. I am sure I should have died
+of mortification to have been so stared at.</p>
+
+<p>"Mother said she feared it was sinful for a deacon's daughter to make
+such a display, and wondered if Semantha remembered what the Apostle
+Paul says of the ornaments that women ought to wear.</p>
+
+<p>"But in talking of Semantha, I have forgotten Deacon Lee's queer
+behavior. He would look at me awhile, and then at Ephraim Allen. It was
+so curious, I began to fear that he was deranged. But at last I found
+out what it meant.</p>
+
+<p>"One day as I was coming out of meeting, and Ephraim had just said,
+'Good morning,' I looked around and there was Deacon Lee close beside
+us, watching us with a severe expression in his face. 'Young man,' said
+he, and the tone was so awful that I trembled all over,&mdash;'young man, I
+have noticed for some time past your attempts to attract the attention
+of this young woman, who, I am grieved to say,'&mdash;turning to me,&mdash;'does
+not receive this notice as she ought. Instead of assuming an expression
+of severe reproof, she blushes from time to time, and casts down her
+eyes, and I cannot discover from her face that this ungodly conduct is
+displeasing to her.'</p>
+
+<p>"I was so overwhelmed by this rebuke that I could not look up or speak,
+and in a minute more I should have cried in good earnest It was
+Ephraim's voice that stopped me. 'I am sure I beg Mercy's pardon and
+yours, Deacon, if I have done anything improper. I suppose I looked at
+her because my eye couldn't find a pleasanter resting-place. You won't
+pretend that Elder Crane is handsome enough to make it a pleasure to
+look at <i>him</i>.'</p>
+
+<p>"I was astonished, and Deacon Lee looked horrified, but Ephraim's face
+glowed all over with smiles.</p>
+
+<p>"'Ephraim Allen,' said the Deacon sternly, 'if you were a professor, I
+should present you to the church for irreverence. As it is, I have done
+my duty';&mdash;and with that he went away.</p>
+
+<p>"Most of the people had left the meeting-house by this time, but a good
+many of them were turning back to look at me where I stood near Deacon
+Lee and Ephraim Allen. I suppose they didn't know what it could mean;
+for in those<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_719" id="Page_719">[Pg 719]</a></span> days we always Walked soberly home from service, not
+profaning the holy day by common talk. And this was the reason that I
+was surprised and frightened when Ephraim, instead of going away by
+himself, walked down the steps with me, and along the road at my side.
+It was a good two miles home, and I had happened to come alone that day,
+father being laid up with a cut in his foot, and mother staying at home
+to nurse him.</p>
+
+<p>"The path was a beautiful one, leading through deep, still woods, now
+coming out into the edge of a clearing, and now running along a
+brookside where there were flowers nodding over the water, and
+bird's-nests in the thick grass on the bank; I thought sometimes that
+the walk did me as much good as going to church, particularly if I came
+alone, and stopped now and then to read my Bible by the way.</p>
+
+<p>"So we walked along, Ephraim and I; and presently we passed a great
+clump of witch-hazel bushes that were in all their bridal white, and
+Ephraim picked a bunch of the flowers, and gave them to me. He had not
+spoken a word since we started, but now he said, 'Are you very much put
+out with Deacon Lee, Mercy?'</p>
+
+<p>"This made me feel very much ashamed again, but I said I hoped I knew
+better than to bear anger against anybody; and then&mdash;quite excited and
+eager&mdash;I said I wanted him to forgive me if I had looked his way more
+than was proper, and not think I meant to be forward or unmaidenly. And
+Ephraim made reply that he would never believe any ill of me, no, not if
+all the deacons in the world were to testify to it; and he said that he
+owed Deacon Lee thanks for so bringing us together, for he should never
+have had the courage to come to me, though he longed for a sight of my
+face every day, and was constant at church, never missing a Sunday, so
+that he might see me. All this he said in such an earnest, sincere
+manner, and his voice was so gentle that I could not rebuke him, though
+I feared that his heart was in a dark, unregenerate state, if he cared
+so much more for me than for Elder Crane's sermons.</p>
+
+<p>"You won't care to have an old woman tell any more of her love-story.
+Now-a-days these things are all written in novels, and I should think
+the bloom of a girl's delicacy must be long gone before she hears such
+words said to herself. Then it was different. I had never dreamed of
+anything so beautiful.</p>
+
+<p>"The woods were very still all around us, only once in a while a bird
+would sing out, and then the silence fall again all the sweeter for the
+song. When the woods opened we caught glimpses of the green grain-fields
+and orchards in blossom. A chipmonk darted across the path, and,
+scampering up into a beech-tree, clung to the great brown hole, and
+looked down at us, perking his head so mischievously that I could not
+help thinking he knew our secret. And so on and on. I've often thought
+that walk was like the life we lived together, and a prophecy of
+it,&mdash;bright, and full of songs and flowers and sweetness, leading
+sometimes through shady places, but never losing sight of God's sweet
+heaven, never missing the warm winds of its inspiration and its hope.</p>
+
+<p>"But before this a dark time was to come.</p>
+
+<p>"We must have been a good while going home, for when we came in sight of
+the house there was mother standing in the door, shading her eyes with
+her hand, and watching for us, and all at once I remembered that she
+must have been anxious; there were bears in those woods, and the next
+winter one was killed in the very path where we walked.</p>
+
+<p>"When mother saw us coming, she smiled, and came down to the road to
+meet us, and shook hands with Ephraim in such a friendly way that my
+heart danced; I had been thinking what if father and mother should not
+approve of him.</p>
+
+<p>"Father was friendly too, and while they sat in the fore-room, and
+talked, mother made some of her cream biscuits for tea. Now I knew by
+this that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_720" id="Page_720">[Pg 720]</a></span> Ephraim would find favor in her eyes, because in our house
+all unnecessary labor was forbidden on the Sabbath, and no small thing
+could have tempted mother to break over this rule. When I went to call
+them to supper, I knew that Ephraim had been speaking to father, and
+that he was kindly disposed towards Ephraim. Father named me in asking
+the blessing, and Ephraim also, speaking of him so tenderly that it
+brought the tears to my eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"All the rest of that summer is very dear to remember. When I think over
+my life, much of it seems misty and far away; but that summer is as
+distinct to my mind as it was when its roses had but just faded, just as
+sweet and wonderful in its sunshine, its blue skies, its fresh-blowing
+winds, its birds and flowers, as it seemed to me then,&mdash;only now I know
+what it was that so glorified it.</p>
+
+<p>"Ephraim had a much greater flow of spirits than I had. I was grave
+beyond my years. But I caught the love of fun from him, and mother and
+father wondered at the change in me. I think a girl always changes when
+she is engaged. A whole world of feeling that has slept is now awakened.
+Even shallow women bloom out for a brief time, and sparkle and shine
+wonderfully. To be sure they fade full soon oftentimes, and only the dry
+leaves are left of all the charm and fragrance.</p>
+
+<p>"And so autumn came, and winter, and with the winter the frolics which
+Ephraim was so fond of, and which he persisted stoutly were as innocent
+as church-going. But father was so disturbed when I spoke of going that
+I gave it up at once, and told Ephraim that, as long as I lived at home,
+I couldn't feel right to disobey father. So at first Ephraim stayed
+contentedly with me, but by and by the old love stirred. A bit of
+dance-music would start his color, and set his feet in motion, and it
+was plain to see where his heart was. I was sorely grieved at this; nay,
+I was more than grieved. I wanted him all to myself. I could not bear
+that he should need anything but me. Ephraim said I was exacting, and I
+thought him cold and unkind. And so there gradually grew up a coldness
+between us; and yet the coldness was all on my side. Ephraim was always
+gentle, even when I was pettish and cross. For so I was. It was partly
+physical. I was not well that winter. I did not sleep, or when I did by
+fits and starts, I woke frightened and crying. Now, my doctor would call
+it nervous sensitiveness; but then people did not give fine names to
+their humors, and mother only looked sorry, and said she was afraid I
+was growing ill-tempered.</p>
+
+<p>"While things were in this state, Ephraim's mother invited me to come
+and spend a week with them. I didn't feel acquainted, and I was shy
+about going; but Ephraim urged it, and mother advised it, and so at last
+I consented to go.</p>
+
+<p>"I was a good deal mortified that I had nothing nice to wear. My best
+gown had been in use two winters, and there were only three breadths in
+the skirt, and Semantha Lee said that nobody in Boston thought of making
+up less than four. But mother's wise counsel reconciled me. She said
+that the Allens knew we had no money to spend on fine clothes, and would
+only expect me to be clean and neat and well-behaved.</p>
+
+<p>"Ephraim, too, praised me boldly to my face, and pretended to think that
+nothing could be so becoming as my faded hood. It was yellow silk, and
+was made out of a turban that mother had worn when she was a girl.</p>
+
+<p>"After I was in the sleigh with Ephraim, all my unhappiness and anxiety
+fled, and I enjoyed every bit of the ride. It was a lonely road, and
+part of the way it went through the woods where the lately fallen snow
+lay in pure white sheets that were written all over with the tracks of
+birds, and rabbits and other wild animals; and the stillness of the
+great woods was so deep and solemn that our love-talk was silenced, and
+we rode on singing hymns. Then out of the woods, and sweeping down into
+a hollow where<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_721" id="Page_721">[Pg 721]</a></span> pleasant farms were nestled snugly together, and so up
+to Ephraim's door. Mr. Jacob Allen was a forehanded farmer, and the
+house was by far the best in town.</p>
+
+<p>"When we drove up to the door, Mary Allen was at the window, watching
+for us. She ran out to the sleigh, and when Ephraim told her here was
+her sister Mercy, she laughed, and shook hands,&mdash;women did not kiss each
+other then,&mdash;and said she was glad I was come to stay a week. So my
+meeting her was not at all dreadful.</p>
+
+<p>"While Ephraim went around to put up the horse, Mary took me into the
+fore-room, where there was a fire, and helped me with my things, and was
+as sociable as if she had known me all her life.</p>
+
+<p>"The room was a great deal nicer than anything I had ever seen. I was
+almost afraid to step on the carpet at first; but then I remembered that
+it must have been meant to be stepped on, or it wouldn't have been laid
+on the floor.</p>
+
+<p>"Pretty soon Mrs. Allen and Prudence came in. Mrs. Allen was a very
+notable woman, and when she had told me how she made her cheese, and
+that she put down her butter in cedar firkins,&mdash;she seemed to think that
+pine ones were not fit for a Christian to use, and that my mother must
+be a terribly shiftless person to put up with them,&mdash;she said she must
+go and see to the pies that were baking. I don't think she was still
+five minutes at a time while I was there, but just driving about the
+house from morning till night. And yet there were her two girls to help
+her, and mother and I did the work for eight, and took in spinning all
+the year round.</p>
+
+<p>"I think Prudence didn't like housework. She was very intimate with
+Semantha Lee; and what Semantha said and did and wore was pretty much
+all her talk. All that week she was at work on old gowns, altering them
+to be like Semantha's. Prudence didn't seem to fancy me at the very
+first; and though I don't want to speak evil of her, she was certainly
+rather a hard person to get along with.</p>
+
+<p>"One day she would remark that I would be quite good-looking if my nose
+wasn't such a pug. And another day that it was a pity I had red hair,
+for really my other features were not so bad; and she said that my gown
+was just like one she had hung up in the garret; and so in this way she
+picked me to pieces, until it seemed as if she couldn't find a good
+thing in me. But this was not as bad as the way in which she talked to
+me about Semantha.</p>
+
+<p>"Nobody was so handsome or so good or so smart as Semantha; and Deacon
+Lee was the most forehanded man in town. As a great secret, she told me
+that Ephraim and Semantha were once as good as engaged, and she didn't
+doubt, if anything should happen to break up the match between Ephraim
+and me, that Ephraim would go back to Semantha.</p>
+
+<p>"I was terribly angry at this, and I felt my lips stiffen, and it was as
+much as I could do to say, 'What could happen to break our engagement?
+Ephraim is solemnly promised to me, and it is just the same in God's
+sight as if we were married.'</p>
+
+<p>"Prudence looked at me a minute, and then said she 'had no idea I had
+such a temper. She had heard that I talked of uniting with the church,
+but after what she had seen, she shouldn't think&mdash;' And here she
+stopped, and it was as much what was not said as what she did say that
+vexed me so. I was heartily thankful that she was only a half-sister to
+Ephraim, for I began to fear I should hate her.</p>
+
+<p>"With all this Mary did not seem to dare to be her own pleasant self,
+and even Ephraim acted as if he wasn't quite at his ease. I began to be
+sadly homesick. I almost hated the sight of the carpet on the floor, and
+the high-curtained bedstead, and the tall chimney-glass, and I longed
+for the love and peace of my humble home.</p>
+
+<p>"I had been at Mrs. Allen's three days, when Semantha Lee came over to
+spend the day. She came in the morning,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_722" id="Page_722">[Pg 722]</a></span> and sent back the hired man
+with the sleigh, because she meant to stay all night with Prudence.</p>
+
+<p>"Semantha was dressed very elegantly. She had a scarlet cloth cloak that
+came down to the bottom of her gown, and the gown itself was green silk,
+with great bishop sleeves lined with buckram, so that they stood out,
+and rattled like a drum when they hit against anything. Mary laughed at
+her because she could not go through our chamber door without turning
+sidewise; but Semantha said they were all the fashion in Boston.</p>
+
+<p>"She was very lively and full of fun that day, though she didn't take
+much notice of me. In the evening we had popped corn and apples, and
+when we pared the apples and threw down the long coils of peel,
+Semantha's took the shape of a letter E. She laughed and blushed, and
+pretended to be very much vexed, but she was really as pleased as she
+could be. Mary whispered to me not to mind, and said Prudence had given
+the peel a sly push with her foot to shape the E; but for all that I
+could hardly help crying.</p>
+
+<p>"That night all of us girls slept in the great double-bedded room.
+Semantha was with Prudence; and long after Mary was asleep I could hear
+them whispering, and every minute or two I would catch Ephraim's name.</p>
+
+<p>"I did not sleep much that night, and in the morning I was almost sick.
+Ephraim was very kind, and when Prudence said she was going to invite in
+some of the young people of the neighborhood that evening, he wanted her
+to put it off; but Prudence said she guessed I would be better,&mdash;she
+thought people could throw off sickness if they tried to do so. At this
+Semantha laughed so disagreeably, and looked over at Ephraim in so
+significant a way, that I am afraid I almost hated her.</p>
+
+<p>"The company came in the evening,&mdash;five or six merry young girls and
+young men. If my head and heart had been right, I could have enjoyed it
+too. But my head ached, and for the rest you would have thought it was
+Semantha who was engaged to Ephraim, and not I.</p>
+
+<p>"There was a young man there named Elihu Parsons. He was very
+handsome,&mdash;too handsome for a man,&mdash;and what with this and his pleasant
+ways he was a great favorite with the girls. I had only seen him once or
+twice, but he remembered me, and came and sat by me while the games were
+going on. I thought this was very good of him, for nobody was so much
+called for as he; but he would not leave me, and was so sociable and
+pleasant that I tried to brighten up and entertain him as well as I
+could. We were in the midst of our talk, when I happened to glance up
+and saw Ephraim looking over at us,&mdash;looking, too, as I had never seen
+him. All at once it flashed upon me that I could make him suffer as he
+had made me. From that moment an evil spirit possessed me. I felt my
+cheeks flush; my heart beat fast; I was full of wild gayety. I sang
+songs when they asked me. Elihu asked me to dance, and I danced,&mdash;I, who
+had never taken a step before in my life. I felt as light as air; I
+seemed to float through the figure.</p>
+
+<p>"Ephraim never came near me the whole evening, but Elihu kept close to
+me, and we had a great deal of talk that I am glad to have forgotten.
+But I remember that he laughed at Semantha Lee, and made fun of her hair
+that he said was like tow, and her eyes that squinted, and her mincing
+gait; and I listened, and felt a malicious pleasure in this dispraise of
+Semantha. Through it all my head ached terribly, and I stupidly wondered
+how I dared be such a wicked girl, and what my mother would say if she
+knew it.</p>
+
+<p>"By and by it was ten o'clock, and then Semantha suddenly discovered
+that she must go home. Mrs. Allen tried to persuade her to stay. But no!
+It was going to snow, she said, and she would not stay. Then Prudence
+said, if she <i>must</i> go, Ephraim would take her home in the sleigh,
+which, of course, was just what Semantha wanted.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know what made me do it,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_723" id="Page_723">[Pg 723]</a></span> but upon this I rose and went over to
+where they were standing, and said that Elihu Parsons was going directly
+past Deacon Lee's, and would be happy to take Semantha, and that I would
+rather Ephraim should not go.</p>
+
+<p>"Prudence lifted up both hands, as if she was too horrified to speak,
+and looked at Semantha. Semantha giggled. She was one of those girls who
+are always laughing foolishly.</p>
+
+<p>"As for Ephraim, his face was dark, and his voice was cold and hard, as
+he said, 'From what we have seen tonight, Mercy, I don't think it can
+make much difference to you what I do'; and then, without another word,
+went out.</p>
+
+<p>"Presently I heard the sleigh-bells, and in a moment Ephraim came in at
+the front door. I hurried out to him. I would make one more effort, I
+thought.</p>
+
+<p>"He stopped on seeing me.</p>
+
+<p>"'Are you going to leave me for Semantha? You are very unkind to me!' I
+said passionately.</p>
+
+<p>"'You are foolish, Mercy. Semantha is our guest, and I have shown her no
+more attention than she has a right to.'</p>
+
+<p>"'Can't you see, Ephraim?' I cried. 'Don't you know that she came here
+on purpose to make trouble between you and me, and that Prudence is
+helping her?'</p>
+
+<p>"He looked surprised, then wholly incredulous. 'You are mistaken, Mercy.
+You are prejudiced against Semantha.'</p>
+
+<p>"I grew angry. I did not know that many men, acute enough to all else,
+are stone-blind where the wiles of a woman are concerned. 'You may go
+then, if you like. I see you don't care for me,' I said bitterly.</p>
+
+<p>"'You know I do care for you,' said Ephraim. His voice was softer. I
+might have won him then, if I would have stooped to persuade. But I
+would not. My pride was hurt. I turned away from him.</p>
+
+<p>"Presently Semantha came out and they drove off.</p>
+
+<p>"Pretty soon Elihu Parsons brought his sleigh round, flung down the
+reins, and came in to say good night. He held my hand and lingered,
+talking, when I was eager for his going. My gayety had fled, and every
+word cost me a pang. At last he said, 'I am going by your house. Can I
+carry any message for you?'</p>
+
+<p>"A wild thought darted into my mind, 'Going by our house? O, if I might
+go too!'</p>
+
+<p>"'You can!' he said eagerly. 'I will take you with the greatest
+pleasure.'</p>
+
+<p>"In an instant I had resolved to go. It seemed to me that I should die
+if I stayed under that roof another night. So I begged him to wait a
+minute, ran up stairs, packed my things; and came down and told the
+family that I was going home. They seemed thunderstruck. Only Prudence
+spoke.</p>
+
+<p>"'Very well,' said she. 'But I suppose you know it is all over between
+you and Ephraim if you go off in this way.'</p>
+
+<p>"I told her that I knew it was all over, thanks to her, and I hoped it
+was a pleasure to her to reflect that she had separated two persons who
+would never have had a hard thought of each other but for her. Mary came
+out into the entry to me crying, and said she hoped we should make it
+up. But I told her that was not likely. And so we drove away.</p>
+
+<p>"I was dull enough now, and Elihu had the talk mostly to himself. It was
+not till we were almost home that he said something which roused me up.
+And then I was angry with him, and asked him what he thought of me to
+suppose I would so readily on with the new love before I was off with
+the old. But I had no sooner made this speech than I burst into tears,
+and prayed him to forgive me, for I knew I had done wrong, and not say
+any more to me, since I was so wretched. I do not know well what reply
+he made, for before I had done speaking I was at home. There was the
+dear old house I had so longed for,&mdash;the little, homely, unpainted
+house, with the well-sweep taller than itself, and the great clump of
+lilacs by the front door.</p>
+
+<p>"I went up the path unsteadily; my<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_724" id="Page_724">[Pg 724]</a></span> head was swimming, and there was a
+curious noise in my ears. I pushed open the door. There was father with
+the open Bible before him, and his spectacles lying upon it; the room
+was bright with the fire and the light of the pine-knot, and mother was
+spinning on the little wheel, as she frequently did in the evening. Her
+face wore its own sweet, peaceful look, but when she saw me the
+expression changed to one of alarm. She said afterward that I looked
+more like a ghost than anything else.</p>
+
+<p>"Why, Mercy!' she cried.</p>
+
+<p>"Father turned slowly round, and beyond that I remember nothing. I fell
+on the floor in a dead faint.</p>
+
+<p>"Mother said I talked all night about what had been troubling me.
+Through all my delirium, I had an aching consciousness that Ephraim was
+lost to me forever. I would rise to go to him, as I thought, but when I
+reached the place where he had been, there was only Prudence or
+Semantha.</p>
+
+<p>"In the morning the doctor came, and said it was scarlet fever. The
+other children had got over it in childhood, but it had waited for me
+till now.</p>
+
+<p>"I was very sick for a whole month. All that time mother was an angel of
+goodness to me. When I was able to sit up, she told me that Ephraim had
+been to inquire for me often. But she said no more, and I could not tell
+her the trouble then.</p>
+
+<p>"I was wasted to a shadow, and was as weak as an hour-old babe. Mother
+used to tuck me up in the great arm-chair, and then the boys would push
+the chair to the window, where I could look out.</p>
+
+<p>"A great snow had fallen during my sickness. It had begun the night I
+came home, as Semantha predicted, and the roads had been almost
+impassable. But they were quite good again now, and father said the time
+had come for him to go down below. It was late in February, and he said
+we should not have a great deal more snow, he thought, and if he waited
+till the spring thaws came, there would be no getting to Boston.</p>
+
+<p>"It was arranged that the oldest boy at home should go with father, so
+that there would be nobody left with mother and me but Jem and David.
+Jem was eight years old, and David six come May; but they were both
+smart, and we thought, with their help, we could take care of the cattle
+till father came back.</p>
+
+<p>"I could not do much yet, and I sat in my arm-chair while mother fried
+doughnuts, and baked great loaves of bread, and made puddings, and
+roasted chickens, for them to take for food on the journey. Father's way
+was to carry his own provisions, and stay at night with friends and
+relations along the road; even if the sleighing was good, and nothing
+happened, he would be a week or more in going to Boston. So, of course,
+the supply must be pretty generous.</p>
+
+<p>"It was a still, bright morning when they set off, with a sky so clear
+that father thought there would be no storm for many days. After the
+excitement of their starting passed away, it seemed very quiet and
+lonesome; for you remember, though I have not said anything about it,
+that my heart was aching for its lost love.</p>
+
+<p>"I had said nothing about it to mother yet, but after they were gone,
+and the chores done up for the night, and the boys playing with their
+cob-houses in the corner, she sat down beside me, saying, 'Now, Mercy,
+tell me all about the trouble between you and Ephraim.' As well as I
+could for crying, I told her, feeling very much ashamed when I came to
+the part about Elihu. But mother was very gentle, and only said, 'I
+fear, my child, that savors of an unregenerate heart.'</p>
+
+<p>"That was true. But while I had been sick I had thought very seriously,
+and I was thankful I had not been taken away while my heart was in such
+a state. I did not dare to tell mother how God's goodness had shone down
+upon me while I lay ill in my bed, but I hoped and prayed that it would
+not leave me.</p>
+
+<p>"It was a relief as well as pain to see that mother blamed Ephraim. She<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_725" id="Page_725">[Pg 725]</a></span>
+said he should not have allowed himself to be deceived and influenced by
+Prudence. I told her I was sure he could not have loved me as he ought,
+and that I thought I would send back to him the little presents he had
+made me, and say that I did not hold him to his promise.</p>
+
+<p>"Mother agreed with me, and the next day I made up the package. There
+was a string of gold beads, and a pair of silver shoe-buckles, and a
+Chinese fan, and a hymn-book, the bunch of witch-hazel blossoms he
+picked for me that day in the woods, and, more precious than all the
+rest, a letter, six foolscap pages in length, that he had written in the
+fall, while I was visiting my cousin in Keene.</p>
+
+<p>"I could not help crying-while I was putting them up, and I took out the
+letter twice, thinking I might keep that. But mother said, if we were
+indeed to be separated, it was my duty to forget my love for Ephraim,
+else it would darken all my life; and life, she said, was given us for
+cheerful praise, and work, which is also praise.</p>
+
+<p>"After I had sent my package by the mail-rider, who passed Mr. Allen's
+house every other day, I thought my trouble would be easier to bear. But
+every day made it harder. I fell into a miserable torpid state, taking
+no interest in anything, and feeling only my misery acutely. I could not
+even pray for help, for prayer itself was a cross.</p>
+
+<p>"Mother was very good to me; she gave me light, pleasant work to do,
+thinking to keep me busy. But however busy my hands were, my thoughts
+were free, and used their freedom to make me suffer.</p>
+
+<p>"Father had been gone eight days, when one afternoon mother came in from
+the barn, where she had been to shake down some hay for the cows, with a
+face so sober that I was frightened at once.</p>
+
+<p>"'Why, mother! what is the matter?' I cried.</p>
+
+<p>"'I'm worried about your father, child,' she said, and then she went to
+the window and looked out.</p>
+
+<p>"'Why, mother, if he started for home yesterday&mdash;'</p>
+
+<p>"'He would be just in season to be caught in the snow,' she interrupted,
+with a vehemence unnatural to her.</p>
+
+<p>"'Snow, mother!'</p>
+
+<p>"I rose, and went to the window. The sky was full of great masses of
+gray clouds, that sometimes parted, and showed a steel-colored
+background, intense and cold, and immeasurably distant. Wide before us
+spread the waste, white, uninhabited fields,&mdash;the nearest house a mile
+away, and its chimney only visible above the hills which hid it. A
+tawny, brazen belt of light lying along the west, where the sun had gone
+down, illuminated the snow, and gave a weird character to the whole
+scene. There was a high wind swaying the tops of the tall trees before
+the house; and once in a while you would see a fragment of cloud caught
+from the great gray curtain, and torn into shreds, or ravelled into a
+thin web, which seemed for a moment to shut close down upon us. It was a
+strange night, a strange sky.</p>
+
+<p>"I felt a vague alarm. But I tried to speak cheerfully. 'It is too cold
+to snow, mother!'</p>
+
+<p>"She pointed to the window. Even as I spoke the air was suddenly
+darkened by a multitude of fine flakes, that crowded faster and faster,
+and were swirled about by the wind, and quickly built up a wall around
+the door.</p>
+
+<p>"As it grew dark the storm increased. The wind, which had been blowing
+steadily all day, rose to a gale. It tugged at the doors and windows; it
+thundered down the chimney; it caught the little house, and shook it
+till the timbers creaked; the noise was truly awful. We got the boys
+into the trundle-bed as soon as we could, and then mother brought out
+her wheel, and I took my knitting. There was a great blazing fire on the
+hearth, and the room was so warm that the yarn ran beautifully. Mother
+made out her stint that night; she was a famous spinner, and the wheel
+went as fast and the yarn was as even as if she had not<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_726" id="Page_726">[Pg 726]</a></span> been so
+dreadfully worried about father. But every few minutes she would stop
+and say she hoped he had not started, or that, having set out, he would
+be warned in time, and stop by the way.</p>
+
+<p>"It was so strange to see mother, who was usually calm, so put about
+that I got very nervous, and was glad when she stopped the wheel, and
+twisted up the yarn she had spun. But as she turned around toward me
+with it in her hand, she looked so strange that I cried out to know what
+was the matter.</p>
+
+<p>"'It is nothing,' she whispered; but I took hold of her, and steadied
+her down into the arm-chair, and then ran for the camphor. That brought
+her round; but now she looked feverish, and was shaking all over, and I
+knew that she was going to have one of her ill turns,&mdash;possibly
+lung-fever,&mdash;for her lungs were but weak, and she rarely got over the
+winter without a fever. The thought made me half wild, but I dared not
+wait to cry or fret. I knew there was no time to be lost, and I hurried
+around, and gave her a warm foot-bath, and kept hot flannels on her
+chest, and made her drink a nice bowl of herb tea as soon as she was in
+bed; for I thought when the perspiration started she would be relieved.
+I was glad enough when the great drops stood on her forehead. Yet the
+hard breathing and the rattling in the chest were not cured. I kept
+renewing the steaming flannels, as the doctor always directed, till she
+fell asleep. She slept almost all night, and I sat in the chair by her,
+occasionally rousing up to put more wood on the fire, and listen to the
+wind, which still held as fierce as it was at sundown.</p>
+
+<p>"By and by I dozed,&mdash;I don't know how long, but I was wakened by hearing
+Jem call out, 'Mercy! why don't it come day?'</p>
+
+<p>"I started up. My fire had gone down, and the room was dark. Mother was
+breathing heavily beside me.</p>
+
+<p>"'I say, Mercy, isn't it morning? Why don't we get up?' persisted Jem.</p>
+
+<p>"I begged him to be still, and, rising, made my way to the clock. I
+could not see the face, but by touching the hands I made out that it
+was eight o'clock. I knew now that we were snowed up, and that was the
+reason why it was so dark.</p>
+
+<p>"I kindled up the fire and lighted a pine knot. Jem and David came up to
+the hearth to dress, half crying and fretting for mother. But I pacified
+them with a breakfast of bread and milk, and while they were eating it I
+ventured to open a door. There was a solid wall of snow, I looked into
+the fore-room,&mdash;it was as dark as a cellar. Then I ran up my stairs, and
+here the little courage I had forsook me, and I grew weak and sick. For
+the snow was already even with the ledge of the chamber window, and all
+the outbuildings were as completely hidden as if the earth had swallowed
+them in the night.</p>
+
+<p>"I ran down stairs hastily, for I heard mother call.</p>
+
+<p>"She looked up at me anxiously. 'How is it, Mercy?'</p>
+
+<p>"'I'm afraid, mother, we are snowed up,' I said.</p>
+
+<p>"'And I'm sick!'</p>
+
+<p>"Mother was sick. That was the worst side of the trouble. It was a
+settled fever by this time, I was sure. We both knew it, we both knew
+that no help was to be had, and that she might die for want of it. We
+were both silent, neither daring to speak, not knowing how to encourage
+and strengthen the other.</p>
+
+<p>"Mother grew worse all day, in spite of all that I could do for her. The
+darkness in the house was most depressing, and made the situation
+tenfold more painful; though I kept a fire and a light burning as at
+evening, I had to be economical of both, for there was only a small
+stock of fuel and a handful of pine knots in the house. It was painful
+to hear the poor cows at the barn lowing for food, and to know that it
+was impossible to reach them. I might, perhaps, have gone out on
+snow-shoes and managed to get into the barn by the window in the loft;
+but father's shoes were loaned to a neighbor,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_727" id="Page_727">[Pg 727]</a></span> and, even if they had
+been at hand, I should hardly dare to risk my strength, not yet
+renovated after my sickness, and, which was so essential to mother's
+safety, in an effort that might fail.</p>
+
+<p>"So the hours went on, and the day that was like night wore to a close.
+In the evening mother brightened up a little. She was calm now, and for
+the time free from pain. There was an unearthly beauty in the large,
+bright hollow eyes, and the thin cheeks, where the rose of fever burned.
+The disease had worked swiftly. Even this revival might be only a
+forerunner of death.</p>
+
+<p>"'I want to tell you, dear,' she said, 'what to do in case I should not
+get well.'</p>
+
+<p>"I hid my face in the quilt, and tried not to sob, while she went on, in
+a sweet, calm, thoughtful way, to tell me of the things that in my
+inexperience I might forget. I must not be wasteful of food or fuel; if
+the snow&mdash;which was still falling&mdash;should cover the chimney so that I
+could not make a fire, I must wrap myself and the children in all the
+warm things I could find,&mdash;there were some new blankets in the chest in
+the chamber, she said, that she had meant for me. I must get those if I
+needed them. 'And if I am not here to encourage you, my child,' she said
+tenderly, 'don't give up hoping. Help cannot be very far off. Some of
+the neighbors will come to us, or father will work his way through the
+snow, and get home. And, Mercy, don't be afraid of the poor body that I
+shall leave behind me. Think of it as the empty house that I have used
+for a little while, and be sure it can do you no harm.'</p>
+
+<p>"I promised all she asked, and hid my tears as well as I could. While
+she slept, and I could do nothing for her, I kept the children quiet
+with playthings and stories. I cooked bread and meat, and made a great
+kettle of porridge against the time when we might not be able to have a
+fire; I hunted in the garret for bits of old boards and broken
+furniture that might serve for fuel.</p>
+
+<p>"For two days the wind held, and then there fell an awful silence as of
+the grave.</p>
+
+<p>"Sometimes I read from the Psalms, or from the Gospel of John, which
+mother dearly loved; and though she did not take much notice, but lay in
+a stupor most of the time, the holy words were comfort and company to
+me. At other times I sat in mute grief, watching her painful breathing,
+and the gradual pinching and sharpening of her features as the
+relentless disease worked upon them. O, it was hard! I don't think many
+lives know so much and such utter misery. In my anxiety and grief, and
+the mental bewilderment resulting from loss of sleep, I forgot to reckon
+the days as they passed.</p>
+
+<p>"But one day, as I sat by mother's pillow, my mind full of the dread
+that seemed now as if it might any moment be realized,&mdash;of the awfulness
+of being left alone in that living tomb with the marble image of what
+was and yet was not my mother, the clock struck nine in the morning.
+Somewhere the sun was shining, I thought. Somewhere there were happy
+lovers, merry-makings in divers places, wedding-bells ringing.</p>
+
+<p>"A faint sound disturbed my revery. I started up and listened intently;
+but the noise did not recur, and I dropped my head again, thinking my
+fancy had cheated me.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know why it was that what failed to reach my strained ear found
+its way to mother's; but all at once, from having been in a stupid state
+from which I could hardly rouse her, she opened her eyes, and said,
+'What is that?'</p>
+
+<p>"'Do you hear anything?' I asked, trembling. But before she could
+answer, I too heard a shout.</p>
+
+<p>"Help was at hand! And mother might yet be saved!</p>
+
+<p>"I burst into tears, and Jem and David set up a loud cry for company.
+Those outside heard it, for the next instant there was a great halloo.
+They<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_728" id="Page_728">[Pg 728]</a></span> were cutting their way through the drift,&mdash;they came every minute
+nearer and nearer. Pretty soon I heard a voice that set my heart beating
+and made me sob again. It was Ephraim's.</p>
+
+<p>"'Are you all alive?' he cried.</p>
+
+<p>"'We are all alive, but mother is very sick.'</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know how long it took to tunnel that huge snow-drift. I sat
+holding mother's hand till there was a noise at the door. I sprang up
+then, and the next instant stood face to face with Ephraim. And we did
+not meet as we had parted.</p>
+
+<p>"I was glad to think that we owed our deliverance to him. He had roused
+up the neighbors, and they came over that trackless waste on snow-shoes.
+On snow-shoes Ephraim went for the doctor, and mother began to mend from
+the time of his coming.</p>
+
+<p>"It was a week before father got home. Yet he had come as fast as the
+roads would let him, travelling night and day in his eagerness to reach
+us. He told us of houses snowed up, and people and animals perishing
+miserably. And by God's grace we were saved, even to the cows, which in
+their hunger had broken loose from their stalls, and eaten the hay from
+the mow.</p>
+
+<p>"And so my life's greatest joy and pain came to me by the storm. It gave
+Ephraim back to me. For forty years as man and wife we had never a hard
+word.</p>
+
+<p>"'Tis thirty years since he went,&mdash;thirty years of Heaven's peace for
+him. I did not think to wait so long when he went. The children have
+been very good to me, but I've missed their father always. But I shall
+go to him soon. Son Ephraim, I am ninety-two to-morrow!"</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="TOUJOURS_AMOUR" id="TOUJOURS_AMOUR"></a>TOUJOURS AMOUR.</h2>
+
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Prithee tell me, Dimple-Chin,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">At what age does Love begin?<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Your blue eyes have scarcely seen<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Summers three, my fairy queen,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">But a miracle of sweets,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Soft approaches, sly retreats,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Show the little archer there,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Hidden in your pretty hair:<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">When didst learn a heart to win?<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Prithee tell me, Dimple-Chin!<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i4">"Oh!" the rosy lips reply,<br /></span>
+<span class="i4">"I can't tell you if I try!<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">'Tis so long I can't remember:<br /></span>
+<span class="i4">Ask some younger Miss than I!"<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Tell, O tell me, Grizzled-Face,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Do your heart and head keep pace?<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">When does hoary Love expire,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">When do frosts put out the fire?<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Can its embers burn below<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_729" id="Page_729">[Pg 729]</a></span><br /></span>
+<span class="i0">All that chill December snow?<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Care you still soft hands to press,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Bonny heads to smooth and bless?<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">When does Love give up the chase?<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Tell, O tell me, Grizzled-Face!<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i4">"Ah!" the wise old lips reply,<br /></span>
+<span class="i4">"Youth may pass and strength may die;<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">But of Love I can't foretoken:<br /></span>
+<span class="i4">Ask some older Sage than I!"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="AMONG_THE_WORKERS_IN_SILVER" id="AMONG_THE_WORKERS_IN_SILVER"></a>AMONG THE WORKERS IN SILVER.</h2>
+
+
+<p>Excursionists to Lake Superior, when they get away up in the northern
+part of Lake Huron, where are those "four thousand islands" lying flat
+and green in the sun, without a tree or a hut upon them, see at length,
+in the distance, a building like a large storehouse, evidently not made
+by Indian hands. The thing is neither rich nor rare; the only wonder is,
+how it got there. For many hours before coming in sight of this
+building, no sign of human life is visible, unless, perchance, the
+joyful passengers catch sight of a dug-out canoe, with a blanket for a
+sail, in which an Indian fisherman sits solitary and motionless, as
+though he too were one of the inanimate features of the scene. On
+drawing near this most unexpected structure, the curiosity of the
+travellers is changed into wild wonder. It is a storehouse with all the
+modern improvements, and over the door is a well-painted sign, bearing
+the words,</p>
+
+
+<p class="center"><span class="smcap">Raspberry Jam</span>.</p>
+
+
+<p>If the present writer, when he first beheld this sign, had read thereon,
+"Opera-Glasses for hire," or "Kid Gloves cleaned by a new and improved
+method," he could not have been more surprised or more puzzled. The
+explanation, however, was very simple. Many years ago, it seems, a
+Yankee visiting that region discovered thousands upon thousands of acres
+of raspberry-bushes hanging full of fruit, and all going to waste. He
+also observed that Indian girls and squaws in considerable numbers lived
+near by. Putting this and that together, he conceived the idea of a
+novel speculation. In the summer following he returned to the place,
+with a copper kettle, many barrels of sugar, and plenty of large stone
+jars. For one cent a pail he had as many raspberries picked as he could
+use; and he kept boiling and jarring until he had filled all his vessels
+with jam, when he put them on board a sloop, took them down to Detroit,
+and sold them. The article being approved, and the speculation being
+profitable, he returned every year to the raspberry country, and the
+business grew to an extent which warranted the erection of this large
+and well-appointed building. In the Western country, the raspberry jam
+made in the region of Lake Huron has been for twenty years an
+established article of trade. We had the curiosity once to taste tarts
+made of it, and can testify that it was as bad as heart could wish. It
+appeared to be a soggy mixture of melted brown sugar and small seeds.</p>
+
+<p>But that is neither here nor there. The oddity of our adventure was in
+discovering such an establishment in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_730" id="Page_730">[Pg 730]</a></span> such a place. Since that time we
+have often had similar surprises, especially in New England, where
+curious industries have established themselves in the most
+out-of-the-way nooks. In a hamlet of three or four houses and a church,
+we see such signs as "Melodeon Manufactory." At a town in Northern
+Vermont we find four hundred men busy, the year round, in making those
+great Fairbanks Scales, which can weigh an apple or a train of cars.
+There is nothing in St. Johnsbury which marks it out as the town in the
+universe fittest to produce huge scales for mankind. The business exists
+there because, forty years ago, there were three excellent heads in the
+place upon the shoulders of three brothers, who put those heads
+together, and learned how to make and how to sell scales. All over New
+England, industries have rooted themselves which appear to have no
+congruity with the places in which they are found. We heard the other
+day of a village in which are made every year three bushels of gold
+rings. We ourselves passed, some time ago, in a remarkably plain New
+England town, a manufactory of fine diamond jewelry. In another
+town&mdash;Providence&mdash;there are seventy-two manufactories of common jewelry.
+Now what is there in the character or in the situation of this city of
+Roger Williams, that should have invited thither so many makers of cheap
+trinkets? It is a solid town, that makes little show for its great
+wealth, and contains less than the average number of people capable of
+wearing tawdry ornaments. Nevertheless, along with machine-shops of
+Titanic power, and cotton-mills of vast extent, we find these
+seventy-two manufactories of jewelry. The reason is, that, about the
+year 1795, one man, named Dodge, prospered in Providence by making such
+jewelry as the simple people of those simple old times would buy of the
+passing pedler. His prosperity lured others into the business, until it
+has grown to its present proportions, and supplies half the country with
+the glittering trash which we all despise upon others and love upon
+ourselves.</p>
+
+<p>But there is something at Providence less to be expected even than
+seventy-two manufactories of jewelry: it is the largest manufactory of
+solid silver-ware in the world! In a city so elegant and refined as
+Providence, where wealth is so real and stable, we should naturally
+expect to find on the sideboards plenty of silver plate; but we were
+unprepared to discover there three or four hundred skilful men making
+silver-ware for the rest of mankind, and all in one establishment,&mdash;that
+of the Gorham Manufacturing Company. This is not only the largest
+concern of the kind in existence, but it is the most complete. Every
+operation of the business, from the melting of the coin out of which the
+ware is made, to the making of the packing-boxes in which it is conveyed
+to New York, takes place in this one congregation of buildings. Nor do
+we hesitate to say, after an attentive examination of the products of
+European taste, that the articles bearing the stamp of this American
+house are not equalled by those imported. There is a fine simplicity and
+boldness of outline about the forms produced here, together with an
+absence of useless and pointless ornament, which render them at once
+more pleasing and more useful than any others we have seen.</p>
+
+<p>It was while going over this interesting establishment, that the
+raspberry-jam incident recurred to us. <i>This</i> thing, however, is both
+rich and rare; and yet the wonder remains how it got there. It got there
+because, forty years ago, an honest man began there a business which has
+grown steadily to this day. It got there just as all the rooted
+businesses of New England got where we find them now. In the brief
+history of this one enterprise we may read the history of the industry
+of New England. Not the less, however, ought the detailed history to be
+written; for it would be a book full of every kind of interest and
+instruction.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_731" id="Page_731">[Pg 731]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>It was an honest man, we repeat, who founded this establishment. We
+believe there is no house of business of the first class in the world,
+of thirty years' standing, the success of which is not clearly traceable
+to its serving the public with fidelity. An old clerk of Mr. A. T.
+Stewart of New York informed us that, in the day of small things, many
+years ago, when Mr. Stewart had only a retail dry-goods store of
+moderate extent, one of the rules of the establishment was this: "<i>Don't
+recommend goods; but never fail to point out defects</i>." Now a man
+struggling with the difficulties of a new business, who lays down a rule
+of that nature, must be either a very honest or a very able man. He is
+likely to be both, for sterling ability is necessarily honest. It is not
+surprising, therefore, that Mr. Stewart is now the monarch of the
+dry-goods trade in the world; and we fully believe that the history of
+all <i>lasting</i> success would disclose a similar root of honesty. In all
+the businesses which have to do with the precious metals and precious
+stones, honesty is the prime necessity; because in them, though it is
+the easiest thing in the world to cheat, the cheat is always capable of
+being detected and proved. A great silver-house holds itself bound to
+take back an article of plate made forty years ago, if it is discovered
+that the metal is not equal in purity to the standard of the silver coin
+of the country in which it was made. The entire and perfect natural
+honesty, therefore, of Jabez Gorham, was the direct cause of the
+prosperity of the house which he founded. He is now a serene and healthy
+man of eighty-two, long ago retired from business. He walks about the
+manufactory, mildly wondering at the extent to which its operations have
+extended. "It is grown past me," he says with a smile; "I know nothing
+about all this."</p>
+
+<p>In the year 1805, this venerable old man was an apprentice to that Mr.
+Dodge who began in Providence the manufacture of ear-rings, breastpins,
+and rings,&mdash;the only articles made by the Providence jewellers for many
+years. In due time Jabez Gorham set up for himself; and he added to the
+list of articles the important item of watch-chains of a peculiar
+pattern, long known in New England as the "Gorham chain." The old
+gentleman gives an amusing account of the simple manner in which
+business was done in those days. When he had manufactured a trunkful of
+jewelry, he would jog away with it to Boston, where, after depositing
+the trunk in his room, he would go round to all the jewellers in the
+city to inform them of his arrival, and to say that his jewelry would be
+ready in his room for inspection on the following morning at ten
+o'clock, and not before. Before the appointed hour every jeweller in the
+town would be at his door; but as it was a point of honor to give them
+all an equal chance, no one was admitted till the clock struck, when all
+pushed in in a body. The jewelry was spread out on the bed, around which
+all the jewellers of Boston, in 1820, could gather without crowding.
+Each man began by placing his hat in some convenient place, and it was
+in his hat that he deposited the articles selected by him for purchase.
+When the whole stock had been transferred from the bed to the several
+hats, Mr. Gorham took a list of the contents of each; whereupon the
+jewellers packed their purchases, and carried them home. In the course
+of the day, the bills were made out; and the next morning Mr. Gorham
+went his rounds and collected the money. The business being thus happily
+concluded, he returned to Providence, to work uninterruptedly for
+another six months. In this manner, Jabez Gorham conducted business for
+sixteen years, before he ever thought of attempting silver-ware. Such
+was his reputation for scrupulous honesty, that, for many years before
+he left the business, none of his customers ever subjected his work to
+any test whatever, not even to that of a pair of scales. It is his
+boast, that, during the whole of his business career of more<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_732" id="Page_732">[Pg 732]</a></span> than half
+a century, he never sold an article of a lower standard of purity than
+the one established by law or by the nature of the precious metals.</p>
+
+<p>About the year 1825, some Boston people discovered that a tolerable
+silver spoon could be made much thinner than the custom of the trade had
+previously permitted, and that these thin spoons could be sold by
+pedlers very advantageously. The consequence of this discovery was, that
+silver spoons became an article of manufacture in Boston, whence pedlers
+conveyed them to the remotest nooks of New England. One day, in 1830,
+the question occurred to Jabez Gorham, Why not make spoons in
+Providence, and sell them to the pedlers who buy our jewelry? The next
+time he took his trunk of trinkets to Boston, he looked about him for a
+man who knew something of the art of spoon-making. One such he found, a
+young man just "out of his time," whom he took back with him to
+Providence, where he established him in an odd corner of his jewelry
+shop. In this small way, thirty-seven years ago, the business began
+which has grown to be the largest and most complete manufactory of
+silver-ware in the world. For the first ten years he made nothing but
+spoons, thimbles, and silver combs, with an occasional napkin-ring, if
+any one in Providence was bold enough to order one. Businesses grew very
+slowly in those days. It was thought a grand success when Jabez Gorham,
+after nearly twenty years' exertion, had fifteen men employed in making
+spoons, forks, thimbles, napkin-rings, children's mugs, and such small
+ware. Nor would Mr. Gorham, of his own motion, have ever carried the
+business much farther; certainly not to the point of producing articles
+that approach the rank of works of art. We have heard the old gentleman
+say, that he often stood at a store-window in Boston, wondering by what
+process certain operations were performed in silver, the results of
+which he saw before him in the form of pitchers and teapots.</p>
+
+<p>But in due course of time Mr. John Gorham, the present head of the
+house, eldest son of the founder, came upon the scene,&mdash;an aspiring,
+ingenious young man, whose nature it was to excel in anything in which
+he might chance to engage. The silversmith's art was then so little
+known in the United States that neither workmen nor information could be
+obtained here in its higher branches. Mr. John Gorham crossed the ocean
+soon after coming of age, and examined every leading silver
+establishment in Europe. He was freely admitted everywhere, as no one in
+the business had ever thought of America as a possible competitor; still
+less did any one see in this quiet Yankee youth the person who was to
+annihilate the American demand for European, silver-ware, and produce
+articles which famous European houses would servilely copy. From the
+time of Mr. John Gorham's return dates the eminence of the present
+company, and of the production of the costlier kinds of silver-ware, on
+a great scale, in the United States. From first to last, the company
+have induced sixty-three accomplished workmen to come from Europe and
+settle in Providence, some of whom might not unjustly be enrolled in the
+list of artists.</p>
+
+<p>The war gave an amazing development to this business, as it did to all
+others ministering to pleasure or the sense of beauty. When the war
+began, in 1861, the Gorham Company employed about one hundred and fifty
+men; and in 1864 this number had increased to four hundred, all engaged
+in making articles of solid silver. Even with this great force the
+company were sometimes unable to supply the demand for their beautiful
+products. On Christmas morning, 1864, there was left in the store in
+Maiden Lane, New York, but seven dollars' worth of ware, out of an
+average stock of one hundred thousand dollars' worth. Perhaps we ought
+not to be surprised at this. Consider our silver weddings. It is not
+unusual for several thousands of dollars' worth of silver to be
+presented on these occasions,&mdash;in one recent instance, sixteen<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_733" id="Page_733">[Pg 733]</a></span> thousand
+dollars' worth was given. And what lady can be married, now-a-days,
+without having a few pounds of silver given to her? For Christmas
+presents, of course, silver-ware is always among the objects dangerous
+to the sanity of those who go forth, just before the holidays, with a
+limited purse and unlimited desires.</p>
+
+<p>What particularly surprises the visitor to the Gorham works at
+Providence is to see labor-saving machinery&mdash;the ponderous steam-hammer,
+the stamping and rolling apparatus&mdash;employed in silver work, instead of
+the baser metals to which they are usually applied. Nothing is done by
+hand which can be done by machinery; so that the three hundred men
+usually employed in solid ware are in reality doing the work of a
+thousand. The first operation is to buy silver coin in Wall Street. In a
+bag of dollars there are always some bad pieces; and as the company
+embark their reputation in every silver vessel that leaves the factory,
+and are always responsible for its purity, each dollar is wrenched
+asunder and its goodness positively ascertained before it is thrown into
+the crucible. The subsequent operations, by which these spoiled dollars
+are converted into objects of brilliant and enduring beauty, can better
+be imagined than described.</p>
+
+<p>New forms of beauty are the constant study of the artist in silver. One
+large apartment in the Gorham establishment&mdash;the artists' room&mdash;is a
+kind of magazine or storehouse of beautiful forms, which have been
+gathered in the course of years by Mr. George Wilkinson, the member of
+the company who has charge of the designing, and who is himself a
+designer of singular taste, fertility, and judgment. Here are deposited
+copies or drawings of all the former products of the establishment. Here
+is a large and most costly library of illustrated works in every
+department of art and science. Mr. Wilkinson gets ideas from works upon
+botany, sculpture, landscape,&mdash;from ancient bas-reliefs and modern
+porcelain; but, more frequently, from those large volumes which exhibit
+the glories of architecture. "The first requisite," he maintains, "of a
+good piece of silver-plate is that it be <i>well built</i>." The artist in
+silver has also to keep constantly in view the practical and commercial
+limitations of his art. The forms which he designs must be such as can
+be executed with due economy of labor and material, such as can be
+easily cleaned, and such as will please the taste of the
+silver-purchasing public. It is by his skill in complying with these
+inexorable conditions, while producing forms of real excellence, that
+Mr. Wilkinson has given such celebrity to the articles made by the
+company to which he belongs.</p>
+
+<p>Few of us, however, will ever be able to buy the dinner-sets, the
+tea-sets, the gorgeous salvers, and the tall &eacute;pergnes with which the
+warerooms of this manufactory are filled. A silver salver of large size
+costs a thousand dollars. A complete dinner-set for a party of
+twenty-four costs twelve thousand dollars. The price of a nice tea-set
+can easily run into three thousand dollars. We noticed one small vase
+(six or eight inches high) exquisitely chased on two sides, which Mr.
+Wilkinson assured us it cost the company about seven hundred dollars to
+produce. There are, as yet, but two or three persons in all America who
+would be likely to become purchasers of the articles in silver which
+rank in Europe as works of art, and which are strictly entitled to that
+distinction. The wonder is who buys the massive utilities that are
+stacked away in such profusion in Maiden Lane. The Gorham Company have
+always in course of manufacture about three tons of silver, and usually
+have a ton of finished work for sale.</p>
+
+<p>An important branch of their business is one recently introduced,&mdash;the
+manufacture of a very superior kind of plated ware, intended to combine
+the strength of baser metal with the beauty of silver. The manufacture
+of such ware has attained great development in England of late years,
+owing chiefly to the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_734" id="Page_734">[Pg 734]</a></span> application of the mysterious power of electricity
+to the laying-on of the silver. We must discourse a little upon this
+admirable application of science to the arts.</p>
+
+<p>Hamlet amused his friend Horatio by tracing the noble dust of Alexander
+till he found it stopping a bunghole. If we trace the course of
+discovery that resulted in this beautiful art, we shall have to reverse
+Hamlet's order: we must begin with the homely object, and end with
+magnificent ones. Electroplating, electrotyping, the electric telegraph,
+and many other arts and wonders, all go back to that dish of frogs which
+the amiable and fond Professor Galvani was preparing for his sick wife's
+dinner one day, about the year 1787. It was a curious reflection, when
+we were illuminating our houses to celebrate the laying of the first
+Atlantic cable, that this bewildering and unique triumph of man over
+nature had no more illustrious origin than the legs of an Italian frog.
+We are aware that the honor <i>has</i> been claimed for a Neapolitan mouse.
+There <i>is</i> a story in the books of a mouse in Naples that had the
+impudence, in 1786, to bite the leg of a professor of medicine, and was
+caught in the act by the professor himself, who punished his audacity by
+dissecting him. While doing so, he observed that, when he touched a
+nerve of the creature with his knife, its limbs were slightly convulsed.
+The professor was struck with the circumstance, was puzzled by it,
+mentioned it, and it was recorded; but as nothing further came of it, no
+connection can be established between that mouse and the splendors of
+silver-plated ware and the wonders of the telegraph. The claims of
+Professor Galvani's frog rest upon a sure foundation of fact. Signora
+Galvani&mdash;so runs one version of the story&mdash;lay sick upon a couch in a
+room in which there was that chaos of domestic utensils and
+philosophical apparatus that may still be observed sometimes in the
+abodes of men addicted to science. The Professor himself had prepared
+the frogs for the stew-pan, and left them upon a table near the
+conductor of an electrical machine. A student, while experimenting with
+the machine, chanced to touch with a steel instrument one of the frogs
+at the intersection of the legs. The sick lady observed that, as often
+as he did so, the legs were convulsed, or, as we now say, were
+<i>galvanized</i>. Upon her husband's return to the room, she mentioned this
+strange thing to him, and he immediately repeated the experiment.</p>
+
+<p>From 1760 to 1790, as the reader is probably aware, all the scientific
+world was on the <i>qui vive</i> with regard to electricity. The most
+brilliant reputations of that century had been won by electric
+discoveries. Franklin was still alive, to reward with his benignant
+approval those who should contribute anything valuable after his own
+immense additions to man's knowledge of this alluring and baffling
+element. It was, therefore, as much the spirit of the time as the genius
+of the man, that made Galvani seize this new fact with eagerness, and
+investigate it with untiring enthusiasm. It was a sad day for the frogs
+of the Pope's dominions when Signora Galvani observed those two naked
+legs fly apart and crook themselves with so much animation. There was
+slaughter in the swamps of Bologna for many a month thereafter. For
+mankind, however, it was a day to be held in everlasting remembrance,
+since it was then that was taken the first step toward the galvanic
+battery!</p>
+
+<p>As fortune favors the brave, so accident aids the ingenious. After
+Professor Galvani had touched the muscles and nerves of many frogs with
+the spark drawn from the electrical machine, another accident occurred
+which led directly to the discovery of the galvanic battery. Having
+skinned a frog, he chanced to hang it by a <i>copper</i> hook upon an <i>iron</i>
+nail; and thus, without knowing it, he brought together the elements of
+a battery,&mdash;two metals and a wet frog. His object in hanging up this
+frog was to see if the electricity of the atmosphere would produce any
+effects, however slight, similar to those produced<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_735" id="Page_735">[Pg 735]</a></span> when the spark of
+the machine was applied to the creature. It did not. After watching his
+frog awhile, the Professor was proceeding to take it down, and while in
+the act of doing so the legs were convulsed! Struck with this
+occurrence, he replaced the frog, took it down again, put it back, took
+it down, until he discovered that, as often as the damp frog (still
+hanging upon its copper hook) touched the iron nail, the contraction of
+the muscles took place, as if the frog had been touched by a conductor
+connected with an electrical machine. This experiment was repeated
+hundreds of times, and varied in as many ways as mortal ingenuity could
+devise. Galvani at length settled down upon the method following: he
+wrapped the nerves taken from the loins of a frog in a leaf of tin, and
+placed the legs of the frog upon a plate of copper; then, as often as
+the leaf of tin was brought in contact with the plate of copper, the
+legs of the frog were convulsed.</p>
+
+<p>People regard Charles Lamb's story of the discovery of roast pig as a
+most extravagant and impossible fiction; but, really, Professor Galvani
+comported himself very much in the manner of that great discoverer. It
+was no more necessary to employ the frog's nerves in the production of
+the electricity, than it was necessary to burn down a house in roasting
+pig for dinner. The poor frog contributed nothing to it but his
+dampness,&mdash;as every boy in a telegraph office now perceives. He was
+merely the <i>wet</i> in the small galvanic battery. Professor Galvani,
+however, exulting in his discovery, leaped to the conclusion that this
+electricity was not the same as that produced by friction. He thought he
+had discovered the long-sought something by which the muscles move
+obedient to the will. "All creatures," he wrote, "have an electricity
+inherent in their economy, which resides specially in the nerves, and is
+by the nerves communicated to the whole body. It is secreted by the
+brain. The interior substance of the nerves is endowed with a
+conducting power for this electricity, and facilitates its movement and
+its passage from one part of the nervous system to another; while the
+oily coating of these organs hinders the dissipation of the fluid, and
+permits its accumulation." He also thought that the muscles were the
+Leyden jars of the animal system, in which the electricity generated by
+the brain and conducted by the nerves was hoarded up for use. When a man
+was tired, he had merely used his electricity too fast; when he was
+fresh, his Leyden jars were all full.</p>
+
+<p>The publication of these experiments in 1791, accompanied by Galvani's
+theory of animal electricity, produced a sensation in scientific circles
+only inferior to that caused by Franklin's demonstration of the identity
+of lightning with electricity, thirty years before. The murder of
+innocent frogs extended from the marshes of Bologna to the swamps of all
+Christendom. "Wherever," says a writer of the time, "frogs were to be
+found and two different metals could be procured, every one was anxious
+to see the mangled limbs of frogs brought to life in this wonderful
+way." Or, as Lamb says, in the dissertation upon Roast Pig: "The thing
+took wing, and now there was nothing to be seen but fire in every
+direction." At first the facts and the theory of Galvani were equally
+accepted; and a grateful world insisted upon styling the new science, as
+it was deemed, "Galvanism." Thus a word was added to all the languages,
+which has been found useful in its literal sense, and forcible in its
+figurative. Whatever we may think of Galvani's philosophy, we cannot
+deny that he immortalized his name. He died a few years after, fully
+satisfied with his theory, but having no suspicion of the many, the
+peculiar, the marvellous results that were to flow from the chance
+discovery of the fact, that a moist frog placed between two different
+metals was a kind of electrical machine.</p>
+
+<p>Among the Italians who caught at Galvani's discovery, the most skilful
+and learned was Professor Volta, of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_736" id="Page_736">[Pg 736]</a></span> Como, who had been an ardent
+electrician from his youth. Many of our readers have seen this year the
+colossal statue of that great man, which adorns his native city on the
+southern shore of the lake. The statue was worthily decreed, because the
+matt who contributes ever so little to a grand discovery in
+science&mdash;provided that little is essential to it&mdash;ranks among the
+greatest benefactors of his species. And what did the admirable Volta
+discover? Reducing the labors of his long life to their simplest
+expression, we should say that his just claim to immortality consists in
+this,&mdash;he found out that the frog had nothing to do with the production
+of electricity in Galvani's experiment, but that a wet card or rag would
+do as well. This discovery was the central fact of his scientific career
+of sixty-four years. It took all of his familiar knowledge of
+electricity, acquired in twenty-seven years of entire devotion to the
+study, to enable him to interpret Galvani's apparatus so far as to get
+rid of the frog; and he spent the remaining thirty-seven years of his
+existence in varying the experiment thus freed from that "demd, damp,
+moist, unpleasant body." It was a severe affliction to the followers of
+Galvani and to the University of Bologna to have their darling theory of
+the nervous electricity so rudely yet so unanswerably refuted. "I do not
+need your frog!" exclaimed the too impetuous Volta. "Give me two metals
+and a moist rag, and I will produce your animal electricity. Your frog
+is nothing but a moist conductor, and in this respect is not as good as
+a wet rag." This was a decisive fact, and it silenced all but a few of
+the disciples of the dead Galvani.</p>
+
+<p>Volta was led to discard the frog by observing that no electric results
+followed when the two plates were of the same metal. Suspecting from
+this that the frog was merely a conductor (instead of the generator) of
+the electric fluid, he tried the experiment with a wet card placed
+between two pairs of plates, and thus discovered that the secret lay in
+the metals being heterogeneous. But it cost thousands of experiments to
+reach this result, and ten years of ceaseless thought and exertion to
+arrive at the invention of the "pile," which merely consists of many
+pairs of heterogeneous plates, each separated by a moist substance. The
+weight of so much metal squeezed the wet cloth dry, and this led to
+various contrivances for keeping it wet, resulting at last in the
+invention of the familiar "trough-battery," now employed in all
+telegraph offices and manufactories of electro-anything. Instead of
+Galvani's frog or Volta's wet rag, the conductor is a solution of
+sulphuric acid, which Volta himself suggested and employed. The negative
+electricity is conveyed to the earth by a wire, and the positive is
+conducted from pair to pair, increasing as it goes, until, if the
+battery is large enough, it may have the force to send a message round
+the world. And the current is continuous. The galvanic battery is an
+electrical machine that goes without turning a handle. By the galvanic
+battery, electricity is made subservient to man. Among other things, it
+sends his messages, faces his type with copper, silvers his coffee-pot,
+and coats the inside of his baby's silver mug with shining gold.</p>
+
+<p>The old methods of covering metals with a plating of silver were so
+difficult and laborious, that durable ware could never have been
+produced by them except at an expense which would have defeated the
+object. In those slow and costly ways plated articles were made as late
+as the year 1840; and thus they might be made at the present moment, if
+Signora Galvani had been looking the other way when the student touched
+the frog with his knife. More than fifty years elapsed before that
+chance discovery was made available in the art we are considering. For
+many years the discoveries of Galvani and Volta did not appear to add
+much to the resources of man, though they excited his "special wonder,"
+Elderly readers can perhaps remember the appalling accounts that used to
+be published, forty years ago or more, of the galvanizing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_737" id="Page_737">[Pg 737]</a></span> of criminals
+after execution. In 1811, at Glasgow, a noted chemist tried the effect
+of a voltaic "pile" of two hundred and seventy pairs of plates upon the
+body of a murderer. As the various parts of the nervous system were
+subjected to the current, the most startling results followed. The whole
+body shuddered as with cold; one of the legs nearly kicked an attendant
+over; the chest heaved, and the lungs inhaled and exhaled. At one time,
+when all the power of the instrument was exerted, we are told that
+"every muscle of the countenance was simultaneously thrown into fearful
+action. Rage, horror, despair and anguish, and ghastly smiles, united
+their hideous expression on the murderer's face, surpassing far the
+wildest representations of a Fuseli or a Kean. At this period several of
+the spectators were obliged to leave the room from terror or sickness,
+and one gentleman fainted." The bodies of horses, oxen, and sheep were
+galvanized, with results the most surprising. Five men were unable to
+hold the leg of a horse subjected to the action of a powerful battery.</p>
+
+<p>So far as we know, nothing of much importance has yet been inferred from
+such experiments as these. Davy and Faraday, however, and their pupils,
+did not confine their attention to these barren wonders. Sir Humphry
+Davy took the "pile" as invented by Volta, in 1800, and founded by its
+assistance what may be styled a new science, and developed it to the
+point where it became available for the arts and utilities of man. The
+simple and easy process by which silver and gold are decomposed, and
+then deposited upon metallic surfaces, is only one of many ways in which
+the galvanic battery ministers to our convenience and pleasure. If the
+reader will step into a manufactory of plated ware, he will see, in the
+plating-room, a trough containing a liquid resembling tea as it comes
+from the teapot. Avoiding scientific terms, we may say that this liquid
+is a solution of silver, and contains about four ounces of silver to a
+gallon of water. There are also thin plates of silver hanging along the
+sides of the trough into the liquid. The galvanic battery which is to
+set this apparatus in motion is in a closet near by. The vessels to be
+plated, after being thoroughly cleaned and exactly weighed, are
+suspended in the liquid by a wire running along the top of the trough.
+When all is ready, the current of electricity generated by the small
+battery in the closet is made to pass through the trough, and along all
+the metallic surfaces therein contained. When this has been done, the
+spectator may look with all his eyes, but he cannot perceive that
+anything is going on. There is no bubbling, nor fizzing, nor any other
+noise or motion. The long row of vessels hang silently at their wire,
+immersed in their tea, and nobody appears to pay any attention to them.
+And so they continue to hang for hours,&mdash;for five or six or seven hours,
+if the design is to produce work which will answer some other purpose
+than selling. All this time a most wonderful and mysterious process is
+going on. That gentle current of electricity, noiseless and invisible as
+it is, is taking the silver held in the solution, and laying it upon the
+surfaces of those vessels, within and without; and at the same time it
+is decomposing the plates of silver hanging along the sides of the
+trough in such a way as to keep up the strength of the solution. We
+cannot recover from the wonder into which the contemplation of this
+process threw us. There are some things which the outside and occasional
+observer can never be done marvelling at. For our part, we never hear
+the click of a telegraphic apparatus without experiencing the same spasm
+of astonishment as when we were first introduced to that mystery. The
+beautiful manner, too, in which this silvering work is done! The most
+delicate brush in the most sympathetic hand could not lay on the colors
+of the palette so evenly, nor could a crucible melt the metals into a
+completer oneness.</p>
+
+<p>And here is the opportunity for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_738" id="Page_738">[Pg 738]</a></span> fraud. In five minutes an article is
+coated with silver in every part, inside and out; and that mere "blush"
+of silver, as the platers term it, will receive as brilliant a polish,
+and look as well (for a month) as if it were solid plate. Nay, it will
+look rather better; since the silver deposited by this exquisite process
+is perfectly pure, while the silver employed in solid ware is of the
+coin standard,&mdash;one tenth alloy. The plater can deposit upon his work as
+little silver as he chooses, either by weakening his solution, or by
+leaving the articles in it for a very short time; and no man can detect
+the cheat with certainty except by an expensive and troublesome process.
+Nor will it suffice for the operator to attend to the strength of his
+solutions, and keep his eye upon the clock. As in certain conditions of
+the atmosphere we can scarcely get a spark from the electrical machine,
+so there are times when the galvanic battery works feebly, and when the
+silvering goes on much more slowly than usual. To guard against errors
+from this cause, there is no sure resource but a system of careful
+weighings. In such establishments as that of the Gorham Company of
+Providence, Tiffany's or Haughwout's of New York, Bailey's of
+Philadelphia, and Bigelow Brothers and Kennard's, or Palmer and
+Batchelder's, of Boston, each article is weighed before it is immersed
+in the solution, its weight is recorded, and it is allowed to remain in
+the solution until it has taken on the whole of the precious metal it
+was designed to receive.</p>
+
+<p>There was a lawsuit the other day in New York, which turned upon the
+quantity of silver deposited upon sundry gross of forks and spoons. The
+plater agreed to put upon them twelve ounces of silver to the gross,
+which is about as much as is ever deposited upon spoons or forks. If he
+had performed his contract, he would have spread over each table-spoon
+about as much silver as there is in a ten-cent piece; and such is the
+nature of silver that these spoons would have worn well for five or six
+years. In fact, there are no better plated spoons yet in use than these
+were designed to be. The plater meant to comply with the usages of the
+trade. He meant to put upon those spoons the quantity of silver which,
+in the trade, <i>stands</i> for twelve ounces to the gross, which is about
+ten ounces to the gross. Such, was probably his virtuous intention, and
+he supposed he had carried out that intention. But when the spoons were
+put to the test, it was discovered that upon one hundred and forty-four
+table-spoons there were but three ounces and a half of silver. It came
+out on the trial that the plater never weighed his work, and trusted
+wholly to the length of time he left it in the solution. He appeared to
+be honestly indignant at the testimony showing that his spoons, which
+had been left four hours subject to the action of the battery, had
+acquired only a film of silver. To the eye of the purchaser, these
+spoons would have presented precisely the same appearance as the best
+plated ware in existence. For two or three months, or even for six
+months, they would have retained their brilliancy. What their appearance
+would have been at the end of a year or two we need not say, for most
+readers have encountered the spectacle in their pilgrimage through a
+world which is said to resemble plated articles of this quality in being
+"all a fleeting show."</p>
+
+<p>Every one is familiar with the gold lining that is now so generally seen
+in silver vessels. This is laid on by the same process as that which
+covers the outside with silver. The vessel is filled with a solution of
+gold, and in this solution a thin plate of gold is suspended. The
+electric current being made to pass through the interior thus prepared,
+the liquid bubbles up like soda-water, and in three or four minutes
+enough gold is deposited upon the inside surface for the purpose
+designed. When this is accomplished, nothing remains but to polish the
+vessel, within and without, and we have<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_739" id="Page_739">[Pg 739]</a></span> a piece of ware which is silver
+when we look at it, and golden when we drink from it.</p>
+
+<p>The obstacle to the introduction of the superior plated ware now made by
+the Gorham Company is its costliness. The best plated ware costs five
+times as much as the worst, and one fourth as much as solid silver. We
+saw the other day three large salvers, which, at a distance of six feet,
+looked very nearly alike. All of them bore a most brilliant polish, and
+all were elaborately decorated. One of them was a trashy article, made
+of an alloy of lead and tin, covered with a "blush" of silver. It had
+been stamped out and shaped at one blow by a stamping-machine, and left
+in the silver solution subject to the action of the battery for perhaps
+fifteen minutes. It was very heavy, and when it was suspended and struck
+it gave forth a dull leaden sound. The price of this abomination was
+thirty-seven dollars and a half, and it would last, with careful
+occasional usage, for a year. Daily use would disclose its real quality
+in a few weeks. Another of these salvers was of solid silver, to which
+no objection could be made except that its price was nine hundred and
+fifty dollars. The third was of that superior plated ware introduced
+recently by the Gorham Company of Providence. The base of this article
+was the metal now called nickel silver,&mdash;a mixture of copper, nickel,
+and zinc,&mdash;3 very hard and ringing compound, perfectly white, and
+capable of a high polish. Upon this hard surface as much silver had been
+deposited as upon the best Sheffield plated ware, which is about as
+much as can be smoothly put upon it by the electro-plating process. When
+this salver was struck, it rang like a bell, and it would not bend under
+the weight of a man. Such a salver, used continually, will retain its
+lustre for a whole generation, and when, after that long period, it
+begins to lose its silver coating, it can be re-silvered and made as
+good as ever. But the price of this article was two hundred
+dollars,&mdash;more than five times the cost of the leaden trash, and a
+fourth of the price of the solid salver. Nevertheless, plated ware of
+this quality is the only kind which it is good economy to buy. There are
+few more extravagant purchases we can make in housekeeping than lead and
+brass ware, covered with a film of silver so thin that one ounce of the
+precious metal can actually be spread over two acres of it.</p>
+
+<p>One fact can easily be borne in mind: good serviceable plated articles
+cost, and <i>must</i> cost, from one fourth to one third as much as similar
+articles of solid silver. Anything of a much lower standard than this is
+trash and vulgarity.</p>
+
+<p>For our part, we prefer good plated ware to solid plate. In plated ware
+we can now have all the beauty of form, all the brilliancy of surface,
+all the durability and utility of solid silver, without its excessive
+costliness, without appearing to be guilty of ostentation, without
+putting our neighbors to shame, and without offering a perpetual
+temptation to burglars.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_740" id="Page_740">[Pg 740]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="WHAT_WE_FEEL" id="WHAT_WE_FEEL"></a>WHAT WE FEEL.</h2>
+
+
+<p>It would seem to be folly for any one to maintain that grass is not
+green, that sugar is not sweet, that the rose has no odor and the
+trumpet no tone. A man would seem to be out of his senses deliberately
+to doubt what the world thinks to be simple truths. Yet this paper will
+deliberately question these truths. It will endeavor to demonstrate that
+the greenness, the sweetness, the fragrance, the music, are not inherent
+qualities of the objects themselves, but are cerebral sensations, whose
+existence is limited to the senses of organized beings.</p>
+
+<p>Is grass green? First let us inquire what green is,&mdash;what color is.
