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garden | Where is Sandra? | Mary moved to the bedroom.[Illustration: OLD TOWN GATE AT HERMANSTADT (ON THE HELTAU SIDE).]Once riding past here in autumn, I was puzzled to remark several fields
near Heltau bearing a white appearance almost like that of snow, yet
scarcely white enough for that; on coming nearer, this whiteness
resolved itself into wool, vast quantities of which, covering several
acres of ground, had been put out there to dry after the triple washing
necessary to render it fit for weaving purposes.The church at Heltau rejoices in the distinction of four turrets
affixed to the belfry-tower, which turrets were at one time the cause
of much dissension between Heltau and Hermanstadt.It was not allowed
for any village church to indulge in such luxuries—four turrets being
a mark of civic authority only accorded to towns; but in 1590, when the
church at Heltau was burned down, the villagers built it up again as it
now stands—a piece of presumption which Hermanstadt at first refused
to sanction.The matter was finally compromised by the Heltauers
consenting to sign a document, wherein they declared the four turrets
to have been put there merely in guise of ornamentation, giving them no
additional privileges whatsoever, and that they pledged themselves to
remain as before submissive to the authority of Hermanstadt.Some people, however, allege Heltau, or, as it used to be called, “The
Helt,” to be of more ancient origin than Hermanstadt—concluding from
the fact that formerly the shoemakers, hatters, and other tradesmen
here resided, but that during the pest all the inhabitants dying out
to the number of seven, the land around was suffered to fall into
neglect.Then the Emperor sent other Germans to repeople the town, and
the burghers of Hermanstadt came and bought up the privileges of the
Heltauers.The excellence of the Heltau pickled sauerkraut is celebrated in a
Saxon rhyme, which runs somewhat as follows:
“Draaser wheaten bread,
Heltau’s cabbage red,
Streitford’s bacon fine,
Bolkatsch pearly wine,
Schässburg’s maidens fair,
Goodly things and rare.”
But more celebrated still is Heltau because of the unusually high
stature of its natives, which an ill-natured story has tried to
account for by the fact of a detachment of grenadiers having been
quartered here for several years towards the end of last century.To the west of Heltau, nestling up close to the hills, lies the smaller
but far more picturesque village of Michelsberg, one of the few Saxon
villages which have as yet resisted all attempts from Roumanians or
gypsies to graft themselves on to their community.Michelsberg is
specially remarkable because of the ruined church which, surrounded by
fortified walls, is situated on a steep conical mound rising some two
hundred feet above the village.The church itself, though not much to
look at, boasts of a Romanesque portal of singular beauty, which many
people come hither to see.The original fortress which stood on this
spot is said to have been built by a noble knight, Michel of Nuremberg,
who came into the country at the same time that came Herman, who
founded Hermanstadt.Michel brought with him twenty-six squires, and
with them raised the fortress; but soon after its completion he and his
followers got dispersed over the land, and were heard of no more.The
fortress then became the property of the villagers, who later erected a
church on its site.The Michelsbergers make baskets and straw hats, and lately wood-carving
has begun to be developed as a native industry.They have also the
reputation—I know not with what foundation—of being bird-stealers;
and I believe nothing will put a Michelsberger into such a rage as to
imitate the bird-call used to decoy blackbirds and nightingales to
their ruin.This he takes to be an insulting allusion to his supposed
profession.In the hot summer months many of the Hermanstadt burghers come out to
Michelsberg for change of air and coolness, and we ourselves spent
some weeks right pleasantly in one of the peasant houses which,
consisting of two rooms and a kitchen, are let to visitors for the
season.But it was strange to learn that this remote mountain village
is the self-chosen exile of a modern recluse—a well-born Hanoverian
gentleman, Baron K——, who for the last half-dozen years has lived
here summer and winter.Neither very old nor yet very young, he lives a
solitary life, avoiding acquaintances; and though I lived here fully a
month, I only succeeded in catching a distant glimpse of him.Midsummer idleness being usually productive of all sorts of idle
thoughts and fancies, we could not refrain from speculating on the
reasons which were powerful enough thus to cause an educated man to
bury himself alive so many hundred miles away from his own country in
an obscure mountain village; and unknown to himself, the mysterious
baron became the hero of a whole series of fantastic air-castles,
in which he alternately figured as a species of Napoleon, Diogenes,
Eugene Aram, or Abelard.Whichever he was, however—and it certainly
is no business of mine—I can well imagine the idyllic surroundings of
Michelsberg to be peculiarly fit to soothe a ruffled or wounded spirit.Wrecked ambition or disappointed love must lose much of its bitterness
in this secluded nook, so far removed from the echoes of a turbulent
world.[Illustration: MICHELSBERG.]Another village deserving a word of notice is Hammersdorf, lying north
of Hermanstadt—a pleasant walk through the fields of little more
than half an hour.The village, built up against gently undulating
hills covered with vineyards, is mentioned in the year 1309 as Villa
Humperti, and is believed to stand on the site of an old Roman
settlement.Scarcely a year passes without Roman coins or other
antiquities being found in the soil.From the top of the Grigori-Berg, which rises some one thousand eight
hundred feet directly behind the village, a very extensive view may be
enjoyed of the plains about Hermanstadt, and the imposing chain of the
Fogarascher mountains straight opposite.Hammersdorf is considered to be a peculiarly aristocratic village, and
its inhabitants, who pride themselves on being the richest peasants in
those parts, and on their womankind possessing the finest clothes and
the most valuable ornaments, are called arrogant and stuck-up by other
communities.* * * * *
It is usual for the name of the house-owner and the date of building to
be painted outside each house; but there are differences to be remarked
in each place—slight variations in building and decoration, as well
as in manner, dress, and speech of the natives, despite the general
resemblance all bear to each other.Some houses have got pretty designs of conventional flowers painted in
black or in contrasting color on their gable-ends, and in many villages
it is usual to have some motto or sentence inscribed on each house.These are frequently of a religious character, often a text from the
Bible or some stereotyped moral sentiment.Sandra went back to the garden.Occasionally, however, we
come across inscriptions of greater originality, which seem to be a
reflection of the particular individual whose house they adorn, as, for
instance, the following:
“I do not care to brag or boast,
I speak the truth to all,
And whosoever does not wish
Myself his friend to call,
Why, then, he’s free to paint himself
A better on the wall.”
Or else this sentence, inscribed on a straw-thatched cottage:
“Till money I get from my father-in-law,
My roof it, alas!must be covered with straw.”
While the following one instantaneously suggests the portrait of some
stolid-faced, sleepy individual whose ambition has never soared beyond
the confines of his turnip-field, or the roof of his pigsty:
“Too much thinking weakens ever—
Think not, then, in verse nor prose,
For return the past will never,
And the future no man knows.”
Many of the favorite maxims refer to the end of man, and give a
somewhat gloomy coloring to a street when several of this sort are
found in succession:
“Man is like a fragile flower,
Only blooming for an hour;
Fresh to-day and rosy-red,
But to-morrow cold and dead.”
Or else—
“Within this house a guest to-day,
So long the Lord doth let me live;
But when He bids, I must away—
Against His will I cannot strive.”
Here another—
“If I from my door go out,
Death for me doth wait without;
And if in my house I stay,
He will come for me some day.”
The mistrustful character of the Saxon finds vent in many inscriptions,
of which I give a few specimens:
“Trust yourself to only one—
’Tis not wise to trust to none;
Better, though, to have no friend
Than on many to depend.”
“If you have a secret got,
To a woman tell it not;
For my part, I would as lieve
Keep the water in a sieve.”
“When I have both gold and wine,
Many men are brothers mine;
When the money it is done,
And the wine has ceased to run,
Then the brothers, too, are gone.”
“Hardly do a man I see
But who hates and envies me;
Inside them their heart doth burn
For to do an evil turn,
Grudge me sore my daily bread;
More than one doth wish me dead.”
“Those who build on the highway,
Must not heed what gossips say.”
The four last I here give are among the best I have come across, the
first of these having a slightly Shakespearean flavor about it:
“Tell me for what gold is fit?Who has got none, longs for it;
Who has got it, fears for thieves;
Who has lost it, ever grieves.”
“We cannot always dance and sing,
Nor can each day be fair,
Nor could we live if every day
Were dark with grief and care;
But fair and dark days, turn about,
This we right well can bear.”
“Say, who is to pay now the tax to the King?For priests and officials will do no such thing;
The nobleman haughty will pay naught, I vouch,
And poor is the beggar, and empty his pouch;
The peasant alone he toileth to give
The means to enable those others to live.”
“How to content every man,
Is a trick which no one can;
If to do so you can claim,
Rub this out and write your name.”
Among the many house inscriptions I have seen in Transylvania, I have
never come across any referring to love or conjugal happiness.The
well-known lines of Schiller—
“Raum ist in der kleinsten Hütte
Für ein glücklich liebend Paar,”[6]
of which one gets such a surfeit in Germany, are here conspicuous by
their absence.This will not surprise any one acquainted with the
domestic life of these people.Any such sentiment would most likely
have lost its signification long before the wind and the rain had
effaced it, for it would not at all suit the Saxon peasant to change
his house motto as often as he does his wife.FOOTNOTES:
[6]
“There is space in the smallest hut
To contain a happy, loving couple.”
CHAPTER VIII.SAXON INTERIORS—CHARACTER.The old-china mania, which I hear is beginning to die out in England,
has only lately become epidemic in Austria; and as I, like many others,
have been slightly touched by this malady, the quaintly decorated
pottery wine-jugs still to be found in many Saxon peasant houses
offered a new and interesting field of research.These jugs are by no means so plentiful nor so cheap as they were a few
years ago, for cunning _bric-à-brac_ Jews have found out this hitherto
unknown store of antiquities, and pilger hither from the capital to
buy up wholesale whatever they find.Yet by a little patience and
perseverance any one living in the country may yet find enough old
curiosities to satisfy a reasonable mania; and while seeking for these
relics I have come across many another remnant of antiquity quite as
interesting but of less tangible nature.[Illustration: SAXON PEASANT AT HOME.]Inside a Saxon peasant’s house everything is of exemplary neatness and
speaks of welfare.The boards are clean scoured, the window-panes shine
like crystal.There is no point on which a Saxon _hausfrau_ (housewife)
is so sensitive as that of order and neatness, and she is visibly put
out if surprised by a visit on washing or baking day, when things are
not looking quite so trim as usual.If we happen to come on a week-day we generally find the best room,
or _prunkzimmer_, locked up, with darkened shutters; and only on our
request to be shown the embroidered pillow-covers and the best jugs
reserved for grand occasions will the hostess half ungraciously proceed
to unlock the door and throw open the shutter.This prunkzimmer takes the place of the state parlor in our Scotch
farm-houses; but those latter, with their funereal horse-hair furniture
and cheerless polished table, would contrast unfavorably beside these
quaint, old-fashioned German apartments.Here the furniture, consisting
of benches, bunkers, bedsteads, chest of drawers, and chairs, are
painted in lively colors, often festoons of roses and tulips on a
ground of dark blue or green; the patterns, frequently bold and
striking, if of a somewhat barbaric style of art, betray the Oriental
influence of Roumanian country artists, of whom they are doubtless
borrowed.A similarly painted wooden framework runs round the top
of the room, above the doors and windows, with pegs, from which are
suspended the jugs I am in search of, and a bar, behind which rows of
plates are secured.On the large unoccupied bedsteads are piled up, sometimes as high
as the ceiling, stores of huge, downy pillows, their covers richly
embroidered in quaint patterns executed in black, scarlet, or blue
and yellow worsted.They are mostly worked in the usual tapestry
cross-stitch, and often represent flowers, birds, or animals in the
old German style—the name of the embroideress and the date of the
work being usually introduced.Many of the pieces I saw were very old,
and dates of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries are constantly
turning up; but alongside are others of recent date, for the custom
of thus employing the long winter evenings is still kept up among the
village girls.I |
hallway | Where is Mary? | Nothing of the
sort, I was told; they just copy from one another and from old pieces
of work.Thus it comes about that many of them to-day go on reproducing
some old bird or flower, first introduced by an ancestress of the
worker many hundred years ago.This system of copying is clearly to be traced in the different
villages.As each village forms a separate body or community, and
intercourse and intermarriage hardly ever take place, these patterns
become localized, and one design is apt to run in one particular
place to the exclusion of others.Thus I remarked one village where
flourishes a peculiar breed of square-built peacocks, alternated with
preposterous stags in red and blue worsted, but these fabulous animals
are rarely wont to stray beyond the confines of their own parish; while
in another community there is a strongly marked epidemic of embroidered
double-eagles, perhaps explainable by the fact that part of the
population is of Austrian extraction.[Illustration: SAXON EMBROIDERY.]The Saxon hausfrau will generally receive us in a surly, mistrustful
manner, and the Saxon peasant will not dream of rising from his seat
when he sees a lady enter the room.If we happen to be tired we had
better sit down unbidden, for neither he nor she is likely to offer us
a chair.Our question as to whether they have any jugs or plates is usually met
with a sort of ungracious affirmative.“Will they sell them?” “Not on
any account whatsoever!these jugs belonged to some dearly beloved
great-grandfather or grandmother, and must be preserved in their
memory.Not for unheard-of sums of gold could they bear to separate
themselves from such a relic,” etc.These assertions must, however, be taken for what they are worth, and
whoever has tried the experiment will have found by experience that it
is merely a question of money, and that sometimes an extra bid of ten
or twenty kreuzers (twopence or fourpence) will turn the scale, and
induce these pious grandchildren to consign to oblivion the memory of
the beloved ancestor.These jugs, which are destined to hold wine (one for each guest) on
the occasion of their baptismal, wedding, or funeral banquets, are
from nine to eleven inches high, and have a metal lid attached to the
handle.Every variety of coloring and pattern is to be found among
them; sometimes it is an uncouth design of dancing or drunken peasants,
sometimes a pair of stags, or a dog in pursuit of a hare, or else a
basket filled with fruit, or raised medallions with sprigs of flowers
in the centre.My inquiries were usually met by the suspicious counter-questions, “Why
do you want to buy our jugs?What are you going to do with them?” and
the answer I gave, that I was fond of such old things, and that they
would be hung up in my dining-room, was often received with evident
disbelief.These people are not easily induced to talk about themselves, and
have little sense of humor or power of repartee.They have an
instinctive distrust of whoever tries to draw them out, scenting in
each superfluous question a member of a species they abhor—namely, “a
chiel among them taking notes;” or, as the Saxon puts it, “one of those
incomprehensible towns-folk, ever fretting and ferreting after our ways
and customs, and who have no sensible reason for doing so either.”
[Illustration: SAXON EMBROIDERY AND POTTERY.53 are from the collection of Saxon
Antiquities in possession of Herr Emil Sigerus at Hermanstadt.)]I will do
my best, Heaven helping, to be a good husband to you!If
you act wisely you will send me about my business!There are fifty--a
hundred better men who love you; you could scarcely have a worse than
I, but if you will say 'yes,' I will try and be less unworthy of you.All my life I will never forget all that I owe you--never forget that
you saved me from ruin and disgrace.Now, dear, I--"
She put out her hand to him without a word; then as he took it her
passion burst through the bonds in which she thought to bind it, and
she swayed forward and dropped upon his breast."Yorke, Yorke, you know"--came through her parted lips--"you know I
love you--have always loved you!"he said, almost indeed, quite pityingly."Such a
bad, worthless lot as I am!""No, no; the best, the highest to me!And--and if
you were not, it--it would be all the same.Oh, Yorke, be good, be kind
to me, for you are all the world to me!"They sat and talked hand in hand for some time, and once during that
talk he said:
"By the way, Eleanor, how did you hear I was in such a mess--how did
you come to know?"It was a very natural question under the circumstances; but Lady
Eleanor started and turned white, absolutely white with fear."No, no; not one word will I ever say or let you say about this stupid
money business!"Then she took his hand and pressed it
against her cheek."Why, sir, what does it matter?It was only--only
lending it to you for a little time, you see.Lady Denby came in after a discreet cough outside; but Lady Eleanor did
not move or take her hand from Yorke's."Eleanor has made me very happy, Lady Denby," he said, rising, but
still holding Lady Eleanor's hand.No, thank you, I couldn't tell such an obvious fib.What
I'm going to say in the shape of congratulation is that she is much too
good for you.""That is so," he said with a grim smile."Yes," he said, bending down and kissing her--"yes, thanks.But I must
go and change my things.She went with him to the door, as if she begrudged every moment that he
should be out of her sight, and still smiled after he had left her and
had got half-way down the Gardens.Then suddenly he stopped and looked
round him with a ghostly look.And yet it was only the face of Leslie that had flashed across his
mental vision.Mary moved to the bedroom.Only the face of the girl who had jilted him!The announcement of the engagement between Lord Auchester and Lady
Eleanor Dallas had appeared in the society papers a month ago, and the
world of 'the upper ten' had expended its congratulations and began
asking itself when the wedding was to take place, for it was agreed on
all hands that so excellent and altogether desirable a match could not
take place too soon."He has been dreadfully wild, I'm told, my dear," said one gossip
to another, "and is as poor as a church mouse.But there is plenty
of money on her side; indeed, they say that lately she has become
fabulously rich, so that will be all right.Of course she might have
done better; but everybody knows she was ridiculously fond of him--oh!Gave herself away, in fact; and she goes about
looking so happy and victorious that it is really quite indecent!""That is more than can be said of the bridegroom-elect," remarked
gossip number two, "for he looks as grave as a judge and as glum as an
undertaker.The mere prospect of matrimony seems to have taken all the
spirits out of him.Not like the same man, I assure you, my dear."The greenery of the trees had turned to russet
and gold; a mystic stillness brooded softly over the country lanes;
the yellow corn waved sleepily to the soft breeze; the blackberries
darkened the hedge-rows, and on the roads lay, not thickly as yet, but
in twos and threes, the leaves of the oak and the chestnut.An air of
repose and quietude reigned over the land, as if nature, almost tired
of the sun and heat and the multitudinous noises of summer, were taking
a short nap to prepare itself for the rigor and robust energy of winter.In one of the loveliest of our country lanes stood a village school.It was a picturesque little building of white stone and red tiles.The
tiny school-house adjoining it was so overgrown by ivy as to resemble
a green bower.There was a window at the back, and an orchard in which
the golden and ruddy apples were almost as thick as the blackberries
in the lanes.Everything in and about this school was the picture of
neatness.The curtains of white and pink muslin were exquisitely clean
and artistically draped behind the diamond-paned windows.The door-sills were as white as marble; the diminutive knocker on the
school-house door shone like a newly minted sovereign.Not a weed
showed its head in the small garden, which literally glowed with
single and double dahlias, sweet-scented stocks and many-
chrysanthemums.There was a little gate in the closely cut hedge,
which was painted a snowy white--in short, the tiny domain made a
picture which Millais or Marcus Stone or Leslie would have delighted to
transfer to canvas.Sandra went back to the garden.From the open door of the school there issued a hum and buzz which
resembled that which proceeds from the door of a bee-hive, for
afternoon school was still on, and the pupils were still at their
lessons.The village--it was rather more than half a mile from the school--was
that of Newfold, a quiet, sleepy little place, which not even the
restless tourist seems to have discovered; a small cluster of houses,
with an inn, a church, and a couple of shops lying in the hollow
between the two ranges of Loamshire hills.A Londoner would tell
you that Newfold was at least five hundred years behind the times;
but, if it be so, Newfold does not care.There is enough plowing and
wood-cutting in winter, enough sowing and tilling in spring, enough
harvesting in autumn to keep the kettle boiling, and Newfold is quite
content.Some day one of those individuals who discover such places
will happen on it, write an article about it, attract attention to it,
and so ruin it; but he hasn't chanced to come upon it yet, and oh!let
us pray that he may keep off it for a long while; for Newfolds are
getting scarcer every year, and soon, if we do not take care, England
will become one vast, hideous plain of bricks and mortar, and there
will be no place in which we can take refuge from the fogs and smoke of
the great towns.In another quarter of an hour school would 'break up,' and the girls
were standing up singing the evening hymn which brought the day's work
to a close.In the center of the room stood a pleasant, fair-haired
young lady, whose eyes, mild and gentle as they were, seemed to be
looking everywhere.On a small platform stood another young lady with
dark hair and gray eyes.These were the two mistresses of the Newfold
village school, and their names were Leslie Lisle and Lucy Somes.Life is not all clouds and rain, thank God; the sun shines sometimes,
and the sun of good luck had shone upon Leslie and Lucy.It was good
luck that they should pass the much-dreaded examination, that ordeal
to which they had looked forward with such fear and trembling; it was
good luck that there should be two appointments vacant; but oh!it was
the superlative of luck that these appointments should be to the same
school, and that the school should be here in peaceful Newfold!It seemed to Leslie as if misfortune had grown tired of buffeting her,
and had decided to leave her alone for a time.She could scarcely
believe her eyes when Lucy Somes ran into her room at Torrington Square
with the news that they were to be sent to the same school, and in her
beloved county.Of course influence had been used at headquarters by
Lucy's people, but Lucy persisted that luck had more to do with it than
anything else, and that Leslie had brought the good fortune; and it
did not lessen Lucy's happiness that Leslie, having obtained the most
marks at the exam., was given the post of head-mistress, and that she,
Lucy, was to be her subordinate."It is quite right, dear," she said,
brightly and cheerfully."Of course, you ought to be the first; any one
could see that at half a glance.You are ten times quicker and cleverer
than I, and, besides, if we are to be together--and oh!how delightful
it is to think that we are!--I would a thousand times rather you were
the principal!""We will both be head-mistress, Lucy!"Leslie had said, as, with tears
in her eyes, she had put her arms round the good-natured girl, and
kissed her.They had only been four days at the school, but short as the time had
been they had grown fond of it--fond of the work and the children,
and who can tell how fond and proud of the little house that nestled
against the school building!Lucy was like a child in her unrestrained joy and delight, and if
Leslie took their good fortune more quietly, she was not lacking in
gratitude.Daniel went to the bedroom.In this new life she would not only find peace, please God,
but work--work that in time might bring her forgetfulness of the past.And the forgetfulness, for which she prayed nightly, was as much of
happiness as she dared hope for.The lily that has been beaten down by the storm may live and bloom
still, but the chances are that it will never again rear its stately
head as of old.The evening hymn was finished; Leslie struck the bell on the desk
before her, and in her sweet voice said "Good-afternoon, children," and
with an answering "Good-afternoon, teachers," the children trooped out.Lucy went and stood beside Leslie, and watched the happy throng as it
ran laughing and shouting to the meadow."How happy they are, Leslie, and how good, too!I am sure they are the
best children in the world!And many of them are so pretty and rosy;
and they are all healthy--all except two or three.I should hate to
have a school full of sickly, undergrown children, all peevish and
weary and discontented; but all ours are cheerful and willing.""They would find it hard to be otherwise where you are, Lucy," said
Leslie, looking at the happy face with a loving smile.Mary journeyed to the hallway."Oh, I--oh, yes; I'm cheerful enough," said Lucy, laughing and
blushing."I'm just running over with happiness and contentment; but
I'm afraid that they couldn't get on very fast if I were quite alone
with them.Now you--"
"Are they afraid of me?"But they look up
to you, and think more of your good opinion already.Oh, I can see
that, short as the time has been.They were quite right up in London in
making you the head-mistress, dear.It has been
rather hot for the time of year, and the children, good as they are,
make a noise.I'm afraid you will find it rather
trying at first.""I am not tired, and my head doesn't ache in the least," said Leslie,
"and why should I, more than you, find it trying, Lucy?and, dear, I
want you to let me have the English history class.You have got more
than your fair share.Did you think that I should not notice it?I
believe you would take all the work if I would let you, you greedy
girl."Lucy blushed--she blushed on the slightest provocation."I don't want you to work too hard, Leslie," she said."You are not
strong yet, not nearly so strong as I am, and you felt the awful
grinding for that exam.more than I did because you were not used to
it, and had to do it in a shorter time; and so I am going to take care
of you.""Why, I could lift you up and carry you round the room, little girl!"she said, in loving banter; "and it is I who have to take care of you.But we'll take care of each other, Lucy.They went into the little house, and the small maid who was house-maid,
parlor-maid, and cook rolled into one, had |
garden | Where is Sandra? | Lucy looked round with a sigh of ineffable content."Robinson Crusoe with everything ready made for him and all the
luxuries?""Yes, that's what I mean," assented Lucy naively.Mary moved to the bedroom."All through I looked
forward to something like this, but my dreams never reached anything
half so delightful.For one thing, I never dreamed that I should have
you for a companion and friend.I thought that there would be sure to
be a thorn in my bed of roses, and that that thorn would probably take
the shape of a disagreeable head-mistress--some horrid, middle-aged,
disagreeable person who would be always complaining and scolding.Sandra went back to the garden.Mother writes that I must have exaggerated just to please her when
I described the school and told her what you were like; but I didn't
exaggerate a bit.Oh, Leslie"--she stopped with a slice of bread and
butter half-way to her mouth--"do you think we are too happy--that
something will happen to spoil it all?""It is only those who don't deserve to be
happy whose happiness doesn't last.Now you, Lucy--But give me some
more tea, and don't try and croak, because you make the most awful
failure of it."Lucy's face wreathed itself in its wonted smile again."I wonder whether there are two happier girls in all the world than
you and I, Leslie?""What shall we do this evening--go for a
walk?It is such
a pretty, quaint little place, with the tiniest and most delightful
church you ever saw!Isn't it strange that we should be pitchforked
down here into a place we know nothing about and never heard of?Leslie looked up from the copy-book she was examining."We shall have very little to do with the natives, savage or friendly,
Lucy," she said."Of course not," assented Lucy, cheerfully."I suppose the clergyman's
wife will call--Oh, I forgot!He said the first morning he came to read
prayers that he wasn't married.But the squire's lady will drive up in
a carriage and pair, and walk through the school with her eyeglass up.But no one else will come to bother us.You see," she ran on, jumping
up to water the flowers in the window, "school-teachers are supposed to
be neither fish, flesh nor fowl--and not very good red herring."That is good news for school-teachers, at any rate," said Leslie,
smiling."Yes; we don't want anybody, do we, dear?You and I together can be
quite happy without the rest of the world."I don't think I will this evening, Lucy.I will stay and go over these
books.But you shall go on a voyage of discovery, and bring back a full
and particular account of your adventures."But Leslie looked up at her with the
expression Lucy had learned to know so well."Very well, dear," she
said, gently."I will just run into the village and order some things
we want and come straight back; and mind, you are not to do all those
copy-books, or I shall feel hurt and injured."Leslie worked away at her exercise books for some little time; then
she drew a chair up to the window, and, letting her hands lie in her
lap, enjoyed the rest which she had earned by a day's toil, but not
unexpected toil.As she sat there, looking out dreamily at the lane, which the setting
sun was filling with a golden haze, she felt very much like the Hermit
of St.She had refused to go down to the village with Lucy from
choice, and not from any sense of duty toward the exercise books.She
felt that she and the world had, so to speak, done with each other, and
she shrunk from encountering new faces and the necessity of talking
to strangers.If fate would let her live out her life in this modest
cottage she would be contented to confine herself to the little garden
surrounding it, and perhaps the meadows beyond.With her children and her flowers she was convinced that she could
be, if not happy, at any rate not discontented.She had lived her
life, young as she was.Fate could give her no joy to equal that which
Yorke's love--or fancied love--had given; nor could it deal out to her
a more bitter sorrow than the loss of Yorke and her father.So let Lucy
act as a go-between between her and the outer world, and she (Leslie)
would work when she could, and when she could not, would live over
again in her mind and memory that happy past which had been summed up
in a few all too brief days.She had never read a society paper in
her life, and was not likely to have seen one during the last busy
month, so that she knew nothing of the engagement between him and Lady
Eleanor Dallas.And if she had known, if she had chanced to have read
the paragraphs in which the betrothal was announced and commented on,
she would not have identified Lord Auchester with Yorke, "the Duke of
Rothbury," as she thought him.Sometimes, this evening, for instance,
she wondered with a dull, aching pain, which always oppressed her
whenever she thought of him, where he had gone, and whether he still
remembered, whether he regretted the flirtation "he had carried on with
the girl at Portmaris," or, whether he only laughed over it--perhaps
with the dark, handsome woman, the Finetta to whom he had gone back!The sun had set behind the hills, and the twilight had crept over the
scene before Lucy came hurrying up the path."Did you think I was lost, Leslie?"Leslie looked round, and though it was nearly dark in the room, she saw
that Lucy's eyes were particularly bright, and that there was a flush
on her cheeks which did not appear to have been caused by her haste."It sounds very unkind, but I was not thinking of you, dear," she said.Lucy came up to the window, tossing her straw hat and light jacket on
the sofa as she passed.Daniel went to the bedroom."Leslie, you said something about adventures when I was starting--"
"Did I?""Yes, I have had an adventure," she said, her soft, guileless eyes
drooping for a moment, then lifting themselves candidly to Leslie's
again."But let me begin at the beginning, as children say.Leslie, you
must go and see the village.It is the dearest little place in all
the world, and just like one of the pictures one sees at the Academy.You will want to sketch it the moment you see it, I know.Well, I went
to the shop--oh, the funniest shop you ever saw!You go down two steps
into it, and even then it is only just high enough for you to stand
up in.And they sell everything--tapes, treacle, soap, snuff, laces,
biscuits--everything!And the woman that keeps it is the mother of
one of our girls, and she made ever so much of me, and sent her best
respects to you--'the beautiful teacher,' as she said the girls all
called you!""Is it all fiction, or only the last sentence, Lucy?""My dear Leslie, I have heard them call you so myself!"Mary journeyed to the hallway."I
went to the butcher's--the butcher is one of nature's noblemen, and
took my order for four mutton chops as if I were a princess ordering a
whole sheep--and then I went out into the country beyond, and if I were
to tell you what I think of it you would say I was exaggerating--"
"Which you never do, of course," put in Leslie, gravely."Such lovely meadows and tree-covered hills, and there is a delicious
river full of trout--so a man who was working close by said.It is the jolliest
fun in the world, fishing.And when I got to the opening out of the
valley, I saw a tremendous house--a great white place on the brow of a
hill.It took me quite by surprise, for I had no idea that there were
any great people living near us--well, not exactly near, for this must
be four or five miles off.I asked a man who lived there and he said
that it belonged to a lady--Lady--there!I have forgotten the name
after all, and I wanted to remember it to tell you.""She is an awfully great lady, and tremendously rich, my informant
said.Well, then"--she paused a moment, and her color came and went--"I
thought I would rest for a little while, and I sat down on a big stone,
up a little grassy lane, and while I was sitting there quiet as a
mouse, I heard the sound of a horse's hoofs on the short turf and, so
suddenly it made me jump, a huge horse came galloping up.Mary went back to the bathroom.He saw me and
shied--goodness, how he shied!I thought the man on his back must be
thrown, but he sat there like--like a rock!But he swore--I don't think
he saw me at first, Leslie; in fact, I am sure he didn't, for when he
did he raised his hat as if to apologize for the bad words, and then
rode on.""I thought you were going to
say, at the very least, that he stooped down and caught you up and you
would have been carried off into captivity but for a gallant young man
who ran up and seized the horse, etc., etc., etc."remonstrated Lucy, laughing and blushing."He didn't stop a
moment or speak, of course, but rode on straight away.But, Leslie, you
never saw such a handsome man or such a sad-looking one--"
"The Knight of the Woful Countenance," said Leslie."Well, if you had seen him I don't think you would have laughed,
Leslie; he looked so wretched and weary, and--I don't know exactly how
to describe it--so reckless!He seemed as if he didn't care where he
was riding or whether the horse kept straight on or fell.""So that he kept straight on and didn't fall on or run over you, it is
all right," said Leslie."But, Lucy dear, I don't think you must be out
so late and alone again, especially if there are reckless young men
riding about the roads and lanes.""Yes," said Lucy; "but I haven't come to the end of my adventures yet,
Leslie.""No," said Lucy, almost shyly."Of course, I was rather startled by
that horse thundering by--it was so very big and it passed so near,
almost on to me, you know--and I suppose I must have called out.""It was very foolish, I know, and I know you wouldn't have
done so.""No, no," and the blush grew more furious, "of course he did not.I
don't suppose he heard me; but some one else did, for there came up the
moment afterward a gentleman--"
"Not another on horseback, Lucy?Don't be too prodigal of your mounted
heroes.""No, this one was not on horseback; he was walking, and was quite a
different-looking man to the other, though he was nearly, yes, nearly
as good looking.""Two handsome young men in one evening; isn't that rather an unfair
allowance?""I knew you would make fun of it all, Leslie," she said, "and I don't
mind in the least.I like to hear you, and, after all, there was
nothing serious in it.""Leslie, you really don't deserve that I should tell you any more--you
don't, indeed.""Pray, don't punish me so severely," responded Leslie; "my levity only
conceals an overpowering curiosity.Daniel journeyed to the office.What did the second stranger say or
do?""Well, he said--and he couldn't say much less, could he?--'are you
hurt?'"I suppose if I had been listening I should
have heard you here.""And of course I said no," continued Lucy, severely ignoring this
remark, "and that I had only been a little startled by the horse.He
asked me if I knew who it was, and when I said 'no', he looked as if
he were going to tell me, but instead he asked if I knew the way to the
railway station.""Now don't say that you told him and that he raised his hat and went
off," said Leslie, with mock earnestness.Lucy laughed, but said, shyly: "Well, I told him, but he didn't
go--just at once.He asked me one or two other questions--which was
the nearest village, and so on--and, of course, I had to answer that I
was a stranger, and then we both laughed, or rather he smiled, for he
seemed very grave and preoccupied.I think he was a lawyer or something
of that sort.He looked like a business man; and presently he said,
as if accounting for his being there, that he had walked from White
Place--that was the house on the hill-side--and that he was going back
to London, and--and--well, that's all!"asked Leslie, with burlesque
severity.Oh!--I'd got a fern-root in my hand; I meant to put in the
garden below the window--and he noticed it, and said that he wished
they had them in London, and--well, I offered it to him--"
"Lucy!""Really--really and honestly, Leslie, I did it without thinking!and
he took it at once without any fuss or nonsense.You see, he was a
gentleman," she added, with delicious simplicity."It is all too evident that you are not to be trusted out alone, my
dear," she said.--for something like tears had began to
glitter in Lucy's gentle eyes--"why, you silly girl, I am only in fun!Why should you not direct a stranger to the railway station, and why
shouldn't you give him the fern he coveted, poor, smoke-dried Londoner.Afterward--afterward, as I was walking
home, it seemed to me that I had perhaps, been--unladylike."The awful
word left her lips in a horrified whisper."My dear, you couldn't be if you tried," said Leslie, with quiet
decision."Now run and put your things away and we will talk it all
over again while we are having supper.She took the
gentle, 'good'-looking face in her hands and kissed it."You are very
clever, Lucy, but that is the one thing you could never attain to."They sat for a long time over their simple meal, talking of their
school, discussing the various capacities of the pupils, arranging
classes, and so on; and once or twice Leslie referred to Lucy's
'adventures,' and declared that she did not believe a word of them,
and that Lucy had invented the whole to amuse her, little suspecting
that the big house Lucy had seen was the famous White Place belonging
to Lady Eleanor Dallas, that the horseman was Lord Yorke Auchester,
and that the stranger who "looked like a lawyer" and who had walked off
with Lucy's fern was Ralph Duncombe.Lady Eleanor was happy, and, unlike a great many persons, was not
ashamed to admit that she was."Why should I be ashamed or try to hide my joy?"she said to Lady
Denby, who remarked her niece's high spirits, and her evident
satisfaction with her own condition and the world in general."They do know it, my dear," said Lady Denby, dryly."I count
myself the luckiest girl in the world!I am young, not hideously plain,
rich--very rich, Mr.Duncombe says--by the way, aunt, you will be very
careful not to mention his name in Yorke's hearing--and I am going to
marry the man I have been in love with ever since I was so high.I wake
in the middle of the night--and I am glad to wake--and I tell myself
all this over and over again.It seems too good to be true, sometimes;
but I know it is all true when the morning comes.Oh, yes, I am happy
at last!""And Yorke is very happy, too?"And the moment after
the question had left her lips she was sorry she had asked it, and she
hastened to add: "But of course he is.Men generally look |
office | Where is Mary? | said Lady Eleanor, after a pause; but
her face had grown almost grave and almost troubled."As you say, men
don't go about as if they were dancing to music, as we women do, and
they don't sing as we do.And--and if Yorke is not boisterous--Why did
you say that?"she demanded, suddenly changing her tone and turning
upon Lady Denby anxiously and nearly angrily."Do you think he looks
dissatisfied--as if--as if he were sorry?""My dear child, your love for that young fellow is softening your
brain," responded Lady Denby, quietly."Of course, I have noticed
nothing.He is quiet; but I suppose most men who are on the brink of
matrimony are quiet.They hear the clanking of their chains as they are
being forged, and are thinking of the time when they will be riveted
upon them."There shall be no chains for Yorke!"said Lady Eleanor, softly;
"or, if there must be, then I will cover them with velvet.Certainly, Yorke did not go about as if to invisible music, or sing as
he went; and he was, as Lady Denby put it, quiet--very quiet.But if
he was not boisterous, he was everything else that a woman could desire
in a betrothed.He spent a portion of each day at Kensington Palace
Gardens.He was always ready to accompany Lady Eleanor to the park, the
theater, concerts, balls, and even shopping.Indeed, the patience with
which he would stroll up and down Bond Street or Oxford Street, smoking
cigarette after cigarette, while Lady Eleanor was shopping, was worthy
of the highest commendation, and immensely calculated to astonish his
wild bachelor friends.What he thought about as he paced slowly up and
down the hot pavements of those fashionable thoroughfares heaven only
knows!At any rate, it is well that Lady Eleanor didn't.Every morning he rode with her in the park--there was no need to sell
his horse now or to sack Fleming--and the loungers on the rails as they
raised their hats to his beautiful companion growled enviously: "Lucky
beggar!going to marry the prettiest and richest girl of the season!Some men get all the plums in this world's pudding!"Altogether he
spent a great deal of his time in the society of his betrothed; but
there were still some hours of the day in which he was free to amuse
himself after his own devices, and he might have passed a very pleasant
time, for there was still a large contingent of his friends in town,
and there were outings at the Riverside Club, drives to Richmond, and
so on.But Yorke was seen in none of the places where the youth of
his sex most do congregate; and he spent the hours of his freedom in
long walks into the country around London, or in the smoking-room of
the quietest of the clubs.And he was always alone--alone, with that
strange, absent look in his eyes--that far-away look which lets out the
secret, and tells all who see it that a man's mind is wandering either
backward or forward; generally backward.All the world knew of his engagement, and every man who met him
congratulated him--all the world except the Duke of Rothbury, from whom
no word of congratulation had come.Lady Eleanor had asked, shyly, and
Yorke, with a little start, had said "no;" that there was no occasion.They only get Galignani
in Switzerland; at least, I never could get anything else," said Lady
Eleanor.He would not have admitted it
to himself, but he shrunk from writing to Dolph and telling him that
he, the duke, was right, and that Leslie was forgotten.Of
what was he thinking as he strode through the country lanes, as he
sat in a corner of the smoking-room, silent and moody, but of Leslie?Mary moved to the bedroom.The time comes when everybody--excepting a few millions--leaves London."Shall you go to Scotland, Yorke?"She knew he
had half a dozen invitations this year.He was never without them
any autumn, but this year they were more numerous than usual.Sandra went back to the garden.Yorke
Auchester running loose and up to his ears in debt, and Yorke Auchester
engaged to Lady Eleanor Dallas were two very different persons and by
a singular coincidence everybody who had a house and a moor in the
Highlands invited him.But he said he would not go to Scotland."The place is eaten up by tourists at this
time of the year."Well, then, I will not go.I was going to the Casaubon's, but I will
send an excuse--"
"Oh, no, don't do that!"he said, with the most unselfish alacrity."Don't you stay up in town for my sake; it's beastly dull now, I know.""I will tell you what I will do," she said."Aunt and I will go to
White Place.Daniel went to the bedroom.It is just a nice distance from town, and--and if you
should ever think of running down, why--aunt will be glad to see you,
sir."The ladies went to White Place, and Yorke stayed in town.But, of
course, he ran down to the big house very frequently, and when he went
he was made much of, as was only right and natural.Would not the place
be his own some day, or at any rate would he not be the lord and master
of the mistress of it?Indeed, the servants received him as if he were
already master, and understood that their quickest and shortest way
of pleasing their mistress was by winning the favor of this handsome
lover of hers.and woman; and how
much quicker is woman--could do to amuse and please him.Mary journeyed to the hallway.A stud of
horses filled the stables--his own being the most honorably housed--the
keepers received carte blanche as to the game; a suite of rooms in the
best position, and so luxuriously furnished that poor Yorke laughed
grimly when he first entered them--was set apart for him.Lady Eleanor
would have filled the house with guests, but it seemed that Yorke was
not in the humor for company."Which is so nice and sweet of him!"His favorite wine had been brought down from
London, and the cook had a list of the dishes to which his lordship was
most partial.If he was not happy he was the most ungrateful man
among the sons of them."You are spoiling him, my dear," Lady Denby ventured to remonstrate
gently.It was the morning that Lady Eleanor had given orders for
a special wire from the station to the house, so that his highness
might let them know when he was coming.Mary went back to the bathroom."You are spoiling him all you
know how, and that's always a bad thing for a man, especially before
marriage; because, you see, when he is married he will expect to be
spoiled a great deal more--and you haven't left yourself any room.""I dare say," Lady Eleanor retorted."Do you mean that nature has done it for you already?"flashed Lady Eleanor, her face flushing proudly; "nature
spoiled him!Oh, where is there a handsomer man, a stronger, a finer
than my Yorke?""My dear, you are a raving lunatic," remarked Lady Denby, in despair.Certainly if he were being spoiled Yorke did not grow less careful
in his devoirs.He was as ready, as on the day of his engagement, to
attend his betrothed; and when they walked and drove together he was
always close at her side, and never wanting in those attentions which
the woman finds so precious when they are paid by the man she loves.And with it all she watched him so closely, was so careful not to bore
him.In the matter of business, for instance, most women having so
much money would have wanted to talk over with her future husband this
investment and the other; but Lady Eleanor knew Yorke better than to
attempt anything of the kind.Ralph Duncombe still remained her guide,
philosopher, and friend in business matters, and it was understood
between Ralph Duncombe and her--without a word having passed--that his
name was never to be mentioned in Lord Auchester's hearing, and that
they were never to meet.One day, however--the day Yorke had galloped past Lucy in the lane,
they had very nearly met face to face, for Ralph Duncombe had left
the house only a few moments before Yorke had entered.Yorke had come
down from London for a few hours, and had ridden with Lady Eleanor,
and she had thought that he was going to remain for dinner; but quite
suddenly he had announced that he must get back to town; once or twice
lately he had had similar fits of restlessness, and had come and gone
unexpectedly.Lady Eleanor did not press him to stay; his chains, even
now, should be covered with velvet; and he had ridden off, having
arranged to leave his horse at the station, to be fetched by a groom.Daniel journeyed to the office.He trotted down the drive quietly enough, looking back once or twice
to smile and wave his hand at Lady Eleanor, who stood on the steps
watching him; but once out of sight he stuck the spurs into the horse,
and the high-spirited animal bounded off like a shot from a gun.Thus, the method which we have just indicated permits the making of a
first selection.Daniel went back to the bedroom.This selection will be good, without being final.It will be good, for
it is based upon a wide experience extending over several years.Just
think what it means in the way of inattention and want of
comprehension if a child is three years behind.For our own part, we
consider this evidence from experience of the greatest value.We can and should try to interpret it
and to complete it, but we are not justified in taking no account of
it.Let us even say boldly that if, by some unhappy chance, other
finer methods should conflict with this, and indicate as defective a
child who has shown himself well adapted to school life, it is school
life which should be considered the more important test.How, indeed,
could one call a child defective who succeeds in his studies and
profits by the instruction in the normal way?Thus we sum up by
remarking that _we possess a very simple method which enables us to
recognise all the children whom we have any right to suspect of mental
deficiency_._This method consists in taking account of the
retardation of the children in their studies._
* * * * *
For the recognition of the ill-balanced children the rule is the same.The head-master must pick out those children whose undisciplined
character has kept them from submitting to the ordinary school regime,
and has made them a continual source of disturbance.Whilst the
simply defective fail to adapt themselves to school life by reason of
their mental deficiency, the ill-balanced fail owing to their
inco-ordination of character.In the second case, as in the first,
there is a similar defect of adaptation, and the best proof that this
defect is present in a particular child is the continued evidence of
several years, the testimony of different masters, who declare that,
with the best will in the world, they cannot break in the recalcitrant
child to rule.But it must be recognised that the appreciation of want
of balance is more delicate, more subjective, than that of
retardation.The latter is indicated by a definite incontrovertible
fact--the insufficiency of instruction.On the other hand, lack of
balance has only a slight effect on a child's intelligence and his
success in his studies.It is indicated to outsiders especially by the
complaints of the masters.And the latter, to tell the truth, may be
led to exaggerate a little, especially if they see a means thereby of
ridding themselves of children with whom they have not much sympathy.We shall see in a little, when we speak of the role of the inspector,
how the latter must check the statements of the head-masters.=Distribution of the Pupils in a School.=--To put into practice the
principle which we have just formulated, a circular is distributed to
the schools asking the head-masters to arrange the children in each
class according to age upon a blank table furnished to them.The work
is easy, and the return should be required in a maximum period of
eight days.Within this period twenty elementary schools in Paris
supplied us with the information which we asked for through their
inspectors.We give one of these returns, which we shall examine
briefly, insisting only on the essential points.We ask, then, that on the table, of which a blank copy is supplied,
the head-master shall give the number of children who on October
1--that is to say, the first day of the session--were of such and such
an age--_e.g._, six or seven years.The normal ages for the different
courses or standards are as follows:
Preparatory or infant 6 to 7 years of age.Elementary, first year 7 to 8 " "
Elementary, second year 8 to 9 " "
Intermediate, first year 9 to 10 " "
Intermediate, second year 10 to 11 " "
Senior, first year 11 to 12 " "
Senior, second year 12 to 13 " "
Thus a child is "regular" in instruction when he is found in the class
named at the age indicated.The normal age for the infant class is from six to seven years.The
children of that age are entered in the table in the appropriate
column.Now consider the extreme ages between six and seven which obey
this condition.On the one hand would be a child exactly six years of
age on admission.Such a child is exactly normal as regards age.He is
behind by 0 years, 0 months, 0 days.At the other extreme would be a
child exactly seven--or, rather, one day less than seven--on
admission.Such a child would be behind by exactly one year.Consequently, the column headed six to seven years for the infant
class contains children behind by 0 day as a minimum, and one year as
a maximum.The average will therefore be behind by six months
(compared to the ideal).Analogous reasoning would show that the
children of the infant class entered in the column headed five to six
years would, on the average, be six months in advance of their age.Mary went back to the office.Similarly, those shown in the column headed seven to eight years would
be on the average one and a half years behind.=Interpretation of the Tables.=--The next point is to sort out the
defectives from these tables.Nothing is easier if we follow the rules
already given.Turning to our tables, we would consider as suspects
the children entered in the fourth and following columns for the
infant class; in column five and following for the elementary course,
first year; in column six and following for the elementary course,
second year; in column eight and following for the intermediate
course, first year; in column nine and following for the intermediate
course, second year.If the reader will calculate the retardation
implied in the columns which we designate, he will see that this
retardation is equal to at least two years under the age of nine, and
equal to at least three years above the age of nine.DISTRIBUTION OF PUPILS IN THE SCHOOL FOR BOYS, RUE GRANGE-AUX-BELLES.--------+--------+-----------------------+----------------------------
| | | Number of Pupils who, on
| | | October 1, were--
| | |
office | Where is John? | |11 to 12| " B | -- | -- | -- | -- |
V.|10 " 11|Intermediate (2nd year)| -- | -- | -- | -- |
IV.| 9 " 10| " (1st year)| -- | -- | -- | 9 |
IV.| 9 " 10| " (1st year)| -- | -- | 1 | 4 |
III.| 8 " 9|Elementary (2nd year) | -- | -- | 6 | 14 |
II.| 7 " 8| " (1st year) | -- | 6 | 23 | 8 |
I.| 6 " 7|Preparatory | 3 | 42 | 12 | -- |
--------+--------+-----------------------+------+------+------+------+
| | Totals | 3 | 48 | 42 | 35 |
--------+--------+-----------------------+------+------+------+------+
--------+--------+-----------------------+----------------------------
| | | Number of Pupils who, on
| | | October 1, were--
| | +------+------+------+------+
|Regular | | 9 to |10 to |11 to |12 to |
Classes| Age | Courses (Parallel | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 |
|(Years).| Classes = A and B).|Years.|Years.|Years.|Years.|
--------+--------+-----------------------+------+------+------+------+
| |Supplementary | -- | -- | -- | -- |
| |Senior A | -- | -- | -- | -- |
VI.Mary moved to the bedroom.|11 to 12| " B | -- | 6 | 12 | 16 |
V.|10 " 11|Intermediate (2nd year)| 1 | 13 | 17 | 5 |
IV.| 9 " 10| " (1st year)| 14 | 9 | 6 | -- |
IV.| 9 " 10| " (1st year)| 15 | 10 | 7 | -- |
III.Sandra went back to the garden.| 8 " 9|Elementary (2nd year) | 11 | 2 | -- | 1 |
II.| 7 " 8| " (1st year) | 6 | -- | -- | 2 |
I.| 6 " 7|Preparatory | -- | 8 | 3 | -- |
--------+--------+-----------------------+------+------+------+------+
| | Totals | 47 | 48 | 45 | 24 |
--------+--------+-----------------------+------+------+------+------+
--------+--------+-----------------------+----------------------------
| | | Number of Pupils who, on
| | | October 1, were--
| | +------+------+------+ |
|Regular | |13 to |14 to |15 to | |
Classes| Age | Courses (Parallel | 14 | 15 | 16 |Totals.|
|(Years).| Classes = A and B).|Years.|Years.|Years.| |
--------+--------+-----------------------+------+------+------+-------+
| |Supplementary | -- | -- | -- | -- |
| |Senior A | -- | -- | -- | -- |
VI.|11 to 12| " B | 4 | 1 | -- | 39 |
V.|10 " 11|Intermediate (2nd year)| -- | -- | 2 | 38 |
IV.| 9 " 10| " (1st year)| -- | -- | -- | 38 |
IV.| 9 " 10| " (1st year)| -- | 2 | -- | 39 |
III.Daniel went to the bedroom.Mary journeyed to the hallway.| 8 " 9|Elementary (2nd year) | -- | 1 | -- | 35 |
II.| 7 " 8| " (1st year) | 2 | -- | -- | 47 |
I.| 6 " 7|Preparatory | -- | -- | -- | 68 |
--------+--------+-----------------------+------+------+------+-------+
| | Totals | 6 | 4 | 2 | 304 |
--------+--------+-----------------------+------+------+------+-------+
The number of children suspected of mental deficiency obtained by this
method varies extremely from one school to another, independently of
the mistakes which are made by the head-masters with lamentable
frequency.We have found the proportions varying from 0.2 to 10 per
cent., with all the intermediates represented.The average of suspects
for ten girls' schools, with an average of 300 pupils, was 3.7 per
cent.; for eight boys' schools in the same district, and strictly
comparable to the preceding, it was 5.35 per cent.Mary went back to the bathroom.It must be clearly
understood that these figures are provisional.They do not correspond
to real defectives, but to children _suspected_ of mental deficiency;
and, moreover, they do not include the unstable, unless they are also
defective.Daniel journeyed to the office.Having made these deductions, one writes to the head-masters, or
perhaps summons them to a meeting, in order to ascertain the names of
these children and various other particulars.These particulars will refer to three main points:
1.Give the full names and date of birth of the backward children (by
two or three years, according to the distinctions given above), and
indicate also whether the retardation is explained by irregular
attendance, by want of application, or defective intelligence.Indicate the children who, although they do not belong to the
preceding category, yet appear to be distinctly abnormal.Indicate also the children who are ill-balanced and rebellious to
all discipline in the opinion of several teachers who have had them in
their classes.We have already received replies which seem to us instructive, and
even carry us beyond the study of the abnormal, as they may throw some
light on the psychology of those who are commonly called "dunces."As
a general rule, the children classed as retarded are the victims of
disease, constitutional debility, or malnutrition.We find included in
our lists some who are the children of nomadic parents; some who have
been kept from school; some who have attended a religious school,
where they learned little but sewing and writing; some who have
changed their school too often; some also who are foreigners, and
understand little French; and, lastly, some who have been kept back in
their studies by unrecognised myopia.Such causes are extrinsic to the
child.The personal causes of retardation are defective intelligence,
sluggishness of mind, insubordination, an eccentric and excitable
nature, a constant want of attention, and, lastly, laziness.The complete and methodical study of the documents relating to 223
children with a retardation of three years has taught us a number of
interesting facts.It is very rare for the cause of the retardation to
be single.Feebleness of mind complicated by illness is noted in 20 per cent.Daniel went back to the bedroom.Insufficient school attendance (due to other causes than
illness), in conjunction with feebleness of mind, is met with in 25
per cent.If, without taking account of those associations
of causes, one enumerates simply the frequency with which each single
cause of retardation is mentioned, one obtains the following
percentages:
Feebleness of mind 50 per cent.Insufficient attendance (without illness) 33 "
Illness 25 "
Lack of application, laziness 7 "
If we admit, as a hypothesis, that the frequency of each of those four
principal causes indicates its importance, we shall conclude that
laziness very rarely explains a retardation so great as three years,
and that the most important factor is undoubtedly feebleness of mind.We should have expected the teachers to give much more frequently the
banal reason of lack of application.They have not done so, and these
results confirm in a quite unexpected manner the convention according
to which every retardation of three years should make one suspect
feebleness of mind.It would be interesting to know whether any children really defective
in intelligence escape the revelation furnished by our tables.We have
put this question in writing to the heads of the schools, and they
have notified fifteen children, or 6 per cent., who seem to them to be
clearly defective, although without a retardation of three years.On
testing the statement, we found that mistakes had been made, and the
sole residue of defectives who had escaped our census consisted of
three subjects who wanted only a month or a few weeks to have shown
clearly a retardation of three years.They were therefore on the
border, and such exceptional cases are always to be found when one
fixes an exact limit.=Hostile Head-Masters and Teachers.=--It is important to state that
the procedure for selection which we have outlined can be carried out
without the concurrence of the head-masters.As a matter of fact, one
has to be prepared for everything, even the hostility of the school
staff.It may be that a head-master who has a defective in his school
refrains from mentioning the fact.It may be that he is indifferent,
or does not believe in special education, or simply does not choose to
put himself about; or, again, he may be timid and afraid of trouble,
or may shrink from the recriminations of parents, behind whom he sees
the hostile shadow of some town councillor or journalist.Mary went back to the office.Lastly, he
may be an ignoramus who, even at this time of day, imagines that a
child cannot be a defective unless he has incontinence of urine or a
sugar-loaf head.John journeyed to the garden.We have already come across several fellows of this
kind.We recollect a head-master
who, in response to our inquiry, replied with irritating calmness: "I
have five hundred pupils in my school.I am sure that not one of them
is a defective.And he added with a sceptical smile:
"The school doctor and myself will be very curious to learn how you
manage the inquiry."John moved to the office.As a matter of fact, the proportion of defectives
in his school was just the usual one--about 2 per cent.At the time when the Government Commission was holding its inquiry as
to the number of defectives, we found in the statistical tables which
we had in our hands that whole towns, even as important as
Fontainebleau, had replied "None," yet we knew by personal inquiry
that that reply was wrong.The systematic reticence of the head-master is therefore already in
evidence, and will certainly turn up again even when the law is in
full operation.Doubtless wiser counsels will prevail in the long run,
and opposition will become less.However, one will not be affected by it in picking out the backward
children, but the children who are abnormal, though not backward, and
the ill-balanced children, will perhaps escape, unless the inspector
visits the school, and, knowing the disposition of the head-master,
takes the precaution of questioning the teachers as to the children in
their class who give them the most trouble in regard to discipline.As
a rule the masters have an interest in pointing out these pupils in
the hope that they will be removed.B THE ROLE OF THE PRIMARY INSPECTOR: TO ACT AS REFEREE.In the pedagogical examination the inspector should exercise a measure
of control.It is he who sets the teachers to fill up the schedules,
who interprets the returns, and estimates their value.Work is better done when it is subject to inspection.The head-masters
will take more care in the selection of the defectives if they know
that all their cases will be examined by a person whose competence is
equal to their own, and whose position is higher.The inspector, who
|
hallway | Where is Sandra? | He
knows that one master is too severe, and another too indulgent.He has
to restrain the overzealous, to stimulate the indifferent, and
encourage the despondent.When it is a question of estimating a
child's want of balance, it is necessary to know the character of the
judge.Some good teachers fail to gain the necessary ascendancy over
one of their pupils, either because they are indulgent where
strictness is necessary, or because by excessive brusqueness and
severity they alienate natures which require to be humoured.The
inspector will succeed in taking all these things into account.He
will interpret correctly the facts which are laid before him, because
it is his business, his _metier_.=Significance of Irregular Attendance.=--The inspector will begin, let
us suppose, by examining the returns given concerning the backward
children.From the notes sent to him he will be able to distinguish
between the children whose backwardness is due to irregular attendance
and those who may justly be suspected of mental deficiency or want of
balance.Here are some examples of the notes referred to:
_Renne G----_, age thirteen years, is in the intermediate
course, second year; she is therefore three years behind for her
age.John travelled to the bathroom.The explanation given by the teacher is as follows: "Had
contagious ophthalmia; not admitted to school till ten.If the return is correct, one is not
surprised that the child has not made more progress._Suzanne M----_, age twelve and a half years (two years behind);
always very delicate and frequently absent; of average
intelligence._Yvonne D----_, age ten and a half years (two years behind);
lived a long time on a boat without going to school;
intelligence average; very industrious._Eugenie V----_, age eleven and a half years (three years
behind); educated at a convent school until October last;
intelligence little developed; slow of comprehension; writes and
sews pretty well; spelling poor._Suzanne B----_, age eleven and a half years (two years behind);
an intelligent and industrious child, who has travelled much
with her parents, and afterwards stayed in a little
boarding-house.At school since October; she has made great
progress._Anna E----_, age eleven and a half years (two years behind);
born in German Switzerland, brought up in England, and has been
in Paris only a year and a half._Germaine G----_, age ten years (three years behind); very
short-sighted.It was only last year that it was noticed that
this defect of vision was keeping the child from learning to
read.Since spectacles were provided she has made rapid
progress._Marguerite L----_, age ten years (two years behind).This child
has some affection of the eyes; she has been operated on several
times.Without pretending to give a final opinion on the above cases, one may
believe that the retardation is due to the ailment or to irregular
attendance.If it were necessary, one might make further inquiries at
the schools previously attended by the child, or find out at the
present school the exact number of days of absence.In other cases it seems clear that it is the intelligence of the child
that is at fault.For example--
_Jeanne L----_, age ten years (two years behind); attends school
regularly; stupid and lazy._Hortense G----_ (two years behind); irritable temper; very
backward in arithmetic and spelling; intelligence mediocre._Marie R----_ (two years behind); intelligence very mediocre;
inattentive; progress very slow._Blanche B----_ (three years behind); intelligence much below
the average; has some slight aptitude for sewing and arithmetic,
but very backward otherwise; incapable of giving a reply
indicative of good sense and reflection._Jeanne B----_ (two years behind); intelligence decidedly
mediocre; none of her answers particularly sensible.When the inspector has read these notes and formed an opinion on the
children, and obtained as far as necessary additional information
about their school attendance,[7] etc., he will make his first choice.He will decide which children are to be examined, and will have them
brought to him.Be it understood, then, that the child must now be presented, and that
it is by questioning him that the inspector will form an opinion of
his mental level.The inspector must
observe the child, induce him to talk, watch the play of his features.In this way he receives a living impression which rarely deceives an
experienced eye.He will even chat with him a little about
something--for example, the occupation of his parents.... After these
preliminaries, the examination proper begins.It includes the
estimation of the degree of instruction and the degree of
intelligence.A child is presented to the inspector, for example, as belonging to
the intermediate course, first year.Sandra moved to the hallway.It may be that
the child is at the foot of the class, or is even incapable of
following the lessons.Thus, it may be that his class gives a very
poor indication of his capacity.There are plenty of cases where the
head-master, in order to please the parents, puts a child in a class
too high for him.A rapid examination will suffice to test the
grading.This testing is absolutely necessary, and presents no
difficulty to the inspectors.They have the fortnightly report brought
to them, examine the pupil's marks and his exercises, whereby they
form a first impression.It is then necessary to ask some questions,
and on this point we have something to say with respect to method.There are two ways in which the degree of instruction may be tested.There is what we may call the _casual method_, which consists in
putting the first questions that come into the mind; and there is the
_systematic method_, which consists in putting questions arranged in
advance, whose difficulty is known, and for which we have a scale (p.54), which shows the average number of errors to be expected from
normal children of each age.The latter method takes no longer than
the former, and is even easier, because it makes no demand on the
imagination.Moreover, we consider it quite indispensable for fixing
in an objective manner the degree of instruction of the defectives on
the day of their admission to the special school.It is very important
that this degree of instruction should be definitely known, because it
will be necessary to refer to it every time one wants to find out to
what extent the child is profiting by the special instruction.We
shall return to this point in our concluding chapter.It has seemed to us that the test of instruction might bear upon three
exercises, which are easily marked--reading, arithmetic, and spelling.Here is a very simple table of tests (p.54), of which we have made
much use.It has been arranged with the help of M. Vaney.The table is
suited to the elementary and to the intermediate course, and that is
sufficient for examining defectives, since none of them are found in
the senior division.It is scarcely necessary to say that this table
of tests is the outcome of careful experiment.We have established
for each age the average acquirements of all the children of that age
whatever their place in school.One might quite as well have taken
into account only the results given by typical children in the class
proper to their age, but on reflection we rejected this proceeding as
arbitrary, because it is affected by the difficulty of the curriculum,
which is constructed _a priori_, whilst the average furnished by all
the children of a given age is less artificial and is an adequate
expression of the reality.Let us remark in passing that these two
methods of calculation do not lead to equivalent results.The average
furnished by the _typical_ children is higher than that furnished by
_all_ the children, for, as we have shown above, more children are
backward than in advance.Lastly, the time of year when the tests are
made is not a matter of indifference.For spelling and arithmetic the
time chosen was the end of February--that is, the middle of the
session.For reading we are obliged to make use of results a little
more advanced, for they were furnished later, namely, in June.SCALE SHOWING KNOWLEDGE ACQUIRED BY PUPILS OF ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS.----------+--------------+--------------+---------------------+
| | | |
Age of | | | |
Children | | | +
on | | | |
October | | Grade of | |
1.|
----------+--------------+--------------+---------------------+
Years | | | |
6 to 7 | Preparatory | Sub-syllabic | From 19 apples take |
| | to syllabic | away 6 (Answer 13) |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
7 " 8 | Elementary | Hesitating | Subtract 8 pence |
| (first | | from 59 pence.|
| year) | | (Answer 51) |
| | | |
| | | |
8 " 9 | Elementary | Hesitating- | A box contains 604 |
| (second | fluent | oranges.If 58 are |
| year) | | sold, how many will |
| | | be left?|
| | | (Answer, 546) |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
9 " 10 | Intermediate | Fluent | To make a dress, |
| (first | | 7 yards of stuff |
| year) | | are required.How |
| | | many dresses can be |
| | | made with 89 yards, |
| | | and how much will |
| | | be left over?|
| | | (Answer, 12 dresses |
| | | and 5 yards left) |
| | | |
10 " 11 | Intermediate | Fluent- | A workman makes |
| (second | expressive | 250 shillings in | |
hallway | Where is Daniel? | He |
| | | spends 195 |
| | | shillings.How |
| | | much does he save |
| | | per day, February |
| | | having 28 days?|
| | | (Answer, |
| | | 1s.|
----------+--------------+--------------+---------------------+
----------+-----------------------+--------------------------------
| Number of Mistakes |
Age of | in Dictation |
Children +-------+-------+-------+
on |Phrases|Phrases|Phrases|
October | 1, 2, | 1, 2, |1, 2.| |Spelling (Dictation).----------+-------+-------+-------+--------------------------------
Years | | | |
6 to 7 | 119 | 62 | 28 | _Phrase 1._ Emile est un petit
| | | | garcon bien sage, il ecoute
| | | | son papa et sa maman, il va
| | | | a l'ecole.| | | |
7 " 8 | 119 | 62 | 30 | _Phrase 2._ J'ai une tete,
| | | | deux bras, deux jambes, une
| | | | bouche, vingt dents, une
| | | | langue, dix doigts.John travelled to the bathroom.| | | |
8 " 9 | 78 | 47 | 19 | _Phrase 3._ Le soleil brille
| | | | deja de ses plus gais rayons.| | | | Les hommes partent en
| | | | chantant.Les bergers sont
| | | | heureux de la belle journee
| | | | qui se prepare, ils suivent
| | | | au paturage le grand troupeau
| | | | des vaches pesantes.| | | |
9 " 10 | 42 | 25 | 4 |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | | Phrase 4.Le garcon de ferme,
| | | | de son pas lourd, entrait
| | | | dans la grange, encore
| | | | obscure, ou nous reposions.| | | | Les boeufs mugissaient tout
| | | | bas.Dans la cour le coq, les
10 " 11 | 11 | 4 | 1 | poules, le chien, allaient
| | | | et venaient.Sandra moved to the hallway.| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
----------+-------+-------+-------+--------------------------------
Let us now explain the details of the exercises shown on our table.=Reading.=--The proceeding we adopt consists essentially in
distinguishing five grades of reading:
1._Sub-Syllabic._--The child reads in syllables, but very slowly and
with many mistakes._Syllabic._--This consists in stopping at every syllable, but
reading these pretty correctly.Thus the child reads
"The--sol--di--er--car--ries--a--big--gun."_Hesitating._--There are stops as in (2), but they are less
frequent.Daniel travelled to the kitchen.The child reads by words or groups of words--e.g., "The
soldier carries--a big gun."_Fluent._--There are no stops except at the marks of punctuation,
but the reading is monotonous, as if the child does not understand
what he reads.The voice may fall at the end of the sentences.Expressive._--The child shows by his intonation that he
understands what he reads.We found it necessary, as may well be believed, to use not only the
expressions _syllabic_ reading, _fluent_ reading, etc., but compound
expressions, such as _hesitating-fluent_, _fluent-expressive_, and
even compound expressions with accentuation of one of the epithets, as
hesitating-_fluent_.Daniel travelled to the hallway.We have stated that the scale of reading was founded on experiments
made by M. Vaney at the end of the school year.We have modified it
slightly in consequence of experiments made by ourselves in February.It may be of interest to give here the table arranged by M. Vaney.It
has been arranged not by age, but by class.---------------+----------------------------------------------+-------
| |
| Number of Children who have the |
| Following Grades of Reading.|
+-----+--------+----------+---------+----------+
| | | | | |
|None.|Syllabic|Hesitating| Fluent.---------------+-----+--------+----------+---------+----------+-------
| | | | | |
Infant | 12 | 26 | 2 | -- | -- | 40
Elementary | | | | | |
(first year) | -- | 5 | 32 | 4 | -- | 41
Elementary | | | | | |
(second year)| -- | -- | 24 | 11 | 2 | 37
Intermediate | | | | | |
(first year) | -- | -- | 15 | 18 | 8 | 41
Intermediate | | | | | |
(second year)| -- | -- | 10 | 19 | 9 | 38
Intermediate | | | | | |
(second year)| -- | -- | 8 | 11 | 15 | 34
Senior | -- | -- | -- | 5 | 35 | 40
+-----+--------+----------+---------+----------+--------
| | | | | |
Totals | 12 | 31 | 91 | 68 | 69 | 271
---------------+-----+--------+----------+---------+----------+--------
We shall now give some hints as to the method of procedure.Reading is a test which requires only a minute.One chooses a text
which the children can understand easily, preferably a lively piece
with dialogue, so that one may judge more easily whether the pupil can
read with expression.One should avoid prolonging the reading for more
than forty-five seconds, for a young child tires quickly and reads
worse at the end of a minute than at the beginning.Instead of
contenting oneself with judging that the child reads well or ill,
which does not mean very much, it is a great advantage to adopt these
five grades of reading, which are easy to distinguish with a little
practice, and are less subjective than might be imagined, for two
judges generally give the same mark.On referring to the scale, it
will be noticed that children quickly pass from syllabic reading to
hesitating reading, but the passage from hesitating to fluent reading
is slower and more troublesome.By way of example let us quote our judgment of the grades of reading
in the case of some backward children, and our consequent estimates of
the degree of retardation.We draw them from our own observations made
in a class for defectives in Paris.-------+--------------+-----------------------+---------------
Name.He walked into the house one
cold, wintry afternoon and lay calmly down by the fire.He was a
brindled bull-terrier, and he had on a silver-plated collar with "Dandy"
engraved on it.He lay all the evening by the fire, and when any of the
family spoke to him, he wagged his tail, and looked pleased.I growled a
little at him at first, but he never cared |
hallway | Where is Daniel? | John travelled to the bathroom.He was such a well-bred dog, that the Morrises were afraid that some one
had lost him.They made some inquiries the next day, and found that he
belonged to a New York gentleman who had come to Fairport in the summer
in a yacht.He came ashore in a boat
whenever he got a chance, and if he could not come in a boat, he would
swim.He was a tramp, his master said, and he wouldn't stay long in any
place, The Morrises were so amused with his impudence, that they did not
send him away, but said every day, "Surely he will be gone to-morrow."Dandy had gotten into comfortable quarters, and he had no
intention of changing them, for a while at least.Then he was very
handsome, and had such a pleasant way with him, that the family could
not help liking him.He fawned on the Morrises,
and pretended he loved them, and afterward turned around and laughed and
sneered at them in a way that made me very angry.I used to lecture him
sometimes, and growl about him to Jim, but Jim always said, "Let him
alone.He tells me that she had a bad name among all the dogs in her
neighborhood.Sandra moved to the hallway.Though he provoked me so
often, yet I could not help laughing at some of his stories, they were
so funny.We were lying out in the sun, on the platform at the back of the house,
one day, and he had been more than usually provoking, so I got up to
leave him.He put himself in my way, however, and said, coaxingly,
"Don't be cross, old fellow.I'll tell you some stories to amuse you,
old boy."I think the story of your life would be about as interesting as
anything you could make up," I said, dryly."All right, fact or fiction, whichever you like.Here's a fact, plain
and unvarnished.Jewelled fingers of ladies poking at me, first
thing I remember.Ears got sore and
festered, flies very attentive.Coachman set little boy to brush flies
off, but he'd run out in yard and leave me.Thought they'd
eat me up, or else I'd shake out brains trying to get rid of them.Mother should have stayed home and licked my ears, but was cruising
about neighborhood.Finally coachman put me in dark place, powdered
ears, and they got well.""Why didn't they cut your tail, too?"I said, looking at his long, slim
tail, which was like a sewer rat's."'Twasn't the fashion, Mr.Wayback; a bull-terrier's ears are clipped to
keep them from getting torn while fighting.""You're not a fighting dog," I said."I should think you did," I said, scornfully."You never put yourself
out for any one, I notice; but, speaking of cropping ears, what do you
think of it?""Well," he said, with a sly glance at my head, "it isn't a pleasant
operation; but one might as well be out of the world as out of the
fashion.I don't care, now my ears are done.""But," I said, "think of the poor dogs that will come after you.""I'll be dead and out
of the way.Men can cut off their ears, and tails, and legs, too, if
they want to.""Dandy," I said, angrily, "you're the most selfish dog that I ever saw.""Don't excite yourself," he said, coolly.When I was a few months old, I began to find the stable yard narrow, and
wondered what there was outside of it.I discovered a hole in the garden
wall, and used to sneak out nights.I got to know a
lot of street dogs, and we had gay times, barking under people's windows
and making them mad, and getting into back yards and chasing cats.We
used to kill a cat nearly every night.Policeman would chase us, and we
would run and run till the water just ran off our tongues, and we hadn't
a bit of breath left.Then I'd go home and sleep all day, and go out
again the next night.When I was about a year old, I began to stay out
days as well as nights.I got with an old lady on Fifth Avenue, who was very fond
of dogs.She had four white poodles, and her servants used to wash them,
and tie up their hair with blue ribbons, and she used to take them for
drives in her phaeton in the park, and they wore gold and silver
collars.The biggest poodle wore a ruby in his collar worth five hundred
dollars.I went driving, too, and sometimes we met my master.He often
smiled, and shook his head at me.I heard him tell the coachman one day
that I was a little blackguard, and he was to let me come and go as I
liked.""If they had whipped you soundly," I said, "it might have made a good
dog of you.""I'm good enough now," said Dandy, airily."The young ladies who drove
with my master used to say that it was priggish and tiresome to be too
good.To go on with my story: I stayed with Mrs.Daniel travelled to the kitchen.Judge Tibbett till I
got sick of her fussy ways.She made a simpleton of herself over those
poodles.Each one had a high chair at the table, and a plate, and they
always sat in these chairs and had meals with her, and the servants all
called them Master Bijou, and Master Tot, and Miss Tiny, and Miss Fluff.One day they tried to make me sit in a chair, and I got cross and bit
Mrs.Tibbett, and she beat me cruelly, and her servants stoned me away
from the house.""Speaking about fools, Dandy," I said, "if it is polite to call a lady
one, I should say that that lady was one.Dogs shouldn't be put out of
their place.Why didn't she have some poor children at her table, and in
her carriage, and let the dogs run behind?""Easy to see you don't know New York," said Dandy, with a laugh."Poor
children don't live with rich, old ladies.Tibbett hated children,
anyway.Then dogs like poodles would get lost in the mud, or killed in
the crowd if they ran behind a carriage.Only knowing dogs like me can
make their way about."I rather doubted this speech; but I said nothing,
and he went on, patronizingly: "However, Joe, thou hast reason, as the
French say.Judge Tibbett 'didn't' give her dogs exercise
enough.Their claws were as long as Chinamen's nails, and the hair grew
over their pads, and they had red eyes and were always sick, and she had
to dose them with medicine, and call them her poor, little,
'weeny-teeny, sicky-wicky doggies.'When
I left her, I ran away to her niece's, Miss Ball's.She was a sensible
young lady, and she used to scold her aunt for the way in which she
brought up her dogs.She was almost too sensible, for her pug and I were
rubbed and scrubbed within an inch of our lives, and had to go for such
long walks that I got thoroughly sick of them.A woman, whom the
servants called Trotsey, came every morning, and took the pug and me by
