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diff --git a/39203.txt b/39203.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..482284b --- /dev/null +++ b/39203.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2257 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, An Edinburgh Eleven, by J. M. Barrie + + +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: An Edinburgh Eleven + Pencil Portraits from College Life + + +Author: J. M. Barrie + + + +Release Date: March 19, 2012 [eBook #39203] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AN EDINBURGH ELEVEN*** + + +E-text prepared by David Edwards, Diane Monico, and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page images generously made +available by Internet Archive (http://www.archive.org) + + + +Note: Images of the original pages are available through + Internet Archive. See + http://www.archive.org/details/edinburghelevenp00barrrich + + + + + +AN EDINBURGH ELEVEN + +Pencil Portraits from College Life + +by + +J. M. BARRIE + +Author of +"The Little Minister," "A Window in Thrums," "When a Man's +Single," "Auld Licht Idylls," etc. + + + + + + + +New York +Lovell, Coryell & Company +5 And 7 East Sixteenth Street + + + + +CONTENTS. + + PAGE + + I. LORD ROSEBERY, 7 + + II. PROFESSOR MASSON, 19 + + III. PROFESSOR BLACKIE, 31 + + IV. PROFESSOR CALDERWOOD, 41 + + V. PROFESSOR TAIT, 53 + + VI. PROFESSOR FRASER, 67 + + VII. PROFESSOR CHRYSTAL, 77 + + VIII. PROFESSOR SELLAR, 91 + + IX. MR. JOSEPH THOMSON, 105 + + X. ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON, 115 + + XI. REV. WALTER C. SMITH, D.D., 129 + + + + +LORD ROSEBERY. + + + + +I. + +LORD ROSEBERY. + + +The first time I ever saw Lord Rosebery was in Edinburgh when I was a +student, and I flung a clod of earth at him. He was a peer; those were +my politics. + +I missed him, and I have heard a good many journalists say since then +that he is a difficult man to hit. One who began by liking him and is +now scornful, which is just the reverse process from mine, told me the +reason why. He had some brochures to write on the Liberal leaders, and +got on nicely till he reached Lord Rosebery, where he stuck. In vain he +walked round his lordship, looking for an opening. The man was +naturally indignant; he is the father of a family. + +Lord Rosebery is forty-one years of age, and has missed many +opportunities of becoming the bosom friend of Lord Randolph Churchill. +They were at Eton together and at Oxford, and have met since. As a boy, +the Liberal played at horses, and the Tory at running off with other +boys' caps. Lord Randolph was the more distinguished at the university. +One day a proctor ran him down in the streets smoking in his cap and +gown. The undergraduate remarked on the changeability of the weather, +but the proctor, gasping at such bravado, demanded his name and +college. Lord Randolph failed to turn up next day at St. Edmund Hall to +be lectured, but strolled to the proctor's house about dinner-time. +"Does a fellow, name of Moore, live here?" he asked. The footman +contrived not to faint. "He do," he replied, severely; "but he are at +dinner." "Ah! take him in my card," said the unabashed caller. The +Merton books tell that for this the noble lord was fined ten pounds. + +There was a time when Lord Rosebery would have reformed the House of +Lords to a site nearer Newmarket. As politics took a firmer grip of +him, it was Newmarket that seemed a long way off. One day at Edinburgh +he realized the disadvantage of owning swift horses. His brougham had +met him at Waverley Station to take him to Dalmeny. Lord Rosebery +opened the door of the carriage to put in some papers, and then turned +away. The coachman, too well bred to look round, heard the door shut, +and, thinking that his master was inside, set off at once. Pursuit was +attempted, but what was there in Edinburgh streets to make up on those +horses? The coachman drove seven miles, until he reached a point in the +Dalmeny parks where it was his lordship's custom to alight and open a +gate. Here the brougham stood for some minutes, awaiting Lord +Rosebery's convenience. At last the coachman became uneasy and +dismounted. His brain reeled when he saw an empty brougham. He could +have sworn to seeing his lordship enter. There were his papers. What +had happened? With a quaking hand the horses were turned, and, driving +back, the coachman looked fearfully along the sides of the road. He met +Lord Rosebery travelling in great good humor by the luggage omnibus. + +Whatever is to be Lord Rosebery's future, he has reached that stage in +a statesman's career when his opponents cease to question his capacity. +His speeches showed him long ago a man of brilliant parts. His tenure +of the Foreign Office proved him heavy metal. Were the Gladstonians to +return to power, the other Cabinet posts might go anywhere, but the +Foreign Secretary is arranged for. Where his predecessors had clouded +their meaning in words till it was as wrapped up as a Mussulman's head, +Lord Rosebery's were the straightforward despatches of a man with his +mind made up. German influence was spoken of; Count Herbert Bismarck +had been seen shooting Lord Rosebery's partridges. This was the +evidence: there has never been any other, except that German methods +commended themselves to the minister rather than those of France. His +relations with the French government were cordial. "The talk of +Bismarck's shadow behind Rosebery," a great French politician said +lately, "I put aside with a smile; but how about the Jews?" Probably +few persons realize what a power the Jews are in Europe, and in Lord +Rosebery's position he is a strong man if he holds his own with them. +Any fears on that ground have, I should say, been laid by his record at +the Foreign Office. + +Lord Rosebery had once a conversation with Prince Bismarck, to which, +owing to some oversight, the Paris correspondent of the _Times_ was not +invited. M. Blowitz only smiled good-naturedly, and of course his +report of the proceedings appeared all the same. Some time afterward +Lord Rosebery was introduced to this remarkable man, who, as is well +known, carries Cabinet appointments in his pocket, and complimented him +on his report. "Ah, it was all right, was it?" asked Blowitz, beaming. +Lord Rosebery explained that any fault it had was that it was all +wrong. "Then if Bismarck did not say that to you," said Blowitz, +regally, "I know he intended to say it." + +The "Uncrowned King of Scotland" is a title that has been made for Lord +Rosebery, whose country has had faith in him from the beginning. Mr. +Gladstone is the only other man who can make so many Scotsmen take +politics as if it were the Highland Fling. Once when Lord Rosebery was +firing an Edinburgh audience to the delirium point, an old man in the +hall shouted out, "I dinna hear a word he says, but it's grand, it's +grand!" During the first Midlothian campaign Mr. Gladstone and Lord +Rosebery were the father and son of the Scottish people. Lord Rosebery +rode into fame on the top of that wave, and he has kept his place in +the hearts of the people, and in oleographs on their walls, ever since. +In all Scottish matters he has the enthusiasm of a Burns dinner, and +his humor enables him to pay compliments. When he says agreeable things +to Scotsmen about their country, there is a twinkle in his eye and in +theirs to which English scribes cannot give a meaning. He has unveiled +so many Burns statues that an American lecturess explains: "Curious +thing, but I feel somehow I am connected with Lord Rosebery. I go to a +place and deliver a lecture on Burns; they collect subscriptions for a +statue, and he unveils it." Such is the delight of the Scottish +students in Lord Rosebery that he may be said to have made the +triumphal tour of the northern universities as their lord-rector; he +lost the post in Glasgow lately through a quibble, but had the honor +with the votes. His address to the Edinburgh undergraduates on +"Patriotism" was the best thing he ever did outside politics, and made +the students his for life. Some of them had smuggled into the hall a +chair with "Gaelic chair" placarded on it, and the lord-rector +unwittingly played into their hands. In a noble peroration he exhorted +his hearers to high aims in life. "Raise your country," he exclaimed +[cheers]; "raise yourselves [renewed cheering]; raise your university +[thunders of applause]." From the back of the hall came a solemn voice, +"Raise the chair!" Up went the Gaelic chair. + +Even Lord Rosebery's views on imperial federation can become a +compliment to Scotland. Having been all over the world himself, and +felt how he grew on his travels, Lord Rosebery maintains that every +British statesman should visit India and the colonies. He said that +first at a semi-public dinner in the country--and here I may mention +that on such occasions he has begun his speeches less frequently than +any other prominent politician with a statement that others could be +got to discharge the duty better; in other words, he has several times +omitted this introduction. On his return to London he was told that his +colleagues in the Administration had been seeing how his scheme would +work out. "We found that if your rule were enforced, the Cabinet would +consist of yourself and Childers." "This would be an ideal cabinet," +Lord Rosebery subsequently remarked in Edinburgh, "for it would be +entirely Scottish," Mr. Childers being member for a Scottish +constituency. + +The present unhappy division of the Liberal party has made enemies of +friends for no leading man so little as for Lord Rosebery. There are +forces working against him, no doubt, in comparatively high places, but +the Unionists have kept their respect for him. His views may be wrong, +but he is about the only Liberal leader, with the noble exception of +Lord Hartington, of whom troublous times have not rasped the temper. +Though a great reader, he is not a literary man like Mr. Morley, who +would, however, be making phrases where Lord Rosebery would make laws. +Sir William Harcourt has been spoken of as a possible prime minister, +but surely it will never come to that. If Mr. Gladstone's successor is +chosen from those who have followed him on the home-rule question, he +probably was not rash in himself naming Lord Rosebery. + +Lord Rosebery could not now step up without stepping into the +premiership. His humor, which is his most obvious faculty, has been a +prop to him many a time ere now, but, if I was his adviser, I should +tell him that it has served its purpose. There are a great many +excellent people who shake their heads over it in a man who has become +a power in the land. "Let us be grave," said Dr. Johnson once to a +merry companion, "for here comes a fool." In an unknown novel there is +a character who says of himself that "he is not stupid enough ever to +be a great man." I happen to know that this reflection was evolved by +the author out of thinking over Lord Rosebery. It is not easy for a +bright man to be heavy, and Lord Rosebery's humor is so spontaneous +that if a joke is made in their company he has always finished laughing +before Lord Hartington begins. Perhaps when Lord Rosebery is on the +point of letting his humor run off with him in a public speech, he +could recover his solemnity by thinking of the _Examiner_. + + + + +PROFESSOR MASSON. + + + + +II. + +PROFESSOR MASSON. + + +Though a man might, to my mind, be better employed than in going to +college, it is his own fault if he does not strike on some one there +who sends his life off at a new angle. If, as I take it, the glory of a +professor is to give elastic minds their proper bent, Masson is a name +his country will retain a grip of. There are men who are good to think +of, and as a rule we only know them from their books. Something of our +pride in life would go with their fall. To have one such professor at a +time is the most a university can hope of human nature; so Edinburgh +need not expect another just yet. These, of course, are only to be +taken as the reminiscences of a student. I seem to remember everything +Masson said, and the way he said it. + +Having, immediately before taken lodgings in a crow's nest, my first +sight of Masson was specially impressive. It was the opening of the +session, when fees were paid, and a whisper ran round the quadrangle +that Masson had set off home with three hundred one-pound notes stuffed +into his trouser pockets. There was a solemn swell of awestruck +students to the gates, and some of us could not help following him. He +took his pockets coolly. When he stopped it was at a second-hand +bookstall, where he rummaged for a long time. Eventually he pounced +upon a dusty, draggled little volume, and went off proudly with it +beneath his arm. He seemed to look suspiciously at strangers now, but +it was not the money but the book he was keeping guard over. His +pockets, however, were unmistakably bulging out. I resolved to go in +for literature. + +Masson, however, always comes to my memory first knocking nails into +his desk or trying to tear the gas-bracket from its socket. He said +that the Danes scattered over England, taking such a hold as a nail +takes when it is driven into