+Light is now understood to be an undulation of the interstellar ether,
+that inconceivably rare, elastic expanse of matter which occupies all
+space,&mdash;an undulation communicated by the incandescent envelope of suns.
+It moves with such wondrous rapidity as to traverse hundreds of
+thousands of miles in a second. Such is the generally received
+explanation of the phenomenon of light; but there is much yet to be
+explained for which this simple undulation of matter seems to be an
+insufficient cause. These waves of motion have different lengths and
+rates of velocity; but the union of them all gives to the human eye the
+impression of white light. When a prism intercepts their flow, it, so to
+speak, assorts these differing waves; and, being separated, they then
+impress the eye with the color of the spectrum, the retina being
+differently affected by the differing velocities with which it is
+touched by the ethereal waves. Color, then, is the sensation of the
+brain, responsive to the touch of the motion of ether; and the brain is
+only thus affected when these waves are thrown back from some object to
+the eye. The multiplicity of tints and hues are reflections from the
+objects which appear to possess them as structural characters. Some of
+the waves pass into the objects and through them, others are arrested by
+them and absorbed, others rebound from them like a ball from a wall; and
+these last, breaking upon the optic nerve, give to it certain sensations
+which we designate as colors. A wave of a certain velocity and length
+gives us a certain sensation which we call blue; another awakens the
+sensation we call yellow. The two series of waves, mingling, produce a
+new sensation which we call green. The necessity of reflection for the
+production of these sensations is evident. The mingled waves have no
+color in their incident flow; but, striking some object, these waves
+become separated, some being absorbed, and the reflected ones produce
+the peculiar sensation we call color.</p>
+
+<p>We know that these varying conditions of light which affect us as color
+have an absolute being. The photographer carries on his nice operations
+behind a yellow screen undisturbed, when the substitution of a pink one
+would at once allow of the chemical action of the other rays of light on
+his plate, to the destruction of his image. Still, the pink and the
+yellow, as colors, are brain sensations. We feel them with our eyes, and
+the feeling they awaken we call color. The optic nerve receives the
+undulations of ether thrown back from grass, and the peculiar sensation
+thus awakened by their touch is called green. The color is not a part of
+the grass, not a quantitative constituent, like its carbon or silex. The
+grass has no color, because color is something existent in the eye of
+the beholder, not in the object awakening that something by its peculiar
+mode of reflecting light. A looking-glass does not possess, as a
+constituent part, the image of a human face; but that face, when put
+before it, appears to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_741" id="Page_741">[Pg 741]</a></span> be a part of the glass; and if no looking-glass
+had ever existed except with a certain face before it, that face would
+be just as much a part of the glass as the color green is of grass. They
+both reflect. Some people are color-blind. They cannot perceive any
+difference between the rose and the leaves around it. Color is
+inconceivable to them. Let us suppose, then, that all men were
+color-blind. They would be fully cognizant of light, shadow, darkness;
+but the nicer sensations of the brain which we call colors would be
+utterly unknown to senses unable to feel their delicate touch. At the
+same time, the different undulations of the different colors might have
+been detected by other means than the sense of sight, as unseen gases
+have been discovered by the chemist. And we cannot say that Nature may
+not possess an inconceivable variety of influences inappreciable by our
+senses. We say grass is green; but is it always so? What varying colors
+does it possess under the varying light to which it is exposed. The same
+grass is light green in the sun, dark green in the shadow, almost black
+in the twilight, and at night what color is it? We may say that it is
+green, but that we cannot see it. By no means. If greenness were an
+inherent attribute, it would be persistent. The weight, density,
+chemical construction, and size of the plant do not change from midday
+to midnight. They are identical in the dark and the light. But the color
+depends entirely on the character of light poured upon it; as that color
+is only a peculiar reflection of that light, or part of it, and that
+reflection is only green when it stimulates an optic nerve to a
+sensation peculiar to its touch. The same grass becomes yellow or brown
+in autumn, possessing then new powers of absorption and reflection. The
+very limited capacity of the eye to receive sensation from light rays is
+proved by the discovery that the spectrum possesses other rays, called
+heat-rays, which the eye cannot perceive. Only about a third of the
+spectrum is visible to the eye. The other portion appears in the form of
+heat, inappreciable by the optic nerve as light.</p>
+
+<p>Color, therefore, is not a physical thing,&mdash;a quantity in Nature. Her
+beauty and glory, visible in her tints and hues, are in the brain of the
+observer,&mdash;a play of light reflected from the myriad objects upon which
+it breaks in infinite diversity of ethereal wavelet's. One may see
+colors which do not exist as undulations. For example, let one look
+fixedly at a brilliant red object for a while, and then close his eyes.
+He will behold an image of the same object of a green color. This green
+color, then, is a sensation in the optic nerve, which, being powerfully
+stimulated by the red, undergoes a reaction, resulting in a sensation
+similar to that which it would experience were it looking at the object
+in green. The color green, in this case, is certainly only nervous
+sensation. As light is now known to be the motion of matter, color, as
+the result of light, must inevitably be limited by it. The touch of the
+light-waves upon our nerves causes certain contractions which we call
+color, the contractions ceasing when the touch is withdrawn. A pane of
+green glass will cast upon a white marble a green light. Let us suppose
+that this play of light had always existed, so far as those two objects
+were concerned. The marble would appear to be permanently green, and not
+white; and if we had not a simple way of removing the light, we should
+certainly say it was green marble. Could we as effectually change the
+play of light which causes grass to appear green, we should at once
+demonstrate as readily, that its color was an appearance to the eye, not
+a part of the grass itself. It is very probable that we are extensively
+deceived in this way,&mdash;that many appearances in nature are only
+simulations which we have no means of detecting. Isomerism in minerals
+has been discovered,&mdash;a state in which quite different physical
+properties are coexistent with identity of component parts. What we
+always see, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_742" id="Page_742">[Pg 742]</a></span> what seems to be permanent, we naturally accept as a
+physical fact; and yet we can understand that our senses may, in many
+instances, be the sport of appearances which, because permanent, we
+conceive to be reality. Thus color is a cerebral sensation only, and
+grass is not green.</p>
+
+<p>Is sugar sweet? That sugar has certain chemical constituents which go to
+make up a saccharine compound we know. But what evidence have we of its
+sweetness, except that the nerves of taste are peculiarly affected when
+brought in contact with it. Its sweetness is not measurable in the
+chemist's scales. It can be analyzed, and its constituent elements
+accurately defined. But sweetness is not one of those elements. The test
+of that is the tongue. Pure sugar of milk has scarce any sweetness at
+all; nevertheless, it is pure sugar. The influence which it has on the
+nerves of taste is only different from that of cane-sugar. Destroy the
+nice nervous connection between the tongue and the brain, and sweetness
+disappears. A severe cold will accomplish this, and while the touch of
+the sugar is felt, the delicate sympathy which is awakened by the sugar
+and is felt in the brain as sweetness is destroyed. The sweetness, like
+the color, is a nervous sensation. We can conceive of a development of
+the nerves of taste which might receive a host of new impressions from
+contact with objects now tasteless. The saccharine compound does exist
+as a chemical quantity, and has a special effect on the nerves of taste,
+exciting them peculiarly, the result of the excitement being the idea of
+sweetness.</p>
+
+<p>Is the rose fragrant? The sense of smell is indeed only a continuation
+of that of taste. In smelling, the nerves are touched by only
+infinitesimally small particles of the substances reaching them, and are
+only able to receive an impression from this excessive distribution.
+This is also true of taste, to a certain degree, as it is impossible to
+fully perceive a flavor until the substance is tolerably comminuted, as
+we smack our lips to obtain it. Indeed, it may be questioned whether
+the whole of taste may not lie in the capabilities of different
+substances for great subdivision of particles. If quartz could be made
+to dissolve into excessively minute particles as readily as sugar, it
+might have its own special flavor. Some odors are offensive in dense
+quantities which are highly agreeable when wafted to us in delicate
+atoms,&mdash;musk, for instance. The rose secretes a volatile oil, the
+wonderfully small atoms of which, on touching the nerves of smell,
+communicate a peculiar sensation. This odor, like the sweetness, exists
+only in the nerves affected; and a trifling disaffection of the nerves
+suffices to destroy it entirely. The chemist can also analyze the oil,
+but he does not enumerate in its elements odor. In fact, we have no
+words to express the sensation of smell. We say sweet, sour, bitter; but
+have no terms to express the differing sensations produced on us by the
+rose, lily, violet, and pink. Their oily atoms awaken different
+sensations in the delicate nerves they touch. The sensation awakened may
+be due to chemical action induced by them in the system. But whether
+chemical or physical, the result of their touch is a motion of matter,
+an impulse communicated to the brain, the sensation of the organ
+being&mdash;the reception of this initiative force being&mdash;what we designate
+as odor. The fragrance of the rose lies, then, in the contractions of
+special nerves, which thus respond to the touch of the oily particles
+that are blown against them.</p>
+
+<p>Does the trumpet sound? A vibration of matter causes the surrounding air
+to vibrate in consonance with it; and the waves of air thus created,
+breaking against the auditory nerve, awaken a peculiar sensation which
+we call sound. The trumpet, vibrating variously, as the valves are moved
+and the air forced through it, initiates waves of air of different
+lengths; and as they are communicated to the surrounding air with
+amazing rapidity, they successively strike the listener's ear. As the
+waves<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_743" id="Page_743">[Pg 743]</a></span> of light touch the optic nerve, so do the grosser waves of air
+touch the auditory nerve. But sound is only a recognized sensation when
+the waves of air are within a certain measurement, a maximum and minimum
+of length. The rush of a whirlwind has no sound, except when arrested by
+some object, and smaller waves of the vast billows of rolling air are
+created. We say that the wind roars. But the tremendous currents above
+us, which sweep along the vast masses of vapor, are noiseless until they
+touch the earth, and some little trifling eddies are made in their lower
+sweep by hills and trees and houses. It is then only noise. The ear
+requires yet smaller waves of air to experience the sensation of tone.
+The lowest note of a piano has barely enough of it to give a definite
+idea. As the waves become shorter, the ear begins to be pleasantly
+affected, and the realm of music is reached. Within a certain restricted
+length of air-waves lies all of the pleasurable sensation which we call
+musical tone. But as we rise in the scale the tone begins to become
+uncertain, until the highest note of the instrument is again indefinite
+noise. The attenuated tone-waves of Nature are also inappreciable by the
+auditory nerves, and an obscure hum or buzz is all that can be
+perceived, until, finally, the eye detects motion which the ear utterly
+fails to perceive as sound. The results of the air-waves are appreciable
+by sight and feeling; but the waves which are heard are not those which
+create the disturbance in nature we see and feel. The wild gust which
+seizes a tree and bows it to the earth is only heard when the branches
+it sways, or the leaves which it rustles, give out a secondary and far
+more attenuate series of waves. A locust, on a warm, sunny day, will
+agitate the air around him with a series of waves which affect the ear
+far more powerfully than the wind which sighs in the waving trees above
+him. Thus sound is the answering sensation of the auditory nerve to the
+touch of air-waves; and these waves must be within certain
+circumscribed limits of magnitude to awaken that sensation at all. The
+greater or less violence with which they strike the ear causes them to
+appear loud or soft. We can imagine a development of the nerves, or of
+the ear apparatus, which might allow them to be influenced by waves of
+greater volume and less rapid flow, and also by those of diminished size
+and accelerated movement The trumpet then does not sounds the ear
+sounds, and in the ear alone lies the music that it makes. The deaf man,
+whose auditory nerves are not sensitive to air-waves, sees the clouds
+move and the trees sway, the brook ripple and the trumpeter with his
+tube at his lips; but the air-waves they all create pass by him, and
+sound is inconceivable. That sound is a mere nervous sensation is
+further proved by the fact that we have disturbances of the auditory
+nerve which we call singing in the ears. No waves of air create this
+disagreeable music. It arises from some affection of the nerve, which
+irritates it to a vibration similar to that which it undergoes when
+air-waves of a certain intensity reach it.</p>
+
+<p>We say the sound rolled on, the odor was wafted, the color was printed,
+our language and our thoughts implying that the sound, the odor, the
+color, are things, when in reality they are all mere sensations,
+answering to the touch of physical agents. All sensation is
+nerve-motion. Outer stimulus, applied to the nerves, causes contractions
+which, communicating with the brain, give the idea of color or taste or
+sound.</p>
+
+<p>The sense of feeling is a recognition of the existence of objects by a
+duller perception than the others, though all of the senses attain their
+perceptions by feeling, in the strict meaning of the word. We say things
+feel hard or soft, the varying density of the objects being the cause of
+the varying sensations they awaken. Smoothness and roughness are varying
+outlines of surface, existing as physical conformation; the pleasurable
+or disagreeable sensations awakened in us by contact being due to the
+greater or less irritation of the nerves of feeling that attrition with
+it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_744" id="Page_744">[Pg 744]</a></span> occasions. Motion is absolutely necessary to give us an ides of the
+density or configuration of an object. The mere touch of that object is
+insufficient to possess us with its nature. Iron and down are
+indistinguishable, unless we, to a certain extent, manipulate them.
+Glass would be indistinguishable from sand-paper did we not to a certain
+extent pass our fingers over the different surfaces. Mere touch would
+not suffice. We have the evidence of all of our senses to prove to us
+the nature of an object. It tastes or smells or vibrates or is colored;
+the varied sensations thus awakened combining to give us our totality of
+conception. The rose reflects light-waves which the eye feels red; it
+emits oil-particles which the nose feels fragrant; it touches our
+tongue, and feels pleasantly; it touches our fingers, and feels soft and
+smooth. It exists in nature as a physical structure, and its existence
+is evident to us through the various sensations it creates in different
+nerves of our bodies, and through them alone.</p>
+
+<p>One of the ancient philosophies maintained that all Nature is but the
+phantasm of our senses. Had it, after first granting that the senses
+themselves were evidences of matter and motion, maintained that Nature
+was only evident to us through them, it would have been simple truth.
+Our perceptions of Nature are limited to the capacity of our nervous
+structure. We frequently make the mistake of endowing matter with
+attributes which it does not possess, and which are resident only in the
+impression communicated to us by forces emanating from it, the forces
+being we know not what. And we can understand that there may be forces
+in nature as powerful as those which we perceive by our senses, but
+which are utterly unrecognized by them. We can understand that it were
+possible for organized beings to possess fifty instead of five senses,
+which might receive from nature other impressions and awaken other
+emotions as beautiful and as beneficent as those arising from sight and
+hearing.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="SONNET" id="SONNET"></a>SONNET.</h2>
+
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Rather, my people, let thy youths parade<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Their woolly flocks before the rising sun;<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">With curds and oat-cakes, when their work is done,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">By frugal handmaids let the board be laid;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Let them refresh their vigor in the shade,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Or deem their straw as down to lie upon,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Ere the great nation which our sires begun<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Be rent asunder by hell's minion, Trade!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">If jarring interests and the greed of gold,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">The corn-rick's envy of the min&eacute;d hill,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">The steamer's grudge against the spindle's skill,&mdash;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">If things so mean our country's fate can mould,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">O, let me hear again the shepherds trill<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Their reedy music to the drowsing fold!<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_745" id="Page_745">[Pg 745]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="LITERATURE_AS_AN_ART" id="LITERATURE_AS_AN_ART"></a>LITERATURE AS AN ART.</h2>
+
+
+<p>As one looks forward to the America of fifty years hence, the main
+source of anxiety appears to be in a probable excess of prosperity, and
+in the want of a good grievance. We seem nearly at the end of those
+great public wrongs which require a special moral earthquake to end
+them. Except to secure the ballot for woman,&mdash;a contest which is thus
+far advancing very peaceably,&mdash;there seems nothing left which need be
+absolutely fought for; no great influence to keep us from a commonplace
+and perhaps debasing success. There will, no doubt, be still need of the
+statesman to adjust the details of government, and of the clergyman to
+keep an eye on private morals, including his own. There will also be
+social and religious changes, perhaps great ones; but there are no omens
+of any very fierce upheaval. And seeing the educational value to this
+generation of the reforms for which it has contended, and especially of
+the antislavery enterprise, one must feel an impulse of pity for our
+successors, who seem likely to have no convictions that they can
+honestly be mobbed for.</p>
+
+<p>Can we spare these great tonics? It is the experience of history that
+all religious bodies are purified by persecution, and materialized by
+peace. No amount of accumulated virtue has thus far saved the merely
+devout communities from deteriorating, when let alone, into
+comfort and good dinners. This is most noticeable in detached
+organizations,&mdash;Moravians, Shakers, Quakers, Roman Catholics,&mdash;they all
+go the same way at last; when persecution and missionary toil are over,
+they enter on a tiresome millennium of meat and pudding. To guard
+against this spiritual obesity, this carnal Eden, what has the next age
+in reserve for us? Suppose forty million perfectly healthy and virtuous
+Americans, what is to keep them from being as uninteresting as so many
+Chinese?</p>
+
+<p>I know of nothing but that aim which is the climax and flower of all
+civilization, without which purity itself grows dull and devotion
+tedious,&mdash;the pursuit of Science and Art. Give to all this nation peace,
+freedom, prosperity, and even virtue, still there must be some absorbing
+interest, some career. That career can be sought only in two
+directions,&mdash;more and yet more material prosperity on the one side.
+Science and Art on the other. Every man's aim must either be riches, or
+something better than riches. Now the wealth is to be respected and
+desired, nor need anything be said against it. And certainly nothing
+need be said in its behalf, there is such a vast chorus of voices
+steadily occupied in proclaiming it. The Instincts of the American mind
+will take care of that; but to advocate the alternative career, the
+striving of the whole nature after something utterly apart from this
+world's wealth,&mdash;it is for this end that a stray voice is needed. It
+will not take long; the clamor of the market will re-absorb us
+to-morrow.</p>
+
+<p>It can scarcely be said that Science and Art have as yet any place in
+America; or if they have, it is by virtue of their prospective value, as
+with the bonds of a Pacific railway. I use the ordinary classification,
+Science and Art, though it is literature only of which I now aim to
+speak. For under one of these two heads all literature must fall; it may
+be either a contribution to science through its matter, or to art
+through its form. The <i>form</i> of literature is usually called <i>style</i> and
+of the highest kind of literature, called poetry or <i>belles-lettres</i>,
+the style is an essential, and almost the essential part. It is in this
+aspect that the matter is now to be considered,&mdash;literature as an art.</p>
+
+<p>The latest French traveller, Ernest Duvergier de Hauranne, says well,
+that,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_746" id="Page_746">[Pg 746]</a></span> for what he calls the academic class&mdash;or class devoted to pure
+literature&mdash;there is as yet no place in America. Such a class must
+conceal itself, he says, beneath the politician's garb, or the
+clergyman's cravat. We may observe that, when our people speak of
+literature, they are very apt to mean a newspaper article, or perhaps a
+sermon, or a legal plea. One editor said that it could be no more
+asserted that literature was ill paid in America, since Governor Andrew
+received ten thousand dollars for an argument against the prohibitory
+liquor law. Even in our largest cities, there are scarcely the rudiments
+of a literary class, apart from the newspapers. Now, journalism is an
+invaluable outlet for the leisure time of a literary man; but his main
+work must be given to something else, or his vocation must change its
+name. He needs the experience of journalism, as he needs that of the
+lyceum and the caucus,&mdash;nay, as he needs the gymnasium and the
+wherry,&mdash;to keep himself healthy and sound. But when he gives the main
+energy of his life to either, though he may not cease to be useful, he
+ceases to be a literary man.</p>
+
+<p>It is useless to complain that, in America, Science is preceding Art;
+that is inevitable. As yet there is a shrinking even from pure
+science,&mdash;that is, from all science which is not directly marketable;
+and while this is so, art must be still further postponed. We have
+hitherto valued science for its applications, natural history as a
+branch of agriculture, mathematics for the sake of life-assurance
+tables, and even a college education as a training for members of
+Congress. Just so far as any of these departments have failed of these
+ends, there is a tendency to disparage them. We are a little like the
+President Dupaty of the French Assembly, who told the astronomer Laplace
+that he considered the discovery of a new planet to be far less
+important than that of a new pudding, as we have already more planets
+than we know what to do with, while we never can have puddings enough.
+We are now outgrowing this limited view of science, but in regard to
+literature the delusion still remains; if it is anything more than an
+amusement, it must afford solid information; it is not yet owned that it
+has value for itself, as an art. Of course, all true instruction,
+however conveyed, is palatable; to a healthy mind the <i>M&eacute;canique
+C&eacute;leste</i> is good reading; so is Mill's "Political Economy," or De
+Morgan's "Formal Logic." But words are available for something which is
+more than knowledge. Words afford a more delicious music than the chords
+of any instrument; they are susceptible of richer colors than any
+painter's palette; and that they should be used merely for the
+transportation of intelligence, as a wheelbarrow carries brick, is not
+enough. The highest aspect of literature assimilates it to painting and
+music. Beyond and above all the domain of use lies beauty, and to aim at
+this makes literature an art.</p>
+
+<p>A book without art is simply a commodity; it may be exceedingly valuable
+to the consumer, very profitable to the producer, but it does not come
+within the domain of pure literature. It is said that some high legal
+authority on copyright thus cites a case: "One Moore had written a book
+which he called 'Irish Melodies,'" and so on. Now, as Aristotle defined
+the shipbuilder's art to be all of the ship but the wood, so the
+literary art displayed in Moore's Melodies was precisely the thing
+ignored in this citation.</p>
+
+<p>To pursue literature as an art is not therefore to be a mathematician
+nor a political economist; still less to be a successful journalist,
+like Greeley, or a lecturer with a thousand annual invitations, like
+Gough. These careers have really no more to do with literature than has
+the stage or the bar. Indeed, a man may earn twenty thousand dollars a
+year by writing "sensation stories," and have nothing to do with
+literature as an art. But to devote one's life to perfecting the manner,
+as well as the matter, of one's work; to expatriate one's self long
+years for it, like Motley; to overcome vast physical obstacles<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_747" id="Page_747">[Pg 747]</a></span> for it,
+like Prescott or Parkman; to live and die only to transfuse external
+nature into human words, like Thoreau; to chase dreams for a lifetime,
+like Hawthorne; to labor tranquilly and see a nation imbued with one's
+thoughts, like Emerson,&mdash;this it is to pursue literature as an art.</p>
+
+<p>There is apparently something in the Anglo-Saxon mind which causes a
+slight shrinking from art as such, perhaps associating it with deception
+or frivolity,&mdash;which tolerates it, and, strange to say, even produces it
+in verse, but really shrinks from it in prose. Across the water, this
+tendency seems to increase. Just as an Englishman is ashamed to speak
+well, and pooh-poohs all oratory, so he is growing ashamed even to write
+well, at least in anything beyond a newspaper; and we on this side have
+emancipated our tongues more than our pens. What stands between
+Americans and good writing is usually want of culture; we write as well
+as we know how, while in England the obstacle seems to be merely a
+boorish whim. The style of English books and magazines is growing far
+less careful than ours,&mdash;less finished, less harmonious, more slipshod,
+more slangy. What second-rate American writer would see any wit in
+describing himself, like Dean Alford in his recent book on language, as
+"an old party in a shovel"? These bad examples are to be regretted; for
+doubtless ten times as many original works are annually published in
+England as in America, and we have an hereditary right to seek from that
+nation those models of culture for which we must now turn to France.</p>
+
+<p>In a late English magazine, there is an elaborate attempt to prove the
+inferiority in manliness of the French mind as compared with the
+English. "Frenchmen are less manly, and Frenchwomen less womanly, than
+English men and women." And one of the illustrations seriously offered
+is this: "In literature they think much of the method, style, and what
+they themselves call the art of making a book."</p>
+
+<p>The charge is true. In France alone among living nations is literature
+habitually pursued as an art; and, in consequence of this, despite the
+seeds of all decay which imperialism sows, French prose-writing has no
+rival in contemporary literature. We cannot fully recognize this fact
+through translations, because only the most sensational French books
+appear to be translated. But as French painters and actors now
+habitually surpass all others even in what are claimed as the English
+qualities,&mdash;simplicity and truth,&mdash;so do French prose-writers excel. To
+be set against the brutality of Carlyle and the shrill screams of
+Ruskin, there is to be seen across the Channel the extraordinary fact of
+an actual organization of good writers, the French Academy, whose
+influence all nations feel. Under their authority we see introduced into
+literary work an habitual grace and perfection, a clearness and
+directness, a light and pliable strength, and a fine shading of
+expression, such as no other tongue can even define. We see the same
+high standard in their criticism, in their works of research, in the
+<i>Revue des Deux Mondes</i>, and, in short, throughout literature. What is
+there in any other language, for instance, to be compared with the
+voluminous writings of Sainte-Beuve, ranging over all history and
+literature, and carrying into all that incomparable style, so delicate,
+so brilliant, so equable, so strong,&mdash;touching all themes, not with the
+blacksmith's hand of iron, but with the surgeon's hand of steel?</p>
+
+<p>In the average type of French novels, one feels the superiority to the
+English in quiet power, in the absence of the sensational and
+exaggerated, and in keeping close to the level of real human life. They
+rely for success upon perfection of style and the most subtile analysis
+of human character; and therefore they are often painful,&mdash;just as
+Thackeray is painful,&mdash;because they look at artificial society, and
+paint what they see. Thus they dwell often on unhappy marriages, because
+such things<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_748" id="Page_748">[Pg 748]</a></span> grow naturally from the false social system in France. On
+the other hand, in France there is very little house-breaking, and
+bigamy is almost impossible, so that we hear delightfully little about
+them; whereas, if you subtract these from the current English novels,
+what is there left?</p>
+
+<p>Germany furnishes at present no models of prose style; and all her past
+models, except perhaps Goethe and Heine, seem to be already losing their
+charm. Yet for knowledge we still go to Germany, and there is a certain
+exuberant wealth that can even impart fascination to a bad style, as to
+that of Jean Paul. Such an author may therefore be very useful to a
+student who can withstand him, which poor Carlyle could not. There was a
+time, it is said, when English and American literature seemed to be
+expiring of conventionalism. Carlyle was the Jenner who inoculated and
+saved us all by this virus from Germany, and then died of his own
+disease. It now seems a privilege, perhaps, to be able to remember the
+time when all literature was in the inflammatory stage of this
+superinduced disorder; but does any one now read Carlyle's French
+Revolution? Every year now shows that the whole trick of style with
+which it was written was false from beginning to end. For surely no
+style can be permanently attractive that is not simple.</p>
+
+<p><i>Simplicity</i> must be the first element of literary art. This assertion
+will no doubt run counter to the common belief. Most persons have an
+impression of something called style in writing,&mdash;as they have an
+impression of something called architecture in building,&mdash;as if it were
+external, superadded, whereas it is in truth the very basis and law of
+the whole. There is the house, they think, and, if you can afford it,
+you put on some architecture; there is the writing, and a college-bred
+man is expected to put on some style. The assumption is, that he is less
+likely to write simply. This shows our school-boy notions of culture. A
+really cultivated person is less likely to waste words on mere
+ornamentation, just as he is less likely to have gingerbread-work on his
+house. Good taste simplifies. Men whose early culture was deficient are
+far more apt to be permanently sophomoric than those who lived through
+the sophomore at the proper time and place. The reason is, that the
+habit of expression, in a cultivated person, matures as his life and
+thought mature; but when a man has had much life and very little
+expression, he is confused by his own thoughts, and does not know how
+much to attempt or how to discriminate. When such a person falls on
+honest slang, it is usually a relief, for then he uses language which is
+fresh and real to him; whereas such phrases in a cultivated person
+usually indicate mere laziness and mental undress. Indeed, almost all
+slang is like parched corn, and should be served up hot, or else not at
+all.</p>
+
+<p>But it is evident that mere simplicity of style is not enough, for there
+is a manner of writing which does not satisfy us, though it may be
+simple and also carefully done. Such, for instance, is the prose style
+of Southey, which was apparently the model for all American writing in
+its day. We see the result in the early volumes of the North American
+Review, whose traditions of rather tame correctness were what enabled us
+to live through the Carlyle epoch with safety. The aim of this style was
+to avoid all impulse, brilliancy, or surprise,&mdash;to be perfectly
+colorless; it was a highly polished smoothness, on which the thoughts
+slid like balls. But style is capable of something more than smoothness
+and clearness; you see this something more when you turn from Prescott
+to Motley, for instance; there is a new quality in the page,&mdash;it has
+become alive. <i>Freshness</i> is perhaps the best word to describe this
+additional element; it is a style that has blood in it. This may come
+from various sources,&mdash;good health, animal spirits, outdoor habits, or
+simply an ardent nature. It is hard to describe this quality, or to give
+rules for it; the most obvious way to acquire it is to keep<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_749" id="Page_749">[Pg 749]</a></span> one's life
+fresh and vigorous, to write only what presses to be said, and to utter
+that as if the world waited for the saying. Where lies the extraordinary
+power of "Jane Eyre," for instance? In the intense earnestness which
+vitalizes every line; each atom of the author's life appears to come
+throbbing and surging through it; every sentence seems endowed with a
+soul of its own, and looks up at you with human eyes.</p>
+
+<p>The next element of literary art may be said to be <i>structure</i>. So
+strong in the American mind is the demand for system and completeness,
+that the logical element of style, which is its skeleton, is not rare
+among us. But this is only the basis; besides the philosophical
+structure of a statement which comes by thought, there is an artistic
+structure which implies the education of the taste. So, in the human
+body, there is a symmetry of the bony frame, and there is a further
+symmetry of the rounded flesh which should cover it; and in literature
+it is not enough to have a perfectly framed logical skeleton,&mdash;there
+should be also a well-proportioned beauty of utterance, which is the
+flesh. Unless this inward and outward structure exist, although a book
+may be never so valuable, it hardly comes within the domain of literary
+art.</p>
+
+<p>These different types of structure may perhaps be illustrated by three
+different books, all belonging to the intermediate ground between
+science and art. I should say that Buckle's "History of Civilization,"
+with all its wealth and vigor, is exceedingly loose-jointed in all its
+logical structure, and also very defective in its literary structure,
+although it happens to have an element of freshness which is rare in
+such a work, and carries the reader along. Darwin's "Origin of Species"
+is better; that has at the bottom a strong logic, whether conclusive or
+otherwise, but is so rambling and confused in its merely literary
+statement, that it does itself no justice. A third book, Huxley's
+"Lectures," combines with its logic a power of clear and symmetrical
+statement that gives it a rare charm, and makes it a contribution, not
+to science alone, but to literature.</p>
+
+<p>In what is called poetry, <i>belles-lettres</i> or pure literature, the
+osseous structure is of course hidden; and the symmetry suggested is
+always that of taste rather than of logic, though logic must be always
+implied, or at least never violated. In some of the greatest modern
+authors, however, there are limitations or drawbacks to this symmetry.
+Margaret Fuller said admirably of her favorite Goethe, that he had the
+artist's hand, but not the artist's love of structure; and in all his
+prose writings one sees a certain divergent and centrifugal habit, which
+completely overpowers him before the end of "Wilhelm Meister," and shows
+itself even in the "Elective Affinities," which is, so far as I know,
+his most perfect prose work.</p>
+
+<p>In Emerson, again, one observes a similar defect; his unit of structure
+is the sentence, and the periods seem combined merely by the accident of
+juxtaposition; each sentence is a pearl, and the whole essay is so much
+clipped from the necklace; but it is fastened at neither end, and the
+beads roll off.</p>
+
+<p>Yet it is not enough for human beauty to possess symmetry of structure,
+within and without: there must be a beautiful coloring also, wealth of
+complexion, fineness of texture. So the next element of literary art
+lies in the <i>choice of words</i>. Style must have richness and felicity.
+Words in a master's hands seem more than words; he can double or
+quadruple their power by skill in using; and this is a result so
+delightful, as to give to certain authors a value out of all proportion
+to their thought. There are books which are luxuries, <i>livres de luxe</i>,
+whose pages seem builded of more potent words than those of common life.
+Keats, for example, in poetry, and Landor in prose, are illustrations of
+this; and perhaps the representative instance, in all English
+literature, of the prismatic resources of mere words is the poem of "The
+Eve of St. Agnes." But thus to be crowned monarch of the sunset, to
+trust one's self with full daring in these<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_750" id="Page_750">[Pg 750]</a></span> realms of glory, demands
+such a balance of endowments as no one in English literature save
+Shakespeare has attained.</p>
+
+<p>In choosing words, it is to be remembered that there is not a really
+poor one in any language; each had originally some vivid meaning, but
+most of them have been worn smooth by passing from hand to hand, and
+hence the infinite care required in their use. "Language," says Max
+M&uuml;ller, "is a dictionary of faded metaphors"; and every writer who
+creates a new image, or even reproduces an old one by passing it through
+a fresh mind, enlarges this vast treasure-house. And this applies not
+only to words of beauty, but to words of wit. "All wit," said Mr. Pitt,
+"is true reasoning "; and Rogers, who preserved this saying, added, that
+he himself had lived long before making the discovery that wit was
+truth.</p>
+
+<p>A final condition of literary art is <i>thoroughness</i>, which must be shown
+both in the preparation and in the revision of one's work. The most
+brilliant mind yet needs a large accumulated capital of facts and
+images, before it can safely enter on its business, Coleridge went to
+Davy's chemical lectures, he said, to get a new stock of metaphors.
+Addison, before beginning the Spectator, had accumulated three folio
+volumes of notes. "The greater part of an author's time," said Dr.
+Johnson, "is spent in reading in order to write; a man will turn over
+half a library to make one book." Unhappily, with these riches comes the
+chance of being crushed by them, of which the agreeable Roman Catholic
+writer, Digby, is a striking recent example. There is no satisfaction in
+being told, as Charles Lamb told Godwin, that "you have read more books
+that are not worth reading than any other man"; nor in being described,
+as was Southey by Shelley, as "a talking album, filled with long
+extracts from forgotten books on unimportant subjects." One must not
+have more knowledge than one can keep in subjection; but every literary
+man needs to accumulate a whole tool-chest in his memory, and another
+in his study, before he can be more than a journeyman at his trade.</p>
+
+<p>Yet the labor of preparation is not, after all, more important than that
+of final revision. The feature of literary art which is always least
+appreciated by the public, and even by young authors, is the amount of
+toil it costs. But all the standards, all the precedents of every art,
+show that the greatest gifts do not supersede the necessity of work. The
+most astonishing development of native genius in any direction, so far
+as I know, is that of Mozart in music; yet it is he who has left the
+remark, that, if few equalled him in his vocation, few had studied it
+with such persevering labor and such unremitting zeal. There is still
+preserved at Ferrara the piece of paper on which Ariosto wrote in
+sixteen different ways one of his most famous stanzas. The novel which
+Hawthorne left unfinished&mdash;and whose opening chapters when published
+proved so admirable&mdash;had been begun by him, as it appeared, in five
+different ways. Yet how many young collegians have at this moment in
+their desks the manuscript of their first novel, and have considered it
+a piece of heroic toil if they have once revised it!</p>
+
+<p>It is to rebuke this literary indolence, and to afford a perpetual
+standard of high art, that the study of Greek ought to be retained in
+our schools. The whole future of our literature may depend upon it; to
+abandon it is deliberately to forego the very highest models. There is
+no other literature which so steadily reproaches a young
+writer,&mdash;nothing else by which he may sustain himself till he forms a
+high standard of his own. Not that he should attempt direct imitations,
+which are almost always failures as such, however attractive in other
+respects; witness Swinburne's "Atalanta." But the true use of Greek
+literature is perpetually to remind us what a wondrous thing literary
+art may be,&mdash;capable of what range of resources, of what thoroughness in
+structure, of what perfection in detail. It is a remarkable fact, that
+the most<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_751" id="Page_751">[Pg 751]</a></span> penetrating and fearless of all our writers, Thoreau,&mdash;he who
+made Nature his sole mistress, and shook himself utterly free from human
+tradition,&mdash;yet clung to Greek literature as the one achievement of man
+that seemed worthy to take rank with Nature, pronouncing it "as refined,
+as solidly done, and as beautiful almost as the morning itself."</p>
+
+<p>These are the qualities of style that seem most obviously
+important,&mdash;simplicity, freshness, structure, choice of words, and
+thoroughness both of preparation and of finish. Yet, in aiming at
+literary art, it must be remembered that all the cardinal virtues go
+into a good style, while each of the seven deadly sins tends to vitiate
+a bad one. What a charm in the merit of humility, for instance, as it is
+sometimes seen in style, leading to a certain self-restraint and
+moderation of tone, however weighty the argument! How great the power of
+an habitual under-statement, on which in due season one strong thought
+rises like an ocean-crest, and breaks, and sweeps onward, lavishing
+itself in splendor! What a glorious gift of heaven would have been the
+style of Ruskin, for instance, could he but have contained himself, and
+put forth only half his strength, instead of always planting, in the
+words of old Fuller, "a piece of ordnance to batter down an aspen-leaf"!</p>
+
+<p>It would be hardly safe to illustrate what has been said by any
+multiplication of examples from our own literature. Yet perhaps there
+will be no danger in saying that America has as yet produced but two
+authors of whom we may claim that their style is in all respects
+adequate to their wants, and the perfect vehicle of their thought. It is
+not always the greatest writers of whom this is true, for one's demands
+upon the vehicle of thought are in proportion to his thoughts, and great
+ideas strain language more than small ones. We cannot say of either
+Emerson or Thoreau, for instance, that his style is adequate to his
+needs, because the needs are immense, and Thoreau, at least, sometimes
+disdains effort. But the only American authors, perhaps, whose style is
+an elastic garment that fits all the uses of the body, are Irving and
+Hawthorne.</p>
+
+<p>This has no reference to the quality of their thought, as to which in
+Irving we feel a slight mediocrity; no matter, there is the agreeable
+style, and it does him all the service he needs. By its aid he reached
+his limit of execution, and we can hardly imagine him, with his
+organization, as accomplishing more. But in Hawthorne we see astonishing
+power, always answered by the style, and capable of indefinite expansion
+within certain lateral limits. His early solitude narrowed his
+affinities, and gave a kind of bloodlessness to his style; clear in hue,
+fine in texture, it is apt to want the mellow tinge which indicates a
+robust and copious life. Even such a criticism seems daring, in respect
+to anything so beautiful; and I can conceive of no other defect in the
+style of Hawthorne.</p>
+
+<p>Perhaps the conclusion of the whole matter may seem to be that literary
+art is so lofty a thing as to be beyond the reach of any of us; as the
+sage in Rasselas, discoursing on poetry, only convinces his hearers that
+no one ever can be a poet. After so much in the way of discouragement,
+it should be added,&mdash;what the most limited experience may teach us
+all,&mdash;that there is no other pursuit so unceasingly delightful. As some
+one said of love, "all other pleasures are not worth its pains." But the
+literary man must love his art, as the painter must love painting, out
+of all proportion to its rewards; or rather, the delight of the work
+must be its own reward. Any praise or guerdon hurts him, if it bring any
+other pleasure to eclipse this. The reward of a good sentence is to have
+written it; if it bring fame or fortune, very well, so long as this
+recompense does not intoxicate. The peril is, that all temporary
+applause is vitiated by uncertainty, and may be leading you right or
+wrong. Goethe wrote to Schiller, "We make money by our poor books."</p>
+
+<p>The impression is somehow conveyed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_752" id="Page_752">[Pg 752]</a></span> to the young, that there exists
+somewhere a circle of cultivated minds, gifted with discernment, who can
+distinguish at a glance between Shakespeare and Tupper. One may doubt
+the existence of any such contemporary tribunal. Certainly there is none
+such in America. Provided an author says something noticeable, and obeys
+the ordinary rules of grammar and spelling, his immediate public asks
+little more; and if he attempts more, it is an even chance that it leads
+him away from favor. Indeed, within the last few years, it has come to
+be a sign of infinite humor to dispense with even these few rules, and
+spell as badly as possible. Yet even if you went to London or to Paris
+in search of this imaginary body of critics, you would not find them;
+there also you would find the transient and the immortal confounded
+together, and the transient often uppermost. Even a foreign country is
+not always, as has been said, a contemporaneous posterity. It is said
+that no American writer was ever so warmly received in England as
+Artemus Ward. It is only the slow alembic of the years that finally
+eliminates from this vast mass of literature its few immortal drops, and
+leaves the rest to perish.</p>
+
+<p>I know of no tonic more useful for a young writer than to read
+carefully, in the English Reviews of sixty or seventy years ago, the
+crushing criticisms on nearly every author of that epoch who has
+achieved lasting fame. What cannot there be read, however, is the
+sterner history of those who were simply neglected. Look, for instance,
+at the career of Charles Lamb, who now seems to us a writer who must
+have disarmed opposition, and have been a favorite from the first.
+Lamb's "Rosamond Gray" was published in 1798, and for two years was not
+even reviewed. His poems appeared during the same year. In 1815 he
+introduced Talfourd to Wordsworth as his own "only admirer." In 1819 the
+series of "Essays of Elia" began, and Shelley wrote to Leigh Hunt that
+year: "When I think of such a mind as Lamb's, when I see how unnoticed
+remain things of such exquisite and complete perfection, what should I
+hope for myself, if I had not higher objects in view than fame?" These
+Essays were published in a volume in 1823; and Willis records that when
+he was in Europe, ten years later, and just before Lamb's death, "it was
+difficult to light upon a person who had read Elia."</p>
+
+<p>This brings us to a contemporary instance. Willis and Hawthorne wrote
+early, side by side, in "The Token," about 1827, forty years ago. Willis
+rose at once to notoriety, but Mr. S. G. Goodrich, the editor of the
+work, states in his autobiography, that Hawthorne's contributions "did
+not attract the slightest attention." Ten years later, in 1837, these
+same sketches were collected in a volume, as "Twice-Told Tales"; but it
+was almost impossible to find a publisher for them, and when published
+they had no success. I well remember the apathy with which even the
+enlarged edition of 1842 was received, in spite of the warm admiration
+of a few; nor was it until the publication of "The Scarlet Letter," in
+1850, that its author could fairly be termed famous. For twenty years he
+was, in his own words, "the obscurest man of letters in America"; and it
+is the thought to which the mind must constantly recur, in thinking of
+Hawthorne, How could any combination of physical and mental vigor enable
+a man to go on producing works of such a quality in an atmosphere so
+chilling?</p>
+
+<p>Probably the truth is, that art precedes criticism, and that every great
+writer creates or revives the taste by which he is appreciated. True, we
+are wont to claim that "one touch of nature makes the whole world kin";
+but it sometimes takes the world a good while to acknowledge its poor
+relations. It seems hard for most persons to recognize a touch of nature
+when they see it. The trees have formed their buds in autumn every year
+since trees first waved; but you will find that the great majority of
+persons have never made that discovery, and suppose that Nature<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_753" id="Page_753">[Pg 753]</a></span> gets up
+those ornaments in spring. And if we are thus blind to what hangs
+conspicuously before our eyes for the whole long winter of every year,
+how unobservant must we be of the rarer phases of earthly beauty and of
+human life? Keep to the conventional, and you have something which all
+have seen, even if they disapprove; copy Nature, and her colors make art
+appear incredible. If you could paint the sunset before your window as
+gorgeous as it is, your picture would be hooted from the walls of the
+exhibition. If you were to write into fiction the true story of the man
+or woman you met yesterday, it would be scouted as too wildly unreal.
+Indeed, the literary artist may almost say, as did the Duke of
+Wellington when urged to write his memoirs, "I should like to speak the
+truth; but if I did, I should be torn in pieces."</p>
+
+<p>Therefore the writer, when he adopts a high aim, must be a law to
+himself, bide his time, and take the risk of discovering, at last, that
+his life has been a failure. His task is one in which failure is easy,
+when he must not only depict the truths of Nature, but must do this with
+such verisimilitude as to vindicate its truth to other eyes, And since
+this recognition may not even begin till after his death, we can see
+what Rivarol meant by his fine saying, that "genius is only great
+patience," and Buffon, by his more guarded definition of genius as the
+aptitude for patience.</p>
+
+<p>Of all literary qualities, this patience has thus far been rarest in
+America. Therefore, there has been in our literature scarcely any quiet
+power; if effects are produced, they must, in literature as in painting,
+be sensational, and cover acres of canvas. As yet, the mass of our
+writers seek originality in mere externals; we think, because we live in
+a new country, we are unworthy of ourselves if we do not Americanize the
+grammar and spelling-book. In a republic, must the objective case be
+governed by a verb? We shall yet learn that it is not new literary forms
+we need, but only, fresh inspiration, combined with cultivated taste.
+The standard of good art is always much the same; modifications are
+trifling. Otherwise we could not enjoy any foreign literature. A fine
+phrase in &AElig;schylus or Dante affects us as if we had read it in Emerson.
+A structural completeness in a work of art seems the same in the
+<i>&OElig;dipus Tyrannus</i> as in "The Scarlet Letter." Art has therefore its
+law; and eccentricity, though sometimes promising as a mere trait of
+youth, is only a disfigurement to maturer years. It is no discredit to
+Walt Whitman that he wrote "Leaves of Grass," only that he did not burn
+it afterwards. A young writer must commonly plough in his first crop, as
+the farmer does, to enrich the soil. Is it luxuriant, astonishing, the
+wonder of the neighborhood; so much the better,&mdash;in let it go!</p>
+
+<p>Sydney Smith said, in 1818, "There does not appear to be in America, at
+this moment, one man of any considerable talents." Though this might not
+now be said, we still stand before the world with something of the Swiss
+reputation, as a race of thrifty republicans, patriotic and courageous,
+with a decided turn for mechanical invention. What we are actually
+producing, even to-day, in any domain of pure art, is very little; it is
+only the broad average intelligence of the masses that does us any
+credit. And even this is easily exaggerated. The majority of members of
+Congress talk bad grammar; so do the majority of public-school teachers.
+I do not mean merely that they speak without elegance, but that in
+moments of confidence they say "We was," and "Them things," and "I done
+it." With the present predominance of merely scientific studies, and the
+increasing distaste for the study of language, I do not see how this is
+to diminish. For all that, there are already visible, in the American
+temperament, two points of great promise in respect to art in general,
+and literary art above all.</p>
+
+<p>First, there is in this temperament a certain pliability and
+impressibility, as compared with the rest of the Anglo-Saxon race; it
+shows a finer grain and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_754" id="Page_754">[Pg 754]</a></span> a nicer touch. If this is not yet shown in the
+way of literature, it is only because the time has not come. It is
+visible everywhere else. The aim which Bonaparte avowed as his highest
+ambition for France, to convert all trades into arts, is being rapidly
+fulfilled all around us. There is a constant tendency to supersede brute
+muscle by the fibres of the brain, and thus to assimilate the rudest
+toil to what Bacon calls "sedentary and within-door arts, that require
+rather the finger than the arm." It is clear that this same impulse, in
+higher and higher applications, must culminate in the artistic creation
+of beauty.</p>
+
+<p>And to fortify this fine instinct, we may trust, secondly, in the
+profound earnestness which still marks our people. With all this
+flexibility, there is yet a solidity of principle beneath, that makes
+the subtile American mind as real and controlling as that of the robust
+race from which it sprang. Though the present tendency of our art is
+towards foreign models, this is but a temporary thing. We must look at
+these till we have learned what they can teach, but a race in which the
+moral nature is strongest will be its own guide at last.</p>
+
+<p>And it is a comfort thus to end in the faith that, as the foundation of
+all true greatness is in the conscience, so we are safe if we can but
+carry into science and art the same earnestness of spirit which has
+fought through the great civil war and slain slavery. As "the Puritan
+has triumphed" in this stern contest, so must the Puritan triumph in the
+more graceful emulations that are to come; but it must be the Puritanism
+of Milton, not of Cromwell only. The invigorating air of great moral
+principles must breathe through all our literature; it is the expanding
+spirit of the seventeenth century by which we must conquer now.</p>
+
+<p>It is worth all that has been sacrificed in New England to vindicate
+this one fact, the supremacy of the moral nature. All culture, all art,
+without this, must be but rootless flowers, such as flaunt round a
+nation's decay. All the long, stern reign of Plymouth Rock and Salem
+Meeting-House was well spent, since it had this for an end,&mdash;to plough
+into the American race the tradition of absolute righteousness, as the
+immutable foundation of all. This was the purpose of our fathers. There
+should be here no European frivolity, even if European grace went with
+it. For the sake of this great purpose, history will pardon all their
+excesses,&mdash;overwork, grim Sabbaths, prohibition of innocent amusements,
+all were better than to be frivolous. And so, in these later years, the
+arduous reforms into which the life-blood of Puritanism has passed have
+all helped to train us for art, because they have trained us in
+earnestness, even while they seemed to run counter to that spirit of joy
+in which art has its being. For no joy is joyous which has not its root
+in something noble. In what awful lines of light has this truth been
+lately written against the sky! What graces might there not have been in
+that Southern society before the war? It had ease, affluence, leisure,
+polished manners, European culture,&mdash;all worthless; it produced not a
+book, not a painting, not a statue; it concentrated itself on politics,
+and failed; then on war, and failed; it is dead and vanished, leaving
+only memories of wrong behind. Let us not be too exultant; the hasty
+wealth of New York may do as little. Intellect in this age is not to be
+found in the circles of fashion; it is not found in such society in
+Europe, it is not here. Even in Paris, the world's capital, imperialism
+taints all it touches; and it is the great traditions of a noble nation
+which make that city still the home of art. We, a younger and cruder
+race, yet need to go abroad for our standard of execution, but our ideal
+and our faith must be our own.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_755" id="Page_755">[Pg 755]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="A_YOUNG_DESPERADO" id="A_YOUNG_DESPERADO"></a>A YOUNG DESPERADO.</h2>
+
+
+<p>When Johnny is all snugly curled up in bed, with his rosy cheek resting
+on one of his scratched and grimy little hands, forming altogether a
+perfect picture of peace and innocence, it seems hard to realize what a
+busy, restive, pugnacious, badly ingenious little wretch he is! There is
+something so comical in those funny little shoes and stockings sprawling
+on the floor,&mdash;they look as if they could jump up and run off, if they
+wanted to,&mdash;there is something so laughable about those little trousers,
+which appear to be making vain attempts to climb up into the
+easy-chair,&mdash;the said trousers still retaining the shape of Johnny's
+little legs, and refusing to go to sleep,&mdash;there is something, I say,
+about these things, and about Johnny himself, which makes it difficult
+for me to remember that, when Johnny is awake, he not unfrequently
+displays traits of character not to be compared with anything but the
+cunning of an Indian warrior, combined with the combative qualities of a
+trained prize-fighter.</p>
+
+<p>I'm sure I don't know how he came by such unpleasant propensities. I am
+myself the meekest of men. Of course, I don't mean to imply that Johnny
+inherited his warlike disposition from his mother. She is the gentlest
+of women. But when you come to Johnny&mdash;he's the terror of the whole
+neighborhood.</p>
+
+<p>He was meek enough at first,&mdash;that is to say, for the first six or seven
+days of his existence. But I verily believe that he wasn't more than
+eleven days old when he showed a degree of temper that shocked
+me,&mdash;shocked me in one so young. On that occasion he turned very red in
+the face,&mdash;he was quite red before,&mdash;doubled up his ridiculous hands in
+the most threatening manner, and finally, in the impotency of rage,
+punched himself in the eye. When I think of the life he led his mother
+and Susan during the first eighteen months after his arrival, I shrink
+from the responsibility of allowing Johnny to call me father.</p>
+
+<p>Johnny's aggressive disposition was not more early developed than his
+duplicity. By the time he was two years of age, I had got the following
+maxim by heart: "Whenever J. is particularly quiet, look out for
+squalls." He was sure to be in some mischief. And I must say there was a
+novelty, an unexpectedness, an ingenuity, in his badness that constantly
+astonished me. The crimes he committed could be arranged alphabetically.
+He never repeated himself. His evil resources were inexhaustible. He
+never did the thing I expected he would. He never failed to do the thing
+I was unprepared for. I am not thinking so much of the time when he
+painted my writing-desk with raspberry jam, as of the occasion when he
+perpetrated an act of original cruelty on Mopsey, a favorite kitten in
+the household. We were sitting in the library. Johnny was playing in the
+front hall. In view of the supernatural stillness that reigned, I
+remarked, suspiciously, "Johnny is very quiet, my dear." At that moment
+a series of pathetic <i>mews</i> was heard in the entry, followed by a
+violent scratching on the oil-cloth. Then Mopsey bounded into the room
+with three empty spools strung upon her tail. The spools were removed
+with great difficulty, especially the last one, which fitted remarkably
+tight. After that, Mopsey never saw a work-basket without arching her
+tortoise-shell back, and distending her tail to three times its natural
+thickness. Another child would have squeezed the kitten, or stuck a pin
+in it, or twisted her tail; but it was reserved for the superior genius
+of Johnny to string rather small spools upon it. He never did the
+obvious thing.</p>
+
+<p>It was this fertility and happiness, if I may say so, of invention, that
+prevented me from being entirely dejected over my son's behavior at this
+period.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_756" id="Page_756">[Pg 756]</a></span> Sometimes the temptation to seize him and shake him was too
+strong for poor human nature. But I always regretted it afterwards. When
+I saw him asleep in his tiny bed, with one tear dried on his plump
+velvety cheek and two little mice-teeth visible through the parted lips,
+I couldn't help thinking what a little bit of a fellow he was, with his
+funny little fingers and his funny little nails; and it didn't seem to
+me that he was the sort of person to be pitched into by a great strong
+man like me.</p>
+
+<p>"When Johnny grows older," I used to say to his mother, "I'll reason
+with him."</p>
+
+<p>Now I don't know when Johnny will grow old enough to be reasoned with.
+When I reflect how hard it is to reason with wise grown-up people, if
+they happen to be unwilling to accept your view of matters, I am
+inclined to be very patient with Johnny, whose experience is rather
+limited, after all, though he is six years and a half old, and naturally
+wants to know why and wherefore. Somebody says something about the duty
+of "blind obedience," I can't expect Johnny to have more wisdom than
+Solomon, and to be more philosophic than the philosophers.</p>
+
+<p>At times, indeed, I have been led to expect this from him. He has shown
+a depth of mind that warranted me in looking for anything. At times he
+seems as if he were a hundred years old. He has a quaint, bird-like way
+of cocking his head on one side, and asking a question that appears to
+be the result of years of study. If I could answer some of those
+questions, I should solve the darkest mysteries of life and death. His
+inquiries, however, generally have a grotesque flavor. One night, when
+the mosquitoes were making lively raids on his person, he appealed to
+me, suddenly: "How does the moon feel when a skeeter bites it?" To his
+meditative mind, the broad, smooth surface of the moon presented a
+temptation not to be resisted by any stray skeeter.</p>
+
+<p>I freely confess that Johnny is now and then too much for me. I wish I
+could read him as cleverly as he reads me. He knows all my weak points;
+he sees right through me, and makes me feel that I am a helpless infant
+in his adroit hands. He has an argumentative, oracular air, when things
+have gone wrong, which always upsets my dignity. Yet how cunningly he
+uses his power! It is only in the last extremity that he crosses his
+legs, puts his hands into his trousers-pockets, and argues the case with
+me. One day last week he was very near coming to grief. By my
+directions, kindling-wood and coal are placed every morning in the
+library grate, in order that I may have a fire the moment I return at
+night. Master Johnny must needs apply a lighted match to this
+arrangement early in the forenoon. The fire was not discovered until the
+blower was one mass of red-hot iron, and the wooden mantelpiece was
+smoking with the intense heat.</p>
+
+<p>When I came home, Johnny was led from the store-room, where he had been
+imprisoned from an early period, and where he had employed himself in
+eating about two dollars' worth of preserved pears.</p>
+
+<p>"Johnny," said I, in as severe a tone as one could use in addressing a
+person whose forehead glistened with syrup,&mdash;"Johnny, don't you remember
+that I have always told you never to meddle with matches?"</p>
+
+<p>It was something delicious to see Johnny trying to remember. He cast one
+eye meditatively up to the ceiling, then he fixed it abstractedly on the
+canary-bird, then he rubbed his ruffled brows with a sticky hand; but
+really, for the life of him, he couldn't recall any injunctions
+concerning matches.</p>
+
+<p>"I can't, papa, truly, truly," said Johnny at length. "I guess I must
+have forgot it."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, Johnny, in order that you may not forget it in future&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Here Johnny was seized with an idea. He interrupted me.</p>
+
+<p>"I'll tell you what you do, papa,&mdash;<i>you just put it down in writin</i>'."</p>
+
+<p>With the air of a man who has settled<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_757" id="Page_757">[Pg 757]</a></span> a question definitely, but at the
+same time is willing to listen politely to any crude suggestions that
+you may have to throw out, Johnny crossed his legs, and thrust his hands
+into those wonderful trousers-pockets. I turned my face aside, for I
+felt a certain weakness creeping into the corners of my mouth. I was
+lost. In an instant the little head, covered all over with yellow curls,
+was laid upon my knee, and Johnny was crying, "I'm so very, very sorry!"</p>
+
+<p>I have said that Johnny is the terror of the neighborhood. I think I
+have not done the young gentleman an injustice. If there is a window
+broken within the radius of two miles from our house, Johnny's ball, or
+a stone known to come from his dexterous hand, is almost certain to be
+found in the battered premises. I never hear the musical jingling of
+splintered glass, but my <i>porte-monnaie</i> gives a convulsive throb in my
+breast-pocket. There is not a doorstep in our street that hasn't borne
+evidences in red chalk of his artistic ability; there isn't a bell that
+he hasn't rung and run away from at least three hundred times. Scarcely
+a day passes but he falls out of something, or over something, or into
+something. A ladder running up to the dizzy roof of an unfinished
+building is no more to be resisted by him than the back platform of a
+horse-car, when the conductor is collecting his fare in front.</p>
+
+<p>I should not like to enumerate the battles that Johnny has fought during
+the past eight months. It is a physical impossibility, I should judge,
+for him to refuse a challenge. He picks his enemies out of all ranks of
+society. He has fought the ash-man's boy, the grocer's boy, the rich
+boys over the way, and any number of miscellaneous boys who chanced to
+stray into our street.</p>
+
+<p>I can't say that this young desperado is always victorious. I have known
+the tip of his nose to be in a state of unpleasant redness for weeks
+together. I have known him to come home frequently with no brim to his
+hat; once he presented himself with only one shoe, on which occasion
+his jacket was split up the back in a manner that gave him the
+appearance of an over-ripe chestnut bursting out of its bur. How he will
+fight! But this I can say,&mdash;if Johnny is as cruel as Caligula, he is
+every bit as brave as Agamemnon. I never knew him to strike a boy
+smaller than himself. I never knew him to tell a lie when a lie would
+save him from disaster.</p>
+
+<p>At present the General, as I sometimes call him, is in hospital. He was
+seriously wounded at the battle of The Little Go-Cart, on the 9th
+instant. On returning from my office yesterday evening, I found that
+scarred veteran stretched upon a sofa in the sitting-room, with a patch
+of brown paper stuck over his left eye, and a convicting smell of
+vinegar about him.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," said his mother, dolefully, "Johnny's been fighting again. That
+horrid Barnabee boy (who is eight years old, if he is a day) won't let
+the child alone."</p>
+
+<p>"Well," said I, "I hope Johnny gave that Barnabee boy a thrashing."</p>
+
+<p>"Didn't I, though?" cries Johnny, from the sofa. "<i>I</i> bet!"</p>
+
+<p>"O Johnny!" says his mother.</p>
+
+<p>Now, several days previous to this, I had addressed the General in the
+following terms:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Johnny, if I ever catch you in another fight of your own seeking, I
+shall cane you."</p>
+
+<p>In consequence of this declaration, it became my duty to look into the
+circumstances of the present affair, which will be known in history as
+the battle of The Little Go-Cart. After going over the ground very
+carefully, I found the following to be the state of the case.</p>
+
+<p>It seems that the Barnabee Boy&mdash;I speak of him as if he were the Benicia
+Boy&mdash;is the oldest pupil in the Primary Military School (I think it
+<i>must</i> be a military school) of which Johnny is a recent member. This
+Barnabee, having whipped every one of his companions, was sighing for
+new boys to conquer, when Johnny joined the institution. He at once
+made<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_758" id="Page_758">[Pg 758]</a></span> friendly overtures of battle to Johnny, who, oddly enough, seemed
+indisposed to encourage his advances. Then Barnabee began a series of
+petty persecutions, which had continued up to the day of the fight.</p>
+
+<p>On the morning of that eventful day the Barnabee Boy appeared in the
+school-yard with a small go-cart. After running down on Johnny several
+times with this useful vehicle, he captured Johnny's cap, filled it with
+sand, and dragged it up and down the yard triumphantly in the go-cart.
+This made the General very angry, of course, and he took an early
+opportunity of kicking over the triumphal car, in doing which he kicked
+one of the wheels so far into space that it has not been seen since.</p>
+
+<p>This brought matters to a crisis. The battle would have taken place then
+and there; but at that moment the school-bell rang, and the gladiators
+were obliged to give their attention to Smith's Speller. But a gloom
+hung over the morning's exercises,&mdash;a gloom that was not dispelled in
+the back row, when the Barnabee Boy stealthily held up to Johnny's
+vision a slate, whereon was inscribed this fearful message:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 350px;">
+<img src="images/image1.jpg" width="350" height="449" alt="" title="" />
+</div>
+
+<p>Johnny got it "put down in writin'" this time!</p>
+
+<p>After a hasty glance at the slate, the General went on with his studies
+composedly enough. Eleven o'clock came, and with it came recess, and
+with recess the inevitable battle.</p>
+
+<p>Now I do not intend to describe the details of this brilliant action,
+for the sufficient reason that, though there were seven young gentlemen
+(connected with the Primary School) on the field as war correspondents,
+their accounts of the engagement are so contradictory as to be utterly
+worthless. On one point they all agree,&mdash;that the contest was sharp,
+short, and decisive. The truth is, the General is a quick, wiry,
+experienced old hero; and it didn't take him long to rout the Barnabee
+Boy, who was in reality a coward, as all bullies and tyrants ever have
+been, and always will be.</p>
+
+<p>I don't approve of boys fighting; I don't defend Johnny; but if the
+General wants an extra ration or two of preserved pear, he shall have
+it!</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>I am well aware that, socially speaking, Johnny is a Black Sheep. I know
+that I have brought him up badly, and that there is not an unmarried man
+or woman in the United States who wouldn't have brought him up very
+differently. It's a great pity that the only people who know how to
+manage children never have any! At the same time, Johnny is not a black
+sheep all over. He has some white spots. His sins&mdash;if wiser folks had no
+greater!&mdash;are the result of too much animal life. They belong to his
+evanescent youth, and will pass away; but his honesty, his generosity,
+his bravery, belong to his character, and are enduring qualities. The
+quickly crowding years will tame him. A good large pane of glass, or a
+seductive bell-knob, ceases in time to have attractions for the most
+reckless spirit. And I am quite confident that Johnny will be a great
+statesman, or a valorous soldier, or, at all events, a good citizen,
+after he has got over being A Young Desperado.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_759" id="Page_759">[Pg 759]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="REVIEWS_AND_LITERARY_NOTICES" id="REVIEWS_AND_LITERARY_NOTICES"></a>REVIEWS AND LITERARY NOTICES.</h2>
+
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p><i>The First Canticle</i> [<i>Inferno</i>] <i>of the Divine Comedy of</i>
+<span class="smcap">Dante Alighieri</span>. Translated by <span class="smcap">Thomas William Parsons</span>. Boston:
+De Vries, Ibarra, and Company.</p></div>
+
+<p>While we must own that we have no sympathy with the theory of free
+translation, we recognize the manifold merits of execution in this work,
+and accept it as one which, together with Mr. Longfellow's version of
+the whole of Dante's <i>Divina Commedia</i>, and Mr. Norton's translation of
+the <i>Vita Nuova</i>, will make the present year memorable in our
+literature. It does not necessarily stand in antagonism to works
+executed in a spirit entirely different, and we shall make no comparison
+of it with the "Inferno" by Mr. Longfellow, the admirers of which will
+be among the first to feel its characteristic and very striking
+excellences.</p>
+
+<p>In substituting the decasyllabic quatrain for the triple rhyme of the
+Italian, we suppose Dr. Parsons desired rather to please the reader's
+ear with a familiar stanza, than to avoid the difficulties (exaggerated,
+we think, by critics) of the <i>terza rima</i>, and he could certainly have
+chosen no more felicitous form after once departing from that of his
+original. He has almost re-created the stanza for his purpose, giving it
+new movement, and successfully adapting to the exigencies of dialogue
+and of narrative what has hitherto chiefly been associated with elegiac
+and didactic poetry. Something of this may be seen in the following
+passages (from the description of the transit through the frozen circle
+of Caina), which moreover appear to us among the best sustained of the
+version.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"And as a frog squats croaking from a stream,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">With nose put forth, what time the village maid<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Oft in her slumber doth of gleaning dream,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Stood in the ice there every doleful shade.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Livid as far as where shame paints the cheek,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">And doomed their faces downward still to hold.<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Chattering like storks, their weeping eyes bespeak<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Their aching hearts, their mouths the biting cold."<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i2">"A thousand visages I saw, by cold<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Turned to dog-faces; horror chills me through<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Whenever of those frozen fords I think.<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">And as we nearer to the centre drew,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Towards which all bodies by their weight must sink,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">There, as I shivered in the eternal chill,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Trampling among the heads, it happed, by luck,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Or destiny&mdash;or, it may be, my will&mdash;<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Hard in the face of one my foot I struck.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Weeping he cried, 'What brings thee bruising us?<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Unless on me fresh vengeance thou wouldst pile<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">For Mont' Aperti, why torment me thus?'<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">And I: 'My Master, wait for me awhile,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">That I through him may set one doubt at rest;<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Then, if thou bid me hasten on, I will.'<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">My leader stopped; and I the shade addressed<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Who kept full bitterly blaspheming still,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">'Say, who art thou whose tongue so foully speaks?'<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">'Nay, who art thou that walk'st the withering air<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Of Antemora, smiting others' cheeks<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">That, wert thou living, 't were too much to bear?'<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">'Living I am; and thou, if craving fame,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Mayst count it precious,'&mdash;this was my reply,&mdash;<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">'That I with other notes record thy name.'<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">He answered thus: 'Far other wish have I.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Trouble me now no longer,&mdash;get thee gone:<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Thine is cold flattery in this waste of Hell.'<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">At this his hindmost hairs I fastened on,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">And cried, 'Thy name! I'll force thee now to tell.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Or not one hair upon thy head shall grow.'<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">He answered thus: 'Although thou pluck me bare,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">I'll neithertell my name, nor visage show;<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Nay, though a thousand times thou rend my hair,'<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"I held his tresses in my fingers wound,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">And more than one tuft had I twitched away<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">As he, with eyes bent down, howled like a hound;<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">When one cried out, 'What ails thee, Bocca? say,&mdash;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Canst thou not make enough clack with thy jaws,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">But thou must bark too! What fiend pricks thee now?'<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">'Aha!' said I, 'henceforth I have no cause<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">To bid thee speak, thou cursed traitor thou!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">I'll shame thee, bearing truth of thee to men.'<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">'Away!' he answered: 'what thou wilt, relate:<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">But, shouldst thou get from hence with breath again,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Mention him too so ready with his prate."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>The encounter of Dante with Farinata and Cavalcante in their fiery tombs
+is also painted with such animated and fortunate strokes that we must
+reproduce some of them here:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"'O Tuscan! thou who com'st with gentle speech.<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Through Hell's hot city, breathing from the earth,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Stop in this place one moment, I beseech:<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Thy tongue betrays the country of thy birth.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Of that illustrious land I know thee sprung,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Which in my day perchance I somewhat vexed.'<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Forth from one vault these sudden accents rung,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">So that I trembling stood with fear perplexed.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Then as I closer to my master drew.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_760" id="Page_760">[Pg 760]</a></span><br /></span>
+<span class="i2">'Turn back! what dost thou?' he exclaimed in haste;<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">'See! Farinata rises to thy view;<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Now mayst behold him upward from his waist.'<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Full in his face already I was gazing,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">While his front lowered, and his proud bosom swelled,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">As though even there, amid his burial blazing,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">The infernal realm in high disdain he held."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>In this scene, however, the radical defect of Dr. Parsons's work
+appears: it is unequal, and unsustained even in some of its best parts.
+It seems scarcely credible that the poet who could produce the grand
+lines just given, could also mar the whole effect of the father's
+frantic appeal to know if his son Guido be no longer alive, by putting
+in his mouth the melodramatic words,</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Sayest thou, 'he had'? <i>what mean ye!</i> is he dead?"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>But our translator does this, and he makes Ugolino report little Anselm
+as saying,</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Thou look'st so, father! what's the matter, what?"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>&mdash;a line that Melpomene herself could not read with tragic effect,&mdash;for,</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Disse; tu guardi si, padre; che hai?"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>As he likewise causes Francesca to say,</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Love quick to kindle every gentler breast<br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><i>Fired this fond being with the lovely shape</i><br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Bereft me so!"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>for,</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Amor, che al cor gentil ratto s'apprende;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Prese costui della bella persona<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Che mi fu tolta ";<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>and,</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Where Po descends in Adria's peace to rest<br /></span>
+<span class="i3"><i>Raging with all his rivulets no more,"</i><br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>for,</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Su la marina dove 'l Po descende<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Per aver pace co' seguaci sui,"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Indeed, we have to confess that the present is on the whole not a
+satisfactory translation of the episode of Francesca da Rimini. The
+inscription on the gate of hell, also, is rendered in a manner scarcely
+to be called successful, and not bearing comparison with that of the
+other rhyming translators,&mdash;Ford, Wright, and Cayley. As to the
+beginning of the seventh canto, we must think that Dr. Parsons was
+chiefly moved by the prevailing sentiment of mankind to translate</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Pape Satan! pape Satan aleppe!"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>into</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Ho! Satan! Popes&mdash;more Popes&mdash;head Satan here!"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>These and other blemishes arrest the most casual glance. The merits of
+any work are harder to prove than its faults, though they are quite as
+deeply felt; and, as we have already intimated, it is the misfortune of
+Dr. Parsons that some of his greatest defects are in passages otherwise
+the most generally successful. There are probably few pages of the
+translation which do not offend by some lapse; but at the same time
+there is no page which will not command admiration by sublime and
+striking lines. We think the whole of the following passage from the
+thirteenth canto (it is the well-known description of the sentient wood
+into which the self-violent are turned) has a peculiar strength and
+dignity:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Amid the branches of this dismal grove,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Their loathsome nests the brutal Harpies build,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Who from the Strophades the Trojans drove<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">With woful auguries erelong fulfilled.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Huge wings they have, men's faces, human throats,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Feet armed with claws, vast bellies clothed with plumes:<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">From those strange trees they pour their doleful notes.<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">'Now, ere thou further penetrate these glooms,'<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Said my good master, 'thou shouldst understand<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Thou'rt in the second circlet, and shall be,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Until thou come upon the horrid sand.<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Give good heed then: more wonders thou shall see,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Yea, to confirm all stories I have told.'<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">On every side I heard heart-rending cries,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">But not a person could I there behold:<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Wherefore I stopped, bewildered with surprise.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Methinks he thought I thought the voices came<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">From some that, hiding, in the thicket lay:<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Because the Master said, 'If thou but maim<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">One of these plants, yen, pluck a branch away,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Then shall thy judgment be more just than now.'<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Therefore my hand I slightly forward reached;<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">And while I wrenched away a little bough<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">From a huge bush, 'Why mangle me?' it screeched.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Then, as the dingy drops began to start,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">'Why dost thou tear me?' shrieked the trunk again,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">'Hast thou no touch of pity in thy heart?<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">We that now here are planted, once were men;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">But, were we serpents' souls, thy hand might shame<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">To have no more compassion on our woes';<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Like a green log, that hisses in the flame,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Groaning at one end, as the other glows,&mdash;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Even as the wind comes sputtering forth, I say,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Thus oozed together from the splintered wood<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Both words and blood. I dropped the broken spray,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">And, like a coward, faint and trembling stood."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>This picture, also, of the apparition of the angel who opens the gates
+of Dis is done with a hand as firm as it is free:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_761" id="Page_761">[Pg 761]</a></span>&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"As frogs before their enemy, the snake,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Quick scattering through the pool in timid shoals,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">On the dankooze a huddling cluster makes'<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">I saw above a thousand mined souls<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Flying from one who passed the Stygian bog,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">With feet unmoistened by the sludgy wave;<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Oft from his face his left hand brushed the fog<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Whose weight alone, it seemed, annoyance gave.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">At once the messenger of Heaven I kenned,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">And toward my master turned, who made a sign<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">That hushed I should remain, and lowly bend.<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Ah me, how full he looked of scorn divine!"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p><br /><br /></p>
+<div class="blockquot"><p><i>Ornithology and O&ouml;logy of New England: containing full
+Descriptions of the Birds of New England, and adjoining States
+and Provinces, arranged by a long-approved Classification and
+Nomenclature; together with a complete History of their Habits,
+Times of Arrival and Departure, their Distribution, Food, Song,
+Time of Breeding, and a careful and accurate Description of
+their Nests and Eggs; with Illustrations of many Species of the
+Birds, and accurate Figures of their Eggs</i>. By <span class="smcap">Edward A.