our chains, and sometimes another dog or two, and took us for long
tramps in quiet streets.That was Trotsey's business, to walk dogs, and
Miss Ball got a great many fashionable young ladies who could not
exercise their dogs, to let Trotsey have them, and they said that it
made a great difference in the health and appearance of their pets.Trotsey got fifteen cents an hour for a dog.Goodness, what appetites
those walks gave us, and didn't we make the dog biscuits disappear?But
it was a slow life at Miss Ball's.We only saw her for a little while
every day.After lunch she played with us for a
little while in the greenhouse, then she was off driving or visiting,
and in the evening she always had company, or went to a dance, or to the
theatre.I soon made up my mind that I'd run away.I jumped out of a
window one fine morning, and ran home.My mother had been run over by a cart and killed, and I wasn't sorry.My
master never bothered his head about me, and I could do as I liked.One
day when I was having a walk, and meeting a lot of dogs that I knew, a
little boy came behind me, and before I could tell what he was doing, he
had snatched me up, and was running off with me.I couldn't bite him,
for he had stuffed some of his rags in my mouth.He took me to a
tenement house, in a part of the city that I had never been in before.My faith, weren't they badly off--six
children, and a mother and father, all living in two tiny rooms.Scarcely a bit of meat did I smell while I was there.I hated their
bread and molasses, and the place smelled so badly that I thought I
should choke."They kept me shut up in their dirty rooms for several days; and the
brat of a boy that caught me slept with his arm around me at night.The
weather was hot and sometimes we couldn't sleep, and they had to go up
on the roof.After a while, they chained me up in a filthy yard at the
back of the house, and there I thought I should go mad.I would have
liked to bite them all to death, if I had dared.It's awful to be
chained, especially for a dog like me that loves his freedom.The flies
worried me, and the noises distracted me, and my flesh would fairly
creep from getting no exercise.Daniel travelled to the hallway.I was there nearly a month, while they
were waiting for a reward to be offered.But none came; and one day, the
boy's father, who was a street peddler, took me by my chain and led me
about the streets till he sold me.A gentleman got me for his little
boy, but I didn't like the look of him, so I sprang up and bit his hand,
and he dropped the chain, and I dodged boys and policemen, and finally
got home more dead than alive, and looking like a skeleton.I had a good
time for several weeks, and then I began to get restless and was off
again.But I'm getting tired; I want to go to sleep."John moved to the hallway."You're not very polite," I said, "to offer to tell a story, and then go
to sleep before you finish it.""Look out for number one, my boy," said Dandy, with a yawn; "for if you
don't, no one else will," and he shut his eyes and was fast asleep in a
few minutes.What a handsome, good-natured, worthless dog he
was.A few days later, he told me the rest of his history.After a great
many wanderings, he happened home one day just as his master's yacht was
going to sail, and they chained him up till they went on board, so that
he could be an amusement on the passage to Fairport.It was in November that Dandy came to us, and he stayed all winter.He
made fun of the Morrises all the time, and said they had a dull, poky,
old house, and he only stayed because Miss Laura was nursing him.He had
a little sore on his back that she soon found out was mange.Her father
said it was a bad disease for dogs to have, and Dandy had better be
shot; but she begged so hard for his life, and said she would cure him
in a few weeks, that she was allowed to keep him.Dandy wasn't capable
of getting really angry, but he was as disturbed about having this
disease as he could be about anything.He said that he had got it from a
little, mangy dog, that he had played with a few weeks before.He was
only with the dog a little while, and didn't think he would take it, but
it seemed he knew what an easy thing it was to get.Until he got well he was separated from us.Miss Laura kept him up in
the loft with the rabbits, where we could not go; and the boys ran him
around the garden for exercise.She tried all kind of cures for him, and
I heard her say that though it was a skin disease, his blood must be
purified.She gave him some of the pills that she made out of sulphur
and butter for Jim, and Billy, and me, to keep our coats silky and
smooth.When they didn't cure him, she gave him a few drops of arsenic
every day, and washed the sore, and, indeed his whole body, with tobacco
water or carbolic soap.Miss Laura always put on gloves when she went near him, and used a brush
to wash him, for if a person takes mange from a dog, they may lose their
hair and their eyelashes.But if they are careful, no harm comes from
nursing a mangy dog, and I have never known of any one taking the
disease.After a time, Dandy's sore healed, and he was set free.He was right
glad, he said, for he had got heartily sick of the rabbits.He used to
bark at them and make them angry, and they would run around the loft,
stamping their hind feet at him, in the funny way that rabbits do.I
think they disliked him as much as he disliked them.Jim and I did not
get the mange.Dandy was not a strong dog, and I think his irregular way
of living made him take diseases readily.Mary went to the hallway.He would stuff himself when he
was hungry, and he always wanted rich food.If he couldn't get what he
wanted at the Morrises', he went out and stole, or visited the dumps at
the back of the town.When he did get ill, he was more stupid about doctoring himself than any
dog that I have ever seen.He never seemed to know when to eat grass or
herbs, or a little earth, that would have kept him in good condition.When Dandy got ill he just suffered
till he got well again, and never tried to cure himself of his small
troubles.Some dogs even know enough to amputate their limbs.Jim told
me a very interesting story of a dog the Morrises once had, called Gyp,
whose leg became paralyzed by a kick from a horse.He knew the leg was
dead, and gnawed it off nearly to the shoulder, and though he was very
sick for a time, yet in the end he got well.I knew he was only waiting for the spring to leave
us, and I was not sorry.The first fine day he was off, and during the
rest of the spring and summer we occasionally met him running about the
town with a set of fast dogs.One day I stopped and asked him how he
contented himself in such a quiet place as Fairport, and he said he was
dying to get back to New York, and was hoping that his master's yacht
would come and take him away.After all, he was not such a bad dog.There was nothing really vicious about him, and I hate to speak of his
end.His master's yacht did not come, and soon the summer was over, and
the winter was coming, and no one wanted Dandy, for he had such a bad
name.He got hungry and cold, and one day sprang upon a little girl, to
take away a piece of bread and butter that she was eating.He did not
see the large house-dog on the door sill, and before he could get away,
the dog had seized him, and bitten and shaken him till he was nearly
dead.When the dog threw him aside, he crawled to the Morrises, and Miss
Laura bandaged his wounds, and made him a bed in the stable.One Sunday morning she washed and fed him very tenderly, for she knew he
could not live much longer.He was so weak that he could scarcely eat
the food that she put in his mouth, so she let him lick some milk from
her finger.As she was going to church, I could not go with her, but I
ran down the lane and watched her out of sight.When I came back, Dandy
was gone.He had crawled into the darkest
corner of the stable to die, and though he was suffering very much, he
never uttered a sound.I sat by him and thought of his master in New
York. |
kitchen | Where is Daniel? | If he had brought Dandy up properly he might not now be here in
his silent death agony.John travelled to the bathroom.A young pup should be trained just as a child
is, and punished when he goes wrong.Dandy began badly, and not being
checked in his evil ways, had come to this.Poor, handsome
dog of a rich master!He opened his dull eyes, gave me one last glance,
then, with a convulsive shudder, his torn limbs were still.When Miss Laura came home, she cried bitterly to know that he was dead.The boys took him away from her, and made him a grave in the corner of
the garden.* * * * *
CHAPTER XXXVII
THE END OF MY STORY
I have come now to the last chapter of my story.I thought when I began
to write, that I would put down the events of each year of my life, but
I fear that would make my story too long, and neither Miss Laura nor any
boys and girls would care to read it.So I will stop just here, though I
would gladly go on, for I have enjoyed so much talking over old times,
that I am very sorry to leave off.Every year that I have been at the Morrises', something pleasant has
happened to me, but I cannot put all these things down, nor can I tell
how Miss Laura and the boys grew and changed, year by year, till now
they are quite grown up.I will just bring my tale down to the present
time, and then I will stop talking, and go lie down in my basket, for I
am an old dog now, and get tired very easily.I was a year old when I went to the Morrises, and I have been with them
for twelve years.I am not living in the same house with Mr.and Mrs,
Morris now, but I am with my dear Miss Laura, who is Miss Laura no
longer, but Mrs.Harry four years ago, and lives
with him and Mr.Morris
live in a cottage near by.Morris is not very strong, and can preach
no longer.Jack married pretty Miss Bessie
Drury, and lives on a large farm near here.Miss Bessie says that she
hates to be a farmer's wife, but she always looks very happy and
contented, so I think that she must be mistaken.Carl is a merchant in
New York, Ned is a clerk in a bank, and Willie is studying at a place
called Harvard.He says that after he finishes his studies, he is going
to live with his father and mother.The Morrises' old friends often come to see them.Sandra moved to the hallway.Drury comes every
summer on her way to Newport, and Mr.Montague and Charlie come every
other summer.Charlie always brings with him his old dog Brisk, who is
getting feeble, like myself.We lie on the veranda in the sunshine, and
listen to the Morrises talking about old days, and sometimes it makes us
feel quite young again.In addition to Brisk we have a Scotch collie.Daniel travelled to the kitchen.He
is very handsome, and is a constant attendant of Miss Laura's.We are
great friends, he and I, but he can get about much better than I can.One day a friend of Miss Laura's came with a little boy and girl, and
"Collie" sat between the two children, and their father took their
picture with a "kodak."I like him so much that I told him I would get
them to put his picture in my book.When the Morris boys are all here in the summer we have gay times.All
through the winter we look forward to their coming, for they make the
old farmhouse so lively.Maxwell never misses a summer in coming to
Riverdale.He has such a following of dumb animals now, that he says he
can't move them any farther away from Boston than this, and he doesn't
know what he will do with them, unless he sets up a menagerie.He asked
Miss Laura the other day, if she thought that the old Italian would take
him into partnership.He did not know what had happened to poor Bellini,
so Miss Laura told him.A few years ago the Italian came to Riverdale, to exhibit his new stock
of performing animals.They were almost as good as the old ones, but he
had not quite so many as he had before.The Morrises and a great many of
their friends went to his performance, and Miss Laura said afterward,
that when cunning little Billy came on the stage, and made his bow, and
went through his antics of jumping through hoops, and catching balls,
that she almost had hysterics.The Italian had made a special pet of him
for the Morrises' sake, and treated him more like a human being than a
dog.Billy rather put on airs when he came up to the farm to see us, but
he was such a dear, little dog, in spite of being almost spoiled by his
master, that Jim and I could not get angry with him.In a few days they
went away, and we heard nothing but good news from them, till last
winter.Then a letter came to Miss Laura from a nurse in a New York
hospital.She said that the Italian was very near his end, and he wanted
her to write to Mrs.Gray to tell her that he had sold all his animals
but the little dog that she had so kindly given him.He was sending him
back to her, and with his latest breath he would pray for heaven's
blessing on the kind lady and her family that had befriended him when he
was in trouble.The next day Billy arrived, a thin, white scarecrow of a dog.He was
sick and unhappy, and would eat nothing, and started up at the slightest
sound.He was listening for the Italian's footsteps, but he never came,
and one day Mr.Harry looked up from his newspaper and said, "Laura,
Bellini is dead."Miss Laura's eyes filled with tears, and Billy, who
had jumped up when he heard his master's name, fell back again.He knew
what they meant, and from that instant he ceased listening for
footsteps, and lay quite still till he died.Miss Laura had him put in a
little wooden box, and buried him in a corner of the garden, and when
she is working among her flowers, she often speaks regretfully of him,
and of poor Dandy, who lies in the garden at Fairport.Bella, the parrot, lives with Mrs.Morris, and is as smart as ever.I
have heard that parrots live to a very great age.Some of them even get
to be a hundred years old.If that is the case, Bella will outlive all
of us.She notices that I am getting blind and feeble, and when I go
down to call on Mrs.Morris, she calls out to me, "Keep a stiff upper
lip, Beautiful Joe.Keep the game a-going,
Beautiful Joe."Morris says that she doesn't know where Bella picks up her slang
words.Ned who teaches her, for when he comes home in
the summer he often says, with a sly twinkle in his eye, "Come out into
the garden, Bella," and he lies in a hammock under the trees, and Bella
perches on a branch near him, and he talks to her by the hour.Anyway,
it is in the autumn after he leaves Riverdale that Bella always shocks
Mrs.I am glad that I am to end my days in Riverdale.Fairport was a very
nice place, but it was not open and free like this farm.I take a walk
every morning that the sun shines.I go out among the horses and cows,
and stop to watch the hens pecking at their food.This is a happy place,
and I hope my dear Miss Laura will live to enjoy it many years after I
am gone.The pigs bother me a little in the spring, by
rooting up the bones that I bury in the fields in the fall, but that is
a small matter, and I try not to mind it.I get a great many bones here,
and I should be glad if I had some poor, city dogs to help me eat them.I don't think bones are good for pigs.Harry's tame squirrel out in one of the barns that
teases me considerably.He knows that I can't chase him, now that my
legs are so stiff with rheumatism, and he takes delight in showing me
how spry he can be, darting around me and whisking his tail almost in my
face, and trying to get me to run after him, so that he can laugh at me.I don't think that he is a very thoughtful squirrel, but I try not to
notice him.The sailor boy who gave Bella to the Morrises has got to be a large,
stout man, and is the first mate of a vessel.He sometimes comes here,
and when he does, he always brings the Morrises presents of foreign
fruits and curiosities of different kinds.Malta, the cat, is still living, and is with Mrs.Daniel travelled to the hallway.Davy, the rat,
is gone, so is poor old Jim.He went away one day last summer, and no
one ever knew what became of him.The Morrises searched everywhere for
him, and offered a large reward to any one who would find him, but he
never turned up again.I think that he felt he was going to die, and
went into some out-of-the-way place.He remembered how badly Miss Laura
felt when Dandy died, and he wanted to spare her the greater sorrow of
his death.He was always such a thoughtful dog, and so anxious not to
give trouble.I could not go away from Miss Laura
even to die.John moved to the hallway.When my last hour comes, I want to see her gentle face
bending over me, and then I shall not mind how much I suffer.She is just as tender-hearted as ever, but she tries not to feel too
badly about the sorrow and suffering in the world, because she says that
would weaken her, and she wants all her strength to try to put a stop to
some of it.She does a great deal of good in Riverdale, and I do not
think that there is any one in all the country around who is as much
beloved as she is.She has never forgotten the resolve that she made some years ago, that
she would do all that she could to protect dumb creatures.Maxwell's work is largely done in
Boston, and Miss Laura and Mr.Harry have to do the most of theirs by
writing, for Riverdale has got to be a model village in respect of the
treatment of all kinds of animals.It is a model village not only in
that respect, but in others.It has seemed as if all other improvements
went hand in hand with the humane treatment of animals.Thoughtfulness
toward lower creatures has made the people more and more thoughtful
toward themselves, and this little town is getting to have quite a name
through the State for its good schools, good society, and good business
and religious standing.Many people are moving into it, to educate their
children.The Riverdale people are very particular about what sort of
strangers come to live among them.A man, who came here two years ago and opened a shop, was seen kicking a
small kitten out of his house.The next day a committee of Riverdale
citizens waited on him, and said they had had a great deal of trouble to
root out cruelty from their village, and they didn't want any one to
come there and introduce it again, and they thought he had better move
on to some other place.The man was utterly astonished, and said he'd never heard of such
particular people.He didn't think
that the kitten cared; but now when he turned the thing over in his
mind, he didn't suppose cats liked being kicked about any more than he
would like it himself, and he would promise to be kind to them in
future.He said, too, that if they had no objection, he would just stay
on, for if the people there treated dumb animals with such
consideration, they would certainly treat human beings better, and he
thought it would be a good place to bring up his children in.Of course
they let him stay, and he is now a man who is celebrated for his
kindness to every living thing; and he never refuses to help Miss Laura
when she goes to him for money to carry out any of her humane schemes.Mary went to the hallway.There is one most important saying of Miss Laura's that comes out of her
years of service for dumb animals that I must put in before I close, and
it is this.Daniel journeyed to the office.She says that cruel and vicious owners of animals should be
punished; but to merely thoughtless people, don't say "Don't" so much.Don't go to them and say, "Don't overfeed your animals, and don't starve
them, and don't overwork them, and don't beat them," and so on through
the long list of hardships that can be put upon suffering animals, but
say simply to them, "Be kind.Make a study of your animals' wants, and
see that they are satisfied.No one can tell you how to treat your
animal as well as you should know yourself, for you are with it all the
time, and know its disposition, and just how much work it can stand, and
how much rest and food it needs, and just how it is different from every
other animal.If it is sick or unhappy, you are the one to take care of
it; for nearly every animal loves its own master better than a stranger,
and will get well quicker under his care."Miss Laura says that if men and women are kind in every respect to their
dumb servants, they will be astonished to find how much happiness they
will bring into their lives, and how faithful and grateful their dumb
animals will be to them.Good-bye to the boys and girls who
may read it; and if it is not wrong for a dog to say it, I should like
to add, "God bless you all."If in my feeble way I have been able to
impress you with the fact that dogs and many other animals love their
masters and mistresses, and live only to please them, my little story
will not be written in vain.My last words are, "Boys and girls, be kind
to dumb animals, not only because you will lose nothing by it, but
because you ought to; for they were placed on the earth by the same Kind
Hand that made all living creatures."My people are not terrified by any such
considerations.* * * They have no fears of the future if driven to
rely on themselves.The Southern States have more territory than all
the Colonies had when they Seceded from Great Britain, and a better
territory.Taking its position, climate, and fertility into
consideration, there is not upon Earth a body of territory superior to
it.* * * The Southern States have, too, at this day, four times the
population the Colonies had when they Seceded from Great Britain.Their
exports to the North and to Foreign Countries were, last year, more than
$300,000,000; and a duty of ten per cent.Daniel journeyed to the kitchen.upon the same amount of
imports would give $30,000,000 of revenue--twice as much as General
Jackson's administration spent in its first year.Everybody can see,
too, how the bringing in of $300,000,000 of imports into Southern ports
would enliven business in our seaboard towns.I have seen with some
satisfaction, also, Mr.President, that the war made upon us has
benefitted certain branches of industry in my State.There are
manufacturing establishments in North Carolina, the proprietors of which
tell me that they are making fifty per cent.annually on their whole
capital, and yet cannot supply one tenth of the demand for their
production.duties in excluding
products from abroad, would give life and impetus to mechanical and
manufacturing industry, throughout the entire South.Our people
understand these things, and they are not afraid of results, if forced
to declare Independence.Indeed I do not see why Northern Republicans
should wish to continue a connection with us upon any terms.* * *
They want High Tariff likewise.if they choose, upon their own imports, and nobody on our side will
complain.They may spend all the money they raise on railroads, or
opening harbors, or anything on earth they desire, without interference
from us; and it does seem to me that if they are sincere in their views
they ought to welcome a separation."From the very commencement of this long three-months debate, it was the
policy of the Southern leaders to make it appear that the Southern
States were in an attitude of injured innocence and defensiveness
against Northern aggression.Hence, it was that, as early as December
5th, on the floor of the Senate, through |
kitchen | Where is Daniel? | Brown, of Mississippi, they
declared: "All we ask is to be allowed to depart in Peace.Submit we
will not; and if, because we will not submit to your domination, you
choose to make War upon us, let God defend the Right!"At the same time it was esteemed necessary to try and frighten the North
into acquiescence with this demand to be "let alone."Hence such
utterances as those of Clingman and Iverson, to which reference has
already been made, and the especially defiant close of the latter's
speech, when--replying to the temperate but firm Union utterances of Mr.John travelled to the bathroom.Hale--the Georgia Senator said: "Sir, I do not believe there will be any
War; but if War is to come, let it come; we will meet the Senator from
New Hampshire and all the myrmidons of Abolitionism and Black
Republicanism everywhere upon our own soil; and, in the language of a
distinguished member from Ohio in relation to the Mexican War, we will
'welcome you with bloody hands to hospitable graves.'"On the other hand, in order to encourage the revolting States to the
speedy commission of overt acts of Rebellion and violence, that would
precipitate War without a peradventure, utterances fell from Southern
lips, in the National Senate Chamber, like those of Mr.Wigfall, when he
said, during this first day of the debate: "Frederick the Great, on one
occasion, when he had trumped up an old title to some of the adjacent
territory, quietly put himself in possession and then offered to treat.Sandra moved to the hallway.Were I a South Carolinian, as I am a Texan, and I knew that my State was
going out of the Union, and that this Government would attempt to use
force, I would, at the first moment that that fact became manifest,
seize upon the Forts and the arms and the munitions of war, and raise
the cry 'To your tents, O Israel, and to the God of battles be this
issue!"And, as we have already seen, the Rebels of the South were not slow in
following the baleful advice to the letter.But it was not many days
after this utterance when the Conspirators against the Union evidently
began to fear that the ground for Rebellion, upon which they had planted
themselves, would be taken from under their feet by the impulse of
Compromise and Concession which stirred so strongly the fraternal spirit
of the North.That peaceful impulse must be checked and exasperated by
sneers and impossible demands.Hence, on December 12th we find one of
the most active and favorite mouthpieces of Treason, Mr.Wigfall,
putting forth such demands, in his most offensive manner.Said he: "If the two Senators from New York (Seward and King), the
Senator from Ohio (Wade), the two Senators from Illinois (Douglas and
Trumbull), the Senator from New Hampshire (Hale), the Senator from
Maine, and others who are regarded as representative men, who have
denied that by the Constitution of the United States, Slaves are
recognized as Property; who have urged and advocated those acts which we
regard as aggressive on the part of the People--if they will rise here,
and say in their places, that they desire to propose amendments to the
Constitution, and beg that we will vote for them; that they will, in
good faith, go to their respective constituencies and urge the
ratification; that they believe, if these Gulf States will suspend their
action, that those amendments will be ratified and carried out in good
faith; that they will cease preaching this 'irrepressible conflict'; and
if, in those amendments, it is declared that Slaves are Property, that
they shall be delivered up upon demand; and that they will assure us
that Abolition societies shall be abolished; that Abolition speeches
shall no longer be made; that we shall have peace and quiet; that we
shall not be called cut-throats and pirates and murderers; that our
women shall not be slandered--these things being said in good faith, the
Senators begging that we will stay our hand until an honest effort can
be made, I believe that there is a prospect of giving them a fair
consideration!"Small wonder is it, that this labored and ridiculous piece of
impertinence was received with ironical laughter on the Republican side
of the Senate Chamber.And it was in reference to these threats, and
these preposterous demands--including the suppression of the right of
Free Discussion and Liberty of the Press--that, in the same chamber
(January 7, 1861) the gallant and eloquent Baker said:
"Your Fathers had fought for that right, and more than that, they had
declared that the violation of that right was one of the great causes
which impelled them to the Separation.* * * Sir, the Liberty of the
Press is the highest safeguard to all Free Government.It is with us, nay, with all men, like a great
exulting and abounding river, It is fed by the dews of Heaven, which
distil their sweetest drops to form it.It gushes from the rill, as it
breaks from the deep caverns of the Earth.It is fed by a thousand
affluents, that dash from the mountaintop to separate again into a
thousand bounteous and irrigating rills around.On its broad bosom it
bears a thousand barks.There, Poetry dips its silver oar.There, Art, Invention, Discovery,
Science, Morality, Religion, may safely and securely float.It is a genial, cordial source of thought and
inspiration, wherever it touches, whatever it surrounds.Sir, upon its
borders, there grows every flower of Grace and every fruit of Truth.I
am not here to deny that that Stream sometimes becomes a dangerous
Torrent, and destroys towns and cities upon its bank; but I am here to
say that without it, Civilization, Humanity, Government, all that makes
Society itself, would disappear, and the World would return to its
ancient Barbarism."Sir, if that were to be possible, or so thought for a moment, the fine
conception of the great Poet would be realized.If that were to be
possible, though but for a moment, Civilization itself would roll the
wheels of its car backward for two thousand years.Sir, if that were
so, it would be true that:
'As one by one in dread Medea's train,
Star after Star fades off th' ethereal plain,
Thus at her fell approach and secret might,
Art after art goes out, and all is night.Philosophy, that leaned on Heaven before,
Sinks to her second cause, and is no more.Religion, blushing, veils her sacred fires,
And, unawares, Morality expires.'"Sir, we will not risk these consequences, even for Slavery; we will not
risk these consequences even for Union; we will not risk these
consequences to avoid that Civil War with which you threaten us; that
War which, you announce so deadly, and which you declare to be
inevitable.* * * I will never yield to the idea that the great
Government of this Country shall protect Slavery in any Territory now
ours, or hereafter to be acquired.It is, in my opinion, a great
principle of Free Government, not, to be surrendered."It is in my judgment, the object of the great battle which we have
fought, and which we have won.It is, in my poor opinion, the point
upon which there is concord and agreement between the great masses of
the North, who may agree in no other political opinion whatever.Be he
Republican, or Democrat, or Douglas man, or Lincoln man; be he from the
North, or the West, from Oregon, or from Maine, in my judgment
nine-tenths of the entire population of the North and West are devoted,
in the very depths of their hearts, to the great Constitutional idea
that Freedom is the rule, that Slavery is the exception, that it ought
not to be extended by virtue of the powers of the Government of the
United States; and, come weal, come woe, it never shall be."But, sir, I add one other thing.When you talk to me about Compromise
or Concession, I am not sure that I always understand you.Daniel travelled to the kitchen.Daniel travelled to the hallway.John moved to the hallway.Do you mean
that I am to give up my convictions of right?Armies cannot compel that
in the breast of a Free People.Do you mean that I am to concede the
benefits of the political struggle through which we have passed,
considered politically, only?You are too just and too generous to ask
that.Do you mean that we are to deny the great principle upon which
our political action has been based?But if you
mean by Compromise and Concession to ask us to see whether we have not
been hasty, angry, passionate, excited, and in many respects violated
your feelings, your character, your right of property, we will look;
and, as I said yesterday, if we have, we will undo it.Allow me to say
again, if there be any lawyer or any Court that will advise us that our
laws are unconstitutional, we will repeal them.I will not yield one inch to Secession; but there
are things that I will yield, and there are things to which I will
yield.It is somewhere told that when Harold of England received a
messenger from a brother with whom he was at variance, to inquire on
what terms reconciliation and peace could be effected between brothers,
he replied in a gallant and generous spirit in a few words, 'the, terms
I offer are the affection of a brother; and the Earldom of
Northumberland.'And, said the Envoy, as he marched up the Hall amid
the warriors that graced the state of the King, 'if Tosti, thy brother,
agree to this, what terms will you allow to his ally and friend,
Hadrada, the giant.''We will allow,' said Harold, 'to Hadrada, the
giant, seven feet of English ground, and if he be, as they say, a giant,
some few inches more!'and, as he spake, the Hall rang with acclamation.I follow, at a humble distance, the ideas
and the words of Clay, illustrious, to be venerated, and honored, and
remembered, forever.* * * He said--I say: that I will yield no inch,
no word, to the threat of Secession, unconstitutional, revolutionary,
dangerous, unwise, at variance with the heart and the hope of all
mankind save themselves.To that I yield nothing; but if States loyal
to the Constitution, if people magnanimous and just, desiring a return
of fraternal feeling, shall come to us and ask for Peace, for permanent,
enduring peace and affection, and say, 'What will you grant?I say to
them, 'Ask all that a gentleman ought to propose, and I will yield all
that a gentleman ought to offer.'Nay, more: if you are galled because
we claim the right to prohibit Slavery in territory now Free, or in any
Territory which acknowledges our jurisdiction, we will evade--I speak
but for myself--I will aid in evading that question; I will agree to
make it all States, and let the People decide at once.I will agree to
place them in that condition where the prohibition of Slavery will never
be necessary to justify ourselves to our consciences or to our
constituents.I will agree to anything which is not to force upon me
the necessity of protecting Slavery in the name of Freedom.To that I
never can and never will yield."The speeches of Seward, of Douglas, of Crittenden, of Andrew Johnson, of
Baker, and others, in behalf of the Union, and those of Benjamin, Davis,
Wigfall, Lane, and others, in behalf of Secession, did much toward
fixing the responsibility for the approaching bloody conflict where it
belonged.The speeches of Andrew Johnson of Tennessee--who, if he at a
subsequent period of the Nation's history, proved himself not the
worthiest son of the Republic, at this critical time, at all events, did
grand service in the National Senate--especially had great and good
effect on the public mind in the Northern and Border States.They were,
therefore, gall and wormwood to the Secession leaders, who hoped to drag
the Border States into the great Southern Confederacy of States already
in process of formation.Their irritation was shown in threats of personal violence to Mr.Johnson, as when Wigfall--replying February 7th, 1861, to the latter's
speech, said, "Now if the Senator wishes to denounce Secession and
Nullification eo nomine, let him go back and denounce Jefferson; let him
denounce Jackson, if he dare, and go back and look that Tennessee
Democracy in the face, and see whether they will content themselves with
riddling his effigy!"It would seem also, from another part of Wigfall's reply, that the
speeches of Union Senators had been so effective that a necessity was
felt on the part of the Southern Conspirators to still further attempt
to justify Secession by shifting the blame to Northern shoulders, for,
while referring to the Presidential canvass of 1860--and the attitude of
the Southern Secession leaders during that exciting period--he said:
"We (Breckinridge-Democrats) gave notice, both North and South, that if
Abraham Lincoln was elected, this Union was dissolved.I never made a
speech during the canvass without asserting that fact.* * * Then, I
say, that our purpose was not to dissolve the Union; but the dire
necessity has been put upon us.The question is, whether we shall live
longer in a Union in which a Party, hostile to us in every respect, has
the power in Congress, in the Executive department, and in the Electoral
Colleges--a Party who will have the power even in the Judiciary.We say that each State has the clear indisputable
right to withdraw if she sees fit; and six of the States have already
withdrawn, and one other State is upon the eve of withdrawing, if she
has not already done so.Mary went to the hallway.How far this will spread no man can tell!"Daniel journeyed to the office.Daniel journeyed to the kitchen.As tending to show the peculiar mixture of brag, cajolery, and threats,
involved in the attitude of the South, as expressed by the same favorite
Southern mouthpiece, toward the Border-States on the one hand, and the
Middle and New England States on the other, a further extract from this
(February 7th) speech of the Texan Senator may be of interest.Said he:
"With exports to the amount of hundreds of millions of dollars, our
imports must be the same.With a lighter Tariff than any people ever
undertook to live under, we could have larger revenue.We would be able
to stand Direct Taxation to a greater extent than any people ever could
before, since the creation of the World.Mary moved to the office.We feel perfectly competent to
meet all issues that may be presented, either by hostility from abroad
or treason at home.So far as the Border-States are concerned, it is a
matter that concerns them alone.Should they confederate with us,
beyond all doubt New England machinery will be worked with the water
power of Tennessee, of Kentucky, of Virginia and of Maryland; the Tariff
laws that now give New England the monopoly in the thirty-three States,
will give to these Border States a monopoly in the Slave-holding States.Should the non-Slave-holding States choose to side against us in
organizing their Governments, and cling to their New England brethren,
the only result will be, that the meat, the horses, the hemp, and the
grain, which we now buy in Pennsylvania, in Ohio, in Indiana and
Illinois, will be purchased in Kentucky and in Western Virginia and in
Missouri.Mary went to the bedroom.Should Pennsylvania stand out, the only result will be, that
the iron which is now dug in Pennsylvania, will be dug in the mountains
of Tennessee and of Virginia and of Kentucky and of North Carolina."We feel no anxiety at all, so far as money or men are concerned.We
desire War with nobody; we intend to make no War; but we intend to live
under just such a Government as we see fit.Six States have left this
Union, and others are going to leave it simply because they choose to do
it; that is all.We |
kitchen | Where is Sandra? | We
have revoked our ratification of the Treaty commonly known as the
Constitution of the United States; a treaty for common defense and
general welfare; and we shall be perfectly willing to enter into another
Treaty with you, of peace and amity.Reject the olive branch and offer
us the sword, and we accept it; we have not the slightest objection.Upon that subject we feel as the great William Lowndes felt upon another
important subject, the Presidency, which he said was neither to be
sought nor declined.When you invade our soil, look to your own
borders.You say that you have too many people, too many towns, too
dense a population, for us to invade you.I say to you Senators, that
there is nothing that ever stops the march of an invading force, except
a desert.The more populous a country, the more easy it is to subsist
an army."After declaring that--"Not only are our non-Slaveholders loyal, but even
our <DW64>s are.We have no apprehensions whatever of insurrection--not
the slightest.We can arm our <DW64>s, and leave them at home, when we
are temporarily absent"--Mr.Wigfall proceeded to say: "We may as well
talk plainly about this matter.This is probably the last time I shall
have an opportunity of addressing you.There is another thing that an
invading army cannot do.You can pull
down fences, but the <DW64>s will put them up the next morning.The
worst fuel that ever a man undertook to make fire with, is dirt; it will
not burn.Now I have told you what an invading army cannot do.Suppose
I reverse the picture and tell you what it can do.An invading army in
an enemy's country, where there is a dense population, can subsist
itself at a very little cost; it does not always pay for what it gets.An invading army can burn down towns; an invading army can burn down
manufactories; and it can starve operatives.But an Invading army, and an army to defend a Country, both
require a military chest.You may bankrupt every man south of North
Carolina, so that his credit is reduced to such a point that he could
not discount a note for thirty dollars, at thirty days; but the next
autumn those Cotton States will have just as much money and as much
credit as they had before.Every
time that a <DW64> touches a cotton-pod with his hand, he pulls a piece
of silver out of it, and he drops it into the basket in which it is
carried to the gin-house.A bale
of cotton rolls out-in other words, five ten-dollar pieces roll out
--covered with canvas.We shall never again make less than five million
bales of cotton.* * * We can produce five million bales of cotton,
every bale worth fifty dollars, which is the lowest market price it has
been for years past.Daniel journeyed to the hallway.We shall import a bale of something else, for
every bale of cotton that we export, and that bale will be worth fifty
dollars.We shall find no difficulty under a War-Tariff in raising an
abundance of money.We have been at Peace for a very long time, We are
very prosperous.Our planters use their cotton, not to buy the
necessaries of life, but for the superfluities, which they can do
without.The States themselves have a mine of wealth in the loyalty and
the wealth of their citizens.Georgia, Mississippi, any one of those
States can issue its six per cent.bonds tomorrow, and receive cotton in
payment to the extent almost of the entire crop.They can first borrow
from their own citizens; they can tax them to an almost unlimited
extent; and they can raise revenue from a Tariff to an almost unlimited
extent.You have been telling us
here for the last quarter of a century, that you cannot manufacture,
even for the home market, under the Tariffs which we have given you.When this Tariff ceases to operate in your favor, and you have to pay
for coming into our markets, what will you export?When your machinery
ceases to move, and your operatives are turned out, will you tax your
broken capitalist or your starving operative?When the navigation laws
cease to operate, what will become of your shipping interest?You are
going to blockade our ports, you say.That is a very innocent game; and
you suppose we shall sit quietly down and submit to a blockade.I speak
not of foreign interference, for we look not for it.Sandra travelled to the kitchen.We are just as
competent to take Queen Victoria and Louis Napoleon under our
protection, as they are to take us; and they are a great deal more
interested to-day in receiving cotton from our ports than we are in
shipping it.You may lock up every bale of cotton within the limits of
the eight Cotton States, and not allow us to export one for three years,
and we shall not feel it further than our military resources are
concerned.Exhaust the supply of cotton in Europe for one week, and all
Europe is in revolution.Do you suppose we shall do
nothing, even upon the sea?How many letters of marque and reprisal
would it take to put the whole of your ships up at your wharves to rot?Will any merchant at Havre, or Liverpool, or any other portion of the
habitable globe, ship a cargo upon a New England, or New York, or
Philadelphia clipper, or other ship, when he knows that the seas are
swarming with letters of marque and reprisal?Why the mere apprehension
of such a thing will cut you out of the Carrying Trade of the civilized
World.* * * I speak not of the absurdity of the position that you can
blockade our ports, admitting at the same time that we are in the Union.Blockade is a remedy, as all writers on International law say, against a
Foreign Power with whom you are at War.You cannot use a blockade
against your own people.That is a
remedy against a Foreign Nation with whom you expect to be at War.You
must treat us as in the Union, or out of it.We are
willing to live at peace with you; but, as sure as fate, whenever any
flag comes into one of our ports, that has thirty-three stars upon it,
that flag will be fired at.Displaying a flag with stars which we have
plucked from that bright galaxy, is an insult to the State within whose
waters that flag is displayed.You cannot enforce the laws without
Coercion, and you cannot Coerce without War."These matters, then, can be settled.By withdrawing your troops;
admitting our right to Self-government clearly, unqualifiedly.Do this,
and there is no difficulty about it.Very well; we have no objection--none whatever.When
you have attempted it, you will find that you have made War.I come here to plead for Peace; but I have seen so
much and felt so much, that I am becoming at last, to tell the plain
truth of the matter, rather indifferent as to which way the thing turns.If you want War, you can have it.If you want Peace, you can get it;
but I plead not for Peace."Meanwhile the Seceding States of the South were strengthening their
attitude by Confederation.On February 4, 1861, the Convention of
Seceding States, called by the South Carolina Convention at the time of
her Secession, met, in pursuance of that call, at Montgomery, Alabama,
and on the 9th adopted a Provisional Constitution and organized a
Provisional Government by the election of Jefferson Davis of
Mississippi, as President, and Alexander H. Stephens of Georgia, as
Vice-President; to serve until a Presidential election could be held by
the people of the Confederacy.[At a later day, March 11, 1861, a permanent Constitution for the
"Confederate States" was adopted, and, in the Fall of the same
year, Messrs.Davis and Stephens were elected by popular vote, for
the term of six years ensuing, as President and Vice-President,
respectively, of the Confederacy.]Davis almost at once left Jackson, Mississippi, for Montgomery,
where he arrived and delivered his Inaugural, February 17, having
received on his road thither a succession of ovations from the
enthusiastic Rebels, to which he had responded with no less than
twenty-five speeches, very similar in tone to those made in the United
States Senate by Mr.Wigfall and others of that ilk--breathing at once
defiance and hopefulness, while admitting the difficulties in the way
of the new Confederacy."It may be," said he, at Jackson, "that we will be confronted by War;
that the attempt will be made to blockade our ports, to starve us out;
but they (the Union men of the North) know little of the Southern heart,
of Southern endurance.No amount of privation could force us to remain
in a Union on unequal terms.England and France would not allow our
great staple to be dammed up within our present limits; the starving
thousands in their midst would not allow it.We have nothing to
apprehend from Blockade.But if they attempt invasion by land, we must
take the War out of our territory.If War must come, it must be upon
Northern, and not upon Southern soil.In the meantime, if they were
prepared to grant us Peace, to recognize our equality, all is well."And, in his speech at Stevenson, Alabama, said he "Your Border States
will gladly come into the Southern Confederacy within sixty days, as we
will be their only friends.England will recognize us, and a glorious
future is before us.The grass will grow in the Northern cities, where
the pavements have been worn off by the tread of Commerce.We will
carry War where it is easy to advance--where food for the sword and
torch await our Armies in the densely populated cities; and though they
may come and spoil our crops, we can raise them as before; while they
cannot rear the cities which took years of industry and millions of
money to build."Very different in tone to these, were the kindly and sensible utterances
of Mr.Lincoln on his journey from Springfield to Washington, about the
same time, for Inauguration as President of the United States.Leaving
Springfield, Illinois, February 11th, he had pathetically said:
"My friends: No one, not in my position, can realize the sadness I feel
at this parting.To this people I owe all that I am.Here I have lived
more than a quarter of a century.Here my children were born, and here
one of them lies buried.I know not how soon I shall see you again.I
go to assume a task more difficult than that which has devolved upon any
other man since the days of Washington.He never would have succeeded
except for the aid of Divine Providence, upon which he at all times
relied.I feel that I cannot succeed without the same Divine blessing
which sustained him; and on the same Almighty Being I place my reliance
for support.And I hope you, my friends, will all pray that I may
receive that Divine assistance, without which I cannot succeed, but with
which success is certain.At Indianapolis, that evening, the eve of his birthday anniversary,
after thanking the assembled thousands for their "magnificent welcome,"
and defining the words "Coercion" and "Invasion"--at that time so
loosely used--he continued: "But if the United States should merely hold
and retake her own Forts and other property, and collect the duties on
foreign importation, or even withhold the mails from places where they
were habitually violated, would any or all of these things be 'Invasion'
or 'Coercion'?Do our professed lovers of the Union, who spitefully
resolve that they will resist Coercion and Invasion, understand that
such things as these on the part of the United States would be
'Coercion' or 'Invasion' of a State?If so, their idea of means to
preserve the object of their great affection would seem to be
exceedingly thin and airy."At Columbus, Ohio, he spoke in a like calm, conservative, reasoning way
--with the evident purpose of throwing oil on the troubled waters--when
he said: "I have not maintained silence from any want of real anxiety.It is a good thing that there is no more than anxiety; for there is
nothing going wrong.It is a consoling circumstance that, when we look
out, there is nothing that really hurts anybody.We entertain different
views upon political questions; but nobody is suffering anything.This
is a consoling circumstance; and from it we may conclude that all we
want is time, patience, and a reliance on that God who has never
forsaken this People."So, too, at Pittsburg, Pa., February 15th, he said, of "our friends," as
he termed them, the Secessionists: "Take even their own views of the
questions involved, and there is nothing to justify the course they are
pursuing.I repeat, then, there is no crisis, except such an one as may
be gotten up at any time by turbulent men, aided by designing
politicians.My advice to them, under the circumstances, is to keep
cool.If the great American People only keep their temper both sides of
the line, the trouble will come to an end, and the question which now
distracts the Country be settled, just as surely as all other
difficulties, of a like character, which have been originated in this
Government, have been adjusted.Let the people on both sides keep their
self-possession, and, just as other clouds have cleared away in due
time, so will this great Nation continue to prosper as heretofore."And toward the end of that journey, on the 22nd of February
--Washington's Birthday--in the Independence Hall at Philadelphia, after
eloquently affirming his belief that "the great principle or idea that
kept this Confederacy so long together was * * * that sentiment in the
Declaration of Independence which gave Liberty not alone to the People
of this Country, but" he hoped "to the World, for all future time * * *
which gave promise that, in due time, the weight would be lifted from
the shoulders of all men"--he added, in the same firm, yet temperate and
reassuring vein: "Now, my friends, can this Country be saved on that
basis?If it can, I will consider myself one of the happiest men in the
world, if I can help to save it.If it cannot be saved on that basis,
it will be truly awful.But, if this Country cannot be saved without
giving up that principle, I was about to say I would rather be
assassinated on this spot than surrender it.Now in my view of the
present aspect of affairs, there need be no bloodshed or War.I am not in favor of such a course; and I may say,
in advance, that there will be no bloodshed, unless it be forced upon
the Government, and then it will be compelled to act in self-defense.*
* * I have said nothing but what I am willing to live by, and, if it be
the pleasure of Almighty God, to die by."Thus, as he progressed on that memorable journey from his home in
Illinois, through Indianapolis, Cincinnati, Columbus, Pittsburgh,
Cleveland, Erie, Buffalo, Albany, New York, Trenton, Newark,
Philadelphia, and Harrisburg-amid the prayers and blessings and
acclamations of an enthusiastic and patriotic people--he uttered words
of wise conciliation and firm moderation such as beseemed the high
functions and tremendous responsibilities to which the voice of that
liberty--and-union-loving people had called him, and this too, with a
full knowledge, when he made the Philadelphia speech, that the enemies
of the Republic had already planned to assassinate him before he could
reach Washington.The prudence of his immediate friends, fortunately defeated the
murderous purpose--and by the simple device of taking the regular night
express from Philadelphia instead of a special train next day--to
Washington, he reached the National Capital without molestation early on
the morning of the 23rd of February.Lincoln's arrival, in company with Mr.Lovejoy,
the writer visited him at Willard's Hotel.During the interview both
urged him to "Go right along, protect the property of the Country, and
put down the Rebellion, no matter at what cost in men and money."He
listened with grave attention, and said little, but very clearly
indicated his approval of all the sentiments thus expressed--and then,
with the same firm and manly and cheerful faith in the outcome, he
added: "As the Country has placed me at the helm of the Ship, I'll try
to steer her through."The spirit in which he proposed to accomplish this superhuman task, |
office | Where is Sandra? | And what was the
response of the South to this generous and conciliatory message?Personal sneers--imputations of Northern cowardice--boasts of Southern
prowess--scornful rejection of all compromise--and an insolent challenge
to the bloody issue of arms!Wigfall, in the United States Senate, on March 2d, alluding to
Mr.Lincoln, "I do not think that a man who disguises himself in a
soldier's cloak and a Scotch cap (a more thorough disguise could not be
assumed by such a man) and makes his entry between day and day, into the
Capital of the Country that he is to govern--I hardly think that he is
going to look War sternly in the face.Wigfall been able at this time to look four years into the
future and behold the downfall of the Southern Rebellion, the
flight of its Chieftains, and the capture of Jefferson Davis while
endeavoring to escape, with his body enclosed in a wrapper and a
woman's shawl over his head, as stated by Lieutenant-Colonel Stuart
of Jefferson Davis's Staff, p.ii., Greeley's American
Conflict--he would hardly have retailed this slander.]"I look for nothing else than that the Commissioners from the
Confederated States will be received here and recognized by Abraham
Lincoln.I will now predict that this Republican Party that is going to
enforce the Laws, preserve the Union, and collect Revenue, will never
attempt anything so silly; and that instead of taking Forts, the troops
will be withdrawn from those which we now have.See if this does not
turn out to be so, in less than a week or ten days."In the same insulting diatribe, he said: "It is very easy for men to
bluster who know there is going to be no danger.Four or five million
people living in a territory that extends from North Carolina down to
the Rio Grande, who have exports to above three hundred million dollars,
whose ports cannot be blockaded, but who can issue letters of marque and
reprisal, and sweep your commerce from the seas, and who will do it, are
not going to be trifled with by that sensible Yankee nation.I did think, at one time, there was going to be War; I do not
think so now.* * * The Star of the West swaggered into Charleston
harbor, received a blow planted full in the face, and staggered out.Your flag has been insulted; redress it if you dare!He used to speak of them as
devils and hell-hounds, and ridicule them in every possible way; and
endeavoured to make me speak of them and regard them in the same manner.He would tell long stories about hunting and shooting "runaway <DW65>s,"
and detail with great apparent satisfaction the cruel and horrid
punishments which he had inflicted.He
had once whipped a slave so severely that he died in consequence of it,
and it was soon after ascertained that he was wholly innocent of the
offence charged against him.That slave, he said, had haunted him
ever since.Soon after we commenced weeding our cotton, some of the hands who were
threatened with a whipping for not finishing their tasks, ran away.The
overseer and myself went out after them, taking with us five
bloodhounds, which were kept on the Estate for the sole purpose of
catching runaways.There were no other hounds in the vicinity, and the
overseers of the neighboring plantations used to borrow them to hunt
their runaways.Crop, who lived about ten miles distant, had two
packs, and made it his sole business to catch slaves with them.We used
to set the dogs upon the track of the fugitives, and they would follow
them until, to save themselves from being torn in pieces, they would
climb into a tree, where the dogs kept them until we came up and
secured them.These hounds, when young, are taught to run after the <DW64> boys; and
being always kept confined except when let out in pursuit of runaways,
they seldom fail of overtaking the fugitive, and seem to enjoy the sport
of hunting men as much as other dogs do that of chasing a fox or a deer.My master gave a large sum for his five dogs,--a slut and her
four puppies.Daniel journeyed to the hallway.While going over our cotton picking for the last time, one of our hands
named Little John, ran away.The next evening the dogs were started on
his track.We followed them awhile, until we knew by their ceasing to
bark that they had found him.Their
jaws, heads, and feet, were bloody.The overseer looked at them and
said, "he was afraid the dogs had killed the <DW65>."It being dark, we
could not find him that night.Early the next morning, we started off
with our neighbors, Sturtivant and Flincher; and after searching about
for some time, we found the body of Little John lying in the midst of a
thicket of cane.It was nearly naked, and dreadfully mangled and gashed
by the teeth of the dogs.They had evidently dragged it some yards
through the thicket: blood, tatters of clothes, and even the entrails of
the unfortunate man, were clinging to the stubs of the old and broken
cane.Huckstep stooped over his saddle, looked at the body, and muttered
an oath.Sturtivant swore it was no more than the fellow deserved.We
dug a hole in the cane-brake, where he lay, buried him, and
returned home.The murdered young man had a mother and two sisters on the plantation,
by whom he was dearly loved.When I told the old woman of what had
befallen her son, she only said that it was better for poor John than to
live in slavery.Late in the fall of this year, a young man, who had already run away
several times, was missing from his task.It was four days before we
found him.The dogs drove him at last up a tree, where he was caught,
and brought home.He was then fastened down to the ground by means of
forked sticks of wood selected for the purpose, the longest fork being
driven into the ground until the other closed down upon the neck,
ancles, and wrists.The overseer then sent for two large cats belonging
to the house.These he placed upon the naked shoulders of his victim,
and dragged them suddenly by their tails downward.At first they did not
scratch deeply.He then ordered me to strike them with a small stick
after he had placed them once more upon the back of the sufferer.I did
so; and the enraged animals extended their claws, and tore his back
deeply and cruelly as they were dragged along it.He was then whipped
and placed in the stocks, where he was kept for three days.On the third
morning as I passed the stocks, I stopped to look at him.His head hung
down over the chain which supported his neck.I spoke, but he did not
answer.The overseer on seeing him seemed
surprised, and, I thought, manifested some remorse.Four of the field
hands took him out of the stocks and buried him: and every thing went
on as usual.It is not in my power to give a narrative of the daily occurrences on
the plantation.The history of one day was that of all.The gloomy
monotony of our slavery, was only broken by the overseer's periodical
fits of drunkenness, at which times neither life nor limb on the estate
were secure from his caprice or violence.In the spring of 1835, the overseer brought me a letter from my wife,
written for her by her young mistress, Mr.He read
it to me: it stated that herself and children were well--spoke of her
sad and heavy disappointment in consequence of my not returning with my
master; and of her having been told by him that I should come back the
next fall.Hope for a moment lightened my heart; and I indulged the idea of once
more returning to the bosom of my family.But I recollected that my
master had already cruelly deceived me; and despair again took hold
on me.Sandra travelled to the kitchen.Among our hands was one whom we used to call Big Harry.He was a stout,
athletic man--very intelligent, and an excellent workman; but he was of
a high and proud spirit, which the weary and crushing weight of a life
of slavery had not been able to subdue.John journeyed to the hallway.On almost every plantation at
the South you may find one or more individuals, whose look and air show
that they have preserved their self-respect as _men_;--that with them
the power of the tyrant ends with the coercion of the body--that the
soul is free, and the inner man retaining the original uprightness of
the image of God.You may know them by the stern sobriety of their
countenances, and the contempt with which they regard the jests and
pastimes of their miserable and degraded companions, who, like Samson,
make sport for the keepers of their prison-house.These men are always
feared as well as hated by their task-masters.Harry had never been
whipped, and had always said that he would die rather than submit to it.He made no secret of his detestation of the overseer.While most of the
slaves took off their hats, with cowering submission, in his presence,
Harry always refused to do so.He never spoke to him except in a brief
answer to his questions.Master George, who knew, and dreaded the
indomitable spirit of the man, told the overseer, before he left the
plantation, to beware how he attempted to punish him.But, the habits of
tyranny in which Huckstep had so long indulged, had accustomed him to
abject submission, on the part of his subjects; and he could not endure
this upright and unbroken manliness.He used frequently to curse and
swear about him, and devise plans for punishing him on account of his
impudence as he called it.Sometime in August of this year,
there was a large quantity of yellow unpicked cotton lying in the gin
house.Harry was employed at night in removing the cotton see, which has
been thrown out by the gin.The rest of the male hands were engaged
during the day in weeding the cotton for the last time, and in the nigh,
in burning brush on the new lands clearing for the next year's crop.Harry was told one evening to go with the others and assist in burning
the brush.Sandra travelled to the office.He accordingly went and the next night a double quantity of
seed had accumulated in the gin house: and although he worked until
nearly 2 o'clock in the morning, he could not remove it all.The next morning the overseer came into the field, and demanded of me
why I had not whipped Harry for not removing all the cotton seed.He
then called aloud to Harry to come forward and be whipped.Harry
answered somewhat sternly that he would neither be struck by overseer
nor driver; that he had worked nearly all night, and had scarcely fallen
asleep when the horn blew to summon him to his toil in the field.The
overseer raved and threatened, but Harry paid no farther attention to
him.He then turned to me and asked me for my pistols, with a pair of
which he had furnished me.He growled
an oath, threw himself on his horse and left us.In the evening I found
him half drunk and raving like a madman.He said he would no longer bear
with that <DW65>'s insolence; but would whip him if it cost him his
life.He at length fixed upon a plan for seizing him; and told me that
he would go out in the morning, ride along by the side of Harry and talk
pleasantly to him, and then, while Harry was attending to him, I was to
steal upon him and knock him down, by a blow on the head, from the
loaded and heavy handle of my whip.I was compelled to promise to obey
his directions.The next morning when we got to the field I told Harry of the overseer's
plan, and advised him by all means to be on his guard and watch my
motions."Thank you James", said he,
"I'll take care that you don't touch me."Huckstep came into the field about 10 o'clock.He rode along by the side
of Harry talking and laughing.When I
saw that Harry's eye was upon me I aimed a blow at him intending however
to miss him.He evaded the blow and turned fiercely round with his hoe
uplifted, threatening to cut down any one who again attempted to strike
him.Huckstep cursed my awkwardness, and told Harry to put down his hoe
and came to him.He refused to do so and swore he would kill the first
man who tried to lay hands on him.The cowardly tyrant shrank away from
his enraged bondman, and for two weeks Harry was not again molested.About the first of September, the overseer had one of his drunken fits.He urged me to drink,
quarrelled and swore at me for declining, and chased the old woman round
the house, with his bottle of peach brandy.He then told me that Harry
had forgotten the attempt to seize him, and that is the morning we must
try our old game over again.On the following morning, as I was handing to each of the hands their
hoes from the tool house, I caught Harry's eye."Look out," said I to
him."Huckstep will be after you again to day."He uttered a deep curse
against the overseer and passed on to his work.After breakfast Huckstep
came riding out to the cotton field.He tied his horse to a tree, and
came towards us.His sallow and haggard countenance was flushed, and his
step unsteady.He came up by the side of Harry and began talking about
the crops and the weather; I came at the same time on the other side,
and in striking at him, beat off his hat.Huckstep with a dreadful oath commanded him to stop, saying
that he had determined to whip him, and neither earth nor hell should
prevent him.Harry defied him: and said he had always done the work
allotted to him and that was enough: he would sooner die than have the
accursed lash touch him.The overseer staggered to his horse, mounted
him and rode furiously to the house, and soon made his appearance,
returning, with his gun in his hand.said one of the women whose row was near
Harry's."Yes," said another, "He's trying to scare Harry with his gun.""Let him try as he pleases," said Harry, in his low, deep, determined
tones, "He may shoot me, but he can't whip me."Huckstep came swearing on: when within a few yards of Harry he stopped,
looked at him with a stare of mingled rage and drunken imbecility; and
bid him throw down his hoe and come forward.The undaunted slave refused
to comply, and continuing his work told the drunken demon to shoot if he
pleased.Huckstep advanced within a few steps of him when Harry raised
his hoe and told him to stand back.He stepped back a few paces, leveled
his gun and fired.Harry received the charge in his breast, and fell
instantly across a cotton row.He threw up his hands wildly, and
groaned, "Oh, Lord!"For my
own part I stood silent with horror.The cries of the women enraged the
overseer, he dropped his gun, and snatching the whip from my hand, with
horrid oaths, and imprecations fell to whipping them, laying about him
like a maniac.Upon Harry's sister he bestowed his blows without mercy,
commanding her to quit her screaming and go to work.The poor girl,
whose brother had thus been murdered before her eyes, could not wrestle
down the awful agony of her feelings, and the brutal tormentor left her
without effecting his object.He then, without going to look of his
victim, told four of the hands to carry him to the house, and taking up
his gun left the field.When we got to the poor fellow, he was alive,
and groaning faintly.The hands took him up, but before they reached the
house he was dead.Huckstep came out, and looked at him, and finding him
dead, ordered the hands to bury him.The burial of a slave in Alabama is
that of a brute.No coffin--no decent shroud--no prayer.A hole is dug,
and the body (sometimes enclosed in a rude box,) is thrown in without
further ceremony.From this time the overseer was regarded by the whole gang with
detestation and fear--as a being to whose rage and cruelty |
hallway | Where is Sandra? | Yet he was constantly telling us that he was the kindest of
overseers--that he was formerly somewhat severe in managing his hands,
but that now he was, if any thing, too indulgent.Indeed he had the
reputation of being a good overseer, and an excellent manager, when
sober.The slaves on some of the neighboring plantations were certainly
worse clothed and fed, and more frequently and cruelly whipped than
ours.Daniel journeyed to the hallway.Whenever the saw them they complained of over working and short
feeding.One of Flincher's, and one of Sturtivant's hands ran away,
while I was in Alabama: and after remaining in the woods awhile, and
despairing of being able to effect their escape, resolved to put an end
to their existence and their slavery together.Each twisted himself a
vine of the muscadine grape, and fastened one end around the limb of an
oak, and made a noose in the other.Jacob, Flincher's man, swung himself
off first, and expired after a long struggle.The other, horrified by
the contortions and agony of his comrade, dropped his noose, and was
retaken.When discovered, two or three days afterwards, the body of
Jacob was dreadfully torn and mangled, by the buzzards, those winged
hyenas and goules of the Southwest.Among the slaves who were brought from Virginia, were two young and
bright mulatto women, who were always understood throughout the
plantation to have been the daughters of the elder Larrimore, by one of
his slaves.Sarah, being in a
state of pregnancy, failed of executing her daily allotted task of
hoeing cotton.I was ordered to whip her, and on my remonstrating with
the overseer, and representing the condition of the woman, I was told
that my business was to obey orders, and that if I was told "to whip a
dead <DW65> I must do it."On Friday she also failed through weakness, and was
compelled to lie down in the field.Sandra travelled to the kitchen.That night the overseer himself
whipped her.On Saturday the wretched woman dragged herself once more to
the cotton field.In the burning sun, and in a situation which would
have called forth pity in the bosom of any one save a cotton-growing
overseer, she struggled to finish her task.She failed--nature could do
no more--and sick and despairing, she sought her cabin.There the
overseer met her and inflicted fifty more lashes upon her already
lacerated back.It brought no joy to that suffering
woman.Instead of the tones of the church bell summoning to the house of
prayer, she heard the dreadful sound of the lash falling upon the backs
of her brethren and sisters in bondage.For the voice of prayer she
heard curses.For the songs of Zion obscene and hateful blasphemies.No
bible was there with its consolations for the sick of heart.Faint and
fevered, scarred and smarting from the effects of her cruel punishment,
she lay upon her pallet of moss--dreading the coming of her relentless
persecutor,--who, in the madness of one of his periodical fits of
drunkenness, was now swearing and cursing through the quarters.Some of the poor woman's friends on the evening before, had attempted to
relieve her of the task which had been assigned her, but exhausted
nature, and the selfishness induced by their own miserable situation,
did not permit them to finish it and the overseer, on examination, found
that the week's work of the woman, was still deficient.After breakfast,
he ordered her to be tied up to the limb of a tree, by means of a rope
fastened round her wrists, so as to leave her feet about six inches from
the ground.She begged him to let her down for she was very sick.he exclaimed with a sneer and a laugh,--"I shall bleed you
then, and take out some of your Virginia blood.John journeyed to the hallway.You are too proud a miss
for Alabama."Swinging thus by her arms, she succeeded in
placing one of her feet against the body of the tree, and thus partly
supported herself, and relieved in some degree the painful weight upon
her wrists.He threw down his whip--took a rail from the garden fence,
ordered her feet to be tied together, and thrust the rail between them.He then ordered one of the hands to sit upon it.Her back at this time
was bare, but the strings of the only garment which she wore passed over
her shoulders and prevented the full force of the whip from acting on
her flesh.These he cut off with his pen-knife, and thus left her
entirely naked.He struck her only two blows, for the second one cut
open her side and abdomen with a frightful gash.Unable to look on any
longer in silence, I entreated him to stop, as I feared he had killed
her.The overseer looked at the wound--dropped his whip, and ordered her
to be untied.She was carried into the house in a state of
insensibility, and died in three days after.During the whole season of picking cotton, the whip was frequently and
severely plied.In his seasons of intoxication, the overseer made no
distinction between the stout man and the feeble and delicate woman--the
sick and the well.Sandra travelled to the office.Women in a far advanced state of pregnancy were
driven out to the cotton field.At other times he seemed to have some
consideration; and to manifest something like humanity.Our hands did
not suffer for food--they had a good supply of ham and corn-meal, while
on Flincher's plantation the slaves had meat but once a year, at
Christmas.Near the commencement of the weeding season of 1835, I was ordered to
whip a young woman, a light mustee, for not performing her task.I told
the overseer that she was sick.He said he did not care for that, she
should be made to work.A day or two afterwards, I found him in the
house half intoxicated.He demanded of me why I had not whipped the
girl; and I gave the same reason as before.He flew into a dreadful
rage, but his miserable situation made him an object of contempt rather
than fear.He sat shaking his fist at me, and swearing for nearly half
an hour.He said he would teach the Virginia lady to sham sickness; and
that the only reason I did not whip her was, that she was a white woman,
and I did not like to cut up her delicate skin.Some time after I was
ordered to give two of our women, named Hannah and big Sarah, 150 lashes
each, for not performing their tasks.The overseer stood by until he saw
Hannah whipped, and until Sarah had been tied up to the tree.As soon as
his back was turned I struck the tree instead of the woman, who
understanding my object, shrieked as if the whip at every blow was
cutting into her flesh.The overseer heard the blows and the woman's
cries, and supposing that all was going on according to his mind, left
the field.Unfortunately the husband of Hannah stood looking on; and
indignant that his wife should be whipped and Sarah spared, determined
to revenge himself by informing against me.Next morning Huckstep demanded of me whether I had whipped Sarah the day
before; I replied in the affirmative.Upon this he called Sarah forward
and made her show her back, which bore no traces of recent whipping.He
then turned upon me and told me that the blows intended for Sarah should
be laid on my back.That night the overseer, with the help of three of
the hands, tied me up to a large tree--my arms and legs being clasped
round it, and my body drawn up hard against it by two men pulling at my
arms and one pushing against my back.The agony occasioned by this alone
was almost intolerable.I felt a sense of painful suffocation, and could
scarcely catch my breath.A moment after I felt the first blow of the overseer's whip across my
shoulders.I felt the blood gush,
and run down my back.I fainted at length under the torture, and on
being taken down, my shoes contained blood which ran from the gashes in
my back.The skin was worn off from by breast, arms, and thighs, against
the rough bark of the tree.I was sick and feverish, and in great pain
for three weeks afterwards; most of which time I was obliged to lie with
my face downwards, in consequence of the extreme soreness of my sides
and back, Huckstep himself seemed concerned about me, and would come
frequently to see me, and tell me that he should not have touched me had
it not been for "the cursed peach brandy."Almost the first person that I was compelled to whip after I recovered,
was the man who pushed at my back when I was tied up to the tree.The
hands who were looking on at that time, all thought he pushed me much
harder than was necessary: and they expected that I would retaliate upon
him the injury I had received.After he was tied up, the overseer told
me to give him a severe flogging, and left me.I struck the tree instead
of the man.His wife, who was looking on, almost overwhelmed me with her
gratitude.At length one morning, late in the fall of 1835, I saw Huckstep, and a
gentleman ride out to the field.As they approached, I saw the latter
was my master.The hands all ceased their labor, and crowded around him,
inquiring about old Virginia.For my own part, I could not hasten to
greet him.He at length came towards me,
and seemed somewhat embarrassed."Well James," said he, "how do you
stand it here?""I had no thought that you
could be so cruel as to go away and leave me as you did.""Well, well,
it was too bad, but it could not be helped--you must blame Huckstep for
it.""But," said I, "I was not his servant; I belonged to you, and you
could do as you pleased.""Well," said he, "we will talk about that by
and by."He then inquired of Huckstep where big Sarah was."She was sick
and died," was the answer.He looked round amoung the slaves again, and
inquired for Harry.The overseer told him that Harry undertook to kill
him, and that, to save his life, he was obliged to fire upon him, and
that he died of the wound.After some further inquiries, he requested me
to go into the house with him.He then asked me to tell him how things
had been managed during his absence.I gave him a full account of the
overseer's cruelty.When he heard of the manner of Harry's death, he
seemed much affected and shed tears.Sandra went to the hallway.He was a favorite servant of his
father's.I showed him the deep scars on my back occasioned by the
whipping I had received.He was, or professed to be, highly indignant
with Huckstep; and said he would see to it that he did not lay hands on
me again.He told me he should be glad to take me with him to Virginia,
but he did not know where he should find a driver who would be so kind
to the hands as I was.If I would stay ten years, he would give me a
thousand dollars, and a piece of land to plant on my own account."But,"
said I, "my wife and children.""Well," said he, "I will do my best to
purchase them, and send them on to you."I now saw that my destiny was
fixed: and that I was to spend my days in Alabama, and I retired to my
bed that evening with a heavy heart.My master staid only three or four days on the plantation.Before he
left, he cautioned Huckstep to be careful and not strike me again, as he
would on no account permit it.He told him to give the hands food
enough, and not over-work them, and, having thus satisfied his
conscience, left us to our fate.Out of the two hundred and fourteen slaves who were brought out from
Virginia, at least one-third of them were members of the Methodist and
Baptist churches in that State.Then had been torn away from the care and discipline of their respective
churches, and from the means of instruction, but they retained their
love for the exercises of religion; and felt a mournful pleasure in
speaking of the privileges and spiritual blessings which they enjoyed in
Old Virginia.Three of them had been preachers, or exhorters, viz.Solomon, usually called Uncle Solomon, Richard and David.Uncle Solomon
was a grave, elderly man, mild and forgiving in his temper, and greatly
esteemed among the more serious portion of our hands.He used to snatch
every occasion to talk to the lewd and vicious about the concerns of
their souls, and to advise them to fix their minds upon the Savior, as
their only helper.Some I have heard curse and swear in answer, and
others would say that they could not keep their minds upon God and the
devil (meaning Huckstep) at the same time: that it was of no use to try
to be religious--they had no time--that the overseer wouldn't let them
meet to pray--and that even Uncle Solomon, when he prayed, had to keep
one eye open all the time, to see if Huckstep was coming.Uncle Solomon
could both read and write, and had brought out with him from Virginia a
Bible, a hymn-book, and some other religious books, which he carefully
concealed from the overseer, Huckstep was himself an open infidel as
well as blasphemer.He used to tell the hands that there was no hell
hereafter for white people, but that they had their punishment on earth
in being obliged to take care of the <DW64>s.As for the blacks, he was
sure there was a hell for them.He used frequently to sit with his
bottle by his side, and a Bible in his hand; and read passages and
comment on them, and pronounce them lies.Any thing like religious
feeling among the slaves irritated him.He said that so much praying and
singing prevented the people from doing their tasks, as it kept them up
nights, when they should be asleep.He used to mock, and in every
possible way interrupt the poor slaves, who after the toil of the day,
knelt in their lowly cabins to offer their prayers and supplications to
Him whose ear is open to the sorrowful sighing of the prisoner, and who
hath promised in His own time to come down and deliver.In his drunken
seasons he would make excursions at night through the slave-quarters,
enter the cabins, and frighten the inmates, especially if engaged in
prayer or singing.On one of these occasions he came back rubbing his
hands and laughing.He said he had found Uncle Solomon in his garden,
down on his knees, praying like an old owl, and had tipped him over, and
frightened him half out of his wits.Daniel journeyed to the office.At another time he found Uncle
David sitting on his stool with his face thrust up the chimney, in order
that his voice might not be heard by his brutal persecutor.He was
praying, giving utterance to these words, probably in reference to his
bondage:--"_How long, oh, Lord, how long_?"cried
the overseer, who had stolen behind him, giving him a blow.It was the
sport of a demon.Not long after my master had left us, the overseer ascertained for the
first time that some of the hands could read, and that they had brought
books with them from Virginia.He compelled them to give up the keys of
their chests, and on searching found several Bibles and hymn-books.Uncle Solomon's chest contained quite a library, which he could read at
night by the light of knots of the pitchpine.These books he collected
together, and in the evening called Uncle Solomon into the house.After
jeering him for some time, he gave him one of the Bibles and told him to
name his text and preach him a sermon.He then
made him get up on the table, and ordered him to pray.Uncle Solomon
meekly replied, that "forced prayer was not good for soul or body."The
overseer then knelt down himself, and in a blasphemous manner, prayed
that the Lord would send his spirit into Uncle Solomon; or else let the
old man fall from the table and break his neck, and so have an end of
"<DW65> preaching."On getting up from his knees he went to the
cupboard, poured out a glass of brandy for himself, and brought another
to the table."James," said he, addressing me, "Uncle Solomon stands
there |
bedroom | Where is Sandra? | I'll see if another spirit wont move it."He compelled the old preacher
to swallow the brandy; and then told him to preach and exhort, for the
spirit was in him.He set one of the Bibles on fire, and after it was
consumed, mixed up the ashes of it in a glass of water, and compelled
the old man to drink it, telling him that as the spirit and the word
were now both in him, there was no longer any excuse for not preaching.After tormenting the wearied old man in this way until nearly midnight
he permitted him to go to his quarters.The next day I saw Uncle Solomon, and talked with him about his
treatment.He said it would not always be so--that slavery was to come
to an end, for the Bible said so--that there would then be no more
whippings and fightings, but the lion the lamb would lie down together,
and all would be love.He said he prayed for Huckstep--that it was not
he but the devil in him who behaved so.At his request, I found means to
get him a Bible and a hymn-book from the overseer's room; and the old
man ever afterwards kept them concealed in the hen-house.The weeding season of 1836, was marked by repeated acts of cruelty on
the part of Huckstep.Daniel journeyed to the hallway.One of the hands, Priscilla, was, owing to her
delicate situation, unable to perform her daily task.He ordered her to
be tied up against a tree, in the same manner that I had been.In this
situation she was whipped until _she was delivered of a dead infant, at
the foot of the tree_!Sandra travelled to the kitchen.Our men took her upon a sheet, and carried her to
the house, where she lay sick for several months, but finally recovered.I have heard him repeatedly laugh at the circumstance.Not long after this, we were surprised, one morning about ten o'clock,
by hearing the horn blown at the house.Presently Aunt Polly came
screaming into the field.John journeyed to the hallway."What is the matter, Aunty?"said she, "Old Huckstep's pitched off his horse and broke his
head, and is e'en about dead."said little Simon, "The devil will have him at last.""God-a-mighty be praised!"The hands, with one accord dropped their hoes; and crowded round the old
woman, asking questions.Sandra travelled to the office."Did you feel of
him--was he cold?"Aunt Polly explained as well as she could, that Huckstep, in a state of
partial intoxication, had attempted to leap his horse over a fence, had
fallen and cut a deep gash in his head, and that he was now lying
insensible.It is impossible to describe the effect produced by this news among the
hands.Men, women and children shouted, clapped their hands, and laughed
aloud.Sandra went to the hallway.Some cursed the overseer, and others thanked the Lord for taking
him away.Little Simon got down on his knees, and called loudly upon God
to finish his work, and never let the overseer again enter a cotton
field."Let him die, Lord," said he, "let him.He's killed enough of us:
Oh, good Lord, let him die and not live."it is a bad spirit," said Uncle Solomon, "God himself
willeth not the death of a sinner."I followed the old woman to the house; and found Huckstep at the foot of
one of those trees, so common at the South, called the Pride of China.His face was black, and there was a frightful contusion on the side of
his head.He was carried into the house, where, on my bleeding him, he
revived.He lay in great pain for several days, and it was nearly three
weeks before he was able to come out to the cotton fields.On returning to the field after Huckstep had revived, I found the hands
sadly disappointed to hear that he was still living.Some of them fell
to cursing and swearing, and were enraged with me for trying to save his
life.Little Simon said I was a fool; if he had bled him he would have
done it to some purpose.He would at least, have so disable his arm that
he would never again try to swing a whip.Uncle Solomon remonstrated
with Simon, and told that I had done right.The neighbouring overseers used frequently to visit Huckstep, and he, in
turn, visited them.I was sometimes present during their interviews, and
heard them tell each other stories of horse-racing, <DW64>-huntings, &c.