wood. For the moment he saw his desk +turned into England; he whirled an invisible hammer in the air, and +down it came on the desk with a crash. No one who has sat under Masson +can forget how the Danes nailed themselves upon England. His desk is +thick with their tombstones. It was when his mind groped for an image +that he clutched the bracket. He seemed to tear his good things out of +it. Silence overcame the class. Some were fascinated by the man; others +trembled for the bracket. It shook, groaned, and yielded. Masson said +another of the things that made his lectures literature; the crisis was +passed; and everybody breathed again. + +He masters a subject by letting it master him; for though his critical +reputation is built on honesty, it is his enthusiasm that makes his +work warm with life. Sometimes he entered the class-room so full of +what he had to say that he began before he reached his desk. If he was +in the middle of a peroration when the bell rang, even the back benches +forgot to empty. There were the inevitable students to whom literature +is a trial, and sometimes they call attention to their sufferings by a +scraping of the feet. Then the professor tried to fix his eyeglass on +them, and when it worked properly they were transfixed. As a rule, +however, it required so many adjustments that by the time his eye took +hold of it he had remembered that students were made so, and his +indignation went. Then, with the light in his eye that some +photographer ought to catch, he would hope that his lecture was not +disturbing their conversation. It was characteristic of his passion for +being just that, when he had criticised some writer severely he would +remember that the back benches could not understand that criticism and +admiration might go together, unless they were told so again. + +The test of a sensitive man is that he is careful of wounding the +feelings of others. Once, I remember, a student was reading a passage +aloud, assuming at the same time such an attitude that the professor +could not help remarking that he looked like a teapot. It was exactly +what he did look like, and the class applauded. But next moment Masson +had apologized for being personal. Such reminiscences are what make +the old literature class-room to thousands of graduates a delight to +think of. + +When the news of Carlyle's death reached the room, Masson could not go +on with his lecture. Every one knows what Carlyle has said of him; and +no one who has heard it will ever forget what he has said of Carlyle. +Here were two men who understood each other. One of the Carlylean +pictures one loves to dwell on shows them smoking together, with +nothing breaking the pauses but Mrs. Carlyle's needles. Carlyle told +Masson how he gave up smoking and then took to it again. He had walked +from Dumfriesshire to Edinburgh to consult a doctor about his health, +and was advised to lose his pipe. He smoked no more, but his health did +not improve, and then one day he walked in a wood. At the foot of a +tree lay a pipe, a tobacco pouch, a match-box. He saw clearly that this +was a case of Providential interference, and from that moment he smoked +again. There the professor's story stops. I have no doubt, though, +that he nodded his head when Carlyle explained what the pipe and +tobacco were doing there. Masson's "Milton" is, of course, his great +work, but for sympathetic analysis I know nothing to surpass his +"Chatterton." Lecturing on Chatterton one day, he remarked, with a +slight hesitation, that had the poet mixed a little more in company +and--and smoked, his morbidness would not have poisoned him. That +turned my thoughts to smoking, because I meant to be a Chatterton, but +greater. Since then the professor has warned me against smoking too +much. He was smoking at the time. + +This is no place to follow Masson's career, nor to discuss his work. To +reach his position one ought to know his definition of a man of +letters. It is curious, and, like most of his departures from the +generally accepted, sticks to the memory. By a man of letters he does +not mean the poet, for instance, who is all soul, so much as the +strong-brained writer whose guardian angel is a fine sanity. He used to +mention John Skelton, the Wolsey satirist, and Sir David Lindsay, as +typical men of letters from this point of view, and it is as a man of +letters of that class that Masson is best considered. In an age of many +whipper-snappers in criticism, he is something of a Gulliver. + +The students in that class liked to see their professor as well as hear +him. I let my hair grow long because it only annoyed other people, and +one day there was dropped into my hand a note containing sixpence and +the words: "The students sitting behind you present their compliments, +and beg that you will get your hair cut with the enclosed, as it +interferes with their view of the professor." + +Masson, when he edited _Macmillan's_, had all the best men round him. +His talk of Thackeray is specially interesting, but he always holds +that in conversation Douglas Jerrold was unapproachable. Jerrold told +him a good story of his seafaring days. His ship was lying off +Gibraltar, and for some hours Jerrold, though only a midshipman, was +left in charge. Some of the sailors begged to get ashore, and he let +them, on the promise that they would bring him back some oranges. One +of them disappeared, and the midshipman suffered for it. More than +twenty years afterward Jerrold was looking in at a window in the Strand +when he seemed to know the face of a weatherbeaten man who was doing +the same thing. Suddenly he remembered, and put his hand on the other's +shoulder. "My man," he said, "you have been a long time with those +oranges!" The sailor recognized him, turned white, and took to his +heels. There is, too, the story of how Dickens and Jerrold made up +their quarrel at the Garrick Club. It was the occasion on which Masson +first met the author of "Pickwick." Dickens and Jerrold had not spoken +for a year, and they both happened to have friends at dinner in the +strangers' room, Masson being Jerrold's guest. The two hosts sat back +to back, but did not address each other, though the conversation was +general. At last Jerrold could stand it no longer. Turning, he +exclaimed, "Charley, my boy, how are you?" Dickens wheeled round and +grasped his hand. + +Many persons must have noticed that, in appearance, Masson is becoming +more and more like Carlyle every year. How would you account for it? It +is a thing his old students often discuss when they meet, especially +those of them who, when at college, made up their minds to dedicate +their first book to him. The reason they seldom do it is because the +book does not seem good enough. + + + + +PROFESSOR JOHN STUART BLACKIE. + + + + +III. + +PROFESSOR JOHN STUART BLACKIE. + + +Lately I was told that Blackie--one does not say Mr. Cromwell--is no +longer professor of Greek in Edinburgh University. What nonsense some +people talk! As if Blackie were not part of the building! In his class +one day he spoke touchingly of the time when he would have to join +Socrates in the Elysian fields. A student cheered--no one knows why. +"It won't be for some time yet," added John Stuart. + +Blackie takes his ease at home, in a dressing-gown and straw hat. This +shows that his plaid really does come off. "My occupation nowadays," he +said to me recently, "is business, blethers, bothers, beggars, and +backgammon." He has also started a profession of going to public +meetings, and hurrying home to write letters to the newspapers about +them. When the editor shakes the manuscript, a sonnet falls out. I +think I remember the professor's saying that he had never made five +shillings by his verses. To my mind they are worth more than that. + +Though he has explained them frequently, there is still confusion about +Blackie's politics. At Manchester they thought he was a Tory, and +invited him to address them, on that understanding. "I fancy I +astonished them," the professor said to me. This is quite possible. +Then he was mistaken for a Liberal. The fact is that Blackie is a +philosopher, who follows the golden mean. He sees this himself. A +philosopher who follows the golden mean is thus a man who runs zig-zag +between two extremes. You will observe that he who does this is some +time before he arrives anywhere. + +The professor has said that he has the strongest lungs in Scotland. Of +the many compliments that might well be paid him, not the least worthy +would be this: that he is as healthy mentally as physically. Mrs. +Norton begins a novel with the remark that one of the finest sights +conceivable is a well-preserved gentleman of middle age. It will be +some time yet before Blackie reaches middle age, but there must be +something wrong with you if you can look at him without feeling +refreshed. Did you ever watch him marching along Princes Street on a +warm day, when every other person was broiling in the sun? His head is +well thrown back, the staff, grasped in the middle, jerks back and +forward like a weaver's shuttle, and the plaid flies in the breeze. +Other people's clothes are hanging limp. Blackie carries his breeze +with him. + +A year or two ago Mr. Gladstone, when at Dalmeny, pointed out that he +had the advantage over Blackie in being of both Highland and Lowland +extraction. The professor, however, is as Scotch as the thistle or his +native hills, and Mr. Gladstone, quite justifiably, considers him the +most outstanding of living Scotsmen. Blackie is not quite sure himself. +Not long ago I heard him read a preface to a life of Mr. Gladstone that +was being printed at Smyrna in modern Greek. He told his readers to +remember that Mr. Gladstone was a great scholar and an upright +statesman. They would find it easy to do this if they first remembered +that he was Scottish. + +The _World_ included Blackie in its list of "Celebrities at Home." It +said that the door was opened by a red-headed lassie. That was probably +meant for local color, and it amused every one who knew Mrs. Blackie. +The professor is one of the most genial of men, and will show you to +your room himself, talking six languages. This tends to make the +conversation one-sided, but he does not mind that. He still writes a +good deal, spending several hours in his library daily, and his talk is +as brilliant as ever. His writing nowadays is less sustained than it +was, and he prefers flitting from one subject to another, to evolving a +great work. When he dips his pen into an ink-pot, it at once writes a +sonnet--so strong is the force of habit. Recently he wrote a page about +Carlyle in a little book issued by the Edinburgh students' bazaar +committee. In this he reproved Carlyle for having "bias." Blackie +wonders why people should have bias. + +Some readers of this may in their student days have been invited to the +Greek professor's house to breakfast, without knowing why they were +selected from among so many. It was not, as they are probably aware, +because of their classical attainments, for they were too thoughtful to +be in the prize-list; nor was it because of the charm of their manners +or the fascination of their conversation. When the professor noticed +any physical peculiarity about a student, such as a lisp, or a glass +eye, or one leg longer than the other, or a broken nose, he was at once +struck by it, and asked him to breakfast. They were very lively +breakfasts, the eggs being served in tureens; but sometimes it was a +collection of the maimed and crooked, and one person at the table--not +the host himself--used to tremble lest, making mirrors of each other, +the guests should see why they were invited. + +Sometimes, instead of asking a student to breakfast, Blackie would +instruct another student to request his company to tea. Then the two +students were told to talk about paulo-post futures in the cool of the +evening, and to read their Greek Testament and to go to the pantomime. +The professor never tired of giving his students advice about the +preservation of their bodily health. He strongly recommended a cold +bath at six o'clock every morning. In winter, he remarked genially, you +can break the ice with a hammer. According to himself, only one +enthusiast seems to have followed his advice, and he died. + +In Blackie's class-room there used to be a demonstration every time he +mentioned the name of a distinguished politician. Whether the +demonstration took the professor by surprise or whether he waited for +it, will never perhaps be known. But Blackie at least put out the gleam +in his eye, and looked as if he were angry. "I will say Beaconsfield," +he would exclaim (cheers and hisses). "Beaconsfield" (uproar). Then he +would stride forward, and, seizing the railing, announce his intention +of saying Beaconsfield until every goose in the room was tired of +cackling. ("Question.") "Beaconsfield." ("No, no.") "Beaconsfield." +("Hear, hear," and shouts of "Gladstone.") "Beaconsfield." ("Three +cheers for Dizzy.") Eventually the class would be dismissed as--(1) +idiots, (2) a bear garden, (3) a flock of sheep, (4) a pack of +numskulls, (5) hissing serpents. The professor would retire, apparently +fuming, to his anteroom, and