+Samuels</span>, Curator of Zo&ouml;logy in the Massachusetts State Cabinet.
+Boston: Nichols and Noyes.</p></div>
+
+<p>The strong point of this book is, that it monopolizes the ground, and
+has no rivals. While no branch of natural history has called forth in
+America such arduous research as ornithology, or such eloquent writing,
+there has yet been for many years no popular manual in print. Audubon,
+Wilson, Nuttall, are all practically inaccessible to the ordinary
+purchaser. Moreover, there have been great advances in scientific
+classification, and also in field knowledge, since those earlier works
+appeared. There is therefore an admirable field for any new writer.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Samuels frankly acknowledges on his first page that he is mainly
+indebted to Professor Baird of the Smithsonian Institute for what is by
+far the most valuable portion of his book,&mdash;the classification, the
+nomenclature, and the generic and specific descriptions. He is only
+responsible for the popular descriptions; but even these consist so very
+largely of quotations that the whole book must evidently be judged
+rather as a compilation than as an original work.</p>
+
+<p>Considered as a compilation, it is valuable, though its title-page
+unfortunately promises more than any work on natural history ever yet
+performed, and so prepares the way for disappointment. Mr. Samuels
+appears to be a zealous and accurate ornithologist, with plenty of
+field-knowledge, but very little descriptive power. Being apparently
+conscious of this, he is shy of delineating the rarer birds, because he
+does not personally know them, while he passes hastily over the more
+familiar, because "their habits are known to all." This last piece of
+abstinence is greatly to be regretted. For a local manual has two main
+objects, to furnish to young students the means of identifying species,
+and to give remote students the means of comparing species. For both
+purposes the commonest birds are most important, since everybody begins
+with these. A boy wishes, for instance, to identify the wood-thrush; or
+a Southern naturalist wishes to compare its traits with those of the
+mocking-bird. He finds that in this book the wood-thrush is dismissed
+with two pages, while there is a quotation from Wilson seven pages long
+upon the habits of the mocking-bird. When will naturalists learn that
+the first duty of each observer is to make a thorough study of his own
+locality, and meanwhile to let the rest of the world alone?</p>
+
+<p>One looks in vain in these pages for any good description of the
+song-sparrow, the blue-bird, the blue-jay, the kingfisher, or the
+oriole. These birds are allowed but a page or two each, although, for
+some reason, more liberal space is given to the robin and the crow. But
+there is no bird so familiar that it does not offer subjects for
+interesting speculation and study. The pretty nocturnal trill of the
+hairbird; the remarkable change which civilization has wrought in the
+habits of the cliff-swallow; the disputed question whether the cat-bird
+is or is not a mocker;&mdash;these and a hundred similar points relate to
+very common birds, and are accordingly unnoticed by Mr. Samuels. Eggs
+really interest him, and his descriptions and measurements of these
+constitute the most original part of the book, and are highly valuable.
+On the other hand, the notes of birds are very inadequately described,
+and sometimes not at all; he does not mention that the loon has a voice.</p>
+
+<p>Again, he does full justice to the chronology of bird biography, and
+gives ample dates as to their coming and going, nesting and hatching.
+But as to their geographical distribution the information is scanty, and
+not always quite reliable. Thus the snowy-owl is described (p. 78) as
+occurring "principally on the sea-coast," whereas it is tolerably<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_762" id="Page_762">[Pg 762]</a></span>
+abundant in the very heart of Massachusetts, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois,
+etc.; the snow-bird is described as nesting in the White Mountains (p.
+314), while the more remarkable fact that it nests on Monadnock is
+omitted; the meadow-lark is described as only remaining in New England
+through "mild winters" (p. 344), whereas near Newport it remains during
+the coldest seasons, more abundantly than any other conspicuous bird.
+These, however, are subordinate points, and there is no important matter
+in which we have seen any reason to impugn the author's accuracy.</p>
+
+<p>The inequality which marks the internal execution of this book marks
+also its externals. The plates of eggs&mdash;four in number, comprising
+thirty eggs&mdash;are admirable; while the plates representing birds are Of
+the most mediocre description, and do discredit to the work. With all
+these merits and demerits, the book is of much value, because an
+unsatisfactory manual is far better than none. It does not take the
+place of that revised edition of Nuttall, which is still the great
+desideratum, but we may use meanwhile an eminently ornithological
+proverb, and say that a Samuels in the hand is worth two Nuttalls in the
+bush.</p>
+<p><br /><br /></p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p><i>Richmond during the War. Four Years of Personal Observation</i>.
+By a Richmond Lady. New York: G. W. Carleton and Company.</p></div>
+
+<p>Mr. Curtis, in his charming book, "Prue and I," speaks of the novel
+effect of landscape which Mr. Titbottom got by putting down his head,
+and regarding the prospect between his knees; and we suppose that most
+ingenious boys, young and old, have similarly contemplated nature, and
+will understand what we mean when we say that the world shows to much
+the same advantage through the books of Southern writers. Especially in
+Southern histories of the late war is the effect noticeable. The general
+outline is the same as when viewed in the more conventional manner, with
+ideas and principles right side up; the objects are the same, the events
+and results are the same; but there is a curious glamour over all, and
+the spectator has a mystical feeling of topsy-turvy, ending in vertigo
+and a disordered stomach.</p>
+
+<p>The present book is in the spirit of all other subjugated literature
+concerning the war,&mdash;a vainglorious and boastful spirit as to events
+that led only to the destruction of the political power of the South; a
+wronged and forgiving, if not quite cheerful, spirit as to the end
+itself. Vivid and powerful presentation of facts would not perhaps be
+expected of an author who calls herself "A Richmond Lady," and there is
+nothing of the sort in the book. It contains sketches of public Rebels
+in civil and military station, washed in with the raw yellows, reds, and
+blues of Southern eulogy; and there is a great deal of gossip concerning
+private life in Richmond, where everybody appears to have spoken and
+acted during the four years of the war as if in the presence of the
+photographers and short-hand writers, and with an eye single to the
+impression upon posterity. It is an eloquent book, and&mdash;need we say?&mdash;a
+dull one.</p>
+<p><br /><br /></p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p><i>Kathrina: her Life and mine, in a Poem</i>, By <span class="smcap">J. G. Holland</span>,
+Author of "Bitter-Sweet." New York: Charles Scribner and
+Company.</p></div>
+
+<p>Let us tell without any caricature of ours, in prose that shall be just
+if not generous, the story of Mr. Holland's hero as we have gathered it
+from the work which the author, for reasons of his own, calls a poem.</p>
+
+<p>The petted son of a rich widow in Northampton, Massachusetts, whose
+father has killed himself in a moment of insanity, reaches the age of
+fourteen years without great event, when his mother takes him to visit a
+lady friend living on the other side of the Connecticut River. In this
+lady's door-yard the hero finds a little lamb tethered in the grass, and
+decked with a necklace of scarlet ribbon, and, having a mind for a
+frolic with the pretty animal, the boy unties it. Instantly it slips its
+tether from his hand, leaps the fence, and runs to the top of the
+nearest mountain, whither he follows it, and where, exalted by the
+magnificence of the landscape, he is for the first time conscious of
+being a poet. Returning to his anxious mother, she too is aware of some
+wondrous change in him, and says:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"My Paul has climbed the noblest mountain height<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">In all his little world, and gazed on scenes<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">As beautiful as rest beneath the sun.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">I trust he will remember all his life<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">That to his best achievement, and the spot<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Nearest to heaven his youthful feet have trod,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">He has been guided by a guileless lamb.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">It is an omen which his mother's heart<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Will treasure with her jewels."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Resolved to give him the best educational<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_763" id="Page_763">[Pg 763]</a></span> advantages his mother sends
+him to Mr. Bancroft's school; or, as Mr. Holland sings, permits him</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"To climb the goodly eminence where he<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">In whose profound and stately pages live<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">His country's annals, ruled his little realm."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Here the hero surpasses all the other boys in everything, and but
+repeats his triumphs later when he goes to Amherst College. His mother
+lives upon the victories which he despises; but at last she yields to
+the taint which was in her own blood as well as her husband's, and
+destroys herself. The son, who was aware of her suicidal tendency, and
+had once overheard her combating it in prayer, curses the God who would
+not listen to her and help her, and rejects Him from his scheme of life.</p>
+
+<p>In due time he falls in love with Kathrina, a young lady whom he first
+sees on the occasion of her public reception into the Congregational
+Church at Hadley. Later he learns that she is staying with the lady
+whose pet lamb led him such a chase,&mdash;that she is in fact her niece, and
+that she has seen better days. We must say that this good lady does
+everything in her power to make a match between the young people; and
+she is more pleased than surprised at the success of her efforts. It has
+been the hero's idea that human love will fill up the void left in his
+life by the rejection of God and religion; but he soon finds himself
+vaguely unhappy and unsatisfied, and he determines to glut his heart
+with literary fame. He goes, therefore, to New York, and succeeds as a
+poet beyond all his dreams of success. For ten years he is the most
+popular of authors; but he sickens of his facile triumph, and imagines
+that to be happy he must write to please himself, and not the multitude.
+He writes with this idea, but pleases nobody, and is as unhappy as ever.</p>
+
+<p>Meanwhile, Kathrina has fallen into a decline. On her death-bed she
+tells him that it is religion alone which can appease and satisfy him;
+but she pleads with him in vain, till one day, when he enters her room,
+and is startled by a strange coincidence: the lamb, which led him to the
+mountain-top and the consciousness of poetic power, had a scarlet ribbon
+on its neck, and now he finds this ribbon</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i10">"at her throat<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Repeated in a bright geranium-flower!"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Then Kathrina tells him that his mother's spirit has talked with her,
+and bidden her say to him this:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"The lamb has slipped the leash by which his hand<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Held her in thrall, and seeks the mountain-height;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And he, if he reclaim her to his grasp,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Must follow where she leads, and kneel at last<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Upon the summit by her side. And more,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Give him my promise that, if he do this,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">He shall receive from that fair altitude<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Such a vision of the realm that lies around,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Cleft by the river of immortal life,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">As shall so lift him from his selfishness,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And so enlarge his soul, that he shall stand<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Redeemed from all unworthiness, and saved<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">To happiness and heaven."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Whereupon, having delivered her message, Kathrina bids him kneel. It is
+the supreme moment of her life. He hears his mother's voice, and the
+voice of the innumerable heavenly host, and even the voice of God
+repeating her mandate. He kneels, and she bids him pray, and, as before,
+all the celestial voices repeat her bidding. He prays and is saved.</p>
+
+<p>Such is the story of Kathrina, or rather of Kathrina's husband, for she
+is herself scarcely other than a name for a series of arguments, with
+little of the flesh and blood of a womanly personality. We have too much
+reverence for high purposes in literature not to applaud Mr. Holland's
+good intent in this work, and we accept fully his theory of letters and
+of life. Both are meagre and unsatisfactory as long as their motive is
+low; both must yield unhappiness and self-despite till religion inform
+them. This is the common experience of man; this is the burden of the
+sayings of the sage from the time of Solomon to the time of Mr. Holland;
+and we can all acknowledge its truth, however we may differ as to the
+essence of religion itself. But we conceive that repetition of this
+truth in a long poem demands of the author an excellence, or of the
+reader a patience, all but superhuman.</p>
+
+<p>How Mr. Holland has met the extraordinary demand upon his powers is
+partly evident from the outline of the poem as we have given it. It must
+be owned that it is rather a feeble fancy which unites two vital epochs
+by the incident of the truant lambkin, and that the plot of the poem
+does not in any way reveal a great faculty of invention. A parable,
+moreover, teaches only so far as it is true to life; and in a tale
+professing to deal with persons of our own day and country, we have a
+right to expect some fidelity to our contemporaries and neighbors. But
+we find nothing of this in "Kathrina,"&mdash;not even in the incident of a
+young gentleman of fourteen sporting with a lambkin; or in the talk of
+young people who make love in long arguments concerning<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_764" id="Page_764">[Pg 764]</a></span> the nature and
+office of genius and the intermediary functions of the teacher.
+Polemically considered, there is nothing very wrong in the discussions
+between those metaphysical lovers, and no one need raise the question as
+to how far Kathrina's peculiar ideas are applicable to the work of
+genius bearing her name.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"The greatest artists speak to fewest souls,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">... The bread that comes from heaven<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Needs finest breaking. Some there doubtless are,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Some ready souls, that take the morsel pure<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Divided to their need; but multitudes<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Must have it in admixtures, menstruums,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And forms that human hands or human life<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Have moulded."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Such passages, though they add nothing to the verisimilitude of
+Kathrina's character, help to make her appear consistent in not laughing
+at a certain weird poem which her lover reads to her. Few ladies in real
+life, however great a tenderness they might feel for a morbid young
+poet, could practise Kathrina's self-control, when, depicting himself as
+a godless youth imprisoned by phantoms "among the elves of the silent
+land," he sings:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Under the charred and ghastly gloom,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Over the flinty stones,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">They led him forth to his terrible doom,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And, plunged in a deep and noisome tomb,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">They sat him among the bones."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Where, crouching, he beholds, through a "loop" in the wall, "a sweet
+angel from the skies":&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Could she not loose him from his thrall,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">And lead him into the light?<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">'Ah me!' he murmured, 'I dare not call,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Lest she may doubt it a goblin's waul,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">And leave me in swift affright!'"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>The question is of the poet himself, immersed in his own gloomy
+thoughts, and of Kathrina, who could rescue him from them; but she has
+heard "only a wild, weird story," and her lover is obliged to explain
+it, and still we are to suppose that she did not laugh. Nay, we are told
+that she instantly accepted the poet, who exclaims:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Are there not lofty moments when the soul<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Leaps to the front of being, casting off<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The robes and clumsy instruments of sense,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And, postured in its immortality,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Reveals its independence of the clod<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">In which it dwells?&mdash;moments in which the earth<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And all material things, all sights and sounds,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">All signals, ministries, interpreters,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Relapse to nothing, and the interflow<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Of thought and feeling, love and life, go on<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Between two spirits, raised to sympathy<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The body dust, within an orb outlined,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">It shall go on forever?"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>We have no reason to suppose that this is not thought a fine passage by
+the author, who will doubtless find readers enough to agree with him, if
+he should not care to accept our estimate of his whole poem.
+Nevertheless, we must confess that it appears to us puerile in
+conception, destitute of due motive, and crude and inartistic in
+treatment. But we should be unjust both to ourselves and our author, if
+we left his work without some allusion to its highly embellished style,
+or, having failed to approve the whole design, refused to notice at all
+the elaborate ornamentation of the parts. Not to be guilty, then, of
+this unfairness, let us cull here some of the fanciful tropes and
+figures which enamel these flowery pages. The oriole is "a torch of
+downy flame"; the "reiterant katydids rasp the mysterious silence"; a
+mother's loss and sorrow are "twin leeches at her heart"; the frosty
+landscape is "fulgent with downy crystals"; Kathrina wears a "pale-blue
+muslin robe," which the hero fancies "dyed with forget-me-nots"; and the
+landscape has usually some effect of dry-goods to the poet's eye. We
+might almost believe that this passage,</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i6">"We touched the hem<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Of the dark mountain's robe, that falls in folds<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Of emerald sward around his feet, and there<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Upon its tufted velvet we sat down,"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>was inspired by perusal of Dr. Holmes's ode to "Evening&mdash;by a Tailor":&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Day hath put on his jacket, and around<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">His burning bosom buttoned it with stars<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Here will I lay me on the velvet grass,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">That is like padding to earth's meagre ribs."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>But Mr. Holland's fancy is of a quality which transcends all feigning in
+others. Whatever it touches it figures in gross material substance,
+preferably wood or some sort of upholstery. When, however, his hero
+first stood in Broadway, he seems to have found no fabric of the looms,
+no variety of plumage, no sort of precious wood or dye-stuff equal to
+the allegory, and he wreaks himself in the following tremendous
+hydraulic image;&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"I saw the waves of life roll up the steps<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Of great cathedrals and retire; and break<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">In charioted grandeur at the feet<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Of marble palaces, and toss their spray<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Of feathered beauty through the open doors,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">To pile the restless foam within; and burst<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">On crowded caravansaries, to fall<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">In quick return; and in dark currents glide<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Through sinuous alleys, and the grimy loops<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Of reeking cellars, and with softest plash<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Assail the gilded shrines of opulence,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And slide in musical relapse away."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No.
+122, December, 1867, by Various
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY ***
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 122,
+December, 1867, 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 20, No. 122, December, 1867
+
+Author: Various
+
+Release Date: April 28, 2009 [EBook #28630]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Joshua Hutchinson, Josephine Paolucci and the
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net.
+(This file was produced from images generously made
+available by Cornell University Digital Collections.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+THE
+
+ATLANTIC MONTHLY.
+
+_A Magazine of Literature, Science, Art, and Politics._
+
+
+VOL. XX.--DECEMBER, 1867.--NO. CXXII.
+
+Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1867, by TICKNOR AND
+FIELDS, in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of
+Massachusetts.
+
+
+
+
+THE GUARDIAN ANGEL.
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIV.
+
+MURRAY BRADSHAW PLAYS HIS LAST CARD.
+
+"How can I see that man this evening, Mr. Lindsay?"
+
+"May I not be _Clement_, dearest? I would not see him at all, Myrtle. I
+don't believe you will find much pleasure in listening to his fine
+speeches."
+
+"I cannot endure it. Kitty, tell him I am engaged, and cannot see him
+this evening. No, no! don't say engaged, say very much occupied."
+
+Kitty departed, communing with herself in this wise:--"Ockipied, is it?
+An' that's what ye cahl it when ye're kapin' company with one young
+gintleman an' don't want another young gintleman to come in an' help the
+two of ye? Ye won't get y'r pigs to market to-day, Mr. Bridshaw,--no,
+nor to-morrow, nayther, Mr. Bridshaw. It's Mrs. Lindsay that Miss Myrtle
+is goin' to be,--an' a big cake there'll be at the weddin', frosted all
+over,--won't ye be plased with a slice o' that, Mr. Bridshaw?"
+
+With these reflections in her mind, Mistress Kitty delivered her
+message, not without a gleam of malicious intelligence in her look that
+stung Mr. Bradshaw sharply. He had noticed a hat in the entry, and a
+little stick by it which he remembered well as one he had seen carried
+by Clement Lindsay. But he was used to concealing his emotions, and he
+greeted the two older ladies, who presently came into the library, so
+pleasantly, that no one who had not studied his face long and carefully
+would have suspected the bitterness of heart that lay hidden far down
+beneath his deceptive smile. He told Miss Silence, with much apparent
+interest, the story of his journey. He gave her an account of the
+progress of the case in which the estate of which she inherited the
+principal portion was interested. He did not tell her that a final
+decision which would settle the right to the great claim might be
+expected at any moment, and he did not tell her that there was very
+little doubt that it would be in favor of the heirs of Malachi Withers.
+He was very sorry he could not see Miss Hazard that evening,--hoped he
+should be more fortunate to-morrow forenoon, when he intended to call
+again,--had a message for her from one of her former school friends,
+which he was anxious to give her. He exchanged certain looks and hints
+with Miss Cynthia, which led her to withdraw and bring down the papers
+he had intrusted to her. At the close of his visit, she followed him
+into the entry with a lamp, as was her common custom.
+
+"What's the meaning of all this, Cynthia? Is that fellow making love to
+Myrtle?"
+
+"I'm afraid so, Mr. Bradshaw. He's been here several times, and they
+seem to be getting intimate. I couldn't do anything to stop it."
+
+"Give me the papers,--quick!"
+
+Cynthia pulled the package from her pocket. Murray Bradshaw looked
+sharply at it. A little crumpled,--crowded into her pocket. Seal
+unbroken. All safe.
+
+"I shall come again to-morrow forenoon. Another day and it will be all
+up. The decision of the court will be known. It won't be my fault if one
+visit is not enough.--You don't suppose Myrtle is in love with this
+fellow?"
+
+"She acts as if she might be. You know he's broke with Susan Posey, and
+there's nothing to hinder. If you ask my opinion, I think it's your last
+chance: she isn't a girl to half do things, and if she has taken to this
+man it will be hard to make her change her mind. But she's young, and
+she has had a liking for you, and if you manage it well there's no
+telling."
+
+Two notes passed between Myrtle Hazard and Master Byles Gridley that
+evening. Mistress Kitty Fagan, who had kept her ears pretty wide open,
+carried them.
+
+Murray Bradshaw went home in a very desperate state of feeling. He had
+laid his plans, as he thought, with perfect skill, and the certainty of
+their securing their end. These papers were to have been taken from the
+envelope, and found in the garret just at the right moment, either by
+Cynthia herself or one of the other members of the family, who was to be
+led on, as it were accidentally, to the discovery. The right moment must
+be close at hand. He was to offer his hand--and heart, of course--to
+Myrtle, and it was to be accepted. As soon as the decision of the land
+case was made known, or not long afterwards, there was to be a search in
+the garret for papers, and these were to be discovered in a certain
+dusty recess, where, of course, they would have been placed by Miss
+Cynthia.
+
+And now the one condition which gave any value to these arrangements
+seemed like to fail. This obscure youth--this poor fool, who had been on
+the point of marrying a simpleton to whom he had made a boyish
+promise--was coming between him and the object of his long pursuit,--the
+woman who had every attraction to draw him to herself. It had been a
+matter of pride with Murray Bradshaw that he never lost his temper so as
+to interfere with the precise course of action which his cool judgment
+approved; but now he was almost beside himself with passion. His labors,
+as he believed, had secured the favorable issue of the great case so
+long pending. He had followed Myrtle through her whole career, if not as
+her avowed lover, at least as one whose friendship promised to flower in
+love in due season. The moment had come when the scene and the
+characters in this village drama were to undergo a change as sudden and
+as brilliant as in those fairy spectacles where the dark background
+changes to a golden palace and the sober dresses are replaced by robes
+of regal splendor. The change was fast approaching; but he, the
+enchanter, as he had thought himself, found his wand broken, and his
+power given to another.
+
+He could not sleep during that night. He paced his room, a prey to
+jealousy and envy and rage, which his calm temperament had kept him from
+feeling in their intensity up to this miserable hour. He thought of all
+that a maddened nature can imagine to deaden its own intolerable
+anguish. Of revenge. If Myrtle rejected his suit, should he take her
+life on the spot, that she might never be another's,--that neither man
+nor woman should ever triumph over him,--the proud, ambitious man,
+defeated, humbled, scorned? No! that was a meanness of egotism which
+only the most vulgar souls could be capable of. Should he challenge her
+lover? It was not the way of the people and time, and ended in absurd
+complications, if anybody was foolish enough to try it. Shoot him? The
+idea floated through his mind, for he thought of everything; but he was
+a lawyer, and not a fool, and had no idea of figuring in court as a
+criminal. Besides, he was not a murderer,--cunning was his natural
+weapon, not violence. He had a certain admiration of desperate crime in
+others, as showing nerve and force, but he did not feel it to be his own
+style of doing business.
+
+During the night he made every arrangement for leaving the village the
+next day, in case he failed to make any impression on Myrtle Hazard and
+found that his chance was gone. He wrote a letter to his partner,
+telling him that he had left to join one of the regiments forming in the
+city. He adjusted all his business matters so that his partner should
+find as little trouble as possible. A little before dawn he threw
+himself on the bed, but he could not sleep; and he rose at sunrise, and
+finished his preparations for his departure to the city.
+
+The morning dragged along slowly. He would not go to the office, not
+wishing to meet his partner again. After breakfast he dressed himself
+with great care, for he meant to show himself in the best possible
+aspect. Just before he left the house to go to The Poplars, he took the
+sealed package from his trunk, broke open the envelope, took from it a
+single paper,--it had some spots on it which distinguished it from all
+the rest,--put it separately in his pocket, and then the envelope
+containing the other papers.
+
+The calm smile he wore on his features as he set forth cost him a
+greater effort than he had ever made before to put it on. He was
+moulding his face to the look with which he meant to present himself;
+and the muscles had been sternly fixed so long that it was a task to
+bring them to their habitual expression in company,--that of ingenuous
+good-nature.
+
+He was shown into the parlor at The Poplars; and Kitty told Myrtle that
+he had called and inquired for her, and was waiting down stairs.
+
+"Tell him I will be down presently," she said. "And, Kitty, now mind
+just what I tell you. Leave your kitchen door open, so that you can hear
+anything fall in the parlor. If you hear a book fall,--it will be a
+heavy one, and will make some noise,--run straight up here to my little
+chamber, and hang this red scarf out of the window. The _left-hand
+side-sash_, mind, so that anybody can see it from the road. If Mr.
+Gridley calls, show him into the parlor, no matter who is there."
+
+Kitty Fagan looked amazingly intelligent, and promised that she would do
+exactly as she was told. Myrtle followed her down stairs almost
+immediately, and went into the parlor, where Mr. Bradshaw was waiting.
+
+Never in his calmest moments had he worn a more insinuating smile on his
+features than that with which he now greeted Myrtle. So gentle, so
+gracious, so full of trust, such a completely natural expression of a
+kind, genial character did it seem, that to any but an expert it would
+have appeared impossible that such an effect could be produced by the
+skilful balancing of half a dozen pairs of little muscles that manage
+the lips and the corners of the mouth. The tones of his voice were
+subdued into accord with the look of his features; his whole manner was
+fascinating, as far as any conscious effort could make it so. It was
+just one of those artificially pleasing effects that so often pass with
+such as have little experience of life for the genuine expression of
+character and feeling. But Myrtle had learned the look that shapes
+itself on the features of one who loves with a love that seeketh not its
+own, and she knew the difference between acting and reality. She met his
+insinuating approach with a courtesy so carefully ordered that it was of
+itself a sentence without appeal. Artful persons often interpret sincere
+ones by their own standard. Murray Bradshaw thought little of this
+somewhat formal address,--a few minutes would break this thin film to
+pieces. He was not only a suitor with a prize to gain, he was a
+colloquial artist about to employ all the resources of his specialty.
+
+He introduced the conversation in the most natural and easy way, by
+giving her the message from a former schoolmate to which he had
+referred, coloring it so delicately, as he delivered it, that it became
+an innocent-looking flattery. Myrtle found herself in a rose-colored
+atmosphere, not from Murray Bradshaw's admiration, as it seemed, but
+only reflected by his mind from another source. That was one of his
+arts,--always, if possible, to associate himself incidentally, as it
+appeared, and unavoidably, with an agreeable impression.
+
+So Myrtle was betrayed into smiling and being pleased before he had said
+a word about himself or his affairs. Then he told her of the adventures
+and labors of his late expedition; of certain evidence which at the very
+last moment he had unearthed, and which was very probably the
+turning-point in the case. He could not help feeling that she must
+eventually reap some benefit from the good fortune with which his
+efforts had been attended. The thought that it might yet be so had been
+a great source of encouragement to him,--it would always be a great
+happiness to him to remember that he had done anything to make her
+happy.
+
+Myrtle was very glad that he had been so far successful,--she did not
+know that it made much difference to her, but she was obliged to him for
+the desire of serving her that he had expressed.
+
+"My services are always yours, Miss Hazard. There is no sacrifice I
+would not willingly make for your benefit. I have never had but one
+feeling toward you. You cannot be ignorant of what that feeling is."
+
+"I know, Mr. Bradshaw, it has been one of kindness. I have to thank you
+for many friendly attentions, for which I hope I have never been
+ungrateful."
+
+"Kindness is not all that I feel towards you, Miss Hazard. If that were
+all, my lips would not tremble as they do now in telling you my
+feelings. I love you."
+
+He sprang the great confession on Myrtle a little sooner than he had
+meant. It was so hard to go on making phrases! Myrtle changed color a
+little, for she was startled.
+
+The seemingly involuntary movement she made brought her arm against a
+large dictionary, which lay very near the edge of the table on which it
+was resting. The book fell with a loud noise to the floor.
+
+There it lay. The young man awaited her answer; he did not think of
+polite forms at such a moment.
+
+"It cannot be, Mr. Bradshaw,--it must not be. I have known you long, and
+I am not ignorant of all your brilliant qualities, but you must not
+speak to me of love. Your regard,--your friendly interest,--tell me that
+I shall always have these, but do not distress me with offering more
+than these."
+
+"I do not ask you to give me your love in return; I only ask you not to
+bid me despair. Let me believe that the time may come when you will
+listen to me,--no matter how distant. You are young,--you have a tender
+heart,--you would not doom one who only lives for you to wretchedness.
+So long that we have known each other! It cannot be that any other has
+come between us--"
+
+Myrtle blushed so deeply that there was no need of his finishing his
+question.
+
+"Do you mean, Myrtle Hazard, that you have cast me aside for
+another?--for this stranger--this artist--who was with you yesterday
+when I came, bringing with me the story of all I had done for you,--yes,
+for you,--and was ignominiously refused the privilege of seeing you?"
+Rage and jealousy had got the better of him this time. He rose as he
+spoke, and looked upon her with such passion kindling in his eyes that
+he seemed ready for any desperate act.
+
+"I have thanked you for any services you may have rendered me, Mr.
+Bradshaw." Myrtle answered, very calmly, "and I hope you will add one
+more to them by sparing me this rude questioning. I wished to treat you
+as a friend; I hope you will not render that impossible."
+
+He had recovered himself for one more last effort. "I was impatient:
+overlook it, I beg you. I was thinking of all the happiness I have
+labored to secure for you, and of the ruin to us both it would be if you
+scornfully rejected the love I offer you,--if you refuse to leave me any
+hope for the future,--if you insist on throwing yourself away on this
+man, so lately pledged to another. I hold the key of all your earthly
+fortunes in my hand. My love for you inspired me in all that I have
+done, and, now that I come to lay the result of my labors at your feet,
+you turn from me, and offer my reward to a stranger. I do not ask you to
+say this day that you will be mine,--I would not force your
+inclinations,--but I do ask you that you will hold yourself free of all
+others, and listen to me as one who may yet be more than a friend. Say
+so much as this, Myrtle, and you shall have such a future as you never
+dreamed of. Fortune, position, all that this world can give, shall be
+yours!"
+
+"Never! never! If you could offer me the whole world, or take away from
+me all that the world can give, it would make no difference to me. I
+cannot tell what power you hold over me, whether of life and death, or
+of wealth and poverty; but after talking to me of love, I should not
+have thought you would have wronged me by suggesting any meaner motive.
+It is only because we have been on friendly terms so long that I have
+listened to you as I have done. You have said more than enough, and I
+beg you will allow me to put an end to this interview."
+
+She rose to leave the room. But Murray Bradshaw had gone too far to
+control himself,--he listened only to the rage which blinded him.
+
+"Not yet!" he said. "Stay one moment, and you shall know what your pride
+and self-will have cost you!"
+
+Myrtle stood, arrested, whether by fear, or curiosity, or the passive
+subjection of her muscles to his imperious will, it would be hard to
+say.
+
+Murray Bradshaw took out the spotted paper from his breast pocket, and
+held it up before her. "Look here!" he exclaimed. "This would have made
+you rich,--it would have crowned you a queen in society,--it would have
+given you all, and more than all, that you ever dreamed of luxury, of
+splendor, of enjoyment; and I, who won it for you, would have taught you
+how to make life yield every bliss it had in store to your wishes. You
+reject my offer unconditionally?"
+
+Myrtle expressed her negative only by a slight contemptuous movement.
+
+Murray Bradshaw walked deliberately to the fireplace, and laid the
+spotted paper upon the burning coals. It writhed and curled, blackened,
+flamed, and in a moment was a cinder dropping into ashes. He folded his
+arms, and stood looking at the wreck of Myrtle's future, the work of his
+cruel hand. Strangely enough, Myrtle herself was fascinated, as it were,
+by the apparent solemnity of this mysterious sacrifice. She had kept her
+eyes steadily on him all the time, and was still gazing at the altar on
+which her happiness had been in some way offered up, when the door was
+opened by Kitty Fagan, and Master Byles Gridley was ushered into the
+parlor.
+
+"Too late, old man!" Murray Bradshaw exclaimed in a hoarse and savage
+voice, as he passed out of the room, and strode through the entry and
+down the avenue. It was the last time the old gate of The Poplars was to
+open or close for him. That same day he left the village; and the next
+time his name was mentioned it was as an officer in one of the regiments
+just raised and about marching to the seat of war.
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXV.
+
+THE SPOTTED PAPER.
+
+What Master Gridley may have said to Myrtle Hazard that served to calm
+her after this exciting scene cannot now be recalled. That Murray
+Bradshaw thought he was inflicting a deadly injury on her was plain
+enough. That Master Gridley did succeed in convincing her that no great
+harm had probably been done her is equally certain.
+
+Like all bachelors who have lived a lonely life, Master Gridley had his
+habits, which nothing short of some terrestrial convulsion--or perhaps,
+in his case, some instinct that drove him forth to help somebody in
+trouble--could possibly derange. After his breakfast, he always sat and
+read awhile,--the paper, if a new one came to hand, or some pleasant old
+author,--if a little neglected by the world of readers, he felt more at
+ease with him, and loved him all the better.
+
+But on the morning after his interview with Myrtle Hazard, he had
+received a letter which made him forget newspapers, old authors, almost
+everything, for the moment. It was from the publisher with whom he had
+had a conversation, it may be remembered, when he visited the city, and
+was to this effect:--That Our Firm propose to print and stereotype the
+work originally published under the title of "Thoughts on the Universe";
+said work to be remodelled according to the plan suggested by the
+Author, with the corrections, alterations, omissions, and additions
+proposed by him; said work to be published under the following title, to
+wit: ---- ----; said work to be printed in 12mo, on paper of good
+quality, from new types, etc., etc., and for every copy thereof printed
+the author to receive, etc., etc.
+
+Master Gridley sat as in a trance, reading this letter over and over, to
+know if it could be really so. So it really was. His book had
+disappeared from the market long ago, as the elm seeds that carpet the
+ground and never germinate disappear. At last it had got a certain value
+as a curiosity for book-hunters. Some one of them, keener-eyed than the
+rest, had seen that there was a meaning and virtue in this unsuccessful
+book, for which there was a new audience educated since it had tried to
+breathe before its time. Out of this had grown at last the publisher's
+proposal. It was too much: his heart swelled with joy, and his eyes
+filled with tears.
+
+How could he resist the temptation? He took down his own particular copy
+of the book, which was yet to do him honor as its parent, and began
+reading. As his eye fell on one paragraph after another, he nodded
+approval of this sentiment or opinion, he shook his head as if
+questioning whether this other were not to be modified or left out, he
+condemned a third as being no longer true for him as when it was
+written, and he sanctioned a fourth with his hearty approval. The reader
+may like a few specimens from this early edition, now a rarity. He shall
+have them, with Master Gridley's verbal comments. The book, as its name
+implied, contained "Thoughts" rather than consecutive trains of
+reasoning or continuous disquisitions. What he read and remarked upon
+were a few of the more pointed statements which stood out in the
+chapters he was turning over. The worth of the book must not be judged
+by these almost random specimens.
+
+"_The best thought, like the most perfect digestion, is done
+unconsciously._--Develop that--Ideas at compound interest in the
+mind.--Be aye sticking in _an idea_,--while you're sleeping it'll be
+growing. Seed of a thought to-day,--flower to-morrow--next week--ten
+years from now, etc.--Article by and by for the....
+
+"_Can the Infinite be supposed to shift the responsibility of the
+ultimate destiny of any created thing to the finite? Our theologians
+pretend that it can. I doubt._--Heretical. _Stet._
+
+"_Protestantism means None of your business. But it is afraid of its own
+logic._--_Stet._ No logical resting-place short of None of your
+business.
+
+"_The supreme self-indulgence is to surrender the will to a spiritual
+director._--Protestantism gave up a great luxury.--Did it, though?
+
+"_Asiatic modes of thought and speech do not express the relations in
+which the American feels himself to stand to his Superiors in this or
+any other sphere of being. Republicanism must have its own religious
+phraseology, which is not that borrowed from Oriental despotisms._
+
+"_Idols and dogmas in place of character; pills and theories in place of
+wholesome living. See the histories of theology and medicine_
+passim.--Hits 'em.
+
+"'_Of such is the kingdom of heaven.' Do you mean to say, Jean Chauvin,
+that_
+
+     _'Heaven_ LIES _about us in our infancy'?_
+
+"_Why do you complain of your organization? Your soul was in a hurry,
+and made a rush for a body. There are patient spirits that have waited
+from eternity, and never found parents fit to be born of._--How do you
+know anything about all that? _Dele._
+
+"_What sweet, smooth voices the negroes have! A hundred generations fed
+on bananas.--Compare them with our apple-eating-white folks!_--It won't
+do. Bananas came from the West Indies.
+
+"_To tell a man's temperament by his handwriting. See if the dots of his
+i's run ahead or not, and if they do, how far._--I've tried that--on
+myself.
+
+"_Marrying into some families is the next thing to being
+canonized._--Not so true now as twenty or thirty years ago. As many
+bladders, but more pins.
+
+"_Fish and dandies only keep on ice._--Who will take? Explain in note
+how all warmth approaching blood-heat spoils fops and flounders.
+
+"_Flying is a lost art among men and reptiles. Bats fly, and men ought
+to. Try a light turbine. Rise a mile straight, fall half a mile
+slanting,--rise half a mile straight, fall half a mile slanting, and so
+on. Or slant up and slant down._--Poh! You ain't such a fool as to think
+that is new,--are you?
+
+"Put in my telegraph project. Central station. Cables with insulated
+wires running to it from different quarters of the city. These form the
+centripetal system. From central station, wires to all the livery
+stables, messenger stands, provision shops, etc., etc. These form the
+centrifugal system. Any house may have a wire in the nearest cable at
+small cost.
+
+"_Do you want to be remembered after the continents have gone under, and
+come up again, and dried, and bred new races? Have your name stamped on
+all your plates and cups and saucers. Nothing of you or yours will last
+like those. I never sit down at my table without looking at the china
+service, and saying, 'Here are my monuments. That butter-dish is my urn.
+This soup-plate is my memorial tablet.'--No need of a skeleton at my
+banquets! I feed from my tombstone and read my epitaph at the bottom, of
+every teacup._--Good."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+He fell into a revery as he finished reading this last sentence. He
+thought of the dim and dread future,--all the changes that it would
+bring to him, to all the living, to the face of the globe, to the order
+of earthly things. He saw men of a new race, alien to all that had ever
+lived, excavating with strange, vast engines the old ocean-bed, now
+become habitable land. And as the great scoops turned out the earth they
+had fetched up from the unexplored depths, a relic of a former simple
+civilization revealed the fact that here a tribe of human beings had
+lived and perished.--Only the coffee-cup he had in his hand half an hour
+ago.--Where would he be then? and Mrs. Hopkins, and Gifted, and Susan,
+and everybody? and President Buchanan? and the Boston State-House? and
+Broadway?--O Lord, Lord, Lord! And the sun perceptibly smaller,
+according to the astronomers, and the earth cooled down a number of
+degrees, and inconceivable arts practised by men of a type yet undreamed
+of, and all the fighting creeds merged in one great universal--
+
+A knock at his door interrupted his revery. Miss Susan Posey informed
+him that a gentleman was waiting below who wished to see him.
+
+"Show him up to my study, Susan Posey, if you please," said Master
+Gridley.
+
+Mr. Penhallow presented himself at Mr. Gridley's door, with a
+countenance expressive of a very high state of excitement.
+
+"You have heard the news, Mr. Gridley, I suppose?"
+
+"What news, Mr. Penhallow?"
+
+"First, that my partner has left very unexpectedly to enlist in a
+regiment just forming. Second, that the great land-case is decided in
+favor of the heirs of the late Malachi Withers."
+
+"Your partner must have known about it yesterday?"
+
+"He did, even before I knew it. He thought himself possessed of a very
+important document, as you know, of which he has made, or means to make,
+some use. You are aware of the artifice I employed to prevent any
+possible evil consequences from any action of his. I have the genuine
+document, of course. I wish you to go over with me to The Poplars, and I
+should be glad to have good old Father Pemberton go with us; for it is a
+serious matter, and will be a great surprise to more than one of the
+family."
+
+They walked together to the old house, where the old clergyman had lived
+for more than half a century. He was used to being neglected by the
+people who ran after his younger colleague; and the attention paid him
+in asking him to be present on an important occasion, as he understood
+this to be, pleased him greatly. He smoothed his long white locks, and
+called a grand-daughter to help make him look fitly for such an
+occasion, and, being at last got into his grandest Sunday aspect, took
+his faithful staff, and set out with the two gentlemen for The Poplars.
+On the way, Mr. Penhallow explained to him the occasion of their visit,
+and the general character of the facts he had to announce. He wished the
+venerable minister to prepare Miss Silence Withers for a revelation
+which would materially change her future prospects. He thought it might
+be well, also, if he would say a few words to Myrtle Hazard, for whom a
+new life, with new and untried temptations, was about to open. His
+business was, as a lawyer, to make known to these parties the facts just
+come to his own knowledge affecting their interests. He had asked Mr.
+Gridley to go with him, as having intimate relations with one of the
+parties referred to, and as having been the principal agent in securing
+to that party the advantages which were to accrue to her from the new
+turn of events. "You are a second parent to her, Mr. Gridley," he said.
+"Your vigilance, your shrewdness, and your--spectacles have saved her. I
+hope she knows the full extent of her obligations to you, and that she
+will always look to you for counsel in all her needs. She will want a
+wise friend, for she is to begin the world anew."
+
+What had happened, when she saw the three grave gentlemen at the door
+early in the forenoon, Mistress Kitty Fagan could not guess. Something
+relating to Miss Myrtle, no doubt: she wasn't goin' to be married right
+off to Mr. Clement,--was she,--and no church, nor cake, nor anything?
+The gentlemen were shown into the parlor. "Ask Miss Withers to go into
+the library, Kitty," said Master Gridley. "Dr. Pemberton wishes to speak
+with her." The good old man was prepared for a scene with Miss Silence.
+He announced to her, in a kind and delicate way, that she must make up
+her mind to the disappointment of certain expectations which she had
+long entertained, and which, as her lawyer, Mr. Penhallow, had come to
+inform her and others, were to be finally relinquished from this hour.
+
+To his great surprise, Miss Silence received this communication almost
+cheerfully. It seemed more like a relief to her than anything else. Her
+one dread in this world was her "responsibility"; and the thought that
+she might have to account for ten talents hereafter, instead of one, had
+often of late been a positive distress to her. There was also in her
+mind a secret disgust at the thought of the hungry creatures who would
+swarm round her if she should ever be in a position to bestow patronage.
+This had grown upon her as the habits of lonely life gave her more and
+more of that fastidious dislike to males in general, as such, which is
+not rare in maidens who have seen the roses of more summers than
+politeness cares to mention.
+
+Father Pemberton then asked if he could see Miss Myrtle Hazard a few
+moments in the library before they went into the parlor, where they were
+to meet Mr. Penhallow and Mr. Gridley, for the purpose of receiving the
+lawyer's communication.
+
+What change was this which Myrtle had undergone since love had touched
+her heart, and her visions of worldly enjoyment had faded before the
+thought of sharing and ennobling the life of one who was worthy of her
+best affections,--of living for another, and of finding her own noblest
+self in that divine office of woman? She had laid aside the bracelet
+which she had so long worn as a kind of charm as well as an ornament.
+One would have said her features had lost something of that look of
+imperious beauty which had added to her resemblance to the dead woman
+whose glowing portrait hung upon her wall. And if it could be that,
+after so many generations, the blood of her who had died for her faith
+could show in her descendant's veins, and the soul of that elect lady of
+her race look out from her far-removed offspring's dark eyes, such a
+transfusion of the martyr's life and spiritual being might well seem to
+manifest itself in Myrtle Hazard.
+
+The large-hearted old man forgot his scholastic theory of human nature
+as he looked upon her face. He thought he saw in her the dawning of that
+grace which some are born with; which some, like Myrtle, only reach
+through many trials and dangers; which some seem to show for a while and
+then lose; which too many never reach while they wear the robes of
+earth, but which speaks of the kingdom of heaven already begun in the
+heart of a child of earth. He told her simply the story of the
+occurrences which had brought them together in the old house, with the
+message the lawyer was to deliver to its inmates. He wished to prepare
+her for what might have been too sudden a surprise.
+
+But Myrtle was not wholly unprepared for some such revelation. There was
+little danger that any such announcement would throw her mind from its
+balance after the inward conflict through which she had been passing.
+For her lover had left her almost as soon as he had told her the story
+of his passion, and the relation in which he stood to her. He, too, had
+gone to answer his country's call to her children, not driven away by
+crime and shame and despair, but quitting all--his new-born happiness,
+the art in which he was an enthusiast, his prospects of success and
+honor--to obey the higher command of duty. War was to him, as to so many
+of the noble youth who went forth, only organized barbarism, hateful
+but for the sacred cause which alone redeemed it from the curse that
+blasted the first murderer. God only knew the sacrifice such young men
+as he made.
+
+How brief Myrtle's dream had been! She almost doubted, at some moments,
+whether she would not awake from it, as from her other visions, and find
+it all unreal. There was no need of fearing any undue excitement of her
+mind after the alternations of feeling she had just experienced. Nothing
+seemed of much moment to her which could come from without,--her real
+world was within, and the light of its day and the breath of its life
+came from her love, made holy by the self-forgetfulness on both sides
+which was born with it.
+
+Only one member of the household was in danger of finding the excitement
+more than she could bear. Miss Cynthia knew that all Murray Bradshaw's
+plans, in which he had taken care that she should have a personal
+interest, had utterly failed. What he had done with the means of revenge
+in his power,--if, indeed, they were still in his power,--she did not
+know. She only knew that there had been a terrible scene, and that he
+had gone, leaving it uncertain whether he would ever return. It was with
+fear and trembling that she heard the summons which went forth, that the
+whole family should meet in the parlor to listen to a statement from Mr.
+Penhallow. They all gathered as requested, and sat round the room, with
+the exception of Mistress Kitty Fagan, who knew her place too well to be
+sittin' down with the likes o' them, and stood with attentive ears in
+the doorway.
+
+Mr. Penhallow then read from a printed paper the decision of the Supreme
+Court in the land-case so long pending, where the estate of the late
+Malachi Withers was the claimant, against certain parties pretending to
+hold under an ancient grant. The decision was in favor of the estate.
+
+"This gives a great property to the heirs," Mr. Penhallow remarked,
+"and the question as to who these heirs are has to be opened. For the
+will under which Silence Withers, sister of the deceased, has inherited,
+is dated some years previously to the decease, and it was not very
+strange that a will of later date should be discovered. Such a will has
+been discovered. It is the instrument I have here."
+
+Myrtle Hazard opened her eyes very widely, for the paper Mr. Penhallow
+held looked exactly like that which Murray Bradshaw had burned, and,
+what was curious, had some spots on it just like some she had noticed on
+that.
+
+"This will," Mr. Penhallow said, "signed by witnesses dead or absent
+from this place, makes a disposition of the testator's property in some
+respects similar to that of the previous one, but with a single change,
+which proves to be of very great importance."
+
+Mr. Penhallow proceeded to read the will. The important change in the
+disposition of the property was this. In case the land-claim was decided
+in favor of the estate, then, in addition to the small provision made
+for Myrtle Hazard, the property so coming to the estate should all go to
+her. There was no question about the genuineness and the legal
+sufficiency of this instrument. Its date was not very long after the
+preceding one, at a period when, as was well known, he had almost given
+up the hope of gaining his case, and when the property was of little
+value compared to that which it had at present.
+
+A long silence followed this reading. Then, to the surprise of all, Miss
+Silence Withers rose, and went to Myrtle Hazard, and wished her joy with
+every appearance of sincerity. She was relieved of a great
+responsibility. Myrtle was young and could bear it better. She hoped
+that her young relative would live long to enjoy the blessings
+Providence had bestowed upon her, and to use them for the good of the
+community, and especially the promotion of the education of deserving
+youth. If some fitting person could be found to advise Myrtle, whose
+affairs would require much care, it would be a great relief to her.
+
+They all went up to Myrtle and congratulated her on her change of
+fortune. Even Cynthia Badlam got out a phrase or two which passed muster
+in the midst of the general excitement. As for Kitty Fagan, she could
+not say a word, but caught Myrtle's hand and kissed it as if it belonged
+to her own saint, and then, suddenly applying her apron to her eyes,
+retreated from a scene which was too much for her, in a state of
+complete mental beatitude and total bodily discomfiture.
+
+Then Silence asked the old minister to make a prayer, and he stretched
+his hands up to Heaven, and called down all the blessings of Providence
+upon all the household, and especially upon this young handmaiden, who
+was to be tried with prosperity, and would need all aid from above to
+keep her from its dangers.
+
+Then Mr. Penhallow asked Myrtle if she had any choice as to the friend
+who should have charge of her affairs.
+
+Myrtle turned to Master Byles Gridley, and said, "You have been my
+friend and protector so far,--will you continue to be so hereafter?"
+
+Master Gridley tried very hard to begin a few words of thanks to her for
+her preference, but, finding his voice a little uncertain, contented
+himself with pressing her hand and saying, "Most willingly, my dear
+daughter!"
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVI.
+
+CONCLUSION.
+
+The same day the great news of Myrtle Hazard's accession to fortune came
+out, the secret was told that she had promised herself in marriage to
+Mr. Clement Lindsay. But her friends hardly knew how to congratulate her
+on this last event. Her lover was gone, to risk his life, not improbably
+to lose it, or to come home a wreck, crippled by wounds, or worn out
+with disease.
+
+Some of them wondered to see her so cheerful in such a moment of trial.
+They could not know how the manly strength of Clement's determination
+had nerved her for womanly endurance. They had not learned that a great
+cause makes great souls, or reveals them to themselves,--a lesson taught
+by so many noble examples in the times that followed. Myrtle's only
+desire seemed to be to labor in some way to help the soldiers and their
+families. She appeared to have forgotten everything for these duties;
+she had no time for regrets, if she were disposed to indulge them, and
+she hardly asked a question as to the extent of the fortune which had
+fallen to her.
+
+The next number of the "Banner and Oracle" contained two announcements
+which she read with some interest when her attention was called to them.
+They were as follows:--
+
+     "A fair and accomplished daughter of this village comes, by the
+     late decision of the Supreme Court, into possession of a
+     property estimated at a million of dollars or more. It consists
+     of a large tract of land purchased many years ago by the late
+     Malachi Withers, now become of immense value by the growth of a
+     city in its neighborhood, the opening of mines, etc., etc. It
+     is rumored that the lovely and highly educated heiress has
+     formed a connection looking towards matrimony with a certain
+     distinguished artist."
+
+     "Our distinguished young townsman, William Murray Bradshaw,
+     Esq., has been among the first to respond to the call of the
+     country for champions to defend her from traitors. We
+     understand that he has obtained a captaincy in the --th
+     Regiment, about to march to the threatened seat of war. May
+     victory perch on his banners!"
+
+The two lovers, parted by their own self-sacrificing choice in the very
+hour that promised to bring them so much happiness, labored for the
+common cause during all the terrible years of warfare, one in the camp
+and the field, the other in the not less needful work which the good
+women carried on at home, or wherever their services were needed.
+Clement--now Captain Lindsay--returned at the end of his first campaign
+charged with a special office. Some months later, after one of the great
+battles, he was sent home wounded. He wore the leaf on his shoulder
+which entitled him to be called Major Lindsay. He recovered from his
+wound only too rapidly, for Myrtle had visited him daily in the military
+hospital where he had resided for treatment; and it was bitter parting.
+The telegraph wires were thrilling almost hourly with messages of death,
+and the long pine boxes came by almost every train,--no need of asking
+what they held!
+
+Once more he came, detailed on special duty, and this time with the
+eagle on his shoulder,--he was Colonel Lindsay. The lovers could not
+part again of their own free will. Some adventurous women had followed
+their husbands to the camp, and Myrtle looked as if she could play the
+part of the Maid of Saragossa on occasion. So Clement asked her if she
+would return with him as his wife; and Myrtle answered, with as much
+willingness to submit as a maiden might fairly show under such
+circumstances, that she would do his bidding. Thereupon, with the
+shortest possible legal notice, Father Pemberton was sent for, and the
+ceremony was performed in the presence of a few witnesses in the large
+parlor at The Poplars, which was adorned with flowers, and hung round
+with all the portraits of the dead members of the family, summoned as
+witnesses to the celebration. One witness looked on with unmoved
+features, yet Myrtle thought there was a more heavenly smile on her
+faded lips than she had ever seen before beaming from the canvas,--it
+was Ann Holyoake, the martyr to her faith, the guardian spirit of
+Myrtle's visions, who seemed to breathe a holier benediction than any
+words--even those of the good old Father Pemberton himself--could
+convey.
+
+They went back together to the camp. From that period until the end of
+the war, Myrtle passed her time between the life of the tent and that of
+the hospital. In the offices of mercy which she performed for the sick
+and the wounded and the dying, the dross of her nature seemed to be
+burned away. The conflict of mingled lives in her blood had ceased. No
+lawless impulses usurped the place of that serene resolve which had
+grown strong by every exercise of its high prerogative. If she had been
+called now to die for any worthy cause, her race would have been
+ennobled by a second martyr, true to the blood of her who died under the
+cruel Queen.
+
+Many sad sights she saw in the great hospital where she passed some
+months at intervals,--one never to be forgotten. An officer was brought
+into the ward where she was in attendance. "Shot through the
+lungs,--pretty nearly gone."
+
+She went softly to his bedside. He was breathing with great difficulty;
+his face was almost convulsed with the effort, but she recognized him in
+a moment: it was Murray Bradshaw,--Captain Bradshaw,--as she knew by the
+bars on his coat flung upon the bed where he had just been laid.
+
+She addressed him by name, tenderly as if he had been a dear brother;
+she saw on his face that hers were to be the last kind words he would
+ever hear.
+
+He turned his glazing eyes upon her. "Who are you?" he said in a feeble
+voice.
+
+"An old friend," she answered; "you knew me as Myrtle Hazard."
+
+He started. "You by my bedside! You caring for me!--for me, that burned
+the title to your fortune to ashes before your eyes! You can't forgive
+that,--I won't believe it! Don't you hate me, dying as I am?"
+
+Myrtle was used to maintaining a perfect calmness of voice and
+countenance, and she held her feelings firmly down. "I have nothing to
+forgive you, Mr. Bradshaw. You may have meant to do me wrong, but
+Providence raised up a protector for me. The paper you burned was not
+the original,--it was a copy substituted for it--"
+
+"And did the old man outwit me after all?" he cried out, rising suddenly
+in bed, and clasping his hands behind his head to give him a few more
+gasps of breath. "I knew he was cunning, but I thought I was his match.
+It must have been Byles Gridley,--nobody else. And so the old man beat
+me after all, and saved you from ruin! Thank God that it came out so!
+Thank God! I can die now. Give me your hand, Myrtle."
+
+She took his hand, and held it until it gently loosed its hold, and he
+ceased to breathe. Myrtle's creed was a simple one, with more of trust
+and love in it than of systematized articles of belief. She cherished
+the fond hope that these last words of one who had erred so miserably
+were a token of some blessed change which the influences of the better
+world might carry onward until he should have outgrown the sins and the
+weaknesses of his earthly career.
+
+Soon after this she rejoined her husband in the camp. From time to time
+they received stray copies of the "Banner and Oracle," which, to Myrtle
+especially, were full of interest, even to the last advertisement. A few
+paragraphs may be reproduced here which relate to persons who have
+figured in this narrative.
+
+                    "TEMPLE OF HYMEN.
+
+     "Married, on the 6th instant, Fordyce Hurlbut, M. D., to Olive,
+     only daughter of the Rev. Ambrose Eveleth. The editor of this
+     paper returns his acknowledgments for a bountiful slice of the
+     wedding-cake. May their shadows never be less!"
+
+Not many weeks after this appeared the following:--
+
+     "Died in this place, on the 28th instant, the venerable Lemuel
+     Hurlbut, M. D., at the great age of XCVI years.
+
+     "'With the ancient is wisdom, and in length of days
+     understanding.'"
+
+Myrtle recalled his kind care of her in her illness, and paid the
+tribute of a sigh to his memory,--there was nothing in a death like his
+to call for any aching regret.
+
+The usual routine of small occurrences was duly recorded in the village
+paper for some weeks longer, when she was startled and shocked by
+receiving a number containing the following paragraph:--
+
+                    "CALAMITOUS ACCIDENT!
+
+     "It is known to our readers that the steeple of the old
+     meeting-house was struck by lightning about a month ago. The
+     frame of the building was a good deal jarred by the shock, but
+     no danger was apprehended from the injury it had received. On
+     Sunday last the congregation came together as usual. The Rev.
+     Mr. Stoker was alone in the pulpit, the Rev. Doctor Pemberton
+     having been detained by slight indisposition. The sermon was
+     from the text, '_The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and
+     the leopard shall lie down with the kid_. (Isaiah xi. 6.) The
+     pastor described the millennium as the reign of love and peace,
+     in eloquent and impressive language. He was in the midst of the
+     prayer which follows the sermon, and had just put up a petition
+     that the spirit of affection and faith and trust might grow up
+     and prevail among the flock of which he was the shepherd, more
+     especially those dear lambs whom he gathered with his arm, and
+     carried in his bosom, when the old sounding-board, which had
+     hung safely for nearly a century,--loosened, no doubt, by the
+     bolt which had fallen on the church,--broke from its
+     fastenings, and fell with a loud crash upon the pulpit,
+     crushing the Rev. Mr. Stoker under its ruins. The scene that
+     followed beggars description. Cries and shrieks resounded
+     through the house. Two or three young women fainted entirely
+     away. Mr. Penhallow, Deacon Rumrill, Gifted Hopkins, Esq., and
+     others, came forward immediately, and after much effort
+     succeeded in removing the wreck of the sounding-board, and
+     extricating their unfortunate pastor. He was not fatally
+     injured, it is hoped; but, sad to relate, he received such a
+     violent blow upon the spine of the back, that palsy of the
+     lower extremities is like to ensue. He is at present lying
+     entirely helpless. Every attention is paid to him by his
+     affectionately devoted family."
+
+Myrtle had hardly got over the pain which the reading of this
+unfortunate occurrence gave her, when her eyes were gladdened by the
+following pleasing piece of intelligence, contained in a subsequent
+number of the village paper:--
+
+                    "IMPOSING CEREMONY.
+
+     "The Reverend Doctor Pemberton performed the impressive rite of
+     baptism upon the first-born child of our distinguished
+     townsman, Gifted Hopkins, Esq., the Bard of Oxbow Village, and
+     Mrs. Susan P. Hopkins, his amiable and respected lady. The babe
+     conducted himself with singular propriety on this occasion. He
+     received the Christian name of Byron Tennyson Browning. May he
+     prove worthy of his name and his parentage!"
+
+The end of the war came at last, and found Colonel Lindsay among its
+unharmed survivors. He returned with Myrtle to her native village, and
+they established themselves, at the request of Miss Silence Withers, in
+the old family mansion. Miss Cynthia, to whom Myrtle made a generous
+allowance, had gone to live in a town not many miles distant, where she
+had a kind of home on sufferance, as well as at The Poplars. This was a
+convenience just then, because Nurse Byloe was invited to stay with them
+for a month or two; and one nurse and two single women under the same
+roof keep each other in a stew all the time, as the old dame somewhat
+sharply remarked.
+
+Master Byles Gridley had been appointed Myrtle's legal protector, and,
+with the assistance of Mr. Penhallow, had brought the property she
+inherited into a more manageable and productive form; so that, when
+Clement began his fine studio behind the old mansion, he felt that at
+least he could pursue his art, or arts, if he chose to give himself to
+sculpture, without that dreadful hag, Necessity, standing by him to
+pinch the features of all his ideals, and give them something of her own
+likeness.
+
+Silence Withers was more cheerful now that she had got rid of her
+responsibility. She embellished her spare person a little more than in
+former years. These young people looked so happy! Love was not so
+unendurable, perhaps, after all.--No woman need despair,--especially if
+she has a house over her, and a snug little property. A worthy man, a
+former missionary, of the best principles, but of a slightly jocose and
+good-humored habit, thought that he could piece his widowed years with
+the not insignificant fraction of life left to Miss Silence, to their
+mutual advantage. He came to the village, therefore, where Father
+Pemberton was very glad to have him supply the pulpit in the place of
+his unfortunate disabled colleague. The courtship soon began, and was
+brisk enough; for the good man knew there was no time to lose at his
+period of life,--or hers either, for that matter. It was a rather odd
+specimen of love-making; for he was constantly trying to subdue his
+features to a gravity which they were not used to, and she was as
+constantly endeavoring to be as lively as possible, with the innocent
+desire of pleasing her light-hearted suitor.
+
+"_Vieille fille fait jeune mariee._" Silence was ten years younger as a
+bride than she had seemed as a lone woman. One would have said she had
+got out of the coach next to the hearse, and got into one some half a
+dozen behind it,--where there is often good and reasonably cheerful
+conversation going on about the virtues of the deceased, the probable
+amount of his property, or the little slips he may have committed, and
+where occasionally a subdued pleasantry at his expense sets the four
+waistcoats shaking that were lifting with sighs a half-hour ago in the
+house of mourning. But Miss Silence, that was, thought that two
+families, with all the possible complications which time might bring,
+would be better in separate establishments. She therefore proposed
+selling The Poplars to Myrtle and her husband, and removing to a house
+in the village, which would be large enough for them, at least for the
+present. So the young folks bought the old house, and paid a mighty good
+price for it, and enlarged it, and beautified and glorified it, and one
+fine morning went together down to the Widow Hopkins's, whose residence
+seemed in danger of being a little crowded,--for Gifted lived there with
+his Susan,--and what had happened might happen again,--and gave Master
+Byles Gridley a formal and most persuasively worded invitation to come
+up and make his home with them at The Poplars.
+
+Now Master Gridley has been betrayed into palpable and undisguised
+weakness at least once in the presence of this assembly, who are looking
+upon him almost for the last time before they part from him, and see his
+face no more. Let us not inquire too curiously, then, how he received
+this kind proposition. It is enough, that, when he found that a new
+study had been built on purpose for him, and a sleeping-room attached to
+it so that he could live there without disturbing anybody if he chose,
+he consented to remove there for a while, and that he was there
+established amidst great rejoicing.
+
+Cynthia Badlam had fallen of late into poor health. She found at last
+that she was going; and as she had a little property of her own,--as
+almost all poor relations have, only there is not enough of it,--she was
+much exercised in her mind as to the final arrangements to be made
+respecting its disposition. The Rev. Dr. Pemberton was one day surprised
+by a message, that she wished to have an interview with him. He rode
+over to the town in which she was residing, and there had a long
+conversation with her upon this matter. When this was settled, her mind
+seemed to be more at ease. She died with a comfortable assurance that
+she was going to a better world, and with a bitter conviction that it
+would be hard to find one that would offer her a worse lot than being a
+poor relation in this.
+
+Her little property was left to Rev. Eliphalet Pemberton and Jacob
+Penhallow, Esq., to be by them employed for such charitable purposes as
+they should elect, educational or other. Father Pemberton preached an
+admirable funeral sermon, in which he praised her virtues, known to this
+people among whom she had long lived, and especially that crowning act
+by which she devoted all she had to purposes of charity and benevolence.
+
+The old clergyman seemed to have renewed his youth since the misfortune
+of his colleague had incapacitated him from labor. He generally preached
+in the _forenoon_ now, and to the great acceptance of the people,--for
+the truth was that the honest minister who had married Miss Silence was
+not young enough or good-looking enough to be an object of personal
+attentions like the Rev. Joseph Bellamy Stoker,--and the old minister
+appeared to great advantage contrasted with him in the pulpit. Poor Mr.
+Stoker was now helpless, faithfully and tenderly waited upon by his own
+wife, who had regained her health and strength,--in no small measure,
+perhaps, from the great need of sympathy and active aid which her
+unfortunate husband now experienced. It was an astonishment to herself
+when she found that she who had so long been served was able to serve
+another. Some who knew his errors thought his accident was a judgment;
+but others believed that it was only a mercy in disguise,--it snatched
+him roughly from his sin, but it opened his heart to gratitude towards
+her whom his neglect could not alienate, and through gratitude to
+repentance and better thoughts. Bathsheba had long ago promised herself
+to Cyprian Eveleth; and, as he was about to become the rector of a
+parish in the next town, the marriage was soon to take place.
+
+How beautifully serene Master Byles Gridley's face was growing! Clement
+loved to study its grand lines, which had so much strength and fine
+humanity blended in them. He was so fascinated by their noble expression
+that he sometimes seemed to forget himself, and looked at him more like
+an artist taking his portrait than like an admiring friend. He
+maintained that Master Gridley had a bigger bump of benevolence and as
+large a one of cautiousness as the two people most famous for the size
+of these organs on the phrenological chart he showed him, and proved it,
+or nearly proved it, by careful measurements of his head. Master Gridley
+laughed, and read him a passage on the pseudo-sciences out of his book.
+
+The disposal of Miss Cynthia's bequest was much discussed in the
+village. Some wished the trustees would use it to lay the foundations of
+a public library. Others thought it should be applied for the relief of
+the families of soldiers who had fallen in the war. Still another set
+would take it to build a monument to the memory of those heroes. The
+trustees listened with the greatest candor to all these gratuitous
+hints. It was, however, suggested, in a well-written anonymous article
+which appeared in the village paper, that it was desirable to follow the
+general lead of the testator's apparent preference. The trustees were at
+liberty to do as they saw fit; but, other things being equal, some
+educational object should be selected. If there were any orphan
+children in the place, it would seem to be very proper to devote the
+moderate sum bequeathed to educating them. The trustees recognized the
+justice of this suggestion. Why not apply it to the instruction and
+maintenance of those two pretty and promising children, virtually
+orphans, whom the charitable Mrs. Hopkins had cared for so long without
+any recompense, and at a cost which would soon become beyond her means?
+The good people of the neighborhood accepted this as the best solution
+of the difficulty. It was agreed upon at length by the trustees, that
+the Cynthia Badlam Fund for Educational Purposes should be applied for
+the benefit of the two foundlings known as Isosceles and Helminthia
+Hopkins.
+
+Master Byles Gridley was greatly exercised about the two "preposterous
+names," as he called them, which in a moment of eccentric impulse he had
+given to these children of nature. He ventured to hint as much to Mrs.
+Hopkins. The good dame was vastly surprised. She thought they was about
+as pooty names as anybody had had given 'em in the village. And they was
+so handy, spoke short,--Sossy and Minthy,--she never should know how to
+call 'em anything else.
+
+"But, my dear Mrs. Hopkins," Master Gridley urged, "if you knew the
+meaning they have to the ears of scholars, you would see that I did very
+wrong to apply such absurd names to my little fellow-creatures, and that
+I am bound to rectify my error. More than that, my dear madam, I mean to
+consult you as to the new names; and if we can fix upon proper and
+pleasing ones, it is my intention to leave a pretty legacy in my will to
+these interesting children."
+
+"Mr. Gridley," said Mrs. Hopkins, "you're the best man I ever see, or
+ever shall see,... except my poor dear Ammi.... I'll do jest as you say
+about that, or about anything else in all this livin' world."
+
+"Well, then, Mrs. Hopkins, what shall be the boy's name?"
+
+"Byles Gridley Hopkins!" she answered instantly.
+
+"Good Lord!" said Mr. Gridley, "think a minute, my dear madam. I will
+not say one word,--only think a minute, and mention some name that will
+not suggest quite so many winks and whispers."
+
+She did think something less than a minute, and then said aloud,
+"Abraham Lincoln Hopkins."
+
+"Fifteen thousand children have been so christened the past year, on a
+moderate computation."
+
+"Do think of some name yourself, Mr. Gridley; I shall like anything that
+you like. To think of those dear babes having a fund--if that's the
+right name--on purpose for 'em, and a promise of a legacy,--I hope they
+won't get _that_ till they're a hundred year old!"
+
+"What if we change Isosceles to Theodore, Mrs. Hopkins? That means _the
+gift of God_, and the child has been a gift from Heaven, rather than a
+burden."
+
+Mrs. Hopkins seized her apron, and held it to her eyes. She was weeping.
+"Theodore!" she said,--"Theodore! My little brother's name, that I
+buried when I was only eleven year old. Drownded. The dearest little
+child that ever you see. I have got his little mug with Theodore on it
+now. Kep' o' purpose. Our little Sossy shall have it. Theodore P.
+Hopkins,--sha'n't it be, Mr. Gridley?"
+
+"Well, if you say so; but why that P., Mrs. Hopkins? Theodore Parker, is
+it?"
+
+"Doesn't P. stand for Pemberton, and isn't Father Pemberton the best man
+in the world--next to you, Mr. Gridley?"
+
+"Well, well, Mrs. Hopkins, let it be so, if you like; if you are suited,
+I am. Now about Helminthia; there can't be any doubt about what we ought
+to call her,--surely the friend of orphans should be remembered in
+naming one of the objects of her charity."
+
+"Cynthia Badlam Fund Hopkins," said the good woman triumphantly,--"is
+that what you mean?"
+
+"Suppose we leave out one of the names,--four are too many. I think the
+general opinion will be that Helminthia should unite the names of her
+two benefactresses,--Cynthia Badlam Hopkins."
+
+"Why, law! Mr. Gridley, isn't that nice?--Minthy and Cynthy,--there
+ain't but one letter of difference! Poor Cynthy would be pleased if she
+could know that one of our babes was to be called after her. She was
+dreadful fond of children."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+On one of the sweetest Sundays that ever made Oxbow Village lovely, the
+Rev. Dr. Eliphalet Pemberton was summoned to officiate at three most
+interesting; ceremonies,--a wedding and two christenings, one of the
+latter a double one.
+
+The first was celebrated at the house of the Rev. Mr. Stoker, between
+the Rev. Cyprian Eveleth and Bathsheba, daughter of the first-named
+clergyman. He could not be present on account of his great infirmity,
+but the door of his chamber was left open that he might hear the
+marriage service performed. The old, white-haired minister, assisted, as
+the papers said, by the bridegroom's father, conducted the ceremony
+according to the Episcopal form. When he came to those solemn words in
+which the husband promises fidelity to the wife so long as they both
+shall live, the nurse, who was watching near the poor father, saw him
+bury his face in his pillow, and heard him murmur the words, "God be
+merciful to me a sinner!"
+
+The christenings were both to take place at the same service, in the old
+meeting-house. Colonel Clement Lindsay and Myrtle his wife came in, and
+stout Nurse Byloe bore their sturdy infant in her arms. A slip of paper
+was handed to the Reverend Doctor on which these words were
+written:--"The name is Charles Hazard."
+
+The solemn and touching rite was then performed; and Nurse Byloe
+disappeared with the child, its forehead glistening with the dew of its
+consecration.
