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diff --git a/8544-h/8544-h.htm b/8544-h/8544-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..3b944be --- /dev/null +++ b/8544-h/8544-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,3579 @@ +<?xml version="1.0" encoding="iso-8859-1"?> + +<!DOCTYPE html + PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd" > + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="en"> + <head> + <title> + Trivia, by Logan Pearsall Smith + </title> + <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve"> + + body { margin:5%; background:#faebd0; text-align:justify} + P { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: .25em; margin-bottom: .25em; } + H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; } + hr { width: 50%; text-align: center;} + .foot { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; text-indent: -3em; font-size: 90%; } + blockquote {font-size: 97%; font-style: italic; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;} + .mynote {background-color: #DDE; color: #000; padding: .5em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 95%;} + .toc { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;} + .toc2 { margin-left: 20%;} + div.fig { display:block; margin:0 auto; text-align:center; } + div.middle { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; } + .figleft {float: left; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 1%;} + .figright {float: right; margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 1%;} + .pagenum {display:inline; font-size: 70%; font-style:normal; + margin: 0; padding: 0; position: absolute; right: 1%; + text-align: right;} + .side { float: right; font-size: 75%; width: 25%; padding-left: 0.8em; + border-left: dashed thin; margin-left: 0.8em; text-align: left; + text-indent: 0; font-weight: bold; font-style: italic; + font-weight: bold; color: black; background: #eeeeee; border: solid 1px;} + pre { font-style: italic; font-size: 90%; margin-left: 10%;} + +</style> + </head> + <body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Trivia, by Logan Pearsall Smith + +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: Trivia + +Author: Logan Pearsall Smith + + +Release Date: July, 2005 [EBook #8544] +This file was first posted on July 21, 2003 +Last Updated: May 13, 2013 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TRIVIA *** + + + + +Text file produced by Joris Van Dael, Charles Aldarondo, Charles +Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team + +HTML file produced by David Widger + + + + +</pre> + + <div style="height: 8em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h1> + TRIVIA + </h1> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <h2> + By Logan Pearsall Smith + </h2> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <h3> + 1917 + </h3> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + <b>CONTENTS</b> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0001"> <i>Bibliographical Note</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0002"> <i>Preface</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0003"> <i>The Author</i> </a> + </p> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0005"> <b>TRIVIA</b> </a> + </p> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0006"> <b>BOOK I</b> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0007"> <i>Happiness</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0008"> <i>To-Day</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0009"> <i>The Afternoon Post</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0010"> <i>The Busy Bees</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0011"> <i>The Wheat</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0012"> <i>The Coming of Fate</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0013"> <i>My Speech</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0014"> <i>Stonehenge</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0015"> <i>The Stars</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0016"> <i>Silvia Doria</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0017"> <i>Bligh House</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0018"> <i>In Church</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0019"> <i>Parsons</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0020"> <i>The Sound of a Voice</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0021"> <i>What Happens</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0022"> <i>A Precaution</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0023"> <i>The Great Work</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0024"> <i>My Mission</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0025"> <i>The Birds</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0026"> <i>High Life</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0027"> <i>Empty Shells</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0028"> <i>Dissatisfaction</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0029"> <i>A Fancy</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0030"> <i>They</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0031"> <i>In the Pulpit</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0032"> <i>Human Ends</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0033"> <i>Lord Arden</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0034"> <i>The Starry Heaven</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0035"> <i>My Map</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0036"> <i>The Snob</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0037"> <i>Companions</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0038"> <i>Edification</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0039"> <i>The Rose</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0040"> <i>The Vicar of Lynch</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0041"> <i>Tu Quoque Fontium</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0042"> <i>The Spider</i> </a> + </p> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0043"> <b>BOOK II</b> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0044"> <i>L'oiseau Bleu</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0045"> <i>At The Bank</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0046"> <i>Mammon</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0047"> <i>I See the World</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0048"> <i>Social Success</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0049"> <i>Apotheosis</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0050"> <i>The Spring in London</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0051"> <i>Fashion Plates</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0052"> <i>Mental Vice</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0053"> <i>The Organ of Life</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0054"> <i>Humiliation</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0055"> <i>Green Ivory</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0056"> <i>In The Park</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0057"> <i>The Correct</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0058"> <i>"Where Do I Come In?"</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0059"> <i>Microbes</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0060"> <i>The Quest</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0061"> <i>The Kaleidoscope</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0062"> <i>Oxford Street</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0063"> <i>Beauty</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0064"> <i>The Power of Words</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0065"> <i>Self-Analysis</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0066"> <i>The Voice of the World</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0067"> <i>And Anyhow</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0068"> <i>Drawbacks</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0069"> <i>Talk</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0070"> <i>The Church of England</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0071"> <i>Misgiving</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0072"> <i>Sanctuaries</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0073"> <i>Symptoms</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0074"> <i>Shadowed</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0075"> <i>The Incredible</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0076"> <i>Terror</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0077"> <i>Pathos</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0078"> <i>Inconstancy</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0079"> <i>The Poplar</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0080"> <i>On the Doorstep</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0081"> <i>Old Clothes</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0082"> <i>Youth</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0083"> <i>Consolation</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0084"> <i>Sir Eustace Carr</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0085"> <i>The Lord Mayor</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0086"> <i>The Burden</i> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0087"> <i>Under An Umbrella</i> </a> + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0001" id="link2H_4_0001"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Bibliographical Note</i> + </h2> + <p> + Some of these pieces were privately printed at the Chiswick Press in 1902. + Others have appeared in the "New Statesman" and "The New Republic," and + are here reprinted with the Editors' permission. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0002" id="link2H_4_0002"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Preface</i> + </h2> + <p> + "You must beware of thinking too much about Style," said my kindly + adviser, "or you will become like those fastidious people who polish and + polish until there is nothing left." + </p> + <p> + "Then there really are such people?" I asked, lost in the thought of how + much I should like to meet them. But the well-informed lady could give me + no precise information about them. + </p> + <p> + I often hear of them in this tantalizing manner, and perhaps one day I + shall get to know them. They sound delightful. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0003" id="link2H_4_0003"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>The Author</i> + </h2> + <p> + These pieces of moral prose have been written, dear Reader, by a large + Carnivorous Mammal, belonging to that suborder of the Animal Kingdom which + includes also the Orang-outang, the tusked Gorilla, the Baboon with his + bright blue and scarlet bottom, and the long-eared Chimpanzee. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0005" id="link2H_4_0005"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h1> + TRIVIA + </h1> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0006" id="link2H_4_0006"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + BOOK I + </h2> + <p> + <i>How blest my lot, in these sweet fields assign'd Where Peace and + Leisure soothe the tuneful mind.</i> + </p> + <p> + SCOTT, of Amwell, <i>Moral Eclogues</i> (1773) + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0007" id="link2H_4_0007"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Happiness</i> + </h2> + <p> + Cricketers on village greens, haymakers in the evening sunshine, small + boats that sail before the wind—all these create in me the illusion + of Happiness, as if a land of cloudless pleasure, a piece of the old + Golden World, were hidden, not (as poets have imagined), in far seas or + beyond inaccessible mountains, but here close at hand, if one could find + it, in some undiscovered valley. Certain grassy lanes seem to lead between + the meadows thither; the wild pigeons talk of it behind the woods. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0008" id="link2H_4_0008"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>To-Day</i> + </h2> + <p> + I woke this morning out of dreams into what we call Reality, into the + daylight, the furniture of my familiar bedroom—in fact into the + well-known, often-discussed, but, to my mind, as yet unexplained Universe. + </p> + <p> + Then I, who came out of Eternity and seem to be on my way thither, got up + and spent the day as I usually spend it. I read, I pottered, I talked, and + took exercise; and I sat punctually down to eat the cooked meals that + appeared at stated intervals. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0009" id="link2H_4_0009"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>The Afternoon Post</i> + </h2> + <p> + The village Post Office, with its clock and letter-box, its postmistress + lost in tales of love-lorn Dukes and coroneted woe, and the sallow-faced + grocer watching from his window opposite, is the scene of a daily crisis + in my life, when every afternoon I walk there through the country lanes + and ask that well-read young lady for my letters. I always expect good + news and cheques; and then, of course, there is the magical Fortune which + is coming, and word of it may reach me any day. What it is, this strange + Felicity, or whence it shall come, I have no notion; but I hurry down in + the morning to find the news on the breakfast table, open telegrams in + delighted panic, and say to myself "Here it is!" when at night I hear + wheels approaching along the road. So, happy in the hope of Happiness, and + not greatly concerned with any other interest or ambition, I live on in my + quiet, ordered house; and so I shall live perhaps until the end. Is it, + indeed, merely the last great summons and revelation for which I am + waiting? I do not know. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0010" id="link2H_4_0010"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>The Busy Bees</i> + </h2> + <p> + Sitting for hours idle in the shade of an apple tree, near the + garden-hives, and under the aerial thoroughfares of those honey-merchants—sometimes + when the noonday heat is loud with their minute industry, or when they + fall in crowds out of the late sun to their night-long labours-I have + sought instruction from the Bees, and tried to appropriate to myself the + old industrious lesson. + </p> + <p> + And yet, hang it all, who by rights should be the teachers and who the + learners? For those peevish, over-toiled, utilitarian insects, was there + no lesson to be derived from the spectacle of Me? Gazing out at me with + myriad eyes from their joyless factories, might they not learn at last—might + I not finally teach them—a wiser and more generous-hearted way to + improve the shining hour? + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0011" id="link2H_4_0011"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>The Wheat</i> + </h2> + <p> + The Vicar, whom I met once or twice in my walks about the fields, told me + that he was glad that I was taking an interest in farming. Only my feeling + about wheat, he said, puzzled him. + </p> + <p> + Now the feeling in regard to wheat which I had not been able to make clear + to the Vicar was simply one of amazement. Walking one day into a field + that I had watched yellowing beyond the trees, I found myself dazzled by + the glow and great expanse of gold. I bathed myself in the intense yellow + under the intense blue sky; how dim it made the oak trees and copses and + all the rest of the English landscape seem! I had not remembered the glory + of the Wheat; nor imagined in my reading that in a country so far from the + Sun there could be anything so rich, so prodigal, so reckless, as this + opulence of ruddy gold, bursting out from the cracked earth as from some + fiery vein below. I remembered how for thousands of years Wheat had been + the staple of wealth, the hoarded wealth of famous cities and empires; I + thought of the processes of corn-growing, the white oxen ploughing, the + great barns, the winnowing fans, the mills with the splash of their + wheels, or arms slow-turning in the wind; of cornfields at harvest-time, + with shocks and sheaves in the glow of sunset, or under the sickle moon; + what beauty it brought into the northern landscape, the antique, + passionate, Biblical beauty of the South! + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0012" id="link2H_4_0012"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>The Coming of Fate</i> + </h2> + <p> + When I seek out the sources of my thoughts, I find they had their + beginning in fragile Chance; were born of little moments that shine for me + curiously in the past. Slight the impulse that made me take this turning + at the crossroads, trivial and fortuitous the meeting, and light as + gossamer the thread that first knit me to my friend. These are full of + wonder; more mysterious are the moments that must have brushed me with + their wings and passed me by: when Fate beckoned and I did not see it, + when new Life trembled for a second on the threshold; but the word was not + spoken, the hand was not held out, and the Might-have-been shivered and + vanished, dim as a into the waste realms of non-existence. + </p> + <p> + So I never lose a sense of the whimsical and perilous charm of daily life, + with its meetings and words and accidents. Why, to-day, perhaps, or next + week, I may hear a voice, and, packing up my Gladstone bag, follow it to + the ends of the world. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0013" id="link2H_4_0013"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>My Speech</i> + </h2> + <p> + "Ladies and Gentlemen," I began—The Vicar was in the chair; Mrs. La + Mountain and her daughters sat facing us; and in the little schoolroom, + with its maps and large Scripture prints, its blackboard with the day's + sums still visible on it, were assembled the labourers of the village, the + old family coachman and his wife, the one-eyed postman, and the gardeners + and boys from the Hall. Having culled from the newspapers a few phrases, I + had composed a speech which I delivered with a spirit and eloquence + surprising even to myself, and which was now enthusiastically received. + The Vicar cried "Hear, Hear!", the Vicar's wife pounded her umbrella with + such emphasis, and the villagers cheered so heartily, that my heart was + warmed. I began to feel the meaning of my own words; I beamed on the + audience, felt that they were all brothers, all wished well to the + Republic; and it seemed to me an occasion to express my real ideas and + hopes for the Commonwealth. + </p> + <p> + Brushing therefore to one side, and indeed quite forgetting my safe + principles, I began to refashion and new-model the State. Most existing + institutions were soon abolished; and then, on their ruins, I proceeded to + build up the bright walls and palaces of the City within me—the City + I had read of in Plato. With enthusiasm, and, I flatter myself, with + eloquence, I described it all—the Warriors, that race of golden + youth bred from the State-ordered embraces of the brave and fair; those + philosophic Guardians, who, being ever accustomed to the highest and most + extensive views, and thence contracting an habitual greatness, possessed + the truest fortitude, looking down indeed with a kind of disregard on + human life and death. And then, declaring that the pattern of this City + was laid up in Heaven, I sat down, amid the cheers of the uncomprehending + little audience. + </p> + <p> + And afterward, in my rides about the country, when I saw on walls and the + doors of barns, among advertisements of sales, or regulations about birds' + eggs or the movements of swine, little weather-beaten, old-looking notices + on which it was stated that I would "address the meeting," I remembered + how the walls and towers of the City I had built up in that little + schoolroom had shone with no heavenly light in the eyes of the Vicar's + party. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0014" id="link2H_4_0014"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Stonehenge</i> + </h2> + <p> + They sit there forever on the dim horizon of my mind, that Stonehenge + circle of elderly disapproving Faces—Faces of the Uncles and + Schoolmasters and Tutors who frowned on my youth. + </p> + <p> + In the bright centre and sunlight I leap, I caper, I dance my dance; but + when I look up, I see they are not deceived. For nothing ever placates + them, nothing ever moves to a look of approval that ring of bleak and + contemptuous Faces. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0015" id="link2H_4_0015"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>The Stars</i> + </h2> + <p> + Battling my way homeward one dark night against the wind and rain, a + sudden gust, stronger than the others, drove me back into the shelter of a + tree. But soon the Western sky broke open; the illumination of the Stars + poured down from behind the dispersing clouds. + </p> + <p> + I was astonished at their brightness, to see how they filled the night + with their soft lustre. So I went my way accompanied by them; Arcturus + followed me, and becoming entangled in a leafy tree, shone by glimpses, + and then emerged triumphant, Lord of the Western sky. Moving along the + road in the silence of my own footsteps, my thoughts were among the + Constellations. I was one of the Princes of the starry Universe; in me + also there was something that was not insignificant and mean and of no + account. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0016" id="link2H_4_0016"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Silvia Doria</i> + </h2> + <p> + Beyond the blue hills, within riding distance, there is a country of parks + and beeches, with views of the far-off sea. I remember in one of my rides + coming on the place which was the scene of the pretty, old-fashioned story + of Silvia Doria. Through the gates, with fine gate-posts, on which + heraldic beasts, fierce and fastidious, were upholding coroneted shields, + I could see, at the end of the avenue, the façade of the House, with its + stone pilasters, and its balustrade on the steep roof. + </p> + <p> + More than one hundred years ago, in that Park, with its Italianized house, + and level gardens adorned with statues and garden temples, there lived, + they say, an old Lord with his two handsome sons. The old Lord had never + ceased mourning for his Lady, though she had died a good many years + before; there were no neighbours he visited, and few strangers came inside + the great Park walls. One day in Spring, however, just when the apple + trees had burst into blossom, the gilded gates were thrown open, and a + London chariot with prancing horses drove up the Avenue. And in the + chariot, smiling and gay, and indeed very beautiful in her dress of yellow + silk, and her great Spanish hat with drooping feathers, sat Silvia Doria, + come on a visit to her cousin, the old Lord. + </p> + <p> + It was her father who had sent her—that he might be more free, some + said, to pursue his own wicked courses—while others declared that he + intended her to marry the old Lord's eldest son. + </p> + <p> + In any case, Silvia Doria came like the Spring, like the sunlight, into + the lonely place. Even the old Lord felt himself curiously happy when he + heard her voice singing about the house; as for Henry and Francis, it was + heaven for them just to walk by her side down the garden alleys. + </p> + <p> + And Silvia Doria, though hitherto she had been but cold toward the London + gallants who had courted her, found, little by little, that her heart was + not untouched. + </p> + <p> + But, in spite of her father, and her own girlish love of gold and rank, it + was not for Henry that she cared, not for the old Lord, but for Francis, + the younger son. Did Francis know of this? They were secretly lovers, the + old scandal reported; and the scandal, it may be, had reached her father's + ears. + </p> + <p> + For one day a coach with foaming horses, and the wicked face of an old man + at its window, galloped up the avenue; and soon afterwards, when the coach + drove away, Silvia Doria was sitting by the old man's side, sobbing + bitterly. + </p> + <p> + And after she had gone, a long time, many of the old, last-century years, + went by without any change. And then Henry, the eldest son, was killed in + hunting; and the old Lord dying a few years later, the titles and the + great house and all the land and gold came to Francis, the younger son. + But after his father's death he was but seldom there; having, as it + seemed, no love for the place, and living for the most part abroad and + alone, for he never married. + </p> + <p> + And again, many years went by. The trees grew taller and darker about the + house; the yew hedges unclipt now, hung their branches over the moss-grown + paths; ivy almost smothered the statues; and the plaster fell away in + great patches from the discoloured garden temples. + </p> + <p> + But at last one day a chariot drove up to the gates; a footman pulled at + the crazy bell, telling the gate-keeper that his mistress wished to visit + the Park. So the gates creaked open, the chariot glittered up the avenue + to the deserted place; and a lady stepped out, went into the garden, and + walked among its moss-grown paths and statues. As the chariot drove out + again, "Tell your Lord," the lady said, smiling, to the lodge-keeper, + "that Silvia Doria came back." + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0017" id="link2H_4_0017"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Bligh House</i> + </h2> + <p> + To the West, in riding past the walls of Bligh, I remembered an incident + in the well-known siege of that house, during the Civil Wars: How, among + Waller's invading Roundhead troops, there happened to be a young scholar, + a poet and lover of the Muses, fighting for the cause, as he thought, of + ancient Freedom, who, one day, when the siege was being more hotly urged, + pressing forward and climbing a wall, suddenly found himself in a quiet + old garden by the house. And here, for a time forgetting, as it would + seem, the battle, and heedless of the bullets that now and then flew past + him like peevish wasps, the young Officer stayed, gathering roses—old-fashioned + damask roses, streaked with red and white—which, for the sake of a + Court Beauty, there besieged with her father, he carried to the house; + falling, however, struck by a chance bullet, or shot perhaps by one of his + own party. A few of the young Officer's verses, written in the stilted + fashion of the time, and almost unreadable now, have been preserved. The + lady's portrait hangs in the white drawing room at Bligh; a simpering, + faded figure, with ringlets and drop-pearls, and a dress of amber-coloured + silk. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0018" id="link2H_4_0018"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>In Church</i> + </h2> + <p> + "For the Pen," said the Vicar; and in the sententious pause that followed, + I felt that I would offer any gifts of gold to avert or postpone the + solemn, inevitable, hackneyed, and yet, as it seemed to me, perfectly + appalling statement that "the Pen is mightier than the Sword." + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0019" id="link2H_4_0019"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Parsons</i> + </h2> + <p> + All the same I like Parsons; they think nobly of the Universe, and believe + in Souls and Eternal Happiness. And some of them, I am told, believe in + Angels—that there are Angels who guide our footsteps, and flit to + and fro unseen on errands in the air about us. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0020" id="link2H_4_0020"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>The Sound of a Voice</i> + </h2> + <p> + As the thoughtful Baronet talked, as his voice went on sounding in my + ears, all the light of desire, and of the sun, faded from the Earth; I saw + the vast landscape of the world dim, as in an eclipse; its populations + eating their bread with tears, its rich men sitting listless in their + palaces, and aged Kings crying "Vanity, Vanity, all is Vanity!" + lugubriously from their thrones. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0021" id="link2H_4_0021"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>What Happens</i> + </h2> + <p> + "Yes," said Sir Thomas, speaking of a modern novel, "it certainly does + seem strange; but the novelist was right. Such things do happen." + </p> + <p> + "But my dear Sir," I burst out, in the rudest manner, "think what life is—just + think what really happens! Why people suddenly swell up and turn dark + purple; they hang themselves on meat-hooks; they are drowned in + horse-ponds, are run over by butchers' carts, and are burnt alive and + cooked like mutton chops!" + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0022" id="link2H_4_0022"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>A Precaution</i> + </h2> + <p> + The folio gave at length philosophic consolations for all the ills and + misfortunes said by the author to be inseparable from human existence—Poverty, + Shipwreck, Plague, Love-Deceptions, and Inundations. Against these antique + Disasters I armed my soul; and I thought it as well to prepare myself + against another inevitable ancient calamity called "Cornutation," or by + other less learned names. How Philosophy taught that after all it was but + a pain founded on conceit, a blow that hurt not; the reply of the Cynic + philosopher to one who reproached him, "Is it my fault or hers?"; how + Nevisanus advises the sufferer to ask himself if he have not offended; + Jerome declares it impossible to prevent; how few or none are safe, and + the inhabitants of some countries, especially parts of Africa, consider it + the usual and natural thing; How Caesar, Pompey, Augustus, Agamemnon, + Menelaus, Marcus Aurelius, and many other great Kings and Princes had all + worn Actaeon's badge; and how Philip turned it to a jest, Pertinax the + Emperor made no reckoning of it; Erasmus declared it was best winked at, + there being no remedy but patience, <i>Dies dolorem minuit</i>; Time, Age + must mend it; and how according to the best authorities, bars, bolts, + oaken doors, and towers of brass, are all in vain. "She is a woman," as + the old Pedant wrote to a fellow Philosopher.... + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0023" id="link2H_4_0023"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>The Great Work</i> + </h2> + <p> + Sitting, pen in hand, alone in the stillness of the library, with flies + droning behind the sunny blinds, I considered in my thoughts what should + be the subject of my great Work. Should I complain against the mutability + of Fortune, and impugn Fate and the Constellations; or should I reprehend + the never-satisfied heart of querulous Man, drawing elegant contrasts + between the unsullied snow of mountains, the serene shining of stars, and + our hot, feverish lives and foolish repinings? Or should I confine myself + to denouncing contemporary Vices, crying "Fie!" on the Age with Hamlet, + sternly unmasking its hypocrisies, and riddling through and through its + comfortable Optimisms? + </p> + <p> + Or with Job, should I question the Universe, and puzzle my sad brains + about Life—the meaning of Life on this apple-shaped Planet? + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0024" id="link2H_4_0024"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>My Mission</i> + </h2> + <p> + But when in modern books, reviews, and thoughtful magazines I read about + the Needs of the Age, its Complex Questions, its Dismays, Doubts, and + Spiritual Agonies, I feel an impulse to go out and comfort it, to still + its cries, and speak earnest words of Consolation to it. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0025" id="link2H_4_0025"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>The Birds</i> + </h2> + <p> + But how can one toil at the great task with this hurry and tumult of birds + just outside the open window? I hear the Thrush, and the Blackbird, that + romantic liar; then the delicate cadence, the wiry descending scale of the + Willow-wren, or the Blackcap's stave of mellow music. All these are + familiar—but what is that unknown voice, that thrilling note? I + hurry out; the voice flees and I follow; and when I return and sit down + again to my task, the Yellowhammer trills his sleepy song in the noonday + heat; the drone of the Greenfinch lulls me into dreamy meditations. Then + suddenly from his tree-trunks and forest recesses comes the Green + Woodpecker, and mocks at me an impudent voice full of liberty and + laughter. + </p> + <p> + Why should all the birds of the air conspire against me? My concern is + with the sad Human Species, with lapsed and erroneous Humanity, not with + that inconsiderate, wandering, feather-headed race. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0026" id="link2H_4_0026"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>High Life</i> + </h2> + <p> + Although that immense Country House was empty and for sale, and I had got + an order to view it, I needed all my courage to walk through the lordly + gates, and up the avenue, and then to ring the door-bell. And when I was + ushered in, and the shutters were removed to let the daylight into those + vast apartments, I sneaked through them, cursing the dishonest curiosity + which had brought me into a place where I had no business. But I was + treated with such deference, and so plainly regarded as a possible + purchaser, that I soon began to believe in the opulence imputed to me. + From all the novels describing the mysterious and glittering life of the + Great which I had read (and I had read many), there came to me the + enchanting vision of my own existence in this Palace. I filled the vast + spaces with the shine of jewels and stir of voices; I saw a vision of + ladies sweeping in their tiaras down the splendid stairs. + </p> + <p> + But my Soul, in her swell of pride, soon outgrew these paltry limits, O + no! Never could I box up and house and localize under that lowly roof the + Magnificence and Ostentation of which I was capable. + </p> + <p> + Then for one thing there was stabling for only forty horses; and of + course, as I told them, this would never do. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0027" id="link2H_4_0027"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Empty Shells</i> + </h2> + <p> + They lie like empty seashells on the shores of Time, the old worlds which + the spirit of man once built for his habitation, and then abandoned. Those + little earth-centred, heaven-encrusted universes of the Greeks and Hebrews + seem quaint enough to us, who have formed, thought by thought from within, + the immense modern Cosmos in which we live—the great Creation of + granite, planned in such immeasurable proportions, and moved by so + pitiless a mechanism, that it sometimes appals even its own creators. The + rush of the great rotating Sun daunts us; to think to the distance of the + fixed stars cracks our brain. + </p> + <p> + But if the ephemeral Being who has imagined these eternal spheres and + spaces, must dwell almost as an alien in their icy vastness, yet what a + splendour lights up for him and dazzles in those great halls! Anything + less limitless would be now a prison; and he even dares to think beyond + their boundaries, to surmise that he may one day outgrow this vast + Mausoleum, and cast from him the material Creation as an integument too + narrow for his insolent Mind. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0028" id="link2H_4_0028"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Dissatisfaction</i> + </h2> + <p> + For one thing I hate Spiders—I dislike all kinds of Insects. Their + cold intelligence, their empty, stereotyped, unremitted industry repel me. + And I am not altogether happy about the future of the Human Race; when I + think of the slow refrigeration of the Earth, the Sun's waning, and the + ultimate, inevitable collapse of the Solar System, I have grave + misgivings. And all the books I have read and forgotten-the thought that + my mind is really nothing but a sieve—this, too, at times + disheartens me. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0029" id="link2H_4_0029"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>A Fancy</i> + </h2> + <p> + More than once, though, I have pleased myself with the notion that + somewhere there is good Company which will like this little Book—these + Thoughts (if I may call them so) dipped up from that phantasmagoria or + phosphorescence which, by some unexplained process of combustion, flickers + over the large lump of soft gray matter in the bowl of my skull. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0030" id="link2H_4_0030"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>They</i> + </h2> + <p> + Their taste is exquisite; They live in Georgian houses, in a world of + ivory and precious china, of old brickwork and stone pilasters. In white + drawing rooms I see Them, or on blue, bird-haunted lawns. They talk + pleasantly of me, and their eyes watch me. From the diminished, ridiculous + picture of myself which the glass of the world gives me, I turn for + comfort, for happiness, to my image in the kindly mirror of those eyes. + </p> + <p> + Who are They? Where, in what paradise or palace, shall I ever find Them? I + may walk all the streets, ring all the door-bells of the World, but I + shall never find them. Yet nothing has value for me save In the crown of + Their approval; for Their coming—which will never be—I build + and plant, and for Them alone I secretly write this little Book, which + They will never read. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0031" id="link2H_4_0031"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>In the Pulpit</i> + </h2> + <p> + The Vicar had certain literary tastes; in his youth he had written an <i>Ode + to the Moon</i>; and he would speak of the difficulty he found in + composing his sermons, week after week. + </p> + <p> + Now I felt that if I composed and preached sermons, I should by no means + confine myself to the Vicar's threadbare subjects—should preach the + Wrath of God, and sound the Last Trump in the ears of my Hell-doomed + congregation, cracking the heavens and dissolving the earth with the + eclipses and thunders and earthquakes of the Day of Judgment. Then I might + refresh them with high and incomprehensible Doctrines, beyond the reach of + Reason—Predestination, Election, the Co-existences and Co-eternities + of the incomprehensible Triad. And with what a holy vehemence would I + exclaim and cry out against all forms of doctrinal Error—all the + execrable hypotheses of the great Heresiarchs! Then there would be many + ancient and learned and out-of-the-way Iniquities to denounce, and + splendid, neglected Virtues to inculcate—Apostolic Poverty, and + Virginity, that precious jewel, that fair garland, so prized in Heaven, + but so rare on earth. + </p> + <p> + For in the range of creeds and morals it is the highest peaks that shine + for me with a certain splendour: it is toward those radiant Alps that, if + I were a Clergyman, I would lead my flock to pasture. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0032" id="link2H_4_0032"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Human Ends</i> + </h2> + <p> + I really was impressed, as we paced up and down the avenue, by the Vicar's + words and weighty, weighed advice. He spoke of the various professions; + mentioned contemporaries of his own who had achieved success: how one had + a Seat in Parliament, would be given a Seat in the Cabinet when his party + next came in; another was a Bishop with a Seat in the House of Lords; a + third was a Barrister who was soon, it was said, to be raised to the + Bench. + </p> + <p> + But in spite of my good intentions, my real wish to find, before it is too + late, some career or other for myself (and the question is getting + serious), I am far too much at the mercy of ludicrous images. Front Seats, + Episcopal, Judicial, Parliamentary Benches—were all the ends then, I + asked my self, of serious, middle-aged ambition only things to sit on? + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0033" id="link2H_4_0033"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Lord Arden</i> + </h2> + <p> + "If I were Lord Arden," said the Vicar, "I should shut up that great + House; it's too big—what can a young unmarried man...?" + </p> + <p> + "If I were Lord Arden," said the Vicar's wife (and Mrs. La Mountain's tone + showed how much she disapproved of that young Nobleman), "if I were Lord + Arden, I should live there, and do my duty to my tenants and neighbours." + </p> + <p> + "If I were Lord Arden," I said; but then it flashed vividly into my mind, + suppose I really were this opulent young Lord? I quite forgot to whom I + was talking; my memory was occupied with the names of people who had been + famous for their enormous pleasures; who had filled their Palaces with + guilty revels, and built Pyramids, Obelisks, and half-acre Tombs, to + soothe their Pride. My mind kindled at the thought of these Audacities. + "If I were Lord Arden!" I cried.... + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0034" id="link2H_4_0034"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>The Starry Heaven</i> + </h2> + <p> + "But what are they really? What do they say they are?" the small young + lady asked me. We were looking up at the Stars, which were quivering that + night in splendid hosts above the lawns and trees. + </p> + <p> + So I tried to explain some of the views that have been held about them. + How people first of all had thought them mere candles set in the sky, to + guide their own footsteps when the Sun was gone; till wise men, sitting on + the Chaldean plains, and watching them with aged eyes, became impressed + with the solemn view that those still and shining lights were the + executioners of God's decrees, and irresistible instruments of His Wrath; + and that they moved fatally among their celestial Houses to ordain and set + out the fortunes and misfortunes of each race of newborn mortals. And so + it was believed that every man or woman had, from the cradle, fighting for + or against him or her, some great Star, Formalhaut, perhaps, Aldebaran, + Altaïr: while great Heroes and Princes were more splendidly attended, and + marched out to their forgotten battles with troops and armies of heavenly + Constellations. + </p> + <p> + But this noble old view was not believed in now; the Stars were no longer + regarded as malignant or beneficent Powers; and I explained how most + serious people thought that somewhere—though just where they did not + know—above the vault of Sky, was to be found the final home of + earnest men and women; where, as a reward for their right views and + conduct, they were to rejoice forever, wearing those diamonds of the + starry night arranged in glorious crowns. This notion, however, had been + disputed by Poets and Lovers: it was Love, according to these young + astronomers, that moved the Sun and other Stars; the Constellations being + heavenly palaces, where people who had adored each other were to meet and + live always together after Death. + </p> + <p> + Then I spoke of the modern and real immensity of the unfathomed Skies. But + suddenly the vast meaning of my words rushed into my mind; I felt myself + dwindling, falling through the blue. And yet, in these silent seconds, + there thrilled through me in the cool sweet air and night no chill of + death or nothingness; but the taste and joy of this Earth, this + orchard-plot of earth, floating unknown, far away in unfathomed space, + with its Moon and meadows. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0035" id="link2H_4_0035"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>My Map</i> + </h2> + <p> + The "Known World" I called the map which I amused myself making for the + children's schoolroom. It included France, England, Italy, Greece, and all + the old shores of the Mediterranean; but the rest I marked "Unknown"; + sketching into the East the doubtful realms of Ninus and Semiramis; + changing back Germany into the Hyrcanian Forest; and drawing pictures of + the supposed inhabitants of these unexplored regions, Dog-Apes, Satyrs, + Cannibals, and Misanthropes, Cimmerians involved in darkness, Amazons, and + Headless Men. And all around the Map I coiled the coils, and curled the + curling waves of the great Sea <i>Oceanum</i>, with the bursting cheeks of + the four Winds, blowing from the four imagined hinges of the Universe. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0036" id="link2H_4_0036"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>The Snob</i> + </h2> + <p> + As I paced in fine company on that Terrace, I felt chosen, exempt, and + curiously happy. There was a glamour in the air, a something in the + special flavour of that moment that was like the consciousness of + Salvation, or the smell of ripe peaches on a sunny wall. + </p> + <p> + I know what you're going to call me, Reader. But I am not to be bullied + and abashed by words. And after all, why not let oneself be dazzled and + enchanted? Are not Illusions pleasant, and is this a world in which + Romance hangs on every tree? + </p> + <p> + And how about your own life? Is that, then, so full of golden visions? + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0037" id="link2H_4_0037"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Companions</i> + </h2> + <p> + Dearest, prettiest, and sweetest of my retinue, who gather with delicate + industry bits of silk and down from the bleak world to make the soft nest + of my fatuous repose; who ever whisper honied words in my ear, or trip + before me holding up deceiving mirrors—is it Hope, or is it not + rather Vanity, that I love the best? + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0038" id="link2H_4_0038"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Edification</i> + </h2> + <p> + "I must really improve my Mind," I tell myself, and once more begin to + patch and repair that crazy structure. So I toil and toil on at the vain + task of edification, though the wind tears off the tiles, the floors give + way, the ceilings fall, strange birds build untidy nests in the rafters, + and owls hoot and laugh in the tumbling chimneys. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0039" id="link2H_4_0039"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>The Rose</i> + </h2> + <p> + The old lady had always been proud of the great rose-tree in her garden, + and was fond of telling how it had grown from a cutting she had brought + years before from Italy, when she was first married. She and her husband + had been travelling back in their carriage from Rome (it was before the + time of railways), and on a bad piece of road south of Siena they had + broken down, and had been forced to pass the night in a little house by + the roadside. The accommodation was wretched of course; she had spent a + sleepless night, and rising early had stood, wrapped up, at her window, + with the cool air blowing on her face, to watch the dawn. She could still, + after all these years, remember the blue mountains with the bright moon + above them, and how a far-off town on one of the peaks had gradually grown + whiter and whiter, till the moon faded, the mountains were touched with + the pink of the rising sun, and suddenly the town was lit as by an + illumination, one window after another catching and reflecting the sun's + beams, till at last the whole little city twinkled and sparkled up in the + sky like a nest of stars. + </p> + <p> + That morning, finding they would have to wait while their carriage was + being repaired, they had driven in a local conveyance up to the city on + the mountain, where they had been told they would find better quarters; + and there they had stayed two or three days. It was one of the miniature + Italian cities with a high church, a pretentious piazza, a few narrow + streets and little palaces, perched all compact and complete, on the top + of a mountain, within an enclosure of walls hardly larger than an English + kitchen garden. But it was full of life and noise, echoing all day and all + night with the sounds of feet and voices. + </p> + <p> + The Café of the simple inn where they stayed was the meeting-place of the + notabilities of the little city; the <i>Sindaco</i>, the <i>avvocato</i>, + the doctor, and a few others; and among them they noticed a beautiful, + slim, talkative old man, with bright black eyes and snow-white hair—tail + and straight and still with the figure of a youth, although the waiter + told them with pride that the <i>Conte</i> was <i>molto vecchio</i>—would + in fact be eighty in the following year. He was the last of his family, + the waiter added—they had once been great and rich people—but + he had no descendants; in fact the waiter mentioned with complacency, as + if it were a story on which the locality prided itself, that the <i>Conte</i> + had been unfortunate in love, and had never married. + </p> + <p> + The old gentleman, however, seemed cheerful enough; and it was plain that + he took an interest in the strangers, and wished to make their + acquaintance. This was soon effected by the friendly waiter; and after a + little talk the old man invited them to visit his villa and garden which + were just outside the walls of the town. So the next afternoon, when the + sun began to descend, and they saw in glimpses through doorways and + windows blue shadows beginning to spread over the brown mountains, they + went to pay their visit. It was not much of a place, a small, modernized + stucco villa, with a hot pebbly garden, and in it a stone basin with + torpid gold fish, and a statue of Diana and her hounds against the wall. + But what gave a glory to it was a gigantic rose-tree which clambered over + the house, almost smothering the windows, and filling the air with the + perfume of its sweetness. Yes, it was a fine rose, the <i>Conte</i> said + proudly when they praised it, and he would tell the Signora about it. And + as they sat there, drinking the wine he offered them, he alluded with the + cheerful indifference of old age to his love-affair, as though he took for + granted that they had heard of it already. + </p> + <p> + "The lady lived across the valley there beyond that hill. I was a young + man then, for it was many years ago. I used to ride over to see her; it + was a long way, but I rode fast, for young men, as no doubt the Signora + knows, are impatient. But the lady was not kind, she would keep me + waiting, oh, for hours; and one day when I had waited very long I grew + very angry, and as I walked up and down in the garden where she had told + me she would see me, I broke one of her roses, broke a branch from it; and + when I saw what I had done, I hid it inside my coat—so—and + when I came home I planted it, and the Signora sees how it has grown. If + the Signora admires it, I must give her a cutting to plant also in her + garden; I am told the English have beautiful gardens that are green, and + not burnt with the sun like ours." + </p> + <p> + The next day, when their mended carriage had come up to fetch them, and + they were just starting to drive away from the inn, the <i>Conte's</i> old + servant appeared with the rose-cutting neatly wrapped up, and the + compliments and wishes for a <i>buon viaggio</i> from her master. The town + collected to see them depart, and the children ran after their carriage + through the gate of the little city. They heard a rush of feet behind them + for a few moments, but soon they were far down toward the valley; the + little town with all its noise and life was high above them on its + mountain peak. + </p> + <p> + She had planted the rose at home, where it had grown and flourished in a + wonderful manner, and every June the great mass of leaves and shoots still + broke out into a passionate splendour of scent and scarlet colour, as if + in its root and fibres there still burnt the anger and thwarted desire of + that Italian lover. Of course the old <i>Conte</i> must have died many + years ago; she had forgotten his name, and had even forgotten the name of + the mountain city that she had stayed in, after first seeing it twinkling + at dawn in the sky, like a nest of stars. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0040" id="link2H_4_0040"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>The Vicar of Lynch</i> + </h2> + <p> + When I heard through country gossip of the strange happening at Lynch + which had caused so great a scandal, and led to the disappearance of the + deaf old Vicar of that remote village, I collected all the reports I could + about it, for I felt that at the centre of this uncomprehending talk and + wild anecdote there was something with more meaning than a mere sudden + outbreak of blasphemy and madness. + </p> + <p> + It appeared that the old Vicar, after some years spent in the quiet + discharge of his parochial duties, had been noticed to become more and + more odd in his appearance and behaviour; and it was also said that he had + gradually introduced certain alterations into the Church services. These + had been vaguely supposed at the time to be of a High Church character, + but afterwards they were put down to a growing mental derangement, which + had finally culminated at that notorious Harvest Festival, when his career + as a clergyman of the Church of England had ended. On this painful + occasion the old man had come into church outlandishly dressed, and had + gone through a service with chanted gibberish and unaccustomed gestures, + and prayers which were unfamiliar to his congregation. There was also talk + of a woman's figure on the altar, which the Vicar had unveiled at a solemn + moment in this performance; and I also heard echo of other gossip—gossip + that was, however, authoritatively contradicted and suppressed as much as + possible—about the use of certain other symbols of a most unsuitable + kind. Then a few days after the old man had disappeared—some of the + neighbours believed that he was dead; some, that he was now shut up in an + asylum for the insane. + </p> + <p> + Such was the fantastic and almost incredible talk I listened to, but in + which, as I say, I found much more meaning than my neighbours. For one + thing, although they knew that the Vicar had come from Oxford to this + remote College living, they knew nothing of his work and scholarly + reputation in that University, and none of them had probably ever heard of—much + less read—an important book which he had written, and which was the + standard work on his special subject. To them he was simply a deaf, + eccentric, and solitary clergyman; and I think I was the only person in + the neighbourhood who had conversed with him on the subject concerning + which he was the greatest living authority in England. + </p> + <p> + For I had seen the old man once—curiously enough at the time of a + Harvest Festival, though it was some years before the one which had led to + his disappearance. Bicycling one day over the hills, I had ridden down + into a valley of cornfields, and then, passing along an unfenced road that + ran across a wide expanse of stubble, I came, after getting off to open + three or four gates, upon a group of thatched cottages, with a little, + unrestored Norman church standing among great elms, I left my bicycle and + walked through the churchyard, and as I went into the church, through its + deeply-recessed Norman doorway, a surprisingly pretty sight met my eyes. + The dim, cool, little interior was set out and richly adorned with an + abundance of fruit and vegetables, yellow gourds, apples and plums and + golden wheat sheaves, great loaves of bread, and garlands of September + flowers. A shabby-looking old clergyman was standing on the top of a + step-ladder, finishing the decorations, when I entered. As soon as he saw + me he came down, and I spoke to him, praising the decorations, and raising + my voice a little, for I noticed that he was somewhat deaf. We talked of + the Harvest Festival, and as I soon perceived that I was talking with a + man of books and University education, I ventured to hint at what had + vividly impressed me in that old, gaudily-decorated church—its pagan + character, as if it were a rude archaic temple in some corner of the + antique world, which had been adorned, two thousand years ago, by pious + country folk for some local festival. The old clergyman was not in the + least shocked by my remark; it seemed indeed rather to please him; there + was, he agreed, something of a pagan character in the modern Harvest + Festival—it was no doubt a bit of the old primitive Vegetation + Ritual, the old Religion of the soil; a Festival, which, like so many + others, had