five minutes afterward he would be playing +himself down the North Bridge on imaginary bagpipes. This sort of thing +added a sauce to all academic sessions. There was a notebook also, +which appeared year after year. It contained the professor's jokes of a +former session, carefully classified by an admiring student. It was +handed down from one year's men to the next; and thus, if Blackie began +to make a joke about haggis, the possessor of the book had only swiftly +to turn to the H's, find what the joke was, and send it along the class +quicker than the professor could speak it. + +In the old days the Greek professor recited a poem in honor of the end +of the session. He composed it himself, and, as known to me, it took +the form of a graduate's farewell to his alma mater. Sometimes he +would knock a map down as if overcome with emotion, and at critical +moments a student in the back benches would accompany him on a penny +trumpet. Now, I believe, the Hellenic Club takes the place of the +class-room. All the eminent persons in Edinburgh attend its meetings, +and Blackie, the Athenian, is in the chair. The policeman in Douglas +Crescent looks skeered when you ask him what takes place on these +occasions. It is generally understood that toward the end of the +meeting they agree to read Greek next time. + + + + +PROFESSOR CALDERWOOD. + + + + +IV. + +PROFESSOR CALDERWOOD. + + +Here is a true story that the general reader may jump, as it is +intended for Professor Calderwood himself. Some years ago an English +daily paper reviewed a book entitled "A Handbook of Moral Philosophy." +The professor knows the work. The "notice" was done by the junior +reporter, to whom philosophical treatises are generally intrusted. He +dealt leniently, on the whole, with Professor Calderwood, even giving +him a word of encouragement here and there. Still the criticism was +severe. The reviewer subsequently went to Edinburgh University, and +came out 144th in the class of moral philosophy. + +That student is now, I believe, on friendly terms with Professor +Calderwood, but has never told him this story. I fancy the professor +would like to know his name. It may perhaps be reached in this way: He +was the young gentleman who went to his classes the first day in a +black coat and silk hat, and was cheered round the quadrangle by a body +of admiring fellow-students, who took him for a professor. + +Calderwood contrives to get himself more in touch with the mass of his +students than some of his fellow-professors, partly because he puts a +high ideal before himself, and to some extent because his subject is +one that Scottish students revel in. Long before they join his class +they know that they are moral philosophers; indeed, they are sometimes +surer of it before they enrol than afterward. Their essays begin in +some such fashion as this: "In joining issue with Reid, I wish to take +no unfair advantage of my antagonist;" or, "Kant is sadly at fault when +he says that----" or, "It is strange that a man of Locke's attainments +should have been blind to the fact----" When the professor reads out +these tit-bits to the class, his eyes twinkle. Some students, of +course, are not such keen philosophers as others. Does Professor +Calderwood remember the one who was never struck by anything in moral +philosophy until he learned by accident that Descartes lay in bed till +about twelve o'clock every morning? Then it dawned on him that he, too, +must have been a philosopher all his life without knowing it. One year +a father and son were in the class. The father got so excited over +volition and the line that divides right from wrong that he wrenched +the desk before him from its sockets and hit it triumphantly, meaning +that he and the professor were at one. He was generally admired by his +fellow-students, because he was the only one in the class who could cry +out "Hear, hear," and even "Question," without blushing. The son, on +the other hand, was _blase_, and would have been an agnostic, only he +could never remember the name. Once a week Calderwood turns his class +into a debating society, and argues things out with his students. This +field-day is a joy to them. Some of them spend the six days previous in +preparing posers. The worst of the professor is that he never sees that +they are posers. What is the use of getting up a question of the most +subtle kind, when he answers it right away? It makes you sit down quite +suddenly. There is an occasional student who tries to convert liberty +of speech on the discussion day into license, and of him the professor +makes short work. The student means to turn the laugh on Calderwood, +and then Calderwood takes advantage of him, and the other students +laugh at the wrong person. It is the older students, as a rule, who are +most violently agitated over these philosophical debates. One with a +beard cracks his fingers, after the manner of a child in a village +school that knows who won the battle of Bannockburn, and feels that he +must burst if he does not let it out at once. A bald-headed man rises +every minute to put a question, and then sits down, looking stupid. He +has been trying so hard to remember what it is that he has forgotten. +There is a legend of two who quarrelled over the Will and fought it out +on Arthur's Seat. + +One year, however, a boy of sixteen or so, with a squeaky voice and a +stammer, was Calderwood's severest critic. He sat on the back bench, +and what he wanted to know was something about the infinite. Every +discussion day he took advantage of a lull in the debate to squeak out, +"With regard to the infinite," and then could never get any further. No +one ever discovered what he wanted enlightenment on about the infinite. +He grew despondent as the session wore on, but courageously stuck to +his point. Probably he is a soured man now. For purposes of exposition, +Calderwood has a blackboard in his lecture-room, on which he chalks +circles that represent the feelings and the will, with arrows shooting +between them. In my class there was a boy, a very little boy, who had +been a dux at school and was a dunce at college. He could not make +moral philosophy out at all, but did his best. Here were his complete +notes for one day: "Edinburgh University; Class of Moral Philosophy; +Professor Calderwood; Lecture 64; Jan. 11. 18--You rub out the arrow, +and there is only the circle left." + +Professor Calderwood is passionately fond of music, as those who visit +at his house know. He is of opinion that there is a great deal of +moral philosophy in "The Dead March in Saul." Once he said something to +that effect in his class, adding enthusiastically that he could excuse +the absence of a student who had been away hearing "The Dead March in +Saul." After that he received a good many letters from students, worded +in this way: "Mr. McNaughton (bench 7) presents his compliments to +Professor Calderwood, and begs to state that his absence from the class +yesterday was owing to his being elsewhere, hearing 'The Dead March in +Saul.'" "Dear Professor Calderwood: I regret my absence from the +lecture to-day, but hope you will overlook it, as I was unavoidably +detained at home, practising 'The Dead March in Saul.' Yours truly, +Peter Webster." "Professor Calderwood: Dear Sir,--As I was coming to +the lecture to-day, I heard 'The Dead March in Saul' being played in +the street. You will, I am sure, make allowance for my non-attendance +at the class, as I was too much affected to come. It is indeed a grand +march. Yours faithfully, John Robbie." "The students whose names are +subjoined thank the professor of moral philosophy most cordially for +his remarks on the elevating power of music. They have been encouraged +thereby to start a class for the proper study of the impressive and +solemn march to which he called special attention, and hope he will +excuse them, should their practisings occasionally prevent their +attendance at the Friday lectures." Professor Calderwood does not +lecture on "The Dead March in Saul" now. + +The class of moral philosophy is not for the few, but the many. Some +professors do not mind what becomes of the nine students, so long as +they can force on every tenth. Calderwood, however, considers it his +duty to carry the whole class along with him; and it is, as a +consequence, almost impossible to fall behind. The lectures are not +delivered, in the ordinary sense, but dictated. Having explained the +subject of the day with the lucidity that is this professor's peculiar +gift, he condenses his remarks into a proposition. It is as if a +minister ended his sermon with the text. Thus: "Proposition 34: Man is +born into the world--(You have got that? See that you have all got +it.) Man is born into the world with a capacity--with a capacity----" +(Anxious student: "If you please, professor, where did you say man was +born into?") "Into the world, with a capacity to distinguish----" +("With a what, sir?")--"with a capacity to distinguish----" (Student: +"Who is born into the world?") "Perhaps I have been reading too +quickly. Man is born into the world, with a capacity to distinguish +between--distinguish between----" (student shuts his book, thinking +that completes the proposition)--"distinguish between right and +wrong--right--and wrong. You have all got Proposition 34, gentlemen?" + +Once Calderwood was questioning a student about a proposition, to see +that he thoroughly understood it. "Give an illustration," suggested the +professor. The student took the case of a murderer. "Very good," said +the professor. "Now give me another illustration." The student pondered +for a little. "Well," he said at length, "take the case of another +murderer." + +Professor Calderwood has such an exceptional interest in his students +that he asks every one of them to his house. This is but one of many +things that makes him generally popular; he also invites his ladies' +class to meet them. The lady whom you take down to supper suggests +Proposition 41 as a nice thing to talk about, and asks what you think +of the metaphysics of ethics. Professor Calderwood sees the ladies into +the cabs himself. It is the only thing I ever heard against him. + + + + +PROFESSOR TAIT. + + + + +V. + +PROFESSOR TAIT. + + +Just as I opened my desk to write enthusiastically of Tait, I +remembered having recently deciphered a pencil note about him, in my +own handwriting, on the cover of Masson's "Chronological List," which I +still keep by me. I turned to the note to see if there was life in it +yet. "Walls," it says, "got 2s. for T. and T. at Brown's, 16 Walker +Street." I don't recall Walls, but T. and T. was short for "Thomson and +Tait's Elements of Natural Philosophy" (elements!), better known in my +year as the "Student's First Glimpse of Hades." Evidently Walls sold +his copy, but why did I take such note of the address? I fear T. and T. +is one of the "Books Which Have Helped Me." This somewhat damps my +ardor. + +When Tait was at Cambridge, it was flung in the face of the +mathematicians that they never stood high in Scriptural knowledge. +Tait and another were the two of whom one must be first wrangler, and +they agreed privately to wipe this stigma from mathematics. They did it +by taking year about the prize which was said to hang out of their +reach. It is always interesting to know of professors who have done +well in Biblical knowledge. All Scottish students at the English +universities are not so successful. I knew a Snell man who was sent +back from the Oxford entrance exam., and he always held himself that +the Biblical questions had done it. + +Turner is said by medicals to be the finest lecturer in the university. +He will never be that so long as Tait is in the natural philosophy +chair. Never, I think, can there have been a more superb demonstrator. +I have his burly figure before me. The small twinkling eyes had a +fascinating gleam in them; he could concentrate them until they held +the object looked at; when they flashed round the room he seemed to +have drawn a rapier. I have seen a man fall back in alarm under Tait's +eyes, though there were a dozen benches between them. These eyes could +be merry as a boy's, though, as when he turned a tube of water on +students who would insist on crowding too near an experiment, for +Tait's was the humor of high spirits. I could conceive him at marbles +still, and feeling annoyed at defeat. He could not fancy anything much +funnier than a man missing his chair. Outside his own subject he is +not, one feels, a six-footer. When Mr. R. L. Stevenson's memoir of the +late Mr. Fleeming Jenkin was published, Tait said at great length that +he did not like it; he would have had the sketch by a scientific man. +But though scientists may be the only men nowadays who have anything to +say, they are also the only men who can't say it. Scientific men out of +their sphere know for a fact that novels are not true. So they draw +back from novelists who write biography. Professor Tait and Mr. +Stevenson are both men of note, who walk different ways, and when they +meet neither likes to take the curbstone. If they were tied together +for life in a three-legged race, which would suffer the more? + +But if Tait's science weighs him to the