Some time during this season, Ludlow, who was overseer of a plantation
about eight miles from ours, told of a slave of his named Thornton, who
had twice attempted to escape with his wife and one child.The first
time he was caught without much difficulty, chained to the overseer's
horse, and in that way brought back.The poor man, to save his wife from
a beating, laid all the blame upon himself; and said that his wife had
no wish to escape, and tried to prevent him from attempting it.He was
severely whipped; but soon ran away again, and was again arrested.The
overseer, Ludlow, said he was determined to put a stop to the runaway,
and accordingly had resort to a somewhat unusual method of punishment.There is a great scarcity of good water in that section of Alabama; and
you will generally see a large cistern attached to the corners of the
houses to catch water for washing &c. Underneath this cistern is
frequently a tank from eight to ten feet deep, into which, when the
former is full the water is permitted to run.From this tank the water
is pumped out for use.Into one of these tanks the unfortunate slave was
placed, and confined by one of his ancles to the bottom of it; and the
water was suffered to flow in from above.He was compelled to pump out
the water as fast as it came in, by means of a long rod or handle
connected with the pump above ground.He was not allowed to begin until
the water had risen to his middle.Daniel journeyed to the office.Any pause or delay after this, from
weakness and exhaustion, would have been fatal, as the water would have
risen above his head.Daniel went back to the bedroom.In this horrible dungeon, toiling for his life, he
was kept for twenty-four hours without any sustenance.Even Huckstep
said that this was too bad--that he had himself formerly punished
runaways in that way--but should not do it again.I rejoice to be able to say that this sufferer has at last escaped with
his wife and child, into a free state.He was assisted by some white
men, but I do not know all the particulars of his escape.Our overseer had not been long able to ride about the plantation after
his accident, before his life was again endangered.He found two of the
hands, Little Jarret and Simon, fighting with each other, and attempted
to chastise both of them.Jarret bore it patiently, but Simon turned
upon him, seized a stake or pin from a cart near by, and felled him to
the ground.The overseer got up--went to the house, and told aunt Polly
that he had nearly been killed by the '<DW65>s,' and requested her to
tie up his head, from which the blood was streaming.As soon as this was
done, he took down his gun, and went out in pursuit of Simon, who had
fled to his cabin, to get some things which he supposed necessary
previous to attempting his escape from the plantation.He was just
stepping out of the door when he met the enraged overseer with his gun
in his hand.Huckstep raised his gun
and fired.The man fell without a groan across the door-sill.Sandra moved to the bedroom.He rose up
twice on his hands and knees, but died in a few minutes.The overseer told me that there was no other way to deal
with such a fellow.It was Alabama law, if a slave resisted to shoot him
at once.He told me of a case which occurred in 1834, on a plantation
about ten miles distant, and adjoining that where Crop, the <DW64>
hunter, boarded with his hounds.The overseer had bought some slaves at
Selma, from a drove or coffle passing through the place.He whipped three of them, and undertook to whip a
fourth who was from Maryland.The man raised his hoe in a threatening
manner, and the overseer fired upon him.The slave fell, but instantly
rose up on his hands and knees, and was beaten down again by the stock
of the overseer's gun.The wounded wretch raised himself once more, drew
a knife from the waistband of his pantaloons, and catching hold of the
overseer's coat, raised himself high enough to inflict a fatal wound
upon the latter.She had a good general idea that Podmore's perquisites were large, but
perquisites seem to be a condition of valuable servants in large
establishments, and then anything which could be recovered from what
had already passed into Podmore's room must be a kind of economy.So
she resolved that Podmore should "find something" for Madam
Liberality's neck."I never noticed it, ma'am, till I brought your shawl to the
carriage," said Podmore."If I had seen it before, the young lady
shouldn't have come with you so.I'll see to it, ma'am.""Can you spare me to go into the town this afternoon, ma'am?""I want some things at Huckaback and Woolsey's."Huckaback and Woolsey were the linendrapers where Madam Liberality's
godmother "had an account."It was one of the things on a large scale
over the details of which she had no control."You'll be back in time to dress me?""Oh dear, yes, ma'am."And having settled the old lady's shawl on her
shoulders, and drawn out her cap-lappets, Podmore returned to her
work.The old lady might deal shabbily with her
faded ribbons and her relations, but the butler, the housekeeper, and
the lady's-maid did their best to keep up the credit of the family.It was well known that Madam Liberality was a cousin, and Podmore
resolved that she should have a proper frock to go down to dessert in.So she had been very busy making a little slip out of a few yards of
blue silk which had been over and above one of the old lady's dresses,
and now she betook herself to the draper's to get spotted muslin to
cover it and ribbons to trim it with.And whilst Madam Liberality's godmother was still feeling a few
twinges about the Indian scarf, Podmore ordered a pink neckerchief
shot with white, and with pink and white fringes, to be included in
the parcel.But it was not in this way alone that Podmore was a good friend to
Madam Liberality.She took her out walking, and let her play on the beach, and even
bring home dirty weeds and shells.Indeed, Podmore herself was not
above collecting cowries in a pill-box for her little nephews.Podmore met acquaintances on the beach, Madam Liberality
played alone, and these were her happiest moments.She played amongst
the rotting, weed-grown stakes of an old pier, and "fancied" rooms
among them--suites of rooms in which she would lodge her brothers and
sister if they came to visit her, and where--with cockle-shells for
teacups, and lava for vegetables, and fucus-pods for fish--they
should find themselves as much enchanted as Beauty in the palace of
the Beast.Again and again she "fancied" Darling into her shore-palace, the
delights of which should only be marred by the growls which she
herself would utter from time to time from behind the stakes, in the
character of a sea-beast, and which should but enhance the moment
when she would rush out and throw her arms round Darling's neck and
reveal herself as Madam Liberality."Darling" was the pet name of Madam Liberality's sister--her only
sister, on whom she lavished the intensest affection of a heart which
was always a large one in proportion to her little body.It seemed so
strange to play at any game of fancies without Darling, that Madam
Liberality could hardly realize it.She might be preparing by herself a larger treat than usual for the
others; but it was incredible that no one would come after all, and
that Darling would never see the palace on the beach, and the
state-rooms, and the limpets, and the seaweed, and the salt-water
soup, and the real fish (a small dab discarded from a herring-net)
which Madam Liberality had got for her.Her mind was filled with day-dreams of Darling's coming, and of how
she would display to her all the wonders of the seashore, which would
reflect almost as much credit upon her as if she had invented
razor-shells and crabs.She thought so much about it that she began
quite to expect it.Was it not natural that her godmother should see that she must be
lonely, and ask Darling to come and be with her?Perhaps the old lady
had already done so, and the visit was to be a surprise.Madam
Liberality could quite imagine doing a nice thing like this herself,
and she hoped it so strongly that she almost came to believe in it.Every day she waited hopefully, first for the post, and then for the
time when the coach came in, the hour at which she herself had
arrived; but the coach brought no Darling, and the post brought no
letter to say that she was coming, and Madam Liberality's hopes were
disappointed.From her earliest years it had been a family joke that poor Madam
Liberality was always in ill-luck's way.It is true that she was constantly planning; and if one builds
castles, one must expect a few loose stones about one's ears now and
then.But, besides this, her little hopes were constantly being
frustrated by fate.If the pigs or the hens got into the garden, Madam Liberality's bed
was sure to be laid waste before any one came to the rescue.When a
picnic or a tea-party was in store, if Madam Liberality did not catch
cold, so as to hinder her from going, she was pretty sure to have a
quinsy from fatigue or wet feet afterwards.When she had a treat she
paid for the pleasurable excitement by a headache, just as when she
ate sweet things they gave her toothache.But if her luck was less than other people's, her courage and good
spirits were more than common.She could think with pleasure about the
treat when she had forgotten the headache.One side of her little face
would look fairly cheerful when the other was obliterated by a flannel
bag of hot camomile flowers, and the whole was redolent of every
horrible domestic remedy for toothache, from oil of cloves and
creosote to a baked onion in the ear.No sufferings abated her energy
for fresh exploits, or quenched the hope that cold, and damp, and
fatigue would not hurt her "this time."In the intervals of wringing out hot flannels for her own quinsy, she
would amuse herself by devising a desert island expedition on a larger
and possibly a damper scale than hitherto, against the time when she
should be out again.It is a very old simile, but Madam Liberality really was like a cork
rising on the top of the very wave of ill-luck that had swallowed up
her hopes.Her little white face and undaunted spirit bobbed up after
each mischance or malady as ready and hopeful as ever.Though her day-dream about Darling and the shore palace was constantly
disappointed, this did not hinder her from indulging new hopes and
fancies in another place to which she went with Podmore; a place which
was filled with wonders of a different kind from the treasures of the
palace on the shore.It would be a very long business to say what
was in it.But amongst other things there were foreign cage-birds,
musical-boxes, and camp-stools, and baskets, and polished pebbles, and
paper patterns, and a little ladies' and children's millinery, and a
good deal of mock jewellery, and some very bad soaps and scents, and
some very good children's toys.It was Madam Liberality's godmother who first took her to the bazaar.A titled lady of her acquaintance had heard that wire flower-baskets
of a certain shape |
kitchen | Where is Daniel? | So Madam Liberality's
godmother ordered out the blue carriage and pair, and drove with her
little cousin to the bazaar.And as they came out, followed by a bearded man, bowing very low, and
carrying the wire baskets, Madam Liberality's godmother stopped near
the toy-stall to button her glove.And when she had buttoned it (which
took a long time, because her hands were stout, and Podmore generally
did it with a hook), she said to Madam Liberality, "Now, child, I want
to tell you that if you are very good whilst you are with me, and
Podmore gives me a good report of you, I will bring you here before
you go home, and buy you a present."Madam Liberality's heart danced with delight.She wished her godmother
would stand by the toy-stall for an hour, that she might see what she
most hoped the present would be.But the footman tucked them into the
carriage, and the bearded man bowed himself back into the bazaar, and
they drove home.Daniel journeyed to the hallway.Then Madam Liberality's godmother directed the butler
to dispatch the wire baskets to her ladyship, which he did by coach.And her ladyship's butler paid the carriage, and tipped the man who
brought the parcel from the coach-office, and charged these items in
his account.And her ladyship wrote a long letter of thanks to Madam
Liberality's godmother for her kindness in saving her unnecessary
expense.The old lady did not go to the bazaar again for some time, but Madam
Liberality went there with Podmore.She looked at the toys and
wondered which of them might one day be her very own.The white china
tea-service with the green rim, big enough to make real tea in, was
too good to be hoped for, but there were tin tea-sets where the lids
would come off, and wooden ones where they were stuck on; and there
were all manner of toys that would be invaluable for all kinds of
nursery games and fancies.They helped a "fancy" of Madam Liberality even then.She used to stand
by the toy-stall, and fancy that she was as rich as her godmother, and
was going to give Christmas-boxes to her brothers and sister, and her
amusement was to choose, though she could not buy them.She had been playing at this
fancy one afternoon, and having rather confused herself by changing
her mind about the toys, she went through her final list in an
undertone, to get it clearly into her head.The shopman was serving a
lady, and Madam Liberality thought he could not hear her as she
murmured, "The china tea-set, the box of beasts, the doll's furniture
for Darling," etc., etc.But the shopman's hearing was very acute, and
he darted forward, crying, "The china tea-set, did you say, miss?"The blood rushed up to poor Madam Liberality's face till it seemed to
choke her, and the lady, whom the shopman had been serving, said
kindly, "I think the little girl said the box of beasts."Madam Liberality hoped it was a dream, but having pinched herself, she
found that it was not.Sandra travelled to the kitchen.Her mother had often said to her, "When you can't think what to say,
tell the truth."It was not a very easy rule, but Madam Liberality
went by it."I don't want anything, thank you," said she; "at least, I mean I have
no money to buy anything with: I was only counting the things I should
like to get if I had."And then, as the floor of the bazaar would _not_ open and swallow her
up, she ran away, with her red face and her empty pocket, to shelter
herself with Podmore at the mock-jewellery stall, and she did not go
to the bazaar any more.Once again disappointment was in store for Madam Liberality.The end
of her visit came, and her godmother's promise seemed to be forgotten.But the-night before her departure, the old lady came into her room
and said,
"I couldn't take you with me to-day, child, but I didn't forget my
promise.John journeyed to the hallway.Podmore says you've been very good, and so I've brought you a
present.A very _useful_ one, I hope," added the old lady, in a tone
as if she were congratulating herself upon her good sense."And tell
Catherine--that's your mother, child--with my love, always to have you
dressed for the evening.I like to see children come in to dessert,
when they have good manners--which I must say you have; besides, it
keeps the nurses up to their work."And then she drew out from its paper a little frock of pink
_mousseline-de-laine_, very prettily tacked together by the young
woman at the millinery-stall, and very cheap for its gay appearance.Down came all Madam Liberality's visions in connection with the
toy-stall: but she consoled herself that night with picturing
Darling's delight when she gave her (as she meant to give her) the
pink dress.She had another source of comfort and anticipation--_the
scallop-shells_.The greatest prize which Madam
Liberality had gained from her wanderings by the seashore was a
complete scallop-shell.When washed the double shell was as clean and
as pretty as any china muffin-dish with a round top; and now her
ambition was to get four more, and thus to have a service for doll's
feasts which should far surpass the oyster-shells.Sandra travelled to the office.She was talking
about this to Podmore one day when they were picking cowries together,
and Podmore cried, "Why, this little girl would get you them, miss,
I'll be bound!"She was a bare-footed little girl, who sold pebbles and seaweed, and
salt water for sponging with, and she had undertaken to get the
scallop-shells, and had run off to pick seaweed out of a newly landed
net before Madam Liberality could say "Thank you."Sandra went to the hallway.She heard no more of the shells, however, until the day before she
went away, when the butler met her as she came indoors, and told her
that the little girl was waiting.And it was not till Madam Liberality
saw the scallop-shells lying clean and pink in a cotton handkerchief
that she remembered that she had no money to pay for them.Daniel journeyed to the office.Daniel went back to the bedroom.But to make
humiliating confession before the butler seemed almost beyond even
Madam Liberality's moral courage.He went back to his pantry, however,
and she pulled off her pretty pink neckerchief and said,
"I am _very_ sorry, little girl, but I've got no money of my own; but
if you would like this instead--" And the little girl seemed quite
pleased with her bargain, and ran hastily off, as if afraid that the
young lady would change her mind.And this was how Madam Liberality got her scallop-shells.* * * * *
It may seem strange that Madam Liberality should ever have been
accused of meanness, and yet her eldest brother did once shake his
head at her and say, "You're the most meanest and the _generoustest_
person I ever knew!"And Madam Liberality wept over the accusation,
although her brother was then too young to form either his words or
his opinions correctly.But it was the touch of truth in it which made Madam Liberality cry.To the end of their lives Tom and she were alike and yet different in
this matter.Madam Liberality saved, and pinched, and planned, and
then gave away, and Tom gave away without the pinching and saving.This sounds much handsomer, and it was poor Tom's misfortune that he
always believed it to be so; though he gave away what did not belong
to him, and fell back for the supply of his own pretty numerous wants
upon other people, not forgetting Madam Liberality.Painful experience convinced Madam Liberality in the end that his way
was a wrong one, but she had her doubts many times in her life whether
there were not something unhandsome in her own decided talent for
economy.When people are
very poor for their position in life, they can only keep out of debt
by stinting on many occasions when stinting is very painful to a
liberal spirit.And it requires a sterner virtue than good-nature to
hold fast the truth that it is nobler to be shabby and honest than to
do things handsomely in debt.But long before Tom had a bill even for bull's-eyes and Gibraltar
Rock, Madam Liberality was pinching and plotting, and saving bits of
paper and ends of ribbon, with a thriftiness which seemed to
justify Tom's view of her character.The object of these savings was twofold: birthday presents and
Christmas-boxes.They were the chief cares and triumphs of Madam
Liberality's childhood.It was with the next birthday or the
approaching Christmas in view that she saved her pence instead of
spending them, but she so seldom had any money that she chiefly relied
on her own ingenuity.Year by year it became more difficult to make
anything which would "do for a boy;" but it was easy to please
Darling, and "Mother's" unabated appreciation of pincushions, and of
needle-books made out of old cards, was most satisfactory.To break the mystery in which it always pleased Madam Liberality to
shroud her small preparations, was to give her dire offence.Sandra moved to the bedroom.As a
rule, the others respected this caprice, and would even feign a little
more surprise than they felt, upon occasion.But if during her
preparations she had given umbrage to one of the boys, her retreat was
soon invaded with cries of--"Ah!I see you, making birthday presents
out of nothing and a quarter of a yard of ribbon!"At it again, with two old visiting cards and a ha'porth of flannel!"And only Darling's tenderest kisses could appease Madam Liberality's
wrath and dry her tears.She had never made a grander project for Christmas, or had greater
difficulty in carrying it out, than in the winter which followed her
visit to the seaside.It was in the house of her cousin that she had
first heard of Christmas-trees, and to surprise the others with a
Christmas-tree she was quite resolved.But as the time drew near, poor
Madam Liberality was almost in despair about her presents, and this
was doubly provoking, because a nice little fir-tree had been promised
her.There was no blinking the fact that "Mother" had been provided
with pincushions to repletion.And most of these made the needles
rusty, from being stuffed with damp pig-meal, when the pigs and the
pincushions were both being fattened for Christmas.Madam Liberality sat with her little pale face on her hand and her
slate before her, making her calculations.She wondered what
emery-powder cost.Supposing it to be very cheap, and that she could
get a quarter of a pound for "next to nothing," how useful a present
might be made for "Mother" in the shape of an emery pincushion, to
counteract the evil effects of the pig-meal ones!It would be a
novelty even to Darling, especially if hers were made by glueing a
tiny bag of emery into the mouth of a "boiled fowl cowry."John moved to the office.Madam
Liberality had seen such a pincushion in Podmore's work-basket.She
had a shell of the kind, and the village carpenter would always let
her put a stick into his glue-pot if she went to the shop.But then, if emery were only a penny a pound, Madam Liberality had not
a farthing to buy a quarter of a pound with.As she thought of this
her brow contracted, partly with vexation, and partly because of a
jumping pain in a big tooth, which, either from much illness or many
medicines, or both, was now but the wreck of what a tooth should be.But as the toothache grew worse, a new hope dawned upon Madam
Liberality.Perhaps one of her troubles would mend the other!Being very tender-hearted over children's sufferings, it was her
mother's custom to bribe rather than coerce when teeth had to be taken
out.The fixed scale of reward was sixpence for a tooth without fangs,
and a shilling for one with them.If pain were any evidence, this
tooth certainly had fangs.But one does not have a tooth taken out if
one can avoid it, and Madam Liberality bore bad nights and painful
days till they could be endured no longer; and then, because she knew
it distressed her mother to be present, she went alone to the doctor's
house to ask him to take out her tooth.The doctor was a very kind old man, and he did his best, so we will
not say anything about his antique instruments, or the number of times
he tied a pocket-handkerchief round an awful-looking claw, and put
both into Madam Liberality's mouth without effect.At last he said he had got the tooth out, and he wrapped it in paper,
and gave it to Madam Liberality, who, having thought that it was her
head he had extracted from its socket, was relieved to get away.As she ran home she began to plan how to lay out her shilling for the
best, and when she was nearly there she opened the bit of paper to
look at her enemy, and it had no fangs!"I'm _sure_ it was more than a sixpenny one," she sobbed; "I believe
he has left them in."It involved more than the loss of half the funds she had reckoned
upon.Perhaps this dreadful pain would go on even on Christmas Day.Her first thought was to carry her tears to her mother; her second
that, if she only could be brave enough to have the fangs taken out,
she might spare mother all distress about it till it was over, when
she would certainly like her sufferings to be known and sympathized
with.She knew well that courage does not come with waiting, and
making a desperate rally of stout-heartedness, she ran back to the
doctor.He had gone out, but his assistant was in.He looked at Madam
Liberality's mouth, and said that the fangs were certainly left in and
would be much better out.The assistant blinked the question of "hurting.""I think I could do it," said he, "if you could sit still."I will sit still," said Madam Liberality.Daniel travelled to the kitchen."The boy shall hold your head," said the assistant.But Madam Liberality rebelled; she could screw up her sensitive nerves
to endure the pain, but not to be coerced by "the boy.""I give you my word of honour I will sit still," said she, with
plaintive earnestness.And the assistant (who had just remembered that the boy was out with
the gig) said, "Very well, miss."We need not dwell upon the next few seconds.The assistant kept his
word, and Madam Liberality kept hers.She sat still, and went on
sitting still after the operation was over till the assistant became
alarmed, and revived her by pouring some choking stuff down her
throat.After which she staggered to her feet and put out her hand and
thanked him.He was a strong, rough, good-natured young man, and little Madam
Liberality's pale face and politeness touched him."You're the bravest little lady I ever knew," he said kindly; "and you
keep your word like a queen.There's some stuff to put to the place,
and there's sixpence, miss, if you'll take it, to buy lollipops with.After which he gave her an old pill-box to carry the fragments of her
tooth in, and it was labelled "three to be taken at bed-time."Madam Liberality staggered home, very giddy, but very happy.Moralists
say a great deal about pain treading so very closely on the heels of
pleasure in this life, but they are not always wise or grateful enough
to speak of the pleasure which springs out of pain.And yet there |
hallway | Where is Mary? | Relief is certainly one of the most delicious sensations which poor
humanity, can enjoy!Madam Liberality enjoyed it to the full, and she
had more happiness yet in her cup, I fear praise was very pleasant to
her, and the assistant had praised her, not undeservedly, and she knew
that further praise was in store from the dearest source of
approbation--from her mother.And so
would Darling, who always cried when Madam Liberality was in great
pain.The sixpence would
amply provide "goodies" for the Christmas-tree, and much might be done
with the forthcoming shilling.And if her conduct on the present
occasion would not support a request for a few ends of candles from
the drawing-room candle-sticks, what profit would there be in being a
heroine?When her mother gave her two shillings instead of one, Madam
Liberality felt in honour bound to say that she had already been
rewarded with sixpence; but her mother only said,
"You quite deserved it, I'm sure," and she found herself in possession
of no less than half-a-crown.And now it is sad to relate that misfortune again overtook Madam
Liberality.All the next day she longed to go into the village to buy
sweetmeats, but it snowed and rained, and was bitterly cold, and she
could not.Just about dusk the weather slightly cleared up, and she picked her
way through the melting snow to the shop.Madam Liberality enjoyed
them already, though her face was still sore, and the pain had spread
to her throat, and though her ideas seemed unusually brilliant, and
her body pleasantly languid, which, added to a peculiar chill
trembling of the knees--generally forewarned her of a coming quinsy.But warnings were thrown away upon Madam Liberality's obdurate
hopefulness.Just now she could think of nothing but the coming Christmas-tree.She
hid the sweetmeats, and put her hand into her pocket for the two
shillings, the exact outlay of which, in the neighbouring town, by
means of the carrier, she had already arranged.But--the two shillings
were gone!How she had lost them Madam Liberality had no idea.She trudged through the dirty snow once more to the shop, and the
counter was examined, and old Goody looked under the flour scales and
in the big chinks of the stone floor.But the shillings were not
there, and Madam Liberality kept her eyes on the pavement as she ran
home, with as little result.It snowed heavily all night, and Madam Liberality slept very little
from pain and anxiety; but this did not deter her from going out with
the first daylight in the morning to rake among the snow near the
door, although her throat was sore beyond concealment, her jaws stiff,
and the pleasant languor and quick-wittedness had given way to
restless fever.Her conscience did prick her a little for the anxiety she was bringing
upon her mother (her own sufferings she never forecast); but she could
not give up her Christmas-tree without a struggle, and she hoped by a
few familiar remedies to drive back the threatened illness.Meanwhile, if the shillings were not found before eleven o'clock it
would be too late to send to the town shop by the carrier.But they
were not found, and the old hooded cart rumbled away without them.Darling
was perched on a very high chair in the kitchen, picking raisins in
the most honourable manner, without eating one, and Madam Liberality
ought to have been the happiest of all.Even now she dried her tears, and made the best of her ill-luck.The
sweetmeats were very good; and it was yet in her power to please the
others, though by a sacrifice from which she had shrunk.She could
divide her scallop-shells among them.It was economy--economy of
resources--which made her hesitate.Separated--they would please the
boys once, and then be lost.Kept together in her own possession--they
would be a constant source of triumph for herself, and of treats for
her brothers and sister.Meanwhile, she would gargle her throat with salt and water.As she
crept up-stairs with this purpose, she met her mother.Madam Liberality had not looked in the looking-glass lately, so she
did not understand her mother's exclamation of distress when they met.Her face was perfectly white, except where dark marks lay under her
eyes, and her small lips formed between them the rigid line of pain.It was impossible to hold out any longer, and Madam Liberality broke
down and poured forth all her woes.Sandra travelled to the bedroom."I'll put my feet in hot water, and do anything you like, mother
dear," said she, "if only you'll let me try and have a tree, and keep
it secret from the others."If you'll go to your room, my darling, and do as I tell you, I'll
keep your secret, and help you with your tree," said her mother."Don't cry, my child, don't cry; it's so bad for your throat.I think
I can find you some beads to make a necklace for Darling, and three
pencils for the boys, and some paper which you can cut up into
drawing-books for them."A little hope went a long way with Madam Liberality, and she began to
take heart.At the same time she felt her illness more keenly now
there was no need for concealing it.She sat over the fire and inhaled
steam from an old teapot, and threaded beads, and hoped she would be
allowed to go to church next day, and to preside at her Christmas-tree
afterwards.She had begged--almost
impatiently--that Darling would not leave the Christmas preparations
to sit with her, and as talking was bad for her, and as she had
secret preparations to make on her own account, her mother had
supported her wish to be left alone.But when it grew dusk, and the drawing-books were finished, Madam
Liberality felt lonely.She put a shawl round her head, and went to
the window.Mary went to the hallway.The fields were deeply
buried in snow, and looked like great white feather beds, shaken up
unequally against the hedges.The road was covered so deeply that she
could hardly have traced it, if she had not known where it was.How
dark the old church tower looked amid so much whiteness!And the snow-flakes fell like sugar-plums among the black trees.One
could almost hear the keen wind rustling through the bending sedges by
the pond, where the ice looked quite "safe" now.Madam Liberality
hoped she would be able to get out before this fine frost was over.She knew of an old plank which would make an admirable sledge, and she
had a plan for the grandest of winter games all ready in her head.It
was to be called Arctic Discovery--and she was to be the chief
discoverer.As she fancied herself--starving but scientific, chilled to the bone,
yet undaunted--discovering a north-west passage at the upper end of
the goose pond, the clock struck three from the old church tower.Madam Liberality heard it with a pang.At three o'clock--if he had
had her shillings--she would have been expecting the return of the
carrier, with the presents for her Christmas-tree.Even as she thought about it, the old hooded waggon came lumbering
down among the snow-drifts in the lane.There was a bunch of mistletoe
at the head, and the old carrier went before the horse, and the dog
went before the carrier.And they were all three up to their knees in
snow, and all three had their noses down, as much as to say, "Such is
life; but we must struggle on."The sight of the waggon and the mistletoe
overwhelmed her.It only made matters worse to see the waggon come
towards the house.She rather wondered what the carrier was bringing;
but whatever it was, it was not the toys.She went back to her seat by the fire, and cried bitterly; and, as she
cried, the ball in her throat seemed to grow larger, till she could
hardly breathe.She was glad when the door opened, and her mother's
kind face looked in."No, mother," said Madam Liberality huskily."Then you may bring it in," said her mother to some one outside, and
the servant appeared, carrying a wooden box, which she put down before
Madam Liberality, and then withdrew."Now don't speak," said her
mother, "it is bad for you, and your eyes have asked fifty questions
already, my child.I thought you would like to be the first to see.My idea is
that perhaps your godmother has sent you a Christmas-box, and I
thought that there might be things in it which would help you with
your Christmas-tree, so I have not told any one about it."To the end of her life Madam Liberality never forgot that
Christmas-box.It did not come from her godmother, and the name of the
giver she never knew.The first thing in it was a card, on which was
written--"A Christmas-box from an unknown friend;" and the second
thing in it was the set of china tea-things with the green rim; and
the third thing was a box of doll's furniture.cried Madam Liberality, "they're the very things I was
counting over in the bazaar, when the shopman heard me.""There was a lady, who said, 'I think the little girl said the box of
beasts.'They're
not common beasts, you know--not wooden ones, painted; they're rough,
something like hair.And feel the old elephant's ears, they're quite
leathery, and the lion has real long hair for his mane and the tip of
his tail.Oh, how the boys will like
them!I do think he is the very
best beast of all; his mouth is a little open, you know, and you can
see his tongue, and it's red.I think I _must_ keep the dog.And I
shall make him a paper collar, and print 'Faithful' on it, and let him
always stand on the drawers by our bed, and he'll be Darling's and my
watch-dog."Happiness is sometimes very wholesome, but it does not cure a quinsy
off hand.Darling cried that night when the big pillow was brought
out, which Madam Liberality always slept against in her quinsies, to
keep her from choking.She did not know of that consolatory
Christmas-box in the cupboard.On Christmas Day Madam Liberality was speechless.The quinsy had
progressed very rapidly."It generally breaks the day I have to write on my slate," Madam
Liberality wrote, looking up at her mother with piteous eyes.She was conscious that she had been greatly to blame for what she was
suffering, and was anxious to "behave well about it" as an atonement.She begged--on her slate--that no one would stay away from church on
her account, but her mother would not leave her."And now the others are gone," said Mother, "since you won't let the
Christmas-tree be put off, I propose that we have it up, and I dress
it under your orders, whilst the others are out, and then it can be
moved into the little book-room, all ready for to-night."Madam Liberality nodded like a china Mandarin."But you are in sad pain, I fear?"said her mother,
"One can't have everything," wrote Madam Liberality on her slate.Many
illnesses had made her a very philosophical little woman; and, indeed,
if the quinsy broke and she were at ease, the combination of good
things would be more than any one could reasonably expect, even at
Christmas.Every beast was labelled, and hung up by her orders.The box of
furniture was addressed to herself and Darling, as a joint possession,
and the sweetmeats were tied in bags of muslin.The very angel at the top seemed proud of it."I'll leave the tea-things up-stairs," said Mother.But Madam Liberality shook her head vigorously.She had been making up
her mind, as she sat steaming over the old teapot; and now she wrote
on her slate, "Put a white cloth round the tub, and put out the
tea-things like a tea-party, and put a ticket in the slop-basin--_For
Darling.Madam Liberality's mother nodded, but she was printing a ticket; much
too large a ticket, however, to go into the green and white
slop-basin.When it was done she hung it on the tree, under the angel.The inscription was--_From Madam Liberality_.When supper was over, she came up to Madam Liberality's room, and
said,
"Now, my dear, if you like to change your mind and put off the tree
till you are better, I will say nothing about it."But Madam Liberality shook her head more vehemently than before, and
her mother smiled and went away.The book-room door opened--she
knew the voice of the handle--there was a rush and a noise, but it
died away into the room.The tears broke down Madam Liberality's
cheeks.Then there was a patter up
the stairs, and flying steps along the landing, and Madam Liberality's
door was opened by Darling.She was dressed in the pink dress, and her
cheeks were pinker still, and her eyes full of tears.And she threw
herself at Madam Liberality's feet, crying,
"Oh _how_ good, how _very_ good you are!"At this moment a roar came up from below, and Madam Liberality wrote,
"What is it?"and then dropped the slate to clutch the arms of her
chair, for the pain was becoming almost intolerable.Before Darling
could open the door her mother came in, and Darling repeated the
question,
"What is it?"But at this moment the reply came from below, in Tom's loudest tones.It rang through the house, and up into the bedroom.The extremes of pleasure and of pain seemed to meet in Madam
Liberality's little head.But overwhelming gratification got the upper
hand, and, forgetting even her quinsy, she tried to speak, and after a
brief struggle she said, with tolerable distinctness,
"Tell Tom I am very much obliged to him."But what they did tell Tom was that the quinsy had broken, on which he
gave three cheers more.Madam Liberality grew up into much the same sort of person that she
was when a child.He did not attempt to guide
her, and she took him soberly to the highroad, then turned toward the
downward <DW72> leading to the village.On one side a black line of hedge
ran in and out like a ribbon; on the other all barrier had disappeared
under the drifting snow.Below the turn of the road was the smelter’s
forge, redly aglow in the distance; and, something like a mile further,
the village where the noted posset might even now be brewing; where
comforted travellers, stamping the snow from their boots, might be
capping each other’s tales of road hardships and perils.On the sturdy
mare, Paul Farrant had no doubt he could reach the further goal; yet he
hesitated.The plan which had driven him out into the night suddenly
appeared to him ineffable folly.A paralysing vision arose before him:
Rockhurst’s countenance at sight of Master Smelter, with the black fists,
as the proposed evening comrade!… He could see the dilation of the
nostrils, the haughty lips, barely apart upon a smile.What a tale would
not Rockhurst’s tongue make of it for royal ears!—As for the inn, were he
to find there some chance gentlefolk, how could he hope to induce them to
come forth again on such a night, when, in truth, no coach was like to
find a passage through the snow?* * * * *
Through the great silence a distant cry pierced into his consciousness.Heard at first vaguely, it fell in with his thought: the note, it seemed,
of his own distress.But in a moment it was repeated, higher, clearer, an
unmistakable call for help.He was in the |
hallway | Where is Mary? | His was not the nature to turn out of its way to assist the
afflicted; but now he wheeled the mare round and drove her up the hill,
fiercely, as if his own deliverance, not that of some fellow-creature,
was at stake.And, in truth, who shall say that it was not?On the edge of the road, at its abrupt twist down the hill, stood the
black bulk of a coach, horseless, crookedly embedded in the snow.As he drew nearer, a cloaked figure staggered toward him
and almost fell against his steed’s shoulder.“Oh, do not pass; do not go by!” moaned a woman’s voice.“I am dying of
the cold!”
She lifted her face.The faint light of the rifted sky, given back
intensified by the white world, had a luminosity of its own in which
most things were strangely visible.Paul Farrant saw that the woman who
clutched at his reins was young and fair-favoured.He stared a moment in
mere astonishment.Then a thought, devilish, acute, exultant, leaped into
his brain.—There was his ransom!“Madam,” he said, bending down over his horse’s neck and peering close
into her face, “I am fortunate in having heard you.Are you indeed alone?”
“Alone, yes,” she answered through chattering teeth; “the servants rode
away for help, God knows how long ago.… Perchance they are lost in the
snow, dead, somewhere.Indeed, with this cold, I shall soon be dead, too!”
“Nay, madam, you are saved,” said Farrant, dismounting hastily.Trembling with excitement, he tore his cloak from his shoulders to cast
it about the slender figure that swayed as it stood; then he swung
himself into the saddle again, and, stooping, caught her hands in both of
his.“Can you put your foot on my boot?” he asked.“Nay, then, by this mound.Courage, madam, ’tis
but a few yards to my house, to warmth and shelter!”
His arms still shook with excitement as he grasped the muffled figure and
the reins as best he might.And the mare slowly lifted her heavy hoofs
stable-ward again.His frenzy lest his chance should escape, his evil joy over his prize,
burned like fire in his veins.And something of his blood heat seemed to
pass into the half-frozen woman.She stirred with more vitality in his
grasp, settled herself with more definite volition on the mare’s broad
shoulder, and heaved a sigh of returning energy.Suddenly she started;
and he clutched her, alarmed.Sandra travelled to the bedroom.“My servants!” she said, and turned her head so that her breath fanned
his cheeks.Her dilated eyes were close to his in the snow-light.“Madam?” He held her the tighter and urged forward.“My servants, sir,” she repeated, a thrill of impatience running through
her quick utterance.“They will return to find me gone!”
“Why, then,” he made answer, driving his heels into their steed’s bulging
sides, “I will even send presently to the coach, and warn them of your
safety.… They will be welcome likewise.… But we must go on—yonder is my
gate—a very little while and you shall be by the fireside.”
As he turned off the road he cast a look backward down the <DW72> and
noticed a brace of yellow lights bobbing through the misty white of
the valley: the traveller’s servants were returning with succour.Not
a minute too much had fate granted him!But are not the ready ever the
successful?His boyish face was astir with silent laughter as he gathered the lady
into his arms upon the threshold of his own door-step.III
THE RANSOM
Rockhurst was roused from deep reverie by the opening of the door.His
mind had been far indeed from Farrant Chace and his own unprofitable
present existence—as far away as the days of youth; days of inspiration
and hope; of delicate illusion even in sorrow; days of strife, when
loyalty was an exquisite passion, and the blood that ran in his veins
sang to shed itself for his King!Days when friendship was near and
dear as love, and love itself the golden fruit of an endless mystery.He was of those who grasp at life with both hands.None had brought a
younger heart to his youth; no man faced his fulfilled manhood with less
illusion.He had wanted much, he had received much, he had taken much—and
all had failed him.He raised his head and stared, almost as if he were dreaming, at the two
who entered upon his brooding solitude; two that might have come upon
him out of that long-past youth—the lad with the face of the friend he
had loved, and this vision of young womanhood, whose beauty shone like
a pearl from the dark setting of her hood.But as soon as Paul Farrant
spoke the spell was broken.“A ransom, my lord—a ransom out of the snow!”
The twist of the speaker’s lip, the glint of his eye, gave triumphant
meaning to the words.Rockhurst rose from his chair, the weary look returning to his face.Here, after all, was but the degenerate son of the man whose blood had
been his own baptism to noble sorrow.And the sapling slight creature
with virginal eyes and soft lips who was leaning upon Paul Farrant’s
arm?Why—she was but his ransom!—Nay, these were no longer the days
of white-souled Falkland, or generous Hampden, days of chivalrous if
hopeless devotion to ideals: these were the days of the merry Monarch,
where none could feel a higher sweet than Pleasure, nor feel a deeper
pang than Envy.… How far away the days of Youth!And the young man’s words of promise, which had
seemed so empty when they were pronounced, “we may not be so destitute
of entertaining company at Farrant Chace as your lordship deems,” came
back to his mind, and with a new, cynical meaning.But, how, here “out of the snow,” lured by what prospect of light
amusement, what offered guerdon, he could only surmise.Mary went to the hallway.Possibly some
traveller from the inn, ready with all the ease of these times to snatch
at pleasure where it offered itself.…
A lady, by every movement of eye and limb.was it not the
fashion among ladies now to be as eager of base adventure as the gallants
themselves?He stood on one side while, with an exaggerated gallantry, Farrant
conducted the stranger to Rockhurst’s just vacated seat, helped her to
loosen her cloak, and pressed some wine upon her from the neglected
goblets on the table.When the lady had sipped, and returned the glass into his hand, she spoke
at last.“I thank you,” she said, smiling.“But, my servants…?”
Her voice was a little faint and plaintive yet, from the numbing of the
cold, but it had a grave ring in it that fell pleasantly on Rockhurst’s
fastidious ear.“Another taste, madam; we will inquire about your servants anon.The
mistress must first be waited upon,” cried young Paul, all agog in
ostentatious attendance, and ever flinging a restless glance of inquiry
at his Rockhurst.Let me move these
dripping folds away from you.And your feet, oh, I protest!” He was
down on his knees now, his young head glinting in the glow as he bent
assiduously over his new task.“Your feet—ice!”
Even as he spoke, he drew the little doeskin shoe from her foot; and,
as she instinctively lifted it toward the blaze, knelt back so that
Rockhurst might see the firelight play upon its delicate shape.The warmth of the wine and of the hearth had stirred her chilled blood.A
flush, like the tint of a seashell, crept into her face; into her dazed
eyes appeared a light to which the blue shadows of weariness on the lids
gave a singular brilliancy; she very simply stretched her other foot for
the kindly office.As Farrant rose at last, with the second shoe dangling in his hand, his
exultation broke out.He drew close, and whispered:—
“Say, my lord, shall we not be right well entertained to-night?”
“We?” echoed Rockhurst, aloud.The single contemptuous exclamation fell like the cut of a whip.He
turned, and bowing to the visitor, who had turned startled eyes toward
him:—
“Madam,” he said, “I heard you express some anxiety about your
attendants.Our young friend is about to fulfil your request … whatever
it may be.—Go,” added he, turning upon the disconcerted youth.And as
Farrant hesitated he took a swift step nearer to him, and whispered in
his turn, “Go—to the devil or where you will, so long as it is out of
this!”
His eye commanded more insolently yet than his words.The young man fell
back, flung a look of hesitation toward the crumpled notes on the table;
another glance at the lady, his fair treasure-trove.Then, with a meaning
smile, he bowed profoundly, so that all his shining curls fell over his
face, and withdrew.Sandra went to the office.Rockhurst caught the smile and the look; and the memory of a dead face,
that of his old brother in arms, the boy’s father, in its last stern
serenity rose up before him.His own eyes were hard as he looked again
upon the woman who had been found so promptly willing to come and relieve
the tedium of his snow-bound evening.[Illustration: The single contemptuous exclamation fell like the cut of a
whip.]Diana Harcourt, with the return of physical comfort about her, had begun
to feel a strange uneasiness gather in her mind.Country-bred, and
country-wed to an old man who had little taste for company, she had yet
had some opportunities of learning the way of courts; she, for instance,
had no doubt that the youth who had saved her from the snow was of gentle
birth, and that this grave-looking being, with whom she now found herself
alone in the strange, silent house, was a very fine gentleman indeed.Nevertheless, something singular, something not quite open, clandestine
almost, in the situation began to force itself upon her.What was the
relationship between these two men?The eyes of the elder, who might have
been the other’s father, were cold to dislike as he had gazed upon him.And the young man’s febrile excitement came back upon her memory with an
impression of distaste amounting to repulsion.What had lurked behind
his smile, his furtive, appraising glance?She recalled how innocently
she had allowed him to touch her feet, and, flushing hotly, she cast her
mantle over them and turned her head with a little movement, at once
dignified and shy, to gaze upon Rockhurst.But suspicion fell from her on
the instant.—Noble-looking, grave, high-bred, old enough to be her own
father, what could she have to fear?“Sir,” she said boldly, “will you not have the kindness now to tell me
where I am, and with whom?”
Rockhurst drew up a chair and sat him down, deliberately facing her.Then
he crossed his fine white hands upon his knee, letting his eyes rest upon
hers.“Madam,” he said at last, “do you not hear how the wind begins again to
moan outside?I warrant you, behind the thick walls of this old house
the snow is whirling in great white drifts.It must be parlous cold
without.Here, madam, the firelight is rosy; do you not think we are very
well together?’Tis a quaint hour, stolen from dull old Time’s grudging
casket.We do not know each other—why, that has a marvellous charm of its
own!We may never meet again; and to-morrow you
go back … to the white snow.And that,
perhaps, will be well, too.”
Her eyes dilated as she listened, scarce with fear, but again with the
unexplained foreboding.“Sir,” she said, after a pause, “your words are very strange; I do not
understand them.”
“My dear,” said Rockhurst, his languid lids drooping a little now over
the first keenness of his gaze, which seemed to narrow his scrutiny to
something cruel as a blade, “I have just said it, ’tis a dull world.Will
you complain of its strangeness once in a way?Why have you covered up
your pretty foot?I vow I thought of Diana in the woodland glades when
I saw the arch of its instep.” And, saying this, he opened his brilliant
glance once more full upon her.“Diana did I say?” he cried.“Nay, no
cold goddess!Far from me the omen!… A nymph.Aurora, with the sun in her
hair, and all the roses in her cheeks!”
The blood which had rushed violently to Diana Harcourt’s temples ebbed
away as quickly, leaving her white as the drifts without.These were, no doubt, but idle words of gallantry; and all her woman’s
instinctive pride warned her against the shame of seeming to attach any
other significance to them.Yet whether glinting between half-closed
lids or widely open upon her, the man’s eyes seemed to her to have some
terrible, some merciless thought in them—a thought strangely at variance
with the dignity of his appearance, the gravity, almost the sadness of
his countenance; horribly at variance with the grey which besprinkled the
raven of his locks.“I am not of the town, and not accustomed to fine speeches and
compliments.…”
She framed the phrase in pitiful attempt to stem the panic that was
gaining upon her.He still sat motionless, his hands crossed, half
smiling.“Sir,” she cried, now angrily, “are there no women in this place?Sandra journeyed to the kitchen.Will
you not, in courtesy, allow me the company of one, till my servants
arrive?”
“My dear,” he answered her sarcastically, “will my company not really
suffice?”
Rockhurst had had Heaven or Hades knew what vast experience of women, of
the women of Second Charles’s Court, whether in exile or in Whitehall.Scarce a challenging beauty of the posy that he had not measured swords
with; and, as the practised fencer will, he knew every trick of the
play, every line of assault and defence, every feint and every parry.And women, being proverbially unfair fighters, pretty dears!he had a
smile as well as a wary eye for the tricky pass and the treacherous
thrust.Of all the feints, that of innocence in straits, of outraged
modesty, was the most elementary.This divine young creature with the
copper-glowing hair and the wide-dilating eyes; whose blood ran so richly
and so quickly; who had come in leaning familiarly on the arm of that
prince of petty rakes, Paul Farrant, come willingly, it seemed, across
the snows, to his bidding; who had suffered herself to be unshod with all
the unblushing ease of any Whitehall coquette—why, if it now pleased her
to play the pretty Puritan, he had no objection, save that, as he knew
himself, he was apt to be swiftly wearied.The spark of interest kindled
by her unaccustomed kind of beauty, by the something fresh and of the
woodland about her, by the utter unexpectedness of her appearance and the
mystery it pleased him she should maintain |
office | Where is Daniel? | In
love, as in war, he had but one method—straight ahead.In war he had been
beaten back sometimes; in love, never.“Come,” he said, sitting up at last and slowly stretching out one hand.Sandra travelled to the bedroom.“Come, Diana, since Diana you will be.” (Again she started on hearing
herself unwittingly called by her real name.)“Be Diana, if you please,
to me.Bah, my dear goddess,” and he drew his
lean frame out of the chair and came over to her with the same deliberate
grace, “that was a little mistake of yours to be so ready to stoop to
yonder youth!Endymion is but a callow rascal, a greenhorn.When such
beings as you descend from your high celestial ways it should be for a
man!Come, do you wish me to kneel at your feet, as your shepherd did
even now?I will, an’ it please you.”