+
+Then, hand in hand, like the babes in the wood, marched up the broad
+aisle--marshalled by Mrs. Hopkins in front, and Mrs. Gifted Hopkins
+bringing up the rear--the two children hitherto known as Isosceles and
+Helminthia. They had been well schooled, and, as the mysterious and to
+them incomprehensible ceremony was enacted, maintained the most stoical
+aspect of tranquillity. In Mrs. Hopkins's words, "They looked like
+picters, and behaved like angels."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+That evening, Sunday evening as it was, there was a quiet meeting of
+some few friends at The Poplars. It was such a great occasion that the
+Sabbatical rules, never strict about Sunday evening,--which was,
+strictly speaking, secular time,--were relaxed. Father Pemberton was
+there, and Master Byles Gridley, of course, and the Rev. Ambrose
+Eveleth, with his son and his daughter-in-law, Bathsheba, and her
+mother, now in comfortable health, Aunt Silence and her husband, Doctor
+Hurlbut and his wife (Olive Eveleth that was), Jacob Penhallow, Esq.,
+Mrs. Hopkins, her son and his wife (Susan Posey that was), the senior
+deacon of the old church (the admirer of the great Scott), the
+Editor-in-chief of the "Banner and Oracle," and, in the background,
+Nurse Byloe and the privileged servant, Mistress Kitty Fagan, with a few
+others whose names we need not mention.
+
+The evening was made pleasant with sacred music, and the fatigues of two
+long services repaired by such simple refections as would not turn the
+holy day into a day of labor. A large-paper copy of the new edition of
+Byles Gridley's remarkable work was lying on the table. He never looked
+so happy,--could anything fill his cup fuller? In the course of the
+evening Clement spoke of the many trials through which they had passed
+in common with vast numbers of their countrymen, and some of those
+peculiar dangers which Myrtle had had to encounter in the course of a
+life more eventful, and attended with more risks, perhaps, than most of
+them imagined. But Myrtle, he said, had always been specially cared for.
+He wished them to look upon the semblance of that protecting spirit who
+had been faithful to her in her gravest hours of trial and danger. If
+they would follow him into one of the lesser apartments up stairs they
+would have an opportunity to do so.
+
+Myrtle wondered a little, but followed with the rest. They all ascended
+to the little projecting chamber, through the window of which her
+scarlet jacket caught the eyes of the boys paddling about on the river
+in those early days when Cyprian Eveleth gave it the name of the
+Fire-hang-bird's Nest.
+
+The light fell softly but clearly on the dim and faded canvas from which
+looked the saintly features of the martyred woman, whose continued
+presence with her descendants was the old family legend. But underneath
+it Myrtle was surprised to see a small table with some closely covered
+object upon it. It was a mysterious arrangement, made without any
+knowledge on her part.
+
+"Now, then, Kitty!" Mr. Lindsay said.
+
+Kitty Fagan, who had evidently been taught her part, stepped forward,
+and removed the cloth which concealed the unknown object. It was a
+lifelike marble bust of Master Byles Gridley.
+
+"And this is what you have been working at so long,--is it, Clement?"
+Myrtle said.
+
+"Which is the image of your protector, Myrtle?" he answered, smiling.
+
+Myrtle Hazard Lindsay walked up to the bust, and kissed its marble
+forehead, saying, "This is the face of my Guardian Angel!"
+
+
+
+
+A MYSTERIOUS PERSONAGE.
+
+
+From the first, our country has been a refuge, not only for kings and
+princes and statesmen and warriors, but for all sorts of adventurers and
+impostors. Following hard after Kosciuszko, General Charles Lee, Baron
+Steuben, Baron de Kalb, Lord Stirling, and Lafayette, we had Talleyrand,
+Louis Philippe, and Jerome Bonaparte, and Joseph, king of Spain; and,
+but for a sudden change of wind, might have had Napoleon the Great
+himself--after the affair of Waterloo. We have always been, and must
+continue to be, overrun with pretenders, mountebanks, blood relations of
+Charles Fox, Lord Byron, and the Guelphs, who are always in the market.
+
+Never, at any time, however, have we had a more puzzling or mysterious
+visitant than Major-General Bratish--Baron Fratelin--Count Eliovich. I
+knew him well,--better, I believe, than others who had known him longer,
+but under less trying circumstances. I stood by him through thick and
+thin. I fought his battles for a long while, and almost always
+single-handed, against a cloud of enemies, at a time when he appeared to
+be hunted for his life by a band of conspirators, and was undoubtedly
+beset by eavesdroppers and spies at every turn.
+
+All at once, after a dazzling career in the political and literary world
+beyond seas, continuing for many years, and followed by a course here
+which kept him always before the public, and for something more than two
+years made it almost a distinction for anybody to be acquainted with
+him, this General Bratish--Count Eliovich--found himself an outcast,
+helpless and hopeless, obliged to live from hand to mouth.
+
+That he was greatly belied, I had reason to know. That he was cruelly
+misunderstood, and wickedly misrepresented by the whole newspaper press
+of our country, I had reason to believe, upon evidence not to be
+questioned; but we are anticipating.
+
+One day, in the summer or fall of 1839, Colonel Bouchette of Quebec, son
+of the late Surveyor-General of Canada, brought a stranger to see me,
+whom he introduced as Major-General Bratish, late in the service of her
+Catholic Majesty, the Queen of Spain, and associate of General De Lacy
+Evans, of the Auxiliary Legion. They were both (Bouchette and Bratish)
+living in Portland at the time, and occupied chambers in the same
+building; and I inferred from what passed in this or in a subsequent
+interview that the Colonel had known the General in Quebec or Montreal,
+about the time of the outbreak there in which they were implicated.
+
+The object they had in view, on their first visit, was to open a way for
+General Bratish to lecture in Portland, upon some one--or more--of many
+subjects,--on Greece, Hungary, Poland, the war in Spain, South America,
+our own Revolutionary War, modern languages, or matters and things in
+general.
+
+The appearance and deportment of the gentleman were much in his favor.
+He seemed both frank and fearless, with a mixture of modesty and
+self-reliance quite captivating. He looked to be about five-and-thirty,
+according to my present recollection, stood five feet nine or ten, with
+a broad chest and good figure. He had not much of military
+bearing,--certainly not more than we see in General Grant,--and on the
+whole bore the appearance of a young, handsome, healthy, well-bred
+Englishman, accustomed to good society. He was neither talkative nor
+reserved, but natural and free; speaking our language with uncommon
+propriety, French and German still better, and Italian like a native,
+and often expressing himself with singular strength and
+picturesqueness,--reminding me of the Italian poet and critic, Ugo
+Foscolo,--whom I saw at the time he was furnishing the papers translated
+by Mrs. Sarah Austin for the Edinburgh Review.
+
+Arrangements were soon made for a first appearance; and the result was
+all that could have been hoped for, and much more than could reasonably
+have been expected. His manner was dignified, unpretending, and earnest;
+and he had a sort of unstudied natural eloquence, quite wonderful in a
+foreigner, unacquainted with our idioms and unaccustomed to platform
+speaking. Whatever might be the subject, he always talked with an air of
+modest truthfulness, and gave the most dramatic and startling
+narratives, like an eyewitness on the stand, testifying under oath.
+Never shall I forget Warsaw, nor the battle of Navarino, as rapidly
+sketched by him in a sort of parenthesis, while he was lecturing upon a
+very different subject; he wanted an illustration, and both of these
+pictures flashed suddenly out upon us. The other lectures that followed
+his first seemed, up to the very last, to grow better and better, until
+we had faith, not only in his representations, but in the man himself.
+
+Instead of shunning, he rather invited inquiry; and at an interview with
+the late Mr. Edward Preble, son of the Commodore, when that gentleman
+was questioning him about Tripoli, and was preparing to show him the
+very charts used by the Commodore, the General refused to look at them,
+and instantly drew a sketch of the harbor, with the castles, batteries,
+and fortifications, and gave the soundings and approaches; and all
+these, upon a careful examination, proved to be correct in every
+particular, according to the testimony of Mr. Preble himself.
+
+About this time, in consequence of the favorable notices that appeared
+in our Portland papers, the Philadelphia Ledger, the Saturday Courier,
+and some other journals of that city, opened upon him in full cry,
+followed by the American press generally; the Courier declaring that he
+had taken _leg bail_ and escaped from Canada,--that he had run away from
+Rochester, after obtaining five hundred dollars from Henry McIlvaine,
+Esq., of the Philadelphia bar, in the shape of fees for constituting
+that gentleman "Consul-General of Greece"! By others he was charged with
+being a tin-pedler, a horse-thief, and a leech-doctor, who had assumed
+the title of Count long after his arrival in this country. Among many
+anonymous letters--letters addressed to strangers in Portland--came one
+from Henry McIlvaine himself, saying: "I see by the Portland papers,
+that a man calling himself _sometimes_ General Bratish, at others
+General Eliovich, Count Eliovich, Baron Fratelin and Walbeck, and
+claiming to have been a general in the Polish, Spanish, Mexican, and
+other armies, is now in your town; and I should suppose, from the papers
+_who_ have noticed him, imposing upon respectable people. Having seen
+something of this person, and been _myself a victim_, I have felt it due
+to my friends in Portland to put them on their guard. He is the son of a
+merchant in Trieste, driven from his home and his friends in consequence
+of his crimes. His pretension to any of the titles he claims is
+altogether without foundation. After _exhausting Europe_, he has within
+a few years turned his talents to good account in our country. He made
+his appearance here about two years ago as Consul-General and Envoy from
+Greece, in which capacity he was very free with his commissions of
+vice-consulships in New York and Philadelphia. He was indicted here for
+forgery,--_convicted_,--obtained a new trial by the false oaths of his
+associates, some of whom are now in the state prison (one for
+horse-stealing), and gave bail for his appearance at the next term. The
+pretence for a new trial was the absence of a witness _who never
+existed_, but who was expected to prove his innocence. Before the next
+term, the Consul-General took wing, leaving his bail, a simple
+Frenchman, to pay the forfeit. It would be impossible for me to give
+anything like a history of his crimes in a letter. Suffice it to say
+that he is a notorious swindler, the most unblushing and inexhaustible
+liar and the most finished rascal I ever saw."
+
+If this were true, how happened it that the notorious swindler, the
+horse-thief, the convicted forger, and the escaped convict was still at
+large,--and not only at large, but always before the public, and _always
+without a change of name_? Why was he not surrendered by his bail? Why
+not followed by a bench warrant, or a requisition from the Governor of
+Pennsylvania? Of course, the story could not be true, as told by Mr.
+McIlvaine. It was too absurd on the face of it.
+
+But was any part of the story true? and, if so, how much? Having been
+frequently imposed upon, both at home and abroad, by adventurers and
+pretenders, I determined to go to the bottom of this case before I
+committed myself, and I must say that, for a while, the stories told by
+General Bratish, and the explanations he gave, seemed to me still more
+absurd and preposterous.
+
+According to his story--to give one example out of a score--he had been
+obliged to apply for the benefit of the Insolvent Act, in Philadelphia,
+owing to losses he had sustained by lending money to distressed
+compatriots, and eleemosynary outcasts, and had been opposed in the
+Court of Insolvency by Colonel John Stille, Jr. and Mr. Henry McIlvaine,
+who threatened him with a prosecution for the forgery of consular
+papers, if he dared to appear. He declared that he did appear,
+nevertheless, and was honorably discharged; that his claims and
+evidences of debt, handed over to Mr. McIlvaine, the assignee, amounted
+to $7,620 for cash lent, while his debts altogether amounted to less
+than $1,000; that he was arrested while in court, on a warrant for
+forgery, and there subjected to a long and rigorous examination by
+Messrs. McIlvaine and Stille, who had got possession of all the claims
+against him; that the offence charged consisted in issuing a commission
+as Vice-Consul of Greece, _with General Bratish's own signature_! that
+McIlvaine went before Mr. Alderman Binns to get the warrant for forgery,
+and employed Colonel John Stille, Jr., his coadjutor, to appear as
+public prosecutor in the Mayor's Court of Philadelphia; that he, General
+Bratish, was put upon trial before a bench of aldermen, not a man of the
+whole except the Recorder being acquainted with the rudiments of law;
+that, on being arraigned, he refused to plead, and called no witnesses
+himself, though some were called by his counsel,--when the Recorder
+directed the plea of "Not guilty" to be entered, and the trial to
+proceed; that he claimed to be a foreign consul provisionally appointed,
+entered a formal protest, which appeared in the papers of the day, and
+never deigned to open his mouth, until, to the consternation and
+amazement of all who understood the case, the jury found him _guilty_,
+under the direction of the Recorder,--a direction which amounted to
+this, namely, that, while General Bratish could not be legally convicted
+of the offence charged, he might be convicted of another offence _not
+charged!_ that a motion for a new trial was entered at the suggestion of
+the Recorder himself, and was finally argued in a burst of indignation
+by General Bratish, who thrust aside his counsel, and refused to be
+delivered on technical grounds; that the motion was opposed by Messrs.
+McIlvaine and Stille, but prevailed; that the verdict was set aside, a
+new trial granted, and General Bratish was allowed to go at large, on
+greatly reduced bail, every member of the court concurring, except Mr.
+Alderman McKean; that no sooner was the trial over, and the proceedings
+published, than a public meeting was called through the National
+Gazette, the Public Ledger, the United States Gazette, and the
+Pennsylvanian, and all persons were invited to appear, and bring
+forward their charges--if any they had--against him; that such a
+meeting, both large and respectable, was held at the College of
+Pharmacy, and resolutions were adopted, declaring the character of
+General Bratish to be "_unimpeached and unimpeachable_" his authority
+from Greece to be fully proved, and his identity to have been
+established by the testimony of "several highly respectable gentlemen
+present"; that, before he could have another trial, the court was
+abolished; and that, after waiting two months for the prosecutor to
+move, for want of something better to do, General Bratish betook himself
+to Canada; that he was followed there, watched, arrested for a
+horse-thief, immediately and honorably discharged, re-arrested upon a
+suspicion of high treason, put beyond the reach of a _habeas corpus_
+writ, and confined for seven months, in the citadel of Quebec and
+elsewhere, _as a prisoner of state_, &c., &c.
+
+Such was a part of his story; and astonishing as it may
+appear--incredible, I might say--I found it, after a most careful
+investigation, to be not only substantially true, but scrupulously
+exact. The evidence came to me through unwilling or prejudiced
+witnesses,--my friend, Henry C. Carey of Philadelphia, among the
+number,--and was corroborated throughout by official documents and
+published proceedings. And here I may as well add, that Mr. Arnold
+Buffum was chairman, and J. Griffith, M. D. secretary, of the meeting
+above referred to, of March 6th, 1838.
+
+While this unhappy controversy was raging, and our people were dividing
+upon the questions involved, a little incident occurred which had a very
+wholesome effect upon our misgivings. The General happened to be in
+conversation with a stranger one day, when the subject of Unitarianism,
+as it existed in the North of Europe, came up. Something was then said
+about the great Unitarian Convention held at Cork, Ireland, two or three
+years before. General Bratish said he was in attendance, and had let
+fall some remarks there. A by-stander, who had very little faith in our
+hero, caught at the ravelling thus dropped. If what the General said
+were true, surely some evidence might be found by diligent search. And,
+sure enough! the gentleman found a copy of the Christian Pioneer, in
+Boston, giving an account of that very Convention. He acknowledged to me
+that he opened the journal with fear and trembling, but soon came upon
+what purported to be an abstract of a speech by General Bratish, and
+what furnished abundant confirmation of his highest pretensions as a
+soldier, as a writer, as a patriot, and as a philanthropist. I saw the
+Pioneer myself. It was a monthly journal, published in Glasgow,
+Scotland, July, 1835. The speech, as reported, was eminently
+characteristic, and the summary that followed was in the following
+words:--
+
+"The society was gratified on this occasion by the presence of the Rev.
+George Harris of Glasgow, whose visit to Cork the committee gladly
+availed themselves of, earnestly requesting his attendance; and of Mr.
+Bratish, _a native of Hungary, and a member of the Hungarian Diet, who,
+in consequence of his intrepid advocacy of the cause of much-injured
+Poland, both in his place in the legislature, and subsequently with his
+pen and his sword, has been obliged to fly his country, and take refuge
+in this kingdom_."
+
+Among the most damaging allegations was one to this effect, that Mr.
+Forsyth, our Secretary of State, had contradicted the story of General
+Bratish about his consular authority and proceedings in every
+particular. So far was this from being true, that Mr. Forsyth
+_confirmed_ the story of General Bratish in substance, acknowledging to
+me that he _knew_ nothing to his prejudice, and that General Bratish had
+held such communications with him as he had represented.
+
+Yet more, while I was patiently and quietly pursuing these
+investigations, Colonel Bouchette handed me a copy of the Bath (Me.)
+Telegraph Extra, of July 19, 1839, containing a report of the
+proceedings at a public meeting held there, in consequence of the
+newspaper charges and anonymous letters which had followed our
+adventurer to that city. It was headed "General Bratish Eliovich (Baron
+Fratelin)," and was signed by Judge Clapp (Ebenezer), and by Henry
+Masters, Secretary. The resolutions were brief but conclusive; and the
+committee that drew them up, after a thorough investigation, were chosen
+from among the most respectable citizens of the place. "Every specific
+charge brought forward by responsible persons," they say, "was most
+completely refuted, and the truth was found entirely in accordance with
+the statements and accounts of the transactions given beforehand by
+General Bratish"; and they declare him "entitled to the confidence and
+respect of the community at large," saying that "his conduct in this
+State has been that of a gentleman and man of honor."
+
+I found too, that, go where he would, behave as he might, the moment his
+name appeared in the papers, anonymous letters and paragraphs followed,
+denouncing him as a "pedler," as a "native Yankee," as a thief who had
+robbed a fellow-boarder at Bedford Springs and then run away, taking one
+of the most unfrequented roads "across the country to Cumberland, upon
+which no public conveyance runs"; and yet I found, upon further inquiry,
+that he went off by the regular mail coach direct to Philadelphia, drove
+straight to the Marshall House, where he had always put up, (one of the
+largest and most respectable establishments in the city,) and _entered
+his name at length on the travellers' book in the usual way_, and was
+received by McIlvaine himself and others he had met with at Bedford
+Springs, on a footing of the most friendly intimacy, for over two months
+after the alleged robbery and exposure.
+
+I ascertained further, that he came to this country in the summer of
+1836 on board the Statesman, Captain Mansfield, from Gothenburg to
+Salem, with letters from Christopher Hughes, our _Charge d'Affaires_ at
+Stockholm, to his son at New York, and with a Swedish passport to North
+America, duly authenticated, in which he was called "the Honorable John
+Bratish de Fratelin"; that he had many other letters, bills of credit,
+and drafts, and a large amount of money in gold,--some "thousands of
+dollars" according to the testimony of Captain N. B. Mansfield himself,
+with whom I communicated by letter; that he was brought on board in the
+Governor's barge, and was known to have been treated with great
+distinction by the Swedish nobility, and to have been so well received
+by Bernadotte himself, the king of Sweden, as to give rise to a report
+that he was a son of Murat, the late king of Naples, whose queen he
+certainly resembled, as he did others of the Bonaparte family; that on
+the passage he put on no airs, claimed no title, but chose to be called
+plain Mr. Bratish, until his rank was discovered, and he came to be
+known as General John Bratish Eliovich (the son of Elias), Baron
+Fratelin; that after a twelve-month's residence at Boston and Salem,
+holding intercourse with what is there called the best society, he went
+to Washington, where he passed the winter of 1837-38 among the
+fashionables and upper-tens; that, while there, he received the
+provisional appointment of Consul-General for the United States from the
+Regency of Greece, dated February 15, 1837, upon which he threw up an
+engagement he had entered into with General Duff Greene, which secured
+him a respectable support, and set about seeing the country; that after
+travelling from New York to New Orleans, he returned to the North, and
+stopped for a month or two at Bedford Springs, _about a day's journey
+from Philadelphia_; that being disappointed in remittances and receipts,
+and unable to collect moneys he had lent to his compatriots, he could
+not pay his bill for six weeks' board, amounting to fifty dollars, and
+went to Philadelphia, leaving with Mr. Brown, the landlord, a part of
+his baggage and books, after trying in vain to dispose of a valuable
+platina medal; that in Philadelphia, Mr. McIlvaine--notwithstanding the
+alleged robbery--lent him one hundred and sixty-five dollars, and was
+constituted Vice-Consul of Greece _ad interim_, that is, "until the
+pleasure of his Majesty, the king of Greece, should be known."
+
+Here then was the foundation of all the attacks made upon the unhappy
+General; but was there not something behind,--something _below_ this
+foundation? The extraordinary case of Dr. Follen, who was hunted from
+pillar to post, year after year, and wellnigh lied into his grave, shows
+what may be done by conspirators and spies and slanderers, when a
+respectable man grows obnoxious to a foreign power. If he is at all
+headstrong or imprudent, nothing can save him. Oddly enough, it happens
+that one of the very papers which followed Dr. Follen whithersoever he
+went, like a sleuth-hound,--the Philadelphia Gazette,--was among the
+bitterest and most unrelenting, of those that assailed General Bratish.
+
+While pursuing these investigations, I learned from what I regarded as
+high authority, that General Bratish had presented an address to Lord
+Normanby, at the head of the whole consular body, having been chosen for
+that special purpose; and I was referred to the Irish Royal Cork Almanac
+for 1835, where, under the head of Foreign Consuls, I read, "Colonel
+John Bratish (d'Elias) Eliovich, K. C. C., S. S., L. H., Consul-General
+of Greece, Mexico, Buenos Ayres, and Switzerland, Consular Agent of
+Turkey."
+
+How were these contradictions to be reconciled,--the facts proved with
+the stories told? If General Bratish was the swindler and impostor they
+pretended, the sooner he was exposed, and the more publicly, the better.
+On the contrary, if he was an honest man--a man greatly wronged and
+belied, like Dr. Follen--he ought to be defended,--but how? He was poor
+and friendless, and the whole newspaper press of the country was either
+against him, or wholly indifferent. Had he been on trial in a court of
+justice, any lawyer would have defended him,--nay, for that matter, he
+might have defended himself. But if he entered the field as a writer,
+alone against a host, volumes would have to be written,--and who would
+publish them,--who read them?
+
+That I might bring the matter to issue at once, knowing well, and from
+long experience, that, when people are accused through the newspaper
+press of our country, they are always believed to be guilty until they
+have _established their innocence_, I sent a communication to the
+Portland Advertiser of October 15, 1839, with my name, charging upon Mr.
+Henry McIlvaine and Colonel John Stille, Jr. all that I afterwards
+repeated with more distinctness and solemnity in "The New World," for
+which I was then writing (and from which I withdrew in consequence of
+what I then regarded as unfairness toward General Bratish on the part of
+my coadjutors, Messrs. Park Benjamin and Epes Sargent), and arraigning
+both McIlvaine and Stille, as conspirators and libellers.
+
+One day, while this controversy was raging, the General called upon me,
+and begged me, for my own satisfaction, to inquire of Baron de
+Mareschal, the Austrian Minister, respecting certain charges that had
+just appeared against him. I consented, and immediately despatched the
+following letter to the care of my friend, the Honorable George Evans,
+our Representative in Congress, requesting him to see the Baron for me.
+
+     "_To_ HIS EXCELLENCY GENERAL BARON DE MARESCHAL, _Envoy
+     Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary from his Majesty the
+     Emperor of Austria._
+
+     "The undersigned is led to apply to your Excellency in behalf
+     of a gentleman here, who has been assailed by a great variety
+     of newspaper slanders, most of which have been triumphantly
+     refuted. The gentleman referred to is known here, by his
+     passports and other credentials, as John Bratish Eliovich, late
+     a general in the service of her most Catholic Majesty, the
+     Queen of Spain, and is now an American citizen.
+
+     "He states--and he bids me trust confidently to the character
+     of your Excellency for an early reply--that in 1828 he was at
+     Rio Janeiro; that instead of 'running away,' as reported, with
+     a large amount of funds belonging to his uncle, Christopher
+     Bratish, he left Rio Janeiro in consequence of being appointed
+     by the Emperor, Dom Pedro, Brazilian Consul to Austria, with
+     the approbation and consent of your Excellency, manifested by a
+     regular passport, granted by your Excellency's legation.
+
+     "The friends of General Bratish in this region are numerous and
+     respectable, and they beg your Excellency's reply to the
+     following questions:--
+
+     "Is the statement above made by General Bratish true?
+
+     "And if your Excellency would be so kind as to say whether, in
+     your opinion, there can be any foundation for the story
+     respecting the 'large amount of money' said to have been
+     carried off by General Bratish, when he is reported to have run
+     away from Rio Janeiro, your Excellency would gladly oblige, not
+     only the undersigned, but a number of other persons deeply
+     interested in the character of General Bratish.
+
+     "Meanwhile, I am with respect your Excellency's most obedient
+     servant,
+
+                              "---- ----.
+
+     "PORTLAND, ME., April, 1840."
+
+     "That your Excellency may know who has taken this liberty, the
+     undersigned begs leave to refer you to the Hon. George Evans,
+     Henry Clay, Daniel Webster, General Scott, or to any member of
+     Congress from the Northern or Middle States."
+
+Through some oversight in the transcribing, the full date of this letter
+does not appear; but I soon received the following from Mr. Evans:--
+
+              HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, WASHINGTON,
+
+                                    April 20, 1840.
+
+     "MY DEAR SIR,--Your favor of ----, enclosing letter for General
+     Mareschal was duly received, and I immediately despatched a
+     messenger to deliver it to the General, with a note in your
+     behalf. Yesterday the General called upon me to say that he
+     felt constrained, from various circumstances, to decline a
+     reply to it. He wishes you to understand that he does this with
+     entire respect for yourself, whom he should be very happy
+     personally to oblige. He said, if the information you seek was
+     desirable for any personal or private purposes of your
+     own,--such as, for instance, if any alliance was in
+     contemplation with any of your friends,--he should feel bound
+     to give you a reply. But he does not think that he ought to be
+     drawn into a newspaper discussion, or to become the subject of
+     comment or remark in such a matter. He wished me to explain his
+     feelings, and hopes you will not impute his declining to any
+     want of regard for you, and that you will appreciate the
+     motives which govern him. I am not at liberty to detail a
+     conversation I held with him on the general subject of your
+     letter. He did not show it to me, though he spoke of its
+     contents.
+
+                        "Very faithfully yours,
+
+                            "GEO. EVANS."
+
+Very adroit and very diplomatic, to be sure, on the part of the Baron;
+but surely he might have answered yes or no to the first question,
+without committing himself. And why not show my letter to Mr. Evans?
+Taking the ground he did, however, he forced me to the following
+conclusion, namely, that he could not answer _No_, and was afraid, for
+reasons of state, perhaps, to answer _Yes_.
+
+And now, what was to be done? Should I prepare a memoir, setting forth
+all these charges, with such refutations and such explanations as had
+occurred, and appeal to the public. There seemed to be no other way
+left.
+
+While I was preparing this memoir, which made a pamphlet of forty-eight
+large octavo pages, with the documentary evidence in small print,
+General Bratish was at my elbow; and one evening, after I had read over
+to him what I had written, I happened to say that I was exceedingly
+sorry for the loss of his orders and decorations in Canada,--they would
+have been such a corroboration of his story.
+
+"Lost!" said he, "they are not lost."
+
+"Where are they?"
+
+"In the bank, with some other valuables."
+
+"In the bank! When can you get them for me?"
+
+"To-morrow, when the bank is open."
+
+Shall I confess the truth? So sudden and so startling was this
+declaration, after what I had seen in the papers about the loss of these
+badges and orders in Canada, that I began, for the first time, to have
+uncomfortable suspicions. But, sure enough, the next day he brought them
+all to me, together with the original contract entered into between
+Colonel De Lacy Evans (afterward General Evans) and General Bratish,
+with the approbation of Alva, the Spanish Ambassador at the Court of St.
+James, whereby it was provided that "John Bratish Eliovich, Esquire, K.
+C. C., V. S. S., V. L. H., &c., &c.," should enjoy the rank, pay, and
+emoluments of a Major-General in the Auxiliary Legion then raising for
+the Queen of Spain. This document, signed by Colonel De Lacy Evans and
+Carbonel, and approved by Alva, styled him "Major-General John Bratish
+Eliovich, K. C. C., V. L. H., &c., &c.," and bore the signature of
+General Bratish, whereby his identity was established; and the
+decorations and orders put into my hands were the following: "Knight
+Commander of Christ," the "Tower and Sword" of Portugal, the "Saviour"
+of Greece, and the "South Star" of Brazil.
+
+Here, certainly, was pretty strong confirmation; and yet on this very
+evening, my wife, who sat where she could see all the changes of his
+countenance while I was writing the memoir and occasionally asking a
+question without looking up, saw enough to satisfy her that Bratish was
+making a fool of her husband, and, the moment his back was turned,
+expressed her astonishment that a man of sense--meaning me--could be so
+easily imposed upon. So much for the instinct of a woman; but more of
+this hereafter.
+
+Not long after this, the General rushed into my office in a paroxysm of
+rage,--the only time I ever saw him disturbed. His honor had been
+questioned, and by whom, of all the world? Why,--would I believe it?--by
+his friend, Colonel Bouchette! Upon further inquiry, I found that he had
+received a draft from his sister, which had to pass through a secret
+channel to him, lest their estates should be confiscated in Hungary;
+that, after two or three disappointments, he had succeeded in getting it
+cashed here without endangering a certain friend in New York; that on
+mentioning the circumstance to Colonel Bouchette, who had counselled him
+not to attempt the negotiation here, that gentleman had laughed in his
+face; whereupon the General turned his back on him, and hurried off to
+my office. A friend was with me at the time. "Ach, mein Freund!" said
+the General, as he finished the story, "he doubted my word, he
+questioned my honor, he asked to see the money; but I refused to show
+him the money,--I was indignant, outraged; but I have it here,--_here_!"
+slapping his breast-pocket, "and I am ready to show it to you." I
+declined; he persisted; until at last, afraid of the impression he might
+make upon my friend Winslow, who was present, I consented. But he only
+talked the louder and the faster, without producing the money; and when
+I grew serious, and insisted on seeing it, he acknowledged that he
+hadn't it with him!
+
+"Where is it, sir?" said I.
+
+"At my lodgings."
+
+"And how long will it take you to produce it?"
+
+"Ten minutes."
+
+"Very well,"--taking out my watch,--"I will wait fifteen, and my friend
+here will stay with me, and be a witness."
+
+Away went the General, and, to my amazement, I must acknowledge, within
+the fifteen minutes he returned, bringing with him a cigar-box
+containing about five hundred dollars in bills and specie, which I
+counted.
+
+Here was a narrow escape,--a matter of life or death to him, certainly,
+if not to me. But where had he got the money? He was very poor, judging
+by appearances. The lecturing was over for a time, and there was no
+field for conjecture. To this hour the whole affair is a mystery.
+Unlikely as it was that he should have obtained it from his sister,
+there seemed to be no other explanation possible.
+
+Other perplexing and contradictory evidence for and against the General
+began to appear. I never saw him on horseback but once, and then I was
+frightened for him. As a general, he ought, of course, to know how to
+ride. As a native Hungarian, he must have been born _to_ the saddle, if
+not _in_ it. Nevertheless, I trembled for him, though the creature he
+had mounted was far from being either vicious or spirited; and then,
+too, when he tried waltzing, he reminded me, and others I am afraid, of
+"the man a-mowing."
+
+On the other hand, he was well-bred and self-possessed, full of accurate
+information, and never obtrusive. And here I am reminded of another
+singular circumstance, which went far in confirmation of the story he
+told. He gave J. S. Buckingham, Esq., M. P., whom I had known in London
+as the Oriental traveller, a letter to me, in which he speaks of him as
+a member of the British-Polish Committee in London,--thereby endangering
+the whole superstructure he had been rearing with so much care. Mr.
+Buckingham wrote me from New York, but failed to see me.
+
+Worn out and wellnigh discouraged by these persecutions, the General now
+left us, and went to New York, from which place he wrote me, under date
+of October 9, 1840, as follows. I give his own orthography, to show
+that, although acquainted with our language to such a degree that he was
+able to lecture in it, as Kossuth did, and to speak it with uncommon
+readiness, he must have learnt it by _ear_, like many others with which
+he was familiar enough for ordinary purposes.
+
+"One of my last occupation upon American soil is one of a painful, and
+at the same times pleasant nature, to wit, to address you, my noble, my
+chivalerouse, my excellent friend. My God revard you and may he for the
+benefit of mankind scater many such persons trought the world--it would
+prevent misantropy and it would serve as the best antidote against
+crimes and deceptions, persecutions and sufferings. O could you know all
+what I suffered in my eventful life, you would indead belive that no
+romance is equal to reality. But--basta--God is great and merciful, and
+I never yit and I hope never will find occassion to doubt the wundaful
+ways of his mercy.... Perhaps no times since I cam to America, I had
+occassion for more patience than during the first days of my arrival in
+N. Y. Harshed by law, cut by some friends, findig once more by European
+new a change in Greece, with my funds low, I began indeed to feel
+bitterly my sad fate--when by one of this suden fricks which I offen
+prouve that man must never despair all changed quit casualy it was
+raported to the German Association that I am her--immediately I was
+invited to ther mittings, the French Lafayette Club followed suit, and
+yesterday evning your humble servant was by acclamation apointed
+Vice-President of the General Union of all the forign assotiations of
+the city of New York (the German Tepcanoe Club 30 pers. excepted)....
+
+"I am very sorry that I cannot tell you where I go--I sail in the cliper
+armed brig Fairfield for the West India unter very avantageouse
+circumstances a eccelent pay rang and emoluments you may guess the rest
+be assured it is a honorable a very honorable employment. My next for
+the South wia Havanna or New York or New Orleans will inform you of the
+rest."
+
+Accompanying this letter was a slip from one of the large New York
+dailies confirming his story, and reporting the resolutions passed at a
+great public meeting, of which A. Sarony was President and Chairman,
+John Bratish, Vice-President, and George Sonne, Secretary. "The call of
+the meeting was read and adopted," says the report, "when General
+Bratish addressed the assemblage in the English, French, and German
+languages, in the most patriotic and eloquent manner. His speech was
+received with enthusiastic and repeated applause."
+
+And here for a long season we lost sight of the General, though two or
+three circumstances occurred, each trivial in itself, but all tending to
+give a new aspect to the affair, just before he left us, we had a small
+party at our house, where, among other amusements, a game called "The
+Four Elements" was introduced. When it was all over, and our visitors
+were gone, a costly handkerchief, with a lace border, was not to be
+found. It had been last seen in the hands of General Bratish. Having no
+idea that, if he had pocketed it by mistake, it would not be returned,
+we waited patiently,--very patiently,--supposing he might have thrown
+aside his company dress-coat without examining the pockets, and that
+when he put it on again the handkerchief would be forthcoming, of
+course. But no,--nothing was heard of it, until one evening at a lecture
+my wife suddenly caught my arm, and, pointing to a white handkerchief
+the General was flourishing within reach, said, "There's Aunt Mary's
+handkerchief, now!"--"Nonsense, my dear!"--"It is, I tell you; I can see
+where he has ripped off the lace." I thought her beside herself; but
+still--why the sudden substitution of a large red Spitalfields for the
+white handkerchief? "Perhaps," said I to my wife,--"perhaps the
+handkerchief was not marked, and he did not know where to find the
+owner."--"But it was marked, and he knows the owner as well as you do,"
+was the reply. Of course, I had nothing more to say; and so I laughed
+the exhibition off, as a sort of _pas de mouchoir_, like that which
+brought Forrest into a controversy with Macready.
+
+And then something else happened. I missed the only copy I had in the
+world of "Niagara and Goldau," which he had borrowed of me and returned,
+with emphasis; and many months after he had disappeared, I received a
+volume of poems from the heart of Germany, entitled, "Der Heimathgruss,
+Eine Pfingstgabe von Mathilde von Tabouillot, geborene Giester,"
+published at Wesel, 1840, with a letter from the lady herself, thanking
+me with great warmth and earnestness for my pamphlet in defence of
+General Bratish. Putting that and that together, I began to have a
+suspicion that my copy of "Niagara and Goldau" had been presented to the
+authoress by my friend, the General,--perhaps in the name of the author.
+
+Yet more. While these little incidents were accumulating and seething
+and simmering, I received a letter from Louis Bratish, in beautiful
+French, dated Birmingham, 7th October, 1841, in which he thanked me most
+heartily for what I had done as the friend of his brother, "John
+Bratish,"--withholding the "General,"--and begging me to consider it as
+coming from the family; and about the same time, another letter, and the
+last I ever received, from the General himself. It was dated "Torrington
+House, near London, 12th October, 1841," and contained the following
+passages:--
+
+"I cannot account for the very extraordinary silence in speite of all my
+request that you would at leas be so kind as to inform me if you realy
+don't wish to hear more from me. I know your Hart too well not to be
+persuaded that it must be some mistake or some intrigue.
+
+"At last my family begin to understand how much they did wrong me and I
+have the pleasure to enclose you a letter of my yungest brother, which
+is now at the house of Messrs. Toniola brothers, a volunteer partner, to
+learn the english....
+
+"Mr. Josua Dodge, late Special Agent of the U. S. in Germany, is
+returning in one or two days to America; this gentleman in consequence
+of his mission crossed and recrossed all Germany and Belgium. I met him
+in Germany; he was present at Stuttgard in a most critical moment, when,
+denunced by the Germanic Federation (in the name of Austria) I was in
+iminent peril. He acted as a true American, boldly stepped forward,
+asked the way and the werfore and united with my firmness, the American
+passports where respected, and Mr. Dodge succeded to get an official
+acknowledgment that nothing was known against my moral character, and
+they took refuge upon some little irregularity in the passport.... He,
+my friends and my family wished very much that I should at lease for
+some times rethurn to America (_pour reson bien juste_) but the
+recollection is too bitter yet.... Several Americans are now visiting my
+sister and her husband in Belgium--among them Mr. Bishop of Cont. and
+Mr. Rowly, C. S. of N. Y.--What would I give to see J. N and his amable
+family!...
+
+"My address is Monsieur Le General Bratish (Eliovich), raccommande a
+Mons. Latard, Vervois Belgique.
+
+"P. S. Great excitement at London. The Morning Chronicle is out upon me
+for having done I don't know what in North America and Germany. All
+fidle-stik. I send you the paper to see how eassy John Bull is gulled. I
+could send you some important news. Attention!!! keep your powder dray!"
+
+Nothing more was heard of our mysterious General until a letter fell
+into my hands, purporting to be written by his brother Luigi. It was in
+choice Italian, and dated Birmingham, 16th April, 1842, charging the
+"Caro Fratello" with having deceived him about Mr. Everett, complaining
+of his behavior to Dr. Sleigh and others who had befriended him; telling
+him that Dr. Sleigh, to whom he referred, doubted his Spanish
+commission, and believed him to have been a member of the "Hunter's
+Association,"--a band of horse-thieves in Canada,--and signifying, in
+language not to be misunderstood, that the family had given up all hope
+of him.
+
+The next information we had was that the General had turned up at Havre,
+and was about being married to the daughter of a wealthy banker, and
+carried a commission as Major-General from the Governor of Maine! And
+then, after a lapse of two years, that he had been travelling with a
+British nobleman, whose baggage he had run away with,--that he was
+arrested for the offence, and tried in Malta, I do not know with what
+result; but I have now before me a supplement of the Malta Times of
+October 9, 1844, in Italian, Spanish, and English, wherein he refers to
+the testimonials of my friend, Albert Smith, Ex-M. C, and Levi Cutter,
+Mayor of Portland; complains bitterly of the late Mr. Carr, Minister of
+the United States at Constantinople; and says, among other things, what
+of itself were enough to show that he had claimed to be a General of the
+State of Maine, and thereby settling the question most conclusively and
+forever. His language is: "To one charge of Mr. Everett, I plead guilty;
+to wit, to have usurped, or succeeded to gain the good opinion of
+respectable people in the United States, and here I am glad, at the same
+time, to put Mr. Everett's mind at rest; _he thinks it possible that I
+may be a General of the State of Maine_, but he admits _only_ the
+possibility, and expresses the hope that it may not be so,--this, after
+the pretension to know my birthplace, life, death, and miracles, and an
+assertion on his part to have had, or seen, a correspondence with the
+Executive of Maine, in my regard, is very diplomatic--_very!_--but his
+Excellency may be easy on this head. I do not share _now_ the military
+glory and honor of fellowship with that very numerous body of generals
+of the United States Militia; and if evidence may be produced that I was
+attended by a staff, I assure his Excellency, that it was only to have
+my boots cleaned by a captain, to be shaved by a major, to be helped by
+a colonel, and to get my meals at the private personal head-quarters of
+a _Gineral_ at one dollar per day."
+
+And here I stop. From that day to this, nothing has been heard of
+General Bratish; but I should not be surprised to have him reappear, as
+if he had risen from the dead, in some new character, and so managing as
+to deceive the very elect. No such pretender has appeared since
+Cagliostro; and nobody ever succeeded so well in misleading public
+opinion, and embroiling so many persons of consideration, both in this
+country and in Europe, not excepting the Chevalier d'Eon, and the
+Princess Cariboo. Many other strange things might be related of Bratish,
+as, for example, his great speech in the Hungarian Diet, reported in the
+_Allgemeine Zeitung_,--the most impudent forgery of our day. But this
+paper is already longer than I intended; and I have only to add, that I
+have reason to believe now that he was indeed a native of Trieste, and
+that Colonel Stille and Mr. McIlvaine were right in saying what they did
+of him _generally_, though wrong in many of the particulars upon which
+they chiefly relied.
+
+
+
+
+A TOUR IN THE DARK.
+
+
+One February evening, more than a year ago, after a drive of fourteen
+miles over a lonely Kentucky road, I drew rein in front of a huge,
+rambling wooden building, standing solitary in the midst of the forest.
+
+There was no village in sight to account for the presence of so large a
+structure, no adjacent farms, and, except a little patch in front of the
+house, no fields,--nothing but the solemn woods which nearly shut it in
+on every side.
+
+I did not ask if this was the Mammoth Cave Hotel. I knew it without
+asking.
+
+Here I was, then, at last,--about to see what I had desired to see ever
+since I was a boy!
+
+But delay frequently comes with the certainty of accomplishing any
+long-cherished desire; and though I had driven with a hasty whip from
+the railway station fourteen miles away, and though the hotel proprietor
+offered to procure me a guide that evening, my haste to see the cave was
+unaccountably over. I ordered a fire in my room, and concluded to wait
+until morning.
+
+It was too early in the season for the usual summer visitors, and I
+found myself the sole guest in this big, lonesome caravansary, that
+looked as though a dozen old-fashioned Dutch farm-houses had been placed
+in the midst of a wood-lot, and then connected by the roofs, the whole
+forming one straggling, weather-stained, labyrinthine building, full of
+little nests of rooms, high-pitched gables, cumbrous outside
+chimney-stacks, cavernous fireplaces, and low, wide corridors open at
+either end, where were uncertain shadows, and draughts of damp air that
+whispered and moaned all night long.
+
+In the evening, as I sat before the blazing pile of logs in the
+fireplace, some one knocked at my door, and a negro servant looked in.
+Would I like to see the guide?
+
+"Certainly. What is his name?"
+
+"Nicholas, sah, Nicholas! But we all calls him Ole Nick."
+
+Rather an ominous name, to be sure! but then, if one goes to the regions
+below, what guide so appropriate?
+
+On presentation, his Majesty proved to be an interesting black man,
+considerably past middle age; wrinkled, as none but a genuine negro ever
+becomes; a short, broad, strong man, with a grizzled beard and mustache,
+quiet but steady eyes, grave in his demeanor, and concise in his
+conversation. He tells me of two routes by which I can make a tour
+through his dominions. The shortest one will require six hours to
+travel, and at the farthest will take me to the banks of the river Styx,
+six miles from the entrance to the cave. The other route will take the
+whole day, and will lead as far as the so-called "Maelstroem,"--a
+singular pit, a hundred and seventy-five feet deep,--and place nine
+miles of gloom between me and this outer world. And with these facts to
+be juggled and distorted in ridiculous combinations with remembrances of
+many persons and places in the vagaries of dreams, I went to bed and to
+sleep.
+
+As the sun came up, we went down,--my guide and I,--down a rocky path
+along the side of a ravine that grew narrower and deeper until we came
+to a dilapidated house where the ravine seemed to end. Stepping upon the
+rotting piazza of this old house and facing "right about," there opened
+before us, as broad and lofty as the entrance to some ancient Egyptian
+temple, the mouth of the cave. From where we stood, a path, as wide as
+an ordinary city sidewalk and as smooth, sloped gently downward through
+the portal.
+
+Turning to the right to avoid the drip of a limpid stream,--that falls
+over the entrance like a perpetual libation to Pluto,--a few minutes'
+walk places us many hundred feet vertically beneath the surface, and in
+the "Rotunda," an enlargement of the cave, which looks about as large as
+the interior of Trinity Church, but is in reality larger; being quite as
+lofty, and measuring at its greatest diameter a hundred and seventy-five
+feet.
+
+Here, as we paused to look, with our flaring lamps poised above our
+heads, a strange squeaking noise was heard, which seemed to come from
+everywhere and nowhere in particular. I glanced inquiringly at my guide,
+in answer to which he simply replied, "Bats," and pointed to the walls,
+where, on closer inspection, I found these creatures clinging by
+thousands, literally blackening the wall, and hanging in festoons a foot
+or two in length. The manner of forming these festoons was curious
+enough: three or four bats having first taken hold of some sharp
+projecting ledge with their hindmost claws, and hanging thereby with
+their heads downward, others had seized their leathery wings at the
+second joint, and they too, hanging with downward heads, had offered
+their wings as holding-places for still others; and so the unsightly
+pendent mass had grown, until in some instances it contained as many as
+twenty or thirty bats. The wonder seemed that four or five pairs of
+little claws not so large as those of a mouse could sustain a weight
+that must have been in some instances as much as three pounds.
+
+The mysterious influence of the approaching spring had penetrated even
+into these abodes of darkness, and aroused in the bats a little life
+after their long hibernation; and their weak, plaintive squeak, which
+had something impish in it withal, came from every shadowy recess, and
+from the dark vault overhead. This "Rotunda" should have been called the
+"Bower of Bats."
+
+As they all hung too high to reach by other means, I flung my stick at
+random upward against the wall, and brought down two of the black
+masses, that writhed helpless upon the stony floor of the cave. Poor,
+palpitating things, unable to loose their clutch upon each other's
+wings, it was hard to say whether they were more disgusting or pitiful.
+What Eshcol clusters these, to bear back from this Canaan of darkness,
+saying, "This is the fruit of it!"
+
+Such an immense number of bats had harbored and died here from time
+immemorial, that more than a hundred acres of the earthy floor of the
+cave had, from their decomposing remains, become impregnated with nitre;
+and during the years 1812 to 1814, a party of saltpetre-makers took up
+their residence here. They made great vats in the cave, in which they
+lixiviated the impregnated earth, and by wooden pipes conveyed it to a
+place where they boiled the water drawn from the vats. Their rude
+mechanical contrivances are standing yet, in the same positions in which
+they were left so long ago; and so dry and pure is the air of the cave,
+that, though more than half a century has passed, these wooden pipes and
+vats show no more indication of decay than they did when first put in.
+In one place my guide dug up from the clayey floor--where it was their
+custom to feed the oxen employed in drawing the materials to and
+fro--some corn-cobs, very dry and light, but as perfect as though they
+were only a few months old.
+
+The footprints of the oxen, made in the earth that was then moist, are
+plainly visible in many places; and the clay has since become almost as
+hard as stone, so that I found it difficult to make any impression in it
+with the point of my pocket-knife.
+
+A few minutes' walk brought us in front of the "Giant's Coffin," an
+enormous rock forty feet in length, which has fallen from the ceiling.
+The resemblance to a coffin is so strangely exact, that, having heard
+mention of it before coming in, I recognized it at the first glance. The
+upper part of the rock is composed of a stratum whiter than the rest,
+and gives it the appearance of having a border of white ornamentation
+around it, just below the lid. It rests upon a gigantic bier about ten
+feet high, and a little longer than the coffin, and the effect is as
+though some kingly son of Anak were lying in state in this huge
+sepulchral vault.
+
+Near at hand is a cluster of objects, not carved out by the accidents of
+time or the long attrition of subterranean rivers, as is the case with
+almost everything else in the cave, but shaped by human hands into a
+mournful resemblance to cottages; the likeness being all the more
+pathetic when one learns the fact that for many months a number of
+benighted human beings made their home here, under the delusion that the
+air of the cave, which is chemically pure and dry, would cure their
+pulmonary diseases; and that here, like plants shut out from the
+generous, fostering sun, they paled and died.
+
+The appearance of those who came out after two or three months'
+residence in the cave is described as frightful. "Their faces," says one
+who saw them, "were entirely bloodless, eyes sunken, and pupils dilated
+to such a degree that the iris ceased to be visible; so that, no matter
+what the original color of the eye might have been, it appeared entirely
+black."
+
+These cottages, if by a great stretch of courtesy I may call them such,
+are very small, consisting each of but one room about ten feet square;
+they had been built of stones collected in the cave, and laid loosely in
+the wall without mortar; they had fireplaces and chimneys, good wooden
+floors, and doors, but no windows, as there was neither light to let in
+nor prospect to view without. As there was neither rain nor snow fall,
+neither midday heat nor dew of night, beneath that stony cope, roofs
+also were useless; so that the structures were only cells that strongly
+reminded one of sepulchres. I can conceive of nothing more melancholy
+than the existence of the seven or eight consumptives, who I am told
+occupied these _ante mortem_ tombs at one time about fifteen years ago.
+Three died there, and every one of the others who had resided in the
+cave for a period of two months died within two or three weeks after
+coming out.
+
+Near to these monuments of ignorance and despair, I noticed a monument
+of another sort, and of later date,--a tribute to one of the most
+gallant and genial of men, in whom it was fully demonstrated that "the
+bravest are the tenderest." It was a pyramidal pile, about eight feet
+high, of carefully selected stones, laid without mortar, but with
+mathematical precision; and on one stone near the top was scratched a
+name dear to every soldier's heart,--"McPherson."
+
+The cells where the living died, and this pile which tells how the
+memory of the dead yet lives, are the last objects on our route that
+have any association with the things of this outer world; these are the
+pillars that mark the beginning of a realm devoid of human
+association,--its Pillars of Hercules, beyond which is a silent waste
+whose darkness breeds the wildest mysteries.
+
+Walking continuously through the gloom, one loses to some extent the
+idea of progression. Here he can get no look ahead, no backward view. He
+is the centre of a little circle of light, beyond which is immeasurable
+darkness, whence objects seem to come to him like apparitions, changing
+form as the first and last rays of light fall upon them, as though the
+shape in which they appear under the full light of the lamp were only
+some disguise of assumed innocence, which they cast off as they glide
+silently into the dark again, to take on some semblance too awful for
+mortal eyes. Farther and farther we went along these arched, crypt-like
+ways; passing frequently through lofty chambers where the roof could not
+be discovered, each with some fanciful and often inappropriate name
+assigned to it, until we came at length to what looked like a window in
+the side wall of the cave. Peering through this, and holding my lamp
+high over my head, I could see neither roof nor sides nor bottom,--only
+the wall in which was the window through which I looked. Upward it was
+lost in the darkness, and from my breast it descended, perpendicular as
+a plummet line, until it vanished in the gulf below, from which arose a
+sound of dripping water. This, my guide informed me, was "Gorin's Dome."
+Taking then from his haversack a Bengal light, he ignited it and threw
+it into the dark void. The sulphurous light shot up and up into a dome
+unlike anything built by human hands, unless it might be the interior of
+some tremendous tower, eighty feet in width, and nearly two hundred in
+height, which the beholder viewed from without, looking inwards through
+a window placed at two thirds of the entire height from the bottom.
+
+The inaccessible floor of this place is nearly level, and the walls
+strictly perpendicular from base to summit; the whole cavern having been
+hollowed out by the constant dripping of water holding carbonic acid in
+solution, which cuts the rock as ordinary water channels the ice of a
+glacier or the mural face of an iceberg into a semblance of columns, and
+sometimes into the folds of an immense curtain.
+
+The brief light fell upon the distant floor; flashed up once, bringing
+into strong relief every salient angle in the wonderful walls, and then
+died out; the awful prospect vanishing like a nightmare vision, and
+leaving nothing to the sense but the sound of the water dripping into
+the depths below. The light had burned only half a minute; but so
+strange was the scene, that this glimpse sufficed to photograph it
+indelibly in my memory.
+
+Gorin's Dome is not the largest of this class of sub-cavities in the
+cave, being smaller than Mammoth Dome; but it is the first of its class
+that the tourist sees, and it is viewed from so singular a stand-point
+that it makes the most startling impression.
+
+Five minutes' farther walk brought us to a wooden footbridge,--a narrow,
+shaky contrivance, with a treacherous footing and a slender hand-rail.
+Here the bottom of the cave seemed to have dropped out, and the roof to
+have gone in search of it; and but for the dim glimpse of the rock on
+the other side one might have suspected that this bridge would launch
+him into that ungeographical locality called, in the old Norse
+mythology, "Ginnunga Gap,"--a place where there was neither side, edge,
+nor bottom to anything.
+
+The vault overhead is called "Minerva's Dome"; the gulf below is called
+the "Side-Saddle Pit," though I failed to discover any degree of
+appropriateness in the odd name.
+
+Standing in the middle of the bridge, my guide flung one of his Bengal
+lights far upward, in the midst of the slow-falling drops that had
+already carved out this tremendous well and were still making it larger.
+The light turned them for an instant into a shower of diamonds; then
+down it fell, down, down! As in its descent it passed the bridge on
+which we stood, the shadows of our two figures rushed up the opposite
+wall, like a pair of demons scared out of their abode by the hissing
+flame; and Nick, the guide, as he leaned over, looking downward after
+it,--every one of the innumerable wrinkles in his black face made more
+distinct, with his white beard and mustache, and the whites of his eyes
+seeming to glow in the blue elfish light,--was a caricature, half
+grotesque, almost terrible, of Satan himself.
+
+Minerva's Dome and Side-Saddle Pit, both being one place and formed by
+the same dripping water, correspond to Gorin's Dome and the pit beneath
+it; that part which has been hollowed out above the roof of the cave
+being called the dome, and the part below the floor of the cave the pit.
+The only difference between the two is that in the case of Gorin's Dome
+the dripping waters have bored their huge shaft on one side of the track
+of the cave, only just piercing the wall of it in one spot, to make the
+window through which it is viewed; while in the case of the Side-Saddle
+Pit the vertical shaft cuts directly across the track of the cave, or,
+to speak more correctly, across the tunnel which was once the bed of a
+subterranean river, but which is now a broad, smooth, dry path.
+
+The topography of this underground realm may be divided into three
+departments, as follows:--
+
+First,--as being greatest in extent,--the "avenues," or tunnels, which
+present conclusive evidence of having once been the channels of a
+subterranean stream, whose waters, having some peculiar solvent
+property, wore their bed lower and lower in the rock, until they cut
+through into some lower opening, through which they were drawn off,
+leaving the old channels dry. Imagine one of the narrow, crooked streets
+in the old part of Boston, spanned by a continuous stone archway from
+the summits of the buildings on either hand; then close with solid
+masonry every window and loop-hole by which a ray of light could
+struggle in, and you have for proportions and sinuosity not a bad
+semblance of these tunnels, which constitute four fifths of the extent
+of the Mammoth Cave.
+
+The second and next largest department is that of the "chambers." These
+are places in the general course of the former river where the roof fell
+in before the withdrawal of the waters, opening great spaces upward; the
+fallen mass forming a sort of island in the centre of the stream, and
+crowding the waters on either side of it against the walls of the cave,
+so that they were worn out to twice the average width, and finally
+itself disappearing under the combined action of the current and the
+solvent properties of the water.
+
+The air in all these tunnels and chambers is remarkably dry and pure.
+Wood seems never to decay here; as is instanced in the wooden pipes and
+vats of the saltpetre-makers, upon which the lapse of a half-century has
+not had any visible effect.
+
+The general width of the tunnels or avenues is about forty or fifty
+feet, and the average height about thirty feet; but this uniformity is
+broken every few hundred yards by chambers, varying in width from eighty
+to two hundred feet, and in height from seventy to two hundred and
+fifty feet. The floor is formed in some places of sand, but generally of
+indurated mud, so hard that it is impossible to make any indentation in
+it with the heel of the boot, and remarkably even and smooth, so that
+almost anywhere one can walk with as much ease as on city sidewalks. The
+walls also are clean and smooth, as in the arched crypts of some mighty
+cathedral. A cross section of almost any one of these tunnels would show
+an elliptic outline, the vertical diameter being the shortest, and the
+bottom being filled with indurated mud or sand to a sufficient depth to
+make a level floor.
+
+The third division or class of openings is that of the "domes" and
+"pits." These were formed by the same kind of agency as the tunnels and
+chambers, namely, by the action of water holding carbonic acid in
+solution; but acting in a different manner, and at a period long after
+the subterranean river had ceased to flow through its tunnels.
+
+The solvent acid of the water must be acquired in percolating through
+the several hundreds of feet of superincumbent earth and sandstone, as
+there is but one of these domes, "Sandstone Dome," that extends upward
+to the sandstone. The solvent water then, after finding its way into the
+vertical crevices of the limestone, gradually rounded them out like
+wells, until the pieces which occasionally fell from the top formed a
+sort of floor. Through the interstices of this floor, the dissolved
+substance of the rock is carried into some deeper and yet undiscovered
+cavities beneath. The floor itself gradually sinks, the domes grow
+higher, and the walls recede as long as the water continues to drip into
+them.
+
+It is not unreasonable to suppose that the substratum of limestone in
+all the country for many miles in the vicinity is perforated with these
+tremendous shafts; as those which are seen in the cave are only such as
+happened to be in the course of the tunnels composing the Mammoth Cave.
+It is not improbable that there are many others on every side, close to
+the line of the tunnels, but not yet connected with them.
+
+In any one of the above-mentioned departments, the description of one
+place answers for most others, except in dimensions. The following are a
+few out of many hundreds of measurements taken in as many different
+places:--
+
+The "Rotunda," the first chamber from the entrance of the cave, is about
+one hundred feet high, and one hundred and seventy-five in diameter.
+
+The "Methodist Church," eighty feet in diameter, and forty in height.
+
+"Wright's Rotunda" is four hundred feet in its shortest diameter, being
+nearly circular; the roof seems perfectly level, and is about forty-five
+feet high.
+
+"Kinney's Arena" is a hundred feet in diameter, and is fifty feet high.
+
+"Proctor's Arcade" is one hundred feet in width and three quarters of a
+mile in length. The walls, which are about forty-five feet high, are
+nearly perpendicular throughout the whole length of the arcade, joining
+the roof nearly at right angles, and are so smooth that they look like
+hammer-dressed stone.
+
+"Silliman's Avenue" is a mile and a half in length and about forty feet
+in height, its width varying from twenty to two hundred feet.
+
+"Shelby's Dome" and the pit beneath it are two hundred and thirty-five
+feet in height, and about twenty-five in diameter.
+
+"Mammoth Dome" is two hundred and fifty feet high, and nearly one
+hundred in diameter.
+
+"Lucy's Dome," the highest in the cave, is sixty feet in diameter, and
+three hundred in height.
+
+Nine miles from the entrance of the cave is the "Maelstroem," a dry pit
+or well, one hundred and seventy-five feet deep, and about twenty in
+diameter; and from the bottom of this shaft may be seen the openings to
+three other avenues, which lead farther into this Plutonian labyrinth
+than mortal foot has ever trod.
+
+Although the distance of nine miles is about as far as tourists usually
+get from the entrance, that is by no means the measure of its extent,
+but only the extent of the direct route; there being a number of other
+tunnels branching off from it on either side, some of which connect with
+it again at a distance of several miles, and some of which have not been
+explored to their connection, if they have any.
+
+The total length of all the explored avenues is estimated at over one
+hundred miles. If a single day's experience in the cave were sufficient
+ground for offering an opinion, I should say that this was a large
+over-estimate; but I have no doubt that, like all other great works of
+both art and nature, it grows upon the sense of the beholder. But even
+setting down its extent at half the foregoing estimate, none can tread
+these hollow chambers, thinking of others unexplored, and extending not
+only from that distant nine-mile-station, but on every hand, into the
+unknown, without a feeling of awe and fear.
+
+Thus on and on through the echoing avenues, where the reverberation of
+our footsteps seemed to follow stealthily far behind us, through chamber
+and hall, where my guide in the advance flung up his lights, revealing
+for an instant the grim and distant vaults,--through "Star Chamber,"
+five hundred feet long, seventy in width, and sixty in height, "Cloud
+Room," a quarter of a mile in length, sixty feet in height, "Deserted
+Chamber," "River Hall," "Revellers' Hall," "The Great Walk,"--through
+all these, and a dozen more, we wandered, until, after two hours' walk,
+and at a distance of four and a half miles from the entrance to the
+cave, I paused upon the muddy banks of the "Styx," and, stooping, dipped
+up in my hands a draught from its cold, sunless waters.
+
+Here my guide would willingly have played Charon to my Ulysses, but as
+no one had penetrated thus far into the cave for several months, the
+boat used to carry visitors over, and to voyage up and down the short
+river (only a hundred and fifty yards in length), had sunk, and we
+found it impossible to raise it.
+
+The river is about twenty-five feet in width, its course crossing that
+of the cave at right angles, and its channel being simply another avenue
+or tunnel on a little lower level than the one by which the visitor
+approaches it.
+
+In this stream, as well as in "Echo River," are found the famous eyeless
+fish. We dipped in vain, for a long time, in hopes of capturing some of
+these. At last I was fortunate enough to secure one tiny specimen, about
+two inches long, which was shaped like other minnows, but had no eyes,
+and was perfectly white, there being not the slightest shade of coloring
+on the back. The upper part of its head was as translucent as agate,
+through which could be seen opaque spots imbedded in the head where the
+base of the eye-sockets should have been. The specimen I obtained was
+one of the smallest, as the guide told me these fishes frequently
+attained the length of six or seven inches.
+
+I secured also an eyeless crawfish about three inches in length. This
+forlorn little creature, like the fish, was entirely colorless. It had
+two slightly protuberant spots in its head where the eyes should be; but
+they were dull and opaque, and did not seem to differ in texture from
+the rest of its body, which had not the translucence of that of the
+fish, but looked as though carved out of white marble.
+
+The fish are found also in "Lake Lethe," a quarter of a mile from the
+Styx, as well as in "Echo River," the largest and most interesting body
+of water in the cave. This last flows out of a tunnel which has such a
+low roof that the volume of water nearly fills it, and from here to
+where it enters the rocks again is three quarters of a mile. Here the
+blind white creatures that inhabit its dark, slow-flowing waters are
+more plentiful, but are as unlike those nimble, glistening fellows which
+inhabit the streams of the outer world, as the cavern's atmosphere of
+darkness and death is different from our atmosphere of light and life.
+They refuse to bite at any bait; they move sluggishly, and, when caught
+in a net, flop languidly, and die. The only food they are known to have
+is the smaller ones of their own kind; and, oddest of all, they, as well
+as the crawfish, give birth to their young alive, instead of spawning
+the eggs to be hatched by the sun. Last and remotest of these sunless
+streams is "Roaring River," the margin of whose solemn waters is nine
+miles from the entrance of the cave. This should be Acheron, which hated
+the light, and ran sighing down into a cave; for from this stream too
+comes a perpetual moan.
+
+The region where the several rivers mentioned are grouped is lower than
+the rest of the cave, and much more gloomy in appearance than the high,
+dry chambers through which one passes in coming back toward the
+entrance.
+
+I was somewhat disappointed in the display of stalactites and other
+similar formations of the protocarbonate of lime found in the cave. For
+a number of years I had been familiar with mines and mining operations
+in the lead-mining districts of Illinois, Wisconsin, and Missouri, and
+had there seen some of the most beautiful, though not the largest,
+specimens of calcareous spar known to exist. The lime in these
+localities being in most instances perfectly pure, the stalactites, to
+the length of three feet sometimes, are as free from coloring as
+icicles. Sometimes the miners' drift (which compared with the Mammoth
+Cave is as a rabbit's burrow to a railway tunnel) is opened into small,
+low-roofed caves; and in these, in addition to the translucent
+stalactites, there are little hollows in the floor covered with thin
+sheets of protocarbonate of lime, no thicker than a pane of
+window-glass, and as white as snow. From beneath these the water has
+sunk away, leaving a hollow space, and giving the whole precisely the
+appearance of those little pools which every one has noticed when a
+muddy road suddenly congeals: the pools of water freeze over, and the
+water disappears, leaving the ice only a shell over a cavity.
+
+Nothing of this kind, however, is found in the Mammoth Cave. The lime of
+which the stalactites are formed being mixed with various oxides and
+other impurities, they are all of a dark brown, or gray, or muddy color.
+With the exception of some stalactite columns in the "Gothic Arcade,"
+which form a fine alcove called the "Gothic Chapel," there are no
+stalactites of extraordinary size. There is a stalactite mass (or was
+some years ago) in "Uhrig's Cave," in the suburbs of the city of St.
+Louis, about twelve feet in height and four feet in diameter, which
+exceeds in size anything I saw in the Mammoth Cave.
+
+The gypsum or alabaster flowers are the crowning beauty of the Mammoth
+Cave. These are an entirely different formation from the stalactites,
+being formed only in a perfectly dry atmosphere, while the stalactites
+are necessarily formed in a moist one.
+
+The gypsum is formed by crystallization, and in that process exerts the
+same expansive force as ice. Wherever it forms in crevices it fractures
+the rocks that enclose it, and protrudes from the crevice; its own bulk
+divides, or splits, and curves open, and outward, with much more
+tenacity than ice. It seems to have a fibrous texture, in the direction
+of which the split always opens.
+
+I found in the "Snowball Room" and in a large chamber called
+"Cleveland's Cabinet," a beautiful display of these flowers. In the
+Snowball Room, the likeness to winter appears again, in the knots
+strongly resembling snowballs stuck all over the ceiling. And in
+Cleveland's Cabinet I found some singularly beautiful specimens of
+alabaster formations. One kind seemed to be literally growing from the
+ceiling as a vegetable would, and looked more than anything else like
+short, thick stalks of celery. If an ordinary stalk of celery were
+split, so that its natural tendency to curl over backward could be
+freely exercised, it would give a very good idea of the shape of some
+of the gypsum flowers, except that these are not often longer than four
+inches, and in that length frequently curl so as to make a complete
+circle. They have the same fibrous appearance as celery, and are as
+white as snow.
+
+When five or six of these stalks--if I may call them so--start from one
+point, and curve outward in different directions from a common centre,
+they frequently form beautiful rosettes. Imagine one of the common
+tiger-lilies, which, instead of its thin, red curving petals, has stalks
+of celery, curving as much, but broken off square at the ends; then
+imagine the celery to be of the purest conceivable white; and you have a
+tolerable conception of one of these beautiful alabaster flowers.
+
+This alabaster growth is found only in a few places throughout the cave;
+when it is in chambers or spaces in which the atmosphere is very dry, it
+invariably has a beautiful fibrous texture like wood or celery, and the
+curved form; but if the atmosphere is damp, it forms on the ceiling in
+round nodules, from two to three inches in diameter, as in the Snowball
+Room.
+
+In the Gothic Arcade there is a sort of colonnade formed along the side
+of the tunnel by the meeting of the down-growing stalactites and the
+upward-growing stalagmites; the two together having formed slender
+columns of spar, from three to six feet in height. One group of these,
+about eight feet high, which is the most beautiful in the cave, is
+called the Gothic Chapel. In many of the formations, it is very
+difficult to trace even the remotest resemblance to the objects after
+which they have been named; but in one instance, that of a stalactite
+called the "Elephant's Head," the resemblance is remarkable.
+
+Ordinarily it is the custom for one guide to conduct a party of four or
+five persons into the cave. I dislike over-officious guides and the
+hackneyed comparisons and wordy wonder of gabbling tourists in grand
+and solemn places like this; therefore, in the morning, before
+starting, I congratulated myself that I should be alone, with the
+exception of the guide, who fortunately seemed thoroughly imbued with
+the spirit of the place in which he had spent the greater portion of his
+time for seventeen years.
+
+He was as grave and taciturn as some cave-keeping anchorite. During our
+inward progress, he had carefully pointed out every place and object of
+interest, and hurled his blue-lights here and there into domes and pits
+and cavernous retreats of darkness. But now, on our backward course, he
+stalked silently and abstractedly before, though he seemed to listen to
+every step of my feet; for, if I paused or made a misstep, he instantly
+looked round.
+
+At last he turned, and, looking me curiously in the face, asked whether
+I thought I should be afraid if left in the dark there a little while.
+Some people could not bear it, he said, and one gentleman who had
+consented to the ordeal of darkness had been half crazed by it, and when
+the guide, who had withdrawn and concealed himself, with his light,
+returned, the traveller tried first to run away into the darkness, and
+then, under some strange hallucination, fired his pistol in the guide's
+face.
+
+I had a suspicion that the effect of the obscurity was exaggerated; I
+was disposed, moreover, to "try the dark," from curiosity. But I must
+acknowledge that, when the guide, with that doubting look, repeated his
+inquiry, I hesitated, asking, "Is there any danger? and from what?"
+
+"Nobody knows, massa," said he seriously; "only some people's nerve
+can't stan' it, dat 's all."
+
+The mention of that odious word, "nerve" sounded so much like the
+familiar solicitation, "Try your nerves, gentlemen?" from the
+electrical-machine man,--who is found on the curbstone of some
+thoroughfare in every city,--that for one brief instant the prestige of
+the great cave was gone.
+
+Poh! I thought, so it is only claptrap after all? "Here, take the
+lamps, all of them, matches too, and go away so far that I cannot hear
+you halloo, even at your loudest. I will sit here until you come back!"
+So saying, I sat down upon a rock in the Star Chamber; and he, taking
+the lights, walked away toward the entrance of the cave.
+
+"So then," I thought, "this is the perfect darkness, the total absence
+of light, which is seldom if ever known above ground; for even in the
+darkest night and the darkest house there are some wandering rays of
+light; though they may not be sufficient to enable the eye to
+distinguish anything, they are there; they penetrate, reflected in a
+hundred zigzags, into the darkest places of the outer world. But here
+there are miles between me and the utmost limits of their influence!"
+
+I held my hand before my face, but could not distinguish by sight that
+it was there. A few pale, phosphorescent gleams, that seemed to be
+wandering in the air, I was convinced were only the remembrances of the
+optic nerve,--eidolons of the retina; but they seemed to some extent
+plastic to my thoughts, and ready to become the subjective creations of
+the brain, outlined in the dark. I could conceive then how the brain,
+excited by fear, or stimulated by emotion, might multiply these
+phantasms, moulding them into the likeness of objects and beings that
+never had any existence in reality. My sense of hearing, too, seemed
+preternaturally sharpened; I could hear the ticking of the watch in my
+pocket, the throbbing of my own heart, the murmur of the air in my
+lungs. I held my breath so that the slightest sound from any other
+source than my own organism should not escape me; the ringing vacancy in
+my ears grew more and more painful. Not the remotest breath of any
+sound, except a faint dropping of water in some distant place! (I could
+think of none but in that awful place called Gorin's Dome.) It seemed to
+whisper, "Hush! hush! hush!" Sometimes I could not hear the dropping;
+for just the same reason that, if one listens intently to the ticking of
+a clock for ten minutes, there are intervals when his ear cannot detect
+it, because of its regular monotonous sound.
+
+In such intervals the tympanum of the ear, aching with the dead collapse
+of its world, made sounds for itself; and it required the exercise of
+reason to convince myself, sometimes, that I did not hear distant
+babbling voices.
+
+But hark! There _is_ a sound! Not distant, but near! Here!--There! A
+sound like large, soft feet treading cautiously. No, not that,
+but--something breathing. Pshaw! I believe it was only the sound of my
+own respiration after all!
+
+I did not exactly "whistle to keep my courage up," but, feeling that I
+must do something to assert my vitality, my antagonism to this
+overpowering dark, I cleared my throat vehemently, defiantly,--AHEM!
+AHEM! AHEM!! But it sounded so incongruous, so impertinent I might say,
+in the midst of that awful silence! Besides, it woke such queer echoes
+from unexpected quarters, that I stopped to listen, and heard the
+water-drops again in Gorin's Dome, whispering, "Hush! hush! hush!" And
+from all the gloomy chambers and tunnels came the echo, breathing,
+"Hush! hash! hush!"