earth, he has a genius for +sticking to his subject, and I am lost in admiration every time I bring +back his lectures. It comes as natural to his old students to say when +they meet, "What a lecturer Tait was!" as to Englishmen to joke about +the bagpipes. It is not possible to draw a perfect circle, Chrystal +used to say, after drawing a very fine one. To the same extent it was +not possible for Tait never to fail in his experiments. The atmosphere +would be too much for him once in a session, or there were other +hostile influences at work. Tait warned us of these before proceeding +to experiment, but we merely smiled. We believed in him as though he +were a Bradshaw announcing that he would not be held responsible for +possible errors. + +I had forgotten Lindsay--"the mother may forget her child." As I write, +he has slipped back into his chair on the professor's right, and I +could photograph him now in his brown suit. Lindsay was the +imperturbable man who assisted Tait in his experiments, and his father +held the post before him. When there were many of us together, we could +applaud Lindsay with burlesque exaggeration, and he treated us +good-humoredly, as making something considerable between us. But I once +had to face Lindsay alone, in quest of my certificate; and suddenly he +towered above me, as a waiter may grow tall when you find that you have +not money enough to pay the bill. He treated me most kindly; did not +reply, of course, but got the certificate, and handed it to me as a +cashier contemptuously shovels you your pile of gold. Long ago I pasted +up a crack in my window with the certificate, but it said, I remember, +that I had behaved respectably--so far as I had come under the eyes of +the professor. Tait was always an enthusiast. + +We have been keeping Lindsay waiting. When he had nothing special to +do, he sat indifferently in his chair, with the face of a precentor +after the sermon has begun. But though it was not very likely that +Lindsay would pay much attention to talk about such playthings as the +laws of nature, his fingers went out in the direction of the professor +when the experiments began. Then he was not the precentor; he was a +minister in one of the pews. Lindsay was an inscrutable man, and I +shall not dare to say that he even half-wished to see Tait fail. He +only looked on, ready for any emergency; but if the experiment would +not come off, he was as quick to go to the professor's assistance as a +member of Parliament is to begin when he has caught the Speaker's eye. +Perhaps Tait would have none of his aid, or pushed the mechanism for +the experiment from him--an intimation to Lindsay to carry it quickly +to the ante-room. Do you think Lindsay read the instructions so? Let me +tell you that your mind fails to seize hold of Lindsay. He marched the +machine out of Tait's vicinity as a mother may push her erring boy away +from his father's arms, to take him to her heart as soon as the door is +closed. Lindsay took the machine to his seat, and laid it before him on +the desk, with well-concealed apathy. Tait would flash his eye to the +right to see what Lindsay was after, and there was Lindsay sitting with +his arms folded. The professor's lecture resumed its way, and then out +went Lindsay's hands to the machine. Here he tried a wheel; again he +turned a screw; in time he had the machine ready for another trial. No +one was looking his way, when suddenly there was a whizz--bang, bang. +All eyes were turned upon Lindsay, the professor's among them. A cheer +broke out as we realized that Lindsay had done the experiment. Was he +flushed with triumph? Not a bit of it; he was again sitting with his +arms folded. A Glasgow merchant of modest manners, when cross-examined +in a law court, stated that he had a considerable monetary interest in +a certain concern. "How much do you mean by a 'considerable monetary +interest'?" demanded the contemptuous barrister who was cross-examining +him. "Oh," said the witness, humbly, "a maiter o' a million an' a +half--or, say, twa million." That Glasgow man in the witness-box is the +only person I can think of, when looking about me for a parallel to +Lindsay. While the professor eyed him and the students deliriously beat +the floor, Lindsay quietly gathered the mechanism together and carried +it to the ante-room. His head was not flung back nor his chest forward, +like one who walked to music. In his hour of triumph he was still +imperturbable. I lie back in my chair to-day, after the lapse of years, +and ask myself again, How did Lindsay behave after he entered the +ante-room, shutting the door behind him? Did he give way? There is no +one to say. When he returned to the class-room he wore his familiar +face; a man to ponder over. + +There is a legend about the natural philosophy class-room, the period +long antecedent to Tait. The professor, annoyed by a habit students had +got into of leaving their hats on his desk, announced that the next hat +placed there would be cut in pieces by him in presence of the class. +The warning had its effect, until one day when the professor was called +for a few minutes from the room. An undergraduate, to whom the natural +sciences, unrelieved, were a monotonous study, slipped into the +ante-room, from which he emerged with the professor's hat. This he +placed on the desk, and then stole in a panic to his seat. An awe fell +upon the class. The professor returned, but when he saw the hat he +stopped. He showed no anger. "Gentlemen," he said, "I told you what +would happen if you again disobeyed my orders." Quite blandly he took a +pen-knife from his pocket, slit the hat into several pieces, and flung +them into the sink. While the hat was under the knife, the students +forgot to demonstrate; but as it splashed into the sink, they gave +forth a true British cheer. The end. + +Close to the door of the natural philosophy room is a window that in my +memory will ever be sacred to a janitor. The janitors of the university +were of varied interest, from the merry one who treated us as if we +were his equals, and the soldier who sometimes looked as if he would +like to mow us down, to the Head Man of All, whose name I dare not +write, though I can whisper it. The janitor at the window, however, sat +there through the long evenings while the Debating Society (of which I +was a member) looked after affairs of state in an adjoining room. We +were the smallest society in the university and the longest-winded, +and I was once nearly expelled for not paying my subscription. Our +grand debate was, "Is the policy of the government worthy the +confidence of this society?" and we also read about six essays yearly +on "The Genius of Robert Burns"; but it was on private business that we +came out strongest. The question that agitated us most was whether the +meetings should be opened with prayer, and the men who thought they +should would not so much as look at the men who thought they should +not. When the janitor was told that we had begun our private business, +he returned to his window and slept. His great day was when we could +not form a quorum, which happened now and then. + +Gregory was a member of that society--what has become of Gregory? He +was one of those men who professors say have a brilliant future before +them, and who have not since been heard of. Morton, another member, was +of a different stamp. He led in the debate on "Beauty of the Mind v. +Beauty of the Body." His writhing contempt for the beauty that is only +skin-deep is not to be forgotten. How noble were his rhapsodies on the +beauty of the mind! And when he went to Calderwood's to supper, how +quick he was to pick out the prettiest girl, who took ten per cent in +moral philosophy, and to sit beside her all the evening! Morton had a +way of calling on his friends the night before a degree examination to +ask them to put him up to as much as would pull him through. + +Tait used to get greatly excited over the rectorial elections, and, if +he could have disguised himself, would have liked, I think, to join in +the fight round the Brewster statue. He would have bled for the +Conservative cause, as his utterances on university reform have shown. +The reformers have some cause for thinking that Tait is a greater man +in his class room than when he addresses the graduates. He has said +that the less his students know of his subject when they join his +class, the less, probably, they will have to unlearn. Such views are +behind the times that feed their children on geographical biscuits in +educational nurseries with astronomical ceilings and historical +wall-papers. + + + + +PROFESSOR CAMPBELL FRASER. + + + + +VI. + +PROFESSOR CAMPBELL FRASER. + + +Not long ago I was back in the Old University--how well I remember +pointing it out as the jail to a stranger, who had asked me to show him +round. I was in one of the library ante-rooms, when some one knocked, +and I looked up, to see Campbell Fraser framed in the doorway. I had +not looked on that venerable figure for half a dozen years. I had +forgotten all my metaphysics. Yet it all came back with a rush. I was +on my feet, wondering if I existed strictly so called. + +Calderwood and Fraser had both their followings. The moral philosophers +wore an air of certainty, for they knew that if they stuck to +Calderwood he would pull them through. You cannot lose yourself in the +back garden. But the metaphysicians had their doubts. Fraser led them +into strange places, and said he would meet them there again next day. +They wandered to their lodgings, and got into difficulties with their +landlady for saying that she was only an aggregate of sense phenomena. +Fraser was rather a hazardous cure for weak intellects. Young men whose +anchor had been certainty of themselves went into that class floating +buoyantly on the sea of facts, and came out all adrift--on the sea of +theory--in an open boat--rudderless--one oar--the boat scuttled. How +could they think there was any chance for them, when the professor was +not even sure of himself? I see him rising in a daze from his chair and +putting his hands through his hair. "Do I exist," he said, +thoughtfully, "strictly so called?" The students (if it was the +beginning of the session) looked a little startled. This was a matter +that had not previously disturbed them. Still, if the professor was in +doubt, there must be something in it. He began to argue it out, and an +uncomfortable silence held the room in awe. If he did not exist, the +chances were that they did not exist either. It was thus a personal +question. The professor glanced round slowly for an illustration. "Am +I a table?" A pained look travelled over the class. Was it just +possible that they were all tables? It is no wonder that the students +who do not go to the bottom during their first month of metaphysics +begin to give themselves airs strictly so called. In the privacy of +their room at the top of the house, they pinch themselves to see if +they are still there. + +He would, I think, be a sorry creature who did not find something to +admire in Campbell Fraser. Metaphysics may not trouble you, as it +troubles him, but you do not sit under the man without seeing his +transparent honesty and feeling that he is genuine. In appearance and +in habit of thought he is an ideal philosopher, and his communings with +himself have lifted him to a level of serenity that is worth struggling +for. Of all the arts professors in Edinburgh, he is probably the most +difficult to understand, and students in a hurry have called his +lectures childish. If so, it may be all the better for them. For the +first half of the hour, they say, he tells you what he is going to do, +and for the second half he revises. Certainly he is vastly explanatory, +but then he is not so young as they are, and so he has his doubts. They +are so cock-sure that they wonder to see him hesitate. Often there is a +mist on the mountain when it is all clear in the valley. + +Fraser's great work is his edition of Berkeley, a labor of love that +should live after him. He has two Berkeleys, the large one and the +little one, and, to do him justice, it was the little one he advised us +to consult. I never read the large one myself, which is in a number of +monster tomes, but I often had a look at it in the library, and I was +proud to think that an Edinburgh professor was the editor. When Glasgow +men came through to talk of their professors, we showed them the big +Berkeley, and after that they were reasonable. There was one man in my +year who really began the large Berkeley, but after a time he was +missing, and it is believed that some day he will be found flattened +between the pages of the first volume. + +The "Selections" was the text-book we used in the class. It is +sufficient to prove that Berkeley wrote beautiful English. I am not +sure that any one has written such English since. We have our own +"stylists," but how self-conscious they are after Berkeley! It is seven +years since I opened my "Selections," but I see that I was once more of +a metaphysician than I have been giving myself credit for. The book is +scribbled over with posers in my handwriting about dualism and primary +realities. Some of the comments are in