not been destroyed by Christianity, but absorbed into it, and + given a new meaning. "Indeed," he added, talking on as if the subject + interested him, and expressing himself with a certain donnish carefulness + of speech that I found pleasant to listen to, "the Harvest Festival is + undoubtedly a survival of the prehistoric worship of that Corn Goddess + who, in classical times, was called Demeter and Ioulo and Ceres, but whose + cult as an Earth-Mother and Corn-Spirit is of much greater antiquity. For + there is no doubt that this Vegetation Spirit has been worshipped from the + earliest times by agricultural peoples; the wheat fields and ripe harvests + being naturally suggestive of the presence amid the corn of a kindly + Being, who, in return for due rites and offerings, will vouchsafe + nourishing rains and golden harvests." He mentioned the references in + Virgil, and the description in Theocritus of a Sicilian Harvest Festival—these + were no doubt familiar to me; but if I was interested in the subject, I + should find, he said, much more information collected in a book which he + had written, but of which I had probably never heard, about the Vegetation + Deities in Greek Religion. As it happened I knew the book, and felt now + much interested in my chance meeting with the distinguished author; and + after expressing this as best I could, I rode off, promising to visit him + again. This promise I was never able to fulfil; but when afterwards, on my + return to the neighbourhood, I heard of that unhappy scandal, my memory of + this meeting and our talk enabled me to form a theory as to what had + really happened. + </p> + <p> + It seemed plain to me that the change had been too violent for this + elderly scholar, taken from his books and college rooms and set down in + the solitude of this remote valley, amid the richness and living sap of + Nature. The gay spectacle, right under his old eyes, of growing shoots and + budding foliage, of blossoming and flowering, and the ripening of fruits + and crops, had little by little (such was my theory) unhinged his brains. + More and more his thoughts had come to dwell, not on the doctrines of the + Church in which he had long ago taken orders, but on the pagan rites which + had formed his life-long study, and which had been the expression of a + life not unlike the agricultural life amid which he now found himself + living. So as his derangement grew upon him in his solitude, he had + gradually transformed, with a maniac's cunning, the Christian services, + and led his little congregation, all unknown to themselves, back toward + their ancestral worship of the Corn-Goddess. At last he had thrown away + all disguise, and had appeared as a hierophant of Demeter, dressed in a + fawn skin, with a crown of poplar leaves, and pedantically carrying the + mystic basket and the winnowing fan appropriate to these mysteries. The + wheaten posset he offered the shocked communicants belonged to these also, + and the figure of a woman on the altar was of course the holy Wheatsheaf, + whose unveiling was the culminating point in that famous ritual. + </p> + <p> + It is much to be regretted that I could not recover full and more exact + details of that celebration in which this great scholar had probably + embodied his mature knowledge concerning a subject which has puzzled + generations of students. But what powers of careful observation could one + expect from a group of labourers and small farmers? Some of the things + that reached my ears I refused to believe—the mention of pig's blood + for instance, and especially the talk of certain grosser symbols, which + the choir boys, it was whispered, had carried about the church in + ceremonious procession. Village people have strange imaginations; and to + this event, growing more and more monstrous as they talked it over, they + must themselves have added this grotesque detail. However, I have written + to consult an Oxford authority on this interesting point, and he has been + kind enough to explain at length that although at the <i>Haloa</i>, or + winter festival of the Corn-Goddess, and also at the <i>Chloeia</i>, or + festival in early spring, some symbolization of the reproductive powers of + Nature would be proper and appropriate, it would have been quite out of + place at the <i>Thalysia</i>, or autumn festival of thanksgiving. I feel + certain that a solecism of this nature—the introduction into a + particular rite of features not sanctioned by the texts—would have + seemed a shocking thing, even to the unhinged mind of one who had always + been so careful a scholar. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0041" id="link2H_4_0041"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Tu Quoque Fontium</i> + </h2> + <p> + Just to sit in the Sun, to bask like an animal in its heat—this is + one of my country recreations. And often I reflect what a thing after all + it is still to be alive and sitting here, above all the buried people of + the world, in the kind and famous Sunshine. + </p> + <p> + Beyond the orchard there is a place where the stream, hurrying out from + under a bridge, makes for itself a quiet pool. A beech-tree upholds its + green light over the blue water; and there, when I have grown weary of the + sun, the great glaring indiscriminating Sun, I can shade myself and read + my book. And listening to this water's pretty voices I invent for it + exquisite epithets, calling it <i>silver-clean</i> or <i>moss-margined</i> + or <i>nymph-frequented</i>, and idly promise to place it among the learned + fountains and pools of the world, making of it a cool green thought for + English exiles in the dust and glare of Eastern deserts. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0042" id="link2H_4_0042"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>The Spider</i> + </h2> + <p> + What shall I compare it to, this fantastic thing I call my Mind? To a + waste-paper basket, to a sieve choked with sediment, or to a barrel full + of floating froth and refuse? + </p> + <p> + No, what it is really most like is a spider's web, insecurely hung on + leaves and twigs, quivering in every wind, and sprinkled with dewdrops and + dead flies. And at its centre, pondering forever the Problem of Existence, + sits motionless the spider-like and uncanny Soul. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0043" id="link2H_4_0043"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + BOOK II + </h2> + <p> + <i>"Thou, Trivia, goddess, aid my song: Through spacious streets conduct + thy bard along."</i> + </p> + <p> + Gay's <i>Trivia, or New Art of Walking Streets of London.</i> + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0044" id="link2H_4_0044"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>L'oiseau Bleu</i> + </h2> + <p> + What is it, I have more than once asked myself, what is it that I am + looking for in my walks about London? Sometimes it seems to me as if I + were following a Bird, a bright Bird that sings sweetly as it floats about + from one place to another. + </p> + <p> + When I find myself however among persons of middle age and settled + principles, see them moving regularly to their offices—what keeps + them going? I ask myself. And I feel ashamed of myself and my Bird. + </p> + <p> + There is though a Philosophic Doctrine—I studied it at College, and + I know that many serious people believe it—which maintains that all + men, in spite of appearances and pretensions, all live alike for Pleasure. + This theory certainly brings portly, respected persons very near to me. + Indeed with a sense of low complicity I have sometimes followed and + watched a Bishop. Was he too on the hunt for Pleasure, solemnly pursuing + his Bird? + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0045" id="link2H_4_0045"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>At The Bank</i> + </h2> + <p> + Entering the Bank in a composed manner, I drew a cheque and handed it to + the cashier through the grating. Then I eyed him narrowly. Would not that + astute official see that I was only posing as a Real Person? No; he calmly + opened a little drawer, took out some real sovereigns, counted them + carefully, and handed them to me in a brass-tipped shovel. I went away + feeling I had perpetrated a delightful fraud. I had got some of the gold + of the actual world! + </p> + <p> + Yet now and then, at the sight of my name on a visiting card, or of my + face photographed in a group among other faces, or when I see a letter + addressed in my hand, or catch the sound of my own voice, I grow shy in + the presence of a mysterious Person who is myself, is known by my name, + and who apparently does exist. Can it be possible that I am as real as any + one else, and that all of us—the cashier and banker at the Bank, the + King on his throne—all feel ourselves like ghosts and goblins in + this authentic world? + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0046" id="link2H_4_0046"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Mammon</i> + </h2> + <p> + Moralists and Church Fathers have named it the root of all Evil, the + begetter of hate and bloodshed, the sure cause of the soul's damnation. It + has been called "trash," "muck," "dunghill excrement," by grave authors. + The love of it is denounced in all Sacred Writings; we find it reprehended + on Chaldean bricks, and in the earliest papyri. Buddha, Confucius, Christ, + set their faces against it; and they have been followed in more modern + times by beneficed Clergymen, Sunday School Teachers, and the leaders of + the Higher Thought. But have the condemnations of all the ages done + anything to tarnish that bright lustre? Men dig for it ever deeper into + the earth's intestines, travel in search of it farther and farther to + arctic and unpleasant regions. + </p> + <p> + In spite of all my moral reading, I must confess that I like to have some + of this gaudy substance in my pocket. Its presence cheers and comforts me, + diffuses a genial warmth through my body. My eyes rejoice in the shine of + it; its clinquant sound is music in my ears. Since I then am in his paid + service, and reject none of the doles of his bounty, I too dwell in the + House of Mammon. I bow before the Idol, and taste the unhallowed ecstasy. + </p> + <p> + How many Altars have been overthrown, and how many Theologies and heavenly + Dreams have had their bottoms knocked out of them, while He has sat there, + a great God, golden and adorned, and secure on His unmoved throne? + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0047" id="link2H_4_0047"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>I See the World</i> + </h2> + <p> + "But you go nowhere, see nothing of the world," my cousins said. Now + though I do go sometimes to the parties to which I am now and then + invited, I find, as a matter of fact, that I get really much more pleasure + by looking in at windows, and have a way of my own of seeing the World. + And of summer evenings, when motors hurry through the late twilight, and + the great houses take on airs of inscrutable expectation, I go owling out + through the dusk; and wandering toward the West, lose my way in unknown + streets—an unknown City of revels. And when a door opens and a + bediamonded Lady moves to her motor over carpets unrolled by powdered + footmen, I can easily think her some great Courtezan, or some + half-believed Duchess, hurrying to card-tables and lit candles and strange + scenes of joy. I like to see that there are still splendid people on this + flat earth; and at dances, standing in the street with the crowd, and + stirred by the music, the lights, the rushing sound of voices, I think the + Ladies as beautiful as Stars who move up those lanes of light past our + rows of vagabond faces; the young men look like Lords in novels; and if + (it has once or twice happened) people I know go by me, they strike me as + changed and rapt beyond my sphere. And when on hot nights windows are left + open, and I can look in at Dinner Parties, as I peer through lace curtains + and window-flowers at the silver, the women's shoulders, the shimmer of + their jewels, and the divine attitudes of their heads as they lean and + listen, I imagine extraordinary intrigues and unheard of wines and + passions. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0048" id="link2H_4_0048"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Social Success</i> + </h2> + <p> + The servant gave me my coat and hat, and in a glow of self-satisfaction I + walked out into the night. "A delightful evening," I reflected, "the + nicest kind of people. What I said about finance and French philosophy + impressed them; and how they laughed when I imitated a pig squealing." + </p> + <p> + But soon after, "God, it's awful," I muttered, "I wish I were dead." + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0049" id="link2H_4_0049"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Apotheosis</i> + </h2> + <p> + But Oh, those heavenly moments when I feel this trivial universe too small + to contain my Attributes; when a sense of the divine Ipseity invades me; + when I know that my voice is the voice of Truth, and my umbrella God's + umbrella! + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0050" id="link2H_4_0050"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>The Spring in London</i> + </h2> + <p> + London seemed last winter like an underground city; as if its low sky were + the roof of a cave, and its murky day a light such as one reads of in + countries beneath the earth. + </p> + <p> + And yet the natural sunlight sometimes shone there; white clouds voyaged + in the blue sky; the interminable multitudes of roofs were washed with + silver by the Moon, or cloaked with a mantle of new-fallen snow. And the + coming of Spring to London was to me not unlike the descent of the + maiden-goddess into Death's Kingdoms, when pink almond blossoms blew about + her in the gloom, and those shadowy people were stirred with faint + longings for meadows and the shepherd's life. Nor was there anything more + virginal and fresh in wood or orchard than the shimmer of young foliage, + which, in May, dimmed with delicate green all the smoke-blackened London + trees. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0051" id="link2H_4_0051"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Fashion Plates</i> + </h2> + <p> + I like loitering at the bookstalls, looking in at the windows of + printshops, and romancing over the pictures I see of shepherdesses and + old-fashioned Beauties. Tall and slim and crowned with plumes in one + period, in another these Ladies become as wide-winged as butterflies, or + float, large, balloon-like visions, down summer streets. And yet in all + shapes they have always (I tell myself) created thrilling effects of + beauty, and waked in the breasts of modish young men ever the same + charming Emotion. + </p> + <p> + But then I have questioned this. Is the emotion always precisely the same? + Is it true to say that the human heart remains quite unchanged beneath all + the changing fashions of frills and ruffles? In this elegant and cruel + Sentiment, I rather fancy that colour and shape do make a difference. I + have a notion that about 1840 was the Zenith, the Meridian Hour, the + Golden Age of the Passion. Those tight-waisted, whiskered Beaux, those + crinolined Beauties, adored one another, I believe, with a leisure, a + refinement, and dismay not quite attainable at other dates. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0052" id="link2H_4_0052"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Mental Vice</i> + </h2> + <p> + There are certain hackneyed Thoughts that will force them-selves on me; I + find my mind, especially in hot weather, infested and buzzed about by + moral Platitudes. "That shows—" I say to myself, or, "How true it is—" + or, "I really ought to have known!" The sight of a large clock sets me off + into musings on the flight of Time; a steamer on the Thames or lines of + telegraph inevitably suggest the benefits of Civilization, man's triumph + over Nature, the heroism of Inventors, the courage, amid ridicule and + poverty, of Stephenson and Watt. Like faint, rather unpleasant smells, + these thoughts lurk about railway stations. I can hardly post a letter + without marvelling at the excellence and accuracy of the Postal System. + </p> + <p> + Then the pride in the British Constitution and British Freedom, which + comes over me when I see, even in the distance, the Towers of Westminster + Palace—that Mother of Parliaments—it is not much comfort that + this should be chastened, as I walk down the Embankment, by the sight of + Cleopatra's Needle, and the Thought that it will no doubt witness the Fall + of the British, as it has that of other Empires, remaining to point its + Moral, as old as Egypt, to Antipodeans musing on the dilapidated bridges. + </p> + <p> + I am sometimes afraid of finding that there is a moral for everything; + that the whole great frame of the Universe has a key, like a box; has been + contrived and set going by a well-meaning but humdrum Eighteenth-century + Creator. It would be a kind of Hell, surely, a world in which everything + could be at once explained, shown to be obvious and useful. I am sated + with Lesson and Allegory, weary of monitory ants, industrious bees, and + preaching animals. The benefits of Civilization cloy me. I have seen + enough shining of the didactic Sun. + </p> + <p> + So gazing up on hot summer nights at the London stars, I cool my thoughts + with a vision of the giddy, infinite, meaningless waste of Creation, the + blazing Suns, the Planets and frozen Moons, all crashing blindly forever + across the void of space. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0053" id="link2H_4_0053"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>The Organ of Life</i> + </h2> + <p> + Almost always In London—in the congregated uproar of streets, or in + the noise that drifts through wails and windows—you can hear the + hackneyed melancholy of street music; a music which sounds like the actual + voice of the human Heart, singing the lost joys, the regrets, the loveless + lives of the people who blacken the pavements, or jolt along on the + busses. + </p> + <p> + "Speak to me kindly," the hand-organ implores; "I'm all alone!" it screams + amid the throng; "thy Vows are all broken," it laments in dingy + courtyards, "And light is thy Fame." And of hot summer afternoons, the Cry + for Courage to Remember, or Calmness to Forget, floats in with the smell + of paint and asphalt—faint and sad—through open office + windows. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0054" id="link2H_4_0054"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Humiliation</i> + </h2> + <p> + "My own view is," I began, but no one listened. At the next pause, "I + always say," I remarked, but again the loud talk went on. Someone told a + story. When the laughter had ended, "I often think—"; but looking + round the table I could catch no friendly or attentive eye. It was + humiliating, but more humiliating the thought that Sophocles and Goethe + would have always commanded attention, while the lack of it would not have + troubled Spinoza or Abraham Lincoln. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0055" id="link2H_4_0055"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Green Ivory</i> + </h2> + <p> + What a bore it is, waking up in the morning always the same person. I wish + I were unflinching and emphatic, and had big, bushy eyebrows and a Message + for the Age. I wish I were a deep Thinker, or a great Ventriloquist. + </p> + <p> + I should like to be refined and melancholy, the victim of a hopeless + passion; to love in the old, stilted way, with impossible Adoration and + Despair under the pale-faced Moon. + </p> + <p> + I wish I could get up; I wish I were the world's greatest Violinist. I + wish I had lots of silver, and first Editions, and green ivory. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0056" id="link2H_4_0056"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>In The Park</i> + </h2> + <p> + "Yes," I said one afternoon in the Park, as I looked rather contemptuously + at the people of Fashion, moving slow and well-dressed in the sunshine, + "but how about the others, the Courtiers and Beauties and Dandies of the + past? They wore fine costumes, and glittered for their hour in the summer + air. What has become of them?" I somewhat rhetorically asked. They were + all dead now. Their day was over. They were cold in their graves. + </p> + <p> + And I thought of those severe spirits who, in garrets far from the Park + and Fashion, had scorned the fumes and tinsel of the noisy World. + </p> + <p> + But, good Heavens! these severe spirits were, it occurred to me, all, as a + matter of fact, quite as dead as the others. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0057" id="link2H_4_0057"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>The Correct</i> + </h2> + <p> + I am sometimes visited by a suspicion that everything isn't quite all + right with the Righteous; that the Moral Law speaks in muffled and dubious + tones to those who listen most scrupulously for its dictates. I feel sure + I have detected a look of doubt and misgiving in the eyes of its earnest + upholders. + </p> + <p> + But there is no such shadow or cloud on the faces in Club windows, or in + the eyes of drivers of four-in-hands, or of fashionable young men walking + down Piccadilly. For these live by a Rule which has not been drawn down + from far-off and questionable skies, and needs no sanction; what they do + is Correct, and that is all. Correctly dressed from head to foot, they + pass, with correct speech and thoughts and gestures, correctly across the + roundness of the Earth. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0058" id="link2H_4_0058"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>"Where Do I Come In?"</i> + </h2> + <p> + When I read in the <i>Times</i> about India and all its problems and + populations; when I look at the letters in large type of important + personages, and find myself face to face with the Questions, Movements, + and great Activities of the Age, "Where do I come in?" I ask myself + uneasily. + </p> + <p> + Then in the great <i>Times</i>-reflected world I find the corner where I + play my humble but necessary part. For I am one of the unpraised, + unrewarded millions without whom Statistics would be a bankrupt science. + It is we who are born, who marry, who die, in constant ratios; who + regularly lose so many umbrellas, post just so many unaddressed letters + every year. And there are enthusiasts among us who, without the least + thought of their own convenience, allow omnibuses to run over them; or + throw themselves month by month, in fixed numbers, from the London + bridges. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0059" id="link2H_4_0059"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Microbes</i> + </h2> + <p> + But how Is one to keep free from those mental microbes that worm-eat + people's brains—those Theories and Diets and Enthusiasms and + infectious Doctrines that we are always liable to catch from what seem the + most innocuous contacts? People go about laden with germs; they breathe + creeds and convictions on you whenever they open their mouths. Books and + newspapers are simply creeping with them—the monthly Reviews seem to + have room for nothing else. Wherewithal then shall a young man cleanse his + way; and how shall he keep his mind immune to Theosophical speculations, + and novel schemes of Salvation? + </p> + <p> + Can he ever be sure that he won't be suddenly struck down by the fever of + Funeral, or of Spelling Reform, or take to his bed with a new Sex Theory? + </p> + <p> + But is this struggle for a healthy mind in a maggoty universe really after + all worth it? Are there not soporific dreams and sweet deliriums more + soothing than Reason? If Transmigration can make clear the dark Problem of + Evil; if Mrs. Mary Baker Eddy can free us from the dominion of Death; if + the belief that Bacon wrote Shakespeare gives a peace that the world + cannot give, why pedantically reject such kindly solace? Why not be led + with the others by still waters, and be made to lie down in green + pastures? + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0060" id="link2H_4_0060"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>The Quest</i> + </h2> + <p> + "We walk alone in the world," the Moralist, at the end of his essay on + Ideal Friendship, writes somewhat sadly, "Friends such as we desire are + dreams and fables," Yet we never quite give up the hope of finding them. + But what awful things happen to us? what snubs, what set-downs we + experience, what shames and disillusions. We can never really tell what + these new unknown persons may do to us. Sometimes they seem nice, and then + begin to talk like gramophones. Sometimes they grab at us with moist + hands, or breathe hotly on our necks, or make awful confidences, or drench + us from sentimental slop-pails. And too often, among the thoughts in the + loveliest heads, we come on nests of woolly caterpillars. + </p> + <p> + And yet we brush our hats, pull on our gloves, and go out and ring + door-bells. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0061" id="link2H_4_0061"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>The Kaleidoscope</i> + </h2> + <p> + I find in my mind, in its miscellany of ideas and musings, a curious + collection of little landscapes and pictures, shining and fading for no + reason. Sometimes they are views in no way remarkable-the corner of a + road, a heap of stones, an old gate. But there are many charming pictures, + too: as I read, between my eyes and book, the Moon sheds down on harvest + fields her chill of silver; I see autumnal avenues, with the leaves + falling, or swept in heaps; and storms blow among my thoughts, with the + rain beating forever on the fields. Then Winter's upward glare of snow + appears; or the pink and delicate green of Spring in the windy sunshine; + or cornfields and green waters, and youths bathing in Summer's golden + heats. + </p> + <p> + And as I walk about, certain places haunt me: a cathedral rises above a + dark blue foreign town, the colour of ivory in the sunset light; now I + find myself in a French garden full of lilacs and bees, and shut-in + sunshine, with the Mediterranean lounging and washing outside its walls; + now in a little college library, with busts, and the green reflected light + of Oxford lawns—and again I hear the bells, reminding me of the + familiar Oxford hours. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0062" id="link2H_4_0062"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Oxford Street</i> + </h2> + <p> + One late winter afternoon in Oxford Street, amid the noise of vehicles and + voices that filled that dusky thoroughfare, as I was borne onward with the + crowd past the great electric-lighted shops, a holy Indifference filled my + thoughts. Illusion had faded from me; I was not touched by any desire for + the goods displayed in those golden windows, nor had I the smallest share + in the appetites and fears of all those moving and anxious faces. And as I + listened with Asiatic detachment to the London traffic, its sound changed + into something ancient and dissonant and sad—into the turbid flow of + that stream of Craving which sweeps men onward through the meaningless + cycles of Existence, blind and enslaved forever. But I had reached the + farther shore, the Harbour of Deliverance, the Holy City; the Great Peace + beyond all this turmoil and fret compassed me around. <i>Om Mani padme hum</i>—I + murmured the sacred syllables, smiling with the pitying smile of the + Enlightened One on his heavenly lotus. + </p> + <p> + Then, in a shop-window, I saw a neatly fitted suit-case. I liked that + suit-case; I desired to possess it. Immediately I was enveloped by the + mists of Illusion, chained once more to the Wheel of Existence, whirled + onward along Oxford Street in that turbid stream of wrong-belief, and + lust, and sorrow, and anger. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0063" id="link2H_4_0063"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Beauty</i> + </h2> + <p> + Among all the ugly mugs of the world we see now and then a face made after + the divine pattern. Then, a wonderful thing happens to us; the Blue Bird + sings, the golden Splendour shines, and for a queer moment everything + seems meaningless save our impulse to follow those fair forms, to follow + them to the clear Paradises they promise. + </p> + <p> + Plato assures us that these moments are not (as we are apt to think them) + mere blurs and delusions of the senses, but divine revelations; that in a + lovely face we see imaged, as in a mirror, the Absolute Beauty—; it + is Reality, flashing on us in the cave where we dwell amid shadows and + darkness. Therefore we should follow these fair forms, and their shining + footsteps will lead us upward to the highest heaven of Wisdom. The Poets, + too, keep chanting this great doctrine of Beauty in grave notes to their + golden strings. Its music floats up through the skies so sweet, so + strange, that the very Angels seem to lean from their stars to listen. + </p> + <p> + But, O Plato, O Shelley, O Angels of Heaven, what scrapes you do get us + into! + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0064" id="link2H_4_0064"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>The Power of Words</i> + </h2> + <p> + I thanked the club porter who helped me into my coat, and stepped out + lightly into the vastness and freshness of the Night. And as I walked + along my eyes were dazzling with the glare I had left; I still seemed to + hear the sound of my speech, and the applause and laughter. + </p> + <p> + And when I looked up at the Stars, the great Stars that bore me company, + streaming over the dark houses as I moved, I felt that I was the Lord of + Life; the mystery and disquieting meaninglessness of existence—the + existence of other people, and of my own, were solved for me now. As for + the Earth, hurrying beneath my feet, how bright was its journey; how + shining the goal toward which it went swinging—you might really say + leaping—through the sky. + </p> + <p> + "I must tell the Human Race of this!" I heard my voice; saw my prophetic + gestures, as I expounded the ultimate meaning of existence to the white, + rapt faces of Humanity. Only to find the words—that troubled me; + were there then no words to describe this Vision—divine—intoxicating? + </p> + <p> + And then the Word struck me; the Word people would use. I stopped in the + street; my Soul was silenced like a bell that snarls at a jarring touch. I + stood there awhile and meditated on language, its perfidious meanness, the + inadequacy, the ignominy of our vocabulary, and how Moralists have spoiled + our words by distilling into them, as into little vials of poison, all + their hatred of human joy. Away with that police-force of brutal words + which bursts in on our best moments and arrests our finest feelings! This + music within me, large, like the song of the stars—like a Glory of + Angels singing—"No one has any right to say I am drunk!" I shouted. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0065" id="link2H_4_0065"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Self-Analysis</i> + </h2> + <p> + "Yes, aren't they odd, the thoughts that float through one's mind for no + reason? But why not be frank—I suppose the best of us are shocked at + times by the things we find ourselves thinking. Don't you agree," I went + on, not noticing (until it was too late) that all other conversation had + ceased, and the whole dinner-party was listening, "don't you agree that + the oddest of all are the improper thoughts that come into one's head—the + unspeakable words I mean, and Obscenities?" When I remember that remark, I + hasten to enlarge my mind with ampler considerations. I think of Space, + and the unimportance in its unmeasured vastness, of our toy solar system; + I lose myself in speculations on the lapse of Time, reflecting how at the + best our human life on this minute and perishing planet is as brief as a + dream. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0066" id="link2H_4_0066"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>The Voice of the World</i> + </h2> + <p> + "And what are you doing now?" The question of these school contemporaries + of mine, and their greeting the other day in Piccadilly (I remember how + shabby I felt as I stood talking to them)—for a day or two that + question haunted me. And behind their well-bred voices I seemed to hear + the voice of Schoolmasters and Tutors, of the Professional Classes, and + indeed of all the world. What, as a plain matter of fact, was I doing, how + did I spend my days? The life-days which I knew were numbered, and which + were described in sermons and on tombstones as so irrevocable, so + melancholy-brief. + </p> + <p> + I decided to change my life. I too would be somebody in my time and age; + my contemporaries should treat me as an important person. I began thinking + of my endeavours, my studies by the midnight lamp, my risings at dawn for + stolen hours of self-improvement. + </p> + <p> + But alas, the day, the little day, was enough just then. It somehow seemed + enough, just to be alive in the Spring, with the young green of the trees, + the smell of smoke in the sunshine; I loved the old shops and books, the + uproar darkening and brightening in the shabby daylight. Just a run of + good-looking faces—and I was always looking for faces—would + keep me amused. And London was but a dim-lit stage on which I could play + in fancy any part I liked. I woke up in the morning like Byron to find + myself famous; I was drawn like Chatham to St. Paul's, amid the cheers of + the Nation, and sternly exclaimed with Cromwell, "Take away that bauble," + as I sauntered past the Houses of Parliament. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0067" id="link2H_4_0067"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>And Anyhow</i> + </h2> + <p> + And anyhow, soon, so soon (in only seven million years or thereabouts the + Encyclopaedia said) this Earth would grow cold, all human activities end, + and the last wretched mortals freeze to death in the dim rays of the dying + Sun. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0068" id="link2H_4_0068"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Drawbacks</i> + </h2> + <p> + I should be all right.... If it weren't for these sudden visitations of + Happiness, these downpourings of Heaven's blue, little invasions of + Paradise, or waftings to the Happy Islands, or whatever you may call these + disconcerting Moments, I should be like everybody else, and as blameless a + rate-payer as any in our Row. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0069" id="link2H_4_0069"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Talk</i> + </h2> + <p> + Once in a while, when doors are closed and curtains drawn on a group of + free spirits, the miracle happens, and Good Talk begins. 'Tis a sudden + illumination—the glow, it may be of sanctified candles, or, more + likely, the blaze around a cauldron of gossip. + </p> + <p> + Is there an ecstasy or any intoxication like it? Oh? to talk, to talk + people into monsters, to talk one's self out of one's clothes, to talk God + from His heaven, and turn everything in the world into a bright tissue of + phrases! + </p> + <p> + These Pentecosts and outpourings of the spirit can only occur very rarely, + or the Universe itself would be soon talked out of existence. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0070" id="link2H_4_0070"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>The Church of England</i> + </h2> + <p> + I have my Anglican moments; and as I sat there that Sunday afternoon, in + the Palladian interior of the London Church, and listened to the + unexpressive voices chanting the correct service, I felt a comfortable + assurance that we were in no danger of being betrayed into any unseemly + manifestations of religious fervour. We had not gathered together at that + performance to abase ourselves with furious hosannas before any dark + Creator of an untamed Universe, no Deity of freaks and miracles and + sinister hocus-pocus; but to pay our duty to a highly respected Anglican + First Cause—undemonstrative, gentlemanly and conscientious—whom, + without loss of self-respect, we could sincerely and decorously praise. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0071" id="link2H_4_0071"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Misgiving</i> + </h2> + <p> + We were talking of people, and a name familiar to us all was mentioned. We + paused and looked at each other; then soon, by means of anecdotes and + clever touches, that personality was reconstructed, and seemed to appear + before us, large, pink, and life-like, and gave a comic sketch of itself + with appropriate poses. + </p> + <p> + "Of course," I said to myself, "this sort of thing never happens to me." + For the notion was quite unthinkable, the notion I mean of my own dear + image, called up like this without my knowledge, to turn my discreet way + of life into a cake-walk. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0072" id="link2H_4_0072"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Sanctuaries</i> + </h2> + <p> + She said, "How small the world is after all!" + </p> + <p> + I thought of China, of a holy mountain in the West of China, full of + legends and sacred trees and demon-haunted caves. It is always enveloped + in mountain mists; and in that white thick air I heard the faint sound of + bells, and the muffled footsteps of innumerable pilgrims, and the + reiterated mantra, <i>Nam-Mo, O-mi-to-Fo</i>, which they murmur as they + climb its slopes. High up among its temples and monasteries marched + processions of monks, with intoned services, and many prostrations, and + lighted candles that glimmer through the fog. There in their solemn + shrines stood the statues of the Arahats, and there, seated on his white + elephant, loomed immense and dim, the image of Amitabha, the Lord of the + Western Heavens. + </p> + <p> + She said "Life is so complicated!" Climbing inaccessible cliffs of rock + and ice, I shut myself within a Tibetan monastery beyond the Himalayan + ramparts. I join with choirs of monks, intoning their deep sonorous dirges + and unintelligible prayers; I beat drums, I clash cymbals, and blow at + dawn from the Lamasery roofs conches, and loud discordant trumpets. And + wandering through those vast and shadowy halls, as I tend the butter-lamps + of the golden Buddhas, and watch the storms that blow across the barren + mountains, I taste an imaginary bliss, and then pass on to other scenes + and incarnations along the endless road that leads me to Nirvana. + </p> + <p> + "But I do wish you would tell me what you really think?" + </p> + <p> + I fled to Africa, into the depths of the dark Ashanti forest. There, in + its gloomiest recesses, where the soil is stained with the blood of the + negroes He has eaten, dwells that monstrous Deity of human shape and red + colour, the great Fetish God, Sasabonsum. I like Sasabonsum: other Gods + are sometimes moved to pity and forgiveness, but to Him such weakness is + unknown. He is utterly and absolutely implacable; no gifts or prayers, no + holocausts of human victims can appease, or ever, for one moment, + propitiate Him. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0073" id="link2H_4_0073"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Symptoms</i> + </h2> + <p> + "But there are certain people I simply cannot stand. A dreariness and + sense of death come over me when I meet them—I really find it + difficult to breathe when they are in the room, as if they had pumped all + the air out of it. Wouldn't it be dreadful to produce that effect on + people! But they never seem to be aware of it. I remember once meeting a + famous Bore; I really must tell you about it, it shows the unbelievable + obtuseness of such people." + </p> + <p> + I told this and another story or two with great gusto, and talked on of my + experiences and sensations, till suddenly I noticed, in the appearance of + my charming neighbour, something—a slightly glazed look in her eyes, + a just perceptible irregularity in her breathing—which turned that + occasion for me into a kind of Nightmare. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0074" id="link2H_4_0074"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Shadowed</i> + </h2> + <p> + I sometimes feel a little uneasy about that imagined self of mine—the + Me of my daydreams—who leads a melodramatic life of his own, quite + unrelated to my real existence. So one day I shadowed him down the street. + He loitered along for a while, and then stood at a shop-window and dressed + himself out in a gaudy tie and yellow waistcoat. Then he bought a great + sponge and two stuffed birds and took them to lodgings, where he led for a + while a shady existence. Next he moved to a big house in Mayfair, and gave + grand dinner-parties, with splendid service and costly wines. His amorous + adventures in this region I pass over. He soon sold his house and horses, + gave up his motors, dismissed his retinue of servants, and went—saving + two young ladies from being run over on the way—to live a life of + heroic self-sacrifice among the poor. + </p> + <p> + I was beginning to feel encouraged about him, when in passing a + fishmonger's, he pointed at a great salmon and said, "I caught that fish." + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0075" id="link2H_4_0075"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>The Incredible</i> + </h2> + <p> + "Yes, but they were rather afraid of you." + </p> + <p> + "Afraid of <i>me</i>?" + </p> + <p> + "Yes, so one of them told me afterwards." + </p> + <p> + I was fairly jiggered. If my personality can inspire fear or respect the + world must be a simpler place than I had thought it. Afraid of a shadow, a + poor make-believe like me? Are children more absurdly terrified by a + candle in a hollow turnip? Was Bedlam at full moon ever scared by anything + half so silly? + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0076" id="link2H_4_0076"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Terror</i> + </h2> + <p> + A pause suddenly fell on our conversation—one of those uncomfortable + lapses when we sit with fixed smiles, searching our minds for some remark + with which to fill up the unseasonable silence. It was only a moment—"But + suppose," I said to myself with horrible curiosity, "suppose none of us + had found a word to say, and we had gone on sitting in silence?" + </p> + <p> + It is the dread of Something happening, Something unknown and awful, that + makes us do anything to keep the flicker of talk from dying out. So + travellers at night in an unknown forest keep their fires ablaze, in fear + of Wild Beasts lurking ready in the darkness to leap upon them. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0077" id="link2H_4_0077"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Pathos</i> + </h2> + <p> + When winter twilight falls on my street with the rain, a sense of the + horrible sadness of life descends upon me. I think of drunken old women + who drown themselves because nobody loves them; I think of Napoleon at St. + Helena, and of Byron growing morose and fat in the enervating climate of + Italy. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0078" id="link2H_4_0078"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Inconstancy</i> + </h2> + <p> + The rose that one wears and throws away, the friend one forgets, the music + that passes—out of the well-known transitoriness of mortal things I + have made myself a maxim or precept to the effect that it is foolish to + look for one face, or to listen long for one voice, in a world that is + after all, as I know, full of enchanting voices. + </p> + <p> + But all the same, I can never quite forget the enthusiasm with which, as a + boy, I read the praises of Constancy and True Love, and the unchanged + Northern Star. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0079" id="link2H_4_0079"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>The Poplar</i> + </h2> + <p> + There is a great tree in Sussex, whose cloud of thin foliage floats high + in the summer air. The thrush sings in it, and blackbirds, who fill the + late, decorative sunshine with a shimmer of golden sound. There the + nightingale finds her green cloister; and on those branches sometimes, + like a great fruit, hangs the lemon-coloured Moon. In the glare of August, + when all the world is faint with heat, there is always a breeze in those + cool recesses, always a noise, like the noise of water, among its lightly + hung leaves. + </p> + <p> + But the owner of this Tree lives in London, reading books. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0080" id="link2H_4_0080"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>On the Doorstep</i> + </h2> + <p> + I rang the bell as of old; as of old I gazed at the great shining Door and + waited. But, alas! that flutter and beat of the wild heart, that delicious + doorstep Terror—it was gone; and with it dear, fantastic, + panic-stricken Youth had rung the bell, flitted round the corner and + vanished for ever. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0081" id="link2H_4_0081"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Old Clothes</i> + </h2> + <p> + Shabby old waistcoat, what made the heart beat that you used to cover? + Funny-shaped hat, where are the thoughts that once nested beneath you? Old + shoes, hurrying along what dim paths of the Past did I wear out your + sole-leather? + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0082" id="link2H_4_0082"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Youth</i> + </h2> + <p> + Oh dear, this living and eating and growing old; these doubts and aches in + the back, and want of interest in the Moon and Roses... + </p> + <p> + Am I the person who used to wake in the middle of the night and laugh with + the joy of living? Who worried about the existence of God, and danced with + young ladies till long after daybreak? Who sang "Auld Lang Syne" and + howled with sentiment, and more than once gazed at the summer stars + through a blur of great, romantic tears? + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0083" id="link2H_4_0083"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Consolation</i> + </h2> + <p> + The other day, depressed on the Underground, I tried to cheer myself by + thinking over the joys of our human lot. But there wasn't one of them for + which I seemed to care a hang—not Wine, nor Friendship, nor Eating, + nor Making Love, nor the Consciousness of Virtue. Was it worth while then + going up in a lift into a world that had nothing less trite to offer? + </p> + <p> + Then I thought of reading—the nice and subtle happiness of reading. + This was enough, this joy not dulled by Age, this polite and unpunished + vice, this selfish, serene, life-long intoxication. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0084" id="link2H_4_0084"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Sir Eustace Carr</i> + </h2> + <p> + When I read the news about Sir Eustace Carr in the morning paper, I was + startled, like everyone else who knew, if only by name this young man, + whose wealth and good looks, whose adventurous travels and whose brilliant + and happy marriage, had made of him an almost romantic figure. + </p> + <p> + Every now and then one hears of some strange happening of this kind. But + they are acts so anomalous, in such startling contradiction to all our + usual ways and accepted notions of life and its value, that most of us are + willing enough to accept the familiar explanation of insanity, or any + other commonplace cause which may be alleged—financial trouble, or + some passionate entanglement, and the fear of scandal and exposure. And + then the Suicide is forgotten as soon as possible, and his memory shuffled + out of the way as something unpleasant to think of. But with a curiosity + that is perhaps a little morbid, I sometimes let my thoughts dwell on + these cases, wondering whether the dead man may not have carried to the + grave with him the secret of some strange perplexity, some passion or + craving or irresistible impulse, of which perhaps his intimates, and + certainly the coroner's jury, can have had no inkling. + </p> + <p> + I had never met or spoken to Sir Eustace Carr—the worlds we lived in + were very different—but I had read of his explorations in the East, + and of the curious tombs he had discovered—somewhere, was it not?—in + the Nile Valley. Then too it happened (and this was the main cause of my + interest) that at one time I had seen him more than once, under + circumstances that were rather unusual. And now I began to think of this + incident. In away it was nothing, and yet the impression haunted me that + it was somehow connected with this final act, for which no explanation, + beyond that of sudden mental derangement, had been offered. This + explanation did not seem to me wholly adequate, although it had been + accepted, I believe, both by his friends and the general public—and + with the more apparent reason on account of a strain of eccentricity, + amounting in some cases almost to insanity, which could be traced, it was + said, in his mother's family. + </p> + <p> + I found it not difficult to revive with a certain vividness the memory of + those cold and rainy November weeks that I had happened to spend alone, + some years ago, in Venice, and of the churches which I had so frequently + haunted. Especially I remembered the great dreary church in the piazza + near my lodgings, into which I would often go on my way to my rooms in the + twilight. It was the season when all the Venice churches are draped in + black, and services for the dead are held in them at dawn and twilight; + and when I entered this Baroque interior, with its twisted columns and + volutes and high-piled, hideous tombs, adorned with skeletons and + allegorical figures and angels blowing trumpets—all so agitated, and + yet all so dead and empty and frigid—I would find the fantastic + darkness filled with glimmering candles, and kneeling figures, and the + discordant noise of chanting. There I would sit, while outside night fell + with the rain on Venice; the palaces and green canals faded into darkness, + and the great bells, swinging against the low sky, sent the melancholy + sound of their voices far over the lagoons. + </p> + <p> + It was here, in this church, that I used to see Sir Eustace Carr; would + generally find him in the same corner when I entered, and would sometimes + watch his face, until the ceremonious extinguishing of the candles, one by + one, left us in shadowy night. It was a handsome and thoughtful face, and + I remember more than once wondering what had brought him to Venice in that + unseasonable month, and why he came so regularly to this monotonous + service. It was as if some spell had drawn him; and now, with my curiosity + newly wakened, I asked myself what had been that spell? I also must have + been affected by it, for I had been there also in his uncommunicating + company. Here, I felt, was perhaps the answer to my question, the secret + of the enigma that puzzled me; and as I went over my memories of that + time, and revived its sombre and almost sinister fascination, I seemed to + see an answer looming before my imagination. But it was an answer, an + hypothesis or supposition, so fantastic, that my common sense could hardly + accept it. + </p> + <p> + For I now saw that the spell which had been on us both at that time in + Venice had been nothing but the spell and tremendous incantation of the + Thought of Death. The dreary city with its decaying palaces and great + tomb-encumbered churches had really seemed, in those dark and desolate + weeks, to be the home and metropolis of the great King of Terrors; and the + services at dawn and twilight, with their prayers for the Dead, and + funereal candles, had been the chanted ritual of his worship. Now suppose + (such was the notion that held my imagination) suppose this spell, which I + had felt but for a time and dimly, should become to someone a real + obsession, casting its shadow more and more completely over a life + otherwise prosperous and happy, might not this be the clue to a history + like that of Sir Eustace Carr's—not only his interest in the buried + East, his presence at that time in Venice, but also his unexplained and + mysterious end? + </p> + <p> + Musing on this half-believed notion, I thought of the great personages and + great nations we read of in ancient history, who have seemed to live with + a kind of morbid pleasure in the shadow of this great Thought; who have + surrounded themselves with mementoes of Death, and hideous symbols of its + power, and who, like the Egyptians, have found their main interest, not in + the present, but in imaginary explorations of the unknown future; not on + the sunlit surface of this earth, but in the vaults and dwelling-places of + the Dead beneath it. + </p> + <p> + Since this preoccupation, this curiosity, this nostalgia, has exercised so + enormous a fascination in the past, I found it not impossible to imagine + some modern favourite of fortune falling a victim to this malady of the + soul; until at last, growing weary of other satisfactions, he might be + drawn to open for himself the dark portal and join the inhabitants of that + dim region, "Kings and Counsellors of the earth, Princes that had gold, + who filled their houses with silver." This, as I say, was the notion that + haunted me, the link my imagination forged between Sir Eustace Carr's + presence in that dark Venetian church, and his self-caused death some + years later. But whether it is really a clue to that unexplained mystery, + or whether it is nothing more than a somewhat sinister fancy, of course, I + cannot say. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0085" id="link2H_4_0085"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>The Lord Mayor</i> + </h2> + <p> + An arctic wind was blowing; it cut through me as I stood there. The + boot-black was finishing his work and complaints. + </p> + <p> + "But I should be 'appy, sir, if only I could make four bob a day," he + said. + </p> + <p> + I looked down at him; it seemed absurd, the belief of this crippled, + half-frozen creature, that four-shillings would make him happy. Happiness! + the fabled treasure of some far-away heaven I thought it that afternoon; + not to be bought with gold, not of this earth! + </p> + <p> + I said something to this effect. But four shillings a day was enough for + the boot-black. + </p> + <p> + "Why," he said, "I should be as 'appy as the Lord Mayor!" + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0086" id="link2H_4_0086"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>The Burden</i> + </h2> + <p> + I know too much; I have stuffed too many of the facts of History and + Science into my intellectuals. My eyes have grown dim over books; + believing in geological periods, cave-dwellers, Chinese Dynasties, and the + fixed stars has prematurely aged me. + </p> + <p> + Why am I to blame for all that is wrong in the world? I didn't invent Sin + and Hate and Slaughter. Who made it my duty anyhow to administer the + Universe, and keep the planets to their Copernican courses? My shoulders + are bent beneath the weight of the firmament; I grow weary of propping up, + like Atlas, this vast and erroneous Cosmos. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0087" id="link2H_4_0087"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + <i>Under An Umbrella</i> + </h2> + <p> + From under the roof of my umbrella I saw the washed pavement lapsing + beneath my feet, the news-posters lying smeared with dirt at the + crossings, the tracks of the busses in the liquid mud. On I went through + this dreary world of wetness. And through how many rains and years shall I + still hurry down wet streets—middle-aged, and then, perhaps, very + old? And on what errands? + </p> + <p> + Asking myself this cheerless question I fade from your vision, Reader, + into the distance, sloping my umbrella against the wind. + </p> + <h3> + THE END + </h3> + <div style="height: 6em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Trivia, by Logan Pearsall Smith + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TRIVIA *** + +***** This file should be named 8544-h.htm or 8544-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/8/5/4/8544/ + + +Text file produced by Joris Van Dael, Charles Aldarondo, Charles +Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team + +HTML file produced by David Widger + + +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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