+
+It began to be terrifying to think that release from this hell of
+silence was dependent upon one man's will, and he too a man I had never
+seen until within a few hours. Where was he now, my dark-faced guide?
+What if he should not be able to find me again in the midst of this
+hundred miles of tunnels that look so much alike? What if he should not
+intend to come? What if--But, thank Heaven! there he is at last! That is
+the firm, substantial sound of a mortal footstep; not those stealthy,
+phantom steps I seemed to hear before! There too is the distant glinting
+of the red lamplight on the sides of the cave! How long it takes him to
+get here! There he is at last! Blessed be his black face! how unlike the
+pale, phosphorescent forms I fancied just a little while ago! How
+foolish seem all those dreadful fancies now, so terribly real then!
+
+
+
+
+AN AUTUMN SONG.
+
+
+    Below the headland with its cedar-plumes
+      A lapse of spacious water twinkles keen,
+    An ever-shifting play of gleams and glooms
+         And flashes of clear green.
+
+    The sumac's garnet pennons where I lie
+      Are mingled with the tansy's faded gold;
+    Fleet hawks are screaming in the light-blue sky,
+         And fleet airs rushing cold.
+
+    The plump peach steals the dying rose's red;
+      The yellow pippin ripens to its fall;
+    The dusty grapes, to purple fulness fed,
+         Droop from the garden-wall.
+
+    And yet, where rainbow foliage crowns the swamp,
+      I hear in dreams an April robin sing,
+    And memory, amid this Autumn pomp,
+         Strays with the ghost of Spring.
+
+
+
+
+BY-WAYS OF EUROPE.
+
+A VISIT TO THE BALEARIC ISLANDS.
+
+
+I.
+
+As the steamer Mallorca slowly moved out of the harbor of Barcelona, I
+made a rapid inspection of the passengers gathered on deck, and found
+that I was the only foreigner among them. Almost without exception they
+were native Majorcans, returning from trips of business or pleasure to
+the Continent. They spoke no language except Spanish and Catalan, and
+held fast to all the little habits and fashions of their insular life.
+If anything more had been needed to show me that I was entering upon
+untrodden territory, it was supplied by the joyous surprise of the
+steward when I gave him a fee. This fact reconciled me to my isolation
+on board, and its attendant awkwardness.
+
+I knew not why I should have chosen to visit the Balearic Islands,
+unless for the simple reason that they lie so much aside from the
+highways of travel, and are not represented in the journals and
+sketch-books of tourists. If any one had asked me what I expected to
+see, I should have been obliged to confess my ignorance; for the few dry
+geographical details which I possessed were like the chemical analysis
+of a liquor wherefrom no one can reconstruct the taste. The _flavor_ of
+a land is a thing quite apart from its statistics. There is no special
+guide-book for the islands, and the slight notices in the works on Spain
+only betray the haste of the authors to get over a field with which they
+are unacquainted. But this very circumstance, for me, had grown into a
+fascination. One gets tired of studying the bill of fare in advance of
+the repast. When the sun and the Spanish coast had set together behind
+the placid sea, I went to my berth with the delightful certainty that
+the sun of the morrow, and of many days thereafter, would rise upon
+scenes and adventures which could not be anticipated.
+
+The distance from Barcelona to Palma is about a hundred and forty miles;
+so the morning found us skirting the southwestern extremity of
+Majorca,--a barren coast, thrusting low headlands, of gray rock into the
+sea, and hills covered with parched and stunted chaparral in the rear.
+The twelfth century, in the shape of a crumbling Moorish watch-tower,
+alone greeted us. As we advanced eastward into the Bay of Palma,
+however, the wild shrubbery melted into plantations of olive, solitary
+houses of fishermen nestled in the coves, and finally a village, of
+those soft ochre-tints which are a little brighter than the soil,
+appeared on the slope of a hill. In front, through the pale morning mist
+which still lay upon the sea, I saw the cathedral of Palma, looming
+grand and large beside the towers of other churches, and presently,
+gliding past a mile or two of country villas and gardens, we entered the
+crowded harbor.
+
+Inside the mole there was a multitude of the light craft of the
+Mediterranean,--xebecs, feluccas, speronaras, or however they may be
+termed,--with here and there a brigantine which had come from beyond the
+Pillars of Hercules. Our steamer drew into her berth beside the quay,
+and after a very deliberate review by the port physician we were allowed
+to land. I found a porter, Arab in everything but costume, and followed
+him through the water-gate into the half-awake city. My destination was
+the Inn of the Four Nations, where I was cordially received, and
+afterwards roundly swindled, by a French host. My first demand was for a
+native attendant, not so much from any need of guide as simply to
+become more familiar with the people through him; but I was told that
+no such serviceable spirit was to be had in the place. Strangers are so
+rare that a class of people who live upon them has not yet been created.
+
+"But how shall I find the Palace of the Government, or the monastery of
+San Domingo, or anything else?" I asked.
+
+"O, we will give you directions, so that you cannot miss them," said the
+host; but he laid before me such a confusion of right turnings and left
+turnings, ups and downs, that I became speedily bewildered, and set
+forth, determined to let the "spirit in my feet" guide me. A
+labyrinthine place is Palma, and my first walks through the city were so
+many games of chance. The streets are very narrow, changing their
+direction, it seemed to me, at every tenth step; and whatever landmark
+one may select at the start is soon shut from view by the high, dark
+houses. At first, I was quite astray, but little by little I regained
+the lost points of the compass.
+
+After having had the Phoenicians, Greeks, Carthaginians, Romans,
+Vandals, and Saracens as masters, Majorca was first made Spanish by King
+Jaime of Aragon, the Conquistador, in the year 1235. For a century after
+the conquest it was an independent kingdom, and one of its kings was
+slain by the English bowmen at the battle of Crecy. The Spanish element
+has absorbed, but not yet entirely obliterated, the characteristics of
+the earlier races who inhabited the island. Were ethnology a more
+positively developed science, we might divide and classify this confused
+inheritance of character; as it is, we vaguely feel the presence of
+something quaint, antique, and unusual, in walking the streets of Palma,
+and mingling with the inhabitants. The traces of Moorish occupation are
+still noticeable everywhere. Although the Saracenic architecture no
+longer exists in its original forms, its details may be detected in
+portals, court-yards, and balconies, in almost every street. The
+conquerors endeavored to remodel the city, but in doing so they
+preserved the very spirit which they sought to destroy.
+
+My wanderings, after all, were not wholly undirected. I found an
+intelligent guide, who was at the same time an old acquaintance. The
+whirligig of time brings about, not merely its revenges, but also its
+compensations and coincidences. Twenty-two years ago, when I was
+studying German as a boy in the old city of Frankfort, guests from the
+South of France came to visit the amiable family with whom I was
+residing. There were M. Laurens, a painter and a musical enthusiast, his
+wife, and Mademoiselle Rosalba, a daughter as fair as her name. Never
+shall I forget the curious letter which the artist wrote to the manager
+of the theatre, requesting that Beethoven's _Fidelio_ might be given
+(and it was!) for his own especial benefit, nor the triumphant air with
+which he came to us one day, saying, "I have something of most
+precious," and brought forth, out of a dozen protecting envelopes, a
+single gray hair from Beethoven's head. Nor shall I forget how Madame
+Laurens taught us French plays, and how the fair Rosalba declaimed Andre
+Chenier to redeem her pawns; but I might have forgotten all these
+things, had it not been for an old volume[A] which turned up at need,
+and which gave me information, at once clear, precise, and attractive,
+concerning the streets and edifices of Palma. The round, solid head,
+earnest eyes, and abstracted air of the painter came forth distinct from
+the limbo of things overlaid but never lost, and went with me through
+the checkered blaze and gloom of the city.
+
+The monastery of San Domingo, which was the head-quarters of the
+Inquisition, was spared by the progressive government of Mendizabal, but
+destroyed by the people. Its ruins must have been the most picturesque
+sight of Palma; but since the visit of M. Laurens they have been
+removed, and their broken vaults and revealed torture-chambers are no
+longer to be seen. There are, however, two or three buildings of more
+than ordinary interest. The _Casa Consistorial_, or City Hall, is a
+massive Palladian pile of the sixteenth century, resembling the old
+palaces of Pisa and Florence, except in the circumstance that its roof
+projects at least ten feet beyond the front, resting on a massive
+cornice of carved wood with curious horizontal caryatides in the place
+of brackets. The rich burnt-sienna tint of the carvings contrasts finely
+with the golden-brown of the massive marble walls,--a combination which
+is shown in no other building of the Middle Ages. The sunken rosettes,
+surrounded by raised arabesque borders, between the caryatides, are
+sculptured with such a careful reference to the distance at which they
+must be seen, that they appear as firm and delicate as if near the
+spectator's eye.
+
+The Cathedral, founded by the Conquistador, and built upon, at
+intervals, for more than three centuries, is not yet finished. It stands
+upon a natural platform of rock, overhanging the sea, where its grand
+dimensions produce the greatest possible effect. In every view of Palma,
+it towers solidly above the houses and bastioned walls, and insists upon
+having the sky as a background for the light Gothic pinnacles of its
+flying buttresses. The government has recently undertaken its
+restoration, and a new front of very admirable and harmonious design is
+about half completed. The soft amber-colored marble of Majorca is
+enriched in tint by exposure to the air, and even when built in large,
+unrelieved masses retains a bright and cheerful character. The new
+portion of the cathedral, like the old, has but little sculpture, except
+in the portals; but that little is so elegant that a greater profusion
+of ornament would seem out of place.
+
+Passing from the clear, dazzling day into the interior, one finds
+himself, at first, in total darkness; and the dimensions of the
+nave--nearly three hundred feet in length by one hundred and forty in
+height--are amplified by the gloom. The wind, I was told, came through
+the windows on the sea side with such force as to overturn the chalices,
+and blow out the tapers on the altar, whereupon every opening was walled
+up, except a rose at the end of the chancel, and a few slits in the
+nave, above the side-aisles. A sombre twilight, like that of a stormy
+day, fills the edifice. Here the rustling of stoles and the muttering of
+prayers suggest incantation rather than worship; the organ has a hollow,
+sepulchral sound of lamentation; and there is a spirit of mystery and
+terror in the stale, clammy air. The place resembles an antechamber of
+Purgatory much more than of Heaven. The mummy of Don Jaime II., son of
+the Conquistador and first king of Majorca, is preserved in a
+sarcophagus of black marble. This is the only historic monument in the
+Cathedral, unless the stranger chooses to study the heraldry of the
+island families from their shields suspended in the chapels.
+
+When I returned to the Four Nations for breakfast, I found at the table
+a gentleman of Palma, who invited me to sit down and partake of his
+meal. For the first time this Spanish custom, which really seems
+picturesque and fraternal when coming from shepherds or muleteers in a
+mountain inn, struck me as the hollowest of forms. The gentleman knew
+that I would not accept his invitation, nor he mine; he knew, moreover,
+that I knew he did not wish me to accept it. The phrase, under such
+conditions, becomes a cheat which offends the sacred spirit of
+hospitality. How far the mere form may go was experienced by George
+Sand, who, having accepted the use of a carriage most earnestly offered
+to her by a Majorcan count, found the equipage at her door, it is true,
+but with it a letter expressing so much vexation, that she was forced to
+withdraw her acceptance of the favor at once, and to apologize for it! I
+have always found much hospitality among the common people of Spain,
+and I doubt not that the spirit exists in all classes; but it requires
+some practice to distinguish between empty phrase and the courtesy which
+comes from the heart. A people who boast of some special virtue
+generally do not possess it.
+
+My own slight intercourse with the Majorcans was very pleasant. On the
+day of my arrival, I endeavored to procure a map of the island, but none
+of the bookstores possessed the article. It could be found in one house
+in a remote street, and one of the shopmen finally sent a boy with me to
+the very door. When I offered money for the service, my guide smiled,
+shook his head, and ran away. The map was more than fifty years old, and
+drawn in the style of two centuries ago, with groups of houses for the
+villages, and long files of conical peaks for the mountains. The woman
+brought it down, yellow and dusty, from a dark garret over the shop, and
+seemed as delighted with the sale as if she had received money for
+useless stock. In the streets, the people inspected me curiously, as a
+stranger, but were always ready to go out of their way to guide me. The
+ground-floor being always open, all the features of domestic life and of
+mechanical labor are exposed to the public. The housewives, the masters,
+and apprentices, busy as they seem, manage to keep one eye disengaged,
+and no one passes before them without notice. Cooking, washing, sewing,
+tailoring, shoemaking, coopering, rope and basket making, succeed each
+other, as one passes through the narrow streets. In the afternoon, the
+mechanics frequently come forth and set up their business in the open
+air, where they can now and then greet a country acquaintance or a city
+friend or sweetheart.
+
+When I found that the ruins of San Domingo had been removed, and a
+statue of Isabella II. erected on the Alameda, I began to suspect that
+the reign of old things was over in Majorca. A little observation of the
+people made this fact more evident. The island costume is no longer
+worn by the young men, even in the country; they have passed into a very
+comical transition state. Old men, mounted on lean asses or mules, still
+enter the gates of Palma, with handkerchiefs tied over their shaven
+crowns, and long gray locks falling on their shoulders,--with short,
+loose jackets, shawls around the waist, and wide Turkish trousers
+gathered at the knee. Their gaunt brown legs are bare, and their feet
+protected by rude sandals. Tall, large-boned, and stern of face, they
+hint both of Vandal and of Moslem blood. The younger men are of inferior
+stature, and nearly all bow-legged. They have turned the flowing
+trousers into modern pantaloons, the legs of which are cut like the
+old-fashioned _gigot_ sleeve, very big and baggy at the top, and tied
+with a drawing-string around the waist. My first impression was, that
+the men had got up in a great hurry, and put on their trousers
+hinder-end foremost. It would be difficult to invent a costume more
+awkward and ungraceful than this.
+
+In the city the young girls wear a large triangular piece of white or
+black lace, which covers the hair, and tightly encloses the face, being
+fastened under the chin and the ends brought down to a point on the
+breast. Their almond-shaped eyes are large and fine, but there is very
+little positive beauty among them. Most of the old country-women are
+veritable hags, and their appearance is not improved by the
+broad-brimmed stove-pipe hats which they wear. Seated astride on their
+donkeys, between panniers of produce, they come in daily from the plains
+and mountains, and you encounter them on all the roads leading out of
+Palma. Few of the people speak any other language than the _Mallorquin_,
+a variety of the Catalan, which, from the frequency of the terminations
+in _ch_ and _tz_, constantly suggests the old Provencal literature. The
+word _vitch_ (son) is both Celtic and Slavonic. Some Arabic terms are
+also retained, though fewer, I think, than in Andalusia.
+
+In the afternoon I walked out into the country. The wall, on the land
+side, which is very high and massive, is pierced by five guarded gates.
+The dry moat, both wide and deep, is spanned by wooden bridges, after
+crossing which one has the choice of a dozen highways, all scantily
+shaded with rows of ragged mulberry-trees, glaring white in the sun and
+deep in impalpable dry dust. But the sea-breeze blows freshening across
+the parched land; shadows of light clouds cool the arid mountains in the
+distance; the olives roll into silvery undulations; a palm in full,
+rejoicing plumage rustles over your head; and the huge spatulate leaves
+of a banana in the nearest garden twist and split into fringes. There is
+no languor in the air, no sleep in the deluge of sunshine; the landscape
+is active with signs of work and travel. Wheat, wine, olives, almonds,
+and oranges are produced, not only side by side, but from the same
+fields, and the painfully thorough system of cultivation leaves not a
+rood of the soil unused.
+
+I had chosen, at random, a road which led me west toward the nearest
+mountains, and in the course of an hour I found myself at the entrance
+of a valley. Solitary farm-houses, each as massive as the tower of a
+fortress and of the color of sunburnt gold, studded the heights,
+overlooking the long slopes of almond-orchards. I looked about for
+water, in order to make a sketch of the scene; but the bed of the brook
+was as dry as the highway. The nearest house toward the plain had a
+splendid sentinel palm beside its door,--a dream of Egypt, which
+beckoned and drew me towards it with a glamour I could not resist. Over
+the wall of the garden the orange-trees lifted their mounds of
+impenetrable foliage; and the blossoms of the pomegranates, sprinkled
+against such a background, were like coals of fire. The fig-bearing
+cactus grew about the house in clumps twenty feet high, covered with
+pale-yellow flowers. The building was large and roomy, with a
+court-yard, around which ran a shaded gallery. The farmer who was
+issuing therefrom as I approached wore the shawl and Turkish trousers
+of the old generation, while his two sons, reaping in the adjoining
+wheat-fields, were hideous in the modern _gigots_. Although I was
+manifestly an intruder, the old man greeted me respectfully, and passed
+on to his work. Three boys tended a drove of black hogs in the stubble,
+and some women were so industriously weeding and hoeing in the field
+beyond, that they scarcely stopped to cast a glance upon the stranger.
+There was a grateful air of peace, order, and contentment about the
+place; no one seemed to be suspicious, or even surprised, when I seated
+myself upon a low wall, and watched the laborers.
+
+The knoll upon which the farm-house stood sloped down gently into the
+broad, rich plain of Palma, extending many a league to the eastward. Its
+endless orchards made a dim horizon-line, over which rose the solitary
+double-headed mountain of Felaniche, and the tops of some peaks near
+Arta. The city wall was visible on my right, and beyond it a bright arc
+of the Mediterranean. The features of the landscape, in fact, were so
+simple, that I fear I cannot make its charm evident to the reader.
+Looking over the nearer fields, I observed two peculiarities of Majorca,
+upon which depends much of the prosperity of the island. The wheat is
+certainly, as it is claimed to be, the finest of any Mediterranean land.
+Its large, perfect grains furnish a flour of such fine quality that the
+whole produce of the island is sent to Spain for the pastry and
+confectionery of the cities, while the Majorcans import a cheap,
+inferior kind in its place. Their fortune depends on their abstinence
+from the good things which Providence has given them. Their pork is
+greatly superior to that of Spain, and it leaves them in like manner;
+their best wines are now bought up by speculators and exported for the
+fabrication of sherry; and their oil, which might be the finest in the
+world, is so injured by imperfect methods of preservation that it might
+pass for the worst. These things, however, give them no annoyance.
+Southern races are sometimes indolent, but rarely Epicurean in their
+habits; it is the Northern man who sighs for his flesh-pots.
+
+I walked forward between the fields toward another road, and came upon a
+tract which had just been ploughed and planted for a new crop. The soil
+was ridged in a labyrinthine pattern, which appeared to have been drawn
+with square and rule. But more remarkable than this was the difference
+of level, so slight that the eye could not possibly detect it, by which
+the slender irrigating streams were conducted to every square foot of
+the field, without a drop being needlessly wasted. The system is an
+inheritance from the Moors, who were the best natural engineers the
+world has ever known. Water is scarce in Majorca, and thus every stream,
+spring, rainfall,--even the dew of heaven,--is utilized. Channels of
+masonry, often covered to prevent evaporation, descend from the
+mountains, branch into narrower veins, and visit every farm on the
+plain, whatever may be its level. Where these are not sufficient, the
+rains are added to the reservoir, or a string of buckets, turned by a
+mule, lifts the water from a well. But it is in the economy of
+distributing water to the fields that the most marvellous skill is
+exhibited. The grade of the surface must not only be preserved, but the
+subtle, tricksy spirit of water so delicately understood and humored
+that the streams shall traverse the greatest amount of soil with the
+least waste or wear. In this respect, the most skilful application of
+science could not surpass the achievements of the Majorcan farmers.
+
+Working my way homeward through the tangled streets, I was struck with
+the universal sound of wailing which filled the city. All the tailors,
+shoemakers, and basket-makers, at work in the open air, were singing,
+rarely in measured strains, but with wild, irregular, lamentable cries,
+exactly in the manner of the Arabs. Sometimes the song was antiphonal,
+flung back and forth from the farthest visible corners of a street; and
+then it became a contest of lungs, kept up for an hour at a time. While
+breakfasting, I had heard, as I supposed, a _miserere_ chanted by some
+procession of monks, and wondered when the doleful strains would cease.
+I now saw that they came from the mouths of some cheerful coopers, who
+were heading barrels a little farther down the street. The Majorcans
+still have their troubadours, who are hired by languishing lovers to
+improvise strains of longing or reproach under the windows of the fair,
+and perhaps the latter may listen with delight; but I know of no place
+where the Enraged Musician would so soon become insane. The isle is full
+of noises, and a Caliban might say that they hurt not; for me they
+murdered sleep, both at midnight and at dawn.
+
+I had decided to devote my second day to an excursion to the mountain
+paradise of Valdemosa, and sallied forth early, to seek the means of
+conveyance. Up to this time I had been worried--tortured, I may say,
+without exaggeration--by desperate efforts to recover the Spanish
+tongue, which I had not spoken for fourteen years. I still had the sense
+of possessing it, but in some old drawer of memory, the lock of which
+had rusted and would not obey the key. Like Mrs. Dombey, I felt as if
+there were Spanish words somewhere in the room, but I could not
+positively say that I had them,--a sensation which, as everybody knows,
+is far worse than absolute ignorance. I had taken a carriage for
+Valdemosa, after a long talk with the proprietor, a most agreeable
+fellow, when I suddenly stopped, and exclaimed to myself, "You are
+talking Spanish,--did you know it?" It was even so: as much of the
+language as I ever knew was suddenly and unaccountably restored to me.
+On my return to the Four Nations, I was still further surprised to find
+myself repeating songs, without the failure of a line or word, which I
+had learned from a Mexican as a school-boy, and had not thought of for
+twenty years. The unused drawer had somehow been unlocked or broken
+open while I slept.
+
+Valdemosa is about twelve miles north of Palma, in the heart of the only
+mountain-chain of the island, which forms its western, or rather
+northwestern coast. The average altitude of these mountains will not
+exceed three thousand feet; but the broken, abrupt character of their
+outlines, and the naked glare of their immense precipitous walls, give
+them that intrinsic grandeur which does not depend on measurement. In
+their geological formation they resemble the Pyrenees; the rocks are of
+that _palombino_, or dove-colored limestone, so common in Sicily and the
+Grecian islands,--pale bluish-gray, taking a soft orange tint on the
+faces most exposed to the weather. Rising directly from the sea on the
+west, they cease almost as suddenly on the land side, leaving all the
+central portion of the island a plain, slightly inclined toward the
+southeast, where occasional peaks or irregular groups of hills interrupt
+its monotony.
+
+In due time my team made its appearance,--an omnibus of basket-work,
+with a canvas cover, drawn by two horses. It had space enough for twelve
+persons, yet was the smallest vehicle I could discover. There appears to
+be nothing between it and the two-wheeled cart of the peasant, which, on
+a pinch, carries six or eight. For an hour and a half we traversed the
+teeming plain, between stacks of wheat worthy to be laid on the altar at
+Eleusis, carob-trees with their dark, varnished foliage, almond-orchards
+bending under the weight of their green nuts, and the country-houses
+with their garden clumps of orange, cactus, and palm. As we drew near
+the base of the mountains, olive-trees of great size and luxuriance
+covered the earth with a fine sprinkle of shade. Their gnarled and
+knotted trunks, a thousand years old, were frequently split into three
+or four distinct and separate trees, which in the process assumed forms
+so marvellously human in their distortion, that I could scarcely believe
+them to be accidental. Dore never drew anything so weird and grotesque.
+Here were two club-headed individuals righting, with interlocked knees,
+convulsed shoulders, and fists full of each other's hair; yonder a bully
+was threatening attack, and three cowards appeared to be running away
+from him with such speed that they were tumbling over one another's
+heels. In one place a horrible dragon was devouring a squirming,
+shapeless animal; in another, a drunken man, with whirling arms and
+tangled feet, was pitching forward upon his face. The living wood in
+Dante was tame beside these astonishing trees.
+
+We now entered a wild ravine, where, nevertheless, the mountain-sides,
+sheer and savage as they were, had succumbed to the rule of man, and
+nourished an olive or a carob tree on every corner of earth between the
+rocks. The road was built along the edge of the deep, dry bed of a
+winter stream, so narrow that a single arch carried it from side to
+side, as the windings of the glen compelled. After climbing thus for a
+mile in the shadows of threatening masses of rock, an amphitheatre of
+gardens, enframed by the spurs of two grand, arid mountains, opened
+before us. The bed of the valley was filled with vines and orchards,
+beyond which rose long terraces, dark with orange and citron trees,
+obelisks of cypress and magnificent groups of palm, with the long white
+front and shaded balconies of a hacienda between. Far up, on a higher
+plateau between the peaks, I saw the church-tower of Valdemosa. The
+sides of the mountains were terraced with almost incredible labor, walls
+massive as the rock itself being raised to a height of thirty feet, to
+gain a shelf of soil two or three yards in breadth. Where the olive and
+the carob ceased, box and ilex took possession of the inaccessible
+points, carrying up the long waves of vegetation until their
+foam-sprinkles of silver-gray faded out among the highest clefts. The
+natural channels of the rock were straightened and made to converge at
+the base, so that not a wandering cloud could bathe the wild growths of
+the summit without being caught and hurried into some tank below. The
+wilderness was forced, by pure toil, to become a Paradise; and each
+stubborn feature, which toil could not subdue, now takes its place as a
+contrast and an ornament in the picture. Verily, there is nothing in all
+Italy so beautiful as Valdemosa!
+
+Lest I should be thought extravagant in my delight, let me give you some
+words of George Sand, which I have since read. "I have never seen," she
+says, "anything so bright, and at the same time so melancholy, as these
+perspectives where the ilex, the carob, pine, olive, poplar, and cypress
+mingle their various hues in the hollows of the mountain,--abysses of
+verdure, where the torrent precipitates its course under mounds of
+sumptuous richness and an inimitable grace.... While you hear the sound
+of the sea on the northern coast, you perceive it only as a faint
+shining line beyond the sinking mountains and the great plain which is
+unrolled to the southward;--a sublime picture, framed in the foreground
+by dark rocks covered with pines; in the middle distance by mountains of
+boldest outline, fringed with superb trees; and beyond these by rounded
+hills which the setting sun gilds with burning colors, where the eye
+distinguishes, a league away, the microscopic profile of trees, fine as
+the antennae of butterflies, black and clear as pen-drawings of India-ink
+on a ground of sparkling gold. It is one of those landscapes which
+oppress you because they leave nothing to be desired, nothing to be
+imagined. Nature has here created that which the poet and the painter
+behold in their dreams. An immense _ensemble_, infinite details,
+inexhaustible variety, blended forms, sharp contours, dim, vanishing
+depths,--all are present, and art can suggest nothing further. Majorca
+is one of the most beautiful countries of the world for the painter, and
+one of the least known. It is a green Helvetia under the sky of
+Calabria, with the solemnity and silence of the Orient."
+
+The village of Valdemosa is a picturesque, rambling place, brown with
+age, and buried in the foliage of fig and orange trees. The highest part
+of the narrow plateau where it stands is crowned by the church and
+monastery of the Trappists (_Cartusa_), now deserted. My coachman drove
+under the open roof of a venta, and began to unharness his horses. The
+family, who were dining at a table so low that they appeared to be
+sitting on the floor, gave me the customary invitation to join them, and
+when I asked for a glass of wine brought me one which held nearly a
+quart. I could not long turn my back on the bright, wonderful landscape
+without; so, taking books and colors, I entered the lonely cloisters of
+the monastery. Followed first by one small boy, I had a retinue of at
+least fifteen children before I had completed the tour of the church,
+court-yard, and the long-drawn, shady corridors of the silent monks; and
+when I took my seat on the stones at the foot of the towers, with the
+very scene described by George Sand before my eyes, a number of older
+persons added themselves to the group. A woman brought me a chair, and
+the children then planted themselves in a dense row before me, while I
+attempted to sketch under such difficulties as I had never known before.
+Precisely because I am no artist, it makes me nervous to be watched
+while drawing; and the remarks of the young men on this occasion were
+not calculated to give me courage.
+
+When I had roughly mapped out the sky with its few floating clouds, some
+one exclaimed, "He has finished the mountains, there they are!" and they
+all crowded around me, saying, "Yes, there are the mountains!" While I
+was really engaged upon the mountains, there was a violent discussion as
+to what they might be; and I don't know how long it would have lasted,
+had I not turned to some cypresses nearer the foreground. Then a young
+man cried out: "O, that's a cypress! I wonder if he will make them
+all,--how many are there? One, two, three, four, five,--yes, he makes
+five!" There was an immediate rush, shutting out earth and heaven from
+my sight, and they all cried in chorus, "One, two, three, four,
+five,--yes, he has made five!" "Cavaliers and ladies," I said, with
+solemn politeness, "have the goodness not to stand before me." "To be
+sure! Santa Maria! How do you think he can see?" yelled an old woman,
+and the children were hustled away. But I thereby won the ill-will of
+those garlic-breathing and scratching imps, for very soon a shower of
+water-drops fell upon my paper. Next a stick, thrown from an upper
+window, dropped on my head, and more than once my elbow was
+intentionally jogged from behind. The older people scolded and
+threatened, but young Majorca was evidently against me. I therefore made
+haste to finish my impotent mimicry of air and light, and get away from
+the curious crowd.
+
+Behind the village there is a gleam of the sea, near, yet at an unknown
+depth. As I threaded the walled lanes, seeking some point of view, a
+number of lusty young fellows, mounted on unsaddled mules, passed me
+with a courteous greeting. On one side rose a grand pile of rock,
+covered with ilex-trees,--a bit of scenery so admirable, that I fell
+into a new temptation. I climbed a little knoll and looked around me.
+Far and near no children were to be seen; the portico of an unfinished
+house offered both shade and seclusion. I concealed myself behind a
+pillar, and went to work. For half an hour I was happy; then around
+black head popped up over a garden-wall, a small brown form crept
+towards me, beckoned, and presently a new multitude had assembled. The
+noise they made provoked a sound of cursing from the interior of a
+stable adjoining the house. They only made a louder tumult in answer;
+the voice became more threatening, and at the end of five minutes the
+door burst open. An old man, with wrath flashing from his eyes, came
+forth. The children took to their heels; I greeted the new-comer
+politely, but he hardly returned the salutation. He was a very fountain
+of curses, and now hurled stones with them after the fugitives. When
+they had all disappeared behind the walls, he went back to his den,
+grumbling and muttering. It was not five minutes, however, before the
+children were back again, as noisy as before; so, at the first thunder
+from the stable, I shut up my book, and returned to the inn.
+
+While the horses were being harnessed, I tried to talk with an old
+native, who wore the island costume, and was as grim and grizzly as
+Ossawatomie Brown. A party of country people from the plains, who seemed
+to have come up to Valdemosa on a pleasure trip, clambered into a
+two-wheeled cart drawn by one mule, and drove away. My old friend gave
+me the distances of various places, the state of the roads, and the
+quality of the wine; but he seemed to have no conception of the world
+outside of the island. Indeed, to a native of the village, whose fortune
+has simply placed him beyond the reach of want, what is the rest of the
+world? Around and before him spread one of its loveliest pictures; he
+breathes its purest air; and he may enjoy its best luxuries, if he heeds
+or knows how to use them.
+
+Up to this day the proper spice and flavor had been wanting. Palma had
+only interested me, but in Valdemosa I found the inspiration, the heat
+and play of vivid, keen sensation, which one (often somewhat
+unreasonably) expects from a new land. As my carriage descended, winding
+around the sides of the magnificent mountain amphitheatre, in the
+alternate shadows of palm and ilex, pine and olive, I looked back,
+clinging to every marvellous picture, and saying to myself, over and
+over again, "I have not come hither in vain." When the last shattered
+gate of rock closed behind me, and the wood of insane olive-trunks was
+passed, with what other eyes I looked upon the rich orchard-plain! It
+had now become a part of one superb whole; as the background of my
+mountain view, it had caught a new glory, and still wore the bloom of
+the invisible sea.
+
+In the evening I reached the Four Nations, where I was needlessly
+invited to dinner by certain strangers, and dined alone, on meats cooked
+in rancid oil. When the cook had dished the last course, he came into a
+room adjoining the dining apartment, sat down to a piano in his white
+cap, and played loud, long, and badly. The landlord had papered this
+room with illustrations from all the periodicals of Europe:
+dancing-girls pointed their toes under cardinals' hats, and bulls were
+baited before the shrines of saints. Mixed with the woodcuts were the
+landlord's own artistic productions, wonderful to behold. All the house
+was proud of this room, and with reason; for there is assuredly no other
+room like it in the world. A notice in four languages, written with
+extraordinary flourishes, announced in the English division that
+travellers will find "confortation and modest prices." The former
+advantage, I discovered, consisted in the art of the landlord, the music
+and oil of the cook, and the attendance of a servant so distant that it
+was easier to serve myself than seek him; the latter may have been
+"modest" for Palma, but in any other place they would have been
+considered brazenly impertinent. I should therefore advise travellers to
+try the "Three Pigeons," in the same street, rather than the Four
+Nations.
+
+The next day, under the guidance of my old friend, M. Laurens, I
+wandered for several hours through the streets, peeping into
+court-yards, looking over garden-walls, or idling under the trees of the
+Alameda. There are no pleasant suburban places of resort, such as are to
+be found in all other Spanish cities; the country commences on the other
+side of the moat. Three small cafes exist, but cannot be said to
+flourish, for I never saw more than one table occupied. A theatre has
+been built, but is only open during the winter, of course. Some placards
+on the walls, however, announced that the national (that is, Majorcan)
+diversion of baiting bulls with dogs would be given in a few days.
+
+The noblesse appear to be even haughtier than in Spain, perhaps on
+account of their greater poverty; and much more of the feudal spirit
+lingers among them, and gives character to society, than on the
+main-land. Each family has still a crowd of retainers, who perform a
+certain amount of service on the estates, and are thenceforth entitled
+to support. This custom is the reverse of profitable; but it keeps up an
+air of lordship, and is therefore retained. Late in the afternoon, when
+the new portion of the Alameda is in shadow, and swept by a delicious
+breeze from the sea, it begins to be frequented by the people; but I
+noticed that very few of the upper class made their appearance. So grave
+and sombre are these latter, that one would fancy them descended from
+the conquered Moors, rather than the Spanish conquerors.
+
+M. Laurens is of the opinion that the architecture of Palma cannot be
+ascribed to an earlier period than the beginning of the sixteenth
+century. I am satisfied, however, either that many fragments of Moorish
+sculpture must have been used in the erection of the older buildings, or
+that certain peculiarities of Moorish art have been closely imitated.
+For instance, that Moorish combination of vast, heavy masses of masonry
+with the lightest and airiest style of ornament, which the Gothic
+sometimes attempts, but never with the same success, is here found at
+every step. I will borrow M. Laurens's words, descriptive of the
+superior class of edifices, both because I can find no better of my own,
+and because this very characteristic has been noticed by him. "Above the
+ground-floor," he says, "there is only one story and a low garret. The
+entrance is a semi-circular portal without ornament; but the number and
+dimensions of the stones, disposed in long radii, give it a stately
+aspect. The grand halls of the main story are lighted by windows
+divided by excessively slender columns, which are entirely Arabic in
+appearance. This character is so pronounced, that I was obliged to
+examine more than twenty houses constructed in the same manner, and to
+study all the details of their construction, in order to assure myself
+that the windows had not really been taken from those fairy Moresque
+palaces, of which the Alhambra is the only remaining specimen. Except in
+Majorca, I have nowhere seen columns which, with a height of six feet,
+have a diameter of only three inches. The fine grain of the marble of
+which they are made, as well as the delicacy of the capitals, led me to
+suppose them to be of Saracenic origin."
+
+I was more impressed by the _Lonja_, or Exchange, than any other
+building in Palma. It dates from the first half of the fifteenth
+century, when the kings of the island had built up a flourishing
+commerce, and expected to rival Genoa and Venice. Its walls, once
+crowded with merchants and seamen, are now only opened for the Carnival
+balls and other festivals sanctioned by religion. It is a square
+edifice, with light Gothic towers at the corners, displaying little
+ornamental sculpture, but nevertheless a taste and symmetry, in all its
+details, which are very rare in Spanish architecture. The interior is a
+single vast hall, with a groined roof, resting on six pillars of
+exquisite beauty. They are sixty feet high, and fluted spirally from top
+to bottom, like a twisted cord, with a diameter of not more than two
+feet and a half. It is astonishing how the airy lightness and grace of
+these pillars relieve the immense mass of masonry, spare the bare walls
+the necessity of ornament, and make the ponderous roof light as a tent.
+There is here the trace of a law of which our modern architects seem to
+be ignorant. Large masses of masonry are always oppressive in their
+effect; they suggest pain and labor, and the Saracens, even more than
+the Greeks, seem to have discovered the necessity of introducing a
+sportive, fanciful element, which shall express the delight of the
+workman in his work.
+
+In the afternoon, I sallied forth from the western coast-gate, and found
+there, sloping to the shore, a village inhabited apparently by sailors
+and fishermen. The houses were of one story, flat-roofed, and
+brilliantly whitewashed. Against the blue background of the sea, with
+here and there the huge fronds of a palm rising from among them, they
+made a truly African picture. On the brown ridge above the village were
+fourteen huge windmills, nearly all in motion. I found a road leading,
+along the brink of the overhanging cliffs, toward the castle of Belver,
+whose brown mediaeval turrets rose against a gathering thunder-cloud.
+This fortress, built as a palace for the kings of Majorca immediately
+after the expulsion of the Moors, is now a prison. It has a superb
+situation, on the summit of a conical hill, covered with umbrella-pines.
+In one of its round, massive towers, Arago was imprisoned for two months
+in 1808. He was at the time employed in measuring an arc of the
+meridian, when news of Napoleon's violent measures in Spain reached
+Majorca. The ignorant populace immediately suspected the astronomer of
+being a spy and political agent, and would have lynched him at once.
+Warned by a friend, he disguised himself as a sailor, escaped on board a
+boat in the harbor, and was then placed in Belver by the authorities, in
+order to save his life. He afterwards succeeded in reaching Algiers,
+where he was seized by order of the Bey, and made to work as a slave.
+Few men of science have known so much of the romance of life.
+
+I had a long walk to Belver, but I was rewarded by a grand view of the
+Bay of Palma, the city, and all the southern extremity of the island. I
+endeavored to get into the fields, to seek other points of view; but
+they were surrounded by such lofty walls that I fancied the owners of
+the soil could only get at them by scaling-ladders. The grain and trees
+on either side of the road were hoary with dust, and the soil of the
+hue of burnt chalk, seemed never to have known moisture. But while I
+loitered on the cliffs the cloud in the west had risen and spread; a
+cold wind blew over the hills, and the high gray peaks behind Valdemosa
+disappeared, one by one, in a veil of rain. A rough _tartana_, which
+performed the service of an omnibus, passed me returning to the city,
+and the driver, having no passengers, invited me to ride. "What is your
+fare?" I asked. "Whatever people choose to give," said he,--which was
+reasonable enough: and I thus reached the Four Nations in time to avoid
+a deluge.
+
+The Majorcans are fond of claiming their island as the birthplace of
+Hannibal. There are some remains supposed to be Carthaginian near the
+town of Alcudia, but, singularly enough, not a fragment to tell of the
+Roman domination, although their _Balearis Major_ must have been then,
+as now, a rich and important possession. The Saracens, rather than the
+Vandals, have been the spoilers of ancient art. Their religious
+detestation of sculpture was at the bottom of this destruction. The
+Christians could consecrate the old temple to a new service, and give
+the names of saints to the statues of the gods; but to the Moslem every
+representation of the human form was worse than blasphemy. For this
+reason, the symbols of the most ancient faith, massive and
+unintelligible, have outlived the monuments of those which followed.
+
+In a forest of ancient oaks near the village of Arta, there still exists
+a number of Cyclopean constructions, the character of which is as
+uncertain as the date of their erection. They are cones of huge,
+irregular blocks, the jambs and lintels of the entrances being of single
+stones. In a few the opening is at the top, with rude projections
+resembling a staircase to aid in the descent. Cinerary urns have been
+found in some of them, yet they do not appear to have been originally
+constructed as tombs. The Romans may have afterwards turned them to that
+service. In the vicinity there are the remains of a Druid circle, of
+large upright monoliths. These singular structures were formerly much
+more numerous, the people (who call them "the altars of the Gentiles")
+having destroyed a great many in building the village and the
+neighboring farm-houses.
+
+I heard a great deal about a cavern on the eastern coast of the island,
+beyond Arta. It is called the Hermit's Cave, and the people of Palma
+consider it the principal thing to be seen in all Majorca. Their
+descriptions of the place, however, did not inspire me with any very
+lively desire to undertake a two days' journey for the purpose of
+crawling on my belly through a long hole, and then descending a shaky
+rope-ladder for a hundred feet or more. When one has performed these
+feats, they said, he finds himself in an immense hall, supported by
+stalactitic pillars, the marvels of which cannot be described. Had the
+scenery of the eastern part of the island been more attractive, I should
+have gone as far as Arta; but I wished to meet the steamer Minorca at
+Alcudia, and there were but two days remaining.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[A] _Souvenirs d'un Voyage d'Art a l'Isle de Majorque._ Par J.-B.
+Laurens.
+
+
+
+
+MINOR ELIZABETHAN DRAMATISTS.
+
+
+In the present paper we propose to consider six dramatists who were more
+immediately the contemporaries of Shakespeare and Jonson, and who have
+the precedence in time, and three of them, if we may believe some
+critics, not altogether without claim to the precedence in merit, of
+Beaumont and Fletcher, Massinger, and Ford. These are Heywood,
+Middleton, Marston, Dekkar, Webster, and Chapman.
+
+They belong to the school of dramatists of which Shakespeare was the
+head, and which is distinguished from the school of Jonson by essential
+differences of principle. Jonson constructed his plays on definite
+external rules, and could appeal confidently to the critical
+understanding, in case the regularity of his plot and the keeping of his
+characters were called in question. Shakespeare constructed his, not
+according to any rules which could be drawn from the practice of other
+dramatists, but according to those interior laws which the mind, in its
+creative action, instinctively divines and spontaneously obeys. In his
+case, the appeal is not to the understanding alone, but to the feelings
+and faculties which were concerned in producing the work itself; and the
+symmetry of the whole is felt by hundreds who could not frame an
+argument to sustain it. The laws to which his genius submitted were
+different from those to which other dramatists had submitted, because
+the time, the circumstances, the materials, the purpose aimed at, were
+different. The time demanded a drama which should represent human life
+in all its diversity, and in which the tragic and comic, the high and
+the low, should be in juxtaposition, if not in combination. The
+dramatists of whom we are about to speak represented them in
+juxtaposition, and rarely succeeded in vitally combining them so as to
+produce symmetrical works. Their comedy and tragedy, their humor and
+passion, move in parallel rather than in converging lines. They have
+diversity; but as their diversity neither springs from, nor tends to, a
+central principle of organization or of order, the result is often a
+splendid anarchy of detached scenes, more effective as detached than as
+related. Shakespeare alone had the comprehensive energy of impassioned
+imagination to fuse into unity the almost unmanageable materials of his
+drama, to organize this anarchy into a new and most complex order, and
+to make a world-wide variety of character and incident consistent with
+oneness of impression. Jonson, not pretending to give his work this
+organic form, put forth his whole strength to give it mechanical
+regularity; every line in his solidest plays costing him, as the wits
+said, "a cup of sack." But the force implied in a Shakespearian drama, a
+force that crushes and dissolves the resisting materials into their
+elements, and recombines or fuses them into a new substance, is a force
+so different in kind from Jonson's, that it would of course be idle to
+attempt an estimate of its superiority in degree. And in regard to those
+minor dramatists who will be the subjects of the present paper, if they
+fall below Jonson in general ability, they nearly all afford scenes and
+passages superior to his best in depth of passion, vigor of imagination,
+and audacious self-committal to the primitive instincts of the heart.
+
+The most profuse, but perhaps the least poetic of these dramatists, was
+Thomas Heywood, of whom little is known, except that he was one of the
+most prolific writers the world has ever seen. In 1598 he became an
+actor, or, as Henslowe, who employed him, phrases it, "came and hired
+himself to me as a covenanted servant for two years." The date of his
+first published drama is 1601; that of his last published work, a
+"General History of Women," is 1657. As early as 1633 he represents
+himself as having had an "entire hand, or at least a main finger," in
+two hundred and twenty plays, of which only twenty-three were printed.
+"True it is," he says, "that my plays are not exposed to the world in
+volumes, to bear the title of Works, as others: one reason is, that many
+of them, by shifting and change of companies, have been negligently
+lost; others of them are still retained in the hands of some actors, who
+think it against their peculiar profit to have them come in print; and a
+third, that it was never any great ambition in me to be in this kind
+voluminously read." It was said of him, by a contemporary, that he "not
+only acted every day, but also obliged himself to write a sheet every
+day for several years; but many of his plays being composed loosely in
+taverns, occasions them to be so mean." Besides his labors as a
+playwright, he worked as translator, versifier, and general maker of
+books. Late in life he conceived the design of writing the lives of all
+the poets of the world, including his contemporaries. Had this project
+been carried out, we should have known something about the external life
+of Shakespeare; for Heywood must have carried in his brain many of those
+facts which we of this age are most curious to know.
+
+Heywood's best plays evince large observation, considerable dramatic
+skill, a sweet and humane spirit, and an easy command of language. His
+style, indeed, is singularly simple, pure, clear, and straightforward;
+but it conveys the impression of a mind so diffused as almost to be
+characterless, and incapable of flashing its thoughts through the images
+of imaginative passion. He is more prosaic, closer to ordinary life and
+character, than his contemporaries. Two of his plays, and the best of
+them all, "A Woman killed with Kindness," and "The English Traveller,"
+are thoroughly domestic dramas, the first, and not the worst, of their
+class. The plot of "The English Traveller" is specially good; and in
+reading few works of fiction do we receive a greater shock of surprise
+than in Geraldine's discovery of the infidelity of Wincott's wife, whom
+he loves with a Platonic devotion. It is as unanticipated as the
+discovery, in Jonson's "Silent Woman," that Epicaene is no woman at all,
+while at the same time it has less the appearance of artifice, and is
+more the result of natural causes.
+
+With less fluency of diction, less skill in fastening the reader's
+interest to his fable, harsher in versification, and generally clumsier
+in construction, the best plays of Thomas Middleton are still superior
+to Heywood's in force of imagination, depth of passion, and fulness of
+matter. It must, however, be admitted that the sentiments which direct
+his powers are not so fine as Heywood's. He depresses the mind, rather
+than invigorates it. The eye he cast on human life was not the eye of a
+sympathizing poet, but rather that of a sagacious cynic. His
+observation, though sharp, close, and vigilant, is somewhat ironic and
+unfeeling. His penetrating, incisive intellect cuts its way to the heart
+of a character as with a knife; and if he lays bare its throbs of guilt
+and weakness, and lets you into the secrets of its organization, he
+conceives his whole work is performed. This criticism applies even to
+his tragedy of "Women beware Women," a drama which shows a deep study of
+the sources of human frailty, considerable skill in exhibiting the
+passions in their consecutive, if not in their conflicting action, and a
+firm hold upon character; but it lacks pathos, tenderness, and humanity;
+its power is out of all proportion to its geniality; the characters,
+while they stand definitely out to the eye, are seen through no
+visionary medium of sentiment and fancy; and the reader feels the force
+of Leantio's own agonizing complaint, that his affliction is
+
+    "Of greater weight than youth was made to bear,
+    As if a punishment of after-life
+    Were fall'n upon man here, so new it is
+    To flesh and blood, so strange, so insupportable."
+
+There is, indeed, no atmosphere to Middleton's mind; and the hard, bald
+caustic peculiarity of his genius, which is unpleasingly felt in
+reading any one of his plays, becomes a source of painful weariness as
+we plod doggedly through the five thick volumes of his works. Like the
+incantations of his own witches, it "casts a thick scurf over life." It
+is most powerfully felt in his tragedy of "The Changeling," at once the
+most oppressive and impressive effort of his genius. The character of De
+Flores in this play has in it a strangeness of iniquity, such as we
+think is hardly paralleled in the whole range of the Elizabethan drama.
+The passions of this brute imp are not human. They are such as might be
+conceived of as springing from the union of animal with fiendish
+impulses, in a nature which knew no law outside of its own lust, and was
+as incapable of a scruple as of a sympathy.
+
+But of all the dramatists of the time, the most disagreeable in
+disposition, though by no means the least powerful in mind, was John
+Marston. The time of his birth is not known; his name is entangled in
+contemporary records with that of another John Marston; and we may be
+sure that his mischief-loving spirit would have been delighted could he
+have anticipated that the antiquaries, a century after his death, would
+be driven to despair by the difficulty of discriminating one from the
+other. It is more than probable, however, that he was the John Marston
+who was of a respectable family in Shropshire; who took his bachelor's
+degree at Oxford in 1592; and who was afterwards married to a daughter
+of the chaplain of James the First. Whatever may have been Marston's
+antecedents, they were such as to gratify his tastes as a cynical
+observer of the crimes and follies of men,--an observer whose hatred of
+evil sprang from no love of good, but to whom the sight of depravity and
+baseness was welcome, inasmuch as it afforded him me occasion to wreak
+his own scorn and pride. His ambition was to be the English Juvenal; and
+it must be conceded that he had the true Iago-like disposition "to spy
+out abuses." Accordingly, in 1598, he published a series of venomous
+satires called "The Scourge of Villanie," rough in versification,
+condensed in thought, tainted in matter, evincing a cankered more than a
+caustic spirit, and producing an effect at once indecent and inhuman. To
+prove that this scourging of villany, which would have put
+Mephistopheles to the blush, was inspired by no respect for virtue, he
+soon followed it up with a poem so licentious that, before it was
+circulated to any extent, it was suppressed by order of Archbishop
+Whitgift, and nearly all the copies destroyed. A writer could not be
+thus dishonored without being brought prominently into notice, and old
+Henslowe, the manager, was after him at once to secure his libellous
+ability for the Rose. Accordingly, we learn from Henslowe's diary, under
+date of September 28, 1599, that he had lent to William Borne "to lend
+unto John Mastone," "the new poete," "the sum of forty shillings," in
+earnest of some work not named. There is an undated letter of Marston to
+Henslowe, written probably in reference to this matter, which is
+characteristic in its disdainfully confident tone. Thus it runs:--
+
+     "MR. HENSLOWE, at the Rose on the Bankside.
+
+     "If you like my playe of Columbus, it is verie well, and you
+     shall give me noe more than twentie poundes for it, but If
+     nott, lett me have it by the Bearer againe, as I know the
+     kinges men will freelie give me as much for it, and the
+     profitts of the third daye moreover.
+
+                            "Soe I rest yours,
+
+                                "JOHN MARSTON."
+
+He seems not to have been popular among the band of dramatists he now
+joined, and it is probable that his insulting manners were not sustained
+by corresponding courage. Ben Jonson had many quarrels with him, both
+literary and personal, and mentions one occasion on which he beat him,
+and took away his pistol. His temper was Italian rather than English,
+and one would conceive of him as quicker with the stiletto than the
+fist. His connection with the stage ceased in 1613, after he had
+produced a number of dramas, of which nine have been preserved. He died
+about twenty years afterwards, in 1634, seemingly in comfortable
+circumstances.
+
+Marston's plays, whether comedies or tragedies, all bear the mark of his
+bitter and misanthropic spirit,--a spirit that seemed cursed by the
+companionship of its own thoughts, and forced them out through a
+well-grounded fear that they would fester if left within. His comedies
+of "The Malcontent," "The Fawn," and "What You Will," have no genuine
+mirth, though an abundance of scornful wit,--of wit which, in his own
+words, "stings, blisters, galls off the skin, with the acrimony of its
+sharp quickness." The baser its objects, the brighter its gleam. It is
+stimulated by the desire to give pain, rather than the wish to
+communicate pleasure. Marston is not without sprightliness, but his
+sprightliness is never the sprightliness of the kid, though it is
+sometimes that of the hyena, and sometimes that of the polecat. In his
+Malcontent he probably drew a nattering likeness of his inner self: yet
+the most compassionate reader of the play would experience little pity
+in seeing the Malcontent hanged. So much, indeed, of Marston's satire is
+directed at depravity, that Ben Jonson used to say that "Marston wrote
+his father-in-law's preachings, and his father-in-law his comedies." It
+is to be hoped, however, that the spirit of the chaplain's tirades
+against sins was not, like his son-in-law's, worse than the sins
+themselves.
+
+If Marston's comic vein is thus, to use one of Dekkar's phrases, that of
+"a thorny-toothed rascal," it may be supposed that his tragic is a still
+fiercer libel on humanity. His tragedies, indeed, though not without a
+gloomy power, are extravagant and horrible in conception and conduct.
+Even when he copies, he makes the thing his own by caricaturing it. Thus
+the plot of "Antonio's Revenge" is plainly taken from "Hamlet," but it
+is "Hamlet" passed through Marston's intellect and imagination, and so
+debased as to look original. Still, the intellect in Marston's tragedies
+strikes the reader as forcible in itself, and as capable of achieving
+excellence, if it could only be divorced from the bad disposition and
+deformed conscience which direct its exercise. He has fancy, and he
+frequently stutters into imagination; but the imp that controls his
+heart corrupts his taste and taints his sense of beauty, and the result
+is that he has a malicious satisfaction in deliberately choosing words
+whose uncouthness finds no extenuation in their expressiveness, and in
+forging elaborate metaphors which disgust rather than delight. His
+description of a storm at sea is among the least unfavorable specimens
+of this perversion of his poetical powers:--
+
+         "The sea grew mad:
+
+       *   *   *   *
+
+    Strait swarthy darkness _popt out_ Phoebus' eye,
+    And blurred the jocund face of bright-cheek'd day;
+    Whilst cruddled fogs masked even darkness' brow;
+    Heaven bade's good night, and the rocks groaned
+    At the intestine uproar of the main."
+
+It must be allowed that both his tragedies and comedies are full of
+strong and striking thoughts, which show a searching inquisition into
+the worst parts of human nature. Occasionally he expresses a general
+truth with great felicity, as when he says,
+
+                       "Pygmy cares
+    Can shelter under patience' shield; but giant griefs
+    Will burst all covert."
+
+His imagination is sometimes stimulated into unusual power in expressing
+the fiercer and darker passions; as, for example, in this image:--
+
+               "O, my soul's enthroned
+    In the triumphant chariot of revenge!"
+
+And in this:--
+
+    "Ghastly amazement! with upstarted hair,
+    Shall hurry on before, and usher us,
+    Whilst trumpets clamor with a sound of death."
+
+He has three descriptions of morning, which seem to have been written in
+emulation of Shakespeare's in "Hamlet"; two of them being found in the
+tragedy which "Hamlet" suggested.
+
+    "Is not yon gleam the shuddering morn that flakes
+    With silver tincture the east verge of heaven?
+
+       *   *   *   *
+
+    For see the dapple-gray coursers of the morn
+    Beat up the light with their bright silver hoofs,
+    And chase it through the sky.
+
+       *   *   *   *
+
+    Darkness is fled: look; look, infant morn hath drawn
+    Bright silver curtains 'bout the couch of night;
+    And now Aurora's house trots azure rings,
+    Breathing fair light about the firmament."
+
+These last two lines appear feeble enough as contrasted with the
+beautiful intensity of imagination in Emerson's picturing of the same
+scene:--
+
+    "O, tenderly the haughty Day
+    _Fills his blue urn with fire_."
+
+The most beautiful passage in Marston's plays is the lament of a father
+over the dead body of his son, who has been defamed. It is so apart from
+his usual style, as to breed the suspicion that the worthy chaplain's
+daughter, whom he made Mrs. Marston, must have given it to him from her
+purer imagination:--
+
+                           "Look on those lips,
+    Those now lawn pillows, on whose tender softness
+    Chaste modest speech, stealing from out his breast,
+    Had wont to rest itself, as loath to post
+    From out so fair an inn: look, look, they seem
+    To stir.
+    And breathe defiance to black obloquy."
+
+If among the dramatists of the period any person could be selected who
+in disposition was the opposite of Marston, it would be Thomas
+Dekkar,--a man whose inborn sweetness and gleefulness of soul carried
+him through vexations and miseries which would have crushed a spirit
+less hopeful, cheerful, and humane. He was probably born about the year
+1575; commenced his career as player and playwright before 1598; and for
+forty years was an author by profession, that is, was occupied in
+fighting famine with his pen. The first intelligence we have of him is
+characteristic of his whole life. It is from Henslowe's Diary, under
+date of February, 1598: "Lent unto the company, to discharge Mr. Decker
+out of the counter in the powltry, the sum of 40 shillings." Oldys tells
+us that "he was in King's Bench Prison from 1613 to 1616"; and the
+antiquary adds ominously, "how much longer I know not." Indeed, Dr.
+Johnson's celebrated condensation of the scholar's life would stand for
+a biography of Dekkar:--
+
+    "Toil, envy, want, the patron, and the jail."
+
+This forced familiarity with poverty and distress does not seem to have
+imbittered his feelings or weakened the force and elasticity of his
+mind. He turned his calamities into commodities. If indigence threw him
+into the society of the ignorant, the wretched, and the depraved, he
+made the knowledge of low life lie thus obtained serve his purpose as
+dramatist or pamphleteer. Whatever may have been the effect of his
+vagabond habits on his principles, they did not stain the sweetness and
+purity of his sentiments. There is an innocency in his very coarseness,
+and a brisk, bright good-nature chirps in his very scurrility. In the
+midst of distresses of all kinds, he still seems, like his own
+Fortunatus, "all felicity up to the brims"; but that his content with
+Fortune is not owing to an unthinking ignorance of her caprice and
+injustice is proved by the words he puts into her mouth:--
+
+    "This world is Fortune's ball wherewith she sports.
+    Sometimes I strike it up into the air,
+    And then create I emperors and kings;
+    Sometimes I spurn it, at which spurn crawls out
+    The wild beast multitude: curse on, you fools,
+    'Tis I that tumble princes from their thrones,
+    And gild false brows with glittering diadems;
+    'T is I that tread on necks of conquerors,
+    And when like semi-gods they have been drawn
+    In ivory chariots to the Capitol,
+    Circled about with wonder of all eyes,
+    The shouts of every tongue, love of all hearts,
+    Being swoln with their own greatness, I have pricked
+    The bladder of their pride, and made them die
+    As water-bubbles (without memory):
+    Whilst the true-spirited soldier stands by
+    Bareheaded, and all bare, whilst at his scars
+    They scoff, that ne'er durst view the face of wars.
+    I set an idiot's cap on virtue's head,
+    Turn learning out of doors, clothe wit in rags,
+    And paint ten thousand images of loam
+    In gaudy silken colors: on the backs
+    Of mules and asses I make asses ride.
+    Only for sport to see the apish world
+    Worship such beasts with sound idolatry.
+    She sits and smiles to hear some curse her name,
+    And some with adoration crown her fame."
+
+The boundless beneficence of Dekkar's heart is specially embodied in
+the character of the opulent lord, Jacomo Gentili, in his play of "The
+Wonder of a Kingdom." When Gentili's steward brings him the book in
+which the amount of his charities is recorded, he exclaims
+impatiently:--
+
+    "Thou vain vainglorious fool, go burn that book;
+    No herald needs to blazon charity's arms.
+
+       *   *   *   *
+
+    I launch not forth a ship, with drums and guns
+    And trumpets, to proclaim my gallantry;
+    He that will read the wasting of my gold
+    Shall find it writ in ashes, which the wind
+    Will scatter ere he spells it."
+
+He will have neither wife nor children. When, he says,
+
+         "I shall have one hand in heaven,
+    To write my happiness in leaves of stars,
+    A wife would pluck me by the other down.
+    This bark has thus long sailed about the world,
+    My soul the pilot, and yet never listened
+    To such a mermaid's song.
+
+       *   *   *   *
+
+    My heirs shall be poor children fed on alms;
+    Soldiers that want limbs; scholars poor and scorned;
+    And these will be a sure inheritance
+    Not to decay; manors and towns will fall,
+    Lordships and parks, pastures and woods, be sold;
+    But this land still continues to the lord:
+    No tricks of law can me beguile of this.
+    But of the beggar's dish, I shall drink healths
+    To last forever; whilst I live, my roof
+    Shall cover naked wretches; when I die,
+    'T is dedicated to St. Charity."
+
+We should not do justice to Dekkar's disposition, even after these
+quotations, did we omit that enumeration of positives and negatives
+which, in his view, make up the character of the happy man:--
+
+    "He that in the sun is neither beam nor moat,
+    He that's not mad after a petticoat,
+    He for whom poor men's curse dig no grave,
+    He that is neither lord's nor lawyer's slave,
+    He that makes This his sea and That his shore,
+    He that in 's coffin is richer than before,
+    He that counts Youth his sword and Age his staff.
+    He that upon his death-bed is a swan.
+    And dead no crow,--he is a Happy Man."
+
+As Dekkar wrote under the constant goad of necessity, he seems to have
+been indifferent to the requirements of art. That "wet-eyed wench,
+Care," was as absent from his ink as from his soul. Even his best plays,
+"Old Fortunatus," "The Wonder of a Kingdom," and another whose title
+cannot be mentioned, are good in particular scenes and characters rather
+than good as wholes. Occasionally, as in the character of Signior
+Orlando Friscobaldo, he strikes off a fresh, original, and masterly
+creation, consistently sustained throughout, and charming us by its
+lovableness, as well as thrilling us by its power; but generally his
+sentiment and imagination break upon us in unexpected felicities,
+strangely better than what surrounds them. These have been culled by the
+affectionate admiration of Lamb, Hunt, and Hazlitt, and made familiar to
+all English readers. To prove how much finer, in its essence, his genius
+was than the genius of so eminent a dramatist as Massinger, we only need
+to compare Massinger's portions of the play of "The Virgin Martyr" with
+Dekkar's. The scene between Dorothea and Angelo, in which she recounts
+her first meeting with him as a "sweet-faced beggar-boy," and the scene
+in which Angelo brings to Theophilus the basket of fruits and flowers
+which Dorothea has plucked in Paradise, are inexpressibly beautiful in
+their exquisite subtlety of imagination and artless elevation of
+sentiment. It is difficult to understand how a writer capable of such
+refinements as these should have left no drama which is a part of the
+classical literature of his country.
+
+One of these scenes--that between Dorothea, the Virgin Martyr, and
+Angelo, an angel who waits upon her in the disguise of a page--we cannot
+refrain from quoting, familiar as it must be to many readers:--
+
+    "_Dor._ My book and taper.
+
+    "_Ang._ Here, most holy mistress.
+
+    "_Dor._ Thy voice bends forth such music, that I never
+    Was ravished with a more celestial sound.
+    Were every servant in the world like thee,
+    So full of goodness, angels would come down
+    To dwell with us; thy name is Angelo,
+    And like that name thou art. Get thee to rest;
+    Thy youth with too much watching is oppressed.
+
+    "_Ang._ No, my dear lady; I could weary stars,
+    And force the wakeful moon to lose her eyes,
+    By my late watching, but to wait on you.
+    When at your prayers you kneel before the altar,
+    Methinks I'm singing with some quire in heaven,
+    So blest I hold me in your company.
+    Therefore, my most loved mistress, do not bid
+    Your boy, so serviceable, to get hence,
+    For then you break his heart.
+
+    "_Dor._ Be nigh me still then.
+    In golden letters down I'll set that day
+    Which gave thee to me. Little did I hope
+    To meet such worlds of comfort in thyself,
+    This little pretty body, when I, coming
+    Forth of the temple, heard my beggar-boy,
+    My sweet-faced, godly beggar-boy, crave an alms,
+    Which with glad hand I gave,--with lucky hand!
+    And when I took thee home, my most chaste bosom
+    Methought was filled with no hot wanton fire,
+    But with a holy flame, mounting since higher,
+    On wings of cherubim, than it did before.
+
+    "_Ang._ Proud am I that my lady's modest eye
+    So likes so poor a servant.
+
+    "_Dor._                 I have offered
+    Handfuls of gold but to behold thy parents.
+    I would leave kingdoms, were I queen of some,
+    To dwell with thy good father....
+                           Show me thy parents;
+    Be not ashamed.
+
+    "_Angelo._ I am not: I did never
+    Know who my mother was; but by yon palace,
+    Filled with bright heavenly courtiers, I dare assure you,
+    And pawn these eyes upon it, and this hand,
+    My father is in heaven; and, pretty mistress,
+    If your illustrious hour-glass spend his sand,
+    No worse than yet it does upon my life,
+    You and I both shall meet my father there,
+    And he shall bid you welcome.
+
+    "_Dor._                 O blessed day!
+    We all long to be there, but lose the way."
+
+But the passage in all Dekkar's works which will be most likely to
+immortalize his name is that often-quoted one, taken from a play whose
+very name is unmentionable to prudish ears:--
+
+    "Patience, my lord! why, 't is the soul of peace;
+    It makes men look like gods--The best of men
+    That e'er wore earth about him was a Sufferer,
+    A soft, meek, patient, humble, tranquil spirit;
+    The first true gentleman that ever breathed."
+
+A more sombre genius than Dekkar, though a genius more than once
+associated with his own in composition, was John Webster, of whose
+biography nothing is certainly known, except that he was a member of the
+Merchant Tailors' Company. His works have been thrice republished within
+thirty years; but the perusal of the whole does not add to the
+impression left on the mind by his two great tragedies. His comic talent
+was small; and for all the mirth in his comedies of "Westward Hoe" and
+"Northward Hoe" we are probably indebted to his associate, Dekkar. His
+play of "Appius and Virginia" is far from being an adequate rendering of
+one of the most beautiful and affecting fables that ever crept into
+history. "The Devil's Law Case," a tragi-comedy, has not sufficient
+power to atone for the want of probability in the plot and want of
+nature in the characters. The historical play of "Sir Thomas Wyatt" can
+only be fitly described by using the favorite word in which Ben Jonson
+was wont to condense his critical opinions,--"It is naught." But "The
+White Devil" and "The Duchess of Malfy" are tragedies which even so rich
+and varied a literature as the English could not lose without a sensible
+diminution of its treasures.
+
+Webster was one of those writers whose genius consists in the expression
+of special moods, and who, outside of those moods, cannot force their
+creative faculties into vigorous action. His mind by instinctive
+sentiment was directed to the contemplation of the darker aspects of
+life. He brooded over crime and misery until his imagination was
+enveloped in their atmosphere, found a fearful joy in probing their
+sources and tracing their consequences, became strangely familiar with
+their physiognomy and psychology, and felt a shuddering sympathy with
+their "deep groans and terrible ghastly looks." There was hardly a
+remote corner of the soul, which hid a feeling capable of giving mental
+pain, into which this artist in agony had not curiously peered; and his
+meditations on the mysterious disorder produced in the human
+consciousness by the rebound of thoughtless or criminal deeds might have
+found fit expression in the lines of the great poet of our own times:--
+
+                     "Action is momentary,--
+    The motion of a muscle, this way or that.
+    Suffering is long, obscure, and infinite."
+
+With this proclivity of his imagination, Webster's power as a dramatist
+consists in confining the domain of his tragedy within definite limits,
+in excluding all variety of incident and character which could interfere
+with his main design of awaking terror and pity, and in the intensity
+with which he arrests, and the tenacity with which he holds the
+attention, as he drags the mind along the pathway which begins in
+misfortune or guilt, and ends in death. He is such a spendthrift of his
+stimulants, and accumulates horror on horror, and crime on crime, with
+such fatal facility, that he would render the mind callous to his
+terrors, were it not that what is acted is still less than what is
+suggested, and that the souls of his characters are greater than their
+sufferings or more terrible than their deeds. The crimes and the
+criminals belong to Italy as it was in the sixteenth century, when
+poisoning and assassination were almost in the fashion; the feelings
+with which they are regarded are English; and the result of the
+combination is to make the poisoners and assassins more fiendishly
+malignant in spirit than they actually were. Thus Ferdinand, in "The
+Duchess of Malfy," is the conception formed by an honest, deep-thoughted
+Englishman of an Italian duke and politician, who had been educated in
+those maxims of policy which were generalized by Machiavelli. Webster
+makes him a devil, but a devil with a soul to be damned. The Duchess,
+his sister, is discovered to be secretly married to her steward; and in
+connection with his brother, the Cardinal, the Duke not only resolves on
+her death, but devises a series of preliminary mental torments to madden
+and break down her proud spirit. The first is an exhibition of wax
+figures, representing her husband and children as they appeared in
+death. Then comes a dance of madmen, with dismal howls and songs and
+speeches. Then a tomb-maker whose talk is of the charnel-house, and who
+taunts her with her mortality. She interrupts his insulting homily with
+the exclamation, "Am I not thy Duchess?" "Thou art," he scornfully
+replies, "some great woman sure, for riot begins to sit on thy forehead
+(clad in gray hairs) twenty years sooner than on a merry milkmaid's.
+Thou sleepest worse than if a mouse should be forced to take up her
+lodging in a cat's ear; a little infant that breeds its teeth, should
+it lie with thee, would cry out, as if thou wert the more unquiet
+bedfellow." This mockery only brings from her firm spirit the proud
+assertion, "I am Duchess of Malfy still." Indeed, her mind becomes
+clearer and calmer as the tortures proceed. At first she had imprecated
+curses on her brothers, and cried,
+
+    "Plagues that make lanes through largest families,
+    Consume them!"
+
+But now, when the executioners appear, when her dirge is sung,
+containing those tremendous lines,
+
+    "Of what is 't fools make such vain keeping?
+    Sin their conception, their birth weeping,
+    Their life a general mist of error,
+    Their death a hideous storm of terror,"--
+
+when all that malice could suggest for her torment has been expended,
+and the ruffians who have been sent to murder her approach to do their
+office, her attitude is that of quiet dignity, forgetful of her own
+sufferings, solicitous for others. Her attendant, Cariola, screams out:
+
+    "Hence, villains, tyrants, murderers: alas!
+    What will you do with my lady? Call for help.
+
+    "_Duchess._ To whom,--to our next neighbors?
+    They are mad folks.
+
+    "_Bosola._ Remove that noise.
+
+    "_Duchess._ Farewell, Cariola.
+    In my last will I have not much to give:
+    A many hungry guests have fed upon me;
+    Thine will be a poor reversion.
+
+    "_Cariola._ I will die with her.
+
+    "_Duchess._ I pray thee, look thou giv'st my little boy
+    Some syrup for his cold, and let the girl
+    Say her prayers ere she sleep. Now what you please:
+    What death?
+
+    "_Bosola._ Strangling; here are your executioners.
+
+       *   *   *   *
+
+    "_Duchess._ Pull, and pull strongly, for your able strength
+    Must pull down heaven upon me:
+    Yet stay, heaven-gates are not so highly arched
+    As princes' palaces; they that enter there
+    Must go upon their knees. Come, violent death.
+    Serve for mandragora to make me sleep.
+    Go, tell my brothers; when I am laid out,
+    They then may feed in quiet."
+
+The strange, unearthly stupor which precedes the remorse of Ferdinand
+for her murder is true to nature, and especially his nature. Bosola,
+pointing to the dead body of the Duchess, says:
+
+    "Fix your eye here.
+
+    "_Ferd._ Constantly.
+
+    "_Bosola._             Do you not weep?
+    Other sins only speak; murther shrieks out:
+    The element of water moistens the earth,
+    But blood flies upwards and bedews the heavens.
+
+    "_Ferd._ Cover her face; mine eyes dazzle;
+    She died young.
+
+    "_Bosola._     I think not so; her infelicity
+    Seemed to have years too many.
+
+    "_Ferd._     She and I were twins:
+    And should I die this instant, I had lived
+    Her time to a minute."
+
+We have said that Webster's peculiarity is the tenacity of his hold on
+the mental and moral constitution of his characters. We know of their
+appetites and passions only by their effects on their souls. He has
+properly no sensuousness. Thus in "The White Devil," his other great
+tragedy, the events proceed from the passion of Brachiano for Vittoria
+Corombona,--a passion so intense as to lead one to order the murder of
+his wife, and the other the murder of her husband. If either Fletcher or
+Ford had attempted the subject, the sensual and emotional motives to the
+crime would have been represented with overpowering force, and expressed
+in the most alluring images, so that wickedness would have been almost
+resolved into weakness; but Webster lifts the wickedness at once from
+the senses into the region of the soul, exhibits its results in
+spiritual depravity, and shows the Satanic energy of purpose which may
+spring from the ruins of the moral will. There is nothing lovable in
+Vittoria. She seems, indeed, almost without sensations; and the
+affection between her and Brachiano is simply the magnetic attraction
+which one evil spirit has for another evil spirit. Francisco, the
+brother of Brachiano's wife, says to him:
+
+    "Thou hast a wife, our sister; would I had given
+    Both her white hands to death, bound and locked fast
+    In her last winding-sheet, when I gave thee
+    But one."