short-hand, which I must at one +time have been able to read, but all are equally unintelligible now. +Here is one of my puzzlers: "Does B here mean impercipient and +unperceived subject or conscious and percipient subject?" Observe the +friendly B. I dare say further on I shall find myself referring to the +professor as F. I wonder if I ever discovered what B meant. I could not +now tell what I meant, myself. + +As many persons are aware, the "Selections" consist of Berkeley's text +with the professor's notes thereon. The notes are explanatory of the +text, and the student must find them an immense help. Here, for +instance, is a note: "Phenomenal or sense dependent existence can be +substantiated and caused only by a self-conscious spirit, for otherwise +there could be no propositions about it expressive of what is +conceivable; on the other hand, to affirm that phenomenal or sense +dependent existence, which alone we know, and which alone is +conceivable, is, or even represents, an inconceivable non-phenomenal or +abstract existence, would be to affirm a contradiction in terms." There +we have it. + +As a metaphysician I was something of a disappointment. I began well, +standing, if I recollect aright, in the three examinations, first, +seventeenth, and seventy-seventh. A man who sat beside me--man was the +word we used--gazed at me reverently when I came out first, and I could +see by his eye that he was not sure whether I existed properly so +called. By the second exam. his doubts had gone, and by the third he +was surer of me than of himself. He came out fifty-seventh, this being +the grand triumph of his college course. He was the same whose key +translated _cras donaberis haedo_ "To-morrow you will be presented with +a kid," but who, thinking that a little vulgar, refined it down to +"To-morrow you will be presented with a small child." + +In the metaphysics class I was like the fountains in the quadrangle, +which ran dry toward the middle of the session. While things were still +looking hopeful for me, I had an invitation to breakfast with the +professor. If the fates had been so propitious as to forward me that +invitation, it is possible that I might be a metaphysician to this day, +but I had changed my lodgings, and, when I heard of the affair, all was +over. The professor asked me to stay behind one day after the lecture, +and told me that he had got his note back with "Left: no address" on +it. "However," he said, "you may keep this," presenting me with the +invitation for the Saturday previously. I mention this to show that +even professors have hearts. That letter is preserved with the +autographs of three editors, none of which anybody can read. + +There was once a medical student who came up to my rooms early in the +session, and I proved to him in half an hour that he did not exist. He +got quite frightened, and I can still see his white face as he sat +staring at me in the gloaming. This shows what metaphysics can do. He +has recovered, however, and is sheep-farming now, his examiners never +having asked him the right questions. + +The last time Fraser ever addressed me was when I was capped. He said, +"I congratulate you, Mr. Smith," and one of the other professors said, +"I congratulate you, Mr. Fisher." My name is neither Smith nor Fisher, +but no doubt the thing was kindly meant. It was then, however, that the +professor of metaphysics had his revenge on me. I had once spelt Fraser +with a "z." + + + + +PROFESSOR CHRYSTAL. + + + + +VII. + +PROFESSOR CHRYSTAL. + + +When Chrystal came to Edinburgh, he rooted up the humors of the +class-room as a dentist draws teeth. Souls were sold for keys that +could be carried in the waistcoat pocket. Ambition fell from heights, +and lay with its eye on a certificate. By night was a rush of ghosts, +shrieking for passes. Horse-play fled before the Differential Calculus +in spectacles. + +I had Chrystal's first year, and recall the gloomy student sitting +before me who hacked "All hope abandon, ye who enter here" into a desk +that may have confined Carlyle. It took him a session, and he was +digging his own grave, for he never got through; but it was something +to hold by, something he felt sure of. All else was spiders' webs in +chalk. + +Chrystal was a fine hare for the hounds who could keep up with him. He +started off the first day with such a spurt that most of us were left +behind mopping our faces, and saying, "Here's a fellow," which is what +Mr. Stevenson says Shakespeare would have remarked about Mr. George +Meredith. We never saw him again. The men who were on speaking +acquaintance with his symbols revelled in him as students love an +enthusiast who is eager to lead them into a world toward which they +would journey. He was a rare guide for them. The bulk, however, lost +him in labyrinths. They could not but admire their brilliant professor; +but while their friend the medallist and he kept the conversation to +themselves, they felt like eavesdroppers hearkening to a pair of +lovers. It is "beautiful," they cried, "but this is no place for us; +let us away." + +A good many went, but their truancy stuck in their throats like Otway's +last roll. The M.A. was before them. They had fancied it in their +hands, but it became shy as a maiden from the day they learned +Chrystal's heresy that Euclid is not mathematics, but only some riders +in it. This snapped the cord that had tied the blind man to his dog, +and the M.A. shot down the horizon. When Rutherford delivered his first +lecture in the chair of institutes of medicine, boisterous students +drowned his voice, and he flung out of the room. At the door he paused +to say, "Gentleman, we shall meet again at Philippi." A dire bomb was +this in the midst of them, warranted to go off, none able to cast it +overboard. We too had our Philippi before us. Chrystal could not be +left to his own devices. + +I had never a passion for knowing that when circles or triangles +attempt impossibilities it is absurd; and _x_ was an unknown quantity I +was ever content to walk round about. To admit to Chrystal that we +understood _x_ was only a way he had of leading you on to _y_ and _z_. +I gave him his chance, however, by contributing a paper of answers to +his first weekly set of exercises. When the hour for returning the +slips came round, I was there to accept fame--if so it was to be--with +modesty; and if it was to be humiliation, still to smile. The professor +said there was one paper, with an owner's name on it, which he could +not read, and it was handed along the class to be deciphered. My +presentiment that it was mine became a certainty when it reached my +hand; but I passed it on pleasantly, and it returned to Chrystal, a +Japhet that never found its father. Feeling that the powers were +against me, I then retired from the conflict, sanguine that the +teaching of my mathematical schoolmaster, the best that could be, would +pull me through. The Disowned may be going the round of the class-room +still. + +The men who did not know when they were beaten returned to their seats, +and doggedly took notes, their faces lengthening daily. Their +note-books reproduced exactly the hieroglyphics of the blackboard, and, +examined at night, were as suggestive as the photographs of persons one +has never seen. To overtake Chrystal after giving him a start was the +presumption that is an offshoot from despair. There was once an elderly +gentleman who for years read the _Times_ every day from the first page +to the last. For a fortnight he was ill of a fever; but, on recovering, +he began at the copy of the _Times_ where he had left off. He +struggled magnificently to make up on the _Times_, but it was in vain. +This is an allegory for the way these students panted after Chrystal. + +Some succumbed and joined the majority--literally; for to mathematics +they were dead. I never hear of the old university now, nor pass under +the shadow of the walls one loves when he is done with them, without +seeing myself as I was the day I matriculated, an awestruck boy, +passing and repassing the gates, frightened to venture inside, +breathing heavily at sight of janitors, Scott and Carlyle in the air. +After that I see nothing fuller of color than the meetings that were +held outside Chrystal's door. Adjoining it is a class-room so little +sought for that legend tells of its door once showing the notice, +"There will be no class to-day, as the student is unwell." The crowd +round Chrystal's could have filled that room. It was composed of +students hearkening at the door to see whether he was to call their +part of the roll to-day. If he did, they slunk in; if not, the crowd +melted into the streets, this refrain in their ears: + + "I'm plucked, I do admit; + I'm spun, my mother dear: + Yet do not grieve for that + Which happens every year. + I've waited very patiently, + I may have long to wait; + But you've another son, mother, + And he will graduate." + +A professor of mathematics once brought a rowdy student from the back +benches to a seat beside him, because: "First, you'll be near the +board; second, you'll be near me; and, third, you'll be near the door." +Chrystal soon discovered that students could be too near the door, and +he took to calling the roll in the middle of the hour, which insured an +increased attendance. It was a silent class, nothing heard but the +patter of pencils, rats scraping for grain, of which there was +abundance, but not one digestion in a bench. To smuggle in a novel up +one's waistcoat was perilous, Chrystal's spectacles doing their work. +At a corner of the platform sat the assistant, with a constable's +authority, but, not formed for swooping, uneasy because he had legs, +and where to put them he knew not. He got through the hour by shifting +his position every five minutes; and, sitting there waiting, he +reminded one of the boy who, on being told to remain so quietly where +he was that he could hear a pin drop, held his breath a moment, then +shouted, "Let it drop!" An excellent fellow was this assistant, who +told us that one of his predecessors had got three months. + +A jest went as far in that class as a plum in the midshipmen's pudding, +and, you remember, when the middies came on a plum they gave three +cheers. In the middle of some brilliant reasoning, Chrystal would stop +to add 4, 7, and 11. Addition of this kind was the only thing he could +not do, and he looked to the class for help--"20," they shouted, "24," +"17," while he thought it over. These appeals to their intelligence +made them beam. They woke up as a sleepy congregation shakes itself +into life when the minister says, "I remember when I was a little +boy----" + +The daring spirits--say, those who were going into their father's +office, and so did not look upon Chrystal as a door locked to their +advancement--sought to bring sunshine into the room. Chrystal soon had +the blind down on that. I hear they have been at it recently, with the +usual result. To relieve the monotony, a student at the end of bench +ten dropped a marble, which toppled slowly downward toward the +professor. At every step it took, there was a smothered guffaw; but +Chrystal, who was working at the board, did not turn his head. When the +marble reached the floor, he said, still with his back to the class, +"Will the student at the end of bench ten, who dropped that marble, +stand up?" All eyes dilated. He had counted the falls of the marble +from step to step. Mathematics do not obscure the intellect. + +Twenty per cent was a good percentage in Chrystal's examinations; +thirty sent you away whistling. As the M.A. drew nigh, students on +their prospects might have been farmers discussing the weather. Some +put their faith in the professor's goodness of heart, of which +symptoms had been showing. He would not, all at once, "raise the +standard"--hated phrase until you are through, when you write to the +papers advocating it. Courage! was it not told of the Glasgow Snell +competition that one of the competitors, as soon as he saw the first +paper, looked for his hat and the door; that he was forbidden to +withdraw until an hour had elapsed, and that he then tackled the paper +and ultimately carried off the Snell? Of more immediate interest, +perhaps, was the story of the quaking student, whose neighbor handed +him in pencil, beneath the desk, the answer to several questions. It +was in an M.A. exam., and the affrighted student found that he could +not read his neighbor's notes. Trusting to fortune, he inclosed them +with his own answers, writing at the top, "No time to write these out +in ink, so inclose them in pencil." He got through: no moral. + +A condemned criminal wondering if he is to get a reprieve will not feel +the position novel if he has loitered in a university quadrangle +waiting for the janitor to nail up the results of a degree exam. A +queer gathering we were, awaiting the verdict of Chrystal. Some +compressed their lips, others were lively as fireworks dipped in water; +there were those who rushed round and round the quadrangle; only one +went the length of saying that he did not want to pass. H. I shall call +him. I met him the other day in Fleet Street, and he annoyed me by +asking at once if I remembered the landlady I