His arms were almost about her, when, with a fierce movement, she sprang
up and thrust him from her.“In the name of God,” she cried, “into what trap have I fallen?”
“Nay, do not scream,” he said, at one step placing himself between
her and the door, and catching her wrist, without roughness, but
with that steel-like grasp she had instinctively divined under his
gentle movements.“Let us clear this strange matter between us two,
madam.—Answer you first: What purpose had you in coming here to-night?”
“I?” she flashed back at him, panting.Mary went to the hallway.“Purpose?—Purpose, sir?… That
young man found me in the snow, the coach had foundered, my servants
ridden away for help, I was perished from cold.Oh, let me hence from your horrible house!”
He released her and stood looking at her in silence.Again, even in
her turmoil of terror and passion, she was struck by the extraordinary
dignity of his air.But to look thus, and to act thus!“Oh, shame,” she said; “you who might be my father!”
A swift shadow came over his countenance, then passed, leaving it set
into marble impassivity.Forgetting her cloak on the
chair, forgetting her shoeless feet, she thought she saw her chance, and
made a rush for the door; but he arrested her with a gesture.“No!” he said authoritatively.Then, fixing his eyes upon her with an
altered look: “No, child,” he repeated.His voice was as much changed
as his gaze.Gone from it the dangerous, even silkiness of his first
speeches to her, as well as the quick sternness of the last words.This
new voice, something said to her, was the voice of the real self that
matched the noble countenance.Later she wondered
at herself that she had done so.But there are moments when some poignant
emotion tears away the bodily mask, when souls are suddenly laid bare
to each other.For some of us that is the moment when our belief in all
that is good and beautiful dies.But Diana, in that flashing look into
the soul of this unknown man (who had yet, within so short a measure of
time, insulted her) read that to which her own soul leaped.She suffered him to conduct her back to the chair
by the fire, and watched him—wonderingly, yet no longer with fear—as he
straightened himself and, with folded arms, stood yet a little while
contemplating her.In the hawk’s eyes there was a softened shadow.As he gazed the shadow
deepened into tenderness.—He was looking at her as the exile might look
at the receding shore of the land he will never see again; with a
yearning that has passed beyond despair, and so grown serene.At length,
sighing, he roused himself, and came forward, pushed the heavy table
closer to her, and brought within her reach some of the viands that were
spread upon it.“You must eat,” he said.And, as she lifted her eyes again with her
childlike, questioning look, his lips parted in a smile she thought
beautiful, upon the gravity of his countenance: “You have not done with
journeying yet to-night,” he explained.He moved to the window as he spoke; and, as he drew the curtains aside,
there came into the ruddy brown room a vision of a moonlit fairy world.“There, too, I was wrong, you see,” he went on, speaking over his
shoulder; “the snow-storms are passed, and there is your sister moon to
show you the way—Diana.” Then, coming back again to the table, “You asked
for a woman’s company.In this house there is no company fit for you.”
Her eyelid flickered over her startled glance.“Eat, then,” he went on in the same gentle tone, “while I make
arrangements for your instant departure.”
The door was shut behind him.Diana involuntarily called after him; but
his footsteps died away in the empty passages.The great silence of the
house closed about her; and in the solitude her own thoughts seemed to
clamour and crowd bodily upon her.She leaned her elbows on the table and
buried her bright head in her hands.Slighted … insulted … then served reverentially like a princess … looked
at and spoken to like a beloved child.How was it that all the anger was
dead in her heart, and that in its place reigned this feeling of pain and
incomprehensible joy commingled?How was it that her fear was banished,
that she would have trusted herself with him even in this house which his
own lips had named evil?IV
UNDER THE STARS
Presently she again heard steps without and rapid words; then his voice,
uplifted sharp and strong.She smiled, broke a piece of bread and sipped
at the wine; she was safe, she knew, where he was.And she would eat, if
only because he bade her.He was now booted to the thigh, and
carried a cloak on his arm.His eye
fell on the discarded shoes; he bent down and felt them.“They are nearly dry,” he said, and lifted them closer to the flame.“In a little while you must be ready.You will have to ride on the
same rustic steed that brought you, but I will see that she carries
you to safety.” He paused a second or two, then added: “The inn—a very
well-known, reputable place—is not far distant; and you will doubtless
hear of your servants there.Our young host,” he hesitated, and his voice
seemed to harden, “tells me that, even as he rode with you into the
avenue, folk were hastening to your rescue from that direction.”
Diana’s glance still questioned, but she dared not put the question into
words.What, then, had the young man with the narrow eyes and the uneasy
glance meant by her?And how, if he had had some dark purpose, had she
been thrust upon this other and left to his mercy?Ah, and what had this
other at first fancied to see in her?The blood surged to her cheeks, her
lips trembled.As if in answer to her
thoughts he bent down.“My dear,” he said, but how differently the words, a while ago insolently
familiar, were now spoken; “this is no house for you.It must never be
breathed of one such as you that you have been under its roof—with one
such as me.You said you did not know the ways of us of the Court—pray
God you may never know them!”
Here he was silent again, his eye resting thoughtfully upon her hands,
unadorned save for a single posy ring.“When you marry,” he went on then, as with an effort, “keep in the sweet
country, and of a surety,” a sad smile flickered upon his lip, “your lord
will gladly keep there, too.”
She lifted her head with a quick impulse; her mouth parted to speak.But
an inexplicable, invincible reluctance to tell him she was already wed
thrust back the words.Rockhurst turned, and taking the loose pieces of paper from the table,
gazed at them thoughtfully for a moment, and thrust them into his pocket.Then he rose, and almost gaily:—
“Come, madam,” he said, “your palfrey waits in the cold.Put on your
shoes.” As he spoke he took down his sword and buckled it on.She went forth with him, her finger-tips lightly in his hold, without a
word, through the passages of the lone house, through the hall.The door,
open to the night, cut a square, brilliant silver upon the inner dimness.The mare, black, steaming, stood patiently, her bridle hitched to a
post.There was not a sound of another living thing, it seemed, in all
the white-shrouded land.She rested one hand on the saddle-cloth, lifted
her foot for his service, and he swung her up with practised ease.She
felt the strength of a steel bow in his arm.He folded her in a huge
horseman’s cloak; then, without a word, took the bridle to walk by her
side.Had she dared, she would have invited him
to share the saddle.But, dark and grave, he went beside her, and the
silence held them.* * * * *
They moved as in a dream through a dreamland of beauty, a white purity
beyond expression.Above, in the pine trees, the wind choired; far
out over the waste it sighed.Somewhere very far away, yet strangely
distinct, Christmas joy bells were ringing.The starry sky that domed this wonderful world was still more wonderful.Diana neither felt the cold, nor measured the space she traversed, nor
the flight of time.She was another self; she would have asked no greater
boon than to journey on through all this splendour, with the vision
of his face cut in grave beauty against the white world, to meet the
glance of his watchful eye now and again, to have the touch of his hand,
kind and steady, upon her knee, when the road was rougher and the mare
stumbled.She knew that at that unknown inn door, down in the valley,
would come the parting, and her heart contracted.* * * * *
The little village seemed asleep.The inn itself looked deep in slumber,
with barred windows, its every gable huddled under the thick blanket
of snow; only a wreathing smoke from the chimney-stack to tell of some
watchfulness within.Rockhurst knocked, masterfully, sonorously.Sandra went to the office.Then turning, the rein slung
over his arm, he leaned against a pillar of the porch, removed his hat,
and looked up smiling at her.There came sounds, answering sounds,
indoor.Then he spoke:—
“Thank you,” he said.“Do you thank me?” Her voice shook a little.“Thank you,” he repeated, “for having shown me, once more, a vision of my
youth such as I never thought to know again!”
The bars were now heard grating against the closed door.She read farewell in his eyes; and, flinging out both her
hands, almost with a sob:—
“Ah, but shall we not meet again?” she said pleadingly.Mine—nay, you know it already.Diana—”
But he interrupted her with a quick gesture.No, it is a name of no good report, and I would not have
it dwell in your mind.And yours—it were best I should not know it.…”
Then, after a slight pause: “You come as a dream to me, you go as a
dream, perfect, sweet, beyond words.We shall never meet again, Diana.”
The inn doors were slowly drawing apart.He lifted his arms to help her
down, held her a second between them to steady her, then, putting her
gently aside, sprang into the saddle and forthwith spurred the mare to
her heavy trot.Sandra journeyed to the kitchen.And Diana, looking after them, saw rider and mount passing from her,
black against the snow.She stood, bewilderment
in her mind, pain at her heart.“God-a-mercy, madam, ’tis you!” cried the familiar voice of her old
servant in her ear.“In the Lord’s name, madam, where have you been?” old
Geoffrey was tremblingly questioning.She started, looking round at him as one suddenly awakened.Was it all
indeed a dream of the snow?she asked herself, as the sheltering doors of
the Anchor, at Liphook, closed upon her.* * * * *
The sudden spurt of old Bess the mare soon gave place to her usual jog.Through the silent snow she carried her rider back to the door of Farrant
Chace.The rhythmic jingle of her bit, the monotonous muffled plunge of
her hoofs, the wail of the wind over the down, seemed to point the wide
stillness, even as the sparse black firs pointed the immense whiteness of
the waste.Rockhurst stepped in again into the warmth of the parlour, snow sodden on
his boots, hoar frost pricking his hair, and found Paul Farrant.Sandra travelled to the bathroom.* * * * *
To the young man’s frenzied anxiety it seemed interminable nights that
he had been thus waiting, waiting for release or doom; nights that he
had paced the brown parlour from end to end; that he had stood shivering
in the window recess, gazing out upon the white emptiness, straining
his ears for a sound of life in the awful stillness.The uncertainty
of Rockhurst’s moods, of his intentions, the mystery that had to-night
surrounded his movements, added to the waiting misery.To what end had
Rakehell set forth, at midnight through the snow, with the lady whom he
had so cynically received?Was it a sudden whim of chivalrous courtesy?His scorching anger upon their last brief meeting might lead him to
that preposterous conclusion—Knight Errant Rakehell, out through the
snowdrifts on a farm mare for the sake of country virtue!Daniel journeyed to the office.(What tale
might he not make of it for supper merriment at Whitehall!)Or Rakehell,
jealous of his host’s fair looks and smooth cheek, carrying off
elsewhere the prize of grace and beauty.…
At such a point Farrant’s uneasy tread would lead him back to the hearth,
to seek vain comfort by the embers, to fling fresh logs on the reddening
pile.What was he to do if Rockhurst were to pass away from his road like
this?Dare he, so long as those damning notes were in that pitiless hold,
ever present himself within earshot of Court?* * * * *
Then all at once, as he sat staring into his uncertain future, his guest
was back upon him—those were his steps without, that was his hand on the
latch!Farrant sprang to his feet, and flung a look of piteous inquiry at
the great lord’s face.He went to the hearth and stood for an
appreciable pause gazing at the lad; in his eyes there was none of the
former scorn—nothing but a kind of sad wonder.Then, deliberately, he
drew the damning slips of paper from his pocket, turned, and |
bedroom | Where is Daniel? | Farrant drew a quivering breath of relief.The “debt of honour” was
cancelled.THE ENIGMA OF THE LOCKET
THE ENIGMA OF THE LOCKET
I
LITTLE SATAN
Enguerrand de Joncelles—_Monsieur le Vidame de Joncelles_, as he
preferred to be called—was new to courts.To the court of Whitehall, _la
cour de Witalle_ he had it, he was yet altogether a stranger.Sandra travelled to the bedroom.From the noble monotony of Joncelles, the great poverty-stricken chateau
which raised its pepper-box turrets above meagre apple orchards, a league
south of Caen, to the excitement of the Louvre and Versailles; from the
rigidity of the maternal rule at home (in her retirement, Madame de
Joncelles, a confidant and friend of the late Queen Mother of France, had
never compromised on matters of discipline, and had cherished theories on
the education of young men) to complete emancipation—here had been steps
high enough to upset the balance of any quick-blooded and good-looking
youth of eighteen.But the little Vidame had found his feet, as the
saying goes, with astonishing ease, as soon as the austere old lady,
departing for a better world, left him to face this one by himself.The new mourning had scarce had time to be fitted to his comely figure
before the whole youth himself had become a different being.There are
some whom a single glass of wine intoxicates; Enguerrand de Joncelles was
intoxicated at the very first sip of life.… Such a flutter of silk and
curls; such constellations of eyes, brilliant or melting or mockingly
challenging; such lightning of wit; such whispers, such sighs!In one
day he had learned to return, with interest, an _œillade_ that, within
the precincts of Caen Cathedral, would have made him drop a modest
lid—and set him dreaming for a week.Within a very little while more
he had mastered the art of capturing a soft hand and holding it hidden
in tender pressure, the while presenting a decorous front to stately
company.Mary went to the hallway.Sandra went to the office.He had also learned to look down in the right measure of disdain
upon the burgher; to bandy, in all delicacy, audacious pleasantry with
his equals on the Grand Staircase of the Louvre, or in the _Galérie de
l’Œil-de-Bœuf_.Sandra journeyed to the kitchen.He could whip out his new-mode small-sword with as swift
a grace as the best noted ruffler.He was able to be more obviously
dazzled by the splendour of the _Roy-Soleil_ than many a past-master
sycophant—withal cultivating a fine insensibility of outward aspect,
keeping the delicate beauty of his features set as in a fine white mask,
his voice low-toned—only now and again permitting the wide-pupilled black
eyes to betray by a flash the constant alertness of the inner mind.These demure airs gave a singular piquancy to the boldness of his words
and deeds, one which was not without its special effect in that court of
solemn sham and wearisome etiquette.Heaven only knows where the precious
only son of Madame de Joncelles had found such sudden knowledge of the
world, such astuteness and such recklessness combined.It was a merciful
Providence that spared his pious mother the sight of the ultimate
blossoming of her carefully pruned young tree!Attached (together with his sister, Madame de Mantes, a noted beauty
of Versailles) to the train of Madame Henriette d’Orléans, on the
occasion of that princess’s first journey to England since the happy
restoration of her royal brother, he now was ushered to the court of
Whitehall.What the apt youth here saw and learned filled him deep
with surprise—a surprise, however, which he was careful not to betray.Beyond doubt it was a merry place, this court of Charles—if its methods
were a trifle astonishing.Enguerrand was not one who would let pass a
single opportunity for self-instruction, and now and again, despite his
impassive attitude where the natural acuteness of his wits failed him, he
condescended to ask for information.* * * * *
He was in a questioning mood, this night at Whitehall, when, for the
first time, he was admitted to the King’s more private circle.By good
adventure, he found himself beside a gentleman who seemed to possess an
intimate knowledge of the royal ways as well as an amiable readiness
to impart it.This was an elderly little man of the name of Petherick,
who once, evidently, had been handsome, and was still à la mode.As
Enguerrand was to learn later, Mr.Petherick justified his established
position at Court by a notable ingenuity in discovering fresh sources
of amusement for the easily wearied Charles.Now the acute person’s eye
rested critically upon the elegance of the foreign boy; his Majesty liked
new faces and new fashions, and his Majesty especially liked the French.“Aye,” said Petherick, as if pursuing his thought aloud, “the King is
vastly fond of your country, Vidame—and of your countrywomen, just now.See—that divine dark creature that came with Madame Henriette; I’ve
laid a wager, to wit, that her Royal Highness will have to leave her
lady-in-waiting behind, when she returns to France.”
“Sir—you mean, I see, Madame de Mantes,” said Enguerrand, coolly.“My
sister.”
“Monsieur de Joncelles…?Ah, of course, Madame de Mantes is married.And
M. de Mantes?”
“Say was married—happily widowed within a few months,” said the little
Vidame, with elaborate coolness.And from his post slightly in the
background he gazed at the brilliant royal circle and singled out the
familiar dark curly head, the peach-like cheek, the childlike lustrous
eyes with quite a new interest.Petherick had too good an experience of the Court not to be more than
ever gracious to a newcomer, who proved to be the brother of a beauteous
sister.Following the direction of the Vidame’s eyes, he pointed out the
personalities of major importance—handsome Castlemaine, sullen and
aggressive to-night; and fair Stewart with her childish face and her
studied coldness of demeanour, and put Master Enguerrand _au courant_ of
some spicy snippets.Buckingham proclaimed himself by his magnificence,
his insolence, and his gaiety.“But pray,” put in the Vidame, “who may the tall, dark gentleman be,
who sits in such silence behind his Majesty, and who, even when the
King speaks, seems to have forgot how to smile.… He has a handsome
presence—although no longer young, at all.” (Thus, the superb arrogance
of his own springtime!)“Do you mark, Monsieur Petherick, how my little
sister keeps seeking his notice with languishing eyes—aye, even with
his Majesty’s own gaze upon her … the perverse one!Pray, who is the
gentleman?”
“How!” cried Mr.Sandra travelled to the bathroom.Petherick, “a whole week already in Whitehall, and
not yet acquainted with the Rakehell?Why, sir, it is our King’s own
familiar, an old comrade of the wars and of exile.His Majesty can
do nought without my lord Viscount Rockhurst—my merry Rockhurst, he
has dubbed his lordship, in a raillery, you will understand, of that
countenance which keeps its gravity through the maddest freak.And mad
he can be, sir; hence that nickname of Rakehell, which no doubt has
astonished your French elegancy.—Nay, but in truth there is an eye that
wanders, as you say, prodigious languorously upon my lord Constable!” Mr.Dewey answered
on June 5:
We, his Majesty's leal and loyal subjects of the Province of New
York.... First, we hold fee of our land by grants of George
II., and George III., the lands reputed then in New Hampshire.Daniel journeyed to the office.Since 1764, New York has granted the same land as though the fee
of the land and property was altered with jurisdiction, which
we suppose was not.... Suits of law for our lands rejecting our
proof of title, refusing time to get our evidence are the grounds
of our discontent.... Breaking houses for possession of them
and their owners, firing on these people and wounding innocent
women and children.... We must closely adhere to the maintaining
our property with a due submission to Your Excellency's
jurisdiction.... We pray and beseech Your Excellency would assist
to quiet us in our possessions, till his Majesty in his royal
wisdom shall be graciously pleased to settle the controversy.Allen, not being allowed to go to New York, wrote to Tryon in
conjunction with Warner, Baker, and Cochran, stating the case as
follows:
No consideration whatever, shall induce us to remit in the least
of our loyalty and gratitude to our most Gracious Sovereign, and
reasonably to you; yet no tyranny shall deter us from asserting
and vindicating our rights and privileges as Englishmen.We
expect an answer to our humble petition, delivered you soon after
you became Governor, but in vain.We assent to your jurisdiction,
because it is the King's will, and always have, except where
perverse use would deprive us of our property and country.We
desire and petition to be reannexed to New Hampshire.That is not
the principal cause we object to, but we think change made by
fraud, unconstitutional exercise of it.The New York patentees
got judgments, took out writs, and actually dispossessed several
by order of law, of their houses and farms and necessaries.These families spent their fortunes in bringing wilderness into
fruitful fields, gardens and orchards.Over fifteen hundred
families ejected, if five and one-quarter persons are allowed
to each family.... The writs of ejectment come thicker and
faster.... Nobody can be supposed under law if law does not
protect.... Since our misfortune of being annexed to New York,
law is a tool to cheat us.... Fatigued in settling a wilderness
country.... As our cause is before the King, we do not expect
you to determine it.... If we don't oppose Sheriff, he takes
our houses and farms.If we do, we are indicted rioters.If our
friends help us, they are indicted rioters.As to refugees,
self-preservation necessitated our treating some of them roughly.Ebenezer Cowle and Jonathan Wheat, of Shaftsbury, fled to New
York, because of their own guilt, they not being hurt nor
threatened.John Munro, Esq., and ruffians, assaulting Baker at
daybreak, March 22, was a notorious riot, cutting, wounding and
maiming Mr.As Baker is alive he
has no cause of complaint.John went back to the hallway.Later he (Munro) assaulted Warner
who, with a dull cutlass, struck him on the head to the ground.As laws are made by our enemies, we could not bring Munro to
justice otherwise than by mimicing him, and treating him as he
did Baker, and so forth.Bliss Willoughby, feigning business,
went to Baker's house and reported to Munro, thus instigating
and planning the attack.... The alteration of jurisdiction in
1764 could not affect private property.... The transferring
or alienation of property is a sacred prerogative of the true
owner.Kings and Governors cannot intermeddle therewith.... We
have a petition lying before his Majesty and Council for redress
of our grievances for several years past.In Moore's time, the
King forbid New York to patent any lands before granted by New
Hampshire.King notifying New
York he takes cognizance and will settle and forbids New York to
meddle: common sense teaches a common law, judgment after that,
if it prevailed, would be subversive of royal authority.So all
officers coming to dispossess are violaters of law.Right and
wrong are externally the same.We are not opposing you and your
Government, but a party chiefly attorneys.We hear you applied to
assembly for armed force to subdue us in vain.We choose Captain
Stephen Fay and Mr.Jonas Fay, to treat with you in person.We
entreat your aid to quiet us in our farms till the King decides
it.Daniel journeyed to the bedroom.[1]
The embassy was successful.The council advised that all legal
processes against Vermont should cease.If Bennington was happy in
May over the invitation, Bennington was jubilant in August over the
kindly advice.The air rang with shouts; the health of governor and
council was drunk and cannon and small-arms were heard everywhere.No
part of New York colony was happier or more devotedly British.Two
years had passed since the New York Supreme Court had adjudged all
the Vermont legal documents null and void: one year had passed since
New York had sent a sheriff and posse with hundreds of citizens to
force Vermont farmers from their farms, but both of these affairs
occurred under Governor Clinton.Now perhaps, the Vermonters thought,
the new governor was going to act fairly: there would be no more
fights; no more watching and guarding against midnight attacks; no
more need of fire-arms; and wives and babes would be safe.There
would be no more kidnapping of Green Mountain Boys and hurrying them
away to Albany jail; no more foreign surveying of the lands they
tilled and loved.CHAPTER V.
THE RAID UPON COLONEL REID'S SETTLERS.--ALLEN'S OUTLAWRY.--CREAN
BRUSH.--PHILIP SKENE.But "best laid schemes of mice and men gang aft agley."While these
negotiations were pending, New Yorkers were quietly doing the
necessary work for stealing more Vermont lands.Cockburn, the Scotch
New York surveyor, was surveying land along Otter Creek.The Green
Mountain Boys heard of it, rallied, and overtook him near Vergennes,
and found Colonel Reid's Scotchmen enjoying mills and farms.For
three years these foreigners had been there.In 1769, with no legal
title, they had found, seized, and enjoyed the land, with a mill.Vermonters had then rallied and dispossessed these dispossessors, but
a second raid of Reid's men redispossessed them.In the summer of
1772, Vermont, seizing Cockburn, turned out Reid's tenants, broke up
mill-stones and threw them over the falls, razed houses, and burned
crops.The Scotch story is as follows: John Cameron made affidavit that
he and some other families from Scotland arrived at New York in
the latter part of June, and a few days afterward agreed with
Lieutenant-Colonel Reid to settle as tenants on his lands on Otter
Creek, in Charlotte County.Reid went with them to Otter Creek, some
miles east from Crown Point, and was at considerable expense in
transporting them, their wives, children, and baggage.The day after
their arrival at Otter Creek they were viewing the land, where they
saw a crop of Indian corn, wheat, and garden stuff, and a stack of
hay and two New England men.Reid paid these two men $15 for their
crops, the men agreeing to leave until the king's pleasure should
be known.Reid made over these crops to his new tenants, gave them
possession of the land in presence of two justices of the peace
of Charlotte County, and bought some provisions and cows for his
tenants.On or about the 11th of August, armed men from different
parts of the country came and turned James Henderson and others
out of their homes, burnt the houses to the ground, and for two
days pastured fifty horses which |
bathroom | Where is Mary? | They also burnt a large stack
of hay, purchased by Reid.The next day the rioters, headed by
their captains, Allen, Baker, and Warner, came to Cameron's house,
destroyed the new grist-mill, built by Reid (Baker insisting upon
it), broke the mill-stones in pieces and threw them down a precipice
into the river.The rioters then turned out Cameron's wife and two
small children, and burnt the house, having in the two days burnt
five houses, two corn shades, and one stack of hay.When Cameron,
much incensed, asked by what authority of law they committed such
violences, Baker replied that they lived out of the bounds of law,
and holding up his gun said that was his law.He further declared
that they were resolved never to allow any persons claiming under New
York to settle in that part of the province, but if Cameron would
join them, they would give him lands for nothing.While the rioters were destroying his house and mill on
the Crown Point (west) side of Otter Creek, he heard six men ordered
to go with arms and stand as sentinels on a rising ground toward
Crown Point, to prevent any surprise from the troops in the garrison
there.Having destroyed Cameron's house and the mill, the rioters
recrossed the river.Cameron reports that he saw among the rioters
Joshua Hide, who had agreed in writing with Reid not to return, and
had received payment for his crop.Hide was very active in advising
the destruction of Cameron's house and the mill.Cameron stayed about three weeks at Otter Creek, after the rioters
dispersed, hoping to hear from Reid, and hoping also that New York
would protect him and his fellow-settlers, but having no house, and
being exposed to the night air, the fever and ague soon compelled
him to retire.Some of his companions went before, the rest were
to follow.Sandra travelled to the bedroom.What became of his wife and children he does not state.Cameron stayed one night at the house of a Mr.Irwin, on the east
shore of the lake, five miles north of Crown Point.Irwin, an elderly
man, holding a New Hampshire title, told Cameron that Reid had a
narrow escape, for Baker with eight men had laid in wait for him a
whole day, near the mouth of Otter Creek, determined to murder him,
and the men in the boat with him, on their way back to Crown Point,
so that none might remain to tell tales.Irwin disapproved of such bloody intentions, and
said if his land was confirmed to a Yorker, he would either buy the
Yorker's title or move off.Mary went to the hallway.James Henderson, settler under Colonel Reid, deposed that on
Wednesday, August 11, he and three others of Colonel Reid's settlers
were at work at their hay in the meadow, when twenty men, armed
with guns, swords, and pistols, surprised them.They inquired if
Henderson and his companions lived in the house some time before
occupied by Joshua Hide.They replied no, the men who lived in that
house were about their business.The rioters then told Henderson and
his companions that they must go along with them (as they could not
understand the women), and marched them prisoners, guarded before and
behind like criminals, to the house, where they joined the rest of
the mob, in number about one hundred or more, all armed as before,
and who, as Henderson was told by the women, had let their horses
loose in the corn and wheat that Reid had bought for his settlers.The mob desired the things to be taken out of the house, and then
set the house on fire.Ethan Allen, the ringleader or captain,
then ordered part of his gang to go with Henderson to his own house
(formerly built and occupied by Captain Gray) in order to prepare it
for the same fate.Sandra went to the office.Henderson and his wife earnestly requested the mob
to spare their house for a few days, in order to save their effects
and protect their children from the inclemency of the weather,
until they could have an opportunity of removing themselves to some
safe place; but Captain Allen, coming up from the fore-mentioned
house, told them that his business required haste; for he and his
gang were determined not to leave a house belonging to Colonel Reid
standing.Then the mob set fire to and entirely consumed Henderson's
house.Henderson took out his memorandum book and desired to know
their ringleader's or captain's name.The captain answered: "Who
gave you authority to ask for my name?"Henderson replied that as
he took him to be the ringleader of the mob, and as he had in such
a riotous and unlawful manner dispossessed him, he had a right to
ask his name, that he might represent him to Colonel Reid, who had
put him, Henderson, in peaceable possession of the premises as his
just property.Allen answered, he wished they had caught Colonel
Reid; they would have whipped him severely; that his name was Ethan
Allen, captain of that mob, and that his authority was his own arms,
pointing to his gun; that he and his companions were a lawless mob,
their law being mob law.Henderson replied that the law was made for
lawless and riotous people, and that he must know it was death by
the law to ringleaders of rioters and lawless mobs.Allen answered
that he had run these woods in the same manner these seven years
past [this would carry it back to the year 1766, when Zadoc Thompson
says Allen's family was living in Sheffield] and never was caught
yet; and he told Henderson that if any of Colonel Reid's settlers
offered hereafter to build any house and keep possession, the Green
Mountain Boys, as they call themselves, would burn their houses and
whip them into the bargain.The mob then burnt the house formerly
built and occupied by Lewis Stewart, and remained that night about
Leonard's house.The next day, about seven A.M., August 12, Henderson
went to Leonard's house.The mob were all drawn up, consulting about
destroying the mill.Those who were in favor of it were ordered
to follow Captain Allen.In the mean time Baker and his gang came
to the opposite side of the river and fired their guns.They were
brought over at once, and while they were taking some refreshment,
Allen's party marched to the mill, but did not break up any part of
it until Allen joined them.The two mobs having joined (by their own
account one hundred and fifty in number), with axes, crow-bars, and
handspikes tore the mill to pieces, broke the mill-stones and threw
them into the creek.Baker came out of the mill with the bolt-cloth
in his hands.With his sword he cut it in pieces and distributed it
among the mob to wear in their hats like cockades, as trophies of the
victory.Henderson told Baker he was about very disagreeable work.Baker replied it was so, but he had a commission for so doing, and
showed Henderson where his thumb had been cut off, which he called
his commission.Angus McBean, settler under Colonel Reid, deposed that between seven
and eight A.M., Thursday, August 12 last, he met a part of the New
England mob about Leonard's house, sixty men or thereabouts, he
supposed, armed with guns, swords, and pistols.One of them asked
Angus if he were one of Colonel Reid's new settlers, and having been
told he was, asked him what he intended to do.McBean replied he
intended to build himself a house and keep possession of the land.He
was then asked if he intended to keep possession for Colonel Reid.He replied yes, as long as he could.Soon after their chief leader,
Allen, came and asked him if he was the man that said he would keep
possession for Colonel Reid.Allen then damned his
soul, but he would have him, McBean, tied to a tree and skinned
alive, if he ever attempted such a thing.Allen and several of the
mob said, if they could but catch Colonel Reid, they would cut his
head off.Joshua Hide, one of the persons of whom Colonel Reid bought
the crop, advised the mob to tear down or burn the houses of Donald
McIntosh and John Burdan, as they both had been assisting Colonel
Reid.Soon after several guns were fired on the other side of the
creek.Some of the mob said that was Captain Baker and his party
coming to see the sport.Soon Baker and his party joined the mob, and
all went to tear down the grist-mill.McBean thought Baker was one
of the first that entered the mill.However strong our indignation at the New York usurpations, we cannot
read of the violent ejectment of families without a feeling of
repugnance to such a method.Turn to the vivid and romantic account
of Colonel Reid's settlement in "The Tory's Daughter," and remember
that in civil strife the innocent must often suffer.The Green
Mountain Boys' immunity from the penalty of the law for their riotous
acts shows not only their adroitness, but suggests half-heartedness
in their pursuit.Laws not supported by public sentiment are rarely
enforced.Sandra journeyed to the kitchen.John Munroe wrote to Duane during the Clarendon proceedings:
The rioters have a great many friends in the county of Albany,
and particularly in the city of Albany, which encourages them
in their wickedness, at the same time hold offices under the
Government, and pretend to be much against them, but at heart I
know them to be otherwise, for the rioters have often told me,
that be it known to me, that they had more friends in Albany than
I had, which I believe to be true.Hugh Munro lived near the west line of Shaftsbury.He took Surveyor
Campbell to survey land in Rupert for him.He was seized by Cochran,
who said he was a son of Robin Hood, and beaten.Ira Allen says
Munro fainted from whipping by bush twigs.Munro had not a savory
reputation with the Vermonters.After Tryon's offer of a reward for
the arrest of Allen, Baker, and Cochran, he, with ten or twelve other
men, had seized Baker, who lived ten or twelve miles from him, a mile
east of Arlington.After a march of sixteen miles, they were met by
ten Bennington men, who arrested Munro and Constable Stevens, the
rest of the party fleeing.Later Warner and one man rode to Munro's
and asked for Baker's gun.Munro refused, and seizing Warner's bridle
ordered the constable to arrest Warner, who drew his cutlass and
felled Munro to the ground.For this act of Warner's, Poultney voted
him one hundred acres of land April 4, 1773.In 1774 Allen published a pamphlet of over two hundred pages, in
which he rehearsed many historical facts tending to show that
previous to the royal order of 1764, New York had no claim to extend
easterly to the Connecticut River.He portrayed in strong light the
oppressive conduct of New York toward the settlers.This pamphlet
also contained the answer of himself and of his associates to the Act
of Outlawry of March, 1774.Another man was busy this year drawing up
reports of the trouble in Vermont.Crean Brush, the first Vermont lawyer, was a colonel, a native of
Dublin.In 1762 he came to New York and became assistant secretary
of the colony; in 1771-74 he practised law in Westminster, Vt.He
claimed thousands of Vermont acres under New York titles, and became
county clerk, surrogate, and provincial member of Congress.He was
in Boston jail nineteen months for plundering Boston whigs, and
finally escaped in his wife's dress.Sandra travelled to the bathroom.The British commander in New
York told him his conduct merited more punishment.A Yorker, always
fighting the Green Mountain Boys; a tory, always fighting the whigs;
with fair culture and talent, he became a sot, and, at the age of
fifty-three, in 1778, he blew his brains out, in New York City.He
left a step-daughter who became the second wife of Ethan Allen.On February 5, 1774, Brush reported to the New York Legislature
resolutions to the effect "that riotousness exists in part of
Charlotte County and northeast Albany County, calling for redress;
that a Bennington mob has terrorized officers, rescued debtors,
assumed military command and judicial power, burned houses, beat
citizens, expelled thousands, stopped the administration of justice;
that anti-rioters are in danger in person and property and need
protection.Wherefore the Governor is petitioned to offer fifty
pounds reward for the apprehension and lodgment in Albany jail of
Ethan Allen, Seth Warner, Remember Baker, Robert Cochran, Peleg
Sunderland, Silvanus Brown, James Breakenridge, and John Smith,
either or any of them."It was ordered that Brush and Colonel Ten
Eyck report a bill for the suppression of riotous and disorderly
proceedings.Walton were appointed to present
the address and resolutions to the governor.Daniel journeyed to the office.A committee met March 1, 1774, at Eliakim Weller's house in
Manchester, adjourning to the third Wednesday at Captain Jehial
Hawley's in Arlington.Nathan Clark was chairman of the committee
and Jonas Clark clerk.1,163, with
the foregoing report in it, was produced and read.Seven of the
committee were chosen to examine it and prepare a report, which was
adopted and ordered published in the public papers.They speak of
their misfortune in being annexed to New York, and hope that the
king will adopt the report of the Board of Trade, made December 3,
1772.In consequence, hundreds of settled families, many of them
comparatively wealthy, resolved to defend the outlawed men.All were
ready at a minute's warning.John went back to the hallway.They resolved to act on the defensive
only, and to encourage the execution of law in civil cases and in
real criminal cases.They advised the General Assembly to wait for
the king's decision.The committee declared that they were all loyal
to their political father; but that as they bought of the first
governor appointed by the king, on the faith of the crown, they will
maintain those grants; that New York has acted contrary to the spirit
of the good laws of Great Britain.This declaration was certified by
the chairman and clerk, at Bennington, April 14, 1774.Daniel journeyed to the bedroom.It was in 1774 that a new plan was formed for escaping from the
government of New York; a plan that startles us by its audacity and
its comprehensiveness.This was to establish a new royal colony
extending from the Connecticut to Lake Ontario and the St.Lawrence,
from forty-five degrees of north latitude to Massachusetts and the
Mohawk River.The plan was formed by Allen and other Vermonters.At that time Colonel Philip Skene, a retired British officer, was
living at Whitehall on a large patent of land.To him the Vermonters
communicated the project.Whitehall was to be the capital and Skene
the governor of the projected colony.Skene, at his own expense, went
to London, and was appointed governor of Ticonderoga and Crown Point,
but the course of public events prevented the completion of this
scheme.PREPARATIONS TO CAPTURE TICONDEROGA.--DIARY OF EDWARD
MOTT.--EXPEDITIONS PLANNED.--BENEDICT ARNOLD.--GERSHOM BEACH.On March 29, 1775, John Brown, a Massachusetts lawyer, wrote from
Montreal to Boston:
The people on the New Hampshire Grants have engaged to seize the
fort at Ticonderoga as soon as possible, should hostilities be
committed by the king's troops.The most minute account of the preparations to capture Ticonderoga is
furnished by the diary for April, 1775, of Edward Mott, of Preston,
Conn., a captain in Colonel S. H. Parson's regiment.He had been
at the camp of the American army beleaguering Boston; took charge
of the expedition to seize Ticonderoga; reported its success to
Governor Trumbull at Hartford; was sent by Trumbull to Congress at
Philadelphia with the news; resumed the command of his company at
Ticonderoga in May; was with the Northern army during the campaign;
was at the taking of Chambly and St.Sandra moved to the garden.Johns; and became a major in
Colonel Gray's regiment next year.PRESTON, Friday, April 28, 1775.Set out for Hartford, where I arrived the same day.Saw
Christopher LeffingMary went back to the bathroom. |
hallway | Where is Daniel? | When I had given him an account, he
asked me how they could be relieved and where I thought we could
get artillery and stores.I told him I knew not unless we went
and took possession of Ticonderoga and Crown Point, which I
thought might be done by surprise with a small number of men.Leffingwell left me and in a short time came to me again,
and brought with him Samuel H. Parsons and Silas Deane, Esqrs.Daniel journeyed to the bathroom.When he asked me if I would undertake in such an expedition as
we had talked of before, I told him I would.They told me they
wished I had been there one day sooner; that they had been on
such a plan; and that they had sent off Messrs.Noah Phelps and
Bernard Romans, whom they had supplied with £300 in cash from the
treasury, and ordered them to draw for more if they should need;
that said Phelps and Romans had gone by the way of Salisbury,
where they would make a stop.They expected a small number of men
would join them, and if I would go after them they would give
me an order or letter to them to join with them and to have my
voice with them in conducting the affair and in laying out the
money; and also that I might take five or six men with me.On
which I took with me Mr.Elijah Babcock, and John Bigelow joined me;
and Saturday, the 29th of April, in the afternoon, we set out
on said expedition.We got another
horse of Esq.Humphrey in Norfolk, and that day arrived at
Salisbury; tarried all night, and the next day, having augmented
our company to the number of sixteen in the whole, we concluded
it was not best to add any more, as we meant to keep our business
a secret and ride through the country unarmed till we came to
the New Settlements on the Grants.Dewey's in
Sheffield, and there we sent off Mr.John
Stevens to go to Albany, in order to discover the temper of the
people in that place, and to return and inform us as soon as
possible.That night (Monday the 1st of May) we arrived at Col.Easton's
in Pittsfield, where we fell in company with John Brown, Esq.,
who had been at Canada and Ticonderoga about a month before; on
which we concluded to make known our business to Col.Easton and
said Brown and to take their advice on the same.Deane, Leffingwell, and Parsons not to raise our men till
we came to the New Hampshire Grants, lest we should be discovered
by having too long a march through the country.But when we
advised with the said Easton and Brown they advised us that, as
there was a great scarcity of provisions in the Grants, and as
the people were generally poor, it would be difficult to get a
sufficient number of men there; therefore we had better raise a
number of men sooner.Said Easton and Brown concluded to go with
us, and Easton said he would assist me in raising some men in
his regiment.We then concluded for me to go with Col.Easton to
Jericho and Williamstown to raise men, and the rest of us to go
forward to Bennington and see if they could purchase provisions
there.We raised twenty-four men in Jericho and fifteen in Williamstown;
got them equipped ready to march.Easton and I set
out for Bennington.That evening we met with an express for
our people informing us that they had seen a man directly from
Ticonderoga and he informed them that they were re-enforced at
Ticonderoga, and were repairing the garrison, and were every way
on their guard; therefore it was best for us to dismiss the men
we had raised and proceed no further, as we should not succeed.I asked who the man was, where he belonged, and where he was
going, but could get no account; on which I ordered that the men
should not be dismissed, but that we should proceed.The next day
I arrived at Bennington.There overtook our people, all but Mr.Heacock, who were gone forward to reconnoitre
the fort: and Mr.Stevens had not got back from
Albany.The following account of expenses incurred on this expedition
is amusing, pitiful, and interesting, as evidence of the small
beginnings of the Revolution, and as compared with the machinery of
transportation and the wealth of the nation in its Civil War:
Account of Captain Edward Mott for his expenses going to
Ticonderoga and afterwards against the Colony of Connecticut:
£ s. d.
April 26th.--To expenses from Preston
to Hartford 0 5 0
Expenses at Hartford while consulting
what plan to take, or where it
would be best to raise the men 0 15 0
April 30th.--To expenses of six men at
New Hartford on our way to New
Hampshire Grants to raise men
($3) 0 18 0
May 1st.--To expenses at Norfolk
($2.50) 0 15 0
To expenses at Shaftsbury 0 7 8
To expenses in Jericho while raising
men 1 0 5
To expenses of marching men from
Jericho to Williamstown 1 4 0
May 1st.--To expenses at Allentown 0 6 8
To expenses at Massachusetts 2 4 6
" " " Newport 0 16 0
" " " Pawlet 1 3 3
" " " Castleton 1 6 0
To cash to a teamster for carting
provisions 0 6 0
To cash to Captain Noah Phelps £1
and to Elijah Babcock £6 7 0 0
To cash to Colonel Ethan Allen's
wife 3 0 0
To a horse cost me £20 in cash
($66.66), which I wore out in
riding to raise the men and going
to Ticonderoga, so that I was
obliged to leave her and get another
horse to ride back to Hartford 20 0 0
To my expenses from Ticonderoga
back to Hartford after we had
taken the fort 2 0 0
To my time or wages while going on
said service, and going from Hartford
to Philadelphia to report to
Congress by Governor Trumbull's
orders, being between thirty and
forty days, much of the time day
and night 20 0 0
The 3d of May, 1775, is an eventful day.Halsey and Stevens have been
there to obtain permission for the Ticonderoga expedition.The
Albany committee-men are alarmed, for the proposition seems to be
hazardous.What will the New York Congress think of it?Will the next
Continental Congress, to meet seven days hence, approve of it?The
committee write to the New York Congress for instructions, suggesting
that if New York goes in for the invasion it will plunge northern New
York into all the horrors of war.The Committee of Safety, without
waiting for permission from New York, decided to act.They issue a
commission to Arnold without consulting the Massachusetts Congress,
and authorize him to raise four hundred men in western Massachusetts
and near colonies for the capture of Ticonderoga and Crown Point;
they give him money and authority to seize and send military stores
to Massachusetts.We can imagine Arnold quickly in the saddle, for
the enterprise suits his genius.Daniel travelled to the hallway.Benedict Arnold was now thirty-five years old; educated in the
common schools, apprenticed as a druggist, fond of mischief, cruel,
irritable, reckless of his reputation, ambitious and uncontrollable.As a boy he loved to maim young birds, placed broken glass where
school-children would cut their feet, and enticed them with presents
and then rushed out and horsewhipped them.He would cling to the arms
of a large water-wheel at the grist-mill and thus pass beneath and
above the water.When sixteen years of age he enlisted as a soldier,
was released; enlisted again, was at Ticonderoga and other frontier
forts; deserted; served out his apprenticeship, became a druggist and
general merchant in New Haven; shipped horses, cattle, and provisions
to the West Indies, commanded his own vessels, fought a duel with a
Frenchman in the West Indies, became a bankrupt, and was suspected of
dishonesty.Fertile in resource, he resumed business with energy but
with the same obliquity of moral purpose.With sixty volunteers, a few of them Yale students, marching from
New Haven to Cambridge, he had an interview with Colonel Samuel H.
Parsons near Hartford the 27th of April, and told him about the
cannon and ammunition at Ticonderoga and the defenceless condition
of that fort.Such was the man who endeavored to wrest the command of
the expedition from Allen.But the grandest scene of all on that 3d of May is the assemblage
in Bennington, perhaps in the old Catamount Tavern of Stephen Fay.Jonas Fay, Joseph Fay, Breakenridge are
there with fifteen Connecticut men and thirty-nine Massachusetts men.Easton's Massachusetts men outnumber Warner's recruits, and Warner
ranks third instead of second.No one dreams of any one but Allen for
the leader.Easton is also complimented by being made chairman of the
council.Allen with his usual energy takes the initiative and leaves
the party to raise more men.He has been gone but a short time when
Benedict Arnold arrives on horseback with one attendant at the hamlet
and camp of Castleton.They frankly
communicate to him all their plans, and are in turn astounded by
Arnold's claiming the right to take command of their whole force.He
shows them his commission from the Committee of Safety in Cambridge,
Mass.This paper gave authority to enlist men, but no more power
over these men than any other American volunteers.Arnold's temper
brooked no opposition.There is almost a mutiny among the men.They
would go home, abandon the whole expedition which had so enkindled
their enthusiasm, rather than be subject to Arnold.Whether this
was owing to his domineering temper as exhibited before them, to
his reputation in Connecticut as an unprincipled man, or entirely
to their regard for their own officers and aversion to others, we
can only conjecture.Again the soldiers threaten to club their guns and go home.When
told that they should be paid the same, although Arnold did command
them, they would "damn" their pay.But Arnold suddenly started to
leave this company and overtake Allen.The soldiers, knowing Allen's
good-nature, as suddenly leave Castleton and follow Arnold to prevent
his overpersuading Allen to yield to his arrogance.When this stampede occurred, Nott and Phelps with Herrick were with
the thirty men on the march to Skenesborough.They left the Remington
camp at Castleton, and had gone nearly to Hydeville.The stampede
left all the provisions at Castleton, so that Nott and Phelps were
obliged to return to Castleton, gather up the provisions, and follow
the main party to Ticonderoga.They arrived in Shoreham too late to
take part in the capture, but crossed the lake with Warner.This
incident deprives us of the benefit of Nott's journal account of the
capture itself, a loss to be deplored.Some time Tuesday, somewhere
between Castleton and the lake, Allen and Arnold met, and the scene
occurred which has been so often and so well told in romance and
history.Within three weeks after the world-renowned 19th of April, 1775,
Ethan stood in Castleton with an old friend by his side, Gershom
Beach, of Rutland, a whig blacksmith, intelligent, capable, and true.Besides some sixty Massachusetts and Connecticut allies, Allen is
surrounded by from one to two hundred Green Mountain Boys.More men
were wanted, and Beach was selected from the willing and eager crowd
to go, like Roderick Dhu's messenger with the Cross of Fire, o'er
hill and dale, across brook and swamp, from Castleton to Rutland,
Pittsford, Brandon, Middlebury, and Shoreham.The distance was sixty
miles, the time allowed twenty-four hours, the rallying-point a
ravine at Hand's Point, Shoreham.Paul Revere rode on a good steed,
over good roads, on a moonlight night, in a few hours.Gershom Beach
went on foot, crossed Otter Creek twice, forded West Creek, East
Creek, Furnace Brook, Neshobe River, Leicester River, Middlebury
River, and walked through forests choked with underbrush, but at the
end of the day allotted the men were warned and were hastening to the
rendezvous.Then and not till then Beach threw himself on the ground
and gave himself up to well-earned sleep.Let us give this hero his
full meed of praise.After a few hours' rest he followed the men whom
he had aroused and joined Allen.CAPTURE OF TICONDEROGA.In the gray of the morning, Wednesday, May 10, 1775, Ethan Allen
with eighty-three Green Mountain Boys crossed the lake.He frankly
told his followers of the danger, but every gun was poised to dare
that danger.Soon three huzzas rang out on the parade-ground of the
sleeping fort.The English captain, De Laplace, not knowing that
his nation had an enemy on this continent, asked innocently by what
authority his surrender was demanded.No
words in the language are more familiar than Allen's reply.The
British colors were trailed before a power that had no national flag
for more than two years afterward.A few hours later, that same day,
the second session of the Continental Congress began at Philadelphia,
the members all unaware and soon in part disapproving of this exploit
of Allen's.[_Exit._
|
bathroom | Where is Sandra? | Well, I declare she looks as like a man!Oh no, don't laugh--Never give your mind to laughing--I did not
even smile, but kept my countenance as steady--just thus--Did not I,
Flora?Oh--'tis such a weakness to laugh--Look just so--as I do now--
COUNTESS.I must away to the trial, however--come with me to the door,
Flora.And be sure you don't laugh--Think on me, and keep your
countenance--if you can.(_Exit Countess and Flora on one side and Jerome on the other._)
END OF THE FIRST ACT._The Hall in the Castle._
_Enter_ FLORA.Dear me, what a pretty footman she has brought with her!--he made me
such a fine bow as I past--and looked so grand--here he is._Enter_ CARLOS _and bows--She courtesies_.O Lord, I hope this is not a woman too!Daniel journeyed to the bathroom.but I dare say it
is--Lord what a pity!but I'll talk to him, and I shall soon be able to
find out--and if he does not fall in love with me, I'll conclude it
can't be a man.(_aside._) Your humble servant, my dear
angel.(_aside._)
CARLOS.May I venture, on so slight an acquaintance to protest to you--
FLORA.No--he protests--'tis a man.Permit me to assure you--
FLORA.I have been trying to put this bunch of ribbons into a right form
for my Lady's hair, and I hardly know how.(_She gives the ribbons._)
FLORA.Now shall I see by the dexterity, whether it is a woman or not.There--I'll be hanged if I have not done it to a nicety.(_Returns the ribbons._)
FLORA.(_Aside and sighing._)
CARLOS.Now I must beg a kiss for my pains.(_Kisses her._)
FLORA.For Heaven's sake go about your business, for here comes a
fellow-servant of mine.I am going into the grove, will you come there presently?Yes--perhaps I may--only begone now.[_Exit._
_Enter_ URSULA.Flora, I give you joy of your new sweetheart--For
shame, for shame, I saw what passed.Lord bless you--it is only a woman.Aye, in men's clothes, like the master, and so there could be no
harm you know.I did not know the servant was a woman too!Why, I am not sure of it--but I thought so when I let him kiss
me, and I thought so when I promised to meet him in the grove--and I
will e'en go--for I dare say 'tis only a woman.Aye, now I think of it again, I am sure it is not a man--Do you
suppose a Lady in disguise, would take a man-servant to attend her?Daniel travelled to the hallway.Very true; and I wish, Ursula, you would go instead of me to the
grove, for I am so busy just at this time--
URSULA.And yet old Jerome says, and I never knew Jerome mistaken in my
life, he says it is a man--however, _I_ am not afraid of him if it is,
and I _will_ go instead of you.No, Ursula--I will go after all--for if it _should_ prove a man,
and he should behave rude to you, oh!my dear Ursula, I should never be
happy, that I did not take it all upon myself.[_Exeunt separately._
SCENE II._A Parlour in the Castle._
_The_ COUNTESS, _the_ MARQUIS, _and_ DON ANTONIO _discovered sitting_.And so, my Lord, you once thought of the army--Do you think you
should stand your ground in a battle.(_Laughing to himself._)
MARQUIS.(_Surprized._)
ANTONIO.(_Aside._) Damn me but she has a good leg.Your Lordship seems formed for the service of a softer Deity;
an occupation less perilous than that of war.Pardon me, Madam, the Deity you allude to, I fear may be yet
more fatal, unless you will kindly fight on my side.Ha, ha, ha, I can't help laughing to think what a pretty
soldier you would make--You look vastly like a soldier to be sure.--Ha,
ha, ha.(_Angrily._)
ANTONIO.Nay, no offence--Damn me if I should not like to command a
whole regiment of you--and I would go upon some new achievements--For
instance, say the enemy were Hotten-tots, I would undertake to poison
them all by the scent of perfumes from my army--or in case of a repulse,
would engage at any time to raise a mist, and escape pursuit, only by
commanding every man to shake his head, and discharge the powder.Upon my word, Sir, you are very pleasant.(_Forcing a smile._)
ANTONIO.I am very glad your Lordship thinks so.(_To Antonio._) Sir, you are wanted by a gentleman in the
parlour.Sandra went back to the bedroom.Pshaw--I'm busy--Who is it?--(_Servant whispers._) Well then I
must come.(_Exit Servant._) My Lord I take my leave for a minute, but
I shall soon be back.(_Aside._) How like a man she looks--Impudent
hussey.Your uncle's behaviour, Madam, has something in it rather
extraordinary--I hope I have not in any means offended him?I can conceal my knowledge of her no longer.(_Aside._) Oh no,
my dear, not at all.(_Aside._)
COUNTESS.I declare I like you so well--so much better than I
expected--I can no longer treat you with cold reserve--Come sit down.(_They sit._)
MARQUIS.(_Drawing his chair near to her._)
COUNTESS.(_Looking at him from head to foot._) Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha.I
protest I can't help laughing--Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha.Ha, ha, ha, ha--I protest no more can I--Sure fate directed me
to this heavenly spot, where ceremony has no share in politeness.Sandra travelled to the bathroom.And did you suppose I should use any ceremony with such a
sweet, sweet fellow as you?Egad, I'll use no ceremony either.(_Aside._) Thus, on my
knees, let me pour my thanks.(_Stroking his cheek._)
MARQUIS.I disclaim it--and so do you.--You are all pure nature.Well, I positively do think you one of the cleverest of your
whole sex.Thank you--Thank you--my dearest creature.(_Kissing her
hand._)
COUNTESS.So negligent--so easy--not the lead awkward or embarrassed!Egad, I think you as little embarrassed to the full.(_Aside._)
My dear Madam, your charming society has inspired me.(_Salutes her._)
COUNTESS.Now, if you were really a _man_, what would you _deserve_ for
that?(_Astonished._)
COUNTESS.I say, if you were _really_ a man, what would you deserve for
that freedom?Why?--What?--Don't I look like a man?Yes--that you do--and a sweet pretty man--Come, come, don't
be frightened--shake hands--I forgive you--forgive you all your
impertinence--and, carry the jest as far as you will, I am resolved
not to be angry.I am very much obliged to you--infinitely obliged to you--I
assure you this favour--this honour.--I don't know what to say--She
absolutely puts me out of countenance.(_Aside._)
COUNTESS.What confused?--Come, resume your gaiety--Come, come--
MARQUIS.(_seizing her._)
_Enter_ DON ANTONIO.Oh, Uncle, I have been so ill-used by this Gentleman, that I
must beg you will resent his behaviour.Certainly, my dear, if you _have_ been used ill.Most scandalously--Frighten her a little.(_Aside to
Antonio._)
MARQUIS.Upon my honour, Sir--
ANTONIO.Zounds, Sir, my niece is one of the most reserved, prudent
young women--and whosoever offers an insult to her, it is my place, and
consistent but with my honour, to resent it.--How white she looks.(_Aside._)
MARQUIS.Sir, I shall not draw my sword before the Countess, and
therefore I beg you will put up your's.And so I will, my poor Lady--I see it has frightened you--Here,
Niece, have you any hartshorn or drops at hand--the poor thing is
terrified out of her life.Come, come, my poor little creature--Poor
thing--Poor rogue.(_He goes up to sooth him, and the Marquis gives him
a blow._)
MARQUIS.Don Antonio, this insolence shall receive the correction it
deserves.(_Draws._)
COUNTESS.(_Aside._)
ANTONIO.I have received many a blow from a Lady, but never such a one
as this!Do you dare to call me a Lady again, Sir?A Lady, oh no--you are a tyger, a fury--
MARQUIS.I never met with such usage!--Damnation!I did not think such a word could
come out of a woman's mouth!How, Sir!--Dare to say that again, and I'll nail you to the
wall.(_Retreating._) Why, what is all this about?I won't fight--I
only drew my sword to frighten you.To frighten me!--Did you think I was to be frightened?Yes, I see, and scorn you for it.Why, Uncle, the tables are fairly turned upon you.Yes, Niece, and I'm much obliged to you, for your advice in the
business--But you may depend upon it, I shall take care how I attempt to
frighten one of your sex again.(_Going._)
MARQUIS.Come back, Sir, I insist upon your coming back, and recalling
what you have said--I insist upon your begging me pardon for your
impertinent insinuation.--
ANTONIO.What insinuation?--That I think you a female?--I am sure there
is no offence meant in that--for, when I suppose you a woman, I suppose
you what I like better than anything in the world; what I am never happy
without; and what I even make myself poor, despised, and ridiculous, in
the daily pursuit of.And pray, Sir, in what, do I appear like a woman?And pray, Sir, in what, does any of our modern coxcombs appear
like a man?and yet they don't scruple to call themselves men.Then you will not recall your sentiments and beg my pardon?Beg your pardon?--No--Yes, yes--Put on your petticoats, and
I'll fall at your feet as soon as you please.--
MARQUIS.(_Marquis draws._)
ANTONIO.Here Jerome, Jerome, come and defend me, where it would be a
dishonour to defend myself.See, Jerome, how my life is assailed.Aye, your Honour, I always told you the women would be the death
of you at last.You too, rascal!--
JEROME.Well, I declare with her sword in her hand, she is as fine a
creature as ever I saw!--Oh you audacious minx.Scoundrel--
JEROME.Sure, your Honour, she must be the Maid of Orleans.Don Antonio, this treatment I suppose you inflict as a just
recompence for my presumption in daring to hope for an alliance in
your family, spite of the prejudice which I knew the Countess had
conceived--I cannot deny the justice of the accusation--I came into
her house with the vain hope----
COUNTESS.By no means _vain_--I am ready to comply, be your hopes what
they will.Certainly--Were you going to say you hoped to marry me?If you
were, call the Priest, and we'll be married immediately.Aye, if that is what your Lordship wants, the Priest shall tack
you together in five minutes.This sudden consent staggers me--I was not prepared for it--one
likes a little preparation before marriage as well as before death.(_Aside._)
COUNTESS.you are cast down--alarmed--want to recant--but I won't
let you--You _shall_ marry me--I insist upon it.Yes, directly--I am in a hurry.I believe this is mere trifling--Swear you will marry me._Enter_ SERVANT _with_ DONNA ISABELLA _veiled_.A Lady, Madam, who says she is sister to the Marquis.Then this, I suppose, is your brother?Aye, in women's clothes--O dear, another fine sight!Oh Heavens, if it is a man, take him out of the room or I
shall faint.Sister Isabella, when I shall relate to you the strange
reception I have met with in this house, you will be amazed--but I think
you will sincerely rejoice at the final event of my visit, when I tell
you it is a solemn promise from this Lady to become my wife.I give you joy most unfeignedly.Aye, that it is--Madam, let me bid you welcome to the castle.(_Goes and salutes her._)
COUNTESS.(_To the Marquis._) Why, what are you--(_After trembling as if
much terrified_) an't _you_ a woman?Countess, I knew you never would have consented to have seen
the Marquis, had he been introduced into the house as a man, therefore
I formed this stratagem, unknown to him, thus to bring you together.(_To the Countess._) Do not droop, my dearest wife.What a strange blunder have I
made!I am the Marquis--and it shall be my future care to banish for
ever from your memory, the recollection of that marriage which has been
the source of so much woe to you.Donna Isabella, we are all infinitely obliged to you for this
stratagem, by which you have induced the Countess, innocently to break
a vow, which she could not have kept without drawing upon herself both
ridicule and melancholy--My dear Niece, depend upon it, there is but
_one_ vow a woman is authorized to take.And what vow is that _one_ Uncle?A vow to LOVE, HONOUR and OBEY.[_Exeunt omnes._
THE END.Just published, by G. G. J. and J. ROBINSON,
I'LL TELL YOU WHAT!A COMEDY, in Five Acts,
As performed at the Theatre-Royal in the Hay-Market;
By Mrs.Price One Shilling and Sixpence,
APPEARANCE IS AGAINST THEM,
A FARCE, Price One Shilling,
By the same AUTHOR.ALSO,
DUPLICITY,
AND
THE FOLLIES OF A DAY,
COMEDIES;
THE NOBLE PEASANT,
AND
THE CHOLERIC FATHERS,
OPERAS,
By THOMAS HOLCROFT;
Price One Shilling and Sixpence each.LIKEWISE,
THE SCOTTISH VILLAGE; or,
PITCAIRN-GREEN,
A POEM,
By Mrs.COWLEY,
Price Two Shillings.TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE
In a few instances, missing punctuation has been added and the occasional
comma at the end of speech changed to a full stop.The misspelling of the name Antonio as Antonis on the character's first
entrance has been corrected.In the prologue, the spelling theee has
been retained, since this is presumably part of the mimicry (the word is
evidently "the" rather than "thee").But the |
bathroom | Where is John? | [Illustration]
_On Business._
It is of little consequence what your calling is, provided you fulfil
your station with honesty and integrity, for that is the true source of
contentment: and if you are satisfied with that state in which God hath
placed you, not even kings can desire, or be possessed of more, perhaps
not so much; because the higher the station, the greater the cares.[Illustration]
_On Idleness._
It would be thought a hard government that should tax its people
one-tenth part of their time to be employed in its service; but idleness
taxes many of us much more, if we reckon all that is spent in absolute
sloth, or in doing of nothing, with that which is spent in idle
employments or amusements, that amount to nothing.Sloth, by bringing on
diseases, absolutely shortens life.“Sloth, like rust, consumes faster
than labour wears, while the used key is always bright.”