+
+This is the language of the intensest passion, but as applied to the
+adulterous lover of Vittoria it seems little more than the utterance of
+reasonable regret; for devil can only truly mate with devil, and
+Vittoria is Brachiano's real "affinity."
+
+The moral confusion they produce by their deeds is traced with more than
+Webster's usual steadiness of nerve and clearness of vision. The evil
+they inflict is a cause of evil in others; the passion which leads to
+murder rouses the fiercer passion which aches for vengeance; and at
+last, when the avengers of crime have become morally as bad as the
+criminals, they are all involved in a common destruction. Vittoria is
+probably Webster's most powerful delineation. Bold, bad, proud,
+glittering in her baleful beauty, strong in that evil courage which
+shrinks from crime as little as from danger, she meets her murderers
+with the same self-reliant scorn with which she met her judges. "Kill
+her attendant first," exclaimed one of them.
+
+    "_Vittoria._ You shall not kill her first; behold my breast:
+    I will be waited on in death; my servant
+    Shall never go before me.
+
+    "_Gasparo._     Are you so brave!
+
+    "_Vittoria._ Yes, I shall welcome death,
+    As princes do some great ambassadors;
+    I'll meet thy weapon half-way.
+
+    "_Lodovico._     Strike, strike,
+    With a joint motion.
+
+    "_Vittoria._     'T was a manly blow;
+    The next thou giv'st, murder some sucking infant,
+    And then thou wilt be famous."
+
+Webster tells us, in the Preface to "The White Devil," that he does not
+"write with a goose-quill winged with two feathers"; and also hints that
+the play failed in representation through its being acted in winter in
+"an open and black theatre," and because it wanted "a full and
+understanding auditory." "Since that time," he sagely adds, "I have
+noted most of the people that come to the playhouse resemble those
+ignorant asses who, visiting stationers' shops, their use is not to
+inquire for good books, but new books." And then comes the
+ever-recurring wail of the playwright, Elizabethan as well as Georgian,
+respecting the taste of audiences. "Should a man," he says, "present to
+such an auditory the most sententious tragedy that ever was written,
+observing all the critical laws, as height of style, and gravity of
+person, enrich it with the sententious chorus, and, as it were, enliven
+death in the passionate and weighty _Nuntius_; yet after all this divine
+rapture, _O dura messorum ilia_, the breath that comes from the
+uncapable multitude is able to poison it."
+
+Of all the contemporaries of Shakespeare, Webster is the most
+Shakespearian. His genius was not only influenced by its contact with
+one side of Shakespeare's many-sided mind, but the tragedies we have
+been considering abound in expressions and situations either suggested
+by or directly copied from the tragedies of him he took for his model.
+Yet he seems to have had no conception of the superiority of Shakespeare
+to all other dramatists; and in his Preface to "The White Devil," after
+speaking of the "full and heightened style of Master Chapman, the
+labored and understanding works of Master Jonson, the no less worthy
+composures of the both worthily excellent Master Beaumont and Master
+Fletcher," he adds his approval, "without wrong last to be named," of
+"the right happy and copious industry of Master Shakespeare, Master
+Dekkar, and Master Heywood." This is not half so felicitous a
+classification as would be made by a critic of our century, who should
+speak of the "right happy and copious industry" of Master Goethe, Master
+Dickens, and Master G. P. R. James.
+
+Webster's reference, however, to "the full and heightened style of
+Master Chapman" is more appropriate; for no writer of that age impresses
+us more by a certain rude heroic height of character than George
+Chapman. Born in 1559, and educated at the University of Oxford, he
+seems, on his first entrance into London life, to have acquired the
+patronage of the noble, and the friendship of all who valued genius and
+scholarship. He was among the few men whom Ben Jonson said he loved. His
+greatest performance, and it was a gigantic one, was his translation of
+Homer, which, in spite of obvious faults, excels all other translations
+in the power to rouse and lift and inflame the mind. Some eminent
+painter, we believe Barry, said that, when he went into the street after
+reading it, men seemed ten feet high. Pope averred that the translation
+of the Iliad might be supposed to have been written by Homer before he
+arrived at years of discretion; and Coleridge declares the version of
+the Odyssey to be as truly an original poem as the Faery Queen. Chapman
+himself evidently thought that he was the first translator who had been
+admitted into intimate relations with Homer's soul, and caught by direct
+contact the sacred fury of his inspiration. He says finely of those who
+had attempted his work in other languages:
+
+    "They failed to search his deep and treasures heart.
+    The cause was, since they wanted the fit key
+    Of Nature, in their downright strength of art,
+           With Poesy to open Poesy."
+
+Chapman was also a voluminous dramatist, and of his many comedies and
+tragedies some sixteen were printed. It is to be feared that the last
+twenty years of his long and honorable life were passed in a desperate
+struggle for the means of subsistence. But his ideas of the dignity of
+his art were so inwoven into his character that he probably met calamity
+bravely. Poesy he early professed to prefer above all worldly wisdom,
+being composed, in his own words, of the "sinews and souls of all
+learning, wisdom, and truth." "We have example sacred enough," he said,
+"that true Poesy's humility, poverty, and contempt are badges of
+divinity, not vanity. Bray then, and bark against it, ye wolf-faced
+worldlings, that nothing but riches, honors, and magistracy" can content
+"I (for my part) shall ever esteem it much more manly and sacred, in
+this harmless and pious study, to sit until I sink into my grave, than
+shine in your vainglorious bubbles and impieties; all your poor
+policies, wisdoms, and their trappings, at no more valuing than a musty
+nut." These sentiments were probably fresh in his heart when, in 1634,
+friendless and poor, at the age of seventy-five, he died. Anthony Wood
+describes him as "a person of most reverend aspect, religious and
+temperate; qualities," he spitefully adds, "rarely meeting in a poet."
+
+Chapman was a man with great elements in his nature, which were so
+imperfectly harmonized that what he was found but a stuttering
+expression in what he wrote and did. There were gaps in his mind; or, to
+use Victor Hugo's image, "his intellect was a book with some leaves torn
+out." His force, great as it was, was that of an Ajax, rather than that
+of an Achilles. Few dramatists of the time afford nobler passages of
+description and reflection. Few are wiser, deeper, manlier in their
+strain of thinking. But when we turn to the dramas from which these
+grand things have been detached, we find extravagance, confusion, huge
+thoughts lying in helpless heaps, sublimity in parts conducing to no
+general effect of sublimity, the movement lagging and unwieldy, and the
+plot urged on to the catastrophe by incoherent expedients. His
+imagination partook of the incompleteness of his intellect. Strong
+enough to clothe the ideas and emotions of a common poet, it was plainly
+inadequate to embody the vast, half-formed conceptions which gasped for
+expression in his soul in its moments of poetic exaltation. Often we
+feel his meaning, rather than apprehend it. The imagery has the
+indefiniteness of distant objects seen by moonlight. There are whole
+passages in his works in which he seems engaged in expressing Chapman to
+Chapman, like the deaf egotist who only placed his trumpet to his ear
+when he himself talked.
+
+This criticism applies more particularly to his tragedies, and to his
+expression of great sentiments and passions. His comedies, though
+over-informed with thought, reveal him to us as a singularly sharp,
+shrewd, and somewhat cynical observer, sparkling with worldly wisdom,
+and not deficient in airiness any more than wit. Hazlitt, we believe,
+was the first to notice that Monsieur D'Olive, in the comedy of that
+name, is "the undoubted prototype of that light, flippant, gay, and
+infinitely delightful class of character, of the professed men of wit
+and pleasure about town, which we have in such perfection in Wycherly
+and Congreve, such as Sparkish, Witwond, Petulant, &c., both in the
+sentiments and the style of writing"; and Tharsalio in "The Widow's
+Tears," and Ludovico in "May-Day," have the hard impudence and cynical
+distrust of virtue, the arrogant and glorying self-_un_righteousness,
+that distinguish another class of characters which the dramatists of the
+age of Charles and Anne were unwearied in providing with insolence and
+repartees. Occasionally we have a jest which Falstaff would not disown.
+Thus in "May-Day," when Cuthbert, a barber, approaches Quintiliano, to
+get, if possible, "certain odd crowns" the latter owes him, Quintiliano
+says, "I think thou 'rt newly married?" "I am indeed, sir," is the
+reply. "I thought so; keep on thy hat, man, 't will be the less
+perceived." Chapman, in his comedies generally, shows a kind of
+philosophical contempt for woman, as a frailer and flimsier, if fairer,
+creature than man, and he sustains his bad judgment with infinite
+ingenuity of wilful wit and penetration of ungracious analysis. In "The
+Widow's Tears" this unpoetic infidelity to the sex pervades the whole
+plot and incidents, as well as gives edge to many an incisive sarcasm.
+My sense, says Tharsalio, "tells me how short-lived widows' tears are,
+that their weeping is in truth but laughing under a mask, that they
+mourn in their gowns and laugh in their sleeves; all of which I believe
+as a Delphian oracle, and am resolved to burn in that faith." "He," says
+Lodovico, in "May-Day,"--he "that holds religious and sacred thought of
+a woman, he that holds so reverend a respect to her that he will not
+touch her but with a kist hand and a timorous heart, he that adores her
+like his goddess, let him be sure she will shun him like her slave....
+Whereas nature made" women "but half fools, we make 'em all fool: and
+this is our palpable flattery of them, where they had rather have plain
+dealing." In all Chapman's comic writing there is something of Ben
+Jonson's mental self-assertion and disdainful glee in his own
+superiority to the weakness he satirizes.
+
+In passing from a comedy like "May-Day" to a tragedy like "Bussy
+D'Ambois," we find some difficulty in recognizing the features of the
+same nature. "Bussy D'Ambois" represents a mind not so much in creation
+as in eruption, belching forth smoke, ashes, and stones, no less than
+flame. Pope speaks of it as full of fustian; but fustian is rant in the
+words when there is no corresponding rant in the soul; whilst Chapman's
+tragedy, like Marlowe's "Tamburlaine," indicates a greater swell in the
+thoughts and passions of his characters than in their expression. The
+poetry is to Shakespeare's what gold ore is to gold. Veins and lumps of
+the precious metal gleam on the eye from the duller substance in which
+it is imbedded. Here are specimens:--
+
+    "_Man is torch borne in the wind; a dream
+    But of a shadow_, summed with all his substance;
+    And as great seamen, using all their wealth
+    And skills in Neptune's deep invisible paths,
+    In tall ships richly built and ribbed with brass,
+    To put a girdle round about the world,
+    When they have done it (coming near their haven)
+    Are fain to give a warning piece, and call
+    A poor stayed fisherman, that never past
+    His country's sight, to waft and guide them in:
+    So when we wander furthest through the waves
+    _Of glassy glory and the gulfs of state_,
+    Topped with all titles, spreading all our reaches,
+    As if each private arm would sphere the earth,
+    We must to Virtue for her guide resort,
+    Or we shall shipwreck in our safest port."
+
+              "In a king
+    All places are contained. His words and looks
+    Are like the flashes and the bolts of Jove;
+    His deeds inimitable, _like the sea
+    That shuts still as it opes_, and leaves no tracks,
+    _Nor prints of precedent for mean men's acts._"
+
+    "His great heart will not down: 't is like the sea
+    That partly by his own internal heat,
+    Partly the stars' daily and nightly motion,
+    Their heat and light, and partly of the place
+    The divers frames, but chiefly by the moon
+    Bristled with surges, never will be won,
+    (No, not when th' hearts of all those powers are burst,)
+    To make retreat into his settled home,
+    Till he be crowned with his own quiet foam."
+
+    "Now, all ye peaceful regents of the night,
+    Silently gliding exhalations,
+    _Languishing winds, and murmuring falls of waters,
+    Sadness of heart, and ominous secureness,
+    Enchantments, dead sleeps_, all the friends of rest
+    That ever wrought upon the life of man,
+    Extend your utmost strengths; and this charmed hour
+    Fix like the centre."
+
+              "There is One
+    That wakes above, whose eye no sleep can bind:
+    He sees through doors and darkness and our thoughts."
+
+            "O, the dangerous siege
+    Sin lays about us! and the tyranny
+    He exercises when he hath expugned:
+    Like to the horror of a winter's thunder,
+    Mixed with a gushing storm, that suffer nothing
+    To stir abroad on earth but their own rages,
+    Is sin, when it hath gathered head above us."
+
+    "Terror of darkness! O thou king of flames!
+    That with thy music-footed horse doth strike
+    The clear light out of crystal, on dark earth,
+    And hurl'st instinctive fire about the world,
+    Wake, wake, the drowsy and enchanted night,
+    That sleeps with dead eyes in this heavy riddle:
+    O thou great prince of shades, where never sun
+    Sticks his far-darted beams, whose eyes are made
+    To shine in darkness, and see ever best
+    Where men are blindest! open now the heart
+    Of thy abashed oracle, that for fear
+    Of some ill it includes would feign lie hid,
+    And rise thou with it in thy greater light."
+
+It is hardly possible to read Chapman's serious verse without feeling
+that he had in him the elements of a great nature, and that he was a
+magnificent specimen of what is called "irregular genius." And one of
+his poems, the dedication of his translation of the Iliad to Prince
+Henry, is of so noble a strain, and from so high a mood, that, while
+borne along with its rapture, we are tempted to place him in the first
+rank of poets and of men. You can feel and hear the throbs of the grand
+old poet's heart in such lines as these:--
+
+              "O, 't is wondrous much,
+    Though nothing prized, that the right virtuous touch
+    Of a well-written soul to virtue moves;
+    Nor have we souls to purpose, if their loves
+    Of fitting objects be not so inflamed.
+    How much were then this kingdom's main soul maimed,
+    To want this great inflamer of all powers
+    That move in human souls.
+
+       *   *   *   *
+
+    Through all the pomp of kingdoms still he shines,
+    And graceth all his gracers.
+
+       *   *   *   *
+
+    A prince's statue, or in marble carved,
+    Or steel, or gold, and shrined, to be preserved,
+    Aloft on pillars and pyramides,
+    Time into lowest ruins may depress;
+    _But drawn with all his virtues in learned verse,
+    Fame shall resound them on oblivion's hearse,
+    Till graves gasp with their blasts, and dead men rise._"
+
+
+
+
+OUR PACIFIC RAILROADS.
+
+
+Two thirds of the United States lie west of the Mississippi River. This
+vast domain has already exercised a tremendous influence over our
+political destiny. The Territories were the immediate occasion of our
+civil war. During an entire generation they furnished the arena for the
+prelusive strife of that war. The Missouri Compromise was to us of the
+East a flag of truce. But neither nature nor the men who populated the
+Western Territories recognized this flag. The vexed question of party
+platforms and sectional debate, the right and the reason of slavery,
+solved itself in the West with a freedom and rough rapidity natural to
+the soil and its population. Climatic limitations and prohibitions went
+hand in hand with the inflow of an emigration mainly from the Northern
+States,--an emigration fostered by political emotions and fevered by
+political injustice. While the South was menacing and the North
+deprecating war, far removed from this tumult of words the conflict was
+going on, and was being decided. And it was because slavery was doomed
+in the great West, and therefore in the nation, that rebellion ensued.
+
+It is worthy of note that the same generation which witnessed the growth
+of the Calhoun school of politics in the South, and of the Free Soil and
+(afterward) the Republican party in the North, and which followed with
+intense interest the stages of the Territorial struggle, witnessed also
+the employment of steam and electricity as agents of human progress.
+These agents, these organs of velocity, abbreviating time and space,
+said, Let the West be East; and before the locomotive the West fled from
+Buffalo to Chicago, across the prairies, the Rocky Mountains, the desert
+steppes beyond, and down the Pacific slope, until it stared the Orient
+into a self-contradiction.
+
+It was on the part of our government a sublime recognition of the power
+of steam, that, while it was struggling for existence, it gave its
+sanction to the Pacific Railroad enterprise. Curiously enough, it is
+through Kansas and Nebraska--the Epidaurus of our Peloponnesian
+war--that the two great rival Pacific Railroad routes are to run.
+
+In the summer of 1861, the project of a trans-continental railway
+connecting our Pacific communities with the older population of the East
+first assumed a practical aspect. For nearly three decades the nation
+had been dreaming of the scheme, but it had done little more than dream.
+Almost with the earliest track-laying in America, a visionary New-Yorker
+startled a sceptical generation by proclaiming the age of steam, and
+pointing at the locomotive as the instrument whereby men should yet
+penetrate the mysterious depths of the Far West, and secure for our
+growing commerce the prize of Asiatic wealth. Curious readers will find
+in the New York Courier and Enquirer of 1837 an article by Dr. Hartley
+Carver, advocating a Pacific Railroad; and in view of how little was
+known at this time of the country beyond the Alleghanies,--so little,
+indeed, that the Territories of the extreme West had no definite
+outline, but were measured from the crest of the Rocky Mountains,--the
+audacity of the proposition might justly have inspired suspicions of the
+sanity of its author. But if Dr. Carver was chimerical, he was at least
+courageous in his persistence. Ten years later, this lineal descendant
+of old John Carver transferred the question from the arena of newspaper
+discussion, and boldly memorialized Congress. Here he found a rival
+advocate in Asa Whitney, whose brain throbbed with the glowing
+possibilities of the Chinese trade, while his specious statistics and
+contagious eloquence arrested public attention. Neither of these
+projectors, however, found the atmosphere of Washington propitious.
+Failing there, they once more had recourse to the press. The discovery
+of gold in California gave fresh vigor to the agitation. In 1850, that
+notable railroad king, William B. Ogden, lent his name to the
+enterprise, and by his cogent and well-considered appeals excited
+confidence in statesmen and capitalists. Three years after, Congress
+yielded to the popular pressure, and ordered those surveys, the result
+of which lies in eleven bulky departmental volumes, and bears the name
+of "Pacific Railroad Reports." Then came the Fremont campaign, with its
+burning enthusiasm, the Pacific Railroad plank in the Republican
+platform, and the defeat which was almost a victory. The succeeding year
+a strong effort was made to secure a national charter; but though
+supported by the Senate, the measure failed to carry in the Lower House.
+
+This disastrous rebuff at Washington produced a profound indignation
+throughout wide sections; yet it may be questioned whether the arguments
+on which the railway scheme was based were sufficiently solid to justify
+such encouragement to the investment of floating capital as the passage
+of the bill would have implied. Beyond the Missouri River, even on the
+line of Western travel, population was as sparsely scattered as in an
+Indian reservation. Neither the gold reaches of Colorado nor the
+silver-bearing "leads" of the Washoe district had as yet been
+discovered. California was known only as a region of placer-digging, and
+its agricultural capacities were very inadequately comprehended. Nor had
+the Pacific Steamship Company ventured to create its China line. A
+railroad certain to cost one hundred and forty millions, as the War
+Department asserted, had in prospect for an immediate revenue only the
+meagre trade of Salt Lake City, and the freightage of bullion from the
+Pacific shore. Indeed, the prevailing faith in the enterprise almost
+passes belief, when it is remembered that no satisfactory survey had
+been made of the Sierra Nevada. That terrible pile of snow-crowned
+peaks, of deep-sunk ravines, of jagged ridges and perilous chasms, where
+the winding bridle-track scarcely permits a driver to walk beside his
+mule, seemed to defy the skill of our boldest engineers. Overland
+travellers reported depths of snow varying from twenty to fifty feet.
+Fearful stories were narrated of luckless wagon-trains caught in the
+narrow defiles by sudden mountain storms, and perishing helplessly amid
+these Alpine rigors. It was surely a legitimate question whether a
+railroad were possible in the face of such embarrassments; and it is
+fair to attribute the adverse action of Congress to these
+considerations, rather than to occult and scarcely explicable sectional
+motives.
+
+At the commencement of the next decade, all this, however, was changed.
+California had developed into a rich grape-producing country. Its
+cereals were beyond the demands of local consumption. A considerable
+trade had sprung up with Oregon, the Sandwich Islands, and latterly with
+China. The production of quicksilver was on the increase. Valuable
+copper mines had recently been opened. Moreover, the immense gold seams
+of Colorado, the vast silver deposits in Nevada, and the auriferous
+quartz of Idaho, were disclosed almost simultaneously, diverting
+population to the interior table-lands, and calling loudly for an
+economical method of transit. Upon the Pacific shore, the desire for a
+through road suddenly became intensified, while the profitableness of a
+railway, at least to the Humboldt Sink, became more and more apparent.
+If only the Sierra might be pierced! That appalling obstacle still threw
+its shadow over the enterprise. Fortunately, at this very crisis there
+wandered down from the mountain, in the pleasant summer days, a railway
+surveyor and engineer, Theodore D. Judah, who had had extensive Eastern
+experiences, and Californian as well. He was a thin, short,
+light-haired Massachusetts man, enthusiastic, conscientious, cautious,
+and with a quick eye for discovering the opportunities of science amid
+the obstacles of nature,--a trait which in an engineer is rightly named
+genius. While engaged in the survey of private claims, he had worked out
+what appeared, on a hurried examination, to be a perfectly feasible
+route through the hills. At Sacramento he modestly stated this belief;
+and in a resident merchant, Mr. C. P. Huntington, he found a willing
+listener. Mr. Huntington, who is to the California end of the Pacific
+Railroad what Durant is to the co-operating Nebraska branch, describes
+in graphic language the earnest consultations, prolonged for several
+weeks, which he and a few other friends held in Leland Stanford's store
+after the day's business was through. There were seven of these men all
+told, not one of them worth less than half a million, and each ready to
+stake his entire property in the enterprise, if it promised success. The
+maps of the new-comer were consulted, the lines carefully studied, and
+the result of their deliberations was the temporary organization of what
+is now known as the Central Pacific Railroad Company of California. The
+engineer in whose representations so much confidence was placed soon
+proved that he was worthy of that confidence; money was forthcoming; an
+adequate surveying party was sent out; and in the summer months of 1861,
+Judah demonstrated the existence of a route by the South Yuba River and
+the Donner Pass greatly superior to all other projected lines, with no
+insuperable engineering difficulties, and capable of defence against all
+interruption by freshet or snow. In the mean while the State Legislature
+had granted a charter to the incorporators in July; and at the first
+stockholders' meeting Stanford was elected president and Huntington
+vice-president of the company. It was evident, however, that an
+undertaking of such vast dimensions could not be completed without
+government help; and the Sacramento party, confident that in Mr. Judah's
+surveys lay the solution of the Pacific problem, repaired at once to
+Washington, and opened anew the railroad agitation.
+
+While the energy of the West was still engaged in penetrating the
+secrets of the formidable Sierra, a movement meaning work began to
+develop itself on the Eastern border. As a general statement, and
+without reference to individual routes, it may be said that in the
+Northern cis-Mississippi States there are two separate railroad systems,
+running in lines about parallel from east to west; the upper combination
+of routes debouching at Chicago, the lower, or central, at St. Louis.
+These lines are slightly entangled with the roads concentrating at
+Cincinnati and Indianapolis; but the division into an upper and lower
+route is sufficiently preserved to admit of distinct classification. The
+capitalists of both the great cities which form the terminal points of
+these systems had long been equally alive to the vast possibilities of
+the Pacific trade, and were eager, not only from local pride, but also
+from knowledge of the simplest principles of commercial policy, to
+secure to their respective communities the main bulk of this immense
+prospective traffic. With this view, Chicago had projected three lines
+across the State of Iowa, all of which were ultimately to converge at
+Council Bluffs. Thence across the coffee-colored Missouri, over rolling
+prairies, and up the slowly curving line of the Platte, stretched an
+easily rising ascent, which, engineers affirmed, had been graduated by
+nature as the most direct and practicable route for the interoceanic
+railroad. As yet no one of these Iowa lines was complete; but they all
+had a corporate existence, and their stockholders formed a nucleus for a
+distinct Pacific movement.
+
+St Louis, on the other hand, aided by the State of which it was the
+commercial capital, had as early as 1851 commenced the construction of
+the Missouri Pacific Railway, whose line shot straight as an arrow
+westward across the State, curving slightly to the north at its
+terminus, which was fixed at Kansas City. Four years later, the
+Territorial government of Kansas incorporated the Leavenworth, Pawnee,
+and Western Railroad, with privilege to build from Leavenworth to Fort
+Riley, and thence westerly. It is apparent that the two companies might
+readily connect, and thus form a rival grand trunk Pacific road.
+
+Both the upper and the lower-enterprises, however, remained for many
+years after their inception in a quiescent state, serving simply as
+topics of newspaper discussion, or of buncombe addresses from local
+rostrums. But in 1860-61 the unexpected discovery of large deposits of
+the precious metals in Colorado and in Nevada gave an enormous impulse
+to the carrying trade of the plains, and the same argument which proved
+so cogent in California aroused the Western capitalists from their
+lethargy. Rumors of the new line over the Sierra also found their way
+East; and the Legislature of Kansas, now a young and vigorous State,
+passed a joint resolution in March, 1862, urging on Congress the
+immediate creation of a national Pacific Railroad Company. In
+anticipation of this action, the agents of the lower route had already
+proceeded to Washington, where they found themselves suddenly in the
+presence, not only of the representatives of the Central Company of
+California, but also of the Chicago projectors and their New York
+friends.
+
+It will scarcely be profitable at the present time to descend into the
+particulars of the rivalry which interests in many respects so divergent
+necessarily entailed. A gentleman who had singular opportunities for
+arriving at an unprejudiced judgment recently informed the writer of
+this article that one company alone employed the element of "influence"
+to the extent of three millions of dollars, or its supposed equivalent.
+Facts of this nature, however, are outside of our purpose; and we shall
+limit our illustration of the character of the struggle to a brief
+glance at the curious tangle of compromises which the charter itself
+presents. Passed in the Lower House by a catch vote, and pushed with
+difficulty through the Senate by appeals to party pledges, by
+unimpeachable proofs of the feasibility of the scheme and the financial
+integrity of its advocates, and above all by intimations amounting
+almost to threats of a possible secession of the Pacific communities,
+the act of 1862 bears the evidence of a conflict of purposes in almost
+every one of its sections. It is evident, for example, that, with the
+tide of civil war beating fiercely around the national capital, Congress
+was still under the spell of the past, and severely distrustful of any
+avoidable increase of public obligations. Bonds were loaned to the
+enterprise at the rate of sixteen thousand dollars per mile for the easy
+work, with treble aid for the mountain division and double for the Salt
+Lake Valley; but this loan was made a first mortgage, twenty-five per
+cent, was reserved till the completion of the road, and the transit
+business of government was to be paid solely by the extinguishment of
+the bonded debt. The land grant also was but six thousand four hundred
+acres per mile. The clashing interests of St. Louis and Chicago are
+shown in the ignoring of any special eastern terminus, and the location
+of the initial point of a new trunk road upon the one hundredth
+meridian, at some equidistant station, to be designated by the
+President. As the Kansas party was already possessed of an organization,
+the charter modified this advantage by incorporating the Nebraska
+line[B], under the name of the Union Pacific Company, and gave it a
+predominant place in the specifications of the act. The aid of
+government, however, was proffered in equal degree to the road which
+was to cross the mountains from Sacramento, and to both the Eastern
+lines; the last two being required to complete a hundred miles each
+within two years after they had respectively filed their assent to the
+terms of the act, while the Central was to build at the rate of
+twenty-five miles a year up the ridges of the Sierra.
+
+In hard-currency times, and with the labor and iron market easy, these
+terms might have been sufficient to invite the ready aid of capital. But
+the close of 1862 and the year succeeding were the darkest periods of
+the war. Gold vibrated from 140 to 180. Iron, which in 1859, sold for
+$35 a ton, was now selling for $130. Moreover, while money was tight,
+labor was also scarce. The two great agencies on which a vast public
+work like this must inevitably depend proved utterly inadequate to the
+emergency. Nevertheless, both the companies which had already an organic
+existence bent themselves with no inconsiderable vigor to their task.
+The Central Pacific accepted the responsibilities and obligations of the
+charter six months after its passage, and commenced the work of grading
+in the succeeding February. Rails, chairs, and rolling stock were
+forwarded by sea, involving heavy expenditures for freightage, and a ten
+per cent war risk on insurance. The company endured further
+embarrassments from the lack of capital, and the fact that in California
+a metallic currency formed the only circulating medium. Nor was it the
+least of its difficulties that the enterprise met with an ambiguous
+reception in many portions of the State, San Francisco especially
+regarding it with cold indifference. The zeal with which the road was
+pushed amid these embarrassments is a striking evidence of the thorough
+faith of its projectors. Although it soon became apparent that further
+legislation would be needed to relieve them from the disabilities
+inherent in the meagreness of the government subsidy, they nevertheless
+succeeded by the 6th of June, 1864, in cutting their line through to
+New Castle, and in laying thereon a solid and continuous track.
+
+In Kansas, the Leavenworth, Pawnee, and Western Railroad Company or, as
+they were beginning to style themselves the Union Pacific Railway,
+Eastern Division, had contracted for an immediate and rapid construction
+of their line as early as September 30th. By the spring of 1863, the
+contractors, Messrs. Ross, Steele, & Co., had involved themselves to the
+extent of five millions, of dollars, and were in full operation with an
+adequate corps of laborers, grading, quarrying stone, building culverts,
+etc. Suddenly, however, all this busy movement ceased. By one of those
+strange revolutions that occasionally occur in the management of
+corporations, a man notorious throughout the whole border, familiarly
+called Sam Hallet, assumed control of the company, denounced the
+contract as in nowise valid, and peremptorily ordered the agents of the
+contracting party to abandon the work. The agents refused. Affairs now
+assumed the aspect of war. Hallet procured a company of United States
+dragoons from Fort Leavenworth, and rode down upon the contumacious
+contractors. The result of this cavalry dash is rather picturesquely
+described in a letter of this novel railroad general, dated August 15,
+1863:--
+
+"I have had an awful row with Carter, a battle on the works, and a sharp
+'pitch in' to get possession; we drove them back, and into the river,
+until they cried enough. S. S. Sharp, my foreman Section No. 1, led
+Carter to the river-bank by the collar; and but for his begging, he
+would have ducked him. I expect Steele and Carter on again with
+reinforcements. Let them come! We will put them into the river the next
+time. We have had to use _strong force_, _quick_ and _bold_. We have
+taken all their ties, houses, and works, and shall hold them."
+
+Triumphant on the battle-field, Hallet now made a rapid
+counter-movement, and effected a transfer of the ownership of the
+company to a new set of capitalists, putting them into immediate
+possession of the entire property of the old corporation. Of the legal
+merits of this singular manoeuvre we are not prepared to give an
+opinion; but it is proper for us to add, that it met with vigorous
+resistance on the part of the former stockholders, at the head of whom
+stood Fremont. Sharp litigations and stormy altercations ensued; and for
+many months most vital to its interests the whole Kansas enterprise was
+shut from view.
+
+While these two companies were moving forward, the one steadily
+overcoming financial and engineering difficulties, the other plunging
+into an inexplicable imbroglio of contested management and contested
+contracts, that great combination of capitalists which held the
+destinies of the Union Pacific met at Chicago in September, 1862, and
+took the preliminary steps for the formation of a company. Books for
+stock subscriptions were opened in every loyal State and Territory. In
+June of the next year the acceptance of the charter by a provisional
+direction was filed at Washington. Nevertheless, an annoying apathy
+filled the public mind. Capital was shy of the enterprise. The terms of
+the act of 1862 were deemed unsatisfactory. Up to August, 1863, only
+about eighty thousand dollars had been subscribed.
+
+At this point, Thomas C. Durant, whose connection with Western roads had
+inspired so much faith in the Pacific project, threw the weight of his
+capital and influence so determinately into the scale, that by October
+the subscriptions had reached two millions, and the company was in a
+condition to organize. Major-General John A. Dix was elected president,
+Dr. Durant became vice-president and general manager, and the
+preliminary survey which he had ordered at his personal expense was
+approved and officially adopted by the direction. As, however, a
+wide-spread feeling existed, not only that additional legislation was
+necessary, but that it might also be obtained, the company contented
+itself that year with the selection of its eastern terminus. President
+Lincoln was consulted; and, acting upon his unofficial sanction, the
+Union Pacific broke ground for the railroad at Omaha, then a struggling
+village in Nebraska Territory, nearly opposite Council Bluffs. The
+inaugural ceremony took place December 2d, and with this event the year
+closed.
+
+For the next few months the efforts of all the companies converged upon
+Congress. The Union Pacific Company appeared at Washington in great
+force. The Central, equally urgent, presented arguments that amounted to
+demonstration; the chief points being the energy with which they had
+striven to comply with the terms of the charter, and the painful failure
+that had attended their endeavor,--a failure clearly imputable to the
+insufficiency of the original bill. The Kansas Company, though rent in
+twain by rival boards of directors, was also on the ground, animated by
+very ambitious purposes, and with a determination to win its ends in
+spite of internal complications. The vigor with which the latter body
+took the field gave a complex character to the struggle, and very much
+prolonged it. On vital points, however, all parties were in accord, and
+in the main results of the campaign each achieved a splendid success.
+The supplementary bill, approved July 2, 1864, as much surpassed the
+legislation of two years previous as the sixteen hundred million
+national debt of 1864 exceeded the five-hundred million debt of 1862;
+The colossal expenditures of the war had led Congressmen to accept the
+estimates of railroad men with implicit credence, and to second their
+demands with generosity. The land grant was doubled, the government
+bonds were made a second lien to the roads under construction, the
+twenty-five per cent reservation was removed, and one half of government
+business was to be paid in money.
+
+The Union Pacific Company effected an important modification of the
+charter in respect to their particular interests. Their maximum capital
+was still fixed at one hundred millions, but individual shares were
+lowered from a thousand to a hundred dollars each. Furthermore, the
+hitherto unwieldy board of direction was limited to fifteen members. On
+the other hand, the Kansas organization obtained the privilege of making
+their own road the grand trunk route, connecting with the Central
+Pacific, in case they should anticipate the Nebraska line in reaching
+the one hundredth meridian, and the latter road should not appear to be
+proceeding in good faith.
+
+As the act which bestowed such signal favors had granted an extension of
+a year for the completion of the first division of each road, the Union
+Pacific was under no absolute compulsion to hasten its work.
+Nevertheless, surveying parties were kept in the field, and the contract
+for the construction of the road to the one hundredth meridian was
+signed in August. This agreement, though nominally known, as the Hoxie
+contract, derived the guaranty of its performance from the Credit
+Mobilier,--an organization with an actual capital of two millions and a
+half, recently created upon the model of the great Paris corporation,
+and in the hands of a few moneyed men whose enterprise and energy were
+admirably proportioned to their large wealth. Its heaviest capitalists
+were also stockholders in the projected road; and as payment was to be
+made in bonds and shares, the Credit Mobilier at once became an
+over-shadowing stockholder in the Union Pacific. The arrangement at a
+subsequent period may not have been wholly beneficial; but at the date
+of the contract the alliance was of incalculable importance. Although
+two millions of stock had been subscribed, the Nebraska line had in
+reality only twenty thousand dollars in its treasury. Without the Credit
+Mobilier, it would have faltered on the threshold of success. Even with
+this powerful auxiliary, it was not yet strong enough to prevent an
+unexpected and vexatious delay.
+
+The first forty miles west from Omaha had been intrusted to Peter A.
+Dey, an engineer of some experience in the West. This gentleman, whose
+ideas seem to have been limited to a straight line, had constructed a
+track satisfactory in its alignments, but with a maximum grade of eighty
+feet per mile, and involving temporary grading of one hundred and
+sixteen feet at several points of the route. A later survey, made under
+the supervision of Colonel Seymour, demonstrated the existence of a far
+better line with forty-feet grades and but nine miles longer. Placed
+upon abstract grounds, there was no question of the relative advantage
+of the two routes. The combined opinion of several of the most skilful
+railroad managers in the country was unanimous for the lower grade, as
+essential to rapid and economical transportation. But there was another
+element in the case which gave a different aspect to the affair. Dey's
+line terminated at Omaha; Seymour's, at Bellevue. If the new route were
+selected, all the magnificent dreams of the Omaha land speculators would
+be summarily dispelled. The territorial population caught the alarm.
+Public meetings were called. A committee was sent post to Washington. It
+was asserted, on grounds that were not destitute of plausibility, that
+the change was attributable quite as much to motives of a stock-jobbing
+order, as to economic considerations. To this charge Dr. Durant
+indignantly replied, but this did not appease the clamor. Nor was the
+dispute ended until after five months of tedious investigation, and a
+guaranteed promise on the part of the company, that, in adopting the new
+line, there should be no alteration of terminus.
+
+While Omaha was still in the white-heat of excitement, the contractors
+had been steadily employed in collecting material for a grand industrial
+campaign. Distant, in the line of travel then open to them, more than
+sixteen hundred miles from New York, with the Missouri River as their
+main avenue for the transportation of rolling stock and machinery west
+of St. Louis, the men who had undertaken to build the road bent
+themselves to the task with a vigor and celerity heretofore
+unequalled in railroad history. Iron from New England, shipped in
+coasting-vessels, and working its slow way through the Gulf of Mexico
+and up the knotted bends of the Mississippi; iron, from Pennsylvania by
+the lower route, and from New York by upper lines; iron in all
+conditions and shapes, from rails, chains, and spikes, to car-wheels and
+steam-engines,--came pouring in week by week, a tonnage beyond all
+estimate or comparison, and involving, from the want of rail
+connections, unparalleled expenditures. The transportation of one class
+of freight alone cost thirteen hundred thousand dollars. All other
+expenses were upon the same magnificent scale. Nebraska, though
+admirably adapted for agriculture, is singularly destitute of woodland.
+The lumber for building, and the cross-ties for track-laying, could only
+be obtained in small quantities and at great distances. Many of the
+sleepers travelled two hundred miles before they found repose on the
+road-bed. The labor market also was but scantily supplied, and agents
+for procuring navvies were despatched east, west, and south. But the
+splendid energy of the contractors had been fruitful of success. A vast
+aggregate of forces stood ready at the melting of the winter's snow and
+the click of the telegraph key to spring into enormous activity.
+
+About the middle of April, 1866, the message came, and the work began.
+Along the dead level of the Platte Valley, through endless reaches of
+prairie, and behind the meagre shelter of outlying hills, the rails are
+still falling in place,--a continuous belt of iron out-rolled over black
+loam and arid sand,--mile after mile, day after day; and with the close
+of the present year there will stretch an unbroken line of five hundred
+and twenty miles of rail across the Plains to the foot of the Black
+Hills. There is no occasion to dilate upon the wonderful systemization
+of labor which has characterized the work of construction. The public is
+already well apprised of the details, from the pens of industrious and
+graphic newspaper correspondents. The company itself has been by no
+means laggard in celebrating its enterprise. Excursion parties of
+capitalists, editors, and Congressmen have severally given in their
+testimony; but, after all, the one fact that in less than twenty months
+American energy has brought the Rocky Mountains within two and one half
+days' journey of New York--though the distance is two thousand
+miles--tells the whole story. One of the chief difficulties of this
+Nebraska route has been, as we have intimated, the scarcity of suitable
+material for cross-ties, and of fuel for the engines. The employment of
+Burnetized cottonwood, and the discovery of a very considerable quantity
+of cedar in the interior, have, however, effectually solved one phase of
+this problem; while for the production of steam science now offers
+petroleum as a practical substitute for wood and coal. But independently
+of this, the road has already reached the bituminous beds of the Black
+Hills, where it will probably find a plentiful supply for its
+necessities. Water also is obtained in sufficient quantities by digging
+from ten to twenty feet down, to the sand which filters the waters of
+the Platte.
+
+Shortly after the Nebraska Company had thrown off the drag-weight of
+local embarrassment, the Kansas line began to disentangle itself from
+legal complications; and on July 1, 1865, the enterprise passed into the
+hands of a management which, if powerless to retrieve the past, was at
+least determined to make the future secure. At the head of this new
+organization was John D. Perry of St Louis; and associated with him were
+a body of capitalists in Missouri and Pennsylvania whose financial
+ability was unquestioned, and who have since evinced a vigor and
+commercial prescience which elevate them to the level of their Eastern
+rivals. Perceiving that the miserable Fremont-Hallet quarrel had
+effectually frustrated all rivalry in the construction of a track to the
+one hundredth meridian, they made application to Congress for an
+extension of their line to Denver, by the Smoky Hill Fork, with the
+privilege of connecting at that point with the Union Pacific. The
+request was readily granted, and the usual land gift of twelve thousand
+eight hundred acres per mile accorded for the entire route. No further
+issue of government bonds was allowed; but as the company was now
+possessed of adequate capital, and as the loans to the other companies
+must all eventually be paid back, there was really very little
+difference in financial advantage on the side of the Nebraska line.
+Moreover, the slight balance against the Kansas route was quite made up
+in the greater fertility of the soil which it would traverse, and the
+large preponderance of its local business, the population along the line
+being treble that of the upper road. These considerations gave an
+elasticity to the Kansas project, and under the new management the work
+of construction has gone on rapidly. The present year will probably find
+the road halting at not less than three hundred and fifty miles west of
+Wyandotte, now the junction-point of the Union Pacific, Eastern
+Division, with the Missouri Pacific Railroad. But this company is not
+satisfied with a simple connection with the Nebraska road. It proposes,
+after making this connection, to continue its main line to San Francisco
+by an extensive detour southward, avoiding the difficult mountain
+systems between Denver and Sacramento, and at the same time availing
+itself of that immense trade which lies visible or latent throughout
+Arizona, New Mexico, and Southern California. Escaping the overwhelming
+snows of the Rocky Mountains, this route will pass through a salubrious
+region abounding in timber and bituminous coal.[C] By intersecting the
+Rio Grande at Albuquerque, it will hold out to the Southern States a
+tempting invitation to form connections, and share to the fullest extent
+in the benefits of this great national enterprise. In this way the
+Pacific Railroad stands ready to second Congress in the work of
+"reconstruction."
+
+Of the Central Pacific Road we have not as yet spoken adequately, and
+shall now be compelled to give the history of its achievements in a
+wholly insufficient space. Unlike the Eastern roads, it has allowed no
+pause in its work from the day of the first track-laying to the present
+moment. Unlike these roads, also, it has had to contend with great
+engineering difficulties from the start, while the material for its
+construction required to be brought over distances to which the
+transportation annoyances of the other lines offer no parallel. All the
+rolling stock, rails, etc. doubled Cape Horn. The timber for the
+trestle-work of bridges was brought from Puget's Sound. For laborers it
+had recourse to China. To reach the crest of the Sierra, they were
+obliged to pierce the hillsides fifteen times, the tunnelling alone
+amounting in continuous line to 6,262 feet. The eight-hour labor
+movement was an additional embarrassment. Embankments built up with
+incalculable labor, and protected by every device of engineering
+science, settled in many cases, and were repaired only after much delay
+and vast expense. Nevertheless, the indomitable projectors of the
+enterprise have proved themselves equal to their task. The Summit Tunnel
+was cut through in August of this year; and by November the road will
+have been extended, not only to the crest of the mountains, but far down
+the eastern slope. Hunter's, which is the wagon depot of the Nevada
+miners, two hundred and seventy-four miles from San Francisco, and one
+hundred and fifty miles from Sacramento, is the point which the
+locomotive is certain to reach by the close of 1867.[D]
+
+Thus far there have been built six hundred and fifty miles of completed
+road. Adding the water route to San Francisco, there are about eight
+hundred miles of continuous steam communication. Despite also the
+bleakness of the Plains in winter, and the protracted rigors of the
+Sierra, it is demonstrated that snow can be no more an obstacle to the
+railroads than icebergs have proved to the Atlantic cable. Including the
+Eastern connections with New York as the Atlantic terminus, we have,
+therefore, two thousand two hundred and fifty miles of the interoceanic
+railroad already in actual operation.
+
+From Hunter's, in Nevada, to the eastern base of the Rocky Mountains,
+stretches the long space of unfinished work, ten hundred and fifty-four
+miles of railroad line, with three sharp crests and a gently rolling
+intra-mountain desert, where the dew never falls, where the twilight
+lingers long into the evening, and the eye wearies of the wastes of
+sage-bush, and the tracts of scant grass between arid breadths of
+dazzling white alkaline sand. A glance at the grades discloses one of
+the difficulties with which the Union Pacific has now to grapple. From
+the Black Hills, within thirty miles the track must rise to its first
+and loftiest ascent, 8,242 feet above the sea-level. Then comes a
+descent of a thousand feet for the same distance, succeeded by equal
+alternations of rise and fall for eight successive points. Beyond Bear
+River, however, these gigantic mountain waves lengthen, and the vast
+interior basin rolls broadly and heavily, with an average level of
+forty-five hundred feet, past Weber Canon and Humboldt Wells. Here the
+line strikes Humboldt River, and runs southwesterly to the Big Bend of
+the Truckee River, along a region singularly favorable in its
+alignments, and described as well supplied with wood and water. In this
+respect recent surveys essentially corroborate the testimony of Fremont.
+
+The difficulties to be overcome by the Central Pacific in its route over
+and through the mountains to meet its eastern branches have already been
+described. But, notwithstanding these, the company claims that it can
+readily construct its line at the rate of one mile per day for five
+hundred working-days. It has nearly ten thousand laborers at work, most
+of them Chinese. The portion of the road completed, with its excellent
+rails, its ties of red-wood and tamarack, and its granite culverts, has
+elicited praise from government commissioners for the thoroughness of
+its execution.
+
+Though none of the routes are as yet completed, the net earnings of each
+of the three companies, over and above the interest on its bonds, have
+surpassed all expectation. In 1865 and 1866 the net earnings of the
+Central Road amounted to $936,000 in gold, and in 1867 they are
+estimated at one million dollars; and this surplus is applied to the
+construction of the road. The net earnings of the Union Pacific
+(Nebraska) Road for the quarter ending July 31, 1867, were $376,589 in
+currency. Those of the Eastern or Kansas branch, for the month of
+August alone, $235,000. Of course these estimates of the profit of the
+roads under the present circumstances are but faint indications of the
+wealth which must accrue to them upon their completion, and after the
+fuller development of the resources upon which they depend. At the
+sources of this future wealth we shall glance presently.
+
+There can be no possible occasion for rivalry between these three
+companies. Each road will take its place in the great work of
+interoceanic communication, and each will find its capacities meagre as
+compared with the commerce which awaits it. But apart from a merely
+commercial view, there are certain points of comparison between the
+various routes which demand a brief notice. The Kansas route will
+probably prove most attractive to the tourists, especially in the event
+of its making the detour through New Mexico above alluded to. The
+Nebraska route will be more monotonous, running across the level and
+treeless valley of the Platte for three hundred miles. To the traveller
+there will always be presented the same swift but shallow river at his
+side, the same bare, misty hills along the horizon, the same limitless
+stretch of the plain before and behind, and the same solitary sky above,
+save as it is varied by sunrise and sunset, until the Black Hills come
+to his relief, and he enters upon the snow-whelmed Sierra. The Central
+route is more picturesque, and also has more elements of grandeur, than
+either of the others. The Nebraska Road, on account of the character of
+the country through which it passes, will probably derive its main
+revenue from the through trade; while the Kansas--if its present purpose
+be carried out--will depend upon the local trade and its multifarious
+connections.
+
+Having traced the history of these Pacific roads, the difficulties which
+they have met and in a large degree conquered, and their general
+features, our consideration of them must from this point grow out of
+their national importance and world-wide significance. For the Pacific
+Railroad is not simply a gigantic public work, it is the world's great
+highway. The world has had several grand routes, along the line of
+which, for certain periods of time, the life-blood and intelligence of
+humanity have coursed. Such was the route which history discloses as the
+most ancient from India overland to the Mediterranean, whence it was
+continued by that old Phoenician Coast Navigation Company to the
+shores of Britain. Along this overland line grew up the great cities of
+Asia, depending upon it for their wealth, refinement, and power; and
+when commerce was diverted from the inland, and the riches of India took
+the ocean path westward, the glory of these cities departed. Such also
+was that later route which gave the Italian cities their opulence and
+strength in the Middle Ages. When the Cape of Good Hope was doubled,
+these Italian centres grew comparatively weak and lustreless. The Roman
+road to Britain laid the foundation of that power, the full development
+of which has given to London its present position as the European
+metropolis. New York City also owes her rapid and stupendous growth to
+that peculiar conjunction of circumstances which has secured her the
+control of the grand Transatlantic commercial route of present times.
+The railroads leading westward from that city, converging upon the
+termini of the Pacific lines, continue this world-route of the incoming
+era to San Francisco, and there, through the Golden Gate, we grasp the
+wealth of Eastern Asia, whence the first great world-route started.
+Events more powerful than tradition have thus revolutionized the old
+system of travel and commerce, calling them eastward. America becomes at
+once interoceanic and mediterranean, commanding the two oceans, and
+mediating between Europe and Asia. By the Pacific Railroad, Hong Kong
+via New York is only forty days distant from London. The tea and silks
+of China and the products of the Spice Islands must pass through America
+to Europe. In this connection, also, there is a profound significance
+in our alliance, every year growing stronger, with Russia, whose extreme
+southern boundary joins Japan, our latest and warmest Asiatic ally.
+
+But the development of American commercial power as against the world is
+secondary to the internal development of our own resources, and to the
+indissoluble bond of national union afforded by this inland route from
+the Atlantic to the Pacific, and by its future connections with every
+portion of our territory. In thirty years, California will have a
+population equal to that of New York to-day, and yet not be half full,
+and the city of St. Louis will number a million of souls. New York City
+and San Francisco, as the two great _entrepots_ of trade; Chicago and
+St. Louis as its two vital centres; and New Orleans at the mouth of our
+great national canal, the Mississippi,--will become nations rather than
+cities, out-stripping all the great cities of ancient and modern
+history. As far as the resources of the West are concerned, one Pacific
+railroad, with two or three branches, will not suffice; we may need a
+road along every parallel. The West is still in a large degree _terra
+incognita_. We know it only in parts. We are indeed aware that
+California is already competing with Russia and the cis-Mississippi
+States in the production of cereals, and that the mineral region of the
+West now annually yields gold and silver worth one hundred millions of
+dollars. But California's agricultural resources are almost untouched;
+while the best "leads" of the vast mineral region are not worked, from
+the fear of a savage race. Missouri extends over thirty-five millions of
+acres of arable land, two millions of which are the alluvial margins of
+rivers, and twenty thousand high rolling prairie; but five sevenths of
+the soil is yet fallow. We see Denver and other cities of the Far West
+spring up in a day; but their growth, marvellous as it is, arises from
+the circumstance that they are great mineral centres, and is cramped and
+partial, depending upon a wearisome and insecure overland route,
+extending over hundreds of miles, via Salt Lake, to Atchison. The
+Pacific Railroad will quicken this development to its full
+possibilities; it will populate the West in a few years; and along its
+lines will spring up a hundred cities, which will advance in the swift
+march of national progress just in proportion to their opportunities for
+rapid communication with the older centres of opulence and culture.
+
+The Indians also, whose sad plaint against the inevitable civilization
+of the locomotive is still ringing in all ears, must succumb before the
+presence of this new power. When we reflect that a single regiment of
+soldiers costs a million a year, we must see that the railroad as a
+peace instrument will render more than an equivalent for all government
+assistance given to it. Moreover, our frontier posts must soon be
+rendered unnecessary by the operation of commerce. The same influence
+will also dissipate the power which the Mormons have gained solely by
+their isolation.
+
+But beyond these immediate considerations arise the magnificent
+commercial certainties which the logic of history reveals. Space fails
+us at this point of fruitful speculation; but it will suffice to say
+that the corollary of the Pacific railroads is the transfer of the
+world's commerce to America, and the substitution of New York for Paris
+and London as the world's exchange. In the train of these immeasurable
+events must come the wealth and the culture which have hitherto been
+limited to Europe. With the year 1866 began the _rapid_ work of this
+revolutionizing enterprise. The year of grace 1870 will witness its
+completion. The four years' civil war is followed by the four years'
+victory of peace. Already the Western cities are tremulous with the
+aspirations which it excites; and the metropolis of the East, with its
+new steamship lines to Brazil, its Cuban cable, and its hundred
+prospective enterprises, awaits the moment which shall lift it to
+imperial importance.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[B] The use of this phrase requires explanation. It has been previously
+stated that Council Bluffs was the point on which the Chicago lines were
+concentrating. It is now to be added, that beyond this growing
+settlement, across the Missouri River, lies Nebraska, and the proposed
+route would necessarily pass through the whole length of this State. At
+the rival roads are connected to a greater or less degree with the
+interests of the States in which are their respective eastern termini,
+and as the legal titles of the two roads are at once ambiguous and
+disagreeably long, we have preferred to designate them simply as the
+Kansas and Nebraska lines.
+
+[C] The point suggested for this divergence southward is in the vicinity
+of Pond Creek, four hundred and twenty miles west of the Missouri River.
+Thence it will deflect to the southwest, touching the base of the
+mountains one hundred and seventy miles beyond Pond Creek, near the
+boundary-line between Colorado and New Mexico. Thus, having passed
+through Southeastern Colorado, New Mexico, and Arizona, it finds its way
+northward, through the marvellously fertile region of Southern
+California, to San Francisco. It is noteworthy that this project offers
+to Mexico immediate participation in our commerce, affording the basis
+of a far more enduring annexation. It is possible that in no far-distant
+future, if this scheme is achieved, San Francisco will find a rival in
+San Diego,--four hundred and fifty-six miles southeast of the former,
+and a much nearer port for the purposes of this route. The project of a
+mountain line from Denver to Salt Lake City, connecting at that point
+with the Central Railroad, is also said to be entertained by the Kansas
+company.
+
+[D] Up to the present time, the Nebraska line has expended about
+twenty-five millions; the Central Railroad, twenty-two millions. On two
+hundred and fifty-nine miles of the Kansas Road there were also
+expended, in cost and equipment, eleven millions. All this has been
+obtained from the sale of bonds, paid-in stock, and the net earnings of
+the roads. The bonds have been made a popular loan, sold by New York
+agents, and chiefly taken in New England, New York State, and Eastern
+Pennsylvania. The purchasing clasp, though largely composed of heavy
+capitalists, consists also of those who have small sums of money to
+invest, and who seek this means as especially secure.
+
+The stockholders of the Union Pacific number from one to two hundred,
+but most of the shares are in a few hands; the Credit Mobilier, Durant,
+and the Ameses being the principal owners. The Central Railroad also
+exhibits the same phenomenon of few shareholders; all of them, of
+course, large capitalists. This gives great power in pushing the work
+on, and illustrates the tendency of the day toward consolidation.
+Hereafter, when the Central and Nebraska lines shall have combined, this
+commanding influence of a comparatively few men will make itself
+signally felt in our politics.
+
+
+
+
+GRANDMOTHER'S STORY: THE GREAT SNOW.
+
+
+It had been snowing all day, and when father came in at dark he said
+that the wind was rising, and the storm gathering power every moment,
+and that before morning all the roads would be fast locked.
+
+Grandmother is a gentle, sweet old lady, whom I remember always with the
+same serene face, bearing all earthly troubles with such holy patience
+as lifts this common life to heaven; she waits for hours in unbroken
+silence, while her face wears the rapt, mystical look of one who talks
+with angels, and then we move softly about her, and not one of us would
+by words of our own call her down from the mount of vision. Within a
+year or two she has grown quite deaf, and since this her life seems yet
+more isolated; sometimes, however, like most deaf persons, she hears
+words spoken in low tones that are not meant for her, perhaps because at
+times the spirit is vividly awake, and more than usually quick to catch
+at and interpret what else might beat in vain upon the dull, corporeal
+sense.
+
+She put by her knitting at father's words, and rose and walked feebly to
+the window, where she stood a long time looking out at the death-white
+waste, shut in by the morose, ominous sky. Then, turning slowly, her
+face alight and beautiful with that beauty which is fairer than youth,
+she said, "It puts me in mind of the Great Snow, Ephraim,--it puts me in
+mind of a good many things!"
+
+Then she came back to the fire, and sat down again in her corner. Memory
+was stirring, the Past unfolding its scroll. The knitting-work fell
+unheeded from the old, trembling fingers. She was a girl again, and the
+story of that far-off girlhood fell softly upon the evening silence.
+
+"I was only eighteen years old, Ephraim, when your grandfather moved
+down from the new State. I had lived up there in the wilderness all my
+life; and I was as shy as a wild rabbit, and, in my own fashion, proud.
+Father was poor in those days, for there were six of us children to feed
+and clothe, and mother was delicate and often ill; so we moved into a
+low, one-story house, that was old too, as well as small; but as we had
+always lived in a log-house, and this was a frame one, we were more than
+satisfied. We did not mind if the snow blew in at the cracks in the
+roof, and nestled in little drifts on the counterpane, for we were used
+to it. I remember that one bright star always peeped down at me in the
+winter through the open spaces between the boards, and shone so calm and
+clear that I used to fancy it was God's home, and somehow my prayers
+seemed surer of getting to him when I said them in the pure light of
+this star. But that was while we were in the new State. When we moved
+down country, I was a grown-up girl, able to turn my hand to any chore
+about the house; and I went to meeting in the meeting-house at the
+Corner, and had got over my childish notions.
+
+"Elder Crane was a very pious man, and he always preached long sermons
+and made long prayers. The sermons were easier to bear than the prayers,
+for the people sat through the sermon; but if you had sat down during
+the prayer, you would have been thought dreadfully wicked, and the Elder
+might have called your name right out the next Sabbath, and prayed for
+you as a poor sinner whom Satan was tempting. And so you stood up, of
+course, though the children sometimes got asleep and fell down, and
+often the girls used to faint away and be carried out. Semantha Lee did,
+at one time, almost as regularly as the Sabbath came round, until at
+last a church committee was sent to labor with her. But Semantha was a
+very free-spoken girl, and she said some hard things against Elder
+Crane's prayers. I always thought that it was more her corsets than the
+length of the prayers.
+
+"I never fainted; for up in the new State I had run wild in the woods,
+and, though I was a frail thing to look at, I had a deal of strength in
+me. But my thoughts rambled a great deal too often; and sometimes I
+doubted if I was as near God in Elder Crane's church as I used to be
+lying on my bed in the chamber of the log-house, and saying my prayers
+to the bright star that looked down so friendly. I asked mother about it
+one day, and she said that surely God was about us everywhere; but she
+added that the church was the appointed means of grace, and that I must
+follow Elder Crane closely, and try to make my heart feel the words. I
+did try, but there was so much about the Israelites in the house of
+bondage, and Moses, and the sacrifices, that, do what I would, I always
+lost myself in the Red Sea, and the chosen people entered the Promised
+Land without me. At such times, when my thoughts went wandering, my eyes
+followed them, and most frequently they went right over to Mr. Jacob
+Allen's pew. I could not well help it, indeed, for his was a wall pew,
+directly opposite ours. Mr. Allen seldom came to meeting, being old and
+rheumatic, but his wife and girls came, and his son, Ephraim.
+
+"At first I noticed Ephraim Allen just as I did the cobwebs upon the
+walls, and the yellow streaks in the wainscoting; afterward I began to
+see what a fine figure he had,--a whole head above his companions,--and
+how broad-shouldered and erect and manly he was; the narrow-backed,
+short-waisted coat that made the rest look so pinched and uncomfortable
+sat gracefully and easily upon him. He had a wide, white
+forehead,--though I did not notice this for a long time,--and short
+curly hair, that looked very black beside the fair skin. Then his cheeks
+were as bright as a rose, and his eyes--but I seldom got so far as his
+eyes, because by some chance they always met mine, and then I was much
+confused and ashamed. But always, in going out of meeting, he used to
+bow to me in passing, and say, 'Good morning, Mercy'; and then I saw
+that his eyes were a clear, dark blue, and I thought they were very
+honest, tender ones. They said that Semantha Lee had been setting her
+cap at him a good while, and I wondered if he liked her.
+
+"This was all the acquaintance we had for two years and more. There was
+not much chance for young people to meet in those days, especially where
+they were strictly brought up, as I was; for father and mother were both
+very pious, and at that time church-members thought it was sinful to
+join in the profane amusements of the world. So when an invitation came
+for me to a husking-frolic, or a paring-bee, or a dance, I was not
+allowed to go. I was shy, as I told you, but I had a girl's natural
+longing for company; and many were the bitter tears I shed up in my
+garret because I could not go with the rest. Mother used to look at me
+as if she pitied me, and once she ventured to speak up in favor of my
+going; but father said sternly that these sports were the means Satan
+used to win away souls from God,--and father was a good deal set in his
+way, and mother gave up to him, as she always did.
+
+"Once or twice Ephraim Allen came to our house, but somehow my shyness
+came over me when I heard his voice at the door, and I hid myself in the
+pantry, and pretended to be very busy turning the cheeses; and so I was,
+for I turned them over and over again, till mother came and said I
+mustn't waste any more butter. Ephraim stayed and stayed, and kept
+talking about the oxbow he had come to see about a great deal longer
+than I thought there was any need of; and I could not get courage enough
+to go out, though I was sore ashamed and vexed at my foolish shyness.
+
+"So the whole two years slipped away, and good morning was all we had
+ever said to each other. About this time I began to notice that Deacon
+Lee got in the way of looking at me in meeting, and his face was very
+sober, as if something displeased him. Semantha, too, would push past me
+in going in and out, and didn't speak to me as she always used to do
+before she went down to Boston to make that long visit among her
+relations. Deacon Lee had a brother living in Boston who was said to be
+a very rich man. Father was at his house once when he went down to sell
+the butter and wool,--as he did every winter,--and he said we could not
+imagine how beautiful it was,--carpets on all the floors, and even in
+the entry, which mother thought must make a deal of work with people
+coming in and out, especially in wet weather. But then father said the
+Lees had negro servants to do the work, and that Mrs. Lee and her
+daughters had nothing to do but sit in the parlor all day long. When
+Semantha came back after her long visit, she brought a great many fine
+things that her cousins had given her. She used to come into meeting,
+her high-heeled slippers clattering, and her clocked stockings showing
+clear down to the peaked toe; she wore a pink crape gown, and over that
+a white muslin cape that came just down to the waist in the back, and
+crossed over in front, and was pinned to her gown at the corners; it was
+bound around with blue lutestring, and her bonnet had a blue bow on it.
+It was a Navarino bonnet, and cost an extravagant price, seeing that it
+couldn't be done over.
+
+"None of us had ever seen such fine things before; and when Semantha
+came in, Elder Crane might as well have sat down, for everybody looked
+at Semantha. I thought it was well that her bonnet hid her face; for if
+she was like me, it must have been crimson. I am sure I should have died
+of mortification to have been so stared at.
+
+"Mother said she feared it was sinful for a deacon's daughter to make
+such a display, and wondered if Semantha remembered what the Apostle
+Paul says of the ornaments that women ought to wear.
+
+"But in talking of Semantha, I have forgotten Deacon Lee's queer
+behavior. He would look at me awhile, and then at Ephraim Allen. It was
+so curious, I began to fear that he was deranged. But at last I found
+out what it meant.
+
+"One day as I was coming out of meeting, and Ephraim had just said,
+'Good morning,' I looked around and there was Deacon Lee close beside
+us, watching us with a severe expression in his face. 'Young man,' said
+he, and the tone was so awful that I trembled all over,--'young man, I
+have noticed for some time past your attempts to attract the attention
+of this young woman, who, I am grieved to say,'--turning to me,--'does
+not receive this notice as she ought. Instead of assuming an expression
+of severe reproof, she blushes from time to time, and casts down her
+eyes, and I cannot discover from her face that this ungodly conduct is
+displeasing to her.'
+
+"I was so overwhelmed by this rebuke that I could not look up or speak,
+and in a minute more I should have cried in good earnest It was
+Ephraim's voice that stopped me. 'I am sure I beg Mercy's pardon and
+yours, Deacon, if I have done anything improper. I suppose I looked at
+her because my eye couldn't find a pleasanter resting-place. You won't
+pretend that Elder Crane is handsome enough to make it a pleasure to
+look at _him_.'
+
+"I was astonished, and Deacon Lee looked horrified, but Ephraim's face
+glowed all over with smiles.
+
+"'Ephraim Allen,' said the Deacon sternly, 'if you were a professor, I
+should present you to the church for irreverence. As it is, I have done
+my duty';--and with that he went away.
+
+"Most of the people had left the meeting-house by this time, but a good
+many of them were turning back to look at me where I stood near Deacon
+Lee and Ephraim Allen. I suppose they didn't know what it could mean;
+for in those days we always Walked soberly home from service, not
+profaning the holy day by common talk. And this was the reason that I
+was surprised and frightened when Ephraim, instead of going away by
+himself, walked down the steps with me, and along the road at my side.
+It was a good two miles home, and I had happened to come alone that day,
+father being laid up with a cut in his foot, and mother staying at home
+to nurse him.
+
+"The path was a beautiful one, leading through deep, still woods, now
+coming out into the edge of a clearing, and now running along a
+brookside where there were flowers nodding over the water, and
+bird's-nests in the thick grass on the bank; I thought sometimes that
+the walk did me as much good as going to church, particularly if I came
+alone, and stopped now and then to read my Bible by the way.
+
+"So we walked along, Ephraim and I; and presently we passed a great
+clump of witch-hazel bushes that were in all their bridal white, and
+Ephraim picked a bunch of the flowers, and gave them to me. He had not
+spoken a word since we started, but now he said, 'Are you very much put
+out with Deacon Lee, Mercy?'
+
+"This made me feel very much ashamed again, but I said I hoped I knew
+better than to bear anger against anybody; and then--quite excited and
+eager--I said I wanted him to forgive me if I had looked his way more
+than was proper, and not think I meant to be forward or unmaidenly. And
+Ephraim made reply that he would never believe any ill of me, no, not if
+all the deacons in the world were to testify to it; and he said that he
+owed Deacon Lee thanks for so bringing us together, for he should never
+have had the courage to come to me, though he longed for a sight of my
+face every day, and was constant at church, never missing a Sunday, so
+that he might see me. All this he said in such an earnest, sincere
+manner, and his voice was so gentle that I could not rebuke him, though
+I feared that his heart was in a dark, unregenerate state, if he cared
+so much more for me than for Elder Crane's sermons.
+
+"You won't care to have an old woman tell any more of her love-story.
+Now-a-days these things are all written in novels, and I should think
+the bloom of a girl's delicacy must be long gone before she hears such
+words said to herself. Then it was different. I had never dreamed of
+anything so beautiful.
+
+"The woods were very still all around us, only once in a while a bird
+would sing out, and then the silence fall again all the sweeter for the
+song. When the woods opened we caught glimpses of the green grain-fields
+and orchards in blossom. A chipmonk darted across the path, and,
+scampering up into a beech-tree, clung to the great brown hole, and
+looked down at us, perking his head so mischievously that I could not
+help thinking he knew our secret. And so on and on. I've often thought
+that walk was like the life we lived together, and a prophecy of
+it,--bright, and full of songs and flowers and sweetness, leading
+sometimes through shady places, but never losing sight of God's sweet
+heaven, never missing the warm winds of its inspiration and its hope.
+
+"But before this a dark time was to come.
+
+"We must have been a good while going home, for when we came in sight of
+the house there was mother standing in the door, shading her eyes with
+her hand, and watching for us, and all at once I remembered that she
+must have been anxious; there were bears in those woods, and the next
+winter one was killed in the very path where we walked.
+
+"When mother saw us coming, she smiled, and came down to the road to
+meet us, and shook hands with Ephraim in such a friendly way that my
+heart danced; I had been thinking what if father and mother should not
+approve of him.
+
+"Father was friendly too, and while they sat in the fore-room, and
+talked, mother made some of her cream biscuits for tea. Now I knew by
+this that Ephraim would find favor in her eyes, because in our house
+all unnecessary labor was forbidden on the Sabbath, and no small thing
+could have tempted mother to break over this rule. When I went to call
+them to supper, I knew that Ephraim had been speaking to father, and
+that he was kindly disposed towards Ephraim. Father named me in asking
+the blessing, and Ephraim also, speaking of him so tenderly that it
+brought the tears to my eyes.
+
+"All the rest of that summer is very dear to remember. When I think over
+my life, much of it seems misty and far away; but that summer is as
+distinct to my mind as it was when its roses had but just faded, just as
+sweet and wonderful in its sunshine, its blue skies, its fresh-blowing
+winds, its birds and flowers, as it seemed to me then,--only now I know
+what it was that so glorified it.
+
+"Ephraim had a much greater flow of spirits than I had. I was grave
+beyond my years. But I caught the love of fun from him, and mother and
+father wondered at the change in me. I think a girl always changes when
+she is engaged. A whole world of feeling that has slept is now awakened.
+Even shallow women bloom out for a brief time, and sparkle and shine
+wonderfully. To be sure they fade full soon oftentimes, and only the dry
+leaves are left of all the charm and fragrance.
+
+"And so autumn came, and winter, and with the winter the frolics which
+Ephraim was so fond of, and which he persisted stoutly were as innocent
+as church-going. But father was so disturbed when I spoke of going that
+I gave it up at once, and told Ephraim that, as long as I lived at home,
+I couldn't feel right to disobey father. So at first Ephraim stayed
+contentedly with me, but by and by the old love stirred. A bit of
+dance-music would start his color, and set his feet in motion, and it
+was plain to see where his heart was. I was sorely grieved at this; nay,
+I was more than grieved. I wanted him all to myself. I could not bear
+that he should need anything but me. Ephraim said I was exacting, and I
+thought him cold and unkind. And so there gradually grew up a coldness
+between us; and yet the coldness was all on my side. Ephraim was always
+gentle, even when I was pettish and cross. For so I was. It was partly
+physical. I was not well that winter. I did not sleep, or when I did by
+fits and starts, I woke frightened and crying. Now, my doctor would call
+it nervous sensitiveness; but then people did not give fine names to
+their humors, and mother only looked sorry, and said she was afraid I
+was growing ill-tempered.
+
+"While things were in this state, Ephraim's mother invited me to come
+and spend a week with them. I didn't feel acquainted, and I was shy
+about going; but Ephraim urged it, and mother advised it, and so at last
+I consented to go.
+
+"I was a good deal mortified that I had nothing nice to wear. My best
+gown had been in use two winters, and there were only three breadths in
+the skirt, and Semantha Lee said that nobody in Boston thought of making
+up less than four. But mother's wise counsel reconciled me. She said
+that the Allens knew we had no money to spend on fine clothes, and would
+only expect me to be clean and neat and well-behaved.
+
+"Ephraim, too, praised me boldly to my face, and pretended to think that
+nothing could be so becoming as my faded hood. It was yellow silk, and
+was made out of a turban that mother had worn when she was a girl.
+
+"After I was in the sleigh with Ephraim, all my unhappiness and anxiety
+fled, and I enjoyed every bit of the ride. It was a lonely road, and
+part of the way it went through the woods where the lately fallen snow
+lay in pure white sheets that were written all over with the tracks of
+birds, and rabbits and other wild animals; and the stillness of the
+great woods was so deep and solemn that our love-talk was silenced, and
+we rode on singing hymns. Then out of the woods, and sweeping down into
+a hollow where pleasant farms were nestled snugly together, and so up
+to Ephraim's door. Mr. Jacob Allen was a forehanded farmer, and the
+house was by far the best in town.
+
+"When we drove up to the door, Mary Allen was at the window, watching
+for us. She ran out to the sleigh, and when Ephraim told her here was
+her sister Mercy, she laughed, and shook hands,--women did not kiss each
+other then,--and said she was glad I was come to stay a week. So my
+meeting her was not at all dreadful.
+
+"While Ephraim went around to put up the horse, Mary took me into the
+fore-room, where there was a fire, and helped me with my things, and was
+as sociable as if she had known me all her life.
+
+"The room was a great deal nicer than anything I had ever seen. I was
+almost afraid to step on the carpet at first; but then I remembered that
+it must have been meant to be stepped on, or it wouldn't have been laid
+on the floor.
+
+"Pretty soon Mrs. Allen and Prudence came in. Mrs. Allen was a very
+notable woman, and when she had told me how she made her cheese, and
+that she put down her butter in cedar firkins,--she seemed to think that
+pine ones were not fit for a Christian to use, and that my mother must
+be a terribly shiftless person to put up with them,--she said she must
+go and see to the pies that were baking. I don't think she was still
+five minutes at a time while I was there, but just driving about the
+house from morning till night. And yet there were her two girls to help
+her, and mother and I did the work for eight, and took in spinning all
+the year round.