quarrelled with because +she wore my socks to church of a Sunday: we found her out one wet +forenoon. H. waited the issue with a cigar in his mouth. He had +purposely, he explained, given in a bad paper. He could not understand +why men were so anxious to get through. He had ten reasons for wishing +to be plucked. We let him talk. The janitor appeared with the fateful +paper, and we lashed about him like waves round a lighthouse, all but +H., who strolled languidly to the board to which the paper was being +fastened. A moment afterward I heard a shriek: "I'm through! I'm +through!" It was H. His cigar was dashed aside, and he sped like an +arrow from the bow to the nearest telegraph office, shouting "I'm +through!" as he ran. + +Those of us who had H.'s fortune now consider Chrystal made to order +for his chair, but he has never, perhaps, had a proper appreciation of +the charming fellows who get ten per cent. + + + + +PROFESSOR SELLAR. + + + + +VIII. + +PROFESSOR SELLAR. + + +When one of the distinguished hunting ladies who chase celebrities +captured Mr. Mark Pattison, he gave anxious consideration to the +quotation which he was asked to write above his name. "Fancy," he said +with a shudder, "going down to posterity arm in arm with _carpe diem_!" +Remembering this, I forbear tying Sellar to _odi profanum vulgus_. Yet +the name opens the door to the quotation. Sellar is a Roman senator. He +stood very high at Oxford, and took a prize for boxing. If you watch +him in the class, you will sometimes see his mind murmuring that +Edinburgh students do not take their play like Oxford men. The +difference is in manner. A courteous fellow-student of Sellar once +showed his relatives over Balliol. "You have now, I think," he said at +last, "seen everything of interest except the master." He flung a +stone at a window, at which the master's head appeared immediately, +menacing, wrathful. "And now," concluded the polite youth, "you have +seen him also." + +Mr. James Payn, who never forgave the Scottish people for pulling down +their blinds on Sundays, was annoyed by the halo they have woven around +the name "professor." He knew an Edinburgh lady who was scandalized +because that mere poet, Alexander Smith, coolly addressed professors by +their surnames. Mr. Payn might have known what it is to walk in the +shadow of a Senatus Academicus could he have met such specimens as +Sellar, Fraser, Tait, and Sir Alexander Grant marching down the Bridges +abreast. I have seen them: an inspiriting sight. The pavement only held +three. You could have shaken hands with them from an upper window. + +Sellar's treatment of his students was always that of a fine gentleman. +Few got near him; all respected him. At times he was addressed in an +unknown tongue, but he kept his countenance. He was particular about +students keeping to their proper benches, and once thought he had +caught a swarthy north countryman straying. "You are in your wrong +seat, Mr. Orr." "Na, am richt eneuch." "You should be in the seat in +front. That is bench 12, and you are entered on bench 10." "Eh? This is +no bench twal, [counting] twa, fower, sax, aucht, ten." "There is +something wrong." "Oh-h-h, [with sudden enlightenment] ye've been +coontin' the first dask; we dinna coont the first dask." The professor +knew the men he had to deal with too well to scorn this one, who turned +out to be a fine fellow. He was the only man I ever knew who ran his +medical and arts classes together, and so many lectures had he to +attend daily that he mixed them up. He graduated, however, in both +faculties in five years, and the last I heard of him was that, when +applying for a medical assistantship, he sent his father's photograph +because he did not have one of himself. He was a man of brains as well +as sinew, and dined briskly on a shilling a week. + +There was a little fellow in the class who was a puzzle to Sellar, +because he was higher sitting than standing: when the professor asked +him to stand up, he stood down. "Is Mr. Blank not present?" Sellar +would ask. "Here, sir," cried Blank. "Then, will you stand up, Mr. +Blank?" (Agony of Blank, and a demonstration of many feet.) "Are you +not prepared, Mr. Blank?" "Yes, sir. _Pastor quum traharet_----" "I +insist on your standing up, Mr. Blank." Several students rise to their +feet to explain, but subside. "Yes, sir. _Pastor quum traharet +per_----" "I shall mark you 'Not prepared,' Mr. Blank." (Further +demonstration, and then an indignant squeak from Blank.) "If you +please, sir, I am standing." "But, in that case, how is it? Ah, oh, ah, +yes; proceed, Mr. Blank." As one man was only called upon for +exhibition five or six times in a year, the professor had always +forgotten the circumstances when he asked Blank to stand up again. +Blank was looked upon by his fellow-students as a practical jest, and +his name was always received with the prolonged applause which greets +the end of an after-dinner speech. + +Sellar never showed resentment to the students who addressed him as +Professor Sellars. + +One day the professor was giving out some English to be translated into +Latin prose. He read on--"and fiercely lifting the axe with both +hands----" when a cheer from the top bench made him pause. The cheer +spread over the room like an uncorked gas. Sellar frowned, but +proceeded--"lifting the axe----" when again the class became demented. +"What does this mean?" he demanded, looking as if he, too, could lift +the axe. "Axe!" shouted a student in explanation. Still Sellar could +not solve the riddle. Another student rose to his assistance. +"Axe--Gladstone!" he cried. Sellar sat back in his chair. "Really, +gentlemen," he said, "I take the most elaborate precautions against +touching upon politics in this class, but sometimes you are beyond me. +Let us continue--'and fiercely lifting his weapon with both hands----'" + +The duxes from the schools suffered a little during their first year, +from a feeling that they and Sellar understood each other. He liked to +undeceive them. We had one, all head, who went about wondering at +himself. He lost his bursary on the way home with it, and still he +strutted. Sellar asked if we saw anything peculiar in a certain line +from Horace. We did not. We were accustomed to trust to Horace's +reputation, all but the dandy. "Eh--ah! professor," he lisped; "it +ought to have been so and so." Sellar looked at this promising plant +from the schools, and watered him without a rose on the pan. "Depend +upon it, Mr.--ah, I did not catch your name, if it ought to have been +so and so, Horace would have made it so and so." + +Sellar's face was proof against wit. It did not relax till he gave it +liberty. You could never tell from it what was going on inside. He read +without a twitch a notice on his door: "Found in this class a +gold-headed pencil case; if not claimed within three days will be sold +to defray expenses." He even withstood the battering-ram on the day of +the publication of his "Augustan Poets." The students could not let +this opportunity pass. They assailed him with frantic applause; every +bench was a drum to thump upon. His countenance said nothing. The drums +had it in the end, though, and he dismissed the class with what is +believed to have verged on a smile. Like the lover who has got his +lady's glance, they at once tried for more, but no. + +Most of us had Humanity our first year, which is the year for +experimenting. Then is the time to join the university library. The +pound, which makes you a member, has never had its poet. You can +withdraw your pound when you please. There are far-seeing men who work +the whole thing out by mathematics. Put simply, this is the notion. In +the beginning of the session you join the library, and soon you forget +about your pound; you reckon without it. As the winter closes in, and +the coal-bunk empties; or you find that five shillings a week for +lodgings is a dream that cannot be kept up; or your coat assumes more +and more the color identified with spring; or you would feast your +friends for once right gloriously; or next Wednesday is your little +sister's birthday; you cower, despairing, over a sulky fire. Suddenly +you are on your feet, all aglow once more. What is this thought that +sends the blood to your head? That library pound! You had forgotten +that you had a bank. Next morning you are at the university in time to +help the library door to open. You ask for your pound; you get it. Your +hand mounts guard over the pocket in which it rustles. So they say. I +took their advice and paid in my money; then waited exultingly to +forget about it. In vain. I always allowed for that pound, in my +thoughts. I saw it as plainly, I knew its every feature as a schoolboy +remembers his first trout. Not to be hasty, I gave my pound two months, +and then brought it home again. I had a fellow-student who lived across +the way from me. We railed at the library-pound theory at open windows +over the life of the street; a beautiful dream, but mad, mad. + +He was an enthusiast, and therefore happy, whom I have seen in the +Humanity class-room on an examination day, his pen racing with time, +himself seated in the contents of an ink bottle. Some stories of exams. +have even a blacker ending. I write in tears of him who, estimating his +memory as a leaky vessel, did with care and forethought draw up a crib +that was more condensed than a pocket cyclopaedia, a very Liebig's +essence of the classics, tinned meat for students in the eleventh hour. +Bridegrooms have been known to forget the ring; this student forgot his +crib. In the middle of the examination came a nervous knocking at the +door. A lady wanted to see the professor at once. The student looked +up, to see his mother handing the professor his crib. Her son had +forgotten it; she was sure that it was important, so she had brought it +herself. + +Jump the body of this poor victim. There was no M.A. for him that year; +but in our gowns and sashes we could not mourn for a might-have-been. +Soldiers talk of the Victoria cross, statesmen of the Cabinet, ladies +of a pearl set in diamonds. These are pretty baubles, but who has +thrilled as the student that with bumping heart strolls into +Middlemass' to order his graduate's gown? He hires it--five +shillings--but the photograph to follow makes it as good as his for +life. Look at him, young ladies, as he struts to the Synod Hall to have +M.A. tacked to his name. Dogs do not dare bark at him. His gait is +springy; in Princes Street he is as one who walks upstairs. Gone to me +are those student days forever, but I can still put a photograph before +me of a ghost in gown and cape, the hair straggling under the cap as +tobacco may straggle over the side of a tin when there is difficulty in +squeezing down the lid. How well the little black jacket looks, how +vividly the wearer remembers putting it on. He should have worn a +dress-coat, but he had none. The little jacket resembled one with the +tails off, and, as he artfully donned his gown, he backed against the +wall so that no one might know. + +To turn up the light on old college days is not always the signal for +the dance. You are back in the dusty little lodging, with its battered +sofa, its slippery tablecloth, the prim array of books, the picture of +the death of Nelson, the peeling walls, the broken clock; you are +again in the quadrangle with him who has been dead this many a year. +There are tragedies in a college course. Dr. Walter Smith has told in a +poem mentioned elsewhere of the brilliant scholar who forgot his +dominie; some, alas! forget their mother. There are men--I know it--who +go mad from loneliness; and medallists ere now have crept home to die. +The capping-day was the end of our springtide, and for some of us the +summer was to be brief. Sir Alexander, gone into the night since then, +flung "I mekemae" at us as we trooped past him, all in bud, some small +flower to blossom in time, let us hope, here and there. + + + + +MR. JOSEPH THOMSON. + + + + +IX. + +MR. JOSEPH THOMSON. + + +Two years hence Joseph Thomson's reputation will be a decade old, +though he is at present only thirty years of age. When you meet him for +the first time you conclude that he must be the explorer's son. His +identity, however, can always be proved by simply mentioning Africa in +his presence. Then he draws himself up, and his eyes glisten, and he is +thinking how glorious it would be to be in the Masai country again, +living on meat so diseased that it crumbled in the hand like +short-bread. + +Gatelaw-bridge Quarry, in Dumfriesshire, is famous for Old Mortality +and Thomson, the latter (when he is at the head of a caravan) being as +hardheaded as if he had been cut out of it. He went to school at +Thornhill, where he spent great part of his time in reading novels, and +then he matriculated at Edinburgh University, where he began to +accumulate medals. Geology and kindred studies were his favorites +there. One day he heard that Keith Johnston, then on the point of +starting for Africa, wanted a lieutenant. Thomson was at that time +equally in need of a Keith Johnston, and everybody who knew him saw +that the opening and he were made for each other. Keith Johnston and +Thomson went out