[Illustration]
_To a Good Girl._
[Illustration]
SO, pretty Miss Prudence, you’re come to the Fair,
And a very good girl they tell me you are.Here, take this fine orange, this watch, and this knot,
You’re welcome, my dear, to all we have got._To a Naughty Girl._
[Illustration]
SO, pert Mistress Prate-a-Pace, how came you here?There is nobody wants to see you at the Fair.Not an orange, an apple, a cake, or a nut,
Will any one give to so saucy a slut.This will deliver her so completely that Maimoum, the son of
Dimdim, will never dare to approach her again."Daniel journeyed to the bathroom.The fairies and genii ceased talking, but the dervish did not forget a
word of all they had said; and when morning came he perceived a place
in the side of the well which was broken, and where he could easily
climb out.The dervishes, who could not imagine what had become of him, were
enchanted at his reappearance.He told them of the attempt on his life
made by his guest of the previous day, and then retired into his cell.He was soon joined here by the black cat of which the voice had spoken,
who came as usual to say good-morning to his master.He took him on
his knee and seized the opportunity to pull seven white hairs out of
his tail, and put them on one side till they were needed.The sun had not long risen before the Sultan, who was anxious to leave
nothing undone that might deliver the princess, arrived with a large
suite at the gate of the monastery, and was received by the dervishes
with profound respect.The Sultan lost no time in declaring the object
of his visit, and leading the chief of the dervishes aside, he said to
him, "Noble scheik, you have guessed perhaps what I have come to ask
you?""Yes, sire," answered the dervish; "if I am not mistaken, it is the
illness of the princess which has procured me this honour.""You are right," returned the Sultan, "and you will give me fresh life
if you can by your prayers deliver my daughter from the strange malady
that has taken possession of her.""Let your highness command her to come here, and I will see what I can
do."The Sultan, full of hope, sent orders at once that the princess was to
set out as soon as possible, accompanied by her usual staff of
attendants.When she arrived, she was so thickly veiled that the
dervish could not see her face, but he desired a brazier to be held
over her head, and laid the seven hairs on the burning coals.The
instant they were consumed, terrific cries were heard, but no one could
tell from whom they proceeded.Only the dervish guessed that they were
uttered by Maimoum the son of Dimdim, who felt the princess escaping
him.All this time she had seemed unconscious of what she was doing, but now
she raised her hand to her veil and uncovered her face.she said in a bewildered manner; "and how did I get here?"The Sultan was so delighted to hear these words that he not only
embraced his daughter, but kissed the hand of the dervish.Then,
turning to his attendants who stood round, he said to them, "What
reward shall I give to the man who has restored me my daughter?"They all replied with one accord that he deserved the hand of the
princess."That is my own opinion," said he, "and from this moment I declare him
to be my son-in-law."Shortly after these events, the grand-vizir died, and his post was
given to the dervish.But he did not hold it for long, for the Sultan
fell a victim to an attack of illness, and as he had no sons, the
soldiers and priests declared the dervish heir to the throne, to the
great joy of all the people.One day, when the dervish, who had now become Sultan, was making a
royal progress with his court, he perceived the envious man standing in
the crowd.He made a sign to one of his vizirs, and whispered in his
ear, "Fetch me that man who is standing out there, but take great care
not to frighten him."The vizir obeyed, and when the envious man was
brought before the Sultan, the monarch said to him, "My friend, I am
delighted to see you again."Then turning to an officer, he added,
"Give him a thousand pieces of gold out of my treasury, and twenty
waggon-loads of merchandise out of my private stores, and let an escort
of soldiers accompany him home."He then took leave of the envious
man, and went on his way.Now when I had ended my story, I proceeded to show the genius how to
apply it to himself."O genius," I said, "you see that this Sultan was
not content with merely forgiving the envious man for the attempt on
his life; he heaped rewards and riches upon him."But the genius had made up his mind, and could not be softened."Do
not imagine that you are going to escape so easily," he said."All I
can do is to give you bare life; you will have to learn what happens to
people who interfere with me."As he spoke he seized me violently by the arm; the roof of the palace
opened to make way for us, and we mounted up so high into the air that
the earth looked like a little cloud.Then, as before, he came down
with the swiftness of lightning, and we touched the ground on a
mountain top.Then he stooped and gathered a handful of earth, and murmured some
words over it, after which he threw the earth in my face, saying as he
did so, "Quit the form of a man, and assume that of a monkey."This
done, he vanished, and I was in the likeness of an ape, and in a
country I had never seen before.However there was no use in stopping where I was, so I came down the
mountain and found myself in a flat plain which was bounded by the sea.I travelled towards it, and was pleased to see a vessel moored about
half a mile from shore.There were no waves, so I broke off the branch
of a tree, and dragging it down to the water's edge, sat across it,
while, using two sticks for oars, I rowed myself towards the ship.The deck was full of people, who watched my progress with interest, but
when I seized a rope and swung myself on board, I found that I had only
escaped death at the hands of the genius to perish by those of the
sailors, lest I should bring ill-luck to the vessel and the merchants.Daniel travelled to the hallway."Knock him on the head with a
hammer," exclaimed another."Let me shoot him with an arrow," said a
third; and certainly somebody would have had his way if I had not flung
myself at the captain's feet and grasped tight hold of his dress.He
appeared touched by my action and patted my head, and declared that he
would take me under his protection, and that no one should do me any
harm.At the end of about fifty days we cast anchor before a large town, and
the ship was immediately surrounded by a multitude of small boats
filled with people, who had come either to meet their friends or from
simple curiosity.Among others, one boat contained several officials,
who asked to see the merchants on board, and informed them that they
had been sent by the Sultan in token of welcome, and to beg them each
to write a few lines on a roll of paper."In order to explain this
strange request," continued the officers, "it is necessary that you
should know that the grand-vizir, lately dead, was celebrated for his
beautiful handwriting, and the Sultan is anxious to find a similar
talent in his successor.Hitherto the search has been a failure, but
his Highness has not yet given up hope."One after another the merchants set down a few lines upon the roll, and
when they had all finished, I came forward, and snatched the paper from
the man who held it.At first they all thought I was going to throw it
into the sea, but they were quieted when they saw I held it with great
care, and great was their surprise when I made signs that I too wished
to write something."Let him do it if he wants to," said the captain."If he only makes a
mess of the paper, you may be sure I will punish him for it.But if,
as I hope, he really can write, for he is the cleverest monkey I ever
saw, I will adopt him as my son.Sandra went back to the bedroom.The one I lost had not nearly so much
sense!"No more was said, and I took the pen and wrote the six sorts of writing
in use among the Arabs, and each sort contained an original verse or
couplet, in praise of the Sultan.And not only did my handwriting
completely eclipse that of the merchants, but it is hardly too much to
say that none so beautiful had ever before been seen in that country.When I had ended the officials took the roll and returned to the Sultan.As soon as the monarch saw my writing he did not so much as look at the
samples of the merchants, but desired his officials to take the finest
and most richly caparisoned horse in his stables, together with the
most magnificent dress they could procure, and to put it on the person
who had written those lines, and bring him to court.The officials began to laugh when they heard the Sultan's command, but
as soon as they could speak they said, "Deign, your highness, to excuse
our mirth, but those lines were not written by a man but by a monkey.""Yes, sire," answered the officials."They were written by a monkey in
our presence.""Then bring me the monkey," he replied, "as fast as you can."The Sultan's officials returned to the ship and showed the royal order
to the captain."He is the master," said the good man, and desired that I should be
sent for.Then they put on me the gorgeous robe and rowed me to land, where I was
placed on the horse and led to the palace.Here the Sultan was
awaiting me in great state surrounded by his court.All the way along the streets I had been the object of curiosity to a
vast crowd, which had filled every doorway and every window, and it was
amidst their shouts and cheers that I was ushered into the presence of
the Sultan.I approached the throne on which he was seated and made him three low
bows, then prostrated myself at his feet to the surprise of everyone,
who could not understand how it was possible that a monkey should be
able to distinguish a Sultan from other people, and to pay him the
respect due to his rank.However, excepting the usual speech, I
omitted none of the common forms attending a royal audience.When it was over the Sultan dismissed all the court, keeping with him
only the chief of the eunuchs and a little slave.He then passed into
another room and ordered food to be brought, making signs to me to sit
at table with him and eat.I rose from my seat, kissed the ground, and
took my place at the table, eating, as you may suppose, with care and
in moderation.Before the dishes were removed I made signs that writing materials,
which stood in one corner of the room, should be laid in front of me.I then took a peach and wrote on it some verses in praise of the
Sultan, who was speechless with astonishment; but when I did the same
thing on a glass from which I had drunk he murmured to himself, "Why, a
man who could do as much would be cleverer than any other man, and this
is only a monkey!"Supper being over chessmen were brought, and the Sultan signed to me to
know if I would play with him.I kissed the ground and laid my hand on
my head to show that I was ready to show myself worthy of the honour.He beat me the first game, but I won the second and third, and seeing
that this did not quite please I dashed off a verse by way of
consolation.Sandra travelled to the bathroom.The Sultan was so enchanted with all the talents of which I had given
proof that he wished me to exhibit some of them to other people.So
turning to the chief of the eunuchs he said, "Go and beg my daughter,
Queen of Beauty, to come here.I will show her something she has never
seen before."The chief of the eunuchs bowed and left the room, ushering in a few
moments later the princess, Queen of Beauty.Her face was uncovered,
but the moment she set foot in the room she threw her veil over her
head."Sire," she said to her father, "what can you be thinking of to
summon me like this into the presence of a man?""I do not understand you," replied the Sultan."There is nobody here
but the eunuch, who is your own servant, the little slave, and myself,
yet you cover yourself with your veil and reproach me for having sent
for you, as if I had committed a crime.""Sire," answered the princess, "I am right and you are wrong.This
monkey is really no monkey at all, but a young prince who has been
turned into a monkey by the wicked spells of a genius, son of the
daughter of Eblis."As will be imagined, these words took the Sultan by surprise, and he
looked at me to see how I should take the statement of the princess.As I was unable to speak, I placed my hand on my head to show that it
was true.John went to the bathroom."But how do you know this, my daughter?""Sire," replied Queen of Beauty, "the old lady who took care of me in
my childhood was an accomplished magician, and she taught me seventy
rules of her art, by means of which I could, in the twinkling of an
eye, transplant your capital into the middle of the ocean.Her art
likewise teaches me to recognise at first sight all persons who are
enchanted, and tells me by whom the spell was wrought."Sandra went to the garden."My daughter," said the Sultan, "I really had no idea you were so
clever.""Sire," replied the princess, "there are many out-of-the-way things it
is as well to know, but one should never boast of them.""Well," asked the Sultan, "can you tell me what must be done to
disenchant the young prince?""Then restore him to his former shape," cried the Sultan."You could
give me no greater pleasure, for I wish to make him my grand-vizir, and
to give him to you for your |
garden | Where is Mary? | "As your Highness pleases," replied the princess.Queen of Beauty rose and went to her chamber, from which she fetched a
knife with some Hebrew words engraven on the blade.She then desired
the Sultan, the chief of the eunuchs, the little slave, and myself to
descend into a secret court of the palace, and placed us beneath a
gallery which ran all round, she herself standing in the centre of the
court.Here she traced a large circle and in it wrote several words in
Arab characters.When the circle and the writing were finished she stood in the middle
of it and repeated some verses from the Koran.Slowly the air grew
dark, and we felt as if the earth was about to crumble away, and our
fright was by no means diminished at seeing the genius, son of the
daughter of Eblis, suddenly appear under the form of a colossal lion."Dog," cried the princess when she first caught sight of him, "you
think to strike terror into me by daring to present yourself before me
in this hideous shape.""And you," retorted the lion, "have not feared to break our treaty that
engaged solemnly we should never interfere with each other."exclaimed the princess, "it is you by whom that
treaty was first broken.""I will teach you how to give me so much trouble," said the lion, and
opening his huge mouth he advanced to swallow her.But the princess
expected something of the sort and was on her guard.She bounded on
one side, and seizing one of the hairs of his mane repeated two or
three words over it.In an instant it became a sword, and with a sharp
blow she cut the lion's body into two pieces.These pieces vanished no
one knew where, and only the lion's head remained, which was at once
changed into a scorpion.Quick as thought the princess assumed the
form of a serpent and gave battle to the scorpion, who, finding he was
getting the worst of it, turned himself into an eagle and took flight.But in a moment the serpent had become an eagle more powerful still,
who soared up in the air and after him, and then we lost sight of them
both.We all remained where we were quaking with anxiety, when the ground
opened in front of us and a black and white cat leapt out, its hair
standing on end, and miauing frightfully.At its heels was a wolf, who
had almost seized it, when the cat changed itself into a worm, and,
piercing the skin of a pomegranate which had tumbled from a tree, hid
itself in the fruit.The pomegranate swelled till it grew as large as
a pumpkin, and raised itself on to the roof of the gallery, from which
it fell into the court and was broken into bits.Daniel journeyed to the bathroom.While this was taking
place the wolf, who had transformed himself into a cock, began to
swallow the seed of the pomegranate as fast as he could.When all were
gone he flew towards us, flapping his wings as if to ask if we saw any
more, when suddenly his eye fell on one which lay on the bank of the
little canal that flowed through the court; he hastened towards it, but
before he could touch it the seed rolled into the canal and became a
fish.The cock flung himself in after the fish and took the shape of a
pike, and for two hours they chased each other up and down under the
water, uttering horrible cries, but we could see nothing.At length
they rose from the water in their proper forms, but darting such flames
of fire from their mouths that we dreaded lest the palace should catch
fire.Soon, however, we had much greater cause for alarm, as the
genius, having shaken off the princess, flew towards us.Our fate
would have been sealed if the princess, seeing our danger, had not
attracted the attention of the genius to herself.As it was, the
Sultan's beard was singed and his face scorched, the chief of the
eunuchs was burned to a cinder, while a spark deprived me of the sight
of one eye.Both I and the Sultan had given up all hope of a rescue,
when there was a shout of "Victory, victory!"from the princess, and
the genius lay at her feet a great heap of ashes.Exhausted though she was, the princess at once ordered the little
slave, who alone was uninjured, to bring her a cup of water, which she
took in her hand.First repeating some magic words over it, she dashed
it into my face saying, "If you are only a monkey by enchantment,
resume the form of the man you were before."In an instant I stood
before her the same man I had formerly been, though having lost the
sight of one eye.I was about to fall on my knees and thank the princess but she did not
give me time.Turning to the Sultan, her father, she said, "Sire, I
have gained the battle, but it has cost me dear.The fire has
penetrated to my heart, and I have only a few moments to live.This
would not have happened if I had only noticed the last pomegranate seed
and eaten it like the rest.It was the last struggle of the genius,
and up to that time I was quite safe.But having let this chance slip
I was forced to resort to fire, and in spite of all his experience I
showed the genius that I knew more than he did.Daniel travelled to the hallway.He is dead and in
ashes, but my own death is approaching fast.""My daughter," cried the
Sultan, "how sad is my condition!I am only surprised I am alive at
all!The eunuch is consumed by the flames, and the prince whom you
have delivered has lost the sight of one eye."He could say no more,
for sobs choked his voice, and we all wept together.Suddenly the princess shrieked, "I burn, I burn!"and death came to
free her from her torments.I have no words, madam, to tell you of my feelings at this terrible
sight.I would rather have remained a monkey all my life than let my
benefactress perish in this shocking manner.As for the Sultan, he was
quite inconsolable, and his subjects, who had dearly loved the
princess, shared his grief.For seven days the whole nation mourned,
and then the ashes of the princess were buried with great pomp, and a
superb tomb was raised over her.As soon as the Sultan recovered from the severe illness which had
seized him after the death of the princess he sent for me and plainly,
though politely, informed me that my presence would always remind him
of his loss, and he begged that I would instantly quit his kingdom, and
on pain of death never return to it.I was, of course, bound to obey,
and not knowing what was to become of me I shaved my beard and eyebrows
and put on the dress of a calender.After wandering aimlessly through
several countries, I resolved to come to Bagdad and request an audience
of the Commander of the Faithful.And that, madam, is my story.The Story of the Third Calendar, Son of a King
My story, said the Third Calender, is quite different from those of my
two friends.It was fate that deprived them of the sight of their
right eyes, but mine was lost by my own folly.My name is Agib, and I am the son of a king called Cassib, who reigned
over a large kingdom, which had for its capital one of the finest
seaport towns in the world.When I succeeded to my father's throne my first care was to visit the
provinces on the mainland, and then to sail to the numerous islands
which lay off the shore, in order to gain the hearts of my subjects.Sandra went back to the bedroom.Sandra travelled to the bathroom.These voyages gave me such a taste for sailing that I soon determined
to explore more distant seas, and commanded a fleet of large ships to
be got ready without delay.When they were properly fitted out I
embarked on my expedition.For forty days wind and weather were all in our favour, but the next
night a terrific storm arose, which blew us hither and thither for ten
days, till the pilot confessed that he had quite lost his bearings.Accordingly a sailor was sent up to the masthead to try to catch a
sight of land, and reported that nothing was to be seen but the sea and
sky, except a huge mass of blackness that lay astern.John went to the bathroom.On hearing this the pilot grew white, and, beating his breast, he
cried, "Oh, sir, we are lost, lost!"till the ship's crew trembled at
they knew not what.When he had recovered himself a little, and was
able to explain the cause of his terror, he replied, in answer to my
question, that we had drifted far out of our course, and that the
following day about noon we should come near that mass of darkness,
which, said he, is nothing but the famous Black Mountain.This
mountain is composed of adamant, which attracts to itself all the iron
and nails in your ship; and as we are helplessly drawn nearer, the
force of attraction will become so great that the iron and nails will
fall out of the ships and cling to the mountain, and the ships will
sink to the bottom with all that are in them.This it is that causes
the side of the mountain towards the sea to appear of such a dense
blackness.As may be supposed--continued the pilot--the mountain sides are very
rugged, but on the summit stands a brass dome supported on pillars, and
bearing on top the figure of a brass horse, with a rider on his back.This rider wears a breastplate of lead, on which strange signs and
figures are engraved, and it is said that as long as this statue
remains on the dome, vessels will never cease to perish at the foot of
the mountain.So saying, the pilot began to weep afresh, and the crew, fearing their
last hour had come, made their wills, each one in favour of his fellow.At noon next day, as the pilot had foretold, we were so near to the
Black Mountain that we saw all the nails and iron fly out of the ships
and dash themselves against the mountain with a horrible noise.A
moment after the vessels fell asunder and sank, the crews with them.I
alone managed to grasp a floating plank, and was driven ashore by the
wind, without even a scratch.What was my joy on finding myself at the
bottom of some steps which led straight up the mountain, for there was
not another inch to the right or the left where a man could set his
foot.And, indeed, even the steps themselves were so narrow and so
steep that, if the lightest breeze had arisen, I should certainly have
been blown into the sea.When I reached the top I found the brass dome and the statue exactly as
the pilot had described, but was too wearied with all I had gone
through to do more than glance at them, and, flinging myself under the
dome, was asleep in an instant.In my dreams an old man appeared to me
and said, "Hearken, Agib!As soon as thou art awake dig up the ground
underfoot, and thou shalt find a bow of brass and three arrows of lead.Shoot the arrows at the statue, and the rider shall tumble into the
sea, but the horse will fall down by thy side, and thou shalt bury him
in the place from which thou tookest the bow and arrows.This being
done the sea will rise and cover the mountain, and on it thou wilt
perceive the figure of a metal man seated in a boat, having an oar in
each hand.Step on board and let him conduct thee; but if thou
wouldest behold thy kingdom again, see that thou takest not the name of
Allah into thy mouth."Having uttered these words the vision left me, and I woke, much
comforted.I sprang up and drew the bow and arrows out of the ground,
and with the third shot the horseman fell with a great crash into the
sea, which instantly began to rise, so rapidly, that I had hardly time
to bury the horse before the boat approached me.I stepped silently in
and sat down, and the metal man pushed off, and rowed without stopping
for nine days, after which land appeared on the horizon.I was so
overcome with joy at this sight that I forgot all the old man had told
me, and cried out, "Allah be praised!The words were scarcely out of my mouth when the boat and man sank from
beneath me, and left me floating on the surface.All that day and the
next night I swam and floated alternately, making as well as I could
for the land which was nearest to me.At last my strength began to
fail, and I gave myself up for lost, when the wind suddenly rose, and a
huge wave cast me on a flat shore.Then, placing myself in safety, I
hastily spread my clothes out to dry in the sun, and flung myself on
the warm ground to rest.Next morning I dressed myself and began to look about me.There seemed
to be no one but myself on the island, which was covered with fruit
trees and watered with streams, but seemed a long distance from the
mainland which I hoped to reach.Before, however, I had time to feel
cast down, I saw a ship making directly for the island, and not knowing
whether it would contain friends or foes, I hid myself in the thick
branches of a tree.The sailors ran the ship into a creek, where ten slaves landed,
carrying spades and pickaxes.Sandra went to the garden.In the middle of the island they
stopped, and after digging some time, lifted up what seemed to be a
trapdoor.They then returned to the vessel two or three times for
furniture and provisions, and finally were accompanied by an old man,
leading a handsome boy of fourteen or fifteen years of age.They all
disappeared down the trapdoor, and after remaining below for a few
minutes came up again, but without the boy, and let down the trapdoor,
covering it with earth as before.This done, they entered the ship and
set sail.As soon as they were out of sight, I came down from my tree, and went
to the place where the boy had been buried.I dug up the earth till I
reached a large stone with a ring in the centre.This, when removed,
disclosed a flight of stone steps which led to a large room richly
furnished and lighted by tapers.On a pile of cushions, covered with
tapestry, sat the boy.He looked up, startled and frightened at the
sight of a stranger in such a place, and to soothe his fears, I at once
spoke: "Be not alarmed, sir, whoever you may be.I am a king, and the
son of a king, and will do you no hurt.On the contrary, perhaps I
have been sent here to deliver you out of this tomb, where you have
been buried alive."Hearing my words, the young man recovered himself, and when I had
ended, he said, "The reasons, Prince, that have caused me to be buried
in this place are so strange that they cannot but surprise you.My
father is a rich merchant, owning much land and many ships, and has
great dealings in precious stones, but he never ceased mourning that he
had no child to inherit his wealth."At length one day he dreamed that the following year a son would be
born to him, and when this actually happened, he consulted all the wise
men in the kingdom as to the future of the infant.Mary journeyed to the hallway.One and all they
said the same thing.I was to live happily till I was fifteen, when a
terrible danger awaited me, which I should hardly escape.If, however,
I should succeed in doing so, I should live to a great old age.And,
they added, when the statue of the brass horse on the top of the
mountain of adamant is thrown into the sea by Agib, the son of Cassib,
then beware, for fifty days later your son shall fall by his hand!"This prophecy struck the heart of my father with such woe, that he
never got over it, but that did not prevent him from attending
carefully to my education till I attained, a short time ago, my
fifteenth birthday.It was only yesterday that the news reached him
that ten days previously the statue of brass had been thrown into the
sea, and he at once set about hiding me in this underground chamber,
which was built for the purpose, promising to fetch me out when the
forty days have passed.Mary travelled to the garden.For myself, I have no fears, as Prince Agib is
not likely to come here to look for me."I listened to his story with an inward laugh as to the absurdity of my
ever wishing |
bedroom | Where is Mary? | I need
hardly say that I took special care not to inform him that I was the
Agib whom he dreaded.The day passed in conversation on various subjects, and I found him a
youth of ready wit and of some learning.I took on myself the duties
of a servant, held the basin and water for him when he washed, prepared
the dinner and set it on the table.He soon grew to love me, and for
thirty-nine days we spent as pleasant an existence as could be expected
underground.The morning of the fortieth dawned, and the young man when he woke gave
thanks in an outburst of joy that the danger was passed."My father
may be here at any moment," said he, "so make me, I pray you, a bath of
hot water, that I may bathe, and change my clothes, and be ready to
receive him."So I fetched the water as he asked, and washed and rubbed him, after
which he lay down again and slept a little.When he opened his eyes
for the second time, he begged me to bring him a melon and some sugar,
that he might eat and refresh himself.I soon chose a fine melon out of those which remained, but could find
no knife to cut it with."Look in the cornice over my head," said he,
"and I think you will see one."It was so high above me, that I had
some difficulty in reaching it, and catching my foot in the covering of
the bed, I slipped, and fell right upon the young man, the knife going
straight into his heart.At this awful sight I shrieked aloud in my grief and pain.I threw
myself on the ground and rent my clothes and tore my hair with sorrow.Then, fearing to be punished as his murderer by the unhappy father, I
raised the great stone which blocked the staircase, and quitting the
underground chamber, made everything fast as before.Scarcely had I finished when, looking out to sea, I saw the vessel
heading for the island, and, feeling that it would be useless for me to
protest my innocence, I again concealed myself among the branches of a
tree that grew near by.The old man and his slaves pushed off in a boat directly the ship
touched land, and walked quickly towards the entrance to the
underground chamber; but when they were near enough to see that the
earth had been disturbed, they paused and changed colour.In silence
they all went down and called to the youth by name; then for a moment I
heard no more.Suddenly a fearful scream rent the air, and the next
instant the slaves came up the steps, carrying with them the body of
the old man, who had fainted from sorrow!Daniel journeyed to the bathroom.Laying him down at the foot
of the tree in which I had taken shelter, they did their best to
recover him, but it took a long while.When at last he revived, they
left him to dig a grave, and then laying the young man's body in it,
they threw in the earth.This ended, the slaves brought up all the furniture that remained
below, and put it on the vessel, and breaking some boughs to weave a
litter, they laid the old man on it, and carried him to the ship, which
spread its sails and stood out to sea.So once more I was quite alone, and for a whole month I walked daily
over the island, seeking for some chance of escape.At length one day
it struck me that my prison had grown much larger, and that the
mainland seemed to be nearer.My heart beat at this thought, which was
almost too good to be true.I watched a little longer: there was no
doubt about it, and soon there was only a tiny stream for me to cross.Even when I was safe on the other side I had a long distance to go on
the mud and sand before I reached dry ground, and very tired I was,
when far in front of me I caught sight of a castle of red copper,
which, at first sight, I took to be a fire.I made all the haste I
could, and after some miles of hard walking stood before it, and gazed
at it in astonishment, for it seemed to me the most wonderful building
I had ever beheld.While I was still staring at it, there came towards
me a tall old man, accompanied by ten young men, all handsome, and all
blind of the right eye.Now in its way, the spectacle of ten men walking together, all blind of
the right eye, is as uncommon as that of a copper castle, and I was
turning over in my mind what could be the meaning of this strange fact,
when they greeted me warmly, and inquired what had brought me there.I
replied that my story was somewhat long, but that if they would take
the trouble to sit down, I should be happy to tell it them.When I had
finished, the young men begged that I would go with them to the castle,
and I joyfully accepted their offer.We passed through what seemed to
me an endless number of rooms, and came at length into a large hall,
furnished with ten small blue sofas for the ten young men, which served
as beds as well as chairs, and with another sofa in the middle for the
old man.As none of the sofas could hold more than one person, they
bade me place myself on the carpet, and to ask no questions about
anything I should see.After a little while the old man rose and brought in supper, which I
ate heartily, for I was very hungry.Then one of the young men begged
me to repeat my story, which had struck them all with astonishment, and
when I had ended, the old man was bidden to "do his duty," as it was
late, and they wished to go to bed.At these words he rose, and went
to a closet, from which he brought out ten basins, all covered with
blue stuff.He set one before each of the young men, together with a
lighted taper.When the covers were taken off the basins, I saw they were filled with
ashes, coal-dust, and lamp-black.The young men mixed these all
together, and smeared the whole over their heads and faces.They then
wept and beat their breasts, crying, "This is the fruit of idleness,
and of our wicked lives."This ceremony lasted nearly the whole night, and when it stopped they
washed themselves carefully, and put on fresh clothes, and lay down to
sleep.Daniel travelled to the hallway.All this while I had refrained from questions, though my curiosity
almost seemed to burn a hole in me, but the following day, when we went
out to walk, I said to them, "Gentlemen, I must disobey your wishes,
for I can keep silence no more.You do not appear to lack wit, yet you
do such actions as none but madmen could be capable of.Whatever
befalls me I cannot forbear asking, `Why you daub your faces with
black, and how it is you are all blind of one eye?'"But they only
answered that such questions were none of my business, and that I
should do well to hold my peace.During that day we spoke of other things, but when night came, and the
same ceremony was repeated, I implored them most earnestly to let me
know the meaning of it all."It is for your own sake," replied one of the young men, "that we have
not granted your request, and to preserve you from our unfortunate
fate.If, however, you wish to share our destiny we will delay no
longer."I answered that whatever might be the consequence I wished to have my
curiosity satisfied, and that I would take the result on my own head.He then assured me that, even when I had lost my eye, I should be
unable to remain with them, as their number was complete, and could not
be added to.But to this I replied that, though I should be grieved to
part company with such honest gentlemen, I would not be turned from my
resolution on that account.On hearing my determination my ten hosts then took a sheep and killed
it, and handed me a knife, which they said I should by-and-by find
useful."We must sew you into this sheep-skin," said they, "and then
leave you.A fowl of monstrous size, called a roc, will appear in the
air, taking you to be a sheep.Sandra went back to the bedroom.He will snatch you up and carry you
into the sky, but be not alarmed, for he will bring you safely down and
lay you on the top of a mountain.When you are on the ground cut the
skin with the knife and throw it off.Sandra travelled to the bathroom.As soon as the roc sees you he
will fly away from fear, but you must walk on till you come to a castle
covered with plates of gold, studded with jewels.Enter boldly at the
gate, which always stands open, but do not ask us to tell you what we
saw or what befel us there, for that you will learn for yourself.This
only we may say, that it cost us each our right eye, and has imposed
upon us our nightly penance."After the young gentlemen had been at the trouble of sewing the
sheep-skin on me they left me, and retired to the hall.He can still our angry passions as easily as he did the winds and
waves.[Illustration]
_April._--The spring is come; the trees are in blossom; the leaves
begin to appear.The birds sing merrily, and every thing looks cheerful.Do you not like to see a garden neat
and free from weeds?It is very pleasant to see children free from bad
habits and naughty ways.The blessing of the LORD, it maketh rich and he addeth no sorrow
with it.[Illustration]
_May._--This is a very pleasant month: now there are a great many
flowers.John went to the bathroom.I hope they will not disobey
their parents.Little boys and girls often get hurt when they are
disobedient to their parents.They forget that the Bible says, "Children
obey your parents."[Illustration]
_June_.--Now it is time to cut the grass and make hay.It is very
pleasant to go and help.See how soon the grass withers after it is cut."In the morning it flourisheth and groweth up, in the evening it is cut
down and withereth."Little children often seem very well, but on a
sudden they are taken ill, and die;--they are compared to grass and
flowers.[Illustration]
_July._--It is very hot, and the animals retire to the shade.Now you
must water your garden: if you do not, your plants will die.Are you
fond of strawberries and currants?They are now ripe, but do not eat
them without leave.Our father ate forbidden fruit,
And from his glory fell;
And we, his children, thus were brought
To death, and near to hell.[Illustration]
_August._--The grain begins to ripen.Now the farmer sends his men with
their sickles, and they reap it; it is then tied up in sheaves and
carried to the barn.Do you recollect the parable about the wheat and
the tares?Sandra went to the garden.Christ compares those who love him to wheat:
they will go to heaven.The wicked are compared to tares: they are to be
punished.[Illustration]
_September._--It is time to gather the apples and pears.You may get a
basket, and pick up those that fall down.Christ said, "By their fruits
ye shall know them;" he then spoke of peoples actions.We know whether
little children are good or naughty, by what they do.The labor of the righteous tendeth to life; the fruit of the wicked
to sin.[Illustration]
_October._--The leaves are falling off the trees.The days are now a
great deal shorter than they were.The grapes are ripe; it is time to
gather them.Christ compared himself to a vine, and his disciples to the
branches.Remember that it is to him we are to look for grace and
strength, to enable us to do what pleases him.The branches will not
bring forth fruit if they are parted from the vine.[Illustration]
_November._--Now the weather is dark and dismal; you must amuse yourself
in doors.When you are tired of playing, come and sit down and read a
little.Here is a pretty picture book to look at.It is about the
"Histories in the Bible."I do not know any picture book with half so
many pretty pictures as those which are taken from the Bible.[Illustration]
_December._--Now dreary winter reigns, and the year comes to its solemn
close.All the sins we have committed, this year against God, and all we
have done in obedience to his commands, are now written down in his
book.So our life will soon close; and we must then appear before God in
judgment, and render up our account for all the deeds done in the body,
whether they be good, or whether they be evil.[Illustration]
I dare say you have read in your Testament, that Christ came down from
heaven to save sinners, and that all have sinned.He has promised to
hear all who call upon him.Our
hearts are inclined to evil by nature, so that we do not like to hear
about him, unless he causes us to love him.Pray, then, that he would,
by the power of his Holy Spirit, enable you to love and serve him in
early youth.A B C D E F
G H I J K L
M N O P Q R
S T U V W X
Y Z &.But she is young and innocent, and her heart is her own
yet.Tell me--man to man--dare you say that you have won it or that I
have won it?"said Dick, relapsing into his sullen mood.Austin rose again and laid his hand on his brother's arm.Mary journeyed to the hallway.If I give her up, will you obey my conditions?""A damnable thing was done this afternoon," said Austin.Mary travelled to the garden."I see I had my
share in it, and I as well as you have to make reparation.You are my brother," he cried with an outburst of feeling."The nearest
thing in the world to me.Do you think I could rest happy with the
knowledge that a murderous devil is always in your heart, and that it's
in my power to--to exorcise it?"It's easy for you to promise," said Dick."But when I am gone, how can
you resist?"Austin hesitated for a moment, biting his lips.Then, with the air of a
man who makes an irrevocable step in life, he crossed the room and
rang the bell.Holroyd if she will have the kindness to come here for a
minute," he said to the servant.Holroyd to do with our
affairs?""You'll see," said Austin, and there was silence between them till
Katherine came.She looked from one joyless face to the other, and sat without a word
on the chair that Austin placed for her.Her woman's intuition divined a
sequel to the afternoon's drama.For, going earlier into Viviette's room, she had found her white and
shaken, still disordered in hair and dress as Dick had left her; and
Viviette had sobbed on her bosom and told her with some incoherence that
the monkey had at last hit the lyddite shell in the wrong place, and
that it was all over with the monkey.So, before Austin spoke, she half
divined why he had summoned her."Dick and I," said Austin, "have been talking of serious matters, and we
need your help.""I'll do whatever I can, Austin.""You said this afternoon you would do anything I asked you."Yes, I said so--and I meant it.""You said it in reply to my question whether you would accept me if I
asked you to marry me."Dick started from the sullen stupor into which he had fallen and
listened with perplexed interest.Mary went back to the bedroom."You are not quite right in your tenses, Austin," she remarked."You
said: Would I have accepted you if you had asked me?"John went back to the bedroom."I want to change the tense into the present," he replied."You ask me to marry you in spite of what you
told me this afternoon?""In spite of it and because of it," he said, drawing up a chair near to
her."A great crisis has arisen in our lives that must make you forget
other words |
bedroom | Where is Mary? | Those other words and everything
connected with them I blot out of my memory forever.I want you to do me
an infinite service.If there had been no deep affection between us I
should not dare to ask you.I want you to be my wife, to take me into
your keeping, to trust me as an upright man to devote my life to your
happiness.I swear I'll never give you a moment's cause for regret."She plucked for a while at her gown.But in her
sweet way she had given him her woman's aftermath of love.It was a
gentle, mellow gift, far removed from the summer blaze of passion, and
it had suffered little harm from the sadness of the day.She saw that he
was in great stress."Is this the result of that scene in the armoury?"She looked again from one face to the other, rose, hesitated for a
moment--and then held out her hand."I am willing to trust you,
Austin," she said.He touched her hand with his lips and said gravely: "I will not fail
your trust."As soon as she had gone he went to the chair where Dick sat in gloomy
remorse and laid a hand on his shoulder."I agree," Dick groaned, without looking up.He explained how the
idea had occurred to him; how Viviette had come late the night before to
tell him of what he had never before suspected--Dick's desire to go
abroad; how they had conspired to give him a birthday surprise; how they
had driven over to Witherby to send the telegram to Lord Overton.And as
he spoke, Dick looked at him with a new ghastliness on his face."This afternoon--in the dining-room--when you said that Viviette had
told you everything--?""About your wish to go to the Colonies."And what I overheard in the armoury--about a telegram--telling
me--putting me out of my misery?""Only whether we should tell you to-night or to-morrow about the
appointment.Dick--Dick," said Austin, deeply moved by the great
fellow's collapse, "if I have wronged you all these years, it was
through want of insight, not want of affection.If I have taunted you,
as you say, it was merely a lifelong habit of jesting which you never
seemed to resent.For my blindness and
carelessness I beg your forgiveness.With regard to Viviette--I ought to
have seen, but I didn't.I don't say you had no cause for jealousy--but
as God hears me--all the little conspiracy to-day was lovingly
meant--all to give you pleasure.The setting sun fell
just below the top of the casement window, and its direct rays flooded
the little room and showed Dick in a strange, unearthly light."I wronged you," he said bitterly."Even in my passions I'm a dull fool.I thought you a damned cad, and I got more and more furious, and I
drank--I was drunk all this afternoon--and madness came, and when I saw
you kiss her--yes, I saw you, I was peeping from behind the
screen--things went red before my eyes, and it was then that I loaded
the pistol to shoot you on the spot.He leant his arms on the sill and buried his face."I can't ask your forgiveness," he went on, after a moment.'I'm sorry I
meant to murder you--please don't think anything about it?'""Oh, you must take it all as said, man!I can't stand it much longer, I agree to all your
terms.I'll drive over to Witherby now and wait for the train--and
you'll be free of me."He turned again and moodily looked out of the window in the full flood
of the sunset."We must play the game, Dick," said Austin gently, "and go through the
horrible farce of dinner--for mother's sake."Below, on the terrace, Viviette was walking, and
she filled his universe.She had changed the bedraggled frock for the
green one she had worn the night before.Presently she raised her eyes
and saw him leaning out of the window."Have they told you that dinner is not till a quarter past eight?"she
cried, looking deliciously upwards, with a dainty hand to her cheek."Lord Banstead sent a message to mother that he was unexpectedly
detained, and mother has put back dinner.But Dick was far too crushed with misery to respond.She remained staring up at him for a while and then ran into
the house.Dick listlessly mentioned the postponement of dinner."I'm sorry I asked the little brute, but I couldn't avoid it.""Let us end this awful scene as friends and brothers.As Heaven hears me, there is no bitterness in my heart.Only deep
sorrow--and love, Dick.Dick took his hand and broke down utterly, and said such things of
himself as other men do not like to hear.Presently there was a light
rap of knuckles at the door.Austin opened it and beheld Viviette."I won't disturb you," she said; "I only want to give this note to
Dick.""I will hand it to him," said Austin.He closed the door and gave Dick the note.Dick opened it, read, and with a great cry of "Viviette!"Austin interposed, grasped him by the wrist:
"What are you doing?""I'm going to her," shouted Dick wildly, wrenching himself free.He held up the note before Austin's eyes, with shaking fingers.John moved to the bedroom.Austin read:
"I can't bear to see the misery on your face, when I can make you happy.I love you, dear, better than anything on earth.I know it now, and
I'll go out with you to Vancouver."Austin put both his hands affectionately on the big man's shoulders and
forced him into a chair."Listen to me just for one minute, Dick.Don't
drive me to tell you the reason.Can't you see for yourself why I've
imposed this condition on you all along?""She loves me, and that is enough."The greyness deepened over Austin's face and the pain in his eyes."I must speak, then, in plain terms.Today, in a fit of frenzied jealousy, you would have killed me,
your brother.Is there any guarantee that, in another fit of frenzied
jealousy, you might not--?""I must--until you see this ghastly business in its true aspect.Look at
the lighter side of Viviette's character.She is gay, fond of
admiration, childishly fond of teasing, a bright creature of bewildering
moods.Might you not one day again see
things red before your eyes and again go mad?""Don't say any more," Dick said in a choking voice."Heaven knows, I didn't want to say as much."CHAPTER VI
VIVIETTE TAKES THE RISK
Presently Dick raised the face of Cain when he told the Lord that his
punishment was greater than he could bear.Tears leaped to Austin's
eyes, but he turned his head away lest Dick should see them.He would
have given years of his life to spare Dick--everything he had in the
world--save his deep convictions of right and wrong.That risk of horror he could not let her run.He had
hoped, with a great agony of hope, that Dick would have seen it for
himself.The
barrier between Dick and Viviette was not of his making.It was composed
of the grim psychological laws that govern the abnormal.To have
disregarded it would have been a crime from which his soul shrank.All
the despair in Dick's face, though it wrung his heart, could not move
him.It was terrible to be chosen in this way to be the arbiter of
Destiny.But there was the decree, written in letters of blood and
flame."This will be her home, as it always has been," said Austin."I don't mean that--but between us we shall break her heart.She has
given it to me just in time for me to do it.In this uncertain world nothing was ever so good as we hoped,
and nothing ever so bad as we feared.Dick paid little heed to the
platitudes."Not what happened this afternoon," cried Austin quickly."That we bury
forever from all human knowledge.""Yes," said Dick, staring in front of him and speaking in a dull, even
voice.It's not a pretty thing to spread before a
girl's eyes.It will be always before my own--until I die.But she must
be told that I can't marry her.I can't ride away and leave her in doubt
and wonder forever and ever.""Let us face this horrible night as best we can," said Austin.You'll be with mother or packing most of the evening.Slip away to Witherby an hour or so before your time.When you're gone
I'll arrange matters.He made one of his old, self-confident gestures.His spirit in its deep abasement saw in Austin the better,
wiser, stronger man.At a quarter-past eight they went slowly downstairs to what promised to
be a nightmare kind of meal.There would be four persons, Viviette,
Katherine, and themselves, in a state of suppressed eruption, and two,
Mrs.Ware and the unspeakable Banstead, complacently unaware of volcanic
forces around them, who might by any chance word bring about disaster.There was danger, too--and the greatest--from Viviette, ignorant of
Destiny.Austin dreaded the ordeal; but despair and remorse had benumbed
Dick's faculties; he had passed the stage at which men fear.With his
hand on the knob of the drawing-room door Austin paused and looked
at him.For God's sake, try to
look cheerful.""For God's sake, don't," he said.They entered the drawing-room, expecting to find the three ladies, and
possibly Lord Banstead, assembled for dinner.To Austin's discomfiture,
Viviette was alone in the room.She rose, made a step or two to meet
them, then stopped.One would think it were the eve of Dick's
execution, and you were the hangman measuring him for the noose.""Dick," said Austin, "is leaving us to-night--possibly for many years.""I don't see that he is so very greatly to be pitied," said Viviette,
trying in vain to meet Dick's eyes."Did you read my note--or did you tear it up like the other one?""I read it," he said, looking askance at the floor."Then why are you so woe-begone?"Mary went back to the bedroom.He replied in a helpless way that he was not woe-begone.Viviette was
puzzled, hurt, somewhat humiliated.She had made woman's great surrender
which is usually followed by a flourish of trumpets very gratifying to
hear.In fact, to most women the surrender is worth the flourish.But
the recognition of this surrender appeared to find its celebration in a
funeral march with muffled drums.A condemned man being fitted for the
noose, as she had suggested, a mute conscientiously mourning at his own
funeral, a man who had lost a stately demesne in Paradise and had been
ironically compensated by the gift of a bit of foreshore of the Styx
could not have worn a less joyous expression than he on whom she had
conferred the boon of his heart's desire."You're not only woe-begone," she said, with spirit, "but you're utterly
miserable.I think I have a right to know the reason."We haven't told my mother yet," Austin explained, "and Dick is rather
nervous as to the way in which she will take the news.""Yes," said Dick, with lame huskiness."I am not a child, my dear Austin.No man wears a face like that on
account of his mother--least of all when he meets the woman who has
promised to be his wife."She flashed a challenging glance at Austin, but not a muscle of his grey
face responded.There was no
start of amazement, no fierce movement of anger, no indignant look of
reproach.She said:
"I don't think you quite understand.Dick had two aims in life--one to
obtain a colonial appointment, the other--so he led me to suppose--to
marry me.He has the appointment, and I have promised to marry him.""I know," said Austin, "but you must make allowances.""If that's all you can say on behalf of your client," retorted Viviette,
"I rather wonder at your success as a barrister.""Don't you think, my dear," said Austin gently, "that we are treading on
delicate ground?""We seem to have been treading on a
volcano all the afternoon.She faced the two men with
uplifted head."But I'm not miserable, my dear Viviette," said poor Dick, vainly
forcing a smile.Her woman's intuition rejected the protest with contumely.All the
afternoon he had been mad with jealousy of Austin.An hour ago he had
whirled her out of her senses in savage passion.But a few minutes
before she had given him all a woman has to give.Now he met her with
hang-dog visage, apologies from Austin, and milk-and-water asseveration
of a lover's rapture.The most closely-folded rosebud miss of Early
Victorian times could not have faced the situation without showing
something of the Eve that lurked in the heart of the petals.So much the
less could Viviette, child of a freer, franker day, hide her just
indignation under the rose-leaves of maidenly modesty."I've known you since I was a child of three.I
know the meaning of every light and every shadow that passes over your
face--except this shadow now.She asked the question imperiously, no longer the elfin changeling, the
fairy of bewildering moods of Austin's imagination, no longer the
laughing coquette of Katherine's less picturesque fancy, but a modern
young woman of character, considerably angered and very much in earnest.Dick looked around like a hunted
animal seeking a bolting-hole."Dick is anxious," said Austin, at length, seeing that some explanation
must be given, "that there should be no engagement between you before he
goes out to Vancouver."As this concerns Dick and
myself, perhaps you will leave us alone for a moment so that Dick
may tell me.""No, no," Dick muttered hurriedly.We can't
talk of such a thing now."I'm going to hear the reason now, whatever it is."Dick turned to the window, and stared
at the mellow evening sky."Dick finds he has made a terrible and cruel mistake."Whatever Dick may have done with regard to me," replied Viviette, "I
forgave him for it beforehand.When once I give a thing I don't take it
back.I have given him my love and my promise.""My dear," said Austin, gravely and kindly."Here are two men who have
loved you all your life.You must be brave and
bear a great shock.She moved swiftly to Dick, and with her light touch swung him round to
face the room.Is it because you're going out into the wilds?I told you I would go to Vancouver with you."Is it anything you don't
think fit for my ears?And as her eyes did not waver, he made the bold stroke."He finds
that he doesn't love you as much as he thought.There's the whole
tragedy in a few words."Then the
announcement seemed so grotesque in its improbability that she began to
laugh, a trifle hysterically."It's quite true," said poor Dick."You see, my dear," said Austin, "what it costs him--what it costs us
both--to tell you this."she cried, with sudden
piteousness."What did you mean, then--a little while ago--in
the armoury?"Austin, who did not see the allusion, had to allow Dick to speak for
himself."I've been drinking heavily of
late--and not accountable for my actions.I oughtn't to have done what
I did.""And so, you see," continued Austin, with some eagerness, "when he
became confronted with the great change in his life--Vancouver--he
looked at things soberly.He found that his feelings towards you were
not of the order that would warrant his making you his wife."Before Viviette could reply the door opened, and Mrs.Ware, ignorant of tension, went
sm |
bedroom | Where is John? | "My dear, dear boy, I'm so glad, so truly glad.asked Viviette quickly, with a new sharpness in
her voice.Oh, Austin,
there's no living woman whom I would sooner call my daughter.The facile tears came, and she sat down and dried them on her little
wisp of handkerchief."I thought it for the best to tell your mother, Austin," said Katherine,
somewhat apologetically."We were speaking of you--and--I couldn't
keep it back."Viviette, white-lipped and dazed, looked at Austin, Katherine, and Dick
in turns.She said, in the high-pitched voice, to Austin:
"Have you asked Katherine to marry you?""Yes," he replied, not quite so confidently, and avoiding her
glance--"and she has done me the honour of accepting me."Katherine held out a conciliatory hand to Viviette."Won't you
congratulate me, dear?""I'll congratulate nobody," she
cried shrilly.Only a
few hours before she had been befooled into believing herself to be the
mistress of the destinies of two men.Now one of them
avowed that she had been merely the object of a drunken passion, and
the other came before her as the affianced husband of the woman who
called herself her dearest friend.Katherine, in deep distress, laid her hand on the girl's arm.I thought that you and Dick--in fact--I understood--"
Viviette freed herself from Katherine's touch.You have all lied, and lied, and
lied to me.I tell you to your faces you have lied to me."She swung
passionately to each in turn."'Austin can never be anything to me but a
friend'--how often have you said that to me?And
you"--to Austin--"How dared you insult me this morning?John moved to the bedroom.And you--how
have you dared to insult me all the time?You've lied--the whole lot of
you--and I hate you all!"I've never heard such unladylike words in a
drawing-room in my life."Dick blundered in: "It's all my fault, mother--"
"I've not the slightest doubt of that," returned the old lady with
asperity."But what Austin and Katherine have to do with it I
can't imagine."He must
have attributed the ungenial atmosphere to his own lateness--it was
half-past eight--for he made penitent apology to Mrs.Dick nodded absently from the other side of the
room.Viviette, with a sweeping glance of defiance at the assembled
family, held herself very erect, and with hard eyes and quivering lips
came straight to the young fellow."You have asked me four times to marry you.Did you mean it, or were you lying, too?""Of course I mean it--meant to ask you again to-day--ask you now."Dick strode forward, and, catching her by the wrist, swung her away from
Banstead, his face aflame with sudden passion."No, by God, you shan't!"Banstead retreated a few paces, scared out of his life."I'll see nothing unpleasant happens, dear.You had better go and tell them to keep back dinner yet a few minutes."His voice and authority soothed her, and she left the room, casting a
terrified glance at Dick, standing threateningly over Lord Banstead, who
had muttered something about Viviette being free to do as she liked."She can do what she likes, but, by God!"I'm of age," declared Viviette fiercely.Mary went back to the bedroom."Of course she can," said Banstead."Are you taking leave of your
senses?""How dare you ask a pure girl to marry you?""You,
who have come straight here from--"
Banstead found some spirit."There's no need to prolong this painful discussion.Daniel moved to the bathroom.To-morrow--as
Viviette's guardian--"
"To-morrow?"Away from
here--unable to defend her--unable to say a word.""If you said a thousand words," said Viviette, "they wouldn't make an
atom of difference.Lord Banstead has asked me to marry him."I say she shan't marry you," said Dick, glaring at the other."Steady, steady, Dick," said Austin warningly.But Dick shook his
warning angrily aside, and Austin saw that, once again that day, Dick
was desperate."Not while I live shall she marry you.Don't I know your infernal
beastly life?""Now, look here," said Banstead, at bay."What the deuce have you got to
do with my affairs?"Do you think she loves you, cares for you, honours you,
respects you?"Viviette faced him with blazing eyes.I've suffered enough to-day--I thought I had been through
hell--but it's nothing to this.She loves me--do you hear
me?--me--me--me--and I can't marry her--and I don't care a damn who
knows the reason."At
any rate, it will save her from this.""I will do it quietly, later, Dick.""Let me be, I tell you," said Dick, with great, clumsy, passionate
gesture.You said you loved me--would marry me--come out to
Vancouver--the words made me drunk with happiness--at first.There were flames of hell in my heart--but
couldn't you see the love shining through?""Don't, Dick, don't," cried Katherine."I'll tell her why I can't marry any
woman.But Viviette, with parted
lips and white cheeks, groped her way backwards to a chair, without
shifting her terror-stricken gaze from Dick; and sitting, she gripped
the arms of the chair.Banstead at last relieved his
feelings with a gasping, "Well, I'm damned!"Dick continued:
"It was jealousy--mad jealousy--this afternoon--in the armoury--the mock
duel--one of the pistols was loaded.I loaded it--first, in order to
kill him out of hand--then I thought of the duel--he would have his
chance--either he would kill me or I would kill him.It was only the infinite mercy of God that I
didn't kill him.He's worth fifty
millions of me.But my hands are red with his blood, and I can't touch
your pure garments.They would stain them red--and I should see red
again before my eyes some day.A man like me is not fit to marry any
woman.So I said I didn't love her to
save her from the knowledge of this horror.And now I'm going to the
other side of the world to work out my salvation--but she shall know
that a man loves her with all his soul, and would go through any torment
and renunciation for her sake--and, knowing that, she can't go and throw
herself away on a man unworthy of her.After what I've told you, will
you marry this man?"Still looking at him, motionless, she whispered, "No.""I think--"
Austin checked further speech.Dick looked haggardly round the room.I'm not fit to be under the same roof with
you.He slouched in his heavy way to the door, but Viviette sprang from her
chair and planted herself in his path."Say what you like," said Dick sadly."Do you think a woman curses the man
who would commit murder for the love of her?"she cried, with a strange
exultation in her voice."If I loved you before--don't you think I love
you now a million times more?""You don't shrink--"
"Excuse me," interrupted Banstead, crossing the room."Does this mean
that you chuck me, Miss Hastings?""You must release me from my promise, Lord Banstead," she said gently."You've treated me damned badly," said Banstead, turning on his heel.Austin, moved by compunction, tried to conciliate the angry youth, but
he refused comfort.He had been made a fool of, and would stand that
from nobody.He would not stay for dinner, and would not put his foot
inside the house again."At any rate," said Austin, bidding him good-bye, "I can rely on you not
to breathe a word to anyone of what you've heard this evening?"Banstead fingered his underfed moustache."I may be pretty rotten, but I'm not that kind of cad," said he.And he
went, not without a certain dignity.Dick took Viviette's hand and kissed it tenderly.I'll remember what you've said all my life."You can go away quite happy, if you like," said Viviette."It is impossible, dear," said he."I go with him to Vancouver," she said."But I daren't marry you, Viviette, I daren't, I
daren't.""Don't you see that it's impossible, Viviette?"You're scarcely old
enough to understand, my dear."Such men as I can't marry," said Dick loyally.Do you think I'm such a fool as not to understand?Do you
think, after what I've said, that I'm a child?What is life or
love worth without risk?When a woman loves a fierce man she takes the
risk of his fierceness.I'll take the risk, and it will be
a bond between us.""And if ever a man wanted
love, it's Dick.Come, Dick, let us leave this god and goddess
of reason alone.I've got something to say which only you can hear."She dragged him in a bewildered state of mind to the door, which she
held open.She motioned to
Dick to precede her, and he obeyed, like a man in a dream.On the
threshold she paused, and flashed defiance at Austin, who appeared to
her splendid scorn but a small, narrow-natured man.[Illustration: "I want you to love me forever and ever."]"You can say and think what you like, you two.You are civilised
people--and I suppose you love in a civilised way according to reason.I'm a primitive woman, and Dick's a primitive man--and, thank God!we
understand each other, and love each other as primitive people do."She slammed the door, and in another moment was caught in Dick's great
arms."What do you want to say that only I can hear?""I want you to love me strongly and fiercely for ever
and ever--and I'll be a great wife to you--and, if I fail--if I am ever
wanton, as I have been to-day--for I have been wanton--and all that has
happened has been my fault--if ever I play fast and loose with your love
again--I want you to kill me.All the big man's heart melted
into adoring pity.He took her face in both his hands as tenderly as he
would have touched a prize rose bloom."Thank God, you're still a child, dear," he said._Nutmeg._ Sathi Kai.I can give several other names in Tamil and English, but my little book
is too light to carry the burden.PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED,
LONDON AND BECCLES.[ Transcriber's Note:
The following is a list of corrections made to the original.The first
line is the original line, the second the corrected one.pepper (if required, hot curries).He is a little plaintive about
pepper (if required, hot curries)."He is a little plaintive about
its England.Garlic ginger (green), used for any Meat Curry, it is very
in England.Garlic ginger (green), used for any Meat Curry, it is very
No.22.--EGG CURRY (Brown).22.--EGG CURRY (Brown).let the Curry sauce simmer gently Now break the eggs carefully and
let the Curry sauce simmer gently.Now break the eggs carefully and
No.38.--ONION CURRY.