+
+"I think Prudence didn't like housework. She was very intimate with
+Semantha Lee; and what Semantha said and did and wore was pretty much
+all her talk. All that week she was at work on old gowns, altering them
+to be like Semantha's. Prudence didn't seem to fancy me at the very
+first; and though I don't want to speak evil of her, she was certainly
+rather a hard person to get along with.
+
+"One day she would remark that I would be quite good-looking if my nose
+wasn't such a pug. And another day that it was a pity I had red hair,
+for really my other features were not so bad; and she said that my gown
+was just like one she had hung up in the garret; and so in this way she
+picked me to pieces, until it seemed as if she couldn't find a good
+thing in me. But this was not as bad as the way in which she talked to
+me about Semantha.
+
+"Nobody was so handsome or so good or so smart as Semantha; and Deacon
+Lee was the most forehanded man in town. As a great secret, she told me
+that Ephraim and Semantha were once as good as engaged, and she didn't
+doubt, if anything should happen to break up the match between Ephraim
+and me, that Ephraim would go back to Semantha.
+
+"I was terribly angry at this, and I felt my lips stiffen, and it was as
+much as I could do to say, 'What could happen to break our engagement?
+Ephraim is solemnly promised to me, and it is just the same in God's
+sight as if we were married.'
+
+"Prudence looked at me a minute, and then said she 'had no idea I had
+such a temper. She had heard that I talked of uniting with the church,
+but after what she had seen, she shouldn't think--' And here she
+stopped, and it was as much what was not said as what she did say that
+vexed me so. I was heartily thankful that she was only a half-sister to
+Ephraim, for I began to fear I should hate her.
+
+"With all this Mary did not seem to dare to be her own pleasant self,
+and even Ephraim acted as if he wasn't quite at his ease. I began to be
+sadly homesick. I almost hated the sight of the carpet on the floor, and
+the high-curtained bedstead, and the tall chimney-glass, and I longed
+for the love and peace of my humble home.
+
+"I had been at Mrs. Allen's three days, when Semantha Lee came over to
+spend the day. She came in the morning, and sent back the hired man
+with the sleigh, because she meant to stay all night with Prudence.
+
+"Semantha was dressed very elegantly. She had a scarlet cloth cloak that
+came down to the bottom of her gown, and the gown itself was green silk,
+with great bishop sleeves lined with buckram, so that they stood out,
+and rattled like a drum when they hit against anything. Mary laughed at
+her because she could not go through our chamber door without turning
+sidewise; but Semantha said they were all the fashion in Boston.
+
+"She was very lively and full of fun that day, though she didn't take
+much notice of me. In the evening we had popped corn and apples, and
+when we pared the apples and threw down the long coils of peel,
+Semantha's took the shape of a letter E. She laughed and blushed, and
+pretended to be very much vexed, but she was really as pleased as she
+could be. Mary whispered to me not to mind, and said Prudence had given
+the peel a sly push with her foot to shape the E; but for all that I
+could hardly help crying.
+
+"That night all of us girls slept in the great double-bedded room.
+Semantha was with Prudence; and long after Mary was asleep I could hear
+them whispering, and every minute or two I would catch Ephraim's name.
+
+"I did not sleep much that night, and in the morning I was almost sick.
+Ephraim was very kind, and when Prudence said she was going to invite in
+some of the young people of the neighborhood that evening, he wanted her
+to put it off; but Prudence said she guessed I would be better,--she
+thought people could throw off sickness if they tried to do so. At this
+Semantha laughed so disagreeably, and looked over at Ephraim in so
+significant a way, that I am afraid I almost hated her.
+
+"The company came in the evening,--five or six merry young girls and
+young men. If my head and heart had been right, I could have enjoyed it
+too. But my head ached, and for the rest you would have thought it was
+Semantha who was engaged to Ephraim, and not I.
+
+"There was a young man there named Elihu Parsons. He was very
+handsome,--too handsome for a man,--and what with this and his pleasant
+ways he was a great favorite with the girls. I had only seen him once or
+twice, but he remembered me, and came and sat by me while the games were
+going on. I thought this was very good of him, for nobody was so much
+called for as he; but he would not leave me, and was so sociable and
+pleasant that I tried to brighten up and entertain him as well as I
+could. We were in the midst of our talk, when I happened to glance up
+and saw Ephraim looking over at us,--looking, too, as I had never seen
+him. All at once it flashed upon me that I could make him suffer as he
+had made me. From that moment an evil spirit possessed me. I felt my
+cheeks flush; my heart beat fast; I was full of wild gayety. I sang
+songs when they asked me. Elihu asked me to dance, and I danced,--I, who
+had never taken a step before in my life. I felt as light as air; I
+seemed to float through the figure.
+
+"Ephraim never came near me the whole evening, but Elihu kept close to
+me, and we had a great deal of talk that I am glad to have forgotten.
+But I remember that he laughed at Semantha Lee, and made fun of her hair
+that he said was like tow, and her eyes that squinted, and her mincing
+gait; and I listened, and felt a malicious pleasure in this dispraise of
+Semantha. Through it all my head ached terribly, and I stupidly wondered
+how I dared be such a wicked girl, and what my mother would say if she
+knew it.
+
+"By and by it was ten o'clock, and then Semantha suddenly discovered
+that she must go home. Mrs. Allen tried to persuade her to stay. But no!
+It was going to snow, she said, and she would not stay. Then Prudence
+said, if she _must_ go, Ephraim would take her home in the sleigh,
+which, of course, was just what Semantha wanted.
+
+"I don't know what made me do it, but upon this I rose and went over to
+where they were standing, and said that Elihu Parsons was going directly
+past Deacon Lee's, and would be happy to take Semantha, and that I would
+rather Ephraim should not go.
+
+"Prudence lifted up both hands, as if she was too horrified to speak,
+and looked at Semantha. Semantha giggled. She was one of those girls who
+are always laughing foolishly.
+
+"As for Ephraim, his face was dark, and his voice was cold and hard, as
+he said, 'From what we have seen tonight, Mercy, I don't think it can
+make much difference to you what I do'; and then, without another word,
+went out.
+
+"Presently I heard the sleigh-bells, and in a moment Ephraim came in at
+the front door. I hurried out to him. I would make one more effort, I
+thought.
+
+"He stopped on seeing me.
+
+"'Are you going to leave me for Semantha? You are very unkind to me!' I
+said passionately.
+
+"'You are foolish, Mercy. Semantha is our guest, and I have shown her no
+more attention than she has a right to.'
+
+"'Can't you see, Ephraim?' I cried. 'Don't you know that she came here
+on purpose to make trouble between you and me, and that Prudence is
+helping her?'
+
+"He looked surprised, then wholly incredulous. 'You are mistaken, Mercy.
+You are prejudiced against Semantha.'
+
+"I grew angry. I did not know that many men, acute enough to all else,
+are stone-blind where the wiles of a woman are concerned. 'You may go
+then, if you like. I see you don't care for me,' I said bitterly.
+
+"'You know I do care for you,' said Ephraim. His voice was softer. I
+might have won him then, if I would have stooped to persuade. But I
+would not. My pride was hurt. I turned away from him.
+
+"Presently Semantha came out and they drove off.
+
+"Pretty soon Elihu Parsons brought his sleigh round, flung down the
+reins, and came in to say good night. He held my hand and lingered,
+talking, when I was eager for his going. My gayety had fled, and every
+word cost me a pang. At last he said, 'I am going by your house. Can I
+carry any message for you?'
+
+"A wild thought darted into my mind, 'Going by our house? O, if I might
+go too!'
+
+"'You can!' he said eagerly. 'I will take you with the greatest
+pleasure.'
+
+"In an instant I had resolved to go. It seemed to me that I should die
+if I stayed under that roof another night. So I begged him to wait a
+minute, ran up stairs, packed my things; and came down and told the
+family that I was going home. They seemed thunderstruck. Only Prudence
+spoke.
+
+"'Very well,' said she. 'But I suppose you know it is all over between
+you and Ephraim if you go off in this way.'
+
+"I told her that I knew it was all over, thanks to her, and I hoped it
+was a pleasure to her to reflect that she had separated two persons who
+would never have had a hard thought of each other but for her. Mary came
+out into the entry to me crying, and said she hoped we should make it
+up. But I told her that was not likely. And so we drove away.
+
+"I was dull enough now, and Elihu had the talk mostly to himself. It was
+not till we were almost home that he said something which roused me up.
+And then I was angry with him, and asked him what he thought of me to
+suppose I would so readily on with the new love before I was off with
+the old. But I had no sooner made this speech than I burst into tears,
+and prayed him to forgive me, for I knew I had done wrong, and not say
+any more to me, since I was so wretched. I do not know well what reply
+he made, for before I had done speaking I was at home. There was the
+dear old house I had so longed for,--the little, homely, unpainted
+house, with the well-sweep taller than itself, and the great clump of
+lilacs by the front door.
+
+"I went up the path unsteadily; my head was swimming, and there was a
+curious noise in my ears. I pushed open the door. There was father with
+the open Bible before him, and his spectacles lying upon it; the room
+was bright with the fire and the light of the pine-knot, and mother was
+spinning on the little wheel, as she frequently did in the evening. Her
+face wore its own sweet, peaceful look, but when she saw me the
+expression changed to one of alarm. She said afterward that I looked
+more like a ghost than anything else.
+
+"Why, Mercy!' she cried.
+
+"Father turned slowly round, and beyond that I remember nothing. I fell
+on the floor in a dead faint.
+
+"Mother said I talked all night about what had been troubling me.
+Through all my delirium, I had an aching consciousness that Ephraim was
+lost to me forever. I would rise to go to him, as I thought, but when I
+reached the place where he had been, there was only Prudence or
+Semantha.
+
+"In the morning the doctor came, and said it was scarlet fever. The
+other children had got over it in childhood, but it had waited for me
+till now.
+
+"I was very sick for a whole month. All that time mother was an angel of
+goodness to me. When I was able to sit up, she told me that Ephraim had
+been to inquire for me often. But she said no more, and I could not tell
+her the trouble then.
+
+"I was wasted to a shadow, and was as weak as an hour-old babe. Mother
+used to tuck me up in the great arm-chair, and then the boys would push
+the chair to the window, where I could look out.
+
+"A great snow had fallen during my sickness. It had begun the night I
+came home, as Semantha predicted, and the roads had been almost
+impassable. But they were quite good again now, and father said the time
+had come for him to go down below. It was late in February, and he said
+we should not have a great deal more snow, he thought, and if he waited
+till the spring thaws came, there would be no getting to Boston.
+
+"It was arranged that the oldest boy at home should go with father, so
+that there would be nobody left with mother and me but Jem and David.
+Jem was eight years old, and David six come May; but they were both
+smart, and we thought, with their help, we could take care of the cattle
+till father came back.
+
+"I could not do much yet, and I sat in my arm-chair while mother fried
+doughnuts, and baked great loaves of bread, and made puddings, and
+roasted chickens, for them to take for food on the journey. Father's way
+was to carry his own provisions, and stay at night with friends and
+relations along the road; even if the sleighing was good, and nothing
+happened, he would be a week or more in going to Boston. So, of course,
+the supply must be pretty generous.
+
+"It was a still, bright morning when they set off, with a sky so clear
+that father thought there would be no storm for many days. After the
+excitement of their starting passed away, it seemed very quiet and
+lonesome; for you remember, though I have not said anything about it,
+that my heart was aching for its lost love.
+
+"I had said nothing about it to mother yet, but after they were gone,
+and the chores done up for the night, and the boys playing with their
+cob-houses in the corner, she sat down beside me, saying, 'Now, Mercy,
+tell me all about the trouble between you and Ephraim.' As well as I
+could for crying, I told her, feeling very much ashamed when I came to
+the part about Elihu. But mother was very gentle, and only said, 'I
+fear, my child, that savors of an unregenerate heart.'
+
+"That was true. But while I had been sick I had thought very seriously,
+and I was thankful I had not been taken away while my heart was in such
+a state. I did not dare to tell mother how God's goodness had shone down
+upon me while I lay ill in my bed, but I hoped and prayed that it would
+not leave me.
+
+"It was a relief as well as pain to see that mother blamed Ephraim. She
+said he should not have allowed himself to be deceived and influenced by
+Prudence. I told her I was sure he could not have loved me as he ought,
+and that I thought I would send back to him the little presents he had
+made me, and say that I did not hold him to his promise.
+
+"Mother agreed with me, and the next day I made up the package. There
+was a string of gold beads, and a pair of silver shoe-buckles, and a
+Chinese fan, and a hymn-book, the bunch of witch-hazel blossoms he
+picked for me that day in the woods, and, more precious than all the
+rest, a letter, six foolscap pages in length, that he had written in the
+fall, while I was visiting my cousin in Keene.
+
+"I could not help crying-while I was putting them up, and I took out the
+letter twice, thinking I might keep that. But mother said, if we were
+indeed to be separated, it was my duty to forget my love for Ephraim,
+else it would darken all my life; and life, she said, was given us for
+cheerful praise, and work, which is also praise.
+
+"After I had sent my package by the mail-rider, who passed Mr. Allen's
+house every other day, I thought my trouble would be easier to bear. But
+every day made it harder. I fell into a miserable torpid state, taking
+no interest in anything, and feeling only my misery acutely. I could not
+even pray for help, for prayer itself was a cross.
+
+"Mother was very good to me; she gave me light, pleasant work to do,
+thinking to keep me busy. But however busy my hands were, my thoughts
+were free, and used their freedom to make me suffer.
+
+"Father had been gone eight days, when one afternoon mother came in from
+the barn, where she had been to shake down some hay for the cows, with a
+face so sober that I was frightened at once.
+
+"'Why, mother! what is the matter?' I cried.
+
+"'I'm worried about your father, child,' she said, and then she went to
+the window and looked out.
+
+"'Why, mother, if he started for home yesterday--'
+
+"'He would be just in season to be caught in the snow,' she interrupted,
+with a vehemence unnatural to her.
+
+"'Snow, mother!'
+
+"I rose, and went to the window. The sky was full of great masses of
+gray clouds, that sometimes parted, and showed a steel-colored
+background, intense and cold, and immeasurably distant. Wide before us
+spread the waste, white, uninhabited fields,--the nearest house a mile
+away, and its chimney only visible above the hills which hid it. A
+tawny, brazen belt of light lying along the west, where the sun had gone
+down, illuminated the snow, and gave a weird character to the whole
+scene. There was a high wind swaying the tops of the tall trees before
+the house; and once in a while you would see a fragment of cloud caught
+from the great gray curtain, and torn into shreds, or ravelled into a
+thin web, which seemed for a moment to shut close down upon us. It was a
+strange night, a strange sky.
+
+"I felt a vague alarm. But I tried to speak cheerfully. 'It is too cold
+to snow, mother!'
+
+"She pointed to the window. Even as I spoke the air was suddenly
+darkened by a multitude of fine flakes, that crowded faster and faster,
+and were swirled about by the wind, and quickly built up a wall around
+the door.
+
+"As it grew dark the storm increased. The wind, which had been blowing
+steadily all day, rose to a gale. It tugged at the doors and windows; it
+thundered down the chimney; it caught the little house, and shook it
+till the timbers creaked; the noise was truly awful. We got the boys
+into the trundle-bed as soon as we could, and then mother brought out
+her wheel, and I took my knitting. There was a great blazing fire on the
+hearth, and the room was so warm that the yarn ran beautifully. Mother
+made out her stint that night; she was a famous spinner, and the wheel
+went as fast and the yarn was as even as if she had not been so
+dreadfully worried about father. But every few minutes she would stop
+and say she hoped he had not started, or that, having set out, he would
+be warned in time, and stop by the way.
+
+"It was so strange to see mother, who was usually calm, so put about
+that I got very nervous, and was glad when she stopped the wheel, and
+twisted up the yarn she had spun. But as she turned around toward me
+with it in her hand, she looked so strange that I cried out to know what
+was the matter.
+
+"'It is nothing,' she whispered; but I took hold of her, and steadied
+her down into the arm-chair, and then ran for the camphor. That brought
+her round; but now she looked feverish, and was shaking all over, and I
+knew that she was going to have one of her ill turns,--possibly
+lung-fever,--for her lungs were but weak, and she rarely got over the
+winter without a fever. The thought made me half wild, but I dared not
+wait to cry or fret. I knew there was no time to be lost, and I hurried
+around, and gave her a warm foot-bath, and kept hot flannels on her
+chest, and made her drink a nice bowl of herb tea as soon as she was in
+bed; for I thought when the perspiration started she would be relieved.
+I was glad enough when the great drops stood on her forehead. Yet the
+hard breathing and the rattling in the chest were not cured. I kept
+renewing the steaming flannels, as the doctor always directed, till she
+fell asleep. She slept almost all night, and I sat in the chair by her,
+occasionally rousing up to put more wood on the fire, and listen to the
+wind, which still held as fierce as it was at sundown.
+
+"By and by I dozed,--I don't know how long, but I was wakened by hearing
+Jem call out, 'Mercy! why don't it come day?'
+
+"I started up. My fire had gone down, and the room was dark. Mother was
+breathing heavily beside me.
+
+"'I say, Mercy, isn't it morning? Why don't we get up?' persisted Jem.
+
+"I begged him to be still, and, rising, made my way to the clock. I
+could not see the face, but by touching the hands I made out that it
+was eight o'clock. I knew now that we were snowed up, and that was the
+reason why it was so dark.
+
+"I kindled up the fire and lighted a pine knot. Jem and David came up to
+the hearth to dress, half crying and fretting for mother. But I pacified
+them with a breakfast of bread and milk, and while they were eating it I
+ventured to open a door. There was a solid wall of snow, I looked into
+the fore-room,--it was as dark as a cellar. Then I ran up my stairs, and
+here the little courage I had forsook me, and I grew weak and sick. For
+the snow was already even with the ledge of the chamber window, and all
+the outbuildings were as completely hidden as if the earth had swallowed
+them in the night.
+
+"I ran down stairs hastily, for I heard mother call.
+
+"She looked up at me anxiously. 'How is it, Mercy?'
+
+"'I'm afraid, mother, we are snowed up,' I said.
+
+"'And I'm sick!'
+
+"Mother was sick. That was the worst side of the trouble. It was a
+settled fever by this time, I was sure. We both knew it, we both knew
+that no help was to be had, and that she might die for want of it. We
+were both silent, neither daring to speak, not knowing how to encourage
+and strengthen the other.
+
+"Mother grew worse all day, in spite of all that I could do for her. The
+darkness in the house was most depressing, and made the situation
+tenfold more painful; though I kept a fire and a light burning as at
+evening, I had to be economical of both, for there was only a small
+stock of fuel and a handful of pine knots in the house. It was painful
+to hear the poor cows at the barn lowing for food, and to know that it
+was impossible to reach them. I might, perhaps, have gone out on
+snow-shoes and managed to get into the barn by the window in the loft;
+but father's shoes were loaned to a neighbor, and, even if they had
+been at hand, I should hardly dare to risk my strength, not yet
+renovated after my sickness, and, which was so essential to mother's
+safety, in an effort that might fail.
+
+"So the hours went on, and the day that was like night wore to a close.
+In the evening mother brightened up a little. She was calm now, and for
+the time free from pain. There was an unearthly beauty in the large,
+bright hollow eyes, and the thin cheeks, where the rose of fever burned.
+The disease had worked swiftly. Even this revival might be only a
+forerunner of death.
+
+"'I want to tell you, dear,' she said, 'what to do in case I should not
+get well.'
+
+"I hid my face in the quilt, and tried not to sob, while she went on, in
+a sweet, calm, thoughtful way, to tell me of the things that in my
+inexperience I might forget. I must not be wasteful of food or fuel; if
+the snow--which was still falling--should cover the chimney so that I
+could not make a fire, I must wrap myself and the children in all the
+warm things I could find,--there were some new blankets in the chest in
+the chamber, she said, that she had meant for me. I must get those if I
+needed them. 'And if I am not here to encourage you, my child,' she said
+tenderly, 'don't give up hoping. Help cannot be very far off. Some of
+the neighbors will come to us, or father will work his way through the
+snow, and get home. And, Mercy, don't be afraid of the poor body that I
+shall leave behind me. Think of it as the empty house that I have used
+for a little while, and be sure it can do you no harm.'
+
+"I promised all she asked, and hid my tears as well as I could. While
+she slept, and I could do nothing for her, I kept the children quiet
+with playthings and stories. I cooked bread and meat, and made a great
+kettle of porridge against the time when we might not be able to have a
+fire; I hunted in the garret for bits of old boards and broken
+furniture that might serve for fuel.
+
+"For two days the wind held, and then there fell an awful silence as of
+the grave.
+
+"Sometimes I read from the Psalms, or from the Gospel of John, which
+mother dearly loved; and though she did not take much notice, but lay in
+a stupor most of the time, the holy words were comfort and company to
+me. At other times I sat in mute grief, watching her painful breathing,
+and the gradual pinching and sharpening of her features as the
+relentless disease worked upon them. O, it was hard! I don't think many
+lives know so much and such utter misery. In my anxiety and grief, and
+the mental bewilderment resulting from loss of sleep, I forgot to reckon
+the days as they passed.
+
+"But one day, as I sat by mother's pillow, my mind full of the dread
+that seemed now as if it might any moment be realized,--of the awfulness
+of being left alone in that living tomb with the marble image of what
+was and yet was not my mother, the clock struck nine in the morning.
+Somewhere the sun was shining, I thought. Somewhere there were happy
+lovers, merry-makings in divers places, wedding-bells ringing.
+
+"A faint sound disturbed my revery. I started up and listened intently;
+but the noise did not recur, and I dropped my head again, thinking my
+fancy had cheated me.
+
+"I don't know why it was that what failed to reach my strained ear found
+its way to mother's; but all at once, from having been in a stupid state
+from which I could hardly rouse her, she opened her eyes, and said,
+'What is that?'
+
+"'Do you hear anything?' I asked, trembling. But before she could
+answer, I too heard a shout.
+
+"Help was at hand! And mother might yet be saved!
+
+"I burst into tears, and Jem and David set up a loud cry for company.
+Those outside heard it, for the next instant there was a great halloo.
+They were cutting their way through the drift,--they came every minute
+nearer and nearer. Pretty soon I heard a voice that set my heart beating
+and made me sob again. It was Ephraim's.
+
+"'Are you all alive?' he cried.
+
+"'We are all alive, but mother is very sick.'
+
+"I don't know how long it took to tunnel that huge snow-drift. I sat
+holding mother's hand till there was a noise at the door. I sprang up
+then, and the next instant stood face to face with Ephraim. And we did
+not meet as we had parted.
+
+"I was glad to think that we owed our deliverance to him. He had roused
+up the neighbors, and they came over that trackless waste on snow-shoes.
+On snow-shoes Ephraim went for the doctor, and mother began to mend from
+the time of his coming.
+
+"It was a week before father got home. Yet he had come as fast as the
+roads would let him, travelling night and day in his eagerness to reach
+us. He told us of houses snowed up, and people and animals perishing
+miserably. And by God's grace we were saved, even to the cows, which in
+their hunger had broken loose from their stalls, and eaten the hay from
+the mow.
+
+"And so my life's greatest joy and pain came to me by the storm. It gave
+Ephraim back to me. For forty years as man and wife we had never a hard
+word.
+
+"'Tis thirty years since he went,--thirty years of Heaven's peace for
+him. I did not think to wait so long when he went. The children have
+been very good to me, but I've missed their father always. But I shall
+go to him soon. Son Ephraim, I am ninety-two to-morrow!"
+
+
+
+
+TOUJOURS AMOUR.
+
+
+    Prithee tell me, Dimple-Chin,
+    At what age does Love begin?
+    Your blue eyes have scarcely seen
+    Summers three, my fairy queen,
+    But a miracle of sweets,
+    Soft approaches, sly retreats,
+    Show the little archer there,
+    Hidden in your pretty hair:
+    When didst learn a heart to win?
+    Prithee tell me, Dimple-Chin!
+
+        "Oh!" the rosy lips reply,
+        "I can't tell you if I try!
+      'Tis so long I can't remember:
+        Ask some younger Miss than I!"
+
+    Tell, O tell me, Grizzled-Face,
+    Do your heart and head keep pace?
+    When does hoary Love expire,
+    When do frosts put out the fire?
+    Can its embers burn below
+    All that chill December snow?
+    Care you still soft hands to press,
+    Bonny heads to smooth and bless?
+    When does Love give up the chase?
+    Tell, O tell me, Grizzled-Face!
+
+        "Ah!" the wise old lips reply,
+        "Youth may pass and strength may die;
+      But of Love I can't foretoken:
+        Ask some older Sage than I!"
+
+
+
+
+AMONG THE WORKERS IN SILVER.
+
+
+Excursionists to Lake Superior, when they get away up in the northern
+part of Lake Huron, where are those "four thousand islands" lying flat
+and green in the sun, without a tree or a hut upon them, see at length,
+in the distance, a building like a large storehouse, evidently not made
+by Indian hands. The thing is neither rich nor rare; the only wonder is,
+how it got there. For many hours before coming in sight of this
+building, no sign of human life is visible, unless, perchance, the
+joyful passengers catch sight of a dug-out canoe, with a blanket for a
+sail, in which an Indian fisherman sits solitary and motionless, as
+though he too were one of the inanimate features of the scene. On
+drawing near this most unexpected structure, the curiosity of the
+travellers is changed into wild wonder. It is a storehouse with all the
+modern improvements, and over the door is a well-painted sign, bearing
+the words,
+
+                    RASPBERRY JAM.
+
+If the present writer, when he first beheld this sign, had read thereon,
+"Opera-Glasses for hire," or "Kid Gloves cleaned by a new and improved
+method," he could not have been more surprised or more puzzled. The
+explanation, however, was very simple. Many years ago, it seems, a
+Yankee visiting that region discovered thousands upon thousands of acres
+of raspberry-bushes hanging full of fruit, and all going to waste. He
+also observed that Indian girls and squaws in considerable numbers lived
+near by. Putting this and that together, he conceived the idea of a
+novel speculation. In the summer following he returned to the place,
+with a copper kettle, many barrels of sugar, and plenty of large stone
+jars. For one cent a pail he had as many raspberries picked as he could
+use; and he kept boiling and jarring until he had filled all his vessels
+with jam, when he put them on board a sloop, took them down to Detroit,
+and sold them. The article being approved, and the speculation being
+profitable, he returned every year to the raspberry country, and the
+business grew to an extent which warranted the erection of this large
+and well-appointed building. In the Western country, the raspberry jam
+made in the region of Lake Huron has been for twenty years an
+established article of trade. We had the curiosity once to taste tarts
+made of it, and can testify that it was as bad as heart could wish. It
+appeared to be a soggy mixture of melted brown sugar and small seeds.
+
+But that is neither here nor there. The oddity of our adventure was in
+discovering such an establishment in such a place. Since that time we
+have often had similar surprises, especially in New England, where
+curious industries have established themselves in the most
+out-of-the-way nooks. In a hamlet of three or four houses and a church,
+we see such signs as "Melodeon Manufactory." At a town in Northern
+Vermont we find four hundred men busy, the year round, in making those
+great Fairbanks Scales, which can weigh an apple or a train of cars.
+There is nothing in St. Johnsbury which marks it out as the town in the
+universe fittest to produce huge scales for mankind. The business exists
+there because, forty years ago, there were three excellent heads in the
+place upon the shoulders of three brothers, who put those heads
+together, and learned how to make and how to sell scales. All over New
+England, industries have rooted themselves which appear to have no
+congruity with the places in which they are found. We heard the other
+day of a village in which are made every year three bushels of gold
+rings. We ourselves passed, some time ago, in a remarkably plain New
+England town, a manufactory of fine diamond jewelry. In another
+town--Providence--there are seventy-two manufactories of common jewelry.
+Now what is there in the character or in the situation of this city of
+Roger Williams, that should have invited thither so many makers of cheap
+trinkets? It is a solid town, that makes little show for its great
+wealth, and contains less than the average number of people capable of
+wearing tawdry ornaments. Nevertheless, along with machine-shops of
+Titanic power, and cotton-mills of vast extent, we find these
+seventy-two manufactories of jewelry. The reason is, that, about the
+year 1795, one man, named Dodge, prospered in Providence by making such
+jewelry as the simple people of those simple old times would buy of the
+passing pedler. His prosperity lured others into the business, until it
+has grown to its present proportions, and supplies half the country with
+the glittering trash which we all despise upon others and love upon
+ourselves.
+
+But there is something at Providence less to be expected even than
+seventy-two manufactories of jewelry: it is the largest manufactory of
+solid silver-ware in the world! In a city so elegant and refined as
+Providence, where wealth is so real and stable, we should naturally
+expect to find on the sideboards plenty of silver plate; but we were
+unprepared to discover there three or four hundred skilful men making
+silver-ware for the rest of mankind, and all in one establishment,--that
+of the Gorham Manufacturing Company. This is not only the largest
+concern of the kind in existence, but it is the most complete. Every
+operation of the business, from the melting of the coin out of which the
+ware is made, to the making of the packing-boxes in which it is conveyed
+to New York, takes place in this one congregation of buildings. Nor do
+we hesitate to say, after an attentive examination of the products of
+European taste, that the articles bearing the stamp of this American
+house are not equalled by those imported. There is a fine simplicity and
+boldness of outline about the forms produced here, together with an
+absence of useless and pointless ornament, which render them at once
+more pleasing and more useful than any others we have seen.
+
+It was while going over this interesting establishment, that the
+raspberry-jam incident recurred to us. _This_ thing, however, is both
+rich and rare; and yet the wonder remains how it got there. It got there
+because, forty years ago, an honest man began there a business which has
+grown steadily to this day. It got there just as all the rooted
+businesses of New England got where we find them now. In the brief
+history of this one enterprise we may read the history of the industry
+of New England. Not the less, however, ought the detailed history to be
+written; for it would be a book full of every kind of interest and
+instruction.
+
+It was an honest man, we repeat, who founded this establishment. We
+believe there is no house of business of the first class in the world,
+of thirty years' standing, the success of which is not clearly traceable
+to its serving the public with fidelity. An old clerk of Mr. A. T.
+Stewart of New York informed us that, in the day of small things, many
+years ago, when Mr. Stewart had only a retail dry-goods store of
+moderate extent, one of the rules of the establishment was this: "_Don't
+recommend goods; but never fail to point out defects_." Now a man
+struggling with the difficulties of a new business, who lays down a rule
+of that nature, must be either a very honest or a very able man. He is
+likely to be both, for sterling ability is necessarily honest. It is not
+surprising, therefore, that Mr. Stewart is now the monarch of the
+dry-goods trade in the world; and we fully believe that the history of
+all _lasting_ success would disclose a similar root of honesty. In all
+the businesses which have to do with the precious metals and precious
+stones, honesty is the prime necessity; because in them, though it is
+the easiest thing in the world to cheat, the cheat is always capable of
+being detected and proved. A great silver-house holds itself bound to
+take back an article of plate made forty years ago, if it is discovered
+that the metal is not equal in purity to the standard of the silver coin
+of the country in which it was made. The entire and perfect natural
+honesty, therefore, of Jabez Gorham, was the direct cause of the
+prosperity of the house which he founded. He is now a serene and healthy
+man of eighty-two, long ago retired from business. He walks about the
+manufactory, mildly wondering at the extent to which its operations have
+extended. "It is grown past me," he says with a smile; "I know nothing
+about all this."
+
+In the year 1805, this venerable old man was an apprentice to that Mr.
+Dodge who began in Providence the manufacture of ear-rings, breastpins,
+and rings,--the only articles made by the Providence jewellers for many
+years. In due time Jabez Gorham set up for himself; and he added to the
+list of articles the important item of watch-chains of a peculiar
+pattern, long known in New England as the "Gorham chain." The old
+gentleman gives an amusing account of the simple manner in which
+business was done in those days. When he had manufactured a trunkful of
+jewelry, he would jog away with it to Boston, where, after depositing
+the trunk in his room, he would go round to all the jewellers in the
+city to inform them of his arrival, and to say that his jewelry would be
+ready in his room for inspection on the following morning at ten
+o'clock, and not before. Before the appointed hour every jeweller in the
+town would be at his door; but as it was a point of honor to give them
+all an equal chance, no one was admitted till the clock struck, when all
+pushed in in a body. The jewelry was spread out on the bed, around which
+all the jewellers of Boston, in 1820, could gather without crowding.
+Each man began by placing his hat in some convenient place, and it was
+in his hat that he deposited the articles selected by him for purchase.
+When the whole stock had been transferred from the bed to the several
+hats, Mr. Gorham took a list of the contents of each; whereupon the
+jewellers packed their purchases, and carried them home. In the course
+of the day, the bills were made out; and the next morning Mr. Gorham
+went his rounds and collected the money. The business being thus happily
+concluded, he returned to Providence, to work uninterruptedly for
+another six months. In this manner, Jabez Gorham conducted business for
+sixteen years, before he ever thought of attempting silver-ware. Such
+was his reputation for scrupulous honesty, that, for many years before
+he left the business, none of his customers ever subjected his work to
+any test whatever, not even to that of a pair of scales. It is his
+boast, that, during the whole of his business career of more than half
+a century, he never sold an article of a lower standard of purity than
+the one established by law or by the nature of the precious metals.
+
+About the year 1825, some Boston people discovered that a tolerable
+silver spoon could be made much thinner than the custom of the trade had
+previously permitted, and that these thin spoons could be sold by
+pedlers very advantageously. The consequence of this discovery was, that
+silver spoons became an article of manufacture in Boston, whence pedlers
+conveyed them to the remotest nooks of New England. One day, in 1830,
+the question occurred to Jabez Gorham, Why not make spoons in
+Providence, and sell them to the pedlers who buy our jewelry? The next
+time he took his trunk of trinkets to Boston, he looked about him for a
+man who knew something of the art of spoon-making. One such he found, a
+young man just "out of his time," whom he took back with him to
+Providence, where he established him in an odd corner of his jewelry
+shop. In this small way, thirty-seven years ago, the business began
+which has grown to be the largest and most complete manufactory of
+silver-ware in the world. For the first ten years he made nothing but
+spoons, thimbles, and silver combs, with an occasional napkin-ring, if
+any one in Providence was bold enough to order one. Businesses grew very
+slowly in those days. It was thought a grand success when Jabez Gorham,
+after nearly twenty years' exertion, had fifteen men employed in making
+spoons, forks, thimbles, napkin-rings, children's mugs, and such small
+ware. Nor would Mr. Gorham, of his own motion, have ever carried the
+business much farther; certainly not to the point of producing articles
+that approach the rank of works of art. We have heard the old gentleman
+say, that he often stood at a store-window in Boston, wondering by what
+process certain operations were performed in silver, the results of
+which he saw before him in the form of pitchers and teapots.
+
+But in due course of time Mr. John Gorham, the present head of the
+house, eldest son of the founder, came upon the scene,--an aspiring,
+ingenious young man, whose nature it was to excel in anything in which
+he might chance to engage. The silversmith's art was then so little
+known in the United States that neither workmen nor information could be
+obtained here in its higher branches. Mr. John Gorham crossed the ocean
+soon after coming of age, and examined every leading silver
+establishment in Europe. He was freely admitted everywhere, as no one in
+the business had ever thought of America as a possible competitor; still
+less did any one see in this quiet Yankee youth the person who was to
+annihilate the American demand for European, silver-ware, and produce
+articles which famous European houses would servilely copy. From the
+time of Mr. John Gorham's return dates the eminence of the present
+company, and of the production of the costlier kinds of silver-ware, on
+a great scale, in the United States. From first to last, the company
+have induced sixty-three accomplished workmen to come from Europe and
+settle in Providence, some of whom might not unjustly be enrolled in the
+list of artists.
+
+The war gave an amazing development to this business, as it did to all
+others ministering to pleasure or the sense of beauty. When the war
+began, in 1861, the Gorham Company employed about one hundred and fifty
+men; and in 1864 this number had increased to four hundred, all engaged
+in making articles of solid silver. Even with this great force the
+company were sometimes unable to supply the demand for their beautiful
+products. On Christmas morning, 1864, there was left in the store in
+Maiden Lane, New York, but seven dollars' worth of ware, out of an
+average stock of one hundred thousand dollars' worth. Perhaps we ought
+not to be surprised at this. Consider our silver weddings. It is not
+unusual for several thousands of dollars' worth of silver to be
+presented on these occasions,--in one recent instance, sixteen thousand
+dollars' worth was given. And what lady can be married, now-a-days,
+without having a few pounds of silver given to her? For Christmas
+presents, of course, silver-ware is always among the objects dangerous
+to the sanity of those who go forth, just before the holidays, with a
+limited purse and unlimited desires.
+
+What particularly surprises the visitor to the Gorham works at
+Providence is to see labor-saving machinery--the ponderous steam-hammer,
+the stamping and rolling apparatus--employed in silver work, instead of
+the baser metals to which they are usually applied. Nothing is done by
+hand which can be done by machinery; so that the three hundred men
+usually employed in solid ware are in reality doing the work of a
+thousand. The first operation is to buy silver coin in Wall Street. In a
+bag of dollars there are always some bad pieces; and as the company
+embark their reputation in every silver vessel that leaves the factory,
+and are always responsible for its purity, each dollar is wrenched
+asunder and its goodness positively ascertained before it is thrown into
+the crucible. The subsequent operations, by which these spoiled dollars
+are converted into objects of brilliant and enduring beauty, can better
+be imagined than described.
+
+New forms of beauty are the constant study of the artist in silver. One
+large apartment in the Gorham establishment--the artists' room--is a
+kind of magazine or storehouse of beautiful forms, which have been
+gathered in the course of years by Mr. George Wilkinson, the member of
+the company who has charge of the designing, and who is himself a
+designer of singular taste, fertility, and judgment. Here are deposited
+copies or drawings of all the former products of the establishment. Here
+is a large and most costly library of illustrated works in every
+department of art and science. Mr. Wilkinson gets ideas from works upon
+botany, sculpture, landscape,--from ancient bas-reliefs and modern
+porcelain; but, more frequently, from those large volumes which exhibit
+the glories of architecture. "The first requisite," he maintains, "of a
+good piece of silver-plate is that it be _well built_." The artist in
+silver has also to keep constantly in view the practical and commercial
+limitations of his art. The forms which he designs must be such as can
+be executed with due economy of labor and material, such as can be
+easily cleaned, and such as will please the taste of the
+silver-purchasing public. It is by his skill in complying with these
+inexorable conditions, while producing forms of real excellence, that
+Mr. Wilkinson has given such celebrity to the articles made by the
+company to which he belongs.
+
+Few of us, however, will ever be able to buy the dinner-sets, the
+tea-sets, the gorgeous salvers, and the tall epergnes with which the
+warerooms of this manufactory are filled. A silver salver of large size
+costs a thousand dollars. A complete dinner-set for a party of
+twenty-four costs twelve thousand dollars. The price of a nice tea-set
+can easily run into three thousand dollars. We noticed one small vase
+(six or eight inches high) exquisitely chased on two sides, which Mr.
+Wilkinson assured us it cost the company about seven hundred dollars to
+produce. There are, as yet, but two or three persons in all America who
+would be likely to become purchasers of the articles in silver which
+rank in Europe as works of art, and which are strictly entitled to that
+distinction. The wonder is who buys the massive utilities that are
+stacked away in such profusion in Maiden Lane. The Gorham Company have
+always in course of manufacture about three tons of silver, and usually
+have a ton of finished work for sale.
+
+An important branch of their business is one recently introduced,--the
+manufacture of a very superior kind of plated ware, intended to combine
+the strength of baser metal with the beauty of silver. The manufacture
+of such ware has attained great development in England of late years,
+owing chiefly to the application of the mysterious power of electricity
+to the laying-on of the silver. We must discourse a little upon this
+admirable application of science to the arts.
+
+Hamlet amused his friend Horatio by tracing the noble dust of Alexander
+till he found it stopping a bunghole. If we trace the course of
+discovery that resulted in this beautiful art, we shall have to reverse
+Hamlet's order: we must begin with the homely object, and end with
+magnificent ones. Electroplating, electrotyping, the electric telegraph,
+and many other arts and wonders, all go back to that dish of frogs which
+the amiable and fond Professor Galvani was preparing for his sick wife's
+dinner one day, about the year 1787. It was a curious reflection, when
+we were illuminating our houses to celebrate the laying of the first
+Atlantic cable, that this bewildering and unique triumph of man over
+nature had no more illustrious origin than the legs of an Italian frog.
+We are aware that the honor _has_ been claimed for a Neapolitan mouse.
+There _is_ a story in the books of a mouse in Naples that had the
+impudence, in 1786, to bite the leg of a professor of medicine, and was
+caught in the act by the professor himself, who punished his audacity by
+dissecting him. While doing so, he observed that, when he touched a
+nerve of the creature with his knife, its limbs were slightly convulsed.
+The professor was struck with the circumstance, was puzzled by it,
+mentioned it, and it was recorded; but as nothing further came of it, no
+connection can be established between that mouse and the splendors of
+silver-plated ware and the wonders of the telegraph. The claims of
+Professor Galvani's frog rest upon a sure foundation of fact. Signora
+Galvani--so runs one version of the story--lay sick upon a couch in a
+room in which there was that chaos of domestic utensils and
+philosophical apparatus that may still be observed sometimes in the
+abodes of men addicted to science. The Professor himself had prepared
+the frogs for the stew-pan, and left them upon a table near the
+conductor of an electrical machine. A student, while experimenting with
+the machine, chanced to touch with a steel instrument one of the frogs
+at the intersection of the legs. The sick lady observed that, as often
+as he did so, the legs were convulsed, or, as we now say, were
+_galvanized_. Upon her husband's return to the room, she mentioned this
+strange thing to him, and he immediately repeated the experiment.
+
+From 1760 to 1790, as the reader is probably aware, all the scientific
+world was on the _qui vive_ with regard to electricity. The most
+brilliant reputations of that century had been won by electric
+discoveries. Franklin was still alive, to reward with his benignant
+approval those who should contribute anything valuable after his own
+immense additions to man's knowledge of this alluring and baffling
+element. It was, therefore, as much the spirit of the time as the genius
+of the man, that made Galvani seize this new fact with eagerness, and
+investigate it with untiring enthusiasm. It was a sad day for the frogs
+of the Pope's dominions when Signora Galvani observed those two naked
+legs fly apart and crook themselves with so much animation. There was
+slaughter in the swamps of Bologna for many a month thereafter. For
+mankind, however, it was a day to be held in everlasting remembrance,
+since it was then that was taken the first step toward the galvanic
+battery!
+
+As fortune favors the brave, so accident aids the ingenious. After
+Professor Galvani had touched the muscles and nerves of many frogs with
+the spark drawn from the electrical machine, another accident occurred
+which led directly to the discovery of the galvanic battery. Having
+skinned a frog, he chanced to hang it by a _copper_ hook upon an _iron_
+nail; and thus, without knowing it, he brought together the elements of
+a battery,--two metals and a wet frog. His object in hanging up this
+frog was to see if the electricity of the atmosphere would produce any
+effects, however slight, similar to those produced when the spark of
+the machine was applied to the creature. It did not. After watching his
+frog awhile, the Professor was proceeding to take it down, and while in
+the act of doing so the legs were convulsed! Struck with this
+occurrence, he replaced the frog, took it down again, put it back, took
+it down, until he discovered that, as often as the damp frog (still
+hanging upon its copper hook) touched the iron nail, the contraction of
+the muscles took place, as if the frog had been touched by a conductor
+connected with an electrical machine. This experiment was repeated
+hundreds of times, and varied in as many ways as mortal ingenuity could
+devise. Galvani at length settled down upon the method following: he
+wrapped the nerves taken from the loins of a frog in a leaf of tin, and
+placed the legs of the frog upon a plate of copper; then, as often as
+the leaf of tin was brought in contact with the plate of copper, the
+legs of the frog were convulsed.
+
+People regard Charles Lamb's story of the discovery of roast pig as a
+most extravagant and impossible fiction; but, really, Professor Galvani
+comported himself very much in the manner of that great discoverer. It
+was no more necessary to employ the frog's nerves in the production of
+the electricity, than it was necessary to burn down a house in roasting
+pig for dinner. The poor frog contributed nothing to it but his
+dampness,--as every boy in a telegraph office now perceives. He was
+merely the _wet_ in the small galvanic battery. Professor Galvani,
+however, exulting in his discovery, leaped to the conclusion that this
+electricity was not the same as that produced by friction. He thought he
+had discovered the long-sought something by which the muscles move
+obedient to the will. "All creatures," he wrote, "have an electricity
+inherent in their economy, which resides specially in the nerves, and is
+by the nerves communicated to the whole body. It is secreted by the
+brain. The interior substance of the nerves is endowed with a
+conducting power for this electricity, and facilitates its movement and
+its passage from one part of the nervous system to another; while the
+oily coating of these organs hinders the dissipation of the fluid, and
+permits its accumulation." He also thought that the muscles were the
+Leyden jars of the animal system, in which the electricity generated by
+the brain and conducted by the nerves was hoarded up for use. When a man
+was tired, he had merely used his electricity too fast; when he was
+fresh, his Leyden jars were all full.
+
+The publication of these experiments in 1791, accompanied by Galvani's
+theory of animal electricity, produced a sensation in scientific circles
+only inferior to that caused by Franklin's demonstration of the identity
+of lightning with electricity, thirty years before. The murder of
+innocent frogs extended from the marshes of Bologna to the swamps of all
+Christendom. "Wherever," says a writer of the time, "frogs were to be
+found and two different metals could be procured, every one was anxious
+to see the mangled limbs of frogs brought to life in this wonderful
+way." Or, as Lamb says, in the dissertation upon Roast Pig: "The thing
+took wing, and now there was nothing to be seen but fire in every
+direction." At first the facts and the theory of Galvani were equally
+accepted; and a grateful world insisted upon styling the new science, as
+it was deemed, "Galvanism." Thus a word was added to all the languages,
+which has been found useful in its literal sense, and forcible in its
+figurative. Whatever we may think of Galvani's philosophy, we cannot
+deny that he immortalized his name. He died a few years after, fully
+satisfied with his theory, but having no suspicion of the many, the
+peculiar, the marvellous results that were to flow from the chance
+discovery of the fact, that a moist frog placed between two different
+metals was a kind of electrical machine.
+
+Among the Italians who caught at Galvani's discovery, the most skilful
+and learned was Professor Volta, of Como, who had been an ardent
+electrician from his youth. Many of our readers have seen this year the
+colossal statue of that great man, which adorns his native city on the
+southern shore of the lake. The statue was worthily decreed, because the
+matt who contributes ever so little to a grand discovery in
+science--provided that little is essential to it--ranks among the
+greatest benefactors of his species. And what did the admirable Volta
+discover? Reducing the labors of his long life to their simplest
+expression, we should say that his just claim to immortality consists in
+this,--he found out that the frog had nothing to do with the production
+of electricity in Galvani's experiment, but that a wet card or rag would
+do as well. This discovery was the central fact of his scientific career
+of sixty-four years. It took all of his familiar knowledge of
+electricity, acquired in twenty-seven years of entire devotion to the
+study, to enable him to interpret Galvani's apparatus so far as to get
+rid of the frog; and he spent the remaining thirty-seven years of his
+existence in varying the experiment thus freed from that "demd, damp,
+moist, unpleasant body." It was a severe affliction to the followers of
+Galvani and to the University of Bologna to have their darling theory of
+the nervous electricity so rudely yet so unanswerably refuted. "I do not
+need your frog!" exclaimed the too impetuous Volta. "Give me two metals
+and a moist rag, and I will produce your animal electricity. Your frog
+is nothing but a moist conductor, and in this respect is not as good as
+a wet rag." This was a decisive fact, and it silenced all but a few of
+the disciples of the dead Galvani.
+
+Volta was led to discard the frog by observing that no electric results
+followed when the two plates were of the same metal. Suspecting from
+this that the frog was merely a conductor (instead of the generator) of
+the electric fluid, he tried the experiment with a wet card placed
+between two pairs of plates, and thus discovered that the secret lay in
+the metals being heterogeneous. But it cost thousands of experiments to
+reach this result, and ten years of ceaseless thought and exertion to
+arrive at the invention of the "pile," which merely consists of many
+pairs of heterogeneous plates, each separated by a moist substance. The
+weight of so much metal squeezed the wet cloth dry, and this led to
+various contrivances for keeping it wet, resulting at last in the
+invention of the familiar "trough-battery," now employed in all
+telegraph offices and manufactories of electro-anything. Instead of
+Galvani's frog or Volta's wet rag, the conductor is a solution of
+sulphuric acid, which Volta himself suggested and employed. The negative
+electricity is conveyed to the earth by a wire, and the positive is
+conducted from pair to pair, increasing as it goes, until, if the
+battery is large enough, it may have the force to send a message round
+the world. And the current is continuous. The galvanic battery is an
+electrical machine that goes without turning a handle. By the galvanic
+battery, electricity is made subservient to man. Among other things, it
+sends his messages, faces his type with copper, silvers his coffee-pot,
+and coats the inside of his baby's silver mug with shining gold.
+
+The old methods of covering metals with a plating of silver were so
+difficult and laborious, that durable ware could never have been
+produced by them except at an expense which would have defeated the
+object. In those slow and costly ways plated articles were made as late
+as the year 1840; and thus they might be made at the present moment, if
+Signora Galvani had been looking the other way when the student touched
+the frog with his knife. More than fifty years elapsed before that
+chance discovery was made available in the art we are considering. For
+many years the discoveries of Galvani and Volta did not appear to add
+much to the resources of man, though they excited his "special wonder,"
+Elderly readers can perhaps remember the appalling accounts that used to
+be published, forty years ago or more, of the galvanizing of criminals
+after execution. In 1811, at Glasgow, a noted chemist tried the effect
+of a voltaic "pile" of two hundred and seventy pairs of plates upon the
+body of a murderer. As the various parts of the nervous system were
+subjected to the current, the most startling results followed. The whole
+body shuddered as with cold; one of the legs nearly kicked an attendant
+over; the chest heaved, and the lungs inhaled and exhaled. At one time,
+when all the power of the instrument was exerted, we are told that
+"every muscle of the countenance was simultaneously thrown into fearful
+action. Rage, horror, despair and anguish, and ghastly smiles, united
+their hideous expression on the murderer's face, surpassing far the
+wildest representations of a Fuseli or a Kean. At this period several of
+the spectators were obliged to leave the room from terror or sickness,
+and one gentleman fainted." The bodies of horses, oxen, and sheep were
+galvanized, with results the most surprising. Five men were unable to
+hold the leg of a horse subjected to the action of a powerful battery.
+
+So far as we know, nothing of much importance has yet been inferred from
+such experiments as these. Davy and Faraday, however, and their pupils,
+did not confine their attention to these barren wonders. Sir Humphry
+Davy took the "pile" as invented by Volta, in 1800, and founded by its
+assistance what may be styled a new science, and developed it to the
+point where it became available for the arts and utilities of man. The
+simple and easy process by which silver and gold are decomposed, and
+then deposited upon metallic surfaces, is only one of many ways in which
+the galvanic battery ministers to our convenience and pleasure. If the
+reader will step into a manufactory of plated ware, he will see, in the
+plating-room, a trough containing a liquid resembling tea as it comes
+from the teapot. Avoiding scientific terms, we may say that this liquid
+is a solution of silver, and contains about four ounces of silver to a
+gallon of water. There are also thin plates of silver hanging along the
+sides of the trough into the liquid. The galvanic battery which is to
+set this apparatus in motion is in a closet near by. The vessels to be
+plated, after being thoroughly cleaned and exactly weighed, are
+suspended in the liquid by a wire running along the top of the trough.
+When all is ready, the current of electricity generated by the small
+battery in the closet is made to pass through the trough, and along all
+the metallic surfaces therein contained. When this has been done, the
+spectator may look with all his eyes, but he cannot perceive that
+anything is going on. There is no bubbling, nor fizzing, nor any other
+noise or motion. The long row of vessels hang silently at their wire,
+immersed in their tea, and nobody appears to pay any attention to them.
+And so they continue to hang for hours,--for five or six or seven hours,
+if the design is to produce work which will answer some other purpose
+than selling. All this time a most wonderful and mysterious process is
+going on. That gentle current of electricity, noiseless and invisible as
+it is, is taking the silver held in the solution, and laying it upon the
+surfaces of those vessels, within and without; and at the same time it
+is decomposing the plates of silver hanging along the sides of the
+trough in such a way as to keep up the strength of the solution. We
+cannot recover from the wonder into which the contemplation of this
+process threw us. There are some things which the outside and occasional
+observer can never be done marvelling at. For our part, we never hear
+the click of a telegraphic apparatus without experiencing the same spasm
+of astonishment as when we were first introduced to that mystery. The
+beautiful manner, too, in which this silvering work is done! The most
+delicate brush in the most sympathetic hand could not lay on the colors
+of the palette so evenly, nor could a crucible melt the metals into a
+completer oneness.
+
+And here is the opportunity for fraud. In five minutes an article is
+coated with silver in every part, inside and out; and that mere "blush"
+of silver, as the platers term it, will receive as brilliant a polish,
+and look as well (for a month) as if it were solid plate. Nay, it will
+look rather better; since the silver deposited by this exquisite process
+is perfectly pure, while the silver employed in solid ware is of the
+coin standard,--one tenth alloy. The plater can deposit upon his work as
+little silver as he chooses, either by weakening his solution, or by
+leaving the articles in it for a very short time; and no man can detect
+the cheat with certainty except by an expensive and troublesome process.
+Nor will it suffice for the operator to attend to the strength of his
+solutions, and keep his eye upon the clock. As in certain conditions of
+the atmosphere we can scarcely get a spark from the electrical machine,
+so there are times when the galvanic battery works feebly, and when the
+silvering goes on much more slowly than usual. To guard against errors
+from this cause, there is no sure resource but a system of careful
+weighings. In such establishments as that of the Gorham Company of
+Providence, Tiffany's or Haughwout's of New York, Bailey's of
+Philadelphia, and Bigelow Brothers and Kennard's, or Palmer and
+Batchelder's, of Boston, each article is weighed before it is immersed
+in the solution, its weight is recorded, and it is allowed to remain in
+the solution until it has taken on the whole of the precious metal it
+was designed to receive.
+
+There was a lawsuit the other day in New York, which turned upon the
+quantity of silver deposited upon sundry gross of forks and spoons. The
+plater agreed to put upon them twelve ounces of silver to the gross,
+which is about as much as is ever deposited upon spoons or forks. If he
+had performed his contract, he would have spread over each table-spoon
+about as much silver as there is in a ten-cent piece; and such is the
+nature of silver that these spoons would have worn well for five or six
+years. In fact, there are no better plated spoons yet in use than these
+were designed to be. The plater meant to comply with the usages of the
+trade. He meant to put upon those spoons the quantity of silver which,
+in the trade, _stands_ for twelve ounces to the gross, which is about
+ten ounces to the gross. Such, was probably his virtuous intention, and
+he supposed he had carried out that intention. But when the spoons were
+put to the test, it was discovered that upon one hundred and forty-four
+table-spoons there were but three ounces and a half of silver. It came
+out on the trial that the plater never weighed his work, and trusted
+wholly to the length of time he left it in the solution. He appeared to
+be honestly indignant at the testimony showing that his spoons, which
+had been left four hours subject to the action of the battery, had
+acquired only a film of silver. To the eye of the purchaser, these
+spoons would have presented precisely the same appearance as the best
+plated ware in existence. For two or three months, or even for six
+months, they would have retained their brilliancy. What their appearance
+would have been at the end of a year or two we need not say, for most
+readers have encountered the spectacle in their pilgrimage through a
+world which is said to resemble plated articles of this quality in being
+"all a fleeting show."
+
+Every one is familiar with the gold lining that is now so generally seen
+in silver vessels. This is laid on by the same process as that which
+covers the outside with silver. The vessel is filled with a solution of
+gold, and in this solution a thin plate of gold is suspended. The
+electric current being made to pass through the interior thus prepared,
+the liquid bubbles up like soda-water, and in three or four minutes
+enough gold is deposited upon the inside surface for the purpose
+designed. When this is accomplished, nothing remains but to polish the
+vessel, within and without, and we have a piece of ware which is silver
+when we look at it, and golden when we drink from it.
+
+The obstacle to the introduction of the superior plated ware now made by
+the Gorham Company is its costliness. The best plated ware costs five
+times as much as the worst, and one fourth as much as solid silver. We
+saw the other day three large salvers, which, at a distance of six feet,
+looked very nearly alike. All of them bore a most brilliant polish, and
+all were elaborately decorated. One of them was a trashy article, made
+of an alloy of lead and tin, covered with a "blush" of silver. It had
+been stamped out and shaped at one blow by a stamping-machine, and left
+in the silver solution subject to the action of the battery for perhaps
+fifteen minutes. It was very heavy, and when it was suspended and struck
+it gave forth a dull leaden sound. The price of this abomination was
+thirty-seven dollars and a half, and it would last, with careful
+occasional usage, for a year. Daily use would disclose its real quality
+in a few weeks. Another of these salvers was of solid silver, to which
+no objection could be made except that its price was nine hundred and
+fifty dollars. The third was of that superior plated ware introduced
+recently by the Gorham Company of Providence. The base of this article
+was the metal now called nickel silver,--a mixture of copper, nickel,
+and zinc,--3 very hard and ringing compound, perfectly white, and
+capable of a high polish. Upon this hard surface as much silver had been
+deposited as upon the best Sheffield plated ware, which is about as
+much as can be smoothly put upon it by the electro-plating process. When
+this salver was struck, it rang like a bell, and it would not bend under
+the weight of a man. Such a salver, used continually, will retain its
+lustre for a whole generation, and when, after that long period, it
+begins to lose its silver coating, it can be re-silvered and made as
+good as ever. But the price of this article was two hundred
+dollars,--more than five times the cost of the leaden trash, and a
+fourth of the price of the solid salver. Nevertheless, plated ware of
+this quality is the only kind which it is good economy to buy. There are
+few more extravagant purchases we can make in housekeeping than lead and
+brass ware, covered with a film of silver so thin that one ounce of the
+precious metal can actually be spread over two acres of it.
+
+One fact can easily be borne in mind: good serviceable plated articles
+cost, and _must_ cost, from one fourth to one third as much as similar
+articles of solid silver. Anything of a much lower standard than this is
+trash and vulgarity.
+
+For our part, we prefer good plated ware to solid plate. In plated ware
+we can now have all the beauty of form, all the brilliancy of surface,
+all the durability and utility of solid silver, without its excessive
+costliness, without appearing to be guilty of ostentation, without
+putting our neighbors to shame, and without offering a perpetual
+temptation to burglars.
+
+
+
+
+WHAT WE FEEL.
+
+
+It would seem to be folly for any one to maintain that grass is not
+green, that sugar is not sweet, that the rose has no odor and the
+trumpet no tone. A man would seem to be out of his senses deliberately
+to doubt what the world thinks to be simple truths. Yet this paper will
+deliberately question these truths. It will endeavor to demonstrate that
+the greenness, the sweetness, the fragrance, the music, are not inherent
+qualities of the objects themselves, but are cerebral sensations, whose
+existence is limited to the senses of organized beings.
+
+Is grass green? First let us inquire what green is,--what color is.
+Light is now understood to be an undulation of the interstellar ether,
+that inconceivably rare, elastic expanse of matter which occupies all
+space,--an undulation communicated by the incandescent envelope of suns.
+It moves with such wondrous rapidity as to traverse hundreds of
+thousands of miles in a second. Such is the generally received
+explanation of the phenomenon of light; but there is much yet to be
+explained for which this simple undulation of matter seems to be an
+insufficient cause. These waves of motion have different lengths and
+rates of velocity; but the union of them all gives to the human eye the
+impression of white light. When a prism intercepts their flow, it, so to
+speak, assorts these differing waves; and, being separated, they then
+impress the eye with the color of the spectrum, the retina being
+differently affected by the differing velocities with which it is
+touched by the ethereal waves. Color, then, is the sensation of the
+brain, responsive to the touch of the motion of ether; and the brain is
+only thus affected when these waves are thrown back from some object to
+the eye. The multiplicity of tints and hues are reflections from the
+objects which appear to possess them as structural characters. Some of
+the waves pass into the objects and through them, others are arrested by
+them and absorbed, others rebound from them like a ball from a wall; and
+these last, breaking upon the optic nerve, give to it certain sensations
+which we designate as colors. A wave of a certain velocity and length
+gives us a certain sensation which we call blue; another awakens the
+sensation we call yellow. The two series of waves, mingling, produce a
+new sensation which we call green. The necessity of reflection for the
+production of these sensations is evident. The mingled waves have no
+color in their incident flow; but, striking some object, these waves
+become separated, some being absorbed, and the reflected ones produce
+the peculiar sensation we call color.
+
+We know that these varying conditions of light which affect us as color
+have an absolute being. The photographer carries on his nice operations
+behind a yellow screen undisturbed, when the substitution of a pink one
+would at once allow of the chemical action of the other rays of light on
+his plate, to the destruction of his image. Still, the pink and the
+yellow, as colors, are brain sensations. We feel them with our eyes, and
+the feeling they awaken we call color. The optic nerve receives the
+undulations of ether thrown back from grass, and the peculiar sensation
+thus awakened by their touch is called green. The color is not a part of
+the grass, not a quantitative constituent, like its carbon or silex. The
+grass has no color, because color is something existent in the eye of
+the beholder, not in the object awakening that something by its peculiar
+mode of reflecting light. A looking-glass does not possess, as a
+constituent part, the image of a human face; but that face, when put
+before it, appears to be a part of the glass; and if no looking-glass
+had ever existed except with a certain face before it, that face would
+be just as much a part of the glass as the color green is of grass. They
+both reflect. Some people are color-blind. They cannot perceive any
+difference between the rose and the leaves around it. Color is
+inconceivable to them. Let us suppose, then, that all men were
+color-blind. They would be fully cognizant of light, shadow, darkness;
+but the nicer sensations of the brain which we call colors would be
+utterly unknown to senses unable to feel their delicate touch. At the
+same time, the different undulations of the different colors might have
+been detected by other means than the sense of sight, as unseen gases
+have been discovered by the chemist. And we cannot say that Nature may
+not possess an inconceivable variety of influences inappreciable by our
+senses. We say grass is green; but is it always so? What varying colors
+does it possess under the varying light to which it is exposed. The same
+grass is light green in the sun, dark green in the shadow, almost black
+in the twilight, and at night what color is it? We may say that it is
+green, but that we cannot see it. By no means. If greenness were an
+inherent attribute, it would be persistent. The weight, density,
+chemical construction, and size of the plant do not change from midday
+to midnight. They are identical in the dark and the light. But the color
+depends entirely on the character of light poured upon it; as that color
+is only a peculiar reflection of that light, or part of it, and that
+reflection is only green when it stimulates an optic nerve to a
+sensation peculiar to its touch. The same grass becomes yellow or brown
+in autumn, possessing then new powers of absorption and reflection. The
+very limited capacity of the eye to receive sensation from light rays is
+proved by the discovery that the spectrum possesses other rays, called
+heat-rays, which the eye cannot perceive. Only about a third of the
+spectrum is visible to the eye. The other portion appears in the form of
+heat, inappreciable by the optic nerve as light.
+
+Color, therefore, is not a physical thing,--a quantity in Nature. Her
+beauty and glory, visible in her tints and hues, are in the brain of the
+observer,--a play of light reflected from the myriad objects upon which
+it breaks in infinite diversity of ethereal wavelet's. One may see
+colors which do not exist as undulations. For example, let one look
+fixedly at a brilliant red object for a while, and then close his eyes.
+He will behold an image of the same object of a green color. This green
+color, then, is a sensation in the optic nerve, which, being powerfully
+stimulated by the red, undergoes a reaction, resulting in a sensation
+similar to that which it would experience were it looking at the object
+in green. The color green, in this case, is certainly only nervous
+sensation. As light is now known to be the motion of matter, color, as
+the result of light, must inevitably be limited by it. The touch of the
+light-waves upon our nerves causes certain contractions which we call
+color, the contractions ceasing when the touch is withdrawn. A pane of
+green glass will cast upon a white marble a green light. Let us suppose
+that this play of light had always existed, so far as those two objects
+were concerned. The marble would appear to be permanently green, and not
+white; and if we had not a simple way of removing the light, we should
+certainly say it was green marble. Could we as effectually change the
+play of light which causes grass to appear green, we should at once
+demonstrate as readily, that its color was an appearance to the eye, not
+a part of the grass itself. It is very probable that we are extensively
+deceived in this way,--that many appearances in nature are only
+simulations which we have no means of detecting. Isomerism in minerals
+has been discovered,--a state in which quite different physical
+properties are coexistent with identity of component parts. What we
+always see, and what seems to be permanent, we naturally accept as a
+physical fact; and yet we can understand that our senses may, in many
+instances, be the sport of appearances which, because permanent, we
+conceive to be reality. Thus color is a cerebral sensation only, and
+grass is not green.
+
+Is sugar sweet? That sugar has certain chemical constituents which go to
+make up a saccharine compound we know. But what evidence have we of its
+sweetness, except that the nerves of taste are peculiarly affected when
+brought in contact with it. Its sweetness is not measurable in the
+chemist's scales. It can be analyzed, and its constituent elements
+accurately defined. But sweetness is not one of those elements. The test
+of that is the tongue. Pure sugar of milk has scarce any sweetness at
+all; nevertheless, it is pure sugar. The influence which it has on the
+nerves of taste is only different from that of cane-sugar. Destroy the
+nice nervous connection between the tongue and the brain, and sweetness
+disappears. A severe cold will accomplish this, and while the touch of
+the sugar is felt, the delicate sympathy which is awakened by the sugar
+and is felt in the brain as sweetness is destroyed. The sweetness, like
+the color, is a nervous sensation. We can conceive of a development of
+the nerves of taste which might receive a host of new impressions from
+contact with objects now tasteless. The saccharine compound does exist
+as a chemical quantity, and has a special effect on the nerves of taste,
+exciting them peculiarly, the result of the excitement being the idea of
+sweetness.
+
+Is the rose fragrant? The sense of smell is indeed only a continuation
+of that of taste. In smelling, the nerves are touched by only
+infinitesimally small particles of the substances reaching them, and are
+only able to receive an impression from this excessive distribution.
+This is also true of taste, to a certain degree, as it is impossible to
+fully perceive a flavor until the substance is tolerably comminuted, as
+we smack our lips to obtain it. Indeed, it may be questioned whether
+the whole of taste may not lie in the capabilities of different
+substances for great subdivision of particles. If quartz could be made
+to dissolve into excessively minute particles as readily as sugar, it
+might have its own special flavor. Some odors are offensive in dense
+quantities which are highly agreeable when wafted to us in delicate
+atoms,--musk, for instance. The rose secretes a volatile oil, the
+wonderfully small atoms of which, on touching the nerves of smell,
+communicate a peculiar sensation. This odor, like the sweetness, exists
+only in the nerves affected; and a trifling disaffection of the nerves
+suffices to destroy it entirely. The chemist can also analyze the oil,
+but he does not enumerate in its elements odor. In fact, we have no
+words to express the sensation of smell. We say sweet, sour, bitter; but
+have no terms to express the differing sensations produced on us by the
+rose, lily, violet, and pink. Their oily atoms awaken different
+sensations in the delicate nerves they touch. The sensation awakened may
+be due to chemical action induced by them in the system. But whether
+chemical or physical, the result of their touch is a motion of matter,
+an impulse communicated to the brain, the sensation of the organ
+being--the reception of this initiative force being--what we designate
+as odor. The fragrance of the rose lies, then, in the contractions of
+special nerves, which thus respond to the touch of the oily particles
+that are blown against them.
+
+Does the trumpet sound? A vibration of matter causes the surrounding air
+to vibrate in consonance with it; and the waves of air thus created,
+breaking against the auditory nerve, awaken a peculiar sensation which
+we call sound. The trumpet, vibrating variously, as the valves are moved
+and the air forced through it, initiates waves of air of different
+lengths; and as they are communicated to the surrounding air with
+amazing rapidity, they successively strike the listener's ear. As the
+waves of light touch the optic nerve, so do the grosser waves of air
+touch the auditory nerve. But sound is only a recognized sensation when
+the waves of air are within a certain measurement, a maximum and minimum
+of length. The rush of a whirlwind has no sound, except when arrested by
+some object, and smaller waves of the vast billows of rolling air are
+created. We say that the wind roars. But the tremendous currents above
+us, which sweep along the vast masses of vapor, are noiseless until they
+touch the earth, and some little trifling eddies are made in their lower
+sweep by hills and trees and houses. It is then only noise. The ear
+requires yet smaller waves of air to experience the sensation of tone.
+The lowest note of a piano has barely enough of it to give a definite
+idea. As the waves become shorter, the ear begins to be pleasantly
+affected, and the realm of music is reached. Within a certain restricted
+length of air-waves lies all of the pleasurable sensation which we call
+musical tone. But as we rise in the scale the tone begins to become
+uncertain, until the highest note of the instrument is again indefinite
+noise. The attenuated tone-waves of Nature are also inappreciable by the
+auditory nerves, and an obscure hum or buzz is all that can be
+perceived, until, finally, the eye detects motion which the ear utterly
+fails to perceive as sound. The results of the air-waves are appreciable
+by sight and feeling; but the waves which are heard are not those which
+create the disturbance in nature we see and feel. The wild gust which
+seizes a tree and bows it to the earth is only heard when the branches
+it sways, or the leaves which it rustles, give out a secondary and far
+more attenuate series of waves. A locust, on a warm, sunny day, will
+agitate the air around him with a series of waves which affect the ear
+far more powerfully than the wind which sighs in the waving trees above
+him. Thus sound is the answering sensation of the auditory nerve to the
+touch of air-waves; and these waves must be within certain
+circumscribed limits of magnitude to awaken that sensation at all. The
+greater or less violence with which they strike the ear causes them to
+appear loud or soft. We can imagine a development of the nerves, or of
+the ear apparatus, which might allow them to be influenced by waves of
+greater volume and less rapid flow, and also by those of diminished size
+and accelerated movement The trumpet then does not sounds the ear
+sounds, and in the ear alone lies the music that it makes. The deaf man,
+whose auditory nerves are not sensitive to air-waves, sees the clouds
+move and the trees sway, the brook ripple and the trumpeter with his
+tube at his lips; but the air-waves they all create pass by him, and
+sound is inconceivable. That sound is a mere nervous sensation is
+further proved by the fact that we have disturbances of the auditory
+nerve which we call singing in the ears. No waves of air create this
+disagreeable music. It arises from some affection of the nerve, which
+irritates it to a vibration similar to that which it undergoes when
+air-waves of a certain intensity reach it.
+
+We say the sound rolled on, the odor was wafted, the color was printed,
+our language and our thoughts implying that the sound, the odor, the
+color, are things, when in reality they are all mere sensations,
+answering to the touch of physical agents. All sensation is
+nerve-motion. Outer stimulus, applied to the nerves, causes contractions
+which, communicating with the brain, give the idea of color or taste or
+sound.
+
+The sense of feeling is a recognition of the existence of objects by a
+duller perception than the others, though all of the senses attain their
+perceptions by feeling, in the strict meaning of the word. We say things
+feel hard or soft, the varying density of the objects being the cause of
+the varying sensations they awaken. Smoothness and roughness are varying
+outlines of surface, existing as physical conformation; the pleasurable
+or disagreeable sensations awakened in us by contact being due to the
+greater or less irritation of the nerves of feeling that attrition with
+it occasions. Motion is absolutely necessary to give us an ides of the
+density or configuration of an object. The mere touch of that object is
+insufficient to possess us with its nature. Iron and down are
+indistinguishable, unless we, to a certain extent, manipulate them.
+Glass would be indistinguishable from sand-paper did we not to a certain
+extent pass our fingers over the different surfaces. Mere touch would
+not suffice. We have the evidence of all of our senses to prove to us
+the nature of an object. It tastes or smells or vibrates or is colored;
+the varied sensations thus awakened combining to give us our totality of
+conception. The rose reflects light-waves which the eye feels red; it
+emits oil-particles which the nose feels fragrant; it touches our
+tongue, and feels pleasantly; it touches our fingers, and feels soft and
+smooth. It exists in nature as a physical structure, and its existence
+is evident to us through the various sensations it creates in different
+nerves of our bodies, and through them alone.
+
+One of the ancient philosophies maintained that all Nature is but the
+phantasm of our senses. Had it, after first granting that the senses
+themselves were evidences of matter and motion, maintained that Nature
+was only evident to us through them, it would have been simple truth.