together, and Johnston died in the jungle. This made a +man in an hour of a stripling. Most youths in Thomson's position at +that turning-point of his career would have thought it judicious to +turn back, and in geographical circles it would have been considered +highly creditable had he brought his caravan to the coast intact. +Thomson, however, pushed on, and did everything that his dead leader +had hoped to do. From that time his career has been followed by every +one interested in African exploration, and by his countrymen with some +pride in addition. When an expedition was organized for the relief of +Emin Pacha, there was for a time some probability of Thomson's having +the command. + +He and Stanley differed as to the routes that should be taken, and +subsequent events have proved that Thomson's was the proper one. + +Thomson came over from Paris at that time to consult with the +authorities, and took up his residence in the most overgrown hotel in +London. His friends here organized an expedition for his relief. They +wandered up and down the endless stairs looking for him, till, had they +not wanted to make themselves a name, they would have beaten a retreat. +He also wandered about looking for them, and at last they met. The +leader of the party, restraining his emotion, lifted his hat, and said, +"Mr. Thomson, I presume?" This is how I found Thomson. + +The explorer had been for some months in Paris at that time, and France +did him the honor of translating his "Through Masailand" into French. +In this book there is a picture of a buffalo tossing Thomson in the +air. This was after he had put several bullets into it, and in the +sketch he is represented some ten feet from the ground, with his gun +flying one way and his cap another. "It was just as if I were +distributing largess to the natives," the traveller says now, though +this idea does not seem to have struck him at the time. He showed the +sketch to a Parisian lady, who looked at it long and earnestly. "Ah, M. +Thomson," she said at length, "but how could you pose like that?" + +Like a good many other travellers, including Mr. Du Chaillu, who says +he is a dear boy, Thomson does not smoke. Stanley, however, smokes very +strong cigars, as those who have been in his sumptuous chambers in Bond +Street can testify. All the three happen to be bachelors, though; +because, one of them says, after returning from years of lonely travel, +a man has such a delight in female society that to pick and choose +would be invidious. Yet they have had their chance. An African race +once tried to bribe Mr. Du Chaillu with a kingdom and over eight +hundred wives--"the biggest offer," he admits, "I ever had in one day." + +Among the lesser annoyances to which Thomson was subjected in Africa +was the presence of rats in the night-time, which he had to brush away +like flies. Until he was asked whether there was not danger in this, it +never seems to have struck him that it was more than annoying. Yet +though he and the two other travellers mentioned (doubtless they are +not alone in this) have put up cheerfully with almost every hardship +known to man, this does not make them indifferent to the comforts of +civilization when they return home. Du Chaillu was looking very +comfortable in a house-boat the other day, where his hosts thought they +were "roughing it"--with a male attendant; and in Stanley's easy-chairs +you sink to dream. The last time I saw Thomson in his rooms in London +he was on his knees, gazing in silent rapture at a china saucer with a +valuable crack in it. + +If you ask Thomson what was the most dangerous expedition he ever +embarked on, he will probably reply, "Crossing Piccadilly." The finest +thing that can be said of him is that during these four expeditions he +never once fired a shot at a native. Other explorers have had to do so +to save their lives. There were often occasions when Thomson could have +done it, to save his life to all appearance, too. The result of his +method of progressing is that where he has gone--and he has been in +parts of Africa never before trod by the white man--he really has +"opened up the country" for those who care to follow him. Civilization +by bullet has only closed it elsewhere. Yet though there is an +abundance of Scotch caution about him, he is naturally an impulsive +man, more inclined personally to march straight on than to reach his +destination by a safer if more circuitous route. Where only his own +life is concerned, he gives you the impression of one who might be +rash; but his prudence at the head of a caravan is at the bottom of the +faith that is placed in him. According to a story that got into the +papers years ago, M. de Brazza once quarrelled with Thomson in Africa, +and all but struck him. Thomson was praised for keeping his temper. The +story was a fabrication, but I fear that if M. de Brazza had behaved +like this, Thomson would not have remembered to be diplomatic till +some time afterward. A truer tale might be told of an umbrella, +gorgeous and wonderful to behold, that De Brazza took to Africa to +impress the natives with, and which Thomson subsequently presented to a +dusky monarch. + +The explorer has never shot a lion, though he has tracked a good many +of them. Once he thought he had one. It was reclining in a little +grove, and Thomson felt that it was his at last. With a trusty native +he crept forward till he could obtain a good shot, and then fired. In +breathless suspense he waited for its spring, and then when it did not +spring he saw that he had shot it through the heart. However, it turned +out only to be a large stone. + +The young Scotchman sometimes thinks of the tremendous effect it would +have had on the natives had he been the possessor of a complete set of +artificial teeth. This is because he has one artificial tooth. +Happening to take it out one day, an awe filled all who saw him, and +from that hour he was esteemed a medicine man. Another excellent way of +impressing Africa with the grandeur of Britain was to take a +photograph. When the natives saw the camera aimed at them, they fell to +the ground vanquished. + +When Thomson was recently in this country, he occasionally took a walk +of twenty or thirty miles to give him an appetite for dinner. This he +calls a stroll. One day he strolled from Thornhill to Edinburgh, had +dinner, and then went to the Exhibition. In appearance he is tall and +strongly knit rather than heavily built, and if you see him more than +once in the same week you discover that he has still an interest in +neck-ties. Perhaps his most remarkable feat consisted in taking a +bottle of brandy into the heart of Africa, and bringing it back +intact. + + + + +ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON. + + + + +X. + +ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON. + + +Some men of letters, not necessarily the greatest, have an +indescribable charm to which we give our hearts. Thackeray is the young +man's first love. Of living authors, none perhaps bewitches the reader +more than Mr. Stevenson, who plays upon words as if they were a musical +instrument. To follow the music is less difficult than to place the +musician. A friend of mine, who, like Mr. Grant Allen, reviews 365 +books a year, and 366 in leap years, recently arranged the novelists of +to-day in order of merit. Meredith, of course, he wrote first, and then +there was a fall to Hardy. "Haggard," he explained, "I dropped from the +Eiffel Tower; but what can I do with Stevenson? I can't put him before +'Lorna Doone.'" So Mr. Stevenson puzzles the critics, fascinating them +until they are willing to judge him by the great work he is to write +by and by when the little books are finished. Over "Treasure Island" I +let my fire die in winter without knowing that I was freezing. But the +creator of Alan Breck has now published nearly twenty volumes. It is so +much easier to finish the little works than to begin the great one, for +which we are all taking notes. + +Mr. Stevenson is not to be labelled novelist. He wanders the byways of +literature without any fixed address. Too much of a truant to be +classified with the other boys, he is only a writer of fiction in the +sense that he was once an Edinburgh University student because now and +again he looked in at his classes when he happened to be that way. A +literary man without a fixed occupation amazes Mr. Henry James, a +master in the school of fiction which tells, in three volumes, how +Hiram K. Wilding trod on the skirt of Alice M. Sparkins without +anything's coming of it. Mr. James analyzes Mr. Stevenson with immense +cleverness, but without summing up. That "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" +should be by the author of "Treasure Island," "Virginibus Puerisque" +by the author of "The New Arabian Nights," "A Child's Garden of Verses" +by the author of "Prince Otto," are to him the three degrees of +comparison of wonder, though for my own part I marvel more that the +author of "Daisy Miller" should be Mr. Stevenson's eulogist. One +conceives Mr. James a boy in velveteens looking fearfully at Stevenson +playing at pirates. + +There is nothing in Mr. Stevenson's sometimes writing essays, sometimes +romances, and anon poems to mark him versatile beyond other authors. +One dreads his continuing to do so, with so many books at his back, +lest it means weakness rather than strength. He experiments too long; +he is still a boy wondering what he is going to be. With Cowley's +candor he tells us that he wants to write something by which he may be +forever known. His attempts in this direction have been in the nature +of trying different ways, and he always starts off whistling. Having +gone so far without losing himself, he turns back to try another road. +Does his heart fail him, despite his jaunty bearing, or is it because +there is no hurry? Though all his books are obviously by the same hand, +no living writer has come so near fame from so many different sides. +Where is the man among us who could write another "Virginibus +Puerisque," the most delightful volume for the hammock ever sung in +prose? The poems are as exquisite as they are artificial. "Jekyll and +Hyde" is the greatest triumph extant in Christmas literature of the +morbid kind. The donkey on the Cevennes (how Mr. Stevenson belabored +him!) only stands second to the "Inland Voyage." "Kidnapped" is the +outstanding boy's book of its generation. "The Black Arrow" alone, to +my thinking, is second class. We shall all be doleful if a marksman who +can pepper his target with inners does not reach the bull's-eye. But it +is quite time the great work was begun. The sun sinks while the climber +walks round his mountain, looking for the best way up. + +Hard necessity has kept some great writers from doing their best work, +but Mr. Stevenson is at last so firmly established that if he +continues to be versatile it will only be from choice. He has attained +a popularity such as is, as a rule, only accorded to classic authors or +to charlatans. For this he has America to thank rather than Britain, +for the Americans buy his books, the only honor a writer's admirers are +slow to pay him. Mr. Stevenson's reputation in the United States is +creditable to that country, which has given him a position here in +which only a few saw him when he left. Unfortunately, with popularity +has come publicity. All day the reporters sit on his garden wall. + +No man has written in a finer spirit of the profession of letters than +Mr. Stevenson, but this gossip vulgarizes it. The adulation of the +American public and of a little band of clever literary dandies in +London, great in criticism, of whom he has become the darling, has made +Mr. Stevenson complacent, and he always tended perhaps to be a thought +too fond of his velvet coat. There is danger in the delight with which +his every scrap is now received. A few years ago, when he was his own +severest and sanest critic, he stopped the publication of a book after +it was in proof--a brave act. He has lost this courage, or he would +have rewritten "The Black Arrow." There is deterioration in the essays +he has been contributing to an American magazine, graceful and +suggestive though they are. The most charming of living stylists, Mr. +Stevenson is self-conscious in all his books now and again, but +hitherto it has been the self-consciousness of an artist with severe +critics at his shoulder. It has become self-satisfaction. The critics +have put a giant's robe on him, and he has not flung it off. He +dismisses "Tom Jones" with a simper. Personally Thackeray "scarce +appeals to us as the ideal gentleman; if there were nothing else [what +else is there?], perpetual nosing after snobbery at least suggests the +snob." From Mr. Stevenson one would not have expected the revival of +this silly charge, which makes a cabbage of every man who writes about +cabbages. I shall say no more of these ill-considered papers, though +the sneers at Fielding call for indignant remonstrance, beyond +expressing a hope that they lie buried between magazine covers. Mr. +Stevenson has reached the critical point in his career, and one would +like to see him back at Bournemouth, writing within high walls. We want +that big book; we