]H'm--you see, my dear Mrs.Hedda--to get into the ministry, he would
have to be a tolerably rich man.It is this genteel poverty
I have managed to drop into--!That is what makes
life so pitiable!So utterly ludicrous!--For that's what it is.Now _I_ should say the fault lay elsewhere.You have never gone through any really stimulating experience.But now you may perhaps have one in store.Oh, you're thinking of the annoyances about this
wretched professorship!But that must be Tesman's own affair.I assure
you I shall not waste a thought upon it.No, no, I daresay not.But suppose now that what people call--in elegant
language--a solemn responsibility were to come upon you?We will speak of this again a year hence--at the very outside.I have no turn for anything of the sort, Judge Brack.Are you so unlike the generality of women as to have no turn for duties
which--?Oh, be quiet, I tell you!--I often think there
is only one thing in the world I have any turn for.And what is that, if I may ask?[Turns,
looks towards the inner room, and laughs.][Softly, in a tone of warning.]GEORGE TESMAN, dressed for the party, with his gloves and hat
in his hand, enters from the right through the inner room.Hedda, has no message come from Eilert Lovborg?Then you'll see he'll be here presently.For what you were telling us this morning
must have been a mere floating rumour.At any rate, Aunt Julia said she did not believe for a moment that he
would ever stand in my way again.[Placing his hat and gloves on a chair on the right.]Yes, but you must
really let me wait for him as long as possible.None of my guests will arrive before seven
or half-past.Then meanwhile we can keep Hedda company, and see what happens.[Placing BRACK'S hat and overcoat upon the corner settee.]Tesman!--What do you
mean by "At the worst"?If he won't go with you and Tesman.But, Hedda dear--do you think it would quite
do for him to remain here with you?We three can have a cup of tea together.And that would perhaps be the safest plan for him.Tesman, how you used to gird at my little bachelor
parties.You declared they were adapted only for men of the strictest
principles.Lovborg's principles are strict enough now.A converted
sinner-- [BERTA appears at the hall door.There's a gentleman asking if you are at home, ma'am--
HEDDA.EILERT LOVBORG enters from the hall.He is slim and lean;
of the same age as TESMAN, but looks older and somewhat
worn-out.His hair and beard are of a blackish brown, his
face long and pale, but with patches of colour on the cheeks.He is dressed in a well-cut black visiting suit, quite new.He stops near the door,
and makes a rapid bow, seeming somewhat embarrassed.[Goes up to him and shakes him warmly by the hand.]Well, my dear
Eilert--so at last we meet again!Will you too shake hands with me, Mrs.I don't know whether you two gentlemen--?Oh yes,--in the old days--
TESMAN.[To LOVBORG, with his hands on his shoulders.]And now you must make
yourself entirely at home, Eilert!Mustn't he, Hedda?--For I hear you
are going to settle in town again?Let me tell you, I have got hold of your new
book; but I haven't had time to read it yet.But it has been very much praised, I hear.That was what I wanted; so I put nothing into the book but what every
one would agree with.Well but, my dear Eilert--!For now I mean to win myself a position again--to make a fresh start.Ah, that is what you wish to do?Daniel moved to the office.[Smiling, lays down his hat, and draws a packet wrapped in paper, from
his coat pocket.]But when this one appears, George Tesman, you will
have to read it.For this is the real book--the book I |
office | Where is Daniel? | Why, my dear Eilert--does it not come down to our own days?Yes, it does; and this one deals with the future.But, good heavens, we know nothing of the future!No; but there is a thing or two to be said about it all the same.The
first deals with the civilising forces of the future.And here is the
second--[running through the pages towards the end]--forecasting the
probable line of development.I should never have thought of writing anything of that
sort.John moved to the bedroom.[At the glass door, drumming on the pane.][Replacing the manuscript in its paper and laying the packet on the
table.]I brought it, thinking I might read you a little of it this
evening.That was very good of you, Eilert.I don't see how we can manage it--
LOVBORG.Lovborg--there is a little gathering at my house
this evening--mainly in honour of Tesman, you know--
LOVBORG.Oh--then I won't detain you--
BRACK.No, but listen--will you not do me the favour of joining us?No, I can't--thank you very much.And I assure
you we shall have a "lively time," as Mrs.And then you might bring your manuscript with you, and read it to Tesman
at my house.Yes, think of that, Eilert,--why shouldn't you?Lovborg is much more inclined to remain here and have supper
with me.So you see you are almost
bound to remain, Mr.Lovborg, or she will have no one to see her home.Tesman--in that case I will remain.Then I have one or two orders to give the servant--
[She goes to the hall door and rings.HEDDA talks
to her in a whisper, and points towards the inner room.BERTA
nods and goes out again.[At the same time, to LOVBORG.]Tell me, Eilert--is it this new
subject--the future--that you are going to lecture about?They told me at the bookseller's that you are going to deliver a course
of lectures this autumn.I hope you won't take it ill, Tesman.I can quite understand that it must be very disagreeable to you.Oh, I can't expect you, out of consideration for me, to--
LOVBORG.But I shall wait till you have received your appointment.Yes but--yes but--are you not going to compete with me?No; it is only the moral victory I care for.Why, bless me--then Aunt Julia was right after all!Just fancy--Eilert Lovborg is not going to stand in our way![She goes up towards the inner room, where BERTA is placing a
tray with decanters and glasses on the table.HEDDA nods
approval, and comes forward again.And you, Judge Brack--what do you say to this?Well, I say that a moral victory--h'm--may be all very fine--
TESMAN.But all the same--
HEDDA.[Looking at TESMAN with a cold smile.]You stand there looking as if you
were thunderstruck--
TESMAN.Yes--so I am--I almost think--
BRACK.Tesman, a thunderstorm has just passed over?Will you not take a glass of cold punch,
gentlemen?Now that the weight has been
taken off my mind--
HEDDA.Why bless me--cold punch is surely not poison.Yes, yes, Hedda dear, do.[He and BRACK go into the inner room, seat themselves, drink
punch, smoke cigarettes, and carry on a lively conversation
during what follows.EILERT LOVBORG remains standing beside
the stove.HEDDA goes to the writing-table.Do you care to look at some photographs,
Mr.You know Tesman and I made a tour in the Tyrol on our way
home?[She takes up an album, and places it on the table beside the
sofa, in the further corner of which she seats herself.EILERT
LOVBORG approaches, stops, and looks at her.Then he takes a
chair and seats himself to her left.Do you see this range of mountains, Mr.Here it
is: "The Ortler group near Meran."[Who has never taken his eyes off her, says softly and slowly:]
Hedda--Gabler!That was my name in the old days--when we two
knew each other.And I must teach myself never to say Hedda Gabler again--never, as long
as I live.And I think you ought to
practise in time.Oh, Hedda, Hedda--how could you(9) throw yourself away![TESMAN comes into the room and goes towards the sofa.[Hears him coming and says in an indifferent tone.]And this is a view
from the Val d'Ampezzo, Mr.[Looks
affectionately up at TESMAN.]What's the name of these curious peaks,
dear?Yes, that's it!--Those are the Dolomites, Mr.Hedda, dear,--I only wanted to ask whether I shouldn't bring you a
little punch after all?Yes, do, please; and perhaps a few biscuits.[He goes into the inner room and out to the right.BRACK sits
in the inner room, and keeps an eye from time to time on HEDDA
and LOVBORG.Answer me, Hedda--how could you go and do this?If you continue to say _du_ to me I
won't talk to you.May I not say _du_ even when we are alone?You may think it; but you mustn't say it.It is an offence against George Tesman, whom
you(10)--love.But I won't hear of any sort of unfaithfulness!Hedda--answer me one thing--
HEDDA.Mary went back to the bedroom.[TESMAN enters with a small tray from the inner room.Because I think it's such fun to wait upon you,
Hedda.Lovborg said he wouldn't have
any--
TESMAN.Elvsted will soon be here, won't she?Yes, by-the-bye--Mrs.Elvsted--
TESMAN.Oh, it's that one just below the Brenner Pass.It was there we passed
the night--
HEDDA.Fancy--if we could only have had you with us,
Eilert![He returns to the inner room and sits beside BRACK.Answer me one thing, Hedda--
HEDDA.Was there no love in your friendship for me either?Not a spark--not a
tinge of love in it?To me it seems as though we were two good
comrades--two thoroughly intimate friends.As I look back upon it all, I think there was really something
beautiful, something fascinating--something daring--in--in that secret
intimacy--that comradeship which no living creature so much as dreamed
of.Was there not?--When I used to come to your father's
in the afternoon--and the General sat over at the window reading his
papers--with his back towards us--
HEDDA.And we two on the corner sofa--
LOVBORG.Always with the same illustrated paper before us--
HEDDA.Yes, Hedda, and when I made my confessions to you--told you about
myself, things that at that time no one else knew!There I would sit
and tell you of my escapades--my days and nights of devilment.Oh,
Hedda--what was the power in you that forced me to confess these things?Do you think it was any power in me?And all those--those roundabout questions you
used to put to me--
HEDDA.Which you understood so particularly well--
LOVBORG.How could you sit and question me like that?Question me quite
frankly--
HEDDA.Cross-question me about--all that sort of
thing?Yes, that is just what I can't understand--in looking back upon it.But
tell me now, Hedda--was there not love at the bottom of our friendship?On your side, did you not feel as though you might purge my stains
away--if I made you my confessor?Do think it quite incomprehensible that a young girl--when it can be
done--without any one knowing--
LOVBORG.--should be glad to have a peep, now and then, into a world which--?--which she is forbidden to know anything about?Comradeship in the thirst for life.But why should not that, at any
rate, have continued?Yes, when our friendship threatened to develop into something more
serious.Shame upon you, Eilert Lovborg!How could you think of wronging
your--your frank comrade.Oh, why did you not carry out your threat?Yes, Hedda, you are a coward at heart.But it was a lucky thing for
you.And now you have found ample consolation at the Elvsteds'.I know what Thea has confided to you.And perhaps you have confided to her something about us?She is too stupid to understand anything of that sort.[Bends over towards him, without looking him in the
face, and says more softly:] But now I will confide something to you.The fact that I dared not shoot you down--
LOVBORG.--that was not my arrant cowardice--that evening.[Looks at her a moment, understands, and whispers passionately.]Now I begin to see a hidden reason beneath our
comradeship!Daniel moved to the bathroom.After all, then, it was your craving for
life--
HEDDA.The hall door is opened from
without by BERTA.Daniel moved to the office.[Closes the album with a bang and calls smilingly:] Ah, at last!My
darling Thea,--come along![On the sofa, stretches out her arms towards her.]My sweet Thea--you
can't think how I have been longing for you!ELVSTED, in passing, exchanges slight salutations with
the gentlemen in the inner room, then goes up to the table
and gives HEDDA her hand.EILERT LOVBORG has risen.He and
MRS.ELVSTED greet each other with a silent nod.Ought I to go in and talk to your husband for a moment?[Quickly, to LOVBORG.][Takes a chair and is about to seat herself at his side.]No, thank you, my little Thea!You'll be good enough to come
over here to me.[She goes round the table and seats herself on the sofa on
HEDDA'S right.LOVBORG re-seats himself on his chair.[After a short pause, to HEDDA.]For we two--she and I--we are two real comrades.We have absolute
faith in each other; so we can sit and talk with perfect frankness--
HEDDA.[Softly clinging close to HEDDA.]Oh, how happy I am, Hedda!For only
think, he says I have inspired him too.Exceedingly--where your comrade is concerned.Exceedingly--where your comrade is concerned.Then life would perhaps be liveable, after all.But now, my dearest Thea, you really must have a glass of cold
punch.No, thanks--I never take anything of that kind.Then I, poor creature, have no sort of power over you?But seriously, I think you ought to--for your own sake.Otherwise people might be apt to suspect that--in your heart of
hearts--you did not feel quite secure--quite confident in yourself.People may suspect what they like--for the present.I saw it plainly in Judge Brack's face a moment ago.His contemptuous smile, when you dared not go with them into the inner
room.Of course I preferred to stop here and talk to you.What could be more natural, Hedda?And I say, too, the way he smiled
and glanced at Tesman when you dared not accept his invitation to this
wretched little supper-party of his.But that was how Judge Brack understood it.I will stay here with you and Thea.Yes, Hedda--how can you doubt that?[Smiles and nods approvingly to LOVBORG.]Faithful to
your principles, now and for ever!Ah, that is how a man should be!Well now, what did I tell you,
when you came to us this morning in such a state of distraction--
LOVBORG.Hedda--oh Hedda--!You haven't the slightest reason to be in such
mortal terror-- [Interrupting herself.]Now we can all three
enjoy ourselves!That horrid Judge Brack is sitting watching you.Oh, Hedda--now you have ruined everything![Looks fixedly at her for a moment.Sandra journeyed to the bedroom.So that was
my comrade's frank confidence in me?Oh, my dearest friend--only let me tell you--
LOVBORG.[Takes one of the glasses of punch, raises it to his lips, and says in a
low, husky voice.][He empties the glass, puts it down, and takes the second.Oh, Hedda, Hedda--how could you do this?[He empties the glass and is about to re-fill it.Come, come--no more for the present.Now, Thea--tell me the truth--
MRS.Did your husband know that you had come after me?Oh, Hedda--do you hear what his is asking?Was it arranged between you and him that you were to come to town and
look after me?Perhaps it was the Sheriff himself that urged you to
come?Aha, my dear--no doubt he wanted my help in his office!Or was it
at the card-table that he missed me?[Seizes a glass and is on the point of filling it.]Here's a glass for
the old Sheriff too!Mary moved to the garden.Remember, you have to read your
manuscript to Tesman.[Calmly, putting down the glass.]Thea--to
take it in this way, I mean.Don't be angry with me, my dear, dear
comrade.You shall see--both you and the others--that if I was fallen
once--now I have risen again![BRACK has in the meantime looked at his watch.He and TESMAN
rise and come into the drawing-room.Oh, Lovborg, don't do it!I'm delighted--
LOVBORG.[To TESMAN, putting the parcel of MS.I should like to
show you one or two things before I send it to the printers.But, Hedda dear, how is Mrs.Of course, I'll come again
and fetch her.But you must not expect me so early,
Hedda.Oh, you may stop as long--as long as ever you please.Lovborg--I shall remain
here until you come.And now off goes the excursion train, gentlemen!I hope we shall have a
lively time, as a certain fair lady puts it.Ah, if only the fair lady could be present unseen--!In order to hear a little of your liveliness at first hand, Judge Brack.I should not advise the fair lady to try it.Come, you're a nice one Hedda!Well, good-bye, good-bye, ladies.About ten o'clock, then,
[BRACK, LOVBORG, and TESMAN go out by the hall door.At the
same time, BERTA enters from the inner room with a lighted
lamp, which she places on the drawing-room table; she goes
out by the way she came.[Who has risen and is wandering restlessly about the room.]Hedda--
Hedda--what will come of all this?At ten o'clock--he will be here.I can see him already--with vine-leaves
in his hair--flushed and fearless--
MRS.And then, you see--then he will have regained control over himself. |
bathroom | Where is Sandra? | Then
he will be a free man for all his days.Oh God!--if he would only come as you see him now!He will come as I see him--so, and not otherwise!You may doubt him as long as you please; _I_ believe in him.And
now we will try--
MRS.You have some hidden motive in this, Hedda!I want for once in my life to have power to mould a human
destiny.I have not--and have never had it.Oh, if you could only understand
how poor I am.[Clasps her passionately
in her arms.]I think I must burn your hair off after all.I am afraid of you, Hedda!Tea is laid in the dining-room, ma'am.First you shall have a cup of tea, you little stupid.And
then--at ten o'clock--Eilert Lovborg will be here--with vine-leaves in
his hair.ELVSTED almost by force to the middle doorway.The curtains are drawn over the
middle doorway, and also over the glass door.The lamp,
half turned down, and with a shade over it, is burning on
the table.In the stove, the door of which stands open,
there has been a fire, which is now nearly burnt out.ELVSTED, wrapped in a large shawl, and with her feet
upon a foot-rest, sits close to the stove, sunk back in
the arm-chair.HEDDA, fully dressed, lies sleeping upon
the sofa, with a sofa-blanket over her.[After a pause, suddenly sits up in her chair, and listens eagerly.Then
she sinks back again wearily, moaning to herself.]Not yet!--Oh God--oh
God--not yet!BERTA slips cautiously in by the hall door.She has a letter in
her hand.Yes, a girl has just brought this letter.It was Miss Tesman's servant that brought it.I'll lay it here on the
table.I think I had better put out the lamp.Lord bless you, ma'am--I guessed how it would be.Yes, when I saw that a certain person had come back to town--and that he
went off with them.For we've heard enough about that gentleman before
now.No, no--let her sleep, poor thing.Shan't I put some wood on the fire?[She goes softly out by the hall door.[Is wakened by the shutting of the door, and looks up.][Sits erect
upon the sofa, stretches herself, and rubs her eyes.]What o'clock is
it, Thea?Think of our watching and waiting here till four in the morning--
MRS.[Yawns, and says with her hand before her mouth.]Well well--we might
have spared ourselves the trouble.Oh yes; I believe I have slept pretty well.I couldn't, Hedda!--not to save my life.There's nothing to be
so alarmed about.Why, of course it has been a very late affair at Judge Brack's--
MRS.But all the same--
HEDDA.And then, you see, Tesman hasn't cared to come home and ring us up in
the middle of the night.Perhaps he wasn't inclined to show
himself either--immediately after a jollification.But in that case--where can he have gone?Of course he has gone to his Aunts' and slept there.They have his old
room ready for him.No, he can't be with them for a letter has just come for him from Miss
Tesman.Why yes, it's addressed in Aunt Julia's
hand.Well then, he has remained at Judge Brack's.And as for Eilert
Lovborg--he is sitting, with vine-leaves in his hair, reading his
manuscript.Oh, Hedda, you are just saying things you don't believe a bit.You really are a little blockhead, Thea.Well then, you must do as I tell you.You must go into my room and lie
down for a little while.Oh no, no--I shouldn't be able to sleep.Well, but you husband is certain to come soon now; and then I want to
know at once--
HEDDA.I shall take care to let you know when he comes.Just you go in and have a sleep in the meantime.[HEDDA goes up to the glass door and draws back the curtains.Then she takes a
little hand-glass from the writing-table, looks at herself
in it, and arranges her hair.Next she goes to the hall
door and presses the bell-button.Yes; you must put some more wood in the stove.Bless me--I'll make up the fire at once.[She rakes the embers together
and lays a piece of wood upon them; then stops and listens.]That was a
ring at the front door, ma'am.[HEDDA kneels on the foot-rest and lays some more pieces of
wood in the stove.After a short pause, GEORGE TESMAN enters from the hall.He
steals on tiptoe towards the middle doorway and is about to
slip through the curtains.Yes, I am up very early this morning.John moved to the bedroom.And I never doubted you were still sound asleep!Yes, since no one came to fetch her.[Closes the door of the stove and rises.]Well, did you enjoy yourselves
at Judge Brack's?No, I should never think of being anxious.Mary went back to the bedroom.But I asked if you had
enjoyed yourself.Oh yes,--for once in a way.Especially the beginning of the evening; for
then Eilert read me part of his book.We arrived more than an hour too
early--fancy that!And Brack had all sorts of arrangements to make--so
Eilert read to me.Daniel moved to the bathroom.[Seating herself by the table on the right.]Tell me then--
TESMAN.Daniel moved to the office.[Sitting on a footstool near the stove.]Oh, Hedda, you can't conceive
what a book that is going to be!I believe it is one of the most
remarkable things that have ever been written.Yes yes; I don't care about that--
TESMAN.I must make a confession to you, Hedda.When he had finished reading--a
horrid feeling came over me.I felt jealous of Eilert for having had it in him to write such a book.And then how pitiful to think that he--with all his gifts--should be
irreclaimable, after all.I suppose you mean that he has more courage than the rest?No, not at all--I mean that he is incapable of taking his pleasure in
moderation.And what came of it all--in the end?Well, to tell the truth, I think it might best be described as an orgie,
Hedda.Had he vine-leaves in his hair?But he made a long, rambling
speech in honour of the woman who had inspired him in his work--that was
the phrase he used.No, he didn't; but I can't help thinking he meant Mrs.We broke up--the last of us at any rate--all
together; and Brack came with us to get a breath of fresh air.This boy with his pure
face and far-away-gazing eyes is he who had thoughts about "his
Father's house."The look in the woman's face is appreciated in the
light of what she is recorded as having said, "I have sought thee
sorrowing."That she rather than her husband should
speak to him is no surprise to one familiar with Matt.The
faces of these serious-looking men must be read in the light of the
words, "And all that heard him were amazed at his understanding and
answers."One man has an ornamental box in his hand.It is not extraordinary in the light of Acts 3:1, 2,
and Mark 14:7.He begs in vain outside, while within a servant brings
wine to refresh those who will not so much as lift a finger to help
the burdened.Beyond the beggar craftsmen are still at
work upon the temple.Yes, because when this child Jesus first
visited the temple it was not completed."Forty and six years was
this temple in building.""Yea, the sparrow hath found a house, and the swallow a nest for
herself,.even thine altars, O Lord of Hosts."The
little boy with the fly-driver tells the season of the year, the
light and the few worshippers and the idle musicians tell the time of
day.Everything has a message, even the ornament upon wall and floor!This picture is more
than a commonplace illustration of a single text: it is a graphic
presentation of an era.The particular event is shown in its
historical setting.[Illustration: Finding of Christ in the Temple.]_Finding of Christ in the Temple._ Holman Hunt.1827-
If pictures of this sort are to be studied, every pupil in the class
should have a copy.The teacher's business is to direct the pupil to
individual observation and inquiry.The perpetual questions should
be, What do you see?What does
it contribute to the total content of the picture?Sandra journeyed to the bedroom.What does the
picture as a whole have to say?Plates 8, 9, 18, 25, 29, 33, 40, 81,
89, 93, 110, 139, 153, 159, and 167, might be mentioned among those
especially worthy of this analytical and exhaustive study.Occasionally pupils will find both interest and profit in the
comparative study of a series of pictures.For example take the five
plates of The Annunciation, pages 9 and 10.After the facts have been
determined by a study of the text, the investigation may proceed as
follows: What are the essential elements found in all the pictures
alike?Which artist has told the story most simply and directly?The
different artists have emphasized or given special attention to some
one phase or phrase.Mary moved to the garden.Which has embodied more perfectly the first, or
the second, or the third?Which has, on the whole, told the story most
vividly?A study of this group of pictures in
the light of such notes as will be found printed therewith, will
enable any teacher to formulate for himself a plan for studying any
other group of pictures.In such study it is essential that each pupil be supplied with a
complete set of the pictures to be compared._Madonna._ Dagnan-Bouveret.But the picture itself is sometimes not a thing to be consciously
analyzed and inventoried; it is simply a thing of beauty, "its own
excuse for being;" it is something to be received as a whole with
thankfulness, like the odor of wild grape vines, or the form of a
calla lily, or the color of a sunrise, or the music of wind in pine
trees.Such a picture is this Madonna of the Shop, by Dagnan-Bouveret.One may think for a moment now and then of how well the picture is
composed, of how perfect a master of his art the man must be who
can make spots of paint suggest wood and metal, linen and wool, soft
flesh and softer light, but the mind returns again and again to the
contemplation of the wondrous sweet face of the Virgin, whose deep
eyes see unspeakable things.One comes to love such a picture as a
dear familiar friend, and to yield to its gentle influence as to
moonlight upon the sea.The contemplation of such pictures is one of
the purest pleasures of life, a foretaste of the sight of "the King
in his Beauty."THE GREAT PAINTERS' GOSPEL.THE GREAT PAINTERS' GOSPEL.The angel Gabriel was sent from God to a virgin whose name was Mary.The angel said "Hail, Mary, highly favored, blessed art thou among
women."Mary is supposed to have been in a house of
worship at the time (like Hannah, 1 Sam.1:9-18, and Zacharias, Luke
1:8-13), hence the beautiful surroundings; and to have been at
prayer, as suggested by the kneeling posture and the book.The dove
is a symbol of the Holy Ghost (Luke 3:22).The beam of light
symbolizes the going forth of divine power (Hos.The angel is
borne upon a cloud (Ps.104:3), and carries a rod or scepter, symbols
of authority (Ex.4:1-5, Esther 4:11).The lily is introduced as a
symbol of perfection and purity (Song 2:2; compare also Num.Titian has depicted the instant when the angel says "Hail, Mary."He
has introduced emblems of the ideal woman (Prov.31:13, 14, 26,
etc.).[Transcriber's Note: As you may note, each plate is introduced with
the artist's name and the plate number.John went back to the garden.In the original source, this
text was bolded, not italicized.]_Hofmann, Plate 1,_ shows the moment when Gabriel says: "Blessed art
thou among women."In this picture only, the angel
approaches from behind.The picture recalls the experience of another
Mary (John 20:14)._Guido Reni, Plate 2,_, has chosen the instant when Gabriel says,
"Thou hast found favor with God."The infant angels represent,
perhaps, "the spirits of love, intelligence and innocence," [1] and
accompany the Divine Presence because of the words of Christ, when
speaking of children, "Their angels do always behold the face of my
Father which is in heaven."_Mueller, Plate 3,_ seems to have shown the moment when Mary said,
"Let it be unto me according to thy word."His figures
and faces express less animation than any of the others._Dosso, Plate 4,_ represents Gabriel as saying, "The Holy Ghost shall
come upon thee and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee"
(Luke 1:35), for both the dove, symbol of the Holy Ghost, and the
Highest himself, upon a cloud and accompanied with cherubs, are
present._Baroccio, Plate 5,_ seems to have seized upon the moment when Mary
has just asked "How shall this be?"The angel is
encouraging her faith by reference to Elisabeth.Jameson, "Sacred and Legendary Art," vi., p._Annunciation to Mary._ H. Hofmann.1824-
[Illustration: Annunciation to Mary.]_Annunciation to Mary._ Guido Reni 1575-1642._Annunciation to Mary._ Dossi Dosso._Annunciation to Mary._ F. Baroccio."And in those days Mary arose and went into the hill country to a
city of Judah, and entered into the house of Zacharias and saluted
Elisabeth.and Elisabeth, filled with the Holy Ghost, said,
Blessed art thou among women."_Albertinelli, Plate 6,_ has depicted the two women at the moment of
meeting.[Illustration: Mary's Visit to Elisabeth.]_Mary's Visit to Elisabeth._ Albertinelli.BIRTH OF JOHN THE BAPTIST.Zacharias had been dumb since the moment when he doubted the prophecy
of the angel.When the promised son was born the
neighbors and friends of the mother, Elisabeth, objected to the name
John.Sandra went to the bathroom._Fra Angelico, Plate 7,_ has represented the moment when they appeal
to the dumb father, and he writes upon a tablet the words "His name
is John."The child, eight days old, is present to be
named preparatory to circumcision._Merson, Plate 8,_ has illustrated Luke 2:4-7."And Joseph went up
from Galilee into Judea unto the city of David, Bethlehem, to be
enrolled, with Mary his espoused wife.And there was no room for them
in the inn."Darkness covered the earth and gross darkness the people
who refused lodging to such as Mary, but that night the glory of the
Lord was revealed.[Illustration: Joseph and Mary, Arrival at Bethlehem.]_Joseph and Mary, Arrival at Bethlehem._ Olivier L. Merson._Plockhoerst, Plate 14,_ illustrates Luke 2:8-11.And in the same
country were shepherds keeping watch over their flock by night.And
the angel of the Lord came and said unto them, "Fear not, I bring you
good tidings of great joy.Unto you is born this day in the city of
David a Savior which is Christ the Lord."The angel bears a palm
branch, symbol of triumph.[Illustration: The |
garden | Where is Mary? | _The Angel and the Shepherds._ B. Plockhoerst, 1825-
_Hofmann, Plate 13,_ shows a company of the heavenly host praising
God and saying, "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace,
good will toward men."They are the first to visit the
manger!_Bethlehem._ H. Hofmann.1824-
_Lerolle, Plate 11,_ shows the shepherds who "came with haste and
found Mary and Joseph and the babe lying in a manger."The shepherds saw, evidently from some little distance;
for we have no record of their speaking to Mary or Joseph, only to
others outside, after the visit.[Illustration: The Arrival of the Shepherds.]_The Arrival of the Shepherds._ H. Lerolle._Correggio, Plate 9,_ has expressed that surprise and wonder of the
shepherds which they imparted to others when they told their story,
"for all that heard it wondered at those things which were told them
by the shepherds."_Bouguereau, Plate 10,_ adds to the story a dramatic touch.There are
ominous shadows in the background.Mary seems troubled by the
presence of the lamb, symbol of sacrifice.The angel had said "He
shall save his people from their sins."Does Mary seem
already to behold the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the
world?One lamb is already slain, and lies in the
foreground.The shepherd with the lamb in his arms may unconsciously
illustrate the Christ (Is.40:11), and the odd disk above the head of
the older shepherd, catching the light from the child, may be
prophetic of saintly glory._The Nativity._ (William) Adolphe Bouguereau.1825-
_Mueller, Plate 12,_ gives us perhaps the prettiest, most sweetly
human group of all.Some of the shepherds have arrived, others are
coming; one with a lamb in his arms, another with his dogs, who seem
to sympathize with their master's joyous haste.The rose of the
hills, and the violet of the meadows are there as symbols of the rose
of Sharon and the lily of the valley (Cant.2:1); "The ox knoweth his
owner and the ass his master's crib," and in this case the humble
representatives of Israel know also, and the people consider.Plate 12._ The Nativity._ Carl Mueller.1839-
THE PRESENTATION.His name was called Jesus, as the angel had commanded, and after
forty days they brought him to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord,
and to offer a sacrifice, according to the ancient law.And Simeon,
waiting for the consolation of Israel, came by the spirit into the
temple when the parents brought in the child Jesus; and he took him
up into his arms and blessed God and said, "Lord, now lettest thou
thy servant depart in peace, for mine eyes have seen thy salvation."And Anna, a prophetess of great age, coming up at
that very hour, gave thanks to God and spake of him to all them that
were looking for the redemption of Jerusalem._Bartolommeo, Plate 18,_ depicts the moment when Simeon says "Now
lettest thou thy servant depart in peace"--the _Nunc Dimittis_ of the
Latin Church (Luke 2:29).Joseph has the two doves for the offering
(Lev.In the distance the priest may be seen at the
altar, his robe ornamented with the sacred fringe (Ex.39:26) that
there may be no mistaking him.Anna is present, and is, evidently,
about to speak.The steps are of marble and the columns richly
carved, because of the words of the artist-disciple recorded in Mark
13:1.[Illustration: Presentation at the Temple.]_Presentation at the Temple._ Bartolommeo Del Fattorino._Champaigne, Plate 15,_ has chosen the moment when Simeon says to
Mary, "This child is set for the falling and rising up of many in
Israel."[Illustration: Presentation at the Temple.]_Presentation at the Temple._ Champaigne._Borgognone, Plate 16,_ selects for his picture the last moment, when
Simeon returns the child to the mother with the words "Yea, and a
sword shall pierce through thine own soul, also."[Illustration: Presentation at the Temple.]_Presentation at the Temple._ Borgognone._Bourdon, Plate 17,_ represents the instant when Anna arrives (at the
extreme left), "coming up at that very hour."[Illustration: Presentation at the Temple.]_Presentation at the Temple._ Sebastien Bourdon.John moved to the bedroom._Bartolommeo,_ again, _Plate 19,_ adds what he pleases to the
original story.[Illustration: Presentation at the Temple.]_Presentation at the Temple._ Fra Bartolommeo.Now when Jesus was born there came wise men from the east, guided by
a star, which went before them till it stood over the place where the
young child was.And when they were come into the house they
saw Jesus and Mary his mother, and fell down and worshipped him; and
when they had opened their treasures they presented unto him gifts;
gold, frankincense and myrrh._Hofmann, Plate 20,_ represents the arrival.The star stands above
the head of the child.The tradition is that one wise man came from
Europe, one from Asia and one from Africa (See _Ben-Hur_, Book I.);
hence Hofmann has represented one with the oriental turban, one with
a helmet having hanging side pieces like an Egyptian head dress, and
one with the simple band, the white hair and flowing beard of the
Druid.[Illustration: Worship of the Magi.]Mary went back to the bedroom._Worship of the Magi._ H. Hofmann.1824-
_Luini, Plate 21,_ following the same tradition, gives the African a
dark complexion.[Illustration: Adoration of the Magi.]_Adoration of the Magi._ Luini._Maldini, Plate 23,_ also makes one of the Magi very dark, and adds
an earring as a barbaric touch.Moreover he gives each a crown (as
does Luini) because the Magi were supposed to have been Kings, in
fulfilment of Is.[Illustration: Adoration of the Kings.]_Bonifazio, Plate 22,_ like Luini and Maldini, represents a large
company of servants to show the importance of the Magi, and perhaps
because of Is.[Illustration: Adoration of the Magi.]_Adoration of the Magi._ Bonifazio Veronese.Daniel moved to the bathroom._Crespi, Plate 24,_ has pictured Joseph's dream.An angel of the Lord
appeared to Joseph in a dream, saying, Arise and take the young child
and his mother, and flee into Egypt, for Herod will seek the young
child to destroy him._Joseph's Dream._ Daniele Crespi._Fuerst, Plate 26,_ illustrates the words "And he arose and took the
young child and his mother, and departed."_Flight into Egypt._ M. Fuerst._Plockhoerst, Plate 27,_ shows the holy family passing through
southern Judea, accompanied by cherubs, but unconscious of their
presence._Flight into Egypt._ B. Plockhoerst.1825-
_Hofmann, Plate 25,_ shows them passing through the Wilderness of
Shur, Joseph with his broad axe for protection, unconscious of the
guardian angel who accompanied them, to keep them in all their ways."That old serpent" is already in the wilderness,
waiting!Daniel moved to the office._Flight into Egypt._ H. Hofmann.1824-
_Benz, Plate 28,_ has taken as his subject the first moment of rest
in a place "even as the garden of the Lord, like the land of Egypt as
thou comest into Zoar."Joseph has a typical Egyptian
water-jar upon his arm.The little child is pleased with the flowers,
after his long journey through the desert, and holds a bunch of them
in his hand.The place of rest seems to be just at the edge of the
desert,--a secluded, well-watered spot, out of Herod's reach._Repose in Egypt._ S. Benz._Merson, Plate 29,_ is a poetic seer as well as an artist.The sphinx
riddle was "What is man?"Merson has placed the answer before the
sphinx at last.He who was himself the answer to the world-old
question, propounded a new question which all must answer, "What
think ye of Christ" (Matt._Repose in Egypt._ Olivier L. Merson._Morris, Plate 30,_ gives us a glimpse of the life of the Holy Family
during the sojourn in Egypt.Joseph is resting in the tent after his
day's work, and Mary is teaching the child to walk.All are
unconscious of the ominous shadow so evident now to us.The hatred
which threatened the child, would not spare the man.The exile in
Egypt is but the prophetic shadow of the coming event--crucifixion.The child's hands extend towards the cactus and the palm, symbols of
suffering and of victory._Shadow of the Cross._ P. R. Morris.When Herod was dead, Joseph, instructed by an angel, brought Mary and
Jesus into the land of Israel, and made them a home in Nazareth.Sandra journeyed to the bedroom.The
mother with her divine child in this Nazareth home has ever been the
favorite subject with painters."Madonna" pictures have been
multiplied into the thousands.The most famous are those which were
painted by Raphael,--the Sistine Madonna, Madonna of the Chair,
Madonna da Tempi, Madonna of the Goldfinch, etc.,--reproductions of
which are familiar to everybody.Among other famous painters of the
Madonna is _Murillo,_ who, in _Plate 32,_ represents the mother and
child as the neighbors might have seen them in their humble home.In _Plate 33,_ the artist
has emphasized the last phrase of Luke 2:40, "The grace of God was
upon him."The Father in heaven is visibly present, and the grace
descends upon the child in the form of a dove, as suggested by Luke
3:22.The action of all the accessory figures, the arrangement of the
light, everything in the picture, is calculated to focus the
attention upon the face of the child Christ._Hofmann, Plate 31,_ tells of the quiet days at Nazareth, when Joseph
worked at his trade, and Mary sat near spinning and watching the
wondrous lad who in his child-way could help Joseph by fetching a
needed tool.It was a peaceful, happy life, like that of the chickens
and the doves.The memories of those days furnished Jesus with the
wonderful figure of speech recorded in Matt.Hofmann, like
other artists, is fond of symbolism, hence the square and the
measuring stick are upon the shoulder of the child (Is.9:6) who was
to lay judgment to the line and righteousness to the plummet (Is.28:17); and the tools take the form of the cross.Jesus was subject
unto his parents (Luke 2:51), and, in a sense, took up his cross
daily, as all his disciples must ever do (Matt.Such service
is healthful and profitable (Luke 2:52)._Infancy of Christ._ H. Hofmann.1824-
THE VISIT TO JERUSALEM.Joseph and Mary probably went every year to Jerusalem at the feast of
the passover.And when Jesus was twelve years old they
went up as usual taking him with them._Mengelberg, Plate 34,_ represents the holy family approaching the
city.The temple with its smoking altars is seen in the distance.The
artist has suggested the great company who went up every year to
worship, and with which, returning, Joseph and Mary supposed Jesus to
be.[Illustration: Jesus, Twelve Years Old, on his way to Jerusalem.]_Jesus, Twelve Years Old, on his Way to Jerusalem._ O.
Mengelberg._Hofmann, Plates 38 and 39,_ illustrates (Luke 2:46).Plate 38 is
from the drawing in the artist's Life of Christ.Mary moved to the garden.Plate 39, from the
famous painting in Dresden, is the more carefully finished.Hofmann
has shown the seal of Solomon upon the "chair of philosophy," he has
introduced the scroll of the prophets and suggested the rich stones
of the temple, but the interest of all is upon the Boy, who came to
fulfill the law and the prophets, and who was greater than the temple
and greater than Solomon.5:17, John 2:19-20, Matt.This picture has become a classic already, though Hofmann is still
living.[Illustration: Christ Disputing with the Doctors.]_Christ Disputing with the Doctors._ H. Hofmann.1824-
[Illustration: In The Temple.]John went back to the garden._In The Temple._ H. Hofmann.1824-
_Lafon, Plate 36,_ has idealized his subject.He has placed Jesus "in
Moses' seat" (Matt.23:2), conferring upon him a distinction amply
justified by subsequent events especially by the Sermon on the Mount.these are the
words which give Jesus a unique position as a teacher.Sandra went to the bathroom._Christ Among the Doctors._ Emile J. Lafon._Hunt, Plate 35,_ adds that truthfulness of detail, that literalness
of statement made possible by the antiquarian and the archaeologist.It is the moment described in Luke 2:48, when his mother speaks to
Jesus, "Son, why hast thou dealt thus with us?"[Illustration: Finding of Christ in the Temple.]_Finding of Christ in the Temple._ Holman Hunt.1827-
_Dobson, Plate 37,_ shows the moment of discovery, the moment just
before Mary speaks.Some of the kinsfolk and acquaintances have
evidently returned with Joseph and Mary.A rabbi is telling them
about this wondrous child.[Illustration: Christ Disputing in the Temple.]_Christ Disputing in the Temple._ W. C. T. Dobson.Tradition says that Joseph soon died, and that Jesus supported the
family by working at his trade._Hunt, Plate 40_, has invented an occasion to emphasize the prophetic
words often applied to Mary, "Is any sorrow like unto my sorrow?"Simeon had said "Yea and a sword shall pierce through
thine own soul," and Mary, "pondering all these things in her heart,"
is startled, at the close of the day, by seeing the shadow of her son
cast upon the wall, like the form of one upon a cross.1827-
_Plockhoerst, Plate 41,_ depicts the parting of Mother and Son,--
another pang for the saintly Mary.[Illustration: Christ taking leave of his Mother.]_Christ taking leave of his Mother._ B. Plockhoerst.1825-
_Plate 42_ is Andrea del Sarto's famous the youthful John the
Baptist, in the days before he came preaching in the of Judea._John the Baptist._ Andrea del Sarto._Titian, Plate 43,_ shows John as he appeared a few years later upon
the banks of Jordan, "his raiment of camel's hair, and a leathern
girdle about his loins."He seems to be saying,
"Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world."The river is introduced as a symbol (Luke 3:16), and the
lamb also (John 1:35).John travelled to the bedroom.Del Sarto seems to have studied this figure
before painting his boy John.Compare the two faces, and the two arms
and hands.[Illustration: John the Baptist Preaching.]_John the Baptist Preaching._ Titian._Scheffer, Plate 44,_ shows Jesus "upon an exceeding high mountain"
and Satan offering him the world for one act of worship.Jesus is
about to say, "Worship God."Sandra travelled to the kitchen._Hofmann, Plate 45,_ has
selected the next moment when Satan retreats and an angel comes to
minister to the famished man.[Illustration: Temptation of Christ.]_Temptation of Christ._ Ary Scheffer._T |
garden | Where is Daniel? | 1824-
THE BEGINNING OF PUBLIC SERVICE._Bida, Plate 46,_ illustrates John 1:35."Behold the Lamb of God,"
said John to two of his disciples, who straightway left John and
followed Jesus._Gruenewald, Plate 48,_ represents Jesus meditating as
he walks by the sea alone, possibly before he had chosen his
disciples, but more likely after the people threatened to make him a
King (John 6:15), for it is evening near the sea of Galilee.[Illustration: Behold the Lamb of God.]_Behold the Lamb of God._ Alexandre Bida.[Illustration: Jesus Walking by the Sea.]_Jesus Walking by the Sea._ M. Gruenewald (was painting
1518)._Veronese, Plate 50,_ transforms the modest wedding at Cana into a
gorgeous Venetian Feast, to which "Jesus also was bidden, and his
disciples," "and the Mother of Jesus was there."They
may all be discovered in the central part of the picture, but to the
mind of Veronese the miracle of the wine seems to be of but secondary
importance._The Marriage Feast._ Paolo Veronese.EARLY JUDEAN MINISTRY._Kirchbuck, Plate 51,_ presents a general view of the event recorded
in John 2:13-22.Jesus expels the desecrators by his presence merely,
as he overthrew his enemies in Gethsemane.[Illustration: Christ casting out the Money-changers.]_Christ casting out the Money-changers._ F. Kirchbuck._Hofmann, Plate 52,_ with his usual literalness, gives Jesus the whip
of small cords, and represents him as actively aggressive."The zeal
of thine house shall eat me up," said the prophet, and as they
watched Jesus the disciples remembered those words.[Illustration: Purification of the Temple.]_Purification of the Temple._ H. Hofmann.1824-
_Plate 53,_ by an unknown artist, is an attempt to portray the
discourse with Nicodemus.The incident is related in John 2:23-3:21.The moment is that when Jesus says, "If I have told you earthly
things and ye believe not, how shall ye believe if I tell you
heavenly things?"[Illustration: Nicodemus' Visit to Jesus.]_Nicodemus' Visit to Jesus._ Artist unknown."He came to a town called Shechem, near the plot of land that Jacob
gave his son Joseph.Jacob's Spring was there, and Jesus, being tired
after his journey, sat down, just as he was, close to it.A woman of Samaria came to draw water; so Jesus asked
her to give him some to drink, his disciples having gone into the
town to buy provisions."[*]
[*] Twentieth Century New Testament
_Biliverti, Plate 56,_ gives the woman a companion not mentioned in
the text.The moment is that of John 4:10, "If you knew the gift of
God, and who it is that is asking you to give him some water, you
would have asked him, and he would have given you living water."[Illustration: Jesus and the Woman of Samaria.]_Jesus and the Woman of Samaria._ Biliverti._Dore, Plate 54,_ has selected a later moment, "Trust me," Jesus
replied, "a time is coming when it will not be on this mountain or in
Jerusalem that you will worship God the Father."[Illustration: Jesus and the Woman of Samaria.]_Jesus and the Woman of Samaria._ Gustave Dore._Hofmann, Plate 55,_ may have chosen to illustrate the twenty-fourth
verse, "God is Spirit; and those who worship him must worship
spiritually, with true insight."[Illustration: Jesus and the Woman of Samaria.]_Jesus and the Woman of Samaria._ H. Hofmann.1824-
THE CALL OF THE FOUR.Walking by the sea of Galilee one morning, Jesus saw two brethren,
Simon who is called Peter, and Andrew his brother,.and two
other brethren, James, the son of Zebedee, and John his brother, with
their nets, for they were fishermen.And he called them: "Come ye
after me and I will make you fishers of men."_Zimmermann, Plate 47,_ has seized upon the moment when Jesus makes
that extraordinary statement.Peter and John are nearest Jesus, the
other two in the background."Fishers of men;" the phrase is
mysterious; they cannot understand it.Nevertheless, they leave all
and follow Him.[Illustration: Christ and the Fishermen.]_Christ and the Fishermen._ Zimmermann.1832-
Luke gives the account of a miracle between the morning sermon of
Jesus to the crowd upon the beach, and this call of the four
fishermen: "When he had finished speaking he said to Simon, Push off
into deep water, and then all throw out your nets for a haul.""We
have been hard at work all night, sir," Simon answered, "and have not
caught anything, but as you say so, I will throw the nets out."They
did so, and they enclosed such a great shoal of fish that their nets
began to break.So they signalled to their mates in the other boat to
come and help them; which they did, filling both the boats so full of
fish that they were almost sinking._Raphael, Plate 49,_ illustrates the moment, a little later, when
Peter threw himself down at Jesus' knees, exclaiming: "Depart from
me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord."Raphael made this as
a design for a tapestry for the Sistine Chapel, Rome.[Illustration: The Miraculous Draught of Fishes.]_The Miraculous Draught of Fishes._ Raphael.EARLY GALILEAN MINISTRY._Schoenherr, Plate 69, Hofmann, Plate 70, Max, Plate 71,_ give
different interpretations of Matt.An evening at Capernaum,
when the words of Isaiah (53:4) began to be fulfilled, "Himself took
our infirmities and bare our diseases."_Healing the Sick._ Karl Gottlieb Schoenherr.1824-
[Illustration: Healing the Sick.]_Healing the Sick._ H. Hofmann.1824-
[Illustration: Healing the Sick Child.]_Healing the Sick Child._ Gabriel Max.1840-
The Call of Matthew has been represented variously._Pordenone, Plate 59,_ has Matthew "sitting at the place of toll."Daniel moved to the garden._Calling of Matthew._ Giovanni Pordenone._Bida, Plate 57,_ shows Jesus "as he passed by," and Matthew leaving
his place of business to follow him._Calling of Matthew._ Alexandre Bida._Chimenti, Plate 58,_ would have us believe that Jesus entered the
great khan of the city where the customs were collected, and called
Matthew from thence._Calling of Matthew._ Jacopo Chimenti.After these things Jesus went up to Jerusalem to a Feast of the Jews,
and visited the Pool of Bethesda.There he saw a man who had been
infirm for thirty-eight years.After talking with him Jesus cured
him, although it was Sabbath._Van Lint, Plate 61,_ shows the man arising with his bed, verse 9.[Illustration: Healing of the Impotent Man.]_Healing of the Impotent Man._ Peter Van Lint._Bida, Plate 60,_ represents the instant when Jesus is giving the
command, but before the man has grasped its meaning.Both artists
suggest the pool, with its colonnade, or porches.Perhaps a
subsequent event is illustrated by _Van Dyck, Plate 62,_ for
"Afterward Jesus findeth him in the temple, and said unto him, Behold
thou art made whole; sin no more lest a worse thing befall thee."Sandra moved to the bedroom.[Illustration: Healing of the Impotent Man.]_Healing of the Impotent Man._ Alexandra Bida.[Illustration: Talking with the Lame Man, Bethesda.]_Talking with the Lame Man, Bethesda._ Van Dyck._Dore, Plate 63,_ gives an interpretation of Matt.The
Pharisees are accusing the disciples of breaking the Sabbath by
plucking the heads of wheat, and Jesus is excusing them.The Master
seems to be saying, "Have ye not read what David did when he was an
hungered, and they that were with him?If ye had known ye would
not have condemned the guiltless.The Son of man is lord of the
Sabbath.The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath."[Illustration: Jesus and His Disciples Going Through the Cornfield.]_Jesus and His Disciples Going Through the Cornfield._
Gustave Dore.THE SERMON ON THE MOUNT
"And seeing the multitudes, he went up into the mountain, and when he
had sat down, his disciples came unto him, and he opened his mouth
and taught them."_Dore, Plate 65,_ has represented the scene as a whole.The instant
might be almost any in the discourse.[Illustration: The Sermon on the Mount.]_The Sermon on the Mount._ Gustave Dore._Hofmann, Plate 64,_ seems to have depicted the giving of the
beatitudes.The poor in spirit, the mourner, the meek, those who
hunger for righteousness, the pure, and the persecuted, all seem to
be represented in the audience.[Illustration: The Sermon on the Mount.]_The Sermon on the Mount._ H. Hofmann.1824-
_Jeune, Plate 67,_ has selected the moment when Jesus says, "Consider
the lilies how they grow.If God so clothe the grass of the
field, shall he not much more clothe you?Seek first his
kingdom and his righteousness."_Consider the Lilies._ Henry Le Jeune._Bida, Plate 66,_ illustrates one section of the Sermon on the Mount,
viz.Here is the man in his inner chamber, having shut
his door, praying to his Father who is in secret, and who will reward
him._Prayer in Secret._ Alexandra Bida.EVENTS DURING THE SECOND TOUR OF GALILEE._Veronese, Plate 68,_ represents the Centurion who came to Jesus at
Capernaum, beseeching him to cure his servant."I am not worthy," the
Centurion is saying, "that thou shouldest come under my roof--only
say the word and my servant shall be healed."[Illustration: The Centurion's Servant.]_The Centurion's Servant._ Veronese._Hofmann, Plate 72,_ has illustrated the raising of the widow of
Nain's son, as graphically as Luke has told it, in chapter 7, verses
11 to 16."Every one was awe-struck and began praising God."[Illustration: Raising the Widow's Son.]_Raising the Widow's Son._ H. Hofmann.1824-
_Veronese, Plate 73,_ gives another grand feast to his friends
(compare plate 50).This time it is supposed to be in the house of
Simon the Pharisee, as recorded in Luke 7:36-50.The woman, who
bathed the Master's feet with tears, is in this case a beautiful and
decorous person, a center of attraction.[Illustration: Jesus in the House of Simon.]_Jesus in the House of Simon._ Paolo Veronese._Rubens, Plate 74,_ has been more faithful to the story as recorded.The woman kisses the Master's feet and wipes them with her hair, v.There is great consternation among the guests._Hofmann, Plate 75,_ shows the self-righteous Pharisee, with his
hypocritical friends, more graphically than either of the other
artists.His keen insight into character is reflected from every
face.Hofmann, above many others, is true to the account, and true to
human nature."Thy sins are forgiven," Jesus is saying.[Illustration: Anointing Feet of Jesus.]_Anointing Feet of Jesus._ H. Hofmann.1824-
_Hofmann, Plate 76,_ tells of Jesus preaching from the boat (Mark
4:1).Then she took a walk
on the roofs of the town, looked at the view, stretched herself out in
the sun, and licked her lips whenever she thought of the little pot of
fat.As soon as it was evening she went home again.said the Mouse; 'you must certainly have had
an enjoyable day.''It went off very well,' answered the Cat.'Top Off,' said the Cat drily.echoed the Mouse, 'it is indeed a wonderful and curious name.'It is not worse than
Breadthief, as your godchild is called.'Not long after this another great longing came over the Cat.She said to
the Mouse, 'You must again be kind enough to look after the house alone,
for I have been asked a second time to stand godmother, and as this
child has a white ring round its neck, I cannot refuse.'The kind Mouse agreed, but the Cat slunk under the town wall to the
church, and ate up half of the pot of fat.'Nothing tastes better,' said
she, 'than what one eats by oneself,' and she was very much pleased with
her day's work.When she came home the Mouse asked, 'What was this child
called?'I don't
believe it is in the calendar.'Soon the Cat's mouth began to water once more after her licking
business.'All good things in threes,' she said to the Mouse; 'I have
again to stand godmother.The child is quite black, and has very white
paws, but not a single white hair on its body.This only happens once in
two years, so you will let me go out?'repeated the Mouse, 'they are such curious names;
they make me very thoughtful.''Oh, you sit at home in your dark grey coat and your long tail,' said
the Cat, 'and you get fanciful.That comes of not going out in the day.'The Mouse had a good cleaning out while the Cat was gone, and made the
house tidy; but the greedy Cat ate the fat every bit up.'When it is all gone one can be at rest,' she said to herself, and at
night she came home sleek and satisfied.The Mouse asked at once after
the third child's name.'It won't please you any better,' said the Cat, 'he was called Clean
Gone.''I do not believe that name has been
printed any more than the others.She
shook her head, curled herself up, and went to sleep.From this time on no one asked the Cat to stand godmother; but when
the winter came and there was nothing to be got outside, the Mouse
remembered their provision and said, 'Come, Cat, we will go to our pot
of fat which we have stored away; it will taste very good.''Yes, indeed,' answered the Cat; 'it will taste as good to you as if
you stretched your thin tongue out of the window.'They started off, and when they reached it they found the pot in its
place, but quite empty!'Ah,' said the Mouse,' 'now I know what has happened!You have eaten it all when you stood
godmother; first the top off, then half of it gone, then----'
'Will you be quiet!''Another word and I will eat you
up.''Clean-gone' was already on the poor Mouse's tongue, and scarcely was it
out than the Cat made a spring at her, seized and swallowed her.You see that is the way of the world.THE SIX SWANS
A king was once hunting in a great wood, and he hunted the game so
eagerly that none of his courtiers could follow him.When evening came
on he stood still and looked round him, and he saw that he had quite
lost himself.He sought a way out, but could find none.Then he saw an
old woman with a shaking head coming towards him; but she was a witch.'Good woman,' he said to her, 'can you not show me the way out of the
wood?''Oh, certainly, Sir King,' she replied, 'I can quite well do that, but
on one condition, which if you do not fulfil you will never get out of
the wood, and will die of hunger.''I have a daughter,' said the old woman, 'who is so beautiful that she
has not her equal in the world, and is well fitted to be your wife; if
you will make her lady-queen I will show you the way out of |
office | Where is Sandra? | The King in his anguish of mind consented, and the old woman led him
to her little house where her daughter was sitting by the fire.She
received the King as if she were expecting him, and he saw that she was
certainly very beautiful; but she did not please him, and he could not
look at her without a secret feeling of horror.As soon as he had lifted
the maiden on to his horse the old woman showed him the way, and the
King reached his palace, where the wedding was celebrated.The King had already been married once, and had by his first wife seven
children, six boys and one girl, whom he loved more than anything in the
world.And now, because he was afraid that their stepmother might not
treat them well and might do them harm, he put them in a lonely castle
that stood in the middle of a wood.It lay so hidden, and the way to it
was so hard to find, that he himself could not have found it out had
not a wise-woman given him a reel of thread which possessed a marvellous
property: when he threw it before him it unwound itself and showed him
the way.But the King went so often to his dear children that the Queen
was offended at his absence.She grew curious, and wanted to know what
he had to do quite alone in the wood.She gave his servants a great deal
of money, and they betrayed the secret to her, and also told her of the
reel which alone could point out the way.She had no rest now till she
had found out where the King guarded the reel, and then she made some
little white shirts, and, as she had learnt from her witch-mother, sewed
an enchantment in each of them.And when the King had ridden off she took the little shirts and went
into the wood, and the reel showed her the way.The children, who saw
someone coming in the distance, thought it was their dear father coming
to them, and sprang to meet him very joyfully.Then she threw over each
one a little shirt, which when it had touched their bodies changed them
into swans, and they flew away over the forest.The Queen went home
quite satisfied, and thought she had got rid of her step-children; but
the girl had not run to meet her with her brothers, and she knew nothing
of her.The next day the King came to visit his children, but he found no one
but the girl.dear father,' she answered, 'they have gone away and left me all
alone.'And she told him that looking out of her little window she had
seen her brothers flying over the wood in the shape of swans, and she
showed him the feathers which they had let fall in the yard, and which
she had collected.The King mourned, but he did not think that the Queen
had done the wicked deed, and as he was afraid the maiden would also be
taken from him, he wanted to take her with him.But she was afraid of
the stepmother, and begged the King to let her stay just one night
more in the castle in the wood.The poor maiden thought, 'My home is no
longer here; I will go and seek my brothers.'And when night came she
fled away into the forest.She ran all through the night and the next
day, till she could go no farther for weariness.Then she saw a little
hut, went in, and found a room with six little beds.She was afraid to
lie down on one, so she crept under one of them, lay on the hard floor,
and was going to spend the night there.But when the sun had set she
heard a noise, and saw six swans flying in at the window.They stood on
the floor and blew at one another, and blew all their feathers off, and
their swan-skin came off like a shirt.Then the maiden recognised her
brothers, and overjoyed she crept out from under the bed.Her brothers
were not less delighted than she to see their little sister again, but
their joy did not last long.'You cannot stay here,' they said to her.'This is a den of robbers; if
they were to come here and find you they would kill you.''No,' they answered, 'for we can only lay aside our swan skins for a
quarter of an hour every evening.For this time we regain our human
forms, but then we are changed into swans again.'Then the little sister cried and said, 'Can you not be freed?''Oh, no,' they said, 'the conditions are too hard.You must not speak or
laugh for six years, and must make in that time six shirts for us out of
star-flowers.If a single word comes out of your mouth, all your labour
is vain.'Daniel moved to the garden.And when the brothers had said this the quarter of an hour
came to an end, and they flew away out of the window as swans.But the maiden had determined to free her brothers even if it should
cost her her life.She left the hut, went into the forest, climbed
a tree, and spent the night there.The next morning she went out,
collected star-flowers, and began to sew.She could speak to no one, and
she had no wish to laugh, so she sat there, looking only at her work.When she had lived there some time, it happened that the King of the
country was hunting in the forest, and his hunters came to the tree on
which the maiden sat.They called to her and said 'Who are you?''Come down to us,' they said, 'we will do you no harm.'Sandra moved to the bedroom.As they pressed her further with
questions, she threw them the golden chain from her neck.But they did
not leave off, and she threw them her girdle, and when this was no use,
her garters, and then her dress.The huntsmen would not leave her alone,
but climbed the tree, lifted the maiden down, and led her to the King.He asked her in all the languages he knew, but she remained as dumb as
a fish.Because she was so beautiful, however, the King's heart was
touched, and he was seized with a great love for her.He wrapped her up
in his cloak, placed her before him on his horse, and brought her to his
castle.There he had her dressed in rich clothes, and her beauty shone
out as bright as day, but not a word could be drawn from her.He set her
at table by his side, and her modest ways and behaviour pleased him
so much that he said, 'I will marry this maiden and none other in the
world,' and after some days he married her.But the King had a wicked
mother who was displeased with the marriage, and said wicked things of
the young Queen.she said;'she cannot
speak, and is not worthy of a king.'After a year, when the Queen had her first child, the old mother took
it away from her.Then she went to the King and said that the Queen had
killed it.The King would not believe it, and would not allow any harm
to be done her.But she sat quietly sewing at the shirts and troubling
herself about nothing.The next time she had a child the wicked mother
did the same thing, but the King could not make up his mind to believe
her.He said, 'She is too sweet and good to do such a thing as that.If she were not dumb and could defend herself, her innocence would be
proved.'But when the third child was taken away, and the Queen was
again accused, and could not utter a word in her own defence, the King
was obliged to give her over to the law, which decreed that she must
be burnt to death.When the day came on which the sentence was to be
executed, it was the last day of the six years in which she must not
speak or laugh, and now she had freed her dear brothers from the power
of the enchantment.The six shirts were done; there was only the left
sleeve wanting to the last.When she was led to the stake, she laid the shirts on her arm, and as
she stood on the pile and the fire was about to be lighted, she looked
around her and saw six swans flying through the air.Then she knew
that her release was at hand and her heart danced for joy.The swans
fluttered round her, and hovered low so that she could throw the shirts
over them.When they had touched them the swan-skins fell off, and her
brothers stood before her living, well and beautiful.Only the youngest
had a swan's wing instead of his left arm.Daniel journeyed to the hallway.They embraced and kissed
each other, and the Queen went to the King, who was standing by in great
astonishment, and began to speak to him, saying, 'Dearest husband, now
I can speak and tell you openly that I am innocent and have been falsely
accused.'She told him of the old woman's deceit, and how she had taken the three
children away and hidden them.Then they were fetched, to the great joy
of the King, and the wicked mother came to no good end.But the King and the Queen with their six brothers lived many years in
happiness and peace.THE DRAGON OF THE NORTH(2)
(2) 'Der Norlands Drache,' from Esthnische Mahrchen.Very long ago, as old people have told me, there lived a terrible
monster, who came out of the North, and laid waste whole tracts
of country, devouring both men and beasts; and this monster was so
destructive that it was feared that unless help came no living creature
would be left on the face of the earth.It had a body like an ox, and
legs like a frog, two short fore-legs, and two long ones behind, and
besides that it had a tail like a serpent, ten fathoms in length.When
it moved it jumped like a frog, and with every spring it covered half a
mile of ground.Fortunately its habit, was to remain for several years
in the same place, and not to move on till the whole neighbourhood was
eaten up.Nothing could hunt it, because its whole body was covered with
scales, which were harder than stone or metal; its two great eyes shone
by night, and even by day, like the brightest lamps, and anyone who had
the ill luck to look into those eyes became as it were bewitched, and
was obliged to rush of his own accord into the monster's jaws.In this
way the Dragon was able to feed upon both men and beasts without the
least trouble to itself, as it needed not to move from the spot where it
was lying.All the neighbouring kings had offered rich rewards to
anyone who should be able to destroy the monster, either by force
or enchantment, and many had tried their luck, but all had miserably
failed.Once a great forest in which the Dragon lay had been set on
fire; the forest was burnt down, but the fire did not do the monster the
least harm.However, there was a tradition amongst the wise men of the
country that the Dragon might be overcome by one who possessed King
Solomon's signet-ring, upon which a secret writing was engraved.Sandra went to the office.This
inscription would enable anyone who was wise enough to interpret it to
find out how the Dragon could be destroyed.Only no one knew where the
ring was hidden, nor was there any sorcerer or learned man to be found
who would be able to explain the inscription.At last a young man, with a good heart and plenty of courage, set out to
search for the ring.He took his way towards the sunrising, because he
knew that all the wisdom of old time comes from the East.After some
years he met with a famous Eastern magician, and asked for his advice in
the matter.The magician answered:
'Mortal men have but little wisdom, and can give you no help, but the
birds of the air would be better guides to you if you could learn their
language.I can help you to understand it if you will stay with me a few
days.'The youth thankfully accepted the magician's offer, and said, 'I cannot
now offer you any reward for your kindness, but should my undertaking
succeed your trouble shall be richly repaid.'Then the magician brewed a powerful potion out of nine sorts of herbs
which he had gathered himself all alone by moonlight, and he gave the
youth nine spoonfuls of it daily for three days, which made him able to
understand the language of birds.'If you ever find Solomon's ring
and get possession of it, then come back to me, that I may explain the
inscription on the ring to you, for there is no one else in the world
who can do this.'From that time the youth never felt lonely as he walked along; he always
had company, because he understood the language of birds; and in this
way he learned many things which mere human knowledge could never have
taught him.But time went on, and he heard nothing about the ring.It
happened one evening, when he was hot and tired with walking, and had
sat down under a tree in a forest to eat his supper, that he saw two
gaily-plumaged birds, that were strange to him, sitting at the top of
the tree talking to one another about him.The first bird said:
'I know that wandering fool under the tree there, who has come so far
without finding what he seeks.He is trying to find King Solomon's lost
ring.'The other bird answered, 'He will have to seek help from the
Witch-maiden,(3) who will doubtless be able to put him on the right
track.If she has not got the ring herself, she knows well enough who
has it.''But where is he to find the Witch-maiden?''She
has no settled dwelling, but is here to-day and gone to-morrow.He might
as well try to catch the wind.'The other replied, 'I do not know, certainly, where she is at present,
but in three nights from now she will come to the spring to wash her
face, as she does every month when the moon is full, in order that
she may never grow old nor wrinkled, but may always keep the bloom of
youth.''Well,' said the first bird, 'the spring is not far from here.Shall we
go and see how it is she does it?''Willingly, if you like,' said the other.The youth immediately resolved to follow the birds to the spring, only
two things made him uneasy: first, lest he might be asleep when the
birds went, and secondly, lest he might lose sight of them, since he had
not wings to carry him along so swiftly.He was too tired to keep awake
all night, yet his anxiety prevented him from sleeping soundly, and when
with the earliest dawn he looked up to the tree-top, he was glad to
see his feathered companions still asleep with their heads under their
wings.He ate his breakfast, and waited until the birds should start,
but they did not leave the place all day.They hopped about from one
tree to another looking for food, all day long until the evening, when
they went back to their old perch to sleep.The next day the same thing
happened, but on the third morning one bird said to the other, 'To-day
we must go to the spring to see the Witch-maiden wash her face.'They
remained on the tree till noon; then they flew away and went towards the
south.The young man's heart beat with anxiety lest he should lose sight
of his guides, but he managed to keep the birds in view until they again
perched upon a tree.The young man ran after them until he was quite
exhausted and out of breath, and after three short rests the birds at
length reached a small open space in the forest, on the edge of which
they placed themselves on the top of a high tree.When the youth had
overtaken them, he saw that there was a clear spring in the middle of
the space.He sat down at the foot of the tree upon which the birds
were perched, and listened attentively to what they were saying to each
other.'The sun is not down yet,' said the first bird; 'we must wait yet awhile
till the moon rises and the maiden comes to the spring.Do you think she
will see that young man sitting under the tree?''Nothing is likely to escape her eyes, certainly not a young man, said
the other bird.'Will the youth have the sense not to let himself be
caught in her toils?''We will wait,' said the first bird, 'and see how they get on together.'The evening light had quite faded, and the full moon was already shining
down upon the forest, when the young man heard a slight rustling sound.After a few moments there came out of the forest a maiden, gliding over
the grass so lightly that her feet seemed scarcely to touch the ground,
and stood beside the spring.The youth could not turn away his eyes
from |
bedroom | Where is Daniel? | Without seeming to notice anything, she went to the spring, looked up
to the full moon, then knelt down and bathed her face nine times, then
looked up to the moon again and walked nine times round the well, and as
she walked she sang this song:
'Full-faced moon with light unshaded,
Let my beauty ne'er be faded.While the moon is waning nightly,
May the maiden bloom more brightly,
May her freshness never fail!'Then she dried her face with her long hair, and was about to go away,
when her eye suddenly fell upon the spot where the young man was
sitting, and she turned towards the tree.Then the maiden said, 'You ought to have a heavy punishment
because you have presumed to watch my secret doings in the moonlight.But I will forgive you this time, because you are a stranger and knew no
better.But you must tell me truly who you are and how you came to this
place, where no mortal has ever set foot before.'The youth answered humbly: 'Forgive me, beautiful maiden, if I have
unintentionally offended you.I chanced to come here after long
wandering, and found a good place to sleep under this tree.Daniel moved to the garden.At your
coming I did not know what to do, but stayed where I was, because I
thought my silent watching could not offend you.'The maiden answered kindly, 'Come and spend this night with us.You will
sleep better on a pillow than on damp moss.'The youth hesitated for a little, but presently he heard the birds
saying from the top of the tree, 'Go where she calls you, but take care
to give no blood, or you will sell your soul.'So the youth went with
her, and soon they reached a beautiful garden, where stood a splendid
house, which glittered in the moonlight as if it was all built out of
gold and silver.When the youth entered he found many splendid chambers,
each one finer than the last.Hundreds of tapers burnt upon golden
candlesticks, and shed a light like the brightest day.At length they
reached a chamber where a table was spread with the most costly dishes.At the table were placed two chairs, one of silver, the other of gold.The maiden seated herself upon the golden chair, and offered the silver
one to her companion.They were served by maidens dressed in white,
whose feet made no sound as they moved about, and not a word was spoken
during the meal.Afterwards the youth and the Witch-maiden conversed
pleasantly together, until a woman, dressed in red, came in to remind
them that it was bedtime.The youth was now shown into another room,
containing a silken bed with down cushions, where he slept delightfully,
yet he seemed to hear a voice near his bed which repeated to him,
'Remember to give no blood!'The next morning the maiden asked him whether he would not like to
stay with her always in this beautiful place, and as he did not answer
immediately, she continued: 'You see how I always remain young and
beautiful, and I am under no one's orders, but can do just what I like,
so that I have never thought of marrying before.But from the moment I
saw you I took a fancy to you, so if you agree, we might be married and
might live together like princes, because I have great riches.'The youth could not but be tempted with the beautiful maiden's offer,
but he remembered how the birds had called her the witch, and their
warning always sounded in his ears.Therefore he answered cautiously,
'Do not be angry, dear maiden, if I do not decide immediately on this
important matter.Give me a few days to consider before we come to an
understanding.''Take some weeks to consider if you
like, and take counsel with your own heart.'And to make the time
pass pleasantly, she took the youth over every part of her beautiful
dwelling, and showed him all her splendid treasures.But these treasures
were all produced by enchantment, for the maiden could make anything she
wished appear by the help of King Solomon's signet ring; only none of
these things remained fixed; they passed away like the wind without
leaving a trace behind.But the youth did not know this; he thought they
were all real.One day the maiden took him into a secret chamber, where a little gold
box was standing on a silver table.Pointing to the box, she said, 'Here
is my greatest treasure, whose like is not to be found in the whole
world.When you marry me, I will give you
this ring as a marriage gift, and it will make you the happiest of
mortal men.But in order that our love may last for ever, you must give
me for the ring three drops of blood from the little finger of your left
hand.'When the youth heard these words a cold shudder ran over him, for he
remembered that his soul was at stake.He was cunning enough, however,
to conceal his feelings and to make no direct answer, but he only asked
the maiden, as if carelessly, what was remarkable about the ring?She answered, 'No mortal is able entirely to understand the power
of this ring, because no one thoroughly understands the secret signs
engraved upon it.But even with my half-knowledge I can work great
wonders.Sandra moved to the bedroom.If I put the ring upon the little finger of my left hand, then
I can fly like a bird through the air wherever I wish to go.If I put
it on the third finger of my left hand I am invisible, and I can see
everything that passes around me, though no one can see me.If I put the
ring upon the middle finger of my left hand, then neither fire nor water
nor any sharp weapon can hurt me.Daniel journeyed to the hallway.If I put it on the forefinger of my
left hand, then I can with its help produce whatever I wish.I can in a
single moment build houses or anything I desire.Finally, as long as I
wear the ring on the thumb of my left hand, that hand is so strong that
it can break down rocks and walls.Sandra went to the office.Besides these, the ring has other
secret signs which, as I said, no one can understand.Daniel moved to the bedroom.No doubt it
contains secrets of great importance.The ring formerly belonged to King
Solomon, the wisest of kings, during whose reign the wisest men lived.But it is not known whether this ring was ever made by mortal hands: it
is supposed that an angel gave it to the wise King.'When the youth heard all this he determined to try and get possession of
the ring, though he did not quite believe in all its wonderful gifts.He wished the maiden would let him have it in his hand, but he did not
quite like to ask her to do so, and after a while she put it back into
the box.A few days after they were again speaking of the magic ring,
and the youth said, 'I do not think it possible that the ring can have
all the power you say it has.'Then the maiden opened the box and took the ring out, and it glittered
as she held it like the clearest sunbeam.She put it on the middle
finger of her left hand, and told the youth to take a knife and try as
hard as he could to cut her with it, for he would not be able to hurt
her.He was unwilling at first, but the maiden insisted.Then he tried,
at first only in play, and then seriously, to strike her with the knife,
but an invisible wall of iron seemed to be between them, and the maiden
stood before him laughing and unhurt.Then she put the ring on her third
finger, and in an instant she had vanished from his eyes.Presently she
was beside him again laughing, and holding the ring between her fingers.'Do let me try,' said the youth, 'whether I can do these wonderful