+Our perceptions of Nature are limited to the capacity of our nervous
+structure. We frequently make the mistake of endowing matter with
+attributes which it does not possess, and which are resident only in the
+impression communicated to us by forces emanating from it, the forces
+being we know not what. And we can understand that there may be forces
+in nature as powerful as those which we perceive by our senses, but
+which are utterly unrecognized by them. We can understand that it were
+possible for organized beings to possess fifty instead of five senses,
+which might receive from nature other impressions and awaken other
+emotions as beautiful and as beneficent as those arising from sight and
+hearing.
+
+
+
+
+SONNET.
+
+
+    Rather, my people, let thy youths parade
+      Their woolly flocks before the rising sun;
+      With curds and oat-cakes, when their work is done,
+      By frugal handmaids let the board be laid;
+    Let them refresh their vigor in the shade,
+      Or deem their straw as down to lie upon,
+      Ere the great nation which our sires begun
+      Be rent asunder by hell's minion, Trade!
+    If jarring interests and the greed of gold,
+      The corn-rick's envy of the mined hill,
+      The steamer's grudge against the spindle's skill,--
+    If things so mean our country's fate can mould,
+      O, let me hear again the shepherds trill
+      Their reedy music to the drowsing fold!
+
+
+
+
+LITERATURE AS AN ART.
+
+
+As one looks forward to the America of fifty years hence, the main
+source of anxiety appears to be in a probable excess of prosperity, and
+in the want of a good grievance. We seem nearly at the end of those
+great public wrongs which require a special moral earthquake to end
+them. Except to secure the ballot for woman,--a contest which is thus
+far advancing very peaceably,--there seems nothing left which need be
+absolutely fought for; no great influence to keep us from a commonplace
+and perhaps debasing success. There will, no doubt, be still need of the
+statesman to adjust the details of government, and of the clergyman to
+keep an eye on private morals, including his own. There will also be
+social and religious changes, perhaps great ones; but there are no omens
+of any very fierce upheaval. And seeing the educational value to this
+generation of the reforms for which it has contended, and especially of
+the antislavery enterprise, one must feel an impulse of pity for our
+successors, who seem likely to have no convictions that they can
+honestly be mobbed for.
+
+Can we spare these great tonics? It is the experience of history that
+all religious bodies are purified by persecution, and materialized by
+peace. No amount of accumulated virtue has thus far saved the merely
+devout communities from deteriorating, when let alone, into
+comfort and good dinners. This is most noticeable in detached
+organizations,--Moravians, Shakers, Quakers, Roman Catholics,--they all
+go the same way at last; when persecution and missionary toil are over,
+they enter on a tiresome millennium of meat and pudding. To guard
+against this spiritual obesity, this carnal Eden, what has the next age
+in reserve for us? Suppose forty million perfectly healthy and virtuous
+Americans, what is to keep them from being as uninteresting as so many
+Chinese?
+
+I know of nothing but that aim which is the climax and flower of all
+civilization, without which purity itself grows dull and devotion
+tedious,--the pursuit of Science and Art. Give to all this nation peace,
+freedom, prosperity, and even virtue, still there must be some absorbing
+interest, some career. That career can be sought only in two
+directions,--more and yet more material prosperity on the one side.
+Science and Art on the other. Every man's aim must either be riches, or
+something better than riches. Now the wealth is to be respected and
+desired, nor need anything be said against it. And certainly nothing
+need be said in its behalf, there is such a vast chorus of voices
+steadily occupied in proclaiming it. The Instincts of the American mind
+will take care of that; but to advocate the alternative career, the
+striving of the whole nature after something utterly apart from this
+world's wealth,--it is for this end that a stray voice is needed. It
+will not take long; the clamor of the market will re-absorb us
+to-morrow.
+
+It can scarcely be said that Science and Art have as yet any place in
+America; or if they have, it is by virtue of their prospective value, as
+with the bonds of a Pacific railway. I use the ordinary classification,
+Science and Art, though it is literature only of which I now aim to
+speak. For under one of these two heads all literature must fall; it may
+be either a contribution to science through its matter, or to art
+through its form. The _form_ of literature is usually called _style_ and
+of the highest kind of literature, called poetry or _belles-lettres_,
+the style is an essential, and almost the essential part. It is in this
+aspect that the matter is now to be considered,--literature as an art.
+
+The latest French traveller, Ernest Duvergier de Hauranne, says well,
+that, for what he calls the academic class--or class devoted to pure
+literature--there is as yet no place in America. Such a class must
+conceal itself, he says, beneath the politician's garb, or the
+clergyman's cravat. We may observe that, when our people speak of
+literature, they are very apt to mean a newspaper article, or perhaps a
+sermon, or a legal plea. One editor said that it could be no more
+asserted that literature was ill paid in America, since Governor Andrew
+received ten thousand dollars for an argument against the prohibitory
+liquor law. Even in our largest cities, there are scarcely the rudiments
+of a literary class, apart from the newspapers. Now, journalism is an
+invaluable outlet for the leisure time of a literary man; but his main
+work must be given to something else, or his vocation must change its
+name. He needs the experience of journalism, as he needs that of the
+lyceum and the caucus,--nay, as he needs the gymnasium and the
+wherry,--to keep himself healthy and sound. But when he gives the main
+energy of his life to either, though he may not cease to be useful, he
+ceases to be a literary man.
+
+It is useless to complain that, in America, Science is preceding Art;
+that is inevitable. As yet there is a shrinking even from pure
+science,--that is, from all science which is not directly marketable;
+and while this is so, art must be still further postponed. We have
+hitherto valued science for its applications, natural history as a
+branch of agriculture, mathematics for the sake of life-assurance
+tables, and even a college education as a training for members of
+Congress. Just so far as any of these departments have failed of these
+ends, there is a tendency to disparage them. We are a little like the
+President Dupaty of the French Assembly, who told the astronomer Laplace
+that he considered the discovery of a new planet to be far less
+important than that of a new pudding, as we have already more planets
+than we know what to do with, while we never can have puddings enough.
+We are now outgrowing this limited view of science, but in regard to
+literature the delusion still remains; if it is anything more than an
+amusement, it must afford solid information; it is not yet owned that it
+has value for itself, as an art. Of course, all true instruction,
+however conveyed, is palatable; to a healthy mind the _Mecanique
+Celeste_ is good reading; so is Mill's "Political Economy," or De
+Morgan's "Formal Logic." But words are available for something which is
+more than knowledge. Words afford a more delicious music than the chords
+of any instrument; they are susceptible of richer colors than any
+painter's palette; and that they should be used merely for the
+transportation of intelligence, as a wheelbarrow carries brick, is not
+enough. The highest aspect of literature assimilates it to painting and
+music. Beyond and above all the domain of use lies beauty, and to aim at
+this makes literature an art.
+
+A book without art is simply a commodity; it may be exceedingly valuable
+to the consumer, very profitable to the producer, but it does not come
+within the domain of pure literature. It is said that some high legal
+authority on copyright thus cites a case: "One Moore had written a book
+which he called 'Irish Melodies,'" and so on. Now, as Aristotle defined
+the shipbuilder's art to be all of the ship but the wood, so the
+literary art displayed in Moore's Melodies was precisely the thing
+ignored in this citation.
+
+To pursue literature as an art is not therefore to be a mathematician
+nor a political economist; still less to be a successful journalist,
+like Greeley, or a lecturer with a thousand annual invitations, like
+Gough. These careers have really no more to do with literature than has
+the stage or the bar. Indeed, a man may earn twenty thousand dollars a
+year by writing "sensation stories," and have nothing to do with
+literature as an art. But to devote one's life to perfecting the manner,
+as well as the matter, of one's work; to expatriate one's self long
+years for it, like Motley; to overcome vast physical obstacles for it,
+like Prescott or Parkman; to live and die only to transfuse external
+nature into human words, like Thoreau; to chase dreams for a lifetime,
+like Hawthorne; to labor tranquilly and see a nation imbued with one's
+thoughts, like Emerson,--this it is to pursue literature as an art.
+
+There is apparently something in the Anglo-Saxon mind which causes a
+slight shrinking from art as such, perhaps associating it with deception
+or frivolity,--which tolerates it, and, strange to say, even produces it
+in verse, but really shrinks from it in prose. Across the water, this
+tendency seems to increase. Just as an Englishman is ashamed to speak
+well, and pooh-poohs all oratory, so he is growing ashamed even to write
+well, at least in anything beyond a newspaper; and we on this side have
+emancipated our tongues more than our pens. What stands between
+Americans and good writing is usually want of culture; we write as well
+as we know how, while in England the obstacle seems to be merely a
+boorish whim. The style of English books and magazines is growing far
+less careful than ours,--less finished, less harmonious, more slipshod,
+more slangy. What second-rate American writer would see any wit in
+describing himself, like Dean Alford in his recent book on language, as
+"an old party in a shovel"? These bad examples are to be regretted; for
+doubtless ten times as many original works are annually published in
+England as in America, and we have an hereditary right to seek from that
+nation those models of culture for which we must now turn to France.
+
+In a late English magazine, there is an elaborate attempt to prove the
+inferiority in manliness of the French mind as compared with the
+English. "Frenchmen are less manly, and Frenchwomen less womanly, than
+English men and women." And one of the illustrations seriously offered
+is this: "In literature they think much of the method, style, and what
+they themselves call the art of making a book."
+
+The charge is true. In France alone among living nations is literature
+habitually pursued as an art; and, in consequence of this, despite the
+seeds of all decay which imperialism sows, French prose-writing has no
+rival in contemporary literature. We cannot fully recognize this fact
+through translations, because only the most sensational French books
+appear to be translated. But as French painters and actors now
+habitually surpass all others even in what are claimed as the English
+qualities,--simplicity and truth,--so do French prose-writers excel. To
+be set against the brutality of Carlyle and the shrill screams of
+Ruskin, there is to be seen across the Channel the extraordinary fact of
+an actual organization of good writers, the French Academy, whose
+influence all nations feel. Under their authority we see introduced into
+literary work an habitual grace and perfection, a clearness and
+directness, a light and pliable strength, and a fine shading of
+expression, such as no other tongue can even define. We see the same
+high standard in their criticism, in their works of research, in the
+_Revue des Deux Mondes_, and, in short, throughout literature. What is
+there in any other language, for instance, to be compared with the
+voluminous writings of Sainte-Beuve, ranging over all history and
+literature, and carrying into all that incomparable style, so delicate,
+so brilliant, so equable, so strong,--touching all themes, not with the
+blacksmith's hand of iron, but with the surgeon's hand of steel?
+
+In the average type of French novels, one feels the superiority to the
+English in quiet power, in the absence of the sensational and
+exaggerated, and in keeping close to the level of real human life. They
+rely for success upon perfection of style and the most subtile analysis
+of human character; and therefore they are often painful,--just as
+Thackeray is painful,--because they look at artificial society, and
+paint what they see. Thus they dwell often on unhappy marriages, because
+such things grow naturally from the false social system in France. On
+the other hand, in France there is very little house-breaking, and
+bigamy is almost impossible, so that we hear delightfully little about
+them; whereas, if you subtract these from the current English novels,
+what is there left?
+
+Germany furnishes at present no models of prose style; and all her past
+models, except perhaps Goethe and Heine, seem to be already losing their
+charm. Yet for knowledge we still go to Germany, and there is a certain
+exuberant wealth that can even impart fascination to a bad style, as to
+that of Jean Paul. Such an author may therefore be very useful to a
+student who can withstand him, which poor Carlyle could not. There was a
+time, it is said, when English and American literature seemed to be
+expiring of conventionalism. Carlyle was the Jenner who inoculated and
+saved us all by this virus from Germany, and then died of his own
+disease. It now seems a privilege, perhaps, to be able to remember the
+time when all literature was in the inflammatory stage of this
+superinduced disorder; but does any one now read Carlyle's French
+Revolution? Every year now shows that the whole trick of style with
+which it was written was false from beginning to end. For surely no
+style can be permanently attractive that is not simple.
+
+_Simplicity_ must be the first element of literary art. This assertion
+will no doubt run counter to the common belief. Most persons have an
+impression of something called style in writing,--as they have an
+impression of something called architecture in building,--as if it were
+external, superadded, whereas it is in truth the very basis and law of
+the whole. There is the house, they think, and, if you can afford it,
+you put on some architecture; there is the writing, and a college-bred
+man is expected to put on some style. The assumption is, that he is less
+likely to write simply. This shows our school-boy notions of culture. A
+really cultivated person is less likely to waste words on mere
+ornamentation, just as he is less likely to have gingerbread-work on his
+house. Good taste simplifies. Men whose early culture was deficient are
+far more apt to be permanently sophomoric than those who lived through
+the sophomore at the proper time and place. The reason is, that the
+habit of expression, in a cultivated person, matures as his life and
+thought mature; but when a man has had much life and very little
+expression, he is confused by his own thoughts, and does not know how
+much to attempt or how to discriminate. When such a person falls on
+honest slang, it is usually a relief, for then he uses language which is
+fresh and real to him; whereas such phrases in a cultivated person
+usually indicate mere laziness and mental undress. Indeed, almost all
+slang is like parched corn, and should be served up hot, or else not at
+all.
+
+But it is evident that mere simplicity of style is not enough, for there
+is a manner of writing which does not satisfy us, though it may be
+simple and also carefully done. Such, for instance, is the prose style
+of Southey, which was apparently the model for all American writing in
+its day. We see the result in the early volumes of the North American
+Review, whose traditions of rather tame correctness were what enabled us
+to live through the Carlyle epoch with safety. The aim of this style was
+to avoid all impulse, brilliancy, or surprise,--to be perfectly
+colorless; it was a highly polished smoothness, on which the thoughts
+slid like balls. But style is capable of something more than smoothness
+and clearness; you see this something more when you turn from Prescott
+to Motley, for instance; there is a new quality in the page,--it has
+become alive. _Freshness_ is perhaps the best word to describe this
+additional element; it is a style that has blood in it. This may come
+from various sources,--good health, animal spirits, outdoor habits, or
+simply an ardent nature. It is hard to describe this quality, or to give
+rules for it; the most obvious way to acquire it is to keep one's life
+fresh and vigorous, to write only what presses to be said, and to utter
+that as if the world waited for the saying. Where lies the extraordinary
+power of "Jane Eyre," for instance? In the intense earnestness which
+vitalizes every line; each atom of the author's life appears to come
+throbbing and surging through it; every sentence seems endowed with a
+soul of its own, and looks up at you with human eyes.
+
+The next element of literary art may be said to be _structure_. So
+strong in the American mind is the demand for system and completeness,
+that the logical element of style, which is its skeleton, is not rare
+among us. But this is only the basis; besides the philosophical
+structure of a statement which comes by thought, there is an artistic
+structure which implies the education of the taste. So, in the human
+body, there is a symmetry of the bony frame, and there is a further
+symmetry of the rounded flesh which should cover it; and in literature
+it is not enough to have a perfectly framed logical skeleton,--there
+should be also a well-proportioned beauty of utterance, which is the
+flesh. Unless this inward and outward structure exist, although a book
+may be never so valuable, it hardly comes within the domain of literary
+art.
+
+These different types of structure may perhaps be illustrated by three
+different books, all belonging to the intermediate ground between
+science and art. I should say that Buckle's "History of Civilization,"
+with all its wealth and vigor, is exceedingly loose-jointed in all its
+logical structure, and also very defective in its literary structure,
+although it happens to have an element of freshness which is rare in
+such a work, and carries the reader along. Darwin's "Origin of Species"
+is better; that has at the bottom a strong logic, whether conclusive or
+otherwise, but is so rambling and confused in its merely literary
+statement, that it does itself no justice. A third book, Huxley's
+"Lectures," combines with its logic a power of clear and symmetrical
+statement that gives it a rare charm, and makes it a contribution, not
+to science alone, but to literature.
+
+In what is called poetry, _belles-lettres_ or pure literature, the
+osseous structure is of course hidden; and the symmetry suggested is
+always that of taste rather than of logic, though logic must be always
+implied, or at least never violated. In some of the greatest modern
+authors, however, there are limitations or drawbacks to this symmetry.
+Margaret Fuller said admirably of her favorite Goethe, that he had the
+artist's hand, but not the artist's love of structure; and in all his
+prose writings one sees a certain divergent and centrifugal habit, which
+completely overpowers him before the end of "Wilhelm Meister," and shows
+itself even in the "Elective Affinities," which is, so far as I know,
+his most perfect prose work.
+
+In Emerson, again, one observes a similar defect; his unit of structure
+is the sentence, and the periods seem combined merely by the accident of
+juxtaposition; each sentence is a pearl, and the whole essay is so much
+clipped from the necklace; but it is fastened at neither end, and the
+beads roll off.
+
+Yet it is not enough for human beauty to possess symmetry of structure,
+within and without: there must be a beautiful coloring also, wealth of
+complexion, fineness of texture. So the next element of literary art
+lies in the _choice of words_. Style must have richness and felicity.
+Words in a master's hands seem more than words; he can double or
+quadruple their power by skill in using; and this is a result so
+delightful, as to give to certain authors a value out of all proportion
+to their thought. There are books which are luxuries, _livres de luxe_,
+whose pages seem builded of more potent words than those of common life.
+Keats, for example, in poetry, and Landor in prose, are illustrations of
+this; and perhaps the representative instance, in all English
+literature, of the prismatic resources of mere words is the poem of "The
+Eve of St. Agnes." But thus to be crowned monarch of the sunset, to
+trust one's self with full daring in these realms of glory, demands
+such a balance of endowments as no one in English literature save
+Shakespeare has attained.
+
+In choosing words, it is to be remembered that there is not a really
+poor one in any language; each had originally some vivid meaning, but
+most of them have been worn smooth by passing from hand to hand, and
+hence the infinite care required in their use. "Language," says Max
+Mueller, "is a dictionary of faded metaphors"; and every writer who
+creates a new image, or even reproduces an old one by passing it through
+a fresh mind, enlarges this vast treasure-house. And this applies not
+only to words of beauty, but to words of wit. "All wit," said Mr. Pitt,
+"is true reasoning "; and Rogers, who preserved this saying, added, that
+he himself had lived long before making the discovery that wit was
+truth.
+
+A final condition of literary art is _thoroughness_, which must be shown
+both in the preparation and in the revision of one's work. The most
+brilliant mind yet needs a large accumulated capital of facts and
+images, before it can safely enter on its business, Coleridge went to
+Davy's chemical lectures, he said, to get a new stock of metaphors.
+Addison, before beginning the Spectator, had accumulated three folio
+volumes of notes. "The greater part of an author's time," said Dr.
+Johnson, "is spent in reading in order to write; a man will turn over
+half a library to make one book." Unhappily, with these riches comes the
+chance of being crushed by them, of which the agreeable Roman Catholic
+writer, Digby, is a striking recent example. There is no satisfaction in
+being told, as Charles Lamb told Godwin, that "you have read more books
+that are not worth reading than any other man"; nor in being described,
+as was Southey by Shelley, as "a talking album, filled with long
+extracts from forgotten books on unimportant subjects." One must not
+have more knowledge than one can keep in subjection; but every literary
+man needs to accumulate a whole tool-chest in his memory, and another
+in his study, before he can be more than a journeyman at his trade.
+
+Yet the labor of preparation is not, after all, more important than that
+of final revision. The feature of literary art which is always least
+appreciated by the public, and even by young authors, is the amount of
+toil it costs. But all the standards, all the precedents of every art,
+show that the greatest gifts do not supersede the necessity of work. The
+most astonishing development of native genius in any direction, so far
+as I know, is that of Mozart in music; yet it is he who has left the
+remark, that, if few equalled him in his vocation, few had studied it
+with such persevering labor and such unremitting zeal. There is still
+preserved at Ferrara the piece of paper on which Ariosto wrote in
+sixteen different ways one of his most famous stanzas. The novel which
+Hawthorne left unfinished--and whose opening chapters when published
+proved so admirable--had been begun by him, as it appeared, in five
+different ways. Yet how many young collegians have at this moment in
+their desks the manuscript of their first novel, and have considered it
+a piece of heroic toil if they have once revised it!
+
+It is to rebuke this literary indolence, and to afford a perpetual
+standard of high art, that the study of Greek ought to be retained in
+our schools. The whole future of our literature may depend upon it; to
+abandon it is deliberately to forego the very highest models. There is
+no other literature which so steadily reproaches a young
+writer,--nothing else by which he may sustain himself till he forms a
+high standard of his own. Not that he should attempt direct imitations,
+which are almost always failures as such, however attractive in other
+respects; witness Swinburne's "Atalanta." But the true use of Greek
+literature is perpetually to remind us what a wondrous thing literary
+art may be,--capable of what range of resources, of what thoroughness in
+structure, of what perfection in detail. It is a remarkable fact, that
+the most penetrating and fearless of all our writers, Thoreau,--he who
+made Nature his sole mistress, and shook himself utterly free from human
+tradition,--yet clung to Greek literature as the one achievement of man
+that seemed worthy to take rank with Nature, pronouncing it "as refined,
+as solidly done, and as beautiful almost as the morning itself."
+
+These are the qualities of style that seem most obviously
+important,--simplicity, freshness, structure, choice of words, and
+thoroughness both of preparation and of finish. Yet, in aiming at
+literary art, it must be remembered that all the cardinal virtues go
+into a good style, while each of the seven deadly sins tends to vitiate
+a bad one. What a charm in the merit of humility, for instance, as it is
+sometimes seen in style, leading to a certain self-restraint and
+moderation of tone, however weighty the argument! How great the power of
+an habitual under-statement, on which in due season one strong thought
+rises like an ocean-crest, and breaks, and sweeps onward, lavishing
+itself in splendor! What a glorious gift of heaven would have been the
+style of Ruskin, for instance, could he but have contained himself, and
+put forth only half his strength, instead of always planting, in the
+words of old Fuller, "a piece of ordnance to batter down an aspen-leaf"!
+
+It would be hardly safe to illustrate what has been said by any
+multiplication of examples from our own literature. Yet perhaps there
+will be no danger in saying that America has as yet produced but two
+authors of whom we may claim that their style is in all respects
+adequate to their wants, and the perfect vehicle of their thought. It is
+not always the greatest writers of whom this is true, for one's demands
+upon the vehicle of thought are in proportion to his thoughts, and great
+ideas strain language more than small ones. We cannot say of either
+Emerson or Thoreau, for instance, that his style is adequate to his
+needs, because the needs are immense, and Thoreau, at least, sometimes
+disdains effort. But the only American authors, perhaps, whose style is
+an elastic garment that fits all the uses of the body, are Irving and
+Hawthorne.
+
+This has no reference to the quality of their thought, as to which in
+Irving we feel a slight mediocrity; no matter, there is the agreeable
+style, and it does him all the service he needs. By its aid he reached
+his limit of execution, and we can hardly imagine him, with his
+organization, as accomplishing more. But in Hawthorne we see astonishing
+power, always answered by the style, and capable of indefinite expansion
+within certain lateral limits. His early solitude narrowed his
+affinities, and gave a kind of bloodlessness to his style; clear in hue,
+fine in texture, it is apt to want the mellow tinge which indicates a
+robust and copious life. Even such a criticism seems daring, in respect
+to anything so beautiful; and I can conceive of no other defect in the
+style of Hawthorne.
+
+Perhaps the conclusion of the whole matter may seem to be that literary
+art is so lofty a thing as to be beyond the reach of any of us; as the
+sage in Rasselas, discoursing on poetry, only convinces his hearers that
+no one ever can be a poet. After so much in the way of discouragement,
+it should be added,--what the most limited experience may teach us
+all,--that there is no other pursuit so unceasingly delightful. As some
+one said of love, "all other pleasures are not worth its pains." But the
+literary man must love his art, as the painter must love painting, out
+of all proportion to its rewards; or rather, the delight of the work
+must be its own reward. Any praise or guerdon hurts him, if it bring any
+other pleasure to eclipse this. The reward of a good sentence is to have
+written it; if it bring fame or fortune, very well, so long as this
+recompense does not intoxicate. The peril is, that all temporary
+applause is vitiated by uncertainty, and may be leading you right or
+wrong. Goethe wrote to Schiller, "We make money by our poor books."
+
+The impression is somehow conveyed to the young, that there exists
+somewhere a circle of cultivated minds, gifted with discernment, who can
+distinguish at a glance between Shakespeare and Tupper. One may doubt
+the existence of any such contemporary tribunal. Certainly there is none
+such in America. Provided an author says something noticeable, and obeys
+the ordinary rules of grammar and spelling, his immediate public asks
+little more; and if he attempts more, it is an even chance that it leads
+him away from favor. Indeed, within the last few years, it has come to
+be a sign of infinite humor to dispense with even these few rules, and
+spell as badly as possible. Yet even if you went to London or to Paris
+in search of this imaginary body of critics, you would not find them;
+there also you would find the transient and the immortal confounded
+together, and the transient often uppermost. Even a foreign country is
+not always, as has been said, a contemporaneous posterity. It is said
+that no American writer was ever so warmly received in England as
+Artemus Ward. It is only the slow alembic of the years that finally
+eliminates from this vast mass of literature its few immortal drops, and
+leaves the rest to perish.
+
+I know of no tonic more useful for a young writer than to read
+carefully, in the English Reviews of sixty or seventy years ago, the
+crushing criticisms on nearly every author of that epoch who has
+achieved lasting fame. What cannot there be read, however, is the
+sterner history of those who were simply neglected. Look, for instance,
+at the career of Charles Lamb, who now seems to us a writer who must
+have disarmed opposition, and have been a favorite from the first.
+Lamb's "Rosamond Gray" was published in 1798, and for two years was not
+even reviewed. His poems appeared during the same year. In 1815 he
+introduced Talfourd to Wordsworth as his own "only admirer." In 1819 the
+series of "Essays of Elia" began, and Shelley wrote to Leigh Hunt that
+year: "When I think of such a mind as Lamb's, when I see how unnoticed
+remain things of such exquisite and complete perfection, what should I
+hope for myself, if I had not higher objects in view than fame?" These
+Essays were published in a volume in 1823; and Willis records that when
+he was in Europe, ten years later, and just before Lamb's death, "it was
+difficult to light upon a person who had read Elia."
+
+This brings us to a contemporary instance. Willis and Hawthorne wrote
+early, side by side, in "The Token," about 1827, forty years ago. Willis
+rose at once to notoriety, but Mr. S. G. Goodrich, the editor of the
+work, states in his autobiography, that Hawthorne's contributions "did
+not attract the slightest attention." Ten years later, in 1837, these
+same sketches were collected in a volume, as "Twice-Told Tales"; but it
+was almost impossible to find a publisher for them, and when published
+they had no success. I well remember the apathy with which even the
+enlarged edition of 1842 was received, in spite of the warm admiration
+of a few; nor was it until the publication of "The Scarlet Letter," in
+1850, that its author could fairly be termed famous. For twenty years he
+was, in his own words, "the obscurest man of letters in America"; and it
+is the thought to which the mind must constantly recur, in thinking of
+Hawthorne, How could any combination of physical and mental vigor enable
+a man to go on producing works of such a quality in an atmosphere so
+chilling?
+
+Probably the truth is, that art precedes criticism, and that every great
+writer creates or revives the taste by which he is appreciated. True, we
+are wont to claim that "one touch of nature makes the whole world kin";
+but it sometimes takes the world a good while to acknowledge its poor
+relations. It seems hard for most persons to recognize a touch of nature
+when they see it. The trees have formed their buds in autumn every year
+since trees first waved; but you will find that the great majority of
+persons have never made that discovery, and suppose that Nature gets up
+those ornaments in spring. And if we are thus blind to what hangs
+conspicuously before our eyes for the whole long winter of every year,
+how unobservant must we be of the rarer phases of earthly beauty and of
+human life? Keep to the conventional, and you have something which all
+have seen, even if they disapprove; copy Nature, and her colors make art
+appear incredible. If you could paint the sunset before your window as
+gorgeous as it is, your picture would be hooted from the walls of the
+exhibition. If you were to write into fiction the true story of the man
+or woman you met yesterday, it would be scouted as too wildly unreal.
+Indeed, the literary artist may almost say, as did the Duke of
+Wellington when urged to write his memoirs, "I should like to speak the
+truth; but if I did, I should be torn in pieces."
+
+Therefore the writer, when he adopts a high aim, must be a law to
+himself, bide his time, and take the risk of discovering, at last, that
+his life has been a failure. His task is one in which failure is easy,
+when he must not only depict the truths of Nature, but must do this with
+such verisimilitude as to vindicate its truth to other eyes, And since
+this recognition may not even begin till after his death, we can see
+what Rivarol meant by his fine saying, that "genius is only great
+patience," and Buffon, by his more guarded definition of genius as the
+aptitude for patience.
+
+Of all literary qualities, this patience has thus far been rarest in
+America. Therefore, there has been in our literature scarcely any quiet
+power; if effects are produced, they must, in literature as in painting,
+be sensational, and cover acres of canvas. As yet, the mass of our
+writers seek originality in mere externals; we think, because we live in
+a new country, we are unworthy of ourselves if we do not Americanize the
+grammar and spelling-book. In a republic, must the objective case be
+governed by a verb? We shall yet learn that it is not new literary forms
+we need, but only, fresh inspiration, combined with cultivated taste.
+The standard of good art is always much the same; modifications are
+trifling. Otherwise we could not enjoy any foreign literature. A fine
+phrase in AEschylus or Dante affects us as if we had read it in Emerson.
+A structural completeness in a work of art seems the same in the
+_Oedipus Tyrannus_ as in "The Scarlet Letter." Art has therefore its
+law; and eccentricity, though sometimes promising as a mere trait of
+youth, is only a disfigurement to maturer years. It is no discredit to
+Walt Whitman that he wrote "Leaves of Grass," only that he did not burn
+it afterwards. A young writer must commonly plough in his first crop, as
+the farmer does, to enrich the soil. Is it luxuriant, astonishing, the
+wonder of the neighborhood; so much the better,--in let it go!
+
+Sydney Smith said, in 1818, "There does not appear to be in America, at
+this moment, one man of any considerable talents." Though this might not
+now be said, we still stand before the world with something of the Swiss
+reputation, as a race of thrifty republicans, patriotic and courageous,
+with a decided turn for mechanical invention. What we are actually
+producing, even to-day, in any domain of pure art, is very little; it is
+only the broad average intelligence of the masses that does us any
+credit. And even this is easily exaggerated. The majority of members of
+Congress talk bad grammar; so do the majority of public-school teachers.
+I do not mean merely that they speak without elegance, but that in
+moments of confidence they say "We was," and "Them things," and "I done
+it." With the present predominance of merely scientific studies, and the
+increasing distaste for the study of language, I do not see how this is
+to diminish. For all that, there are already visible, in the American
+temperament, two points of great promise in respect to art in general,
+and literary art above all.
+
+First, there is in this temperament a certain pliability and
+impressibility, as compared with the rest of the Anglo-Saxon race; it
+shows a finer grain and a nicer touch. If this is not yet shown in the
+way of literature, it is only because the time has not come. It is
+visible everywhere else. The aim which Bonaparte avowed as his highest
+ambition for France, to convert all trades into arts, is being rapidly
+fulfilled all around us. There is a constant tendency to supersede brute
+muscle by the fibres of the brain, and thus to assimilate the rudest
+toil to what Bacon calls "sedentary and within-door arts, that require
+rather the finger than the arm." It is clear that this same impulse, in
+higher and higher applications, must culminate in the artistic creation
+of beauty.
+
+And to fortify this fine instinct, we may trust, secondly, in the
+profound earnestness which still marks our people. With all this
+flexibility, there is yet a solidity of principle beneath, that makes
+the subtile American mind as real and controlling as that of the robust
+race from which it sprang. Though the present tendency of our art is
+towards foreign models, this is but a temporary thing. We must look at
+these till we have learned what they can teach, but a race in which the
+moral nature is strongest will be its own guide at last.
+
+And it is a comfort thus to end in the faith that, as the foundation of
+all true greatness is in the conscience, so we are safe if we can but
+carry into science and art the same earnestness of spirit which has
+fought through the great civil war and slain slavery. As "the Puritan
+has triumphed" in this stern contest, so must the Puritan triumph in the
+more graceful emulations that are to come; but it must be the Puritanism
+of Milton, not of Cromwell only. The invigorating air of great moral
+principles must breathe through all our literature; it is the expanding
+spirit of the seventeenth century by which we must conquer now.
+
+It is worth all that has been sacrificed in New England to vindicate
+this one fact, the supremacy of the moral nature. All culture, all art,
+without this, must be but rootless flowers, such as flaunt round a
+nation's decay. All the long, stern reign of Plymouth Rock and Salem
+Meeting-House was well spent, since it had this for an end,--to plough
+into the American race the tradition of absolute righteousness, as the
+immutable foundation of all. This was the purpose of our fathers. There
+should be here no European frivolity, even if European grace went with
+it. For the sake of this great purpose, history will pardon all their
+excesses,--overwork, grim Sabbaths, prohibition of innocent amusements,
+all were better than to be frivolous. And so, in these later years, the
+arduous reforms into which the life-blood of Puritanism has passed have
+all helped to train us for art, because they have trained us in
+earnestness, even while they seemed to run counter to that spirit of joy
+in which art has its being. For no joy is joyous which has not its root
+in something noble. In what awful lines of light has this truth been
+lately written against the sky! What graces might there not have been in
+that Southern society before the war? It had ease, affluence, leisure,
+polished manners, European culture,--all worthless; it produced not a
+book, not a painting, not a statue; it concentrated itself on politics,
+and failed; then on war, and failed; it is dead and vanished, leaving
+only memories of wrong behind. Let us not be too exultant; the hasty
+wealth of New York may do as little. Intellect in this age is not to be
+found in the circles of fashion; it is not found in such society in
+Europe, it is not here. Even in Paris, the world's capital, imperialism
+taints all it touches; and it is the great traditions of a noble nation
+which make that city still the home of art. We, a younger and cruder
+race, yet need to go abroad for our standard of execution, but our ideal
+and our faith must be our own.
+
+
+
+
+A YOUNG DESPERADO.
+
+
+When Johnny is all snugly curled up in bed, with his rosy cheek resting
+on one of his scratched and grimy little hands, forming altogether a
+perfect picture of peace and innocence, it seems hard to realize what a
+busy, restive, pugnacious, badly ingenious little wretch he is! There is
+something so comical in those funny little shoes and stockings sprawling
+on the floor,--they look as if they could jump up and run off, if they
+wanted to,--there is something so laughable about those little trousers,
+which appear to be making vain attempts to climb up into the
+easy-chair,--the said trousers still retaining the shape of Johnny's
+little legs, and refusing to go to sleep,--there is something, I say,
+about these things, and about Johnny himself, which makes it difficult
+for me to remember that, when Johnny is awake, he not unfrequently
+displays traits of character not to be compared with anything but the
+cunning of an Indian warrior, combined with the combative qualities of a
+trained prize-fighter.
+
+I'm sure I don't know how he came by such unpleasant propensities. I am
+myself the meekest of men. Of course, I don't mean to imply that Johnny
+inherited his warlike disposition from his mother. She is the gentlest
+of women. But when you come to Johnny--he's the terror of the whole
+neighborhood.
+
+He was meek enough at first,--that is to say, for the first six or seven
+days of his existence. But I verily believe that he wasn't more than
+eleven days old when he showed a degree of temper that shocked
+me,--shocked me in one so young. On that occasion he turned very red in
+the face,--he was quite red before,--doubled up his ridiculous hands in
+the most threatening manner, and finally, in the impotency of rage,
+punched himself in the eye. When I think of the life he led his mother
+and Susan during the first eighteen months after his arrival, I shrink
+from the responsibility of allowing Johnny to call me father.
+
+Johnny's aggressive disposition was not more early developed than his
+duplicity. By the time he was two years of age, I had got the following
+maxim by heart: "Whenever J. is particularly quiet, look out for
+squalls." He was sure to be in some mischief. And I must say there was a
+novelty, an unexpectedness, an ingenuity, in his badness that constantly
+astonished me. The crimes he committed could be arranged alphabetically.
+He never repeated himself. His evil resources were inexhaustible. He
+never did the thing I expected he would. He never failed to do the thing
+I was unprepared for. I am not thinking so much of the time when he
+painted my writing-desk with raspberry jam, as of the occasion when he
+perpetrated an act of original cruelty on Mopsey, a favorite kitten in
+the household. We were sitting in the library. Johnny was playing in the
+front hall. In view of the supernatural stillness that reigned, I
+remarked, suspiciously, "Johnny is very quiet, my dear." At that moment
+a series of pathetic _mews_ was heard in the entry, followed by a
+violent scratching on the oil-cloth. Then Mopsey bounded into the room
+with three empty spools strung upon her tail. The spools were removed
+with great difficulty, especially the last one, which fitted remarkably
+tight. After that, Mopsey never saw a work-basket without arching her
+tortoise-shell back, and distending her tail to three times its natural
+thickness. Another child would have squeezed the kitten, or stuck a pin
+in it, or twisted her tail; but it was reserved for the superior genius
+of Johnny to string rather small spools upon it. He never did the
+obvious thing.
+
+It was this fertility and happiness, if I may say so, of invention, that
+prevented me from being entirely dejected over my son's behavior at this
+period. Sometimes the temptation to seize him and shake him was too
+strong for poor human nature. But I always regretted it afterwards. When
+I saw him asleep in his tiny bed, with one tear dried on his plump
+velvety cheek and two little mice-teeth visible through the parted lips,
+I couldn't help thinking what a little bit of a fellow he was, with his
+funny little fingers and his funny little nails; and it didn't seem to
+me that he was the sort of person to be pitched into by a great strong
+man like me.
+
+"When Johnny grows older," I used to say to his mother, "I'll reason
+with him."
+
+Now I don't know when Johnny will grow old enough to be reasoned with.
+When I reflect how hard it is to reason with wise grown-up people, if
+they happen to be unwilling to accept your view of matters, I am
+inclined to be very patient with Johnny, whose experience is rather
+limited, after all, though he is six years and a half old, and naturally
+wants to know why and wherefore. Somebody says something about the duty
+of "blind obedience," I can't expect Johnny to have more wisdom than
+Solomon, and to be more philosophic than the philosophers.
+
+At times, indeed, I have been led to expect this from him. He has shown
+a depth of mind that warranted me in looking for anything. At times he
+seems as if he were a hundred years old. He has a quaint, bird-like way
+of cocking his head on one side, and asking a question that appears to
+be the result of years of study. If I could answer some of those
+questions, I should solve the darkest mysteries of life and death. His
+inquiries, however, generally have a grotesque flavor. One night, when
+the mosquitoes were making lively raids on his person, he appealed to
+me, suddenly: "How does the moon feel when a skeeter bites it?" To his
+meditative mind, the broad, smooth surface of the moon presented a
+temptation not to be resisted by any stray skeeter.
+
+I freely confess that Johnny is now and then too much for me. I wish I
+could read him as cleverly as he reads me. He knows all my weak points;
+he sees right through me, and makes me feel that I am a helpless infant
+in his adroit hands. He has an argumentative, oracular air, when things
+have gone wrong, which always upsets my dignity. Yet how cunningly he
+uses his power! It is only in the last extremity that he crosses his
+legs, puts his hands into his trousers-pockets, and argues the case with
+me. One day last week he was very near coming to grief. By my
+directions, kindling-wood and coal are placed every morning in the
+library grate, in order that I may have a fire the moment I return at
+night. Master Johnny must needs apply a lighted match to this
+arrangement early in the forenoon. The fire was not discovered until the
+blower was one mass of red-hot iron, and the wooden mantelpiece was
+smoking with the intense heat.
+
+When I came home, Johnny was led from the store-room, where he had been
+imprisoned from an early period, and where he had employed himself in
+eating about two dollars' worth of preserved pears.
+
+"Johnny," said I, in as severe a tone as one could use in addressing a
+person whose forehead glistened with syrup,--"Johnny, don't you remember
+that I have always told you never to meddle with matches?"
+
+It was something delicious to see Johnny trying to remember. He cast one
+eye meditatively up to the ceiling, then he fixed it abstractedly on the
+canary-bird, then he rubbed his ruffled brows with a sticky hand; but
+really, for the life of him, he couldn't recall any injunctions
+concerning matches.
+
+"I can't, papa, truly, truly," said Johnny at length. "I guess I must
+have forgot it."
+
+"Well, Johnny, in order that you may not forget it in future--"
+
+Here Johnny was seized with an idea. He interrupted me.
+
+"I'll tell you what you do, papa,--_you just put it down in writin_'."
+
+With the air of a man who has settled a question definitely, but at the
+same time is willing to listen politely to any crude suggestions that
+you may have to throw out, Johnny crossed his legs, and thrust his hands
+into those wonderful trousers-pockets. I turned my face aside, for I
+felt a certain weakness creeping into the corners of my mouth. I was
+lost. In an instant the little head, covered all over with yellow curls,
+was laid upon my knee, and Johnny was crying, "I'm so very, very sorry!"
+
+I have said that Johnny is the terror of the neighborhood. I think I
+have not done the young gentleman an injustice. If there is a window
+broken within the radius of two miles from our house, Johnny's ball, or
+a stone known to come from his dexterous hand, is almost certain to be
+found in the battered premises. I never hear the musical jingling of
+splintered glass, but my _porte-monnaie_ gives a convulsive throb in my
+breast-pocket. There is not a doorstep in our street that hasn't borne
+evidences in red chalk of his artistic ability; there isn't a bell that
+he hasn't rung and run away from at least three hundred times. Scarcely
+a day passes but he falls out of something, or over something, or into
+something. A ladder running up to the dizzy roof of an unfinished
+building is no more to be resisted by him than the back platform of a
+horse-car, when the conductor is collecting his fare in front.
+
+I should not like to enumerate the battles that Johnny has fought during
+the past eight months. It is a physical impossibility, I should judge,
+for him to refuse a challenge. He picks his enemies out of all ranks of
+society. He has fought the ash-man's boy, the grocer's boy, the rich
+boys over the way, and any number of miscellaneous boys who chanced to
+stray into our street.
+
+I can't say that this young desperado is always victorious. I have known
+the tip of his nose to be in a state of unpleasant redness for weeks
+together. I have known him to come home frequently with no brim to his
+hat; once he presented himself with only one shoe, on which occasion
+his jacket was split up the back in a manner that gave him the
+appearance of an over-ripe chestnut bursting out of its bur. How he will
+fight! But this I can say,--if Johnny is as cruel as Caligula, he is
+every bit as brave as Agamemnon. I never knew him to strike a boy
+smaller than himself. I never knew him to tell a lie when a lie would
+save him from disaster.
+
+At present the General, as I sometimes call him, is in hospital. He was
+seriously wounded at the battle of The Little Go-Cart, on the 9th
+instant. On returning from my office yesterday evening, I found that
+scarred veteran stretched upon a sofa in the sitting-room, with a patch
+of brown paper stuck over his left eye, and a convicting smell of
+vinegar about him.
+
+"Yes," said his mother, dolefully, "Johnny's been fighting again. That
+horrid Barnabee boy (who is eight years old, if he is a day) won't let
+the child alone."
+
+"Well," said I, "I hope Johnny gave that Barnabee boy a thrashing."
+
+"Didn't I, though?" cries Johnny, from the sofa. "_I_ bet!"
+
+"O Johnny!" says his mother.
+
+Now, several days previous to this, I had addressed the General in the
+following terms:--
+
+"Johnny, if I ever catch you in another fight of your own seeking, I
+shall cane you."
+
+In consequence of this declaration, it became my duty to look into the
+circumstances of the present affair, which will be known in history as
+the battle of The Little Go-Cart. After going over the ground very
+carefully, I found the following to be the state of the case.
+
+It seems that the Barnabee Boy--I speak of him as if he were the Benicia
+Boy--is the oldest pupil in the Primary Military School (I think it
+_must_ be a military school) of which Johnny is a recent member. This
+Barnabee, having whipped every one of his companions, was sighing for
+new boys to conquer, when Johnny joined the institution. He at once
+made friendly overtures of battle to Johnny, who, oddly enough, seemed
+indisposed to encourage his advances. Then Barnabee began a series of
+petty persecutions, which had continued up to the day of the fight.
+
+On the morning of that eventful day the Barnabee Boy appeared in the
+school-yard with a small go-cart. After running down on Johnny several
+times with this useful vehicle, he captured Johnny's cap, filled it with
+sand, and dragged it up and down the yard triumphantly in the go-cart.
+This made the General very angry, of course, and he took an early
+opportunity of kicking over the triumphal car, in doing which he kicked
+one of the wheels so far into space that it has not been seen since.
+
+This brought matters to a crisis. The battle would have taken place then
+and there; but at that moment the school-bell rang, and the gladiators
+were obliged to give their attention to Smith's Speller. But a gloom
+hung over the morning's exercises,--a gloom that was not dispelled in
+the back row, when the Barnabee Boy stealthily held up to Johnny's
+vision a slate, whereon was inscribed this fearful message:--
+
+[Illustration]
+
+Johnny got it "put down in writin'" this time!
+
+After a hasty glance at the slate, the General went on with his studies
+composedly enough. Eleven o'clock came, and with it came recess, and
+with recess the inevitable battle.
+
+Now I do not intend to describe the details of this brilliant action,
+for the sufficient reason that, though there were seven young gentlemen
+(connected with the Primary School) on the field as war correspondents,
+their accounts of the engagement are so contradictory as to be utterly
+worthless. On one point they all agree,--that the contest was sharp,
+short, and decisive. The truth is, the General is a quick, wiry,
+experienced old hero; and it didn't take him long to rout the Barnabee
+Boy, who was in reality a coward, as all bullies and tyrants ever have
+been, and always will be.
+
+I don't approve of boys fighting; I don't defend Johnny; but if the
+General wants an extra ration or two of preserved pear, he shall have
+it!
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+I am well aware that, socially speaking, Johnny is a Black Sheep. I know
+that I have brought him up badly, and that there is not an unmarried man
+or woman in the United States who wouldn't have brought him up very
+differently. It's a great pity that the only people who know how to
+manage children never have any! At the same time, Johnny is not a black
+sheep all over. He has some white spots. His sins--if wiser folks had no
+greater!--are the result of too much animal life. They belong to his
+evanescent youth, and will pass away; but his honesty, his generosity,
+his bravery, belong to his character, and are enduring qualities. The
+quickly crowding years will tame him. A good large pane of glass, or a
+seductive bell-knob, ceases in time to have attractions for the most
+reckless spirit. And I am quite confident that Johnny will be a great
+statesman, or a valorous soldier, or, at all events, a good citizen,
+after he has got over being A Young Desperado.
+
+
+
+
+REVIEWS AND LITERARY NOTICES.
+
+
+     _The First Canticle_ [_Inferno_] _of the Divine Comedy of_
+     DANTE ALIGHIERI. Translated by THOMAS WILLIAM PARSONS. Boston:
+     De Vries, Ibarra, and Company.
+
+While we must own that we have no sympathy with the theory of free
+translation, we recognize the manifold merits of execution in this work,
+and accept it as one which, together with Mr. Longfellow's version of
+the whole of Dante's _Divina Commedia_, and Mr. Norton's translation of
+the _Vita Nuova_, will make the present year memorable in our
+literature. It does not necessarily stand in antagonism to works
+executed in a spirit entirely different, and we shall make no comparison
+of it with the "Inferno" by Mr. Longfellow, the admirers of which will
+be among the first to feel its characteristic and very striking
+excellences.
+
+In substituting the decasyllabic quatrain for the triple rhyme of the
+Italian, we suppose Dr. Parsons desired rather to please the reader's
+ear with a familiar stanza, than to avoid the difficulties (exaggerated,
+we think, by critics) of the _terza rima_, and he could certainly have
+chosen no more felicitous form after once departing from that of his
+original. He has almost re-created the stanza for his purpose, giving it
+new movement, and successfully adapting to the exigencies of dialogue
+and of narrative what has hitherto chiefly been associated with elegiac
+and didactic poetry. Something of this may be seen in the following
+passages (from the description of the transit through the frozen circle
+of Caina), which moreover appear to us among the best sustained of the
+version.
+
+    "And as a frog squats croaking from a stream,
+      With nose put forth, what time the village maid
+      Oft in her slumber doth of gleaning dream,
+      Stood in the ice there every doleful shade.
+    Livid as far as where shame paints the cheek,
+      And doomed their faces downward still to hold.
+      Chattering like storks, their weeping eyes bespeak
+      Their aching hearts, their mouths the biting cold."
+
+      "A thousand visages I saw, by cold
+    Turned to dog-faces; horror chills me through
+      Whenever of those frozen fords I think.
+      And as we nearer to the centre drew,
+      Towards which all bodies by their weight must sink,
+    There, as I shivered in the eternal chill,
+      Trampling among the heads, it happed, by luck,
+      Or destiny--or, it may be, my will--
+      Hard in the face of one my foot I struck.
+    Weeping he cried, 'What brings thee bruising us?
+      Unless on me fresh vengeance thou wouldst pile
+      For Mont' Aperti, why torment me thus?'
+      And I: 'My Master, wait for me awhile,
+    That I through him may set one doubt at rest;
+      Then, if thou bid me hasten on, I will.'
+      My leader stopped; and I the shade addressed
+      Who kept full bitterly blaspheming still,
+    'Say, who art thou whose tongue so foully speaks?'
+      'Nay, who art thou that walk'st the withering air
+      Of Antemora, smiting others' cheeks
+      That, wert thou living, 't were too much to bear?'
+    'Living I am; and thou, if craving fame,
+      Mayst count it precious,'--this was my reply,--
+      'That I with other notes record thy name.'
+      He answered thus: 'Far other wish have I.
+    Trouble me now no longer,--get thee gone:
+      Thine is cold flattery in this waste of Hell.'
+      At this his hindmost hairs I fastened on,
+      And cried, 'Thy name! I'll force thee now to tell.
+    Or not one hair upon thy head shall grow.'
+      He answered thus: 'Although thou pluck me bare,
+      I'll neithertell my name, nor visage show;
+      Nay, though a thousand times thou rend my hair,'
+
+    "I held his tresses in my fingers wound,
+      And more than one tuft had I twitched away
+      As he, with eyes bent down, howled like a hound;
+      When one cried out, 'What ails thee, Bocca? say,--
+    Canst thou not make enough clack with thy jaws,
+      But thou must bark too! What fiend pricks thee now?'
+      'Aha!' said I, 'henceforth I have no cause
+      To bid thee speak, thou cursed traitor thou!
+    I'll shame thee, bearing truth of thee to men.'
+      'Away!' he answered: 'what thou wilt, relate:
+      But, shouldst thou get from hence with breath again,
+      Mention him too so ready with his prate."
+
+The encounter of Dante with Farinata and Cavalcante in their fiery tombs
+is also painted with such animated and fortunate strokes that we must
+reproduce some of them here:--
+
+    "'O Tuscan! thou who com'st with gentle speech.
+      Through Hell's hot city, breathing from the earth,
+      Stop in this place one moment, I beseech:
+      Thy tongue betrays the country of thy birth.
+    Of that illustrious land I know thee sprung,
+      Which in my day perchance I somewhat vexed.'
+      Forth from one vault these sudden accents rung,
+      So that I trembling stood with fear perplexed.
+    Then as I closer to my master drew.
+      'Turn back! what dost thou?' he exclaimed in haste;
+      'See! Farinata rises to thy view;
+      Now mayst behold him upward from his waist.'
+
+    "Full in his face already I was gazing,
+      While his front lowered, and his proud bosom swelled,
+      As though even there, amid his burial blazing,
+      The infernal realm in high disdain he held."
+
+In this scene, however, the radical defect of Dr. Parsons's work
+appears: it is unequal, and unsustained even in some of its best parts.
+It seems scarcely credible that the poet who could produce the grand
+lines just given, could also mar the whole effect of the father's
+frantic appeal to know if his son Guido be no longer alive, by putting
+in his mouth the melodramatic words,
+
+    "Sayest thou, 'he had'? _what mean ye!_ is he dead?"
+
+But our translator does this, and he makes Ugolino report little Anselm
+as saying,
+
+    "Thou look'st so, father! what's the matter, what?"
+
+--a line that Melpomene herself could not read with tragic effect,--for,
+
+    "Disse; tu guardi si, padre; che hai?"
+
+As he likewise causes Francesca to say,
+
+    "Love quick to kindle every gentler breast
+    _Fired this fond being with the lovely shape_
+    Bereft me so!"
+
+for,
+
+    "Amor, che al cor gentil ratto s'apprende;
+    Prese costui della bella persona
+    Che mi fu tolta ";
+
+and,
+
+    "Where Po descends in Adria's peace to rest
+       _Raging with all his rivulets no more,"_
+
+for,
+
+    "Su la marina dove 'l Po descende
+    Per aver pace co' seguaci sui,"
+
+Indeed, we have to confess that the present is on the whole not a
+satisfactory translation of the episode of Francesca da Rimini. The
+inscription on the gate of hell, also, is rendered in a manner scarcely
+to be called successful, and not bearing comparison with that of the
+other rhyming translators,--Ford, Wright, and Cayley. As to the
+beginning of the seventh canto, we must think that Dr. Parsons was
+chiefly moved by the prevailing sentiment of mankind to translate
+
+    "Pape Satan! pape Satan aleppe!"
+
+into
+
+    "Ho! Satan! Popes--more Popes--head Satan here!"
+
+These and other blemishes arrest the most casual glance. The merits of
+any work are harder to prove than its faults, though they are quite as
+deeply felt; and, as we have already intimated, it is the misfortune of
+Dr. Parsons that some of his greatest defects are in passages otherwise
+the most generally successful. There are probably few pages of the
+translation which do not offend by some lapse; but at the same time
+there is no page which will not command admiration by sublime and
+striking lines. We think the whole of the following passage from the
+thirteenth canto (it is the well-known description of the sentient wood
+into which the self-violent are turned) has a peculiar strength and
+dignity:--
+
+    "Amid the branches of this dismal grove,
+      Their loathsome nests the brutal Harpies build,
+      Who from the Strophades the Trojans drove
+      With woful auguries erelong fulfilled.
+    Huge wings they have, men's faces, human throats,
+      Feet armed with claws, vast bellies clothed with plumes:
+      From those strange trees they pour their doleful notes.
+      'Now, ere thou further penetrate these glooms,'
+    Said my good master, 'thou shouldst understand
+      Thou'rt in the second circlet, and shall be,
+      Until thou come upon the horrid sand.
+      Give good heed then: more wonders thou shall see,
+    Yea, to confirm all stories I have told.'
+      On every side I heard heart-rending cries,
+      But not a person could I there behold:
+      Wherefore I stopped, bewildered with surprise.
+    Methinks he thought I thought the voices came
+      From some that, hiding, in the thicket lay:
+      Because the Master said, 'If thou but maim
+      One of these plants, yen, pluck a branch away,
+    Then shall thy judgment be more just than now.'
+      Therefore my hand I slightly forward reached;
+      And while I wrenched away a little bough
+      From a huge bush, 'Why mangle me?' it screeched.
+    Then, as the dingy drops began to start,
+      'Why dost thou tear me?' shrieked the trunk again,
+      'Hast thou no touch of pity in thy heart?
+      We that now here are planted, once were men;
+    But, were we serpents' souls, thy hand might shame
+      To have no more compassion on our woes';
+      Like a green log, that hisses in the flame,
+      Groaning at one end, as the other glows,--
+    Even as the wind comes sputtering forth, I say,
+      Thus oozed together from the splintered wood
+      Both words and blood. I dropped the broken spray,
+      And, like a coward, faint and trembling stood."
+
+This picture, also, of the apparition of the angel who opens the gates
+of Dis is done with a hand as firm as it is free:--
+
+    "As frogs before their enemy, the snake,
+      Quick scattering through the pool in timid shoals,
+      On the dankooze a huddling cluster makes'
+      I saw above a thousand mined souls
+    Flying from one who passed the Stygian bog,
+      With feet unmoistened by the sludgy wave;
+      Oft from his face his left hand brushed the fog
+      Whose weight alone, it seemed, annoyance gave.
+    At once the messenger of Heaven I kenned,
+      And toward my master turned, who made a sign
+      That hushed I should remain, and lowly bend.
+      Ah me, how full he looked of scorn divine!"
+
+
+     _Ornithology and Ooelogy of New England: containing full
+     Descriptions of the Birds of New England, and adjoining States
+     and Provinces, arranged by a long-approved Classification and
+     Nomenclature; together with a complete History of their Habits,
+     Times of Arrival and Departure, their Distribution, Food, Song,
+     Time of Breeding, and a careful and accurate Description of
+     their Nests and Eggs; with Illustrations of many Species of the
+     Birds, and accurate Figures of their Eggs_. By EDWARD A.
+     SAMUELS, Curator of Zooelogy in the Massachusetts State Cabinet.
+     Boston: Nichols and Noyes.
+
+The strong point of this book is, that it monopolizes the ground, and
+has no rivals. While no branch of natural history has called forth in
+America such arduous research as ornithology, or such eloquent writing,
+there has yet been for many years no popular manual in print. Audubon,
+Wilson, Nuttall, are all practically inaccessible to the ordinary
+purchaser. Moreover, there have been great advances in scientific
+classification, and also in field knowledge, since those earlier works
+appeared. There is therefore an admirable field for any new writer.
+
+Mr. Samuels frankly acknowledges on his first page that he is mainly
+indebted to Professor Baird of the Smithsonian Institute for what is by
+far the most valuable portion of his book,--the classification, the
+nomenclature, and the generic and specific descriptions. He is only
+responsible for the popular descriptions; but even these consist so very
+largely of quotations that the whole book must evidently be judged
+rather as a compilation than as an original work.
+
+Considered as a compilation, it is valuable, though its title-page
+unfortunately promises more than any work on natural history ever yet
+performed, and so prepares the way for disappointment. Mr. Samuels
+appears to be a zealous and accurate ornithologist, with plenty of
+field-knowledge, but very little descriptive power. Being apparently
+conscious of this, he is shy of delineating the rarer birds, because he
+does not personally know them, while he passes hastily over the more
+familiar, because "their habits are known to all." This last piece of
+abstinence is greatly to be regretted. For a local manual has two main
+objects, to furnish to young students the means of identifying species,
+and to give remote students the means of comparing species. For both
+purposes the commonest birds are most important, since everybody begins
+with these. A boy wishes, for instance, to identify the wood-thrush; or
+a Southern naturalist wishes to compare its traits with those of the
+mocking-bird. He finds that in this book the wood-thrush is dismissed
+with two pages, while there is a quotation from Wilson seven pages long
+upon the habits of the mocking-bird. When will naturalists learn that
+the first duty of each observer is to make a thorough study of his own
+locality, and meanwhile to let the rest of the world alone?
+
+One looks in vain in these pages for any good description of the
+song-sparrow, the blue-bird, the blue-jay, the kingfisher, or the
+oriole. These birds are allowed but a page or two each, although, for
+some reason, more liberal space is given to the robin and the crow. But
+there is no bird so familiar that it does not offer subjects for
+interesting speculation and study. The pretty nocturnal trill of the
+hairbird; the remarkable change which civilization has wrought in the
+habits of the cliff-swallow; the disputed question whether the cat-bird
+is or is not a mocker;--these and a hundred similar points relate to
+very common birds, and are accordingly unnoticed by Mr. Samuels. Eggs
+really interest him, and his descriptions and measurements of these
+constitute the most original part of the book, and are highly valuable.
+On the other hand, the notes of birds are very inadequately described,
+and sometimes not at all; he does not mention that the loon has a voice.
+
+Again, he does full justice to the chronology of bird biography, and
+gives ample dates as to their coming and going, nesting and hatching.
+But as to their geographical distribution the information is scanty, and
+not always quite reliable. Thus the snowy-owl is described (p. 78) as
+occurring "principally on the sea-coast," whereas it is tolerably
+abundant in the very heart of Massachusetts, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois,
+etc.; the snow-bird is described as nesting in the White Mountains (p.
+314), while the more remarkable fact that it nests on Monadnock is
+omitted; the meadow-lark is described as only remaining in New England
+through "mild winters" (p. 344), whereas near Newport it remains during
+the coldest seasons, more abundantly than any other conspicuous bird.
+These, however, are subordinate points, and there is no important matter
+in which we have seen any reason to impugn the author's accuracy.
+
+The inequality which marks the internal execution of this book marks
+also its externals. The plates of eggs--four in number, comprising
+thirty eggs--are admirable; while the plates representing birds are Of
+the most mediocre description, and do discredit to the work. With all
+these merits and demerits, the book is of much value, because an
+unsatisfactory manual is far better than none. It does not take the
+place of that revised edition of Nuttall, which is still the great
+desideratum, but we may use meanwhile an eminently ornithological
+proverb, and say that a Samuels in the hand is worth two Nuttalls in the
+bush.
+
+
+     _Richmond during the War. Four Years of Personal Observation_.
+     By a Richmond Lady. New York: G. W. Carleton and Company.
+
+Mr. Curtis, in his charming book, "Prue and I," speaks of the novel
+effect of landscape which Mr. Titbottom got by putting down his head,
+and regarding the prospect between his knees; and we suppose that most
+ingenious boys, young and old, have similarly contemplated nature, and
+will understand what we mean when we say that the world shows to much
+the same advantage through the books of Southern writers. Especially in
+Southern histories of the late war is the effect noticeable. The general
+outline is the same as when viewed in the more conventional manner, with
+ideas and principles right side up; the objects are the same, the events
+and results are the same; but there is a curious glamour over all, and
+the spectator has a mystical feeling of topsy-turvy, ending in vertigo
+and a disordered stomach.
+
+The present book is in the spirit of all other subjugated literature
+concerning the war,--a vainglorious and boastful spirit as to events
+that led only to the destruction of the political power of the South; a
+wronged and forgiving, if not quite cheerful, spirit as to the end
+itself. Vivid and powerful presentation of facts would not perhaps be
+expected of an author who calls herself "A Richmond Lady," and there is
+nothing of the sort in the book. It contains sketches of public Rebels
+in civil and military station, washed in with the raw yellows, reds, and
+blues of Southern eulogy; and there is a great deal of gossip concerning
+private life in Richmond, where everybody appears to have spoken and
+acted during the four years of the war as if in the presence of the
+photographers and short-hand writers, and with an eye single to the
+impression upon posterity. It is an eloquent book, and--need we say?--a
+dull one.
+
+
+     _Kathrina: her Life and mine, in a Poem_, By J. G. HOLLAND,
+     Author of "Bitter-Sweet." New York: Charles Scribner and
+     Company.
+
+Let us tell without any caricature of ours, in prose that shall be just
+if not generous, the story of Mr. Holland's hero as we have gathered it
+from the work which the author, for reasons of his own, calls a poem.
+
+The petted son of a rich widow in Northampton, Massachusetts, whose
+father has killed himself in a moment of insanity, reaches the age of
+fourteen years without great event, when his mother takes him to visit a
+lady friend living on the other side of the Connecticut River. In this
+lady's door-yard the hero finds a little lamb tethered in the grass, and
+decked with a necklace of scarlet ribbon, and, having a mind for a
+frolic with the pretty animal, the boy unties it. Instantly it slips its
+tether from his hand, leaps the fence, and runs to the top of the
+nearest mountain, whither he follows it, and where, exalted by the
+magnificence of the landscape, he is for the first time conscious of
+being a poet. Returning to his anxious mother, she too is aware of some
+wondrous change in him, and says:
+
+    "My Paul has climbed the noblest mountain height
+    In all his little world, and gazed on scenes
+    As beautiful as rest beneath the sun.
+    I trust he will remember all his life
+    That to his best achievement, and the spot
+    Nearest to heaven his youthful feet have trod,
+    He has been guided by a guileless lamb.
+    It is an omen which his mother's heart
+    Will treasure with her jewels."
+
+Resolved to give him the best educational advantages his mother sends
+him to Mr. Bancroft's school; or, as Mr. Holland sings, permits him
+
+    "To climb the goodly eminence where he
+    In whose profound and stately pages live
+    His country's annals, ruled his little realm."
+
+Here the hero surpasses all the other boys in everything, and but
+repeats his triumphs later when he goes to Amherst College. His mother
+lives upon the victories which he despises; but at last she yields to
+the taint which was in her own blood as well as her husband's, and
+destroys herself. The son, who was aware of her suicidal tendency, and
+had once overheard her combating it in prayer, curses the God who would
+not listen to her and help her, and rejects Him from his scheme of life.
+
+In due time he falls in love with Kathrina, a young lady whom he first
+sees on the occasion of her public reception into the Congregational
+Church at Hadley. Later he learns that she is staying with the lady
+whose pet lamb led him such a chase,--that she is in fact her niece, and
+that she has seen better days. We must say that this good lady does
+everything in her power to make a match between the young people; and
+she is more pleased than surprised at the success of her efforts. It has
+been the hero's idea that human love will fill up the void left in his
+life by the rejection of God and religion; but he soon finds himself
+vaguely unhappy and unsatisfied, and he determines to glut his heart
+with literary fame. He goes, therefore, to New York, and succeeds as a
+poet beyond all his dreams of success. For ten years he is the most
+popular of authors; but he sickens of his facile triumph, and imagines
+that to be happy he must write to please himself, and not the multitude.
+He writes with this idea, but pleases nobody, and is as unhappy as ever.
+
+Meanwhile, Kathrina has fallen into a decline. On her death-bed she
+tells him that it is religion alone which can appease and satisfy him;
+but she pleads with him in vain, till one day, when he enters her room,
+and is startled by a strange coincidence: the lamb, which led him to the
+mountain-top and the consciousness of poetic power, had a scarlet ribbon
+on its neck, and now he finds this ribbon
+
+              "at her throat
+    Repeated in a bright geranium-flower!"
+
+Then Kathrina tells him that his mother's spirit has talked with her,
+and bidden her say to him this:--
+
+    "The lamb has slipped the leash by which his hand
+    Held her in thrall, and seeks the mountain-height;
+    And he, if he reclaim her to his grasp,
+    Must follow where she leads, and kneel at last
+    Upon the summit by her side. And more,
+    Give him my promise that, if he do this,
+    He shall receive from that fair altitude
+    Such a vision of the realm that lies around,
+    Cleft by the river of immortal life,
+    As shall so lift him from his selfishness,
+    And so enlarge his soul, that he shall stand
+    Redeemed from all unworthiness, and saved
+    To happiness and heaven."
+
+Whereupon, having delivered her message, Kathrina bids him kneel. It is
+the supreme moment of her life. He hears his mother's voice, and the
+voice of the innumerable heavenly host, and even the voice of God
+repeating her mandate. He kneels, and she bids him pray, and, as before,
+all the celestial voices repeat her bidding. He prays and is saved.
+
+Such is the story of Kathrina, or rather of Kathrina's husband, for she
+is herself scarcely other than a name for a series of arguments, with
+little of the flesh and blood of a womanly personality. We have too much
+reverence for high purposes in literature not to applaud Mr. Holland's
+good intent in this work, and we accept fully his theory of letters and
+of life. Both are meagre and unsatisfactory as long as their motive is
+low; both must yield unhappiness and self-despite till religion inform
+them. This is the common experience of man; this is the burden of the
+sayings of the sage from the time of Solomon to the time of Mr. Holland;
+and we can all acknowledge its truth, however we may differ as to the
+essence of religion itself. But we conceive that repetition of this
+truth in a long poem demands of the author an excellence, or of the
+reader a patience, all but superhuman.
+
+How Mr. Holland has met the extraordinary demand upon his powers is
+partly evident from the outline of the poem as we have given it. It must
+be owned that it is rather a feeble fancy which unites two vital epochs
+by the incident of the truant lambkin, and that the plot of the poem
+does not in any way reveal a great faculty of invention. A parable,
+moreover, teaches only so far as it is true to life; and in a tale
+professing to deal with persons of our own day and country, we have a
+right to expect some fidelity to our contemporaries and neighbors. But
+we find nothing of this in "Kathrina,"--not even in the incident of a
+young gentleman of fourteen sporting with a lambkin; or in the talk of
+young people who make love in long arguments concerning the nature and
+office of genius and the intermediary functions of the teacher.
+Polemically considered, there is nothing very wrong in the discussions
+between those metaphysical lovers, and no one need raise the question as
+to how far Kathrina's peculiar ideas are applicable to the work of
+genius bearing her name.
+
+    "The greatest artists speak to fewest souls,
+    ... The bread that comes from heaven
+    Needs finest breaking. Some there doubtless are,
+    Some ready souls, that take the morsel pure
+    Divided to their need; but multitudes
+    Must have it in admixtures, menstruums,
+    And forms that human hands or human life
+    Have moulded."
+
+Such passages, though they add nothing to the verisimilitude of
+Kathrina's character, help to make her appear consistent in not laughing
+at a certain weird poem which her lover reads to her. Few ladies in real
+life, however great a tenderness they might feel for a morbid young
+poet, could practise Kathrina's self-control, when, depicting himself as
+a godless youth imprisoned by phantoms "among the elves of the silent
+land," he sings:
+
+    "Under the charred and ghastly gloom,
+      Over the flinty stones,
+    They led him forth to his terrible doom,
+    And, plunged in a deep and noisome tomb,
+      They sat him among the bones."
+
+Where, crouching, he beholds, through a "loop" in the wall, "a sweet
+angel from the skies":--
+
+    "Could she not loose him from his thrall,
+      And lead him into the light?
+    'Ah me!' he murmured, 'I dare not call,
+    Lest she may doubt it a goblin's waul,
+      And leave me in swift affright!'"
+
+The question is of the poet himself, immersed in his own gloomy
+thoughts, and of Kathrina, who could rescue him from them; but she has
+heard "only a wild, weird story," and her lover is obliged to explain
+it, and still we are to suppose that she did not laugh. Nay, we are told
+that she instantly accepted the poet, who exclaims:
+
+    "Are there not lofty moments when the soul
+    Leaps to the front of being, casting off
+    The robes and clumsy instruments of sense,
+    And, postured in its immortality,
+    Reveals its independence of the clod
+    In which it dwells?--moments in which the earth
+    And all material things, all sights and sounds,
+    All signals, ministries, interpreters,
+    Relapse to nothing, and the interflow
+    Of thought and feeling, love and life, go on
+    Between two spirits, raised to sympathy
+    The body dust, within an orb outlined,
+    It shall go on forever?"
+
+We have no reason to suppose that this is not thought a fine passage by
+the author, who will doubtless find readers enough to agree with him, if
+he should not care to accept our estimate of his whole poem.
+Nevertheless, we must confess that it appears to us puerile in
+conception, destitute of due motive, and crude and inartistic in
+treatment. But we should be unjust both to ourselves and our author, if
+we left his work without some allusion to its highly embellished style,
+or, having failed to approve the whole design, refused to notice at all
+the elaborate ornamentation of the parts. Not to be guilty, then, of
+this unfairness, let us cull here some of the fanciful tropes and
+figures which enamel these flowery pages. The oriole is "a torch of
+downy flame"; the "reiterant katydids rasp the mysterious silence"; a
+mother's loss and sorrow are "twin leeches at her heart"; the frosty
+landscape is "fulgent with downy crystals"; Kathrina wears a "pale-blue
+muslin robe," which the hero fancies "dyed with forget-me-nots"; and the
+landscape has usually some effect of dry-goods to the poet's eye. We
+might almost believe that this passage,
+
+          "We touched the hem
+    Of the dark mountain's robe, that falls in folds
+    Of emerald sward around his feet, and there
+    Upon its tufted velvet we sat down,"
+
+was inspired by perusal of Dr. Holmes's ode to "Evening--by a Tailor":--
+
+    "Day hath put on his jacket, and around
+    His burning bosom buttoned it with stars
+    Here will I lay me on the velvet grass,
+    That is like padding to earth's meagre ribs."
+
+But Mr. Holland's fancy is of a quality which transcends all feigning in
+others. Whatever it touches it figures in gross material substance,
+preferably wood or some sort of upholstery. When, however, his hero
+first stood in Broadway, he seems to have found no fabric of the looms,
+no variety of plumage, no sort of precious wood or dye-stuff equal to
+the allegory, and he wreaks himself in the following tremendous
+hydraulic image;--
+
+    "I saw the waves of life roll up the steps
+    Of great cathedrals and retire; and break
+    In charioted grandeur at the feet
+    Of marble palaces, and toss their spray
+    Of feathered beauty through the open doors,
+    To pile the restless foam within; and burst
+    On crowded caravansaries, to fall
+    In quick return; and in dark currents glide
+    Through sinuous alleys, and the grimy loops
+    Of reeking cellars, and with softest plash
+    Assail the gilded shrines of opulence,
+    And slide in musical relapse away."
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No.
+122, December, 1867, by Various
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY ***
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