think he is capable of it, and so we cannot afford to +let him drift into the seaweed. About the writer with whom his name is +so often absurdly linked we feel differently. It is as foolish to rail +at Mr. Rider Haggard's complacency as it would be to blame Christopher +Sly for so quickly believing that he was born a lord. + +The key-note of all Mr. Stevenson's writings is his indifference, so +far as his books are concerned, to the affairs of life and death on +which their minds are chiefly set. Whether man has an immortal soul +interests him as an artist not a whit: what is to come of man troubles +him as little as where man came from. He is a warm, genial writer, yet +this is so strange as to seem inhuman. His philosophy is that we are +but as the light-hearted birds. This is our moment of being; let us +play the intoxicating game of life beautifully, artistically, before we +fall dead from the tree. We all know it is only in his books that Mr. +Stevenson can live this life. The cry is to arms; spears glisten in the +sun; see the brave bark riding joyously on the waves, the black flag, +the dash of red color twisting round a mountain-side. Alas! the drummer +lies on a couch beating his drum. It is a pathetic picture, less true +to fact now, one rejoices to know, than it was recently. A common +theory is that Mr. Stevenson dreams an ideal life to escape from his +own sufferings. This sentimental plea suits very well. The noticeable +thing, however, is that the grotesque, the uncanny, holds his soul; his +brain will only follow a colored clew. The result is that he is chiefly +picturesque, and, to those who want more than art for art's sake, never +satisfying. Fascinating as his verses are, artless in the perfection of +art, they take no reader a step forward. The children of whom he sings +so sweetly are cherubs without souls. It is not in poetry that Mr. +Stevenson will give the great book to the world, nor will it, I think, +be in the form of essays. Of late he has done nothing quite so fine as +"Virginibus Puerisque," though most of his essays are gardens in which +grow few weeds. Quaint in matter as in treatment, they are the best +strictly literary essays of the day, and their mixture of tenderness +with humor suggests Charles Lamb. Some think Mr. Stevenson's essays +equal to Lamb's, or greater. To that I say, no. The name of Lamb will +for many a year bring proud tears to English eyes. Here was a man, weak +like the rest of us, who kept his sorrows to himself. Life to him was +not among the trees. He had loved and lost. Grief laid a heavy hand on +his brave brow. Dark were his nights; horrid shadows in the house; +sudden terrors; the heart stops beating waiting for a footstep. At that +door comes Tragedy, knocking at all hours. Was Lamb dismayed? The +tragedy of his life was not drear to him. It was wound round those who +were dearest to him; it let him know that life has a glory even at its +saddest, that humor and pathos clasp hands, that loved ones are drawn +nearer, and the soul strengthened in the presence of anguish, pain, and +death. When Lamb sat down to write, he did not pull down his blind on +all that is greatest, if most awful, in human life. He was gentle, +kindly; but he did not play at pretending that there is no cemetery +round the corner. In Mr. Stevenson's exquisite essays one looks in vain +for the great heart that palpitates through the pages of Charles Lamb. + +The great work, if we are not to be disappointed, will be fiction. Mr. +Stevenson is said to feel this himself, and, as I understand, "Harry +Shovel" will be his biggest bid for fame. It is to be, broadly +speaking, a nineteenth-century "Peregrine Pickle," dashed with +Meredith, and this in the teeth of many admirers who maintain that the +best of the author is Scottish. Mr. Stevenson, however, knows what he +is about. Critics have said enthusiastically--for it is difficult to +write of Mr. Stevenson without enthusiasm--that Alan Breck is as good +as anything in Scott. Alan Breck is certainly a masterpiece, quite +worthy of the greatest of all story-tellers, who, nevertheless, it +should be remembered, created these rich side characters by the score, +another before dinner-time. English critics have taken Alan to their +hearts, and appreciate him thoroughly; the reason, no doubt, being that +he is the character whom England acknowledges as the Scottish type. The +Highlands, which are Scotland to the same extent as Northumberland is +England, present such a character to this day, but no deep knowledge of +Mr. Stevenson's native country was required to reproduce him. An +artistic Englishman or American could have done it. Scottish religion, +I think, Mr. Stevenson has never understood, except as the outsider +misunderstands it. He thinks it hard because there are no colored +windows. "The color of Scotland has entered into him altogether," says +Mr. James, who, we gather, conceives in Edinburgh Castle a place where +tartans glisten in the sun, while rocks re-echo bagpipes. Mr. James is +right in a way. It is the tartan, the claymore, the cry that the +heather is on fire, that are Scotland to Mr. Stevenson. But the +Scotland of our day is not a country rich in color; a sombre gray +prevails. Thus, though Mr. Stevenson's best romance is Scottish, that +is only, I think, because of his extraordinary aptitude for the +picturesque. Give him any period in any country that is romantic, and +he will soon steep himself in the kind of knowledge he can best turn to +account. Adventures suit him best, the ladies being left behind; and so +long as he is in fettle it matters little whether the scene be Scotland +or Spain. The great thing is that he should now give to one ambitious +book the time in which he has hitherto written half a dozen small ones. +He will have to take existence a little more seriously--to weave +broadcloth instead of lace. + + + + +REV. WALTER C. SMITH, D.D. + + + + +XI. + +REV. WALTER C. SMITH, D.D. + + +During the four winters another and I were in Edinburgh, we never +entered any but Free churches. This seems to have been less on account +of a scorn for other denominations than because we never thought of +them. We felt sorry for the "men" who knew no better than to claim to +be on the side of Dr. Macgregor. Even our Free kirks were limited to +two, St. George's and the Free High. After all, we must have been +liberally minded beyond most of our fellows, for, as a rule, those who +frequented one of these churches shook their heads at the other. It is +said that Dr. Whyte and Dr. Smith have a great appreciation of each +other. They, too, are liberally minded. + +To contrast the two leading Free Church ministers in Edinburgh as they +struck a student would be to become a boy again. The one is always +ready to go on fire, and the other is sometimes at hand with a jug of +cold water. Dr. Smith counts a hundred before he starts, while the +minister of Free St. George's is off at once at a gallop, and would +always arrive first at his destination if he had not sometimes to turn +back. He is not only a Gladstonian, but Gladstonian; his enthusiasm +carries him on as steam drives the engine. Dr. Smith being a critic, +with a faculty of satire, what would rouse the one man makes the other +smile. Dr. Whyte judges you as you are at the moment; Dr. Smith sees +what you will be like to-morrow. Some years ago the defeated side in a +great Assembly fight met at a breakfast to reason itself into a belief +that it had gained a remarkable moral victory. Dr. Whyte and Dr. Smith +were both present, and the former was so inspiriting that the breakfast +became a scene of enthusiasm. Then Dr. Smith arose and made a remark +about a company of Mark Tapleys--after which the meeting broke up. + +I have a curious reminiscence of the student who most frequently +accompanied me to church in Edinburgh. One Sunday when we were on our +way up slushy Bath Street to Free St. George's he discovered that he +had not a penny for the plate. I suggested to him to give twopence next +time; but no, he turned back to our lodgings for the penny. Some time +afterward he found himself in the same position when we were nearing +the Free High. "I'll give twopence next time," he said cheerfully. I +have thought this over since then, and wondered if there was anything +in it. + +The most glorious privilege of the old is to assist the young. The two +ministers who are among the chief pillars of the Free Church in +Edinburgh are not old yet, but they have had a long experience, and the +strength and encouragement they have been to the young is the grand +outstanding fact of their ministries. Their influence is, of course, +chiefly noticeable in the divinity men, who make their Bible classes so +remarkable. There is a sort of Freemasonry among the men who have come +under the influence of Dr. Smith. It seems to have steadied them--to +have given them wise rules of life that have taken the noise out of +them, and left them undemonstrative, quiet, determined. You will have +little difficulty, as a rule, in picking out Dr. Smith's men, whether +in the pulpit or in private. They have his mark, as the Rugby boys were +marked by Dr. Arnold. Even in speaking of him, they seldom talk in +superlatives: only a light comes into their eye, and you realize what a +well-founded reverence is. I met lately in London an Irishman who, when +the conversation turned to Scotland, asked what Edinburgh was doing +without Dr. Smith (who was in America at the time). He talked with such +obvious knowledge of Dr. Smith's teaching, and with such affection for +the man, that by and by we were surprised to hear that he had never +heard him preach nor read a line of his works. He explained that he +knew intimately two men who looked upon their Sundays in the Free High, +and still more upon their private talks with the minister, as the +turning-point in their lives. They were such fine fellows, and they +were so sure that they owed their development to Dr. Smith, that to +know the followers was to know something of the master. This it is to +be a touchstone to young men. + +There are those who think Dr. Smith the poet of higher account than Dr. +Smith the preacher. I do not agree with them, though there can be no +question that the author of "Olrig Grange" and Mr. Alexander Anderson +are the two men now in Edinburgh who have (at times) the divine +afflatus. "Surfaceman" is a true son of Burns. Of him it may be said, +as it never can be said of Dr. Smith, that he sings because he must. +His thoughts run in harmonious numbers. The author of "Olrig Grange" is +the stronger mind, however, and his lines are always pregnant of +meaning. He is of the school of Mr. Lewis Morris, but an immeasurably +higher intellect if not so fine an artist: indeed, though there are +hundreds of his pages that are not poetry, there are almost none that +could not be rewritten into weighty prose. Sound is never his sole +object. Good novels in verse are a mistake, for it is quite certain +they would be better in prose. The novelist has a great deal to say +that cannot be said naturally in rhythm, and much of Dr. Smith's blank +verse is good prose in frills. It is driven into an undeserved +confinement. + +The privilege of critics is to get twelve or twenty minor poets in a +row, and then blow them all over at once. I remember one who despatched +Dr. Smith with a verse from the book under treatment. Dr. Smith writes +of a poet's verses, "There is no sacred fire in them, Nor much of +homely sense and shrewd;" and when the critic came to these lines he +stopped reading: he declared that Dr. Smith had passed judgment on +himself. This is a familiar form of criticism, but in the present case +it had at least the demerit of being false. There is so much sacred +fire about Dr. Smith's best poetry that it is what makes him a poet; +and as for "homely sense and shrewd," he has simply more of it than any +contemporary writer of verse. It is what gives heart to his satire, and +keeps him from wounding merely for the pleasure of drawing blood. In +conjunction with the sacred fire, the noble indignation that mean +things should be, the insight into the tragic, it is what makes "Hilda" +his greatest poem. Without it there could not be pathos, which is +concerned with little things; nor humor, nor, indeed, the flash into +men and things that makes such a poem as "Dr. Linkletter's Scholar" as +true as life, as sad as death. If only for the sake of that noble piece +of writing, every Scottish student should have "North-Country Folk" in +his possession. The poem is probably the most noteworthy thing that has +been said of northern university life. + + + + + * * * * * + + + + +Transcriber's note: + +Minor punctuation errors were corrected. + +The following typographical errors were corrected: + +Page 50: Changed Calderwod to Calderwood. + +Page 111: Changed civiliaztion to civilization. + +Page 128: Changed litle to little. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AN EDINBURGH ELEVEN*** + + +******* This file should be named 39203.txt or 39203.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/3/9/2/0/39203 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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