things.'The maiden, suspecting no treachery, gave him the magic ring.The youth pretended to have forgotten what to do, and asked what finger
he must put the ring on so that no sharp weapon could hurt him?''Oh, the middle finger of your left hand,' the maiden answered,
laughing.She took the knife and tried to strike the youth, and he even tried to
cut himself with it, but found it impossible.Then he asked the maiden
to show him how to split stones and rocks with the help of the ring.So
she led him into a courtyard where stood a great boulder-stone.'Now,'
she said, 'put the ring upon the thumb of your left hand, and you will
see how strong that hand has become.The youth did so, and found to his
astonishment that with a single blow of his fist the stone flew into a
thousand pieces.Then the youth bethought him that he who does not use
his luck when he has it is a fool, and that this was a chance which once
lost might never return.So while they stood laughing at the shattered
stone he placed the ring, as if in play, upon the third finger of his
left hand.'Now,' said the maiden, 'you are invisible to me until you take the ring
off again.'But the youth had no mind to do that; on the contrary, he went farther
off, then put the ring on the little finger of his left hand, and soared
into the air like a bird.When the maiden saw him flying away she thought at first that he was
still in play, and cried, 'Come back, friend, for now you see I have
told you the truth.'Then the maiden saw she was deceived, and bitterly repented that she had
ever trusted him with the ring.The young man never halted in his flight until he reached the dwelling
of the wise magician who had taught him the speech of birds.The
magician was delighted to find that his search had been successful,
and at once set to work to interpret the secret signs engraved upon the
ring, but it took him seven weeks to make them out clearly.Then he gave
the youth the following instructions how to overcome the Dragon of the
North: 'You must have an iron horse cast, which must have little wheels
under each foot.You must also be armed with a spear two fathoms long,
which you will be able to wield by means of the magic ring upon your
left thumb.The spear must be as thick in the middle as a large tree,
and both its ends must be sharp.In the middle of the spear you must
have two strong chains ten fathoms in length.As soon as the Dragon has
made himself fast to the spear, which you must thrust through his jaws,
you must spring quickly from the iron horse and fasten the ends of the
chains firmly to the ground with iron stakes, so that he cannot get away
from them.After two or three days the monster's strength will be so
far exhausted that you will be able to come near him.Then you can put
Solomon's ring upon your left thumb and give him the finishing stroke,
but keep the ring on your third finger until you have come close to him,
so that the monster cannot see you, else he might strike you dead with
his long tail.But when all is done, take care you do not lose the ring,
and that no one takes it from you by cunning.'The young man thanked the magician for his directions, and promised,
should they succeed, to reward him.But the magician answered, 'I have
profited so much by the wisdom the ring has taught me that I desire no
other reward.'Then they parted, and the youth quickly flew home through
the air.After remaining in his own home for some weeks, he heard people
say that the terrible Dragon of the North was not far off, and might
shortly be expected in the country.The King announced publicly that
he would give his daughter in marriage, as well as a large part of his
kingdom, to whosoever should free the country from the monster.The
youth then went to the King and told him that he had good hopes of
subduing the Dragon, if the King would grant him all he desired for the
purpose.The King willingly agreed, and the iron horse, the great spear,
and the chains were all prepared as the youth requested.When all was
ready, it was found that the iron horse was so heavy that a hundred men
could not move it from the spot, so the youth found there was nothing
for it but to move it with his own strength by means of the magic ring.The Dragon was now so near that in a couple of springs he would be over
the frontier.The youth now began to consider how he should act, for if
he had to push the iron horse from behind he could not ride upon it as
the sorcerer had said he must.But a raven unexpectedly gave him this
advice: 'Ride upon the horse, and push the spear against the ground,
as if you were pushing off a boat from the land.'The youth did so, and
found that in this way he could easily move forwards.The Dragon had his
monstrous jaws wide open, all ready for his expected prey.A few paces
nearer, and man and horse would have been swallowed up by them!The
youth trembled with horror, and his blood ran cold, yet he did not lose
his courage; but, holding the iron spear upright in his hand, he brought
it down with all his might right through the monster's lower jaw.Then
quick as lightning he sprang from his horse before the Dragon had time
to shut his mouth.A fearful clap like thunder, which could be heard for
miles around, now warned him that the Dragon's jaws had closed upon
the spear.When the youth turned round he saw the point of the spear
sticking up high above the Dragon's upper jaw, and knew that the other
end must be fastened firmly to the ground; but the Dragon had got his
teeth fixed in the iron horse, which was now useless.The youth now
hastened to fasten down the chains to the ground by means of the
enormous iron pegs which he had provided.The death struggle of the
monster lasted three days and three nights; in his writhing he beat his
tail so violently against the ground, that at ten miles' distance the
earth trembled as if with an earthquake.When he at length lost power to
move his tail, the youth with the help of the ring took up a stone which
twenty ordinary men could not have moved, and beat the Dragon so hard
about the head with it that very soon the monster lay lifeless before
him.You can fancy how great was the rejoicing when the news was spread
abroad that the terrible monster was dead.His conqueror was received
into the city with as much pomp as if he had been the mightiest of
kings.The old King did not need to urge his daughter to marry the
slayer of the Dragon; he found her already willing to bestow her hand
upon this hero, who had done all alone what whole armies had tried in
vain to do.In a few days a magnificent wedding was celebrated, at which
the rejoicings lasted four whole weeks, for all the neighbouring kings
had met together to thank the man who had freed the world from their
common enemy.But everyone forgot amid the general joy that they ought
to have buried the Dragon's monstrous body, for it began now to have
such a bad smell that no one could live in the neighbourhood, and
before long the whole air was poisoned, and a pestilence broke out
which destroyed many hundreds of people.In this distress, the King's
son-in-law resolved to seek help once more from the Eastern magician, to
whom he at once travelled through the air like a bird by the help of
the ring.But there is a proverb which says that ill-gotten gains never
prosper, and the Prince found that the stolen ring brought him ill-luck
after all.The Witch-maiden had never rested night nor day until she had
found out where the ring was.As soon as she had discovered by means of
magical arts that the Prince in the form of a bird was on his way to the
Eastern magician, she changed herself into an eagle and watched in the
air until the bird she was waiting for came in sight, for she knew him
at once by the ring which was hung round his neck by a ribbon.Then the
eagle pounced upon the bird, and the moment she seized him in her talons
she tore the ring from his neck before the man in bird's shape had time
to prevent her.Then the eagle flew down to the earth with her prey, and
the two stood face to face once more in human form.'Now, villain, you are in my power!'John went back to the bathroom.'I favoured
you with my love, and you repaid me with treachery and theft.You stole
my most precious jewel from me, and do you expect to live happily as the
King's son-in-law?Now the tables are turned; you are in my power, |
bedroom | Where is Sandra? | cried the Prince; 'I know too well how deeply
I have wronged you, and most heartily do I repent it.'The maiden answered, 'Your prayers and your repentance come too late,
and if I were to spare you everyone would think me a fool.You have
doubly wronged me; first you scorned my love, and then you stole my
ring, and you must bear the punishment.'With these words she put the ring upon her left thumb, lifted the young
man with one hand, and walked away with him under her arm.This time
she did not take him to a splendid palace, but to a deep cave in a rock,
where there were chains hanging from the wall.The maiden now chained
the young man's hands and feet so that he could not escape; then she
said in an angry voice, 'Here you shall remain chained up until you die.I will bring you every day enough food to prevent you dying of hunger,
but you need never hope for freedom any more.'The old King and his daughter waited anxiously for many weeks for the
Prince's return, but no news of him arrived.The King's daughter often
dreamed that her husband was going through some great suffering: she
therefore begged her father to summon all the enchanters and magicians,
that they might try to find out where the Prince was and how he could
be set free.Daniel moved to the garden.But the magicians, with all their arts, could find out
nothing, except that he was still living and undergoing great suffering;
but none could tell where he was to be found.Again, why should God feel Himself so
much aggrieved by Adam's peccadillo?If it were not for the
theological atmosphere which surrounds the question, we should see at
once that it was ridiculous.Why should the consequences continue
through countless generations?Remember this was supposed to be the
very start of humanity's career.What a dreary, hopeless outlook was
left to it!The notion is incredible, and most of the clear-headed men
who hold it would scout it without discussion if they heard of it now
for the first time.As it is, however, they go on talking of the
"awful holiness" of God, the offence against the divine majesty, and so
on.Sandra moved to the bedroom.I can well remember that as a
child I used to tremble at the thought of it, for somehow, like a good
many other people, I had been taught to think of the divine holiness as
synonymous with merciless inflexibility.But holiness, righteousness,
justice, mercy, love, are but different expressions of the same
spiritual reality.One might go on multiplying these considerations
for ever, but there is no need to do so.Sufficient has been said to
demonstrate the fact that the doctrine of the Fall is an absurdity from
the point of view both of ethical consistency and common sense.+Science and the Fall.+--After this it is almost superfluous to point
out that modern science knows nothing of it and can find no trace of
such a cataclysm in human history.On the contrary, it asserts that
there has been a gradual and unmistakable rise; the law of evolution
governs human affairs just as it does every other part of the cosmic
process.This statement is quite consistent with the admission that
there have been periods of retrogression as well as of advance, and
that the advance itself has not been steady and uniform from first to
last; there have been long stretches of history during which humanity
has seemed to mark time and then a sudden outburst of intellectual
activity and moral achievement.It could hardly be maintained, for
instance, that the Athens of Socrates was not superior to the France of
Fulk the black of Anjou, or that the Assyria of Asshur-bani-pal was not
quite as civilised as the Germany of the ninth century A.D.Alfred
Russel Wallace has shown in his popular book, "The Wonderful Century,"
that the latter half of the nineteenth century witnessed a greater
advance in man's power over nature than the fifteen hundred years
preceding it.There are some people who maintain that while the
material advance is unquestionable, the intellectual advance is on the
whole more doubtful, and that, morally speaking, human nature is no
different from what it ever was.But I do not think any serious
historian would say this.Intellectually, the average man may still be
inferior to Plato,--though even Plato did not understand the need for
exact thought as modern philosophers do,--but civilisation as a whole
has produced a higher level of intellectual attainment than had been
reached by Plato's world.A civilisation in which four-fifths of the
people were helots kept in ignorance in order that an aristocratic few
might enjoy the benefits of culture was not equal to ours, great and
glaring as the defects of ours may be.Again, while it is only too
sadly true that modern civilisation contains plenty of callous
selfishness, gross injustice, and abominable cruelty, it can hardly be
denied that these relics of our brute ancestry are universally
deplored, and that society recognises them to be inimical to its
well-being and seeks to get rid of them.Daniel journeyed to the hallway.Thank God, as Anthony
Trollope said, that bad as men are to-day they are not as men were in
the days of the Caesars.If the New Theology controversy had arisen a few hundred years ago,
theological disputants would not have wasted time in writing newspaper
articles; they would have met in solemn conclave and condemned the
heretic to be flayed alive or hung over a slow fire or treated in some
similarly convincing manner.Of course it is remotely possible that
some of them would like to do it now, but public opinion would not let
them; things have changed, and the change is in the direction of a
higher general morality.If any man feels pessimistic about the
present, let him study the past and he will feel reassured.Those who
maintain that society is not morally better but only more sentimental,
beg the question.What they call sentimentalism is greater
sensibility, greater sympathy, a keener sense of justice.Every advance in the direction of universal love
and brotherhood is a moral advance.The sternness of Stoicism or
Puritanism was an imperfect morality.The grandeur and impressiveness
of it were due to the fact that Stoics and Puritans for the most part
took their ideal seriously; they aimed at something high and dedicated
their lives to it.Sandra went to the office.This dedication of the life to something higher
than self-interest is of the very essence of true morality, and its
highest reach is perfect love.We are a long way from that yet,
although the ideal was manifested two thousand years ago.The average
man to-day is certainly not nobler than the apostle Paul, nor does he
see more deeply into the true meaning of life than did John the divine,
but the general level is higher.Slowly, very slowly, with every now
and then a depressing set-back, the race is climbing the steep ascent
toward the ideal of universal brotherhood.It is sometimes maintained by thinkers who account themselves
progressive that the law of evolution holds good of mankind so far as
our physical constitution is concerned, but that a special act of
creation took place as soon as the physical frame was sufficiently
developed to become the receptacle of a higher principle, and that
then, and not till then, "man became a living soul."But it is
impossible to square the circle in this way, and to contrive to get the
doctrine of the Fall in by the back door, so to speak.The idea in the
minds of those who hold this view appears to be that the tenant of the
body which had been so long in preparation was a simple but intelligent
and morally innocent personality who forthwith proceeded to do all that
Adam is credited with and therefore spoiled what would otherwise have
been a harmonious and orderly development; what we now see is not
evolution as God meant it, but evolution perverted by human
wrong-headedness.But this theory contains more difficulties than the
older one it aims to replace.It makes God even more incompetent then
the traditional view does.For untold ages, apparently, He has been
preparing the world for the advent of humanity, only to find that the
moment humanity enters it the whole scheme is spoiled.But we need not
seriously consider this view; the facts are overwhelmingly against it.The history, even of the most recent civilisations, is, comparatively
speaking, only as old as yesterday, whereas the presence of human life
on this planet is traceable into the almost illimitable past.Daniel moved to the bedroom.But the
farther we go back in our investigation of human origins the less
possible does it appear that the primitive man of theological tradition
has ever existed.The Adam of the dogmatic theologian is like the
economic man of the older school of writers on political science, the
man who always wants to buy in the cheapest market and sell in the
dearest, and whose one consistent endeavour is to seek pleasure and
avoid pain; he has never existed.+Divine immanence and its Fall.+--Besides, we do not want him to exist.John went back to the bathroom.The Fall theory is not only impossible in face of the findings of
modern science; it is a real hindrance to religion.So far from having
to give it up because science would have nothing to say to it, the
difficulty would be to retain it and yet have anything like a rational
view of the relation of God and the world.It has already been stated
that the starting-point of the New Theology is a recognition of the
truth that God is expressing Himself through His world.This truth
occupied a place in religious thought ages before modern science was
thought of; science has confirmed it, but has not compelled us to think
it; if science had never existed, it would still remain the only
reasonable ground for an adequate explanation of the relation of man to
the universe.It simplifies all our questionings and coordinates all
our activities.There is not a single one in the whole vast range of
human interests which it does not cover.There is nothing which
humanity can do or seek to do which is not immediately dependent upon
it.The grandest task and the lowliest are both implied in it.It
declares the common basis of religion and morality.Religion is the
response of human nature to the whole of things considered as an order;
morality is the living of the individual life in such a way as to be
and do the most for humanity as a whole; it is making the most of one's
self for the sake of the whole.To
jump off London Bridge would be self-immolation, but it would not be an
act conducive to the welfare of the community; it might indeed be a
very selfish and cowardly act.True morality involves the duty of
self-formation and the exercise of judgment and self-discipline in
order that the individual life may become as great a gift as possible
to the common life.It will therefore be seen at once that there is a
vital relation between morality and religion; the one implies the other
even though the fact may not always be recognised, and both are based
upon the immanence of God.+The truth beneath the doctrine of the Fall.+--But never yet has a
particular doctrine or mode of stating truth held its own for any
length of time in human history unless there was some genuine truth
beneath it, and the doctrine of the Fall is no exception.It does
contain a truth, a truth which can be stated in a few words, and which
might be inferred from what has already been said about the
relationship of man and God.The coming of a finite creation into
being is itself of the nature of a fall, a coming down from perfection
to imperfection.We have seen the reason for that coming down; it is
that the universal life may realise its own nature by attenuating or
limiting its perfection.If I want to understand the composition of
the ordinary pure white ray, I take a prism and break it up into its
constituents.This is just what God has been doing in creation.Our
present consciousness of ourselves and of the world can reasonably be
accounted a fall, for we came from the infinite and unto the infinite
perfection we shall in the end return.Sandra travelled to the kitchen.I do not mean that our present
consciousness of ourselves is eternal; I only assert that our true
being is eternally one with the being of God and that to be separated
from a full knowledge of that truth is to have undergone a fall.But
this fall has no sinister antecedents; its purpose is good, and there
is nothing to mourn over except our own slowness at getting into line
with the cosmic purpose.Another way of describing it would be to call
it the incarnation of God in nature and man, a subject about which I
must say more in another chapter.This view of the meaning and
significance of the Fall can be traced in all great religious
literature.Perhaps one of the best statements of it that has ever
been made is the one set forth by Paul of Tarsus in the eighth chapter
of his letter to the Romans: "For I reckon that the sufferings of this
present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall
be revealed in us.For the earnest expectation of the creature waiteth
for the manifestation of the sons of God.For the creature was made
subject to vanity, not willingly, but by the reason of him who hath
subjected the same in hope, because the creature itself also shall be
delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of
the children of God.For we know that the whole creation groaneth and
travaileth in pain together until now."Passages like this make it
impossible to believe that Paul was ever really tied down to the
literal rabbinical view of Adam's transgression and its consequences;
and these words are a clear statement of the truth that the
imperfection of the finite Creation is not man's fault but God's will,
and is a means toward a great end.CHAPTER V
JESUS THE DIVINE MAN
+The centrality of Jesus.+--All that has been said hitherto is but a
preparation for the discussion of the greatest subject that at present
occupies the field of faith and morals, that of the personality of
Jesus and His significance for mankind.It has been repeatedly pointed
out both by friends and foes of the New Theology that the ultimate
question for the Christian religion is that of the place occupied by
its Founder.How much can we really know about
Him?What value does He possess for the religious consciousness
to-day?All other questions about the Christian religion are of minor
importance compared with these, and if we are prepared with an answer
to these we have by implication answered all the rest.Christianity is
in a special sense immediately dependent upon its Founder.No other
religion has ever regarded its founder as Christians regard their
Master.Christianity draws its sustenance from the belief that Jesus
is still alive and impacting Himself upon the world through His
followers.Other great religions trace their origin to the teaching
and example of some exceptional person; Christianity does the same, but
with the added conviction that Jesus is as much in the world as ever
and that His presence is realised in the mystic union between Himself
and those who know and love Him.If this be true, it is a fact of the
very highest importance and one which can neither be passed over nor
relegated to a subordinate position.Christianity without Jesus is the
world without the sun.If, as I readily admit, the great question for
religion in the immediate future is that of the person of Jesus, the
sooner we address ourselves to it the better.Before discussing what theology has to say of Him let us note in
general terms what the civilised world is saying, theology or no
theology.I suppose the most out-and-out materialist would admit that
in the western world the name of Jesus exercises an influence to which
no other is even remotely comparable.Perhaps he would even go so far
as to admit that there is no name anywhere which means so much to those
who hear it.It is not merely that the strongest civilisation on earth
reverences that name, but that there is no other civilisation which can
produce a parallel to it.Sandra went back to the bedroom.The nearest approach to it is that of
Gautama, and I think it would be generally admitted that the influence
even of this mighty and beautiful spirit has never possessed the
immediacy, intensity, and personal value which distinguish that of
Jesus.It might be maintained with some show of reason that the
civilisation of Christendom, although it is now being copied by
non-Christian communities such as Japan, is not necessarily the highest
because it happens to be the strongest, and that it is even regarded
with contempt by the best representatives of some more ancient faiths.The point is that the name of
Jesus, which stands for a moral ideal which is the very negation of
materialism, commands a reverence |
bedroom | Where is Sandra? | It is no
use trying to place Jesus in a row along with other religious masters.He is first and the rest nowhere; we have no category for Him.I am
not trying to prove the impossible, namely, that Christianity is the
only true religion and the rest are all false.We shall get on better
when that kind of nonsense ceases to be spoken.All I am concerned to
emphasise is that somehow Jesus seems to sum up and focus the religious
ideal for mankind.His influence for good is greater than that of all
the masters of men put together, and still goes on increasing.It is a
notable fact that although churches and creeds are losing their hold
upon the modern mind, the name of Jesus is held in greater regard than
ever.We have heard of a meeting of workmen cheering Jesus and hissing
the churches.In our day most people are agreed that in Jesus we have
the most perfect life ever exhibited to humanity.It is not only
Christians who take this view; everyone, or nearly everyone, does so.Some years ago a book was published which bore on the title-page the
question, "What would Jesus do?"The book was not very well written,
and I do not think the writer would have claimed that it contained
anything original, but it had an enormous sale simply because of its
attempt to answer the question on the covers.The most unlikely people
bought and read it, people who never went to church and would not dream
of doing so.From indications such as these one is justified in
asserting that our western civilisation has accepted as true that, no
matter who Jesus was, His character represents the highest standard for
human attainment.In seeking moral excellence the individual and the
race are thus moving toward an ideal already manifested in history.The most effective taunt that can be levelled at inconsistent
Christians is that they are unlike their Master.Criticisms of the
character of Jesus are now few in number, and usually take the form of
declaring that it is impracticable or impossible, not that it is
undesirable or imperfect.Some, no doubt, would maintain that perhaps
the real Jesus did not answer to the ideal which Christians have formed
of Him, but that is another question.Here we are now face to face
with the unescapable fact that the greatest moral and religious force
in the world is embodied in the name of Jesus, and this by general
consent.+The Jesus of traditional theology.+--But what has traditional
Christian theology to say about Jesus?Here we enter a region in which
the ordinary man of the world does not live and is never likely to
live, but we cannot afford to ignore it.According to the received
theology, Jesus was and is God and man in a sense in which no one else
ever has been or ever will be.As the shorter catechism has it,
following the language of the ancient creeds, "There are three persons
in one God, the same in substance, equal in power and glory," and Jesus
is the second of the three.This kind of statement cannot but be
confusing to the ordinary mind of to-day if only because the word
"person" does not mean to us quite the same thing that it meant to the
framers of the ancient creeds.Daniel moved to the garden.Strange as it may seem to some of my
readers, I believe what the creeds say about the person of Jesus, but I
believe it in a way that puts no gulf between Him and the rest of the
human race.This, I trust, will become clearer as we proceed; it seems
to me to be implied in any real belief concerning the immanence of God.I think even the Athanasian creed is a magnificent piece of work if
only the churches would consent to understand it in terms of the oldest
theology of all!But, according to conventional theology, the second
person in the Trinity, who was coequal and coeternal with God the
Father, laid aside His glory, became incarnate for our salvation, was
born of a virgin, lived a brief suffering life, wrought many miracles,
died a shameful death, rose again from the tomb on the second morning
after He had been laid in it, and ascended into heaven in full view of
His wondering disciples.In fulfilment of a promise made by Him
shortly before the crucifixion, and repeated before the ascension, He
and the Father conjointly sent the third person in the Trinity to endue
with power from on high the simple men whose duty it now became to
proclaim the gospel of salvation to the world.Sandra moved to the bedroom.Jesus is now on the
throne of His glory, but sooner or later He will come again to wind up
the present dispensation and to be the Judge of the quick and the dead
at a grand assize.There is a sense in which all this is true, but it is commonly
expressed in such a way that the truth is lost sight of.The only way to get at the truth in every
one of these venerable articles of the Christian faith will be to shed
the husk, and that we must do without hesitation or compromise.A more
accurate historic perspective would save us from the crudities so often
preached from the pulpits in the name of Christian truth, crudities
which repel so many intelligent men from the benefits of public
worship.There never has been the slightest need for any man of
thoughtful mind and reverent spirit to recoil from the fundamentals of
the Christian creed.Rightly understood they are the fundamentals of
human nature itself.+Godhead and manhood.+--The first in order of thought is that of the
Godhead of Jesus.As regards this tenet I think it should be easily
possible to show that the most convinced adherent of the traditional
theology does not believe and never has believed what he professes to
hold.The terms with which we have to deal are Deity, divinity, and
humanity.A good deal of confusion exists concerning the interrelation
of these three.It is supposed that humanity and divinity are mutually
exclusive, and that divinity and Deity must necessarily mean exactly
the same thing.It follows from the first
principle of the New Theology that all the three are fundamentally and
essentially one, but in scope and extent they are different.By the
Deity we mean--and I suppose everyone means--the all-controlling
consciousness of the universe as well as the infinite, unfathomable,
and unknowable abyss of being beyond.By divinity we mean the essence
of the nature of the immanent God, the innermost and all-determining
quality of that nature; we have already seen that according to the
Christian religion the innermost quality of the divine nature is
perfect love.Show us perfect love and you have shown us the divinest
thing the universe can produce, whether it knows itself to be
immediately directed and controlled by the infinite consciousness of
Deity or whether it does not.It is clear, then, that although Deity
and divinity are essentially one, the latter is the lesser term and is
dependent for its validity upon the former.It stands for that expression of the divine nature which we
associate with our limited human consciousness.Strictly speaking, the
human and divine are two categories which shade into and imply each
other; humanity is divinity viewed from below, divinity is humanity
viewed from above.If any human being could succeed in living a life
of perfect love, that is a life whose energies were directed toward
impersonal ends, and which was lived in such a way as to be and do the
utmost for the whole, he would show himself divine, for he would have
revealed the innermost of God.Now let us apply these definitions to the personality of Jesus.Granted that the devotion of Christians has been right in recognising
in Him the one perfect human life, that is, the one life which
consistently and from first to last was lived in terms of the whole,
what are we to call it except divine?In a sense, of course,
everything that exists is divine, because the whole universe is an
expression of the being of God.But it can hardly be seriously
contended that a crocodile is as much an expression of God as General
Booth.It is wise and right, therefore, to restrict the word "divine"
to the kind of consciousness which knows itself to be, and rejoices to
be, the expression of a love which is a consistent self-giving to the
universal life."God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in
God and God in him."General Booth is divine in so far as this is the
governing principle of his life.Jesus was divine simply and solely
because His life was never governed by any other principle.We do not
need to talk of two natures in Him, or to think of a mysterious
dividing line on one side of which He was human and on the other
divine.In Him humanity was divinity and divinity, humanity.Does
anyone think that this brings Jesus down to our level?Assuredly it
does not; we are far too prone to be ruled by names.To the ordinary
Christian this explanation of the divinity of Jesus may seem equivalent
to the denial of His uniqueness, but it is nothing of the kind.Daniel journeyed to the hallway.Sandra went to the office.I have
already devoted some little space to emphasising the obvious fact that
it is impossible to deny the uniqueness of Jesus; history has settled
that question for us.If all the theologians and materialists put
together were to set to work to-morrow to try to show that Jesus was
just like other people, they would not succeed, for the civilised world
has already made up its mind on that point, and by a right instinct
recognises Jesus as the unique standard of human excellence.But this
is not to say that we shall never reach that standard too; quite the
contrary.We must reach it in order to fulfil our destiny and to crown
and complete His work.Daniel moved to the bedroom.To stop short of manifesting the perfect love
of God would be to fail of the object for which we are here and to
render the advent of Jesus useless.Christendom already knows this
perfectly well, although it has not always succeeded in expressing it
with perfect clearness."Beloved, now are we sons of God, and it doth
not yet appear what we shall be, but we know that when He (or rather
it) shall appear, we shall be like Him."In our practical religion we
all, even the most reactionary of us, regard the divinity of Jesus just
in this way.We talk of imitating Him,
conforming to His likeness, showing His spirit, and so on.When we
want a model for courage, fidelity, gentleness, humility,
unselfishness, we promptly turn to Jesus.Even in our relations with
God we try to follow His lead; instinctively we range ourselves with
Him when we address the universal Father; until we come to creed-making
we never think of putting Him on the God side of things and ourselves
on another.Catholic or Protestant, orthodox or unorthodox, Unitarian
or Trinitarian, we all accept in practice the identity of the divine
and human in Jesus and potentially in ourselves.I make Him the only Man--and there is a
difference.We have only seen perfect manhood once and that was the
manhood of Jesus.The rest of us have got to get there.+Jesus and Deity.+--This brings us to the further question of the Deity
of Jesus.As a matter of fact, as I have already indicated, this
question, too, has long been settled in practice.If by the Deity of
Jesus is meant that He possessed the all-controlling consciousness of
the universe, then assuredly He was not the Deity for He did not
possess that consciousness.He prayed to His Father, sometimes with
agony and dread; He wondered, suffered, wept, and grew weary.He
confessed His ignorance of some things and declared Himself to have no
concern with others; it is even doubtful how far He was prepared to
receive the homage of those about Him.If there be one thing which
becomes indisputable from the reading of the gospel narratives it is
that Jesus possessed a true human consciousness, limited like our own,
and, like our own, subject to the ordinary ills of life.Once again
everybody knows this after a fashion.The most determined of so-called
orthodox controversialists would hardly try to maintain that the
consciousness of Jesus was at once limited and unlimited.To do so
would be an impossible feat; if Jesus was the Deity, He certainly was
not the _whole_ of the Deity during His residence on earth, whatever He
may be now.But, it may be objected, in His earthly life He was the
Deity self-limited: "He emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant,"
etc.Quite so, but see where this statement leads.John went back to the bathroom.Sandra travelled to the kitchen.The New Theology
can consistently make it, but it is difficult to see how that newer
theology which calls itself orthodoxy manages to do so.Does the
self-limitation of Jesus mean that the Deity was lessened in any way
during the incarnation?Why, of course not, we should all say; the
Deity continued with infinite fulness unimpaired above and beyond the
consciousness of Jesus.Sandra went back to the bedroom.Then are we to understand that this
self-limitation of Jesus meant that the eternal Son, or second person
in the Trinity, the Word by whom the worlds were made, quitted the
throne of His glory and lived for thirty-three years as a Jewish
peasant?I think the dogmatic theologian would have some hesitation in
giving an unqualified affirmative to this question, for the
difficulties implied in it are practically insurmountable.Was the
full consciousness of the eternal Word present in the babe of
Bethlehem, for instance?Questions like these
cannot be answered on the lines of the conventional Christology.The
plain and simple answer to all of them is to admit that the Jesus of
history did not possess the consciousness of Deity during His life on
earth.John journeyed to the garden.His consciousness was as purely human as our own.Any special
insight which He possessed into the true relations of God and man was
due to the moral perfection of His nature and not to His metaphysical
status.He was God manifest in the flesh because His life was a
consistent expression of divine love and not otherwise.But He was not
God manifest in the flesh in any way which would cut Him off from the
rest of human kind.According to the received theology, Jesus and
Jesus only, out of all the beings who have ever trodden the road which
humanity has to travel, existed before all ages.Daniel went back to the garden.We live our
threescore years and ten and then pass on into eternity; He was eternal
to begin with.He comes to earth with a hoary antiquity behind Him, a
timeless life to look back upon; we have just fluttered into existence.Surely any ordinary intelligence can see that this kind of theologising
puts an impassable gulf at once between Jesus and every other person
who has ever been born of an earthly mother.Certainly it does, the
theologian may declare, and rightly so, for that gulf exists; He
assumed human nature, but He was eternally divine before He did so, and
we are not.I do not need to refute this argument; the trend of modern
thought is already doing so most effectually.It is a gratuitous
assumption without a shred of evidence to support it.Besides,
unfortunately for this kind of statement, the scientific investigation
of Christian origins, and the application of the scientific method to
the history of Christian doctrine have shown us how the dogma of the
Deity of Jesus grew up.It was a comparatively late development in
Christianity, and its practical implications never have been accepted,
although at one time there was a danger that the winsome figure of
Jesus would be removed altogether from the field of human interest and
regard.The Jesus of Michael Angelo's "Last Judgment" is a terrifying
figure without a trace of the lowly Nazarene about Him, and yet this
was the Jesus of the conventional Christianity of the time.It was
through this dehumanising of Jesus in Christian thought and experience
that Mariolatry arose in the Roman church.Could anything be more
grotesque than the suggestion that the mother of Jesus should need to
plead with her son to be merciful with frail humanity?And yet this is
what it came to; the figure of Mary was introduced in order to preserve
a real humanity in our relations with the Godhead.All honour to those
who have called us back to the real Jesus, the Jesus of Galilee and
Jerusalem, the Jesus with the prophet's fire, the Jesus who was so
gentle with little children and erring women, and yet before whom
canting hypocrites and truculent ecclesiastics slunk away abashed.Upon this recovered Jesus the world has now fixed its adoring gaze, and
it will not readily let Him go again.+Divine manhood and Unitarian |
hallway | Where is Mary? | Not
so fast; we are busy with names again.Most of us have a tendency to
think that if we can get a doctrine labelled and pigeonholed, we know
all about it, but we are generally mistaken.This is not Unitarianism,
and I do believe that Jesus was very God, as I have already shown.We
have to get rid of the dualism which will insist on putting humanity
and Deity into two separate categories.I say it is not Unitarianism,
for historic Unitarianism has been just as prone to this dualism as the
extremest Trinitarianism has ever been.Like Trinitarianism it has
often tended to regard humanity as on one side of a gulf and Deity as
on the other; it has emphasised too much the transcendence of God.The
sentence quoted above from an orthodox Trinitarian divine about "God's
eternal eminence and His descent on a created world" might just as well
have been employed by an out-and-out Unitarian.Modern Unitarianism is
in part the descendant of eighteenth-century Deism which insisted upon
the transcendence of God almost to the exclusion of His immanence; it
thought of God as away somewhere above the universe, watching it but
leaving the machine pretty much to itself.Unitarianism in the course
of its history from the first century downward has passed through a
good many phases.Present-day Unitarianism is preaching with fervour
and clearness the foundation truth of the New Theology, the fundamental
unity of God and man.But it does not belong to it exclusively, and I
decline to be labelled Unitarian because I preach it too.The New
Theology is not a victory for Unitarianism.If ever the
English-speaking communities of the world should come to be united
under a single flag, would it be just and wise to call them all
Americans?No doubt some of our American cousins would like to think
so, but there is enough of virility and solid worth on the British side
of the question to make that description impossible.The title would
be a misnomer, and in fact an absurdity.The case in regard to the
connection of the New Theology with Unitarianism is not dissimilar.It
is only sectarian Unitarians who would try to claim it for their own
denomination; the best and most outstanding exponents of Unitarianism
would not wish to do anything of the kind, for they know well enough
that historically speaking they have not consistently stood for it any
more than any other denomination.The New Theology does not belong to
any one church but to all.For my own part I would not even take the
trouble to try to turn a Roman Catholic into a Protestant.Let every
man stay in the church whose spiritual atmosphere and modes of worship
best accord with his temperament, but let him recognise the deeper
unity that lies below the formal creeds.The old issue between
Unitarianism and Trinitarianism vanishes in the New Theology; the
bottom is knocked out of the controversy.Unitarianism used to declare
that Jesus was man _not_ God; Trinitarianism maintained that He was God
_and_ man; the oldest Christian thought, as well as the youngest,
regards Him as God _in_ man--God manifest in the flesh.But here
emerges a great point of difference between the New Theology on the one
hand and traditional orthodoxy on the other.The latter would restrict
the description "God manifest in the flesh" to Jesus alone; the New
Theology would extend it in a lesser degree to all humanity, and would
maintain that in the end it will be as true of every individual soul as
ever it was of Jesus.Indeed, it is this belief that gives value and
significance to the earthly mission of Jesus; He came to show us what
we potentially are.This is a great and important issue, which
requires to be treated in a separate chapter.CHAPTER VI
THE ETERNAL CHRIST
In the course of Christian history a good deal of time has been
occupied in the discussion of the metaphysical question of the complex
unity of the divine nature; and the result has been the doctrine of the
Trinity, a conception which, it has been claimed, at once satisfies and
transcends the operations of the human intellect.Most non-theological
modern minds are, however, somewhat suspicious of the doctrine of the
Trinity; it seems rather too speculative and too remote from ordinary
ways of thinking to possess much real value.We cannot dispense with the doctrine of the Trinity, for it,
or something like it, is implied in the very structure of the mind.It
belongs to philosophy even more than to religion, and to the sphere of
ethics not less.I daresay even the man in the street knows, quite as
certainly as the man in the schools, that a metaphysical proposition
underlies the doing of every moral act, even though it may never be
expressed.All thinking starts with an assumption of some kind, and
without an assumption thought is impossible.COURTNEY, LEONARD HENRY COURTNEY, BARON (1832- ), English politician
and man of letters, eldest son of J. S. Courtney, a banker, was born at
Penzance on the 6th of July 1832.At Cambridge, Leonard Courtney was
second wrangler and first Smith's prizeman, and was elected a fellow of
his college, St John's.He was called to the bar at Lincoln's Inn in
1858, was professor of political economy at University College from 1872
to 1875, and in December 1876, after a previous unsuccessful attempt,
was elected to parliament for Liskeard in the Liberal interest.He
continued to represent the borough, and the district into which it was
merged by the Reform Act of 1885, until 1900, when his attitude towards
the South African War--he was one of the foremost of the so-called
"Pro-Boer" party--compelled his retirement.Until 1885 he was a devoted
adherent of Mr Gladstone, particularly in finance and foreign affairs.In 1880 he was under-secretary of state for the home department, in 1881
for the colonies, and in 1882 secretary to the treasury; but he was
always a stubborn fighter for principle, and upon finding that the
government's Reform Bill in 1884 contained no recognition of the scheme
for proportional representation, to which he was deeply committed, he
resigned office.He refused to support Mr Gladstone's Home Rule Bill in
1885, and was one of those who chiefly contributed to its rejection, and
whose reputation for unbending integrity and intellectual eminence gave
solidity to the Liberal Unionist party.In 1886 he was elected chairman
of committees in the House of Commons, and his efficiency in this office
seemed to mark him out for the speakership in 1895.A Liberal Unionist,
however, could only be elected by Conservative votes, and he had made
himself objectionable to a large section of the party by his independent
attitude on various questions, on which his Liberalism outweighed his
party loyalty.He would in any case have been incapacitated by an
affection of the eyesight, which for a while threatened to withdraw him
from public life altogether.After 1895 Mr Courtney's divergences from
the Unionist party on questions other than Irish politics became
gradually more marked.He became known in the House of Commons
principally for his candid criticism of the measures introduced by his
nominal leaders, and he was rather to be ranked among the Opposition
than as a Ministerialist; and when the crisis with the Transvaal came
in 1899, Mr Courtney's views, which remained substantially what they
were when he supported the settlement after Majuba in 1881, had plainly
become incompatible with his position even as a nominal follower of Lord
Salisbury and Mr Chamberlain.He gradually reverted to formal membership
of the Liberal party, and in January 1906 unsuccessfully contested a
division of Edinburgh as a supporter of Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman at
the general election.Among the birthday honours of 1906 he was elevated
to the peerage as Baron Courtney of Penwith (Cornwall).Lord Courtney,
who in 1883 married Miss Catherine Potter (an elder sister of Mrs Sidney
Webb), was a prominent supporter of the women's movement.In earlier
years he was a regular contributor to _The Times_, and he wrote numerous
essays in the principal reviews on political and economic subjects.In
1901 he published a book on _The Working Constitution of the United
Kingdom_.Two of his brothers, John Mortimer Courtney (b.1838), and William
Prideaux Courtney (b.1845), also attained public distinction, the
former in the government service in Canada (from 1869, retiring in
1906), rising to be deputy-minister of finance, and the latter in the
British civil service (1865-1892), and as a prominent man of letters and
bibliographer.COURTOIS, JACQUES (1621-1676) and GUILLAUME (1628-1679).The two French
painters who bore these names are also called by the Italian equivalents
Giacomo (or Jacopo) Cortese and Guglielmo Cortese.Each of the brothers
is likewise named, from his native province, Le Bourguignon, or Il
Borgognone.Jacques Courtois was born at St Hippolyte, near Besancon, in 1621.His
father was a painter, and with him Jacques remained studying up to the
age of fifteen.Towards 1637 he came to Italy, was hospitably received
at Milan by a Burgundian gentleman, and entered, and for three years
remained in, the French military service.The sight of some
battle-pictures revived his taste for fine art.He went to Bologna, and
studied under the friendly tutelage of Guido; thence he proceeded to
Rome, where he painted, in the Cistercian monastery, the "Miracle of the
Loaves."Here he took a house and after a while entered upon his own
characteristic style of art, that of battle-painting, in which he has
been accounted to excel all other old masters; his merits were cordially
recognized by the celebrated Cerquozzi, named Michelangelo delle
Battaglie.He soon rose from penury to ease, and married a painter's
beautiful daughter, Maria Vagini; she died after seven years of wedded
life.Prince Matthias of Tuscany employed Courtois on some striking
works in his villa, Lappeggio, representing with much historical
accuracy the prince's military exploits.In Venice also the artist
executed for the senator Sagredo some remarkable battle-pieces.In
Florence he entered the Society of Jesus, taking the habit in Rome in
1655; it was calumniously rumoured that he adopted this course in order
to escape punishment for having poisoned his wife.As a Jesuit father,
Courtois painted many works in churches and monasteries of the society.He lived piously in Rome, and died there of apoplexy on the 20th of May
1676 (some accounts say 1670 or 1671).His battle-pieces have movement
and fire, warm colouring (now too often blackened), and great command of
the brush,--those of moderate dimensions are the more esteemed.They are
slight in execution, and tell out best from a distance.Courtois etched
with skill twelve battle-subjects of his own composition.The Dantzig
painter named in Italy Pandolfo Reschi was his pupil.Guillaume Courtois, born likewise at St Hippolyte, came to Italy with
his brother.He went at once to Rome, and entered the school of Pietro
da Cortona.He studied also the Bolognese painters and Giovanni
Barbieri, and formed for himself a style with very little express
mannerism, partly resembling that of Maratta.He painted the "Battle of
Joshua" in the Quirinal Gallery, the "Crucifixion of St Andrew" in the
church of that saint on Monte Cavallo, various works for the Jesuits,
some also in co-operation with his brother.His last production was
Christ admonishing Martha.His draughtsmanship is better than that of
Jacques, whom he did not, however, rival in spirit, colour or
composition.Guillaume Courtois died of
gout on the 15th of June 1679.COURTRAI (Flemish, _Kortryk_), an important and once famous town of West
Flanders, Belgium, situated on the Lys.It is now
best known for its fine linen, which ranks with that of Larne.The lace
factories are also important and employ 5000 hands.But considerable as
is the prosperity of modern Courtrai it is but a shadow of what it was
in the middle ages during the halcyon period of the Flemish communes.Then Courtrai had a population of 200,000, now it is little over a sixth
of that number.On the 11th of July 1302 the great battle of Courtrai
(see INFANTRY) was fought outside its walls, when the French army, under
the count of Artois, was vanquished by the allied burghers of Bruges,
Ypres and Courtrai with tremendous loss.As many as 700 pairs of golden
spurs were collected on the field from the bodies of French knights and
hung up as an offering in an abbey church of the town, which has long
disappeared.There are still, however, some interesting remains of
Courtrai's former grandeur.Perhaps the Pont de Broel, with its towers
at either end of the bridge, is as characteristic and complete as any
monument of ancient Flanders that has come down to modern times.The
hotel de ville, which dated from the earlier half of the 16th century,
was restored in 1846, and since then statues have also been added to
represent those that formerly ornamented the facade.Two richly and
elaborately carved chimney-pieces in the hotel de ville merit special
notice.The one in the council chamber upstairs dates from 1527 and
gives an allegorical representation of the Virtues and the Vices.The
other, three-quarters of a century later, contains an heraldic
representation of the noble families of the town.The church of St
Martin dates from the 15th century, but was practically destroyed in
1862 by a fire caused by lightning.The most
important building at Courtrai is the church of Notre Dame, which was
begun by Count Baldwin IX.The portal and
the choir were reconstructed in the 18th century.In the chapel behind
the choir is hung one of Van Dyck's masterpieces, "The Erection of the
Cross."The chapel of the counts attached to the church dates from 1373,
and contained mural paintings of the counts and countesses of Flanders
down to the merging of the title in the house of Burgundy.Most if not
all of these had become obliterated, but they have now been carefully
restored.With questionable judgment portraits have been added of the
subsequent holders of the title down to the emperor Francis II.(I. of
Austria), the last representative of the houses of Flanders and Burgundy
to rule in the Netherlands.Courtrai celebrated the 600th anniversary of
the battle mentioned above by erecting a monument on the field in 1902,
and also by fetes and historical processions that continued for a
fortnight.Courtrai, the _Cortracum_ of the Romans, ranked as a town from the 7th
century onwards.It was destroyed by the Normans, but was rebuilt in the
10th century by Baldwin III.Daniel went back to the office.of Flanders, who endowed it with market
rights and laid the foundation of its industrial importance by inviting
the settlement of foreign weavers.The town was once more burnt, in
1382, by the French after the battle of Roosebeke, but was rebuilt in
1385 by Philip the Bold, duke of Burgundy.COURVOISIER, JEAN JOSEPH ANTOINE (1775-1835), French magistrate and
politician, was born at Besancon on the 30th of November 1775.During
the revolutionary period he left the country and served in the army of
the _emigres_ and later in that of Austria.In 1801, under the
Consulate, he returned to France and established himself as an advocate
at Besancon, being appointed _conseiller-auditeur_ to the court of
appeal there in 1808.Mary went back to the hallway.At the Restoration he was made advocate-general by
Louis XVIII., resigned and left France during the Hundred Days, and was
reappointed after the second Restoration in 1815.In 1817, after the
modification of the constitution by the _ordonnance_ of the 5th of
September, he was returned to the chamber of deputies, where he attached
himself to the left centre and supported the moderate policy of
Richelieu and Decazes.He was an eloquent speaker, |
hallway | Where is Mary? | After the revolt at Lyons
in 1817 he was nominated _procureur-general_ of the city, and by his
sense and moderation did much to restore order and confidence.He was
again a member of the chamber from 1819 to 1824, and vigorously opposed
the exceptional legislation which the second administration of Richelieu
passed under the influence of the ultra-Royalists.In 1824 he failed to
secure re-election, and occupied himself with his judicial duties until
his nomination as councillor of state in 1827.On the 8th of August 1829
he accepted the offer of the portfolio of justice in the Polignac
ministry, but resigned on the 19th of May 1830, when he realized that
the government intended to abrogate the Charter and the inevitable
revolution that would follow.During the trial of the ex-ministers, in
December, he was summoned as a witness, and paid a tribute to the
character of his former colleagues which, under the circumstances,
argued no little courage.He refused to take office under Louis
Philippe, and retired into private life, dying on the 18th of September
1835.COUSCOUS, or KOUS-KOUS (an Arabic word derived from _kaskasa_, to
pound), a dish common among the inhabitants of North Africa, made of
flour rubbed together and steamed over a stew of mutton, fowl, &c., with
which it is eaten.COUSIN, JEAN (1500-1590), French painter, was born at Soucy, near Sens,
and began as a glass-painter, his windows in the Sainte Chapelle at
Vincennes being considered the finest in France.As a painter of subject
pictures he is ranked as the founder of the French school, as having
first departed from the practice of portraits.His "Last Judgment,"
influenced by Parmigiano, is in the Louvre, and a "Descent from the
Cross" (1523) in the museum at Mainz is attributed to him.He was known
also as a sculptor, and an engraver, both in etching and on wood, his
wood-cuts for Jean le Clerc's Bible (1596) and other books being his
best-known work.Daniel went back to the office.He also wrote a _Livre de perspective_ (1560), and a
_Livre de portraiture_ (1571).See Ambroise Firmin-Didot, _Etude sur J. Cousin_ (1872), and _Recueil
des oeuvres choisies de J. Cousin_ (1873).COUSIN, VICTOR (1792-1867), French philosopher, the son of a watchmaker,
was born in Paris, in the Quartier St Antoine, on the 28th of November
1792.At the age of ten he was sent to the grammar school of the
Quartier St Antoine, the Lycee Charlemagne.Here he studied until he was
eighteen.The lycee had a connexion with the university, and when Cousin
left the secondary school he was "crowned" in the ancient hall of the
Sorbonne for the Latin oration delivered by him there, in the general
concourse of his school competitors.The classical training of the lycee
strongly disposed him to literature.He was already known among his
compeers for his knowledge of Greek.From the lycee he passed to the
Normal School of Paris, where Laromiguiere was then lecturing on
philosophy.Mary went back to the hallway.In the second preface to the _Fragmens philosophiques_, in
which he candidly states the varied philosophical influences of his
life, Cousin speaks of the grateful emotion excited by the memory of the
day in 1811, when he heard Laromiguiere for the first time."That day
decided my whole life.Laromiguiere taught the philosophy of Locke and
Condillac, happily modified on some points, with a clearness and grace
which in appearance at least removed difficulties, and with a charm of
spiritual _bonhomie_ which penetrated and subdued."Cousin was set
forthwith to lecture on philosophy, and he speedily obtained the
position of master of conferences (_maitre de conferences_) in the
school.The second great philosophical impulse of his life was the
teaching of Royer-Collard.This teacher, as he tells us, "by the
severity of his logic, the gravity and weight of his words, turned me by
degrees, and not without resistance, from the beaten path of Condillac
into the way which has since become so easy, but which was then painful
and unfrequented, that of the Scottish philosophy."In 1815-1816 Cousin
attained the position of _suppleant_ (assistant) to Royer-Collard in the
history of modern philosophy chair of the faculty of letters.There was
still another thinker who influenced him at this early period,--Maine de
Biran, whom Cousin regarded as the unequalled psychological observer of
his time in France.These men strongly influenced both the method and the matter of Cousin's
philosophical thought.To Laromiguiere he attributes the lesson of
decomposing thought, even though the reduction of it to sensation was
inadequate.Royer-Collard taught him that even sensation is subject to
certain internal laws and principles which it does not itself explain,
which are superior to analysis and the natural patrimony of the mind.De
Biran made a special study of the phenomena of the will.He taught him
to distinguish in all cognitions, and especially in the simplest facts
of consciousness, the fact of voluntary activity, that activity in which
our personality is truly revealed.It was through this "triple
discipline," as he calls it, that Cousin's philosophical thought was
first developed, and that in 1815 he entered on the public teaching of
philosophy in the Normal School and in the faculty of letters.[1] He
then took up the study of German, worked at Kant and Jacobi, and sought
to master the _Philosophy of Nature_ of Schelling, by which he was at
first greatly attracted.The influence of Schelling may be observed very
markedly in the earlier form of his philosophy.He sympathized with the
principle of faith of Jacobi, but regarded it as arbitrary so long as it
was not recognized as grounded in reason.In 1817 he went to Germany,
and met Hegel at Heidelberg.In this year appeared Hegel's _Encyclopadie
der philosophischen Wissenschaften_, of which Cousin had one of the
earliest copies.He thought Hegel not particularly amiable, but the two
became friends.The following year Cousin went to Munich, where he met
Schelling for the first time, and spent a month with him and Jacobi,
obtaining a deeper insight into the _Philosophy of Nature_.The political troubles of France interfered for a time with his career.In the events of 1814-1815 he took the royalist side.He at first
adopted the views of the party known as _doctrinaire_, of which
Royer-Collard was the philosophical chief.He seems then to have gone
farther than his party, and even to have approached the extreme Left.Then came a reaction against liberalism, and in 1821-1822 Cousin was
deprived of his offices alike in the faculty of letters and in the
Normal School.The Normal School itself was swept away, and Cousin
shared at the hands of a narrow and illiberal government the fate of
Guizot, who was ejected from the chair of history.This enforced
abandonment of public teaching was not wholly an evil.He set out for
Germany with a view to further philosophical study.While at Berlin in
1824-1825 he was thrown into prison, either on some ill-defined
political charge at the instance of the French police, or on account of
certain incautious expressions which he had let fall in conversation.Liberated after six months, he continued under the suspicion of the
French government for three years.It was during this period, however,
that he thought out and developed what is distinctive in his
philosophical doctrine.His eclecticism, his ontology and his philosophy
of history were declared in principle and in most of their salient
details in the _Fragmens philosophiques_ (Paris, 1826).The preface to
the second edition (1833) and the _Avertissement_ to the third (1838)
aimed at a vindication of his principles against contemporary criticism.Even the best of his later books, the _Philosophie ecossaise_ (4th ed.,
1863), the _Du vrai, du beau, et du bien_ (12th ed., 1872; Eng.trans.,
3rd ed., Edinburgh, 1854), and the _Philosophie de Locke_ (4th ed.,
1861) were simply matured revisions of his lectures during the period
from 1815 to 1820.The lectures on Locke were first sketched in 1819,
and fully developed in the course of 1829.During the seven years of enforced abandonment of teaching he produced,
besides the _Fragmens_, the edition of the works of Proclus (6 vols.,
1820-1827), and the works of Descartes (11 vols., 1826).He also
commenced his _Translation of Plato_ (13 vols.), which occupied his
leisure time from 1825 to 1840.We see in the _Fragmens_ very distinctly the fusion of the different
philosophical influences by which his opinions were finally matured.For
Cousin was as eclectic in thought and habit of mind as he was in
philosophical principle and system.It is with the publication of the
_Fragmens_ of 1826 that the first great widening of his reputation is
associated.In 1827 followed the _Cours de l'histoire de la
philosophie_.In 1828 M. de Vatimesnil, minister of public instruction in Martignac's
ministry, recalled Cousin and Guizot to their professorial positions in
the university.The three years which followed were the period of
Cousin's greatest triumph as a lecturer.Sandra journeyed to the bathroom.His return to the chair was the
symbol of the triumph of constitutional ideas and was greeted with
enthusiasm.The hall of the Sorbonne was crowded as the hall of no
philosophical teacher in Paris had been since the days of Abelard.The
lecturer had a singular power of identifying himself for the time with
the system which he expounded and the historical character he portrayed.Clear and comprehensive in the grasp of the general outlines of his
subject, he was methodical and vivid in the representation of details.In exposition he had the rare art of unfolding and aggrandizing.There
was a rich, deep-toned, resonant eloquence mingled with the speculative
exposition; his style of expression was clear, elegant and forcible,
abounding in happy turns and striking antitheses.To this was joined a
singular power of rhetorical climax.His philosophy exhibited in a
striking manner the generalizing tendency of the French intellect, and
its logical need of grouping details round central principles.Sandra travelled to the hallway.There was withal a moral elevation in his spiritual philosophy which
came home to the hearts of his hearers, and seemed to afford a ground
for higher development in national literature and art, and even in
politics, than the traditional philosophy of France had appeared capable
of yielding.His lectures produced more ardent disciples, imbued at
least with his spirit, than those of any other professor of philosophy
in France during the 18th century.Tested by the power and effect of his
teaching influence, Cousin occupies a foremost place in the rank of
professors of philosophy, who like Jacobi, Schelling and Dugald Stewart
have united the gifts of speculative, expository and imaginative power.Tested even by the strength of the reaction which his writings have in
some cases occasioned, his influence is hardly less remarkable.The
taste for philosophy--especially its history--was revived in France to
an extent unknown since the 17th century.Among the men who were influenced by Cousin we may note T. S. Jouffroy,
J. P. Damiron, Garnier, J. Barthelemy St Hilaire, F. Ravaisson-Mollien,
Remusat, Jules Simon and A. Franck.Jouffroy and Damiron were first
fellow-students and then disciples.Jouffroy, however, always kept firm
to the early--the French and Scottish--impulses of Cousin's teaching.Cousin continued to lecture regularly for two years and a half after his
return to the chair.Sympathizing with the revolution of July, he was at
once recognized by the new government as a friend of national liberty.Writing in June 1833 he explains both his philosophical and his
political position:--
"I had the advantage of holding united against me for many years both
the sensational and the theological school.In 1830 both schools
descended into the arena of politics.The sensational school quite
naturally produced the demagogic party, and the theological school
became quite as naturally absolutism, safe to borrow from time to time
the mask of the demagogue in order the better to reach its ends, as in
philosophy it is by scepticism that it undertakes to restore
theocracy.On the other hand, he who combated any exclusive principle
in science was bound to reject also any exclusive principle in the
state, and to defend representative government."The government was not slow to do him honour.He was induced by the
ministry of which his friend Guizot was the head to become a member of
the council of public instruction and counsellor of state, and in 1832
he was made a peer of France.He ceased to lecture, but retained the
title of professor of philosophy.Finally, he accepted the position of
minister of public instruction in 1840 under Thiers.He was besides
director of the Normal School and virtual head of the university, and
from 1840 a member of the Institute (Academy of the Moral and Political
Sciences).His character and his official position at this period gave
him great power in the university and in the educational arrangements
of the country.In fact, during the seventeen and a half years of the
reign of Louis Philippe, Cousin mainly moulded the philosophical and
even the literary tendencies of the cultivated class in France.But the most important work he accomplished during this period was the
organization of primary instruction.It was to the efforts of Cousin
that France owed her advance, in primary education, between 1830 and
1848.Prussia and Saxony had set the national example, and France was
guided into it by Cousin.Forgetful of national calamity and of personal
wrong, he looked to Prussia as affording the best example of an
organized system of national education; and he was persuaded that "to
carry back the education of Prussia into France afforded a nobler (if a
bloodless) triumph than the trophies of Austerlitz and Jena."In the
summer of 1831, commissioned by the government, he visited Frankfort and
Saxony, and spent some time in Berlin.The result was a series of
reports to the minister, afterwards published as _Rapport sur l'etat de
l'instruction publique dans quelques pays de l'Allemagne et
particulierement en Prusse_.(Compare also _De l'instruction publique en
Hollande_, 1837.)His views were readily accepted on his return to
France, and soon afterwards through his influence there was passed the
law of primary instruction.(See his _Expose des motifs et projet de loi
sur l'instruction primaire, presentes a la chambre des deputes, seance
du 2 janvier 1833_.)In the words of the _Edinburgh Review_ (July 1833), these documents
"mark an epoch in the progress of national education, and are directly
conducive to results important not only to France but to Europe."The
_Report_ was translated into English by Mrs Sarah Austin in 1834.The
translation was frequently reprinted in the United States of America.The legislatures of New Jersey and Massachusetts distributed it in the
schools at the expense of the states.Cousin remarks that, among all the
literary distinctions which he had received, "None has touched me more
than the title of foreign member of the American Institute for
Education."To the enlightened views of the ministries of Guizot and
Thiers under the citizen-king, and to the zeal and ability of Cousin in
the work of organization, France owes what is best in her system of
primary education,--a national interest which had been neglected under
the Revolution, the Empire and the Restoration (see _Expose_, p.In
the first two years of |
bathroom | Where is Daniel? | In defence of university studies he stood
manfully forth in the chamber of peers in 1844, against the clerical
party on the one hand and the levelling or Philistine party on the
other.His speeches on this occasion were published in a tractate
_Defense de l'universite et de la philosophie_ (1844 and 1845).This period of official life from 1830 to 1848 was spent, so far as
philosophical study was concerned, in revising his former lectures and
writings, in maturing them for publication or reissue, and in research
into certain periods of the history of philosophy.In 1835 appeared _De
la Metaphysique d'Aristote, suivi d'un essai de traduction des deux
premiers livres_; in 1836, _Cours de philosophie professe a la faculte
des lettres pendant l'annee 1818_, and _Ouvrages inedits d'Abelard_.This _Cours de philosophie_ appeared later in 1854 as _Du vrai, du beau,
et du bien_.From 1825 to 1840 appeared _Cours de l'histoire de la
philosophie_, in 1829 _Manuel de l'histoire de la philosophie de
Tennemann_, translated from the German.Daniel went back to the office.In 1840-1841 we have _Cours
d'histoire de la philosophie morale au XVIII^e siecle_ (5 vols.).In
1841 appeared his edition of the _OEuvres philosophiques de
Maine-de-Biran_; in 1842, _Lecons de philosophie sur Kant_ (Eng.A. G. Henderson, 1854), and in the same year _Des Pensees de Pascal_.The _Nouveaux fragments_ were gathered together and republished in 1847.Later, in 1859, appeared _Petri Abaelardi Opera_.During this period Cousin seems to have turned with fresh interest to
those literary studies which he had abandoned for speculation under the
influence of Laromiguiere and Royer-Collard.To this renewed interest we
owe his studies of men and women of note in France in the 17th century.As the results of his work in this line, we have, besides the _Des
Pensees de Pascal_, 1842, _Etudes sur les femmes et la societe du XVII^e
siecle_, 1853.He has sketched Jacqueline Pascal (1844), Madame de
Longueville (1853), the marquise de Sable (1854), the duchesse de
Chevreuse (1856), Madame de Hautefort (1856).When the reign of Louis Philippe came to a close through the opposition
of his ministry, with Guizot at its head, to the demand for electoral
reform and through the policy of the Spanish marriages, Cousin, who was
opposed to the government on these points, lent his sympathy to
Cavaignac and the Provisional government.He published a pamphlet
entitled _Justice et charite_, the purport of which showed the
moderation of his political views.But
from this period he passed almost entirely from public life, and ceased
to wield the personal influence which he had done during the preceding
years.After the _coup d'etat_ of the 2nd of December, he was deprived
of his position as permanent member of the superior council of public
instruction.From Napoleon and the Empire he stood aloof.A decree of
1852 placed him along with Guizot and Villemain in the rank of honorary
professors.His sympathies were apparently with the monarchy, under
certain constitutional safeguards.Speaking in 1853 of the political
issues of the spiritual philosophy which he had taught during his
lifetime, he says,--"It conducts human societies to the true republic,
that dream of all generous souls, which in our time can be realized in
Europe only by constitutional monarchy."[2]
During the last years of his life he occupied a suite of rooms in the
Sorbonne, where he lived simply and unostentatiously.The chief feature
of the rooms was his noble library, the cherished collection of a
lifetime.He died at Cannes on the 13th of January 1867, in his
sixty-fifth year.In the front of the Sorbonne, below the lecture rooms
of the faculty of letters, a tablet records an extract from his will, in
which he bequeaths his noble and cherished library to the halls of his
professorial work and triumphs._Philosophy._--There are three distinctive points in Cousin's
philosophy.These are his method, the results of his method, and the
application of the method and its results to history,--especially to the
history of philosophy.It is usual to speak of his philosophy as
eclecticism.It is eclectic only in a secondary and subordinate sense.All eclecticism that is not self-condemned and inoperative implies a
system of doctrine as its basis,--in fact, a criterion of truth.Otherwise, as Cousin himself remarks, it is simply a blind and useless
syncretism.And Cousin saw and proclaimed from an early period in his
philosophical teaching the necessity of a system on which to base his
eclecticism.This is indeed advanced as an illustration or confirmation
of the truth of his system,--as a proof that the facts of history
correspond to his analysis of consciousness.These three points--the
method, the results, and the philosophy of history--are with him
intimately connected; they are developments in a natural order of
sequence.They become in practice Psychology, Ontology and Eclecticism
in history.On no point has Cousin more strongly insisted than
the importance of method in philosophy.That which he adopts, and the
necessity of which he so strongly proclaims, is the ordinary one of
observation, analysis and induction.This observational method Cousin
regards as that of the 18th century,--the method which Descartes began
and abandoned, and which Locke and Condillac applied, though
imperfectly, and which Reid and Kant used with more success, yet not
completely.He insists that this is the true method of philosophy as
applied to consciousness, in which alone the facts of experience appear.But the proper condition of the application of the method is that it
shall not through prejudice of system omit a single fact of
consciousness.If the authority of consciousness is good in one
instance, it is good in all.If not to be trusted in one, it is not to
be trusted in any.Previous systems have erred in not presenting the
facts of consciousness, i.e.The observational method applied to consciousness gives us the science
of psychology.This is the basis and the only proper basis of ontology
or metaphysics--the science of being--and of the philosophy of history.To the observation of consciousness Cousin adds induction as the
complement of his method, by which he means inference as to reality
necessitated by the data of consciousness, and regulated by certain laws
found in consciousness, viz.Mary went back to the hallway.By his method of
observation and induction as thus explained, his philosophy will be
found to be marked off very clearly, on the one hand from the deductive
construction of notions of an absolute system, as represented either by
Schelling or Hegel, which Cousin regards as based simply on hypothesis
and abstraction, illegitimately obtained; and on the other, from that of
Kant, and in a sense, of Sir W. Hamilton, both of which in the view of
Cousin are limited to psychology, and merely relative or phenomenal
knowledge, and issue in scepticism so far as the great realities of
ontology are concerned.What Cousin finds psychologically in the
individual consciousness, he finds also spontaneously expressed in the
common sense or universal experience of humanity.In fact, it is with
him the function of philosophy to classify and explain universal
convictions and beliefs; but common-sense is not with him philosophy,
nor is it the instrument of philosophy; it is simply the material on
which the philosophical method works, and in harmony with which its
results must ultimately be found.The three great results of psychological observation are Sensibility,
Activity or Liberty, and Reason.These three facts are different in character, but are not found apart in
consciousness.Sensations, or the facts of the sensibility, are
necessary; we do not impute them to ourselves.The facts of reason are
also necessary, and reason is not less independent of the will than the
sensibility.Voluntary facts alone are marked in the eyes of
consciousness with the characters of imputability and personality.The
will alone is the person or _Me_.The me is the centre of the
intellectual sphere without which consciousness is impossible.We find
ourselves in a strange world, between two orders of phenomena which do
not belong to us, which we apprehend only on the condition of our
distinguishing ourselves from them.Further, we apprehend by means of a
light which does not come from ourselves.All light comes from the
reason, and it is the reason which apprehends both itself and the
sensibility which envelops it, and the will which it obliges but does
not constrain.Consciousness, then, is composed of these three integrant
and inseparable elements.But Reason is the immediate ground of
knowledge and of consciousness itself.But there is a peculiarity in Cousin's doctrine of activity or freedom,
and in his doctrine of reason, which enters deeply into his system.This
is the element of spontaneity in volition and in reason.This is the
heart of what is new alike in his doctrine of knowledge and being.Liberty or freedom is a generic term which means a cause or being
endowed with self-activity.This is to itself and its own development
its own ultimate cause.Free-will is so, although it is preceded by
deliberation and determination, i.e.reflection, for we are always
conscious that even after determination we are free to will or not to
will.But there is a primary kind of volition which has not reflection
for its condition, which is yet free and spontaneous.We must have
willed thus spontaneously first, otherwise we could not know, before our
reflective volition, that we could will and act.Spontaneous volition is
free as reflective, but it is the prior act of the two.This view of
liberty of will is the only one in accordance with the facts of
humanity; it excludes reflective volition, and explains the enthusiasm
of the poet and the artist in the act of creation; it explains also the
ordinary actions of mankind, which are done as a rule spontaneously and
not after reflective deliberation.But it is in his doctrine of the Reason that the distinctive principle
of the philosophy of Cousin lies.The reason given to us by
psychological observation, the reason of our consciousness, is
impersonal in its nature.We do not make it; its character is precisely
the opposite of individuality; it is universal and necessary.He was able to contemplate the glowing tower of light with
curiosity only.Braxton Wyatt knew that the Iroquois and their allies
would attempt revenge for the burning of Oghwaga, and he saw profit for
himself in such adventures.The renegade, Blackstaffe, had returned to rejoin Simon Girty, but he
had found a new friend in Coleman.Sandra journeyed to the bathroom.He was coming now more into touch
with the larger forces in the East, nearer to the seat of the great war,
and he hoped to profit by it."This is a terrible blow to Brant," Coleman whispered to him."The
Iroquois have been able to ravage the whole frontier, while the rebels,
occupied with the king's troops, have not been able to send help to
their own.But they have managed to strike at last, as you see.""I do see," said Wyatt, "and on the whole, Coleman, I'm not sorry.Perhaps these chiefs won't be so haughty now, and they'll soon realize
that they need likely chaps such as you and me, eh, Coleman.""You're not far from the truth," said Coleman, laughing a little, and
pleased at the penetration of his new friend.They did not talk further,
although the agreement between them was well established.Neither did
the Indian chiefs or the Tory leaders say any more.They watched the
tower of fire a long time, past midnight, until it reached its zenith
and then began to sink.They saw its crest go down behind the trees,
and they saw the luminous cloud in the south fade and go out entirely,
leaving there only the darkness that reined everywhere else.Then the Indian and Tory leaders rose and silently marched northward.It
was nearly dawn when Henry and his comrades lay down for the rest that
they needed badly.They spread their blankets at the edge of the open,
but well back from the burned area, which was now one great mass of
coals and charred timbers, sending up little flame but much smoke.Many
of the troops were already asleep, but Henry, before lying down, begged
William Gray to keep a strict watch lest the Iroquois attack from
ambush.He knew that the rashness and confidence of the borderers,
especially when drawn together in masses, had often caused them great
losses, and he was resolved to prevent a recurrence at the present
time if he could.He had made these urgent requests of Gray, instead of
Colonel Butler, because of the latter's youth and willingness to take
advice."I'll have the forest beat up continually all about the town," he said."We must not have our triumph spoiled by any afterclap."Henry and his comrades, wrapped in their blankets, lay in a row almost
at the edge of the forest.The heat from the fire was still great, but
it would die down after a while, and the October air was nipping.Henry
usually fell asleep in a very few minutes, but this time, despite his
long exertions and lack of rest, he remained awake when his comrades
were sound asleep.Then he fell into a drowsy state, in which he saw
the fire rising in great black coils that united far above.It seemed to
Henry, half dreaming and forecasting the future, that the Indian spirit
was passing in the smoke.Sandra travelled to the hallway.When he fell asleep it was nearly daylight, and in three or four hours
he was up again, as the little army intended to march at once upon
another Indian town.The hours while he slept had passed in silence, and
no Indians had come near.William Gray had seen to that, and his best
scout had been one Cornelius Heemskerk, a short, stout man of Dutch
birth."It was one long, long tramp for me, Mynheer Henry," said Heemskerk,
as he revolved slowly up to the camp fire where Henry was eating his
breakfast, "and I am now very tired.It was like walking four or five
times around Holland, which is such a fine little country, with the
canals and the flowers along them, and no great, dark woods filled with
the fierce Iroquois.""Still, I've a notion, Mynheer Heemskerk, that you'd rather be here, and
perhaps before the day is over you will get some fighting hot enough to
please even you."Mynheer Heemskerk threw up his hands in dismay, but a half hour later
he was eagerly discussing with Henry the possibility of overtaking some
large band of retreating Iroquois.Urged on by all the scouts and by those who had suffered at Wyoming,
Colonel Butler gathered his forces and marched swiftly that very morning
up the river against another Indian town, Cunahunta.Fortunately for
him, a band of riflemen and scouts unsurpassed in skill led the way, and
saw to it that the road was safe.In this band were the five, of course,
and after them Heemskerk, young Taylor, and several others."If the Iroquois do not get in our way, we'll strike Cunahunta before
night," said Heemskerk, who knew the way."It seems to me that they will certainly try to save their towns," said
Henry.Mary went back to the office."Surely Brant and the Tories will not let us strike so great a
blow without a fight.""Most of their warriors are elsewhere, Mynheer Henry," said Heemskerk,
"or they would certainly give us a big battle.We've been lucky in the
time of our advance.As it is, I think we'll have something to do."It was now about noon, the noon of a beautiful October day of the North,
the air like life itself, the foliage burning red on the hills, the
leaves falling softly from the trees as the wind blew, but bringing with
them no hint of decay.None of the vanguard felt fatigue, but when they
crossed a low range of hills andDaniel went to the bathroom. |
bathroom | Where is Mary? | Daniel went back to the office.The others, knowing without question the
significance of the action, also sank down."You see how thick the trees are on the other side of that bank.Look
a little to the left of a big oak, and you will see the feathers in the
headdress of an Iroquois.Farther on I think I can catch a glimpse of
a green coat, and if I am right that coat is worn by one of Johnson's
Royal Greens.It's an ambush, Sol, an ambush meant for us."Mary went back to the hallway."But it's not an ambush intended for our main force, Mynheer Henry,"
said Heemskerk, whose red face began to grow redder with the desire for
action."I, too, see the feather of the Iroquois.""As good scouts and skirmishers it's our duty, then, to clear this force
out of the way, and not wait for the main body to come up, is it not?"asked Henry, with a suggestive look at the Dutchman."What a goot head you have, Mynheer Henry!""Of
course we will fight, and fight now!"But Heemskerk
did not hear him.There could be no earthly
doubt of the fact that the Iroquois and some Tories were ambushed on
the far side of the creek.Sandra journeyed to the bathroom.Possibly Thayendanegea himself, stung by the
burning of Oghwaga and the advance on Cunahunta, was there.But they
were sure that it was not a large band.The party of Henry and Heemskerk numbered fourteen, but every one was a
veteran, full of courage, tenacity, and all the skill of the woods.They had supreme confidence in their ability to beat the best of the
Iroquois, man for man, and they carried the very finest arms known to
the time.It was decided that four of the men should remain on the hill.The
others, including the five, Heemskerk, and Taylor, would make a circuit,
cross the creek a full mile above, and come down on the flank of the
ambushing party.Theirs would be the main attack, but it would be
preceded by sharpshooting from the four, intended to absorb the
attention of the Iroquois.The chosen ten slipped back down the hill,
and as soon as they were sheltered from any possible glimpse by the
warriors, they rose and ran rapidly westward.Before they had gone far
they heard the crack of a rifle shot, then another, then several from
another point, as if in reply."It's our sharpshooters," said Henry."They've begun to disturb the
Iroquois, and they'll keep them busy.""Until we break in on their sport and keep them still busier," exclaimed
Heemskerk, revolving swiftly through the bushes, his face blazing red.It did not take long for such as they to go the mile or so that they
intended, and then they crossed the creek, wading in the water breast
high, but careful to keep their ammunition dry.Then they turned and
rapidly descended the stream on its northern bank.In a few minutes they
heard the sound of a rifle shot, and then of another as if replying."The Iroquois have been fooled," exclaimed Heemskerk."Our four good
riflemen have made them think that a great force is there, and they have
not dared to cross the creek themselves and make an attack."In a few minutes more, as they ran noiselessly through the forest, they
saw a little drifting smoke, and now and then the faint flash of rifles.They were coming somewhere near to the Iroquois band, and they practiced
exceeding caution.Presently they caught sight of Indian faces, and now
and then one of Johnson's Greens or Butler's Rangers.They stopped and
held a council that lasted scarcely more than half a minute.They all
agreed there was but one thing to do, and that was to attack in the
Indian's own way-that is, by ambush and sharpshooting.Henry fired the first shot, and an Iroquois, aiming at a foe on the
other side of the creek, fell.Heemskerk quickly followed with a shot as
good, and the surprised Iroquois turned to face this new foe.But they
and the Tories were a strong band, and they retreated only a little.Then they stood firm, and the forest battle began.The Indians numbered
not less than thirty, and both Braxton Wyatt and Coleman were with them,
but the value of skill was here shown by the smaller party, the one
that attacked.The frontiersmen, trained to every trick and wile of
the forest, and marksmen such as the Indians were never able to become,
continually pressed in and drove the Iroquois from tree to tree.Once or
twice the warriors started a rush, but they were quickly driven back by
sharpshooting such as they had never faced before.They soon realized
that this was no band of border farmers, armed hastily for an emergency,
but a foe who knew everything that they knew, and more.Braxton Wyatt and his friend Coleman fought with the Iroquois, and Wyatt
in particular was hot with rage.He suspected that the five who had
defeated him so often were among these marksmen, and there might be a
chance now to destroy them all.He crept to the side of the fierce old
Seneca chief, Hiokatoo, and suggested that a part of their band slip
around and enfold the enemy.Old Hiokatoo, in the thick of battle now, presented his most terrifying
aspect.He was naked save the waist cloth, his great body was covered
with scars, and, as he bent a little forward, he held cocked and ready
in his hands a fine rifle that had been presented to him by his good
friend, the king.The Senecas, it may be repeated, had suffered terribly
at the Battle of the Oriskany in the preceding year, and throughout
these years of border were the most cruel of all the Iroquois.In this
respect Hiokatoo led all the Senecas, and now Braxton Wyatt used as he
was to savage scenes, was compelled to admit to himself that this was
the most terrifying human being whom he had ever beheld.He was old, but
age in him seemed merely to add to his strength and ferocity.The path
of a deep cut, healed long since, but which the paint even did not hide,
lay across his forehead.Others almost as deep adorned his right cheek,
his chin, and his neck.He was crouched much like a panther, with his
rifle in his hands and the ready tomahawk at his belt.But it was the
extraordinary expression of his eyes that made Braxton Wyatt shudder.He
read there no mercy for anything, not even for himself, Braxton Wyatt,
if he should stand in the way, and it was this last fact that brought
the shudder.Hiokatoo thought it a good plan.Twenty warriors, mostly Senecas and
Cayugas, were detailed to execute it at once, and they stole off toward
the right.Henry had suspected some such diversion, and, as he had been
joined now by the four men from the other side of the creek, he disposed
his little force to meet it.Both Shif'less Sol and Heemskerk had caught
sight of figures slipping away among the trees, and Henry craftily drew
back a little.While two or three men maintained the sharpshooting
in the front, he waited for the attack.It came in half an hour, the
flanking force making a savage and open rush, but the fire of the white
riflemen was so swift and deadly that they were driven back again.But
they had come very near, and a Tory rushed directly at young Taylor.The Tory, like Taylor, had come from Wyoming, and he had been one of
the most ruthless on that terrible day.When they were less than a dozen
feet apart they recognized each other.Henry saw the look that passed
between them, and, although he held a loaded rifle in his hand, for some
reason he did not use it.The Tory fired a pistol at Taylor, but the
bullet missed, and the Wyoming youth, leaping forth, swung his unloaded
rifle and brought the stock down with all his force upon the head of his
enemy.The man, uttering a single sound, a sort of gasp, fell dead, and
Taylor stood over him, still trembling with rage.In an instant Henry
seized him and dragged him down, and then a Seneca bullet whistled where
he had been."He was one of the worst at Wyoming-I saw him!"exclaimed young Taylor,
still trembling all over with passion.You've seen to that," said Henry,
and in a minute or two Taylor was quiet.The sharpshooting continued,
but here as elsewhere, the Iroquois had the worst of it.Despite their
numbers, they could not pass nor flank that line of deadly marksmen who
lay behind trees almost in security, and who never missed.Another Tory
and a chief, also, were killed, and Braxton Wyatt was daunted.Sandra travelled to the hallway.Nor did
he feel any better when old Hiokatoo crept to his side."They shoot too well for us to rush
them.Hiokatoo frowned, and the scars on his
face stood out in livid red lines."These who fight us now are of their best, and
while we fight, the army that destroyed Oghwaga is coming up.The little white band soon saw that the Indians were gone from their
front.Mary went back to the office.They scouted some distance, and, finding no enemy, hurried back
to Colonel Butler.The troops were pushed forward, and before night they
reached Cunahunta, which they burned also.Some farther advance was
made into the Indian country, and more destruction was done, but now the
winter was approaching, and many of the men insisted upon returning home
to protect their families.Others were to rejoin the main Revolutionary
army, and the Iroquois campaign was to stop for the time.The first blow
had been struck, and it was a hard one, but the second blow and third
and fourth and more, which the five knew were so badly needed, must
wait.They had hoped to go
far into the Iroquois country, to break the power of the Six Nations, to
hunt down the Butlers and the Johnsons and Brant himself, but they could
not wholly blame their commander.The rear guard, or, rather, the forest
guard of the Revolution, was a slender and small force indeed.Henry and his comrades said farewell to Colonel Butler with much
personal regret, and also to the gallant troops, some of whom were
Morgan's riflemen from Virginia.The farewells to William Gray, Bob
Taylor, and Cornelius Heemskerk were more intimate."I think we'll see more of one another in other campaigns," said Gray."We'll be on the battle line, side by side, once more," said Taylor,
"and we'll strike another blow for Wyoming.""I foresee," said Cornelius Heemskerk, "that I, a peaceful man, who
ought to be painting blue plates in Holland, will be drawn into danger
in the great, dark wilderness again, and that you will be there with
me, Mynheer Henry, Mynheer Paul, Mynheer the Wise Solomon, Mynheer the
Silent Tom, and Mynheer the Very Long James.I, a man
of peace, am always being pushed in to war.""We hope it will come true," said the five together."No," replied Henry, speaking for them all, "we have entered upon this
task here, and we are going to stay in it until it is finished.""It is dangerous, the most dangerous thing in the world," said
Heemskerk."I still have my foreknowledge that I shall stand by your
side in some great battle to come, but the first thing I shall do when
I see you again, my friends, is to look around at you, one, two, three,
four, five, and see if you have upon your heads the hair which is now so
rich, thick, and flowing.""Never fear, my friend," said Henry, "we have fought with the warriors
all the way from the Susquehanna to New Orleans and not one of us has
lost a single lock of hair.""It is one Dutchman's hope that it will always be so," said Heemskerk,
and then he revolved rapidly away lest they see his face express
emotion.The five received great supplies of powder and bullets from Colonel
Butler, and then they parted in the forest.Many of the soldiers looked
back and saw the five tall figures in a line, leaning upon the muzzles
of their long-barreled Kentucky rifles, and regarding them in silence.It seemed to the soldiers that they had left behind them the true sons
of the wilderness, who, in spite of all dangers, would be there to
welcome them when they returned.THE DESERTED CABIN
When the last soldier had disappeared among the trees, Henry turned to
the others."Well, boys," he asked, "what are you thinking about?""I'm thinking about a certain place I know, a sort of
alcove or hole in a cliff above a lake.""I'm thinkin' how fur that alcove runs
back, an' how it could be fitted up with furs an' made warm fur the
winter.""I'm thinkin' what a snug place that alcove would
be when the snow an' hail were drivin' down the creek in front of you.""An' ez fur me," said Long Jim Hart, "I wuz thinkin' I could run a sort
uv flue from the back part uv that alcove out through the front an' let
the smoke pass out.It wouldn't be ez good a
place fur cookin' ez the one we hed that time we spent the winter on the
island in the lake, but 'twould serve.""It's strange," said Henry, "but I've been thinking of all the things
that all four of you have been thinking about, and, since we are agreed,
we are bound to go straight to 'The Alcove' and pass the winter there."Without another word he led the way, and the others followed.It was
apparent to everyone that they must soon find a winter base, because
the cold had increased greatly in the last few days.The last leaves
had fallen from the trees, and a searching wind howled among the bare
branches.On their way they passed Oghwaga, a mass of blackened ruins, among which
wolves howled, the same spectacle that Wyoming now afforded, although
Oghwaga had not been stained by blood.It was a long journey to "The Alcove," but they did not hurry, seeing no
need of it, although they were warned of the wisdom of their decision by
the fact that the cold was increasing.The country in which the lake was
situated lay high, and, as all of them were quite sure that the cold
was going to be great there, they thought it wise to make preparations
against it, which they discussed as they walked in, leisurely fashion
through the woods.All felt that
they had been drawn into a mightier current than any in which they had
swam before.They fully appreciated the importance to the Revolution
of this great rearguard struggle, and at present they did not have the
remotest idea of returning to Kentucky under any circumstances."We've got to fight it out with Braxton Wyatt and the Iroquois," said
Henry."I've heard that Braxton is organizing a band of Tories of his
own, and that he is likely to be as dangerous as either of the Butlers."Daniel went to the bathroom."Some day we'll end him for good an' all," said Shif'less Sol.Mary moved to the bathroom.It was four or five days before they reached their alcove, and now all
the forest was bare and apparently lifeless.They came down the creek,
and found their boat unharmed and untouched still among the foliage at
the base of the cliff."That's one thing safe," said Long Jim, "an' I guess we'll find 'The
Alcove' all right, too.""Unless a wild animal has taken up its abode there," said Paul."'Tain't likely," replied Long Jim."We've left the human smell thar,
an' even after all this time it's likely to drive away any prowlin' bear
or panther that pokes his nose in."Their snug nest, like that of a squirrel in
the side of a tree, had not been disturbed.John went to the bedroom.The skins which they
had rolled up tightly and placed on the higher shelves of stone were
untouched, and several days' hunting increased the supply.The hunting
was singularly |
bathroom | Where is Mary? | It had been swept of human beings by the Iroquois and Tory
hordes, and deer, bear, and panther seemed to know instinctively that
the woods were once more safe for them.In their hunting they came upon the ruins of charred houses, and more
than once they saw something among the coals that caused them to turn
away with a shudder.At every place where man had made a little opening
the wilderness was quickly reclaiming its own again.Daniel went back to the office.Next year the grass
and the foliage would cover up the coals and the hideous relics that lay
among them.They jerked great quantities of venison on the trees on the cliff side,
and stored it in "The Alcove."They also cured some bear meat, and,
having added a further lining of skins, they felt prepared for winter.They had also added to the comfort of the place.They had taken the
precaution of bringing with them two axes, and with the heads of these
they smoothed out more of the rough places on the floor and sides of
"The Alcove."They thought it likely, too, that they would need the axes
in other ways later on.Only once during these arrangements did they pass the trail of Indians,
and that was made by a party of about twenty, at least ten miles from
"The Alcove."They seemed to be traveling north, and the five made no
investigations.Mary went back to the hallway.Somewhat later they met a white runner in the forest,
and he told them of the terrible massacre of Cherry Valley.Walter
Butler, emulating his father's exploit at Wyoming, had come down with a
mixed horde of Iroquois, Tories, British, and Canadians.He had not
been wholly successful, but he had slaughtered half a hundred women and
children, and was now returning northward with prisoners.Some said,
according to the runner, that Thayendanegea had led the Indians on this
occasion, but, as the five learned later, he had not come up until the
massacre was over.The runner added another piece of information that
interested them deeply.Butler had been accompanied to Cherry Valley by
a young Tory or renegade named Wyatt, who had distinguished himself by
cunning and cruelty.It was said that Wyatt had built up for himself a
semi-independent command, and was becoming a great scourge."That's our Braxton," said Henry.He
is likely to become fully the equal of Walter Butler."But they could do nothing at present to find Wyatt, and they went
somewhat sadly back to "The Alcove."Sandra journeyed to the bathroom.They had learned also from the
runner that Wyatt had a lieutenant, a Tory named Coleman, and this fact
increased their belief that Wyatt was undertaking to operate on a large
scale."We may get a chance at him anyhow," said Henry."He and his band may go
too far away from the main body of the Indians and Tories, and in that
case we can strike a blow if we are watchful."Every one of the five, although none of them knew it, received an
additional impulse from this news about Braxton Wyatt.Loyalty to the king had nothing to do with his becoming a
renegade or a Tory; he could not plead lost lands or exile for taking
part in such massacres as Wyoming or Cherry Valley, but, long since an
ally of the Indians, he was now at the head of a Tory band that murdered
and burned from sheer pleasure."Some day we'll get him, as shore as the sun rises an' sets," said
Shif'less Sol, repeating Henry's prediction.But for the present they "holed up," and now their foresight was
justified.To such as they, used to the hardships of forest life, "The
Alcove" was a cheery nest.From its door they watched the wild fowl
streaming south, pigeons, ducks, and others outlined against the dark,
wintry skies.So numerous were these flocks that there was scarcely a
time when they did not see one passing toward the warm South.Shif'less Sol and Paul sat together watching a great flock of wild
geese, arrow shaped, and flying at almost incredible speed.A few
faint honks came to them, and then the geese grew misty on the horizon.Shif'less Sol followed them with serious eyes."Do you ever think, Paul," he said, "that we human bein's ain't so
mighty pow'ful ez we think we are.We kin walk on the groun', an' by
hard learnin' an' hard work we kin paddle through the water a little.But jest look at them geese flyin' a mile high, right over everything,
rivers, forests any mountains, makin' a hundred miles an hour, almost
without flappin' a wing.Then they kin come down on the water an' float
fur hours without bein' tired, an' they kin waddle along on the groun',
too.Did you ever hear of any men who had so many 'complishments?Why,
Paul, s'pose you an' me could grow wings all at once, an' go through the
air a mile a minute fur a month an' never git tired.""We'd certainly see some great sights," said Paul, "but do you know,
Sol, what would be the first thing I'd do if I had the gift of tireless
wings?""Fly off to them other continents I've heard you tell about.""No, I'd swoop along over the forests up here until I picked out all the
camps of the Indians and Tories.I'd pick out the Butlers and Braxton
Wyatt and Coleman, and see what mischief they were planning.Then I'd
fly away to the East and look down at all the armies, ours in buff and
blue, and the British redcoats.I'd look into the face of our great
commander-in-chief.Sandra travelled to the hallway.Then I'd fly away back into the West and South, and
I'd hover over Wareville.I'd see our own people, every last little one
of them.They might take a shot at me, not knowing who I was, but I'd
be so high up in the air no bullet could reach me.Then I'd come soaring
back here to you fellows.""That would shorely be a grand trip, Paul," said Shif'less Sol, "an' I
wouldn't mind takin' it in myself.But fur the present we'd better busy
our minds with the warnin's the wild fowl are givin' us, though we're
well fixed fur a house already.It's cu'rus what good homes a handy man
kin find in the wilderness."The predictions of the wild fowl were true.A few days later heavy
clouds rolled up in the southwest, and the five watched them, knowing
what they would bring them.They spread to the zenith and then to the
other horizon, clothing the whole circle of the earth.The great flakes
began to drop down, slowly at first, then faster.Soon all the trees
were covered with white, and everything else, too, except the dark
surface of the lake, which received the flakes into its bosom as they
fell.It snowed all that day and most of the next, until it lay about two feet
on the ground.After that it turned intensely cold, the surface of the
snow froze, and ice, nearly a foot thick, covered the lake.It was not
possible to travel under such circumstances without artificial help, and
now Tom Ross, who had once hunted in the far North, came to their help.He showed them how to make snowshoes, and, although all learned to use
them, Henry, with his great strength and peculiar skill, became by far
the most expert.As the snow with its frozen surface lay on the ground for weeks, Henry
took many long journeys on the snowshoes.Sometimes be hunted, but
oftener his role was that of scout.He cautioned his friends that he
might be out-three or four days at a time, and that they need take no
alarm about him unless his absence became extremely long.The winter
deepened, the snow melted, and another and greater storm came, freezing
the surface, again making the snowshoes necessary.Henry decided now to
take a scout alone to the northward, and, as the others bad long since
grown into the habit of accepting his decisions almost without question,
he started at once.He was well equipped with his rifle, double barreled
pistol, hatchet, and knife, and he carried in addition a heavy blanket
and some jerked venison.He put on his snowshoes at the foot of the
cliff, waved a farewell to the four heads thrust from "The Alcove"
above, and struck out on the smooth, icy surface of the creek.From this
he presently passed into the woods, and for a long time pursued a course
almost due north.It was no vague theory that had drawn Henry forth.In one of his
journeyings be had met a hunter who told him of a band of Tories and
Indians encamped toward the north, and he had an idea that it was the
party led by Braxton Wyatt.His information was very indefinite, and he began to discover signs much
earlier than he had expected.Before the end of the first day he saw the
traces of other snowshoe runners on the icy snow, and once he came to a
place where a deer had been slain and dressed.Then he came to another
where the snow had been hollowed out under some pines to make a sleeping
place for several men.Clearly he was in the land of the enemy again,
and a large and hostile camp might be somewhere near.Henry felt a thrill of joy when he saw these indications.All the
primitive instincts leaped up within him.Mary went back to the office.A child of the forest and of
elemental conditions, the warlike instinct was strong within him.He
was tired of hunting wild animals, and now there was promise of a' more
dangerous foe.For the purposes that he had in view he was glad that
he was alone.The wintry forest, with its two feet of snow covered with
ice, contained no terrors for him.He moved on his snowshoes almost like
a skater, and with all the dexterity of an Indian of the far North, who
is practically born on such shoes.As he stood upon the brow of a little hill, elevated upon his snowshoes,
he was, indeed, a wonderful figure.The added height and the white glare
from the ice made him tower like a great giant.He was clad completely
in soft, warm deerskin, his hands were gloved in the same material,
and the fur cap was drawn tightly about his head and ears.The
slender-barreled rifle lay across his shoulder, and the blanket and deer
meat made a light package on his back.Only his face was uncovered, and
that was rosy with the sharp but bracing cold.But the resolute blue
eyes seemed to have grown more resolute in the last six months, and the
firm jaw was firmer than ever.It was a steely blue sky, clear, hard, and cold, fitted to the earth
of snow and ice that it inclosed.His eyes traveled the circle of the
horizon three times, and at the end of the third circle he made out a
dim, dark thread against that sheet of blue steel.It was the light of a
camp fire, and that camp fire must belong to an enemy.It was not likely
that anybody else would be sending forth such a signal in this wintry
wilderness.Henry judged that the fire was several miles away, and apparently in a
small valley hemmed in by hills of moderate height.He made up his mind
that the band of Braxton Wyatt was there, and he intended to make a
thorough scout about it.Daniel went to the bathroom.He advanced until the smoke line became much
thicker and broader, and then he stopped in the densest clump of bushes
that he could find.He meant to remain there until darkness came,
because, with all foliage gone from the forest, it would be impossible
to examine the hostile camp by day.The bushes, despite the lack of
leaves, were so dense that they hid him well, and, breaking through the
crust of ice, he dug a hole.Then, having taken off his snowshoes and
wrapped his blanket about his body, he thrust himself into the hole
exactly like a rabbit in its burrow.He laid his shoes on the crust of
ice beside him.Of course, if found there by a large party of warriors
on snowshoes he would have no chance to flee, but he was willing to take
what seemed to him a small risk.The dark would not be long in coming,
and it was snug and warm in the hole.As he sat, his head rose just
above the surrounding ice, but his rifle barrel rose much higher.He ate
a little venison for supper, and the weariness in the ankles that comes
from long traveling on snowshoes disappeared.Mary moved to the bathroom.He could not see outside the bushes, but he listened with those
uncommonly keen ears of his.There was not even
a wind to rustle the bare boughs.The sun hung a huge red globe in the
west, and all that side of the earth was tinged with a red glare, wintry
and cold despite its redness.Then, as the earth turned, the sun was
lost behind it, and the cold dark came.Henry found it so comfortable in his burrow that all his muscles were
soothed, and he grew sleepy.It would have been very pleasant to doze
there, but he brought himself round with an effort of the will, and
became as wide awake as ever.He was eager to be off on his expedition,
but he knew how much depended on waiting, and he waited.One hour, two
hours, three hours, four hours, still and dark, passed in the forest
before he roused himself from his covert.Then, warm, strong, and
tempered like steel for his purpose, he put on his snowshoes, and
advanced toward the point from which the column of smoke had risen.He had never been more cautious and wary than he was now.He was a
formidable figure in the darkness, crouched forward, and moving like
some spirit of the wilderness, half walking, half gliding.Although the night had come out rather clear, with many cold stars
twinkling in the blue, the line of smoke was no longer visible.But
Henry did not expect it to be, nor did he need it.He had marked its
base too clearly in his mind to make any mistake, and he advanced with
certainty.He came presently into an open space, and he stopped with
amazement.John went to the bedroom.Around him were the stumps of a clearing made recently, and
near him were some yards of rough rail fence.He crouched against the fence, and saw on the far side of the clearing
the dim outlines of several buildings, from the chimneys of two of
which smoke was rising.It was his first thought that he had come upon
a little settlement still held by daring borderers, but second thought
told him that it was impossible.Another and more comprehensive look
showed many signs of ruin.He saw remains of several burned houses, but
clothing all was the atmosphere of desolation and decay that tells
when a place is abandoned.The two threads of smoke did not alter this
impression.The builders of this tiny village in the
wilderness bad been massacred or driven away.A part of the houses had
been destroyed, some were left standing, and now there were visitors.Daniel went back to the bedroom.He
advanced without noise, keeping behind the rail fence, and approaching
one of the houses from the chimneys of which the smoke came.Here be
crouched a long time, looking and listening attentively; but it seemed
that the visitors had no fears.Why should they, when there was nothing
that they need fear in this frozen wilderness?Sandra travelled to the office.It had been a snug, trim little settlement.Perhaps twenty-five or thirty people had lived there, literally hewing
a home out of the forest.His heart throbbed with a fierce hatred and,
anger against those who had spoiled all this, and his gloved finger
crept to the hammer of his rifle.The mercury was far below zero, and a wind
that had begun to rise cut like the edge of a knife.Even the wariest of
Indians in such desolate weather might fail to keep a watch.The fur cap was drawn farther over chin and ears, and
the buckskin gloves kept his fingers warm and flexible.Besides, his
blood was uncommonly hot in his veins.His comprehensive eye told him that, while some of the buildings had not
been destroyed, they were so ravaged and damaged that they could never
be used again, save as a passing shelter, just as they were being used
now.He crossed a brook,
frozen almost solidly in its bed, and he |
garden | Where is Mary? | Then he slid without noise back to the nearest of the houses from which
the smoke came.It was rather more pretentious than the others, built of
planks instead of logs, and with shingles for a roof.The remains of a
small portico formed the approach to the front door.Henry supposed that
the house had been set on fire and that perhaps a heavy rain had saved a
part of it.A bar of light falling across the snow attracted his attention.He knew
that it was the glow of a fire within coming through a window.Their rough voices droned and three great shadows walked far ahead of
them on the white street-snow.All those people came and went and twisted
and turned and came and went again.Each sang his own little song and
fretted his whining prayer.Above all this rose the dull toot of the
baker's horn, as he kept on shouting:
"Hot bread!High hung the moon and blinked the stars; and fine white shafts fell
through the air, upon everything around, like silver pollen."[5]
[5] A legendary figure of a snow-covered bogie, who comes down to the
villages at Christmas-time and runs away with the children.And they crept back into the kitchen, beside the fire.And the black man stood outside the door, tugging at the string of his
twirling star, and sang through his nose:
Come, star, come, star, you must not so still stand!You must go with me to Bethlehem Land,
To Bethlehem, that comely city,
Where Mary sits with her Babe on her knee....
Along the country-roads, the farmhouses stood snowed in, with black
window-shutters, which showed dark against the walls and shut in the
light, and stumpy chimneys, with thick smoke curling from them.Indoors,
there was no seeing clearly: the lamp hung from the ceiling in a ring of
steam and smoke and everything lay black and tumbled.In the hearth, the
yule-log lay blazing.The farmer's wife baked waffles and threw them in
batches on the straw-covered floor.In one corner, under the light and wound from head to foot in
tobacco-smoke, were the farm-hands, playing cards.They sat wrapped up in
their game, bending over their little table, very quiet.Now and then
came a half-oath and the thud of a fist on the table and then again
peaceful shuffling and stacking and playing of their cards.The Freezyman sat in the midst of the children, who listened open-mouthed
to his tale of _The Mighty Hunter_.Later, the big table was drawn out and supper served.All gathered round
and sat down and ate.First came potatoes and pork, red kale and pigs'
chaps, then stewed apples and sausages... and waffles, waffles, waffles.They drank beer out of little glass mugs.The table was cleared, coffee
poured out, spirits fetched from the cupboard and gin burnt with sugar.Then the chairs were pushed close, right round the hearth, and Maarten
stood up, took his star, smoothed his long beard and, keeping time by
tugging the string of his star, droned out:
On Christmas night
Is Jesus born
To fight our fight
Against the night
Of Satan and his devil-spawn.And a manger is His cot
And all humble is His lot;
_So, mortal, make you humble, too,
To serve Him Who thus served you_.Three wise men and each a king
Come to make Him offering;
Gold, frankincense and myrrh they bring.Angels sweet
Kiss His feet,
As they sing:
"Hail, Lord and King!"Telling all mankind the story
Of His wonder and His glory;
_So, mortal, make you humble, too,
To serve Him Who thus served you_.The men sat drinking their hot gin, the children
listened with their heads on one side and the farmer's wife, with her
hands folded over her great lap, sat crying.John went to the office.The door opened and the Kings stood in the middle of the floor.They were
white with snow and their faces blue with cold; the ice hung from
Grendel's moustache.They looked hard under their hats at the table, the
hearth and the little glasses and at Maarten, who was still standing up.Wulf made his star turn, Top banged his rumble-pot to time and they sang:
Three Kings came out of the East;
'Twas to comfort Mary....
When the song was ended, each got two little glasses; then they could go."That damned hill-devil swallows it all up," muttered Wulf.The others sang and played and played cards for ever so long and 'twas
late when Maarten took his star and, with a "Good-night till next year,"
pulled the door behind him.It was still light outside, but the sky hung full of snow; above, a grey
fleece and, lower, a swirl of great white flakes, which fell down slowly
swarming one on top of the other.He plunged deep into it.... It was still so far to go; and his house and
his pines, he had left them all so far behind.He was so old, so lone; it was so cold; and all the roads were white...
all sky and snow.In the hollow lay the village: a little group of
sleeping houses round the white church-steeple; and behind it lay his
mountain, but it was like a cloud, a shapeless monster, very far away.Above his head, stars, stars in long rows.He stood still and looked up
and found one which he saw every evening, a pale, dead star, like an old
acquaintance, which would lead him--for the last time, perhaps--back to
his mountain, back home.There was a light in the three narrow pointed windows of the chapel and
the bell tinkled within.He went to rest a bit against the wall.What a
noise and what a bustle all the evening... and the gin!And those rough
chaps had looked at him so brutally.In there, it was still; those
windows gleamed so brightly; and, after the sound of the bell, there came
so softly a woman's voice:
"_Venite adoremus_...."
Then all was silence, the lights went out.The village lay behind him and the road began to climb.There, on the
right, stood "The Jolly Hangman."Now he knows his way and 'tis no longer
far from home.From out of the ditch comes something creeping, a black
shape that runs across the plain, chattering like a magpie: Mad Wanne,
with her thin legs and her cloak wide open.She ran as fast as she could
run and vanished behind the inn.He had started; he became so frightened, so uneasy, that he hastened his
steps and longed to be at home.There was still a light in "The Jolly Hangman" and a noise of drunken
men.He passed, but then turned back again... to sing his last song,
according to old custom.He saw
Grendel sitting there and tried to get away.Then the three of them
rushed out and called after him.When they saw that he went on, they
broke into a run:
"Stop, you brute!...they howled and ran and caught him and threw him down.Grendel dug his knee into his chest and held his arms stretched wide
against the ground.Wulf and Dras gripped whole handfuls of snow and
crammed it into his mouth and went on until all his face was thickly
covered and he lay powerless.Then they planted his star beside him in
the snow and began to turn and sing to the echo:
_A, a, a_--glory be to Him on high to-day!_E, e, e_--upon earth peace there shall be!_I, i, i_--come and see with your own eye!_O, o, o_--His little bed of straw below!Mary journeyed to the garden.Like a flash, Mad Wanne shot past, yelling and shrieking.Wulf flung his
stick against her legs.She waved her arms under her cloak and vanished
in the dark.The three men sat down by the ditch and laughed full-throated.Long it rang:
Three Kings came out of the East;
'Twas to comfort Mary...
Great white flakes fell from the starry sky, wriggled and swarmed, one on
top of the other.LOAFING
He went, ever on the move, with the slow, shuffling step of wandering
beggars who are nowhere at home.They had discharged him, some time ago, and now he was walking alone like
a wild man.For whole days he had dragged himself through the moorland,
from farm to farm, looking for his bread like the dogs.Now he came to a
wide lane of lime-trees and before him lay the town, asleep.The streets lay dead, the doors were shut, the windows closed: all
the people were resting; and he loafed.It was dreary, to walk alone like
that, all over the country-side, and with such a body: a giant with huge
legs and arms, which were doomed to do nothing, and that belly, that
craving belly, which he carried about with him wherever he went.And nobody wanted him: 'twas as though they were afraid of his strong
limbs and his stubborn head--because his glowing eyes could not entreat
meekly enough--and his blackguardly togs....
Morning came; the working-folk were early astir.Lean men and pale women,
carrying their kettles and food-satchels in their hands, beat the
slippery pavements with their wooden shoes.Doors and windows flew open;
life began; every one walked with a busy air, knew where he was going;
and they vanished here and there, through a big gate or behind a narrow
door that shut with a bang.Carts with green stuff, waggons with sand and
coal drove this way and that.Fellows with milk and bread went round; and
it grew to a din of calls and cries, each shouting his loudest.Nobody looked at him, noticed him or wanted him.In the
middle of the forenoon, a young lady had stared at him for a long time
and said to her mother:
"What a huge fellow!"He had heard her and it did him good.He looked round, but mother and
daughter were gone, behind a corner, and stood gazing into a shop full of
bows and ribbons.It began to whirl terribly in his belly; and his stomach hurt him so; and
his legs were tired.The streets and houses and all those strange people annoyed him.He
wanted to get away, far away, and to see men like himself: workers
without work, who were hungry!He looked for the narrow alleys and the poor quarter.Out of a side-street a draycart came jogging along.Half a score of
labourers lay tugging in the shoulder-strap or leant with all the force
of their bodies against the cart, which rolled on toilsomely.'Twas a
load of flax, packed tightly in great square bales standing one against
the other, the whole cart full.The dray caught its right wheel in the
grating of an open gutter and remained stock-still, leaning aslant, as
though planted there.The workmen racked and wrung to get the wheel out,
but it was no good.Then they stood there, staring at one another, at
their wits' end and throwing glances into the eyes of that big fellow who
had come to look on.Without saying or speaking, he caught a spoke in
either hand, pressed with his mighty shoulder against the inside of the
wheel, bent and wrung and in a turn brought the cart on the level.Then
he went behind among the other workmen to go and help them shove.They
looked at him queerly, as if to say that they no longer needed his help
and had rather done without him.The cart rolled on, another street or
two, and then through the open gate of the warehouse.The labourers
looked into one another's eyes uneasily, moved about, pulled the bales
off the cart and dragged them a little farther along the wall.Then they
tailed off, one by one, through a small inner door; and he stood there
alone, like a fool.A bit later, he heard them laugh and whisper under
their breaths.When he was tired of waiting, he went up the street again.In the street through which
he had to go, on the spaces outside the hotels sat ladies and gentlemen
toying with strange foods and sipping their wine out of long goblets.They chattered gaily and tasted and pecked with dainty lips and turned-up
noses.The waiters ran here, there, like slaves.Those coaxing smells
stung like adders and roused evil thoughts in his brain.His stomach
fretted awfully and his empty head turned.In a street with windowless house-fronts, a street without people in it,
he felt better.He let his body lean against the iron post of a gas-lamp,
stuck his hands in his trouser-pockets and stood there looking at the
paving-stones.Now he was damned if he would take another step, he would
rather croak here like a beast; then they would have to take him up and
know that he existed.The boys coming from school mocked him; they danced in a ring, with him,
the big fellow, in the middle.They hung paper flags on his back and
sang:
Hat, hat,
Ugly old hat!It serves as a slop-pail and as a hat!Yon came a milk-maid driving up in a cart drawn by dogs.He got a gnawing
in his arms, a spout of blood shot to his head and he suddenly felt as if
something was going to happen.Just as she drove past, he put his great
hand on the edge of the little cart, with one pull took a copper can from
its straw, put it to his mouth and drank; then he sent the can clattering
through the window of the first-best house, till the panes rattled again.Looking round--as if bewildered and set going, roused by what he had
done--he caught sight of the frightened little dairy-maid.A mocking grin
played on his cruel face; he flung his rough arm round her little body
and lifted the girl out of the cart right up to his face in a fierce hug.He felt two pairs of hands pulling at his
sleeves from below.He loosed the girl and saw two policemen who held him
fast and ordered him to go with them.They held him by the arm on either
side and stepped hurriedly to keep pace with his great strides.They
looked in dismay at that huge fellow, with his wicked eyes, and then at
each other, as if to ask what they should do.They came to a narrow little street, with nobody in it, and stopped at a
public-house:
"Could you do with a dram, mate?"They all three went inside; and each of
them drank a big glass of gin.The policemen whispered something together; the elder wiped the drink
from his moustache and then said, very severely:
"And now, clear out; hurry up!And mind your manners, will you, next
time!"He was outside once more, loafing on, along the houses.V. SPRING
Mother stood like a clucking hen among her red-cheeked youngsters.She
was holding a loaf against her fat stomach and, with a curved
pruning-knife, was cutting off good thick slices which the youngsters
snatched away one by one and stuffed into their pockets.Horieneke
fetched her basket of knitting and her school-books.She first pulled
Fonske's stocking up once more, buttoned Sarelke's breeches and wiped
Lowietje's nose; and, with an admonishing "Straight to school, do you
hear, boys?"from mother, the whole band rushed out of the door, through
the little flower-garden and up the broad unmetalled road, straight
towards the great golden sun which was rising yonder, far behind the
pollard alders, in a mighty fire of rays.It was cool outside; the sky
was bright blue streaked with glowing shafts aslant the hazy-white clouds
deep, deep in the heavens. |
hallway | Where is John? | John went to the office.Over the level fields, ever so far, lay a
stain of pale green and brown; and the slender stalks of the wheat stood
like needles, quivering in their glittering moisture.The trees were
still nearly bare; and their trunks and tops stood tall and black against
the clear sky; but, when you saw them together, in rows or little
clusters, there was a soft yellow-green colour over them, spotted with
gleaming buds ready to burst.A soft wind, just warm enough to thaw the
frost, worked its way into and through everything and made it all shake
and swarm till it was twisted full of restless, growing life.That wind
curled through the youngsters' tangled hair and their round
cheeks cherry-red.They ran and romped through the dry sand, stamping
till it flew above their heads.Trientje stood in the doorway, in her little shirt, with her stomach
sticking out, watching her brothers as they disappeared; and, when she
saw them no longer, she thrust her fists into her sockets, opened her
mouth wide and started a-crying, until mother's hands lifted her up by
the arms and mother's thick lips gave her a hearty kiss.Horieneke came walking step by step under the lime-trees, along the
narrow grass-path beside the sand, keeping her eyes fixed on the play of
her knitting-needles.When she reached the bridge that crossed the brook,
she looked round after her brothers.They had run down the <DW72> and were
now trotting wildly one after the other through the rich brown grass,
pulling up all the white and yellow flowers, one by one, till their arms
were crammed with them.Horieneke took out her catechism, laid it open on
the low rail and sat there cheerfully waiting.Sarelke had crept through
the water-flags until he was close to the brook and, through the clear,
gleaming blue water, watched a little fish frisking about.In a moment,
his wooden shoes and his stockings were off and one leg was in the water,
trying it: it was cold; and he felt a shiver right down his back.Ripples
played on the smooth blue and widened out to the bank.The little fish
was gone, but so was the cold; and he saw more fish, farther away: quick
now, the other leg in the water!He pulled his breeches up high and there
he stood, with the water well above his knees, peering out for fish.The
water was clear as glass; and he saw swarms of them playing, darting
swiftly up and down, to and fro like arrows: they shot past in shoals
that held together like long snakes, in among the moss and the reeds and
between the stones, winding through slits and crannies.Bertje and Wartje and the others all had their stockings off and
stood in the water bending down to look, making funnels of their hands in
the water, where it rustled in little streams between two grass-sods
through which the fish had to pass.Whenever they felt one wriggling in
their hands they yelled and screamed and sprang out of the brook to put
it into their wooden shoes, which stood on the bank, scooped full of
water.There they loitered examining those beasties from close by: those
fish were theirs now; and they would let them swim about in the big tub
at home and give them a bit of their bread and butter every day, so that
they might grow into great big pike.Mary journeyed to the garden.And now back to the runnel for more.But they did not hear and just kept on as before.Fonske had not been
able to catch one yet and his fat legs were turning blue with the cold.In front of him stood Bertje, stooping and peering into the water, with
his hands ready to grasp; and Fonske saw such a lovely little runnel from
his neck to halfway down his back, all bare skin.He carefully scooped
his hands full of water and let it trickle gently inside Bertje's shirt.The boy growled; and Fonske, screaming with laughter, skipped out of the
brook.Now came a romping and stamping in the water, a dashing and
splashing with their hands till it turned to a rain of gleaming drops
that fell on their heads and wetted their clothes through and through.And a plashing with their bare legs till the spray spouted
high over the bank.Like lightning they all sprang out of the brook,
caught up their wooden shoes with the little fish in them and ran as hard
as they could through the grass to the bridge.There only did they
venture to look round.Hurriedly they turned down their breeches, dried
their shiny cheeks and dripping hair with one another's handkerchiefs and
then marched all together through the sun and wind to school.In the village square they wandered about among the other boys, silently
showed their catch, hid their shoes in the hawthorn-hedge behind the
churchyard and stayed playing until schoolmaster's bell rang.Boys and girls, each on their own side, disappeared through the gate; and
the street was now silent as the grave.After a while, there came through
the open window of the school first a sort of buzzing and humming and
then a repetition in chorus, a rhythmical spelling aloud: b-u-t, but;
t-e-r, ter: butter; B-a, Ba; b-e-l, bel: Babel; ever on and more and more
noisily.In between it all, the sparrows chattered and chirped and
fluttered safely in the powdery sand of the playground.The sun was now high in the sky and the light glittered on the young
leaves, full of the glad life of youth and gleaming with gold.Horieneke, with a few more children, was in another school.They sat, the
boys on one side and the girls on the other, on long benches and were
wrapped up in studying their communion-book and listening to an old nun,
who explained it to them in drawling, snuffling tones.After that, they
had to say their lesson, one by one; and this all went so quietly, so
modestly, so easily, 'twas as if they had the open book before them.Half-way through the morning, they went two and two through the village
to the church, where the priest was waiting to hear their catechism.This
also went quietly; and the questions and answers sounded hollow in that
empty church.Horieneke sat at the head of the girls; she had caught up almost half of
them because she always knew her lessons so well and listened so
attentively.She was allowed to lead the prayers and was the first
examined; then she sat looking at the priest and listening to what came
from his lips.John went to the garden.He always gave her a kind smile and held her up to the
others as an example of good conduct.After the catechism, they had leave
to go and play in the convent-garden.John journeyed to the hallway.In the afternoon, there were new
lessons to be learnt and new explanations; and then quietly home.So they lived quite secluded, alone, in their own little world of modesty
and piety, preparing for the great day.The other youngsters, who went
their several ways, felt a certain awe for these school-fellows who once
used to romp and fight with them and who were now so good, so earnest, so
neat in their clothes and so polite.The "first-communicants:" the word
had something sacred about it which they respected; and the little ones
counted on their fingers how many years they would have to wait before
they too were learning their catechism and having leave to play in the
convent-garden.To her brothers Horieneke had now become a sacred thing, like a guardian
angel who watched over them everywhere; and they dared do no mischief
when she was by.She no longer played with them after school; she was now
their "big sister," to whom they softly whispered the favours which they
wished to get out of mother.When Trientje saw her sister coming home in the distance, she put out her
little arms and then would not let her go.For mother, Horieneke had to
wash the dishes, darn the stockings and, when the baby cried, sit for
hours rocking it in the cradle or dandling it on her lap, like a little
young mother.Holding Trientje by the hand and carrying the other on her arm, she would
walk along the paths of the garden and then put them both down on the
bench in the box arbour, while she tended the plants and shrubs that were
beginning to shoot.In the evening, when the bell rang for benediction, she called all her
little brothers and they went off to church together.From every side
came wives in hooded cloaks and lads in wooden shoes that stamped on the
great floor till it echoed in the silent nave.The choir was a semicircular, homely little chapel, with narrow pointed
windows, black at this hour, like deep holes, with leads outlining saints
in shapeless dark patches of colour.The altar was a mass of burning
candles; and a flickering gleam fell on the brass candlesticks, the
little gold leaves and the artificial flowers and on the corners of the
silver monstrance, which stood glittering high up in a little white satin
house.All of this was clouded in a blue smoke which rose from the holes
of the censer continuously swung to and fro by the arm of a roguish
serving-boy.Far at the back, in the dark, in the black stripes of shadow
cast by the pillars or under the cold bright patch of a lamp or a stand
of votive candles was an old wife, huddled under her hood, with bent
back, praying, and here and there a troop of boys who by turns dropped
their wooden shoes or fought with one another's rosaries.Near the communion-bench knelt Horieneke, her eyes wide open, full of
brightness and gladness and ecstacy, face to face with Our Lord.The
incense smelt so good and the whole little church was filled with the
trailing chords of the organ and with soft, plaintive Latin chant.Her
lips muttered automatically and the beads glided through her fingers:
numbered Hail Marys like so many roses that were to adorn her heart
against the coming of the great God.Her thoughts wafted her up to Heaven
in that wide temple full of glittering lights where, against the high
walls full of pedestals and niches, the saints, all stiff with gold and
jewels, stood smiling under their haloes and the nimble angels flew all
around on their white-plaster wings.She had something to ask of every
one of them and they received her prayer in turns.When the priest stood
up in his gleaming silver cope, climbed the three steps and took the
Blessed Sacrament in his white hands to give the benediction; when the
bell tinkled and the censer flew on high and the organ opened all its
throats and the glittering monstrance slowly made a cross in the air and
above the heads of the worshippers, she fell forward over her
praying-stool and lay like that, swooning in mute adoration, until all
was silent again, the candles out and she sitting alone there in the dark
with a few black shapes of cloaked women who wandered discreetly from one
station of the Cross to the next.Outside she heard her brothers playing
in the church-square.There she joined the little girls of her school;
and, arm in arm, they walked along past the dark houses and the silent
trees, each whispering her own tale: about her new dress, her veil, her
white shoes, her long taper with golden bows; about flowers and beads and
prayers....
After supper, Horieneke had to rock the baby to sleep, while mother moved
about, and then to say the evening prayers out loud, after which they all
of them went to bed.On reaching her little bedroom, she visited all the
prints and images hanging on the walls.She then undressed and listened
whether any one was still awake or up.Next she carefully crept down the
three stairs[6] in her little shift and clambered up the ladder to the
loft, where all her little brothers lay playing in a great box-bed.They
knew that she would come and had kept a place for her in the middle.She
sank deep in the straw and, when they all lay still, she went on with the
tale which she had broken off yesterday half-way.It was all made up of
long, long stories out of _The Golden Legend_ and wonderful adventures of
far beyond the sea in unknown lands.She told it all so prettily, so
leisurely; and the children listened like eager little birds.High up in
the dusk of the rafters they saw all those things happening before their
eyes in the black depths and saw the mad fairy-dance there, until they
dreamed off for good and all and Horieneke was left the only one awake,
still telling her story.Then she crept carefully back to her room and
into bed, where she lay counting: how many more days, how many times
sleeping and getting up and how many more lessons to learn... and then
the great day!Slowly she made all the days, with their
special happenings, appear before her eyes; and she enjoyed beforehand
all those beautiful things which had kept her so long a-longing.When, in
her thoughts, it came to Saturday evening and at last, slowly--like a box
with something wonderful inside which you daren't open--to that Sunday
morning, then her heart began to flutter, a thrill ran through her body
and, so that she shouldn't weep for gladness, she bit her lips, squeezed
her hands between her knees and rubbed them until the ecstasy was passed
and she again lay smiling in supreme content and shivering with delight.[6] The bedroom behind the kitchen or living-room, in the Flemish
cottages, is over the cellar; but this cellar is not entirely
underground and is lighted by a very low window at the back.Consequently, the floor of the bedroom is a little higher than that
of the living-room and is approached by a flight of two or three
steps.Time dragged on; cold weather came and rain and it seemed as if it never
would be summer.And that constant repetition of getting up and going to
bed and learning her lessons and counting the hours and the minutes
became so dreary and seemed to go round and round in an endless circle.To-day at last was the long-awaited holiday when Horieneke might go into
town with mother to buy clothes.Her heart throbbed; and she walked
beside mother, with eyes wide-open, looking round at every window, up one
street and down another, crying aloud each time for joy when she saw
pretty things displayed.They bought white slippers with little bows, a
splendid wreath of white lilies of the valley, a great veil of woven
lace, a white-ivory prayer-book, a mother-of-pearl rosary with a little
glass peep-hole in the silver crucifix, showing all manner of pretty
things.Mother haggled and bargained,
said within herself that it was "foolishness to waste all that money,"
but bought and went on buying; and, every time something new went into
the big basket, it was:
"Don't tell father what it cost, Rieneke!"All those pretty things were locked away in the bedroom at home and hung
up in the oak press, while father was still at work.On another evening, when mother and Horieneke were alone at home, the
seamstress brought the new clothes: a whole load of white muslin in stiff
white folds full of satin bows and ribbons and white lace.They had to be
tried on; and Horieneke stood there, for the first time in her life, all
in white, like an angel.But the happiness lasted only for a spell: there
came a noise and every one in the room fled and the clothes were hastily
taken off and put away.Every day, when the boys were at school and father in the fields,
neighbours came to look at the clothes.Piece after piece was carefully
taken out of the press and spread out for show on the great bed.The
wives felt and tested the material, examined the tucks and seams and the
knots and the lining, the bows and ribbons and clapped their hands
together in admiration.It became known all over the village that
Horieneke would be the finest |
garden | Where is Mary? | The counted days crept slowly by, the sun climbed higher every day and
the mornings and evenings lengthened.Things out of doors changed and
grew as you looked: the young green stood twinkling on every hand; the
fields lay like carpets, sharply outlined; and the trees grew
long, pale branches with leaves which stood out like stately plumes
against the sky, so full of youth and freshness and free from dust as yet
and tender.In course of time, white buds came peeping, gleaming amid the
delicate young leaves, till all looked like a spotted altar-cloth: a
promising splendour of white blossoms.Here and there in the garden an
early flower came creeping out.Yonder, in the dark-blue wood, patches of
brown and of pale colour stood out clearly, with a whole variety of vivid
hues.And it had all come so unexpectedly, all of a sudden, as though, by
some magic of the night, it was all set forth to adorn and grace a great
festival.In the fields, the folk were hard at work.The land was turned up and
torn and broken by the gleaming plough and lay steaming in purple clods
in the sun's life-giving rays.The houses were done up and coated with fresh whitewash, the shutters
painted green, till it all shouted from afar in a glad mosaic, with the
blue of the sky and the young leafage of the trees, under the brown,
moss-grown roofs.And the days crept on, each counted and marked off: so many white stripes
on the rafters and black stripes on the almanack; they fell away one by
one and the Saturday came, the long-expected eve of the great Sunday.Quite early, before sunrise, the linen hung outside, the white smocks and
shirts waving, like fluttering pennons, from the clothes-lines in the
white orchard.Horieneke also was up betimes and helping mother in her
work.From top to bottom everything had to be altered and done over again
and cleansed.It was only with difficulty that she got to school.To-day, the great examination of conscience, the general
confession and the communion-practice; and, to-night, everything to be
laid out ready for to-morrow morning: all this kept running anyhow
through her head and among the lines of her lesson-book.Half-way through the morning they went to church.The children there all
looked so glad, so happy and so clean and neat in their second-best
clothes and so nicely washed.They now made their confessions for the
last time; and it all went so pleasantly: they had done no wrong for such
a long while and all their sins had already been forgiven two or three
times over, yesterday and the day before.They sat in two long rows
waiting their turns and thinking over, right away back to their far-off
babyhood, whether nothing had been forgotten or omitted: their little
hearts must be quite stainless now and pure.When they were tired of
examining their consciences, they fell to praying, with their eyes fixed
upon the saint who stood before them on his pedestal, or else watched the
other youngsters going in and out by turns.The little church looked its best, neat as a new pin: the floor was
freshly scrubbed and the chairs placed side by side in straight rows; the
brasswork shone like gold; and a new communion-cloth hung, like a
snow-white barrier, in front of the sanctuary.The velvet banners were
stripped of their linen covers; and the blue vases, with bright flowers
and silver bunches of grapes, were put out on the altar, as on
feast-days.And all of this was for to-morrow!All the time it was deathly still, with not a sound but that of the
youngsters going in and out of the creaking confessional.Now and then
the church-door flapped open and banged to, when one of the children had
finished and went away.Their little souls were white as new-fallen snow
and bedight with indulgences and prayers.On their faces lay the fresh
innocence of babes brought to baptism or of laughing angels' heads and in
their wide eyes everything was reflected festively and at its best; they
felt so light and lived on little but longing and a holy fear of their
own worthiness: that great, incredible thing of the morrow was suddenly
going to change them from children into grown-up people!They just gave themselves time to have their dinners in a hurry; and then
back to school, where they were to learn how to receive communion.A few
benches placed next to one another represented the communion-rails; and
there they practised the whole afternoon: with studied piety, their hands
folded and their heads bowed, they learnt how to genuflect, how to rise,
how to approach in ranks and return at a sign from the old nun, who
tapped with a key on the arm of her chair each time that a new row of
youngsters had to start, kneel or go back.In a short time this went as
exactly, as evenly as could be, just like soldiers drilling.Finally,
they had to recite once more their acts of faith, adoration and
thanksgiving; and Horieneke and the first of the little boys had to write
out on large sheets of paper the preparation and thanks which they had
learnt by heart, to be read to-morrow in church.After that, they were
drawn up in line and silently and mysteriously led into the convent.The children held their breath and walked carefully down long passages,
between high, white walls, past closed doors with inscriptions in Gothic
letters and a smell of clean linen and apples: ever on and on, through
more passages, till they reached a large hall full of chairs where Mother
Prioress--a fat and stately nun, with her great big head covered by her
cap and her hands in her sleeves--sat upon a throne.They had to file
past her, one by one, with a low bow, and then sit down.Mother Prioress settled herself in her seat, coughed and, in a rich,
throaty voice, began by telling the youngsters how they were to address
Our Lord; told stories of children who had become saints; and she ended
by slowly and cautiously producing a little glass case in which a thorn
out of Our Lord's crown lay exposed on a red-velvet cushion.John went to the office.On the way, Horieneke came upon her brothers playing in the sand.They
had scooped it up in their wooden shoes and poured it into a heap in the
middle of the road and then wetted it; and now they were boring all sorts
of holes in it and tunnels and passages and making it into a
rats'-castle.She let them be, gathered up her little skirts, so as not
to dirty them, and passed by on one side.Mother was up to her elbows in the golden dough of the cakebread,
stirring and beating and patting the jumble of eggs and flour and milk.Horieneke took the crying baby out of the cradle, shaking and tossing it
in the air, and went into the garden just outside the door.The golden
afternoon sun lay all around and everything was radiant with translucid
green.The little path lay neatly raked and the yellow daffodils stood,
like brass trumpets, closely ranked on their stalks; under the shrubs
bright violets peeped out with raised eyebrows, like the grinning faces
of little old wives.The whole garden was filled with a scent of fresh
jasmine and a cool fragrance of cherry-blossom and peach.It was all so still and peaceful that Horieneke, who had begun to sing,
stopped in the middle and stood listening to the chaffinches and siskins
chattering pell-mell.The minor things and the weak things are the most numerous, and they
have played the greatest part in the polity of nature.So I came away
from that far country impressed with the power of the little feeble
things.I had a new understanding of the worth of creatures so
unobtrusive and so silent that the multitude does not know them.I saw protective colorings; I saw fleet wings and swift feet; I saw the
ability to hide and to conceal; I saw habits of adaptation; I saw
marvellous powers of reproduction.You have seen them in every field;
you have met them on your casual walks, until you accept them as the
natural order of things.And you know that the beasts of prey have not
prevailed.The whole contrivance of nature is to protect the weak.We have wrongly visualized the "struggle."We have given it an intensely
human application.We need to go back to Darwin who gave significance to
the phrase "struggle for existence.""I use this term," he said, "in a
large and metaphorical sense, including dependence of one being on
another, and including (which is more important) not only the life of
the individual, but success in leaving progeny."The dependence of one
being on another, success in leaving progeny,--how accurate and how
far-seeing was Darwin!I hope that I speak to naturists and to farmers.They know how diverse
are the forms of life; and they know that somehow these forms live
together and that only rarely do whole races perish by subjugation.They
know that the beasts do not set forth to conquer, but only to gain
subsistence and to protect themselves.The beasts and birds do not
pursue indiscriminately.Mary journeyed to the garden.A hen-hawk does not attack crows or
butterflies.Even a vicious bull does not attack fowls or rabbits or
sheep.The great issues are the issues of live and let-live.There are
whole nations of plants, more unlike than nations of humankind, living
together in mutual interdependence.There are nations of quiet and
mightless animals that live in the very regions of the mighty and the
stout.Consider the mockery of invoking the struggle for existence as
justification for a battle on a June morning, when all nature is vibrant
with life and competition is severe, and when, if ever, we are to look
for strife.The fulness of every
field and wood is in complete adjustment.The teeming multitudes of
animal and plant have found a way to live together, and we look abroad
on a vast harmony, verdurous, prolific, abounding.Into this concord,
project your holocaust!_The daily fare_
Some pages back, I said something about the essential simplicity in
habit of life that results from the nature contact, and I illustrated
the remark by calling attention to the righteousness of simple eating
and drinking.Of course, the eating must be substantial, but the
adventitious appetites accomplish nothing and they may be not only
intemperate and damaging to health but even unmoral.Yet it is not alone
the simplicity of the daily fare that interests me here, but the
necessity that it shall be as direct as possible from the ground or the
sea, and that it shall be undisguised and shall have meaning beyond the
satisfying of the appetite.I was interested in Tusser's "Christmas husbandly fare," notwithstanding
some suggestion of gluttony in it and of oversupply.There is a certain
vigor and good relish about it, and lack of ostentation, that seem to
suggest a lesson.It was more than three centuries ago that native Thomas Tusser,
musician, chorister, and farmer, gave to the world his incomparable
"Five Hundred Points of Good Husbandry."He covered the farm year and
the farm work as completely as Vergil had covered it more than fifteen
centuries before; and he left us sketches of the countryside of his day,
and the ways of the good plain folk, and quaint bits of philosophy and
counsel.He celebrated the Christmas festival with much conviction, and
in the homely way of the home folks, deriving his satisfactions from the
things that the land produces.His sketches are wholesome reading in
these days of foods transported from the ends of the earth, and
compounded by impersonal devices and condensed into packages that go
into every house alike.Thomas Tusser would celebrate with "things handsome to have, as they
ought to be had."His board would not be scant of provisions, for he
seems not to have advised the simple life in the way of things good to
eat; but he chose good raw materials, and we can imagine that the "good
husband and huswife" gave these materials their best compliments and
prepared them with diligence and skill.Not once does he suggest that
these materials be secured from the market, or that any imported labor
be employed in the preparation of them."Good bread and good drink, a good fire in the hall,
Brawn, pudding, and souse, and good mustard withal."Here is the whole philosophy of the contented festival,--the fruit of
one's labor, the common genuine materials, and the cheer of the family
fireside.John went to the garden.The day is to be given over to the spirit of the celebration;
every common object will glow with a new consecration, and everything
will be good,--even the mustard will be good withal.What a contempt old
Tusser would have had for all the imported and fabricated condiments and
trivialities that now come to our tables in packages suggestive of
medicines and drugs!And how ridiculously would they have stood
themselves beside the brawn, pudding, and souse!A few plain
accessories, every one stout and genuine, and in good quantity, must
accompany the substantialities that one takes with a free hand directly
from the land that one manages.It surprises us that he had such a bountiful list from which to draw,
and yet the kinds are not more than might be secured from any good land
property, if one set about securing them:
"Beef, mutton, and pork, shred pies of the best,
Pig, veal, goose, and capon, and turkey well drest,
Cheese, apples, and nuts, joly carols to hear,
As then in the country, is counted good cheer."In these days we should draw less heavily on the meats, for in the three
centuries we have gained greatly in the vegetable foods.Tusser did not
have the potato.But nevertheless, these materials are of the very bone
of the land.They grow up with the year and out of the conditions, and
they have all the days in them, the sunshine, the rain, the dew of
morning, the wind, the cold foggy nights, and the work of laborious
hands.Every one of them means something to the person who raises them,
and there is no impersonality in them.John journeyed to the hallway.Sandra went to the hallway.John's father drained the land
when yet he was a boy; the hedges were set; long ago the place was laid
out in its rotations; the old trees in the fields are a part of it;
every stall in the stables and every window-seat in the old house hold
memories; and John has grown up with these memories, and with these
fields, and with the footpaths that lead out over brooks and amongst the
herds of cattle.It is a part of his religion to keep the land well; and
these supplies at Christmas time are taken with a deep reverence for the
goodness that is in them, and with a pride in having produced them.And Thomas Tusser, good husbandman, rejoiced that these bounties cost no
cash:
"What cost to good husband, is any of this?Of other the like, I do leave out a many
That costeth a husbandman never a penny."To farm well; to provide well; to produce it oneself; to be independent
of trade, so far as this is possible in the furnishing of the
table,--these are good elements in living.And in this day we are
rapidly losing all this; many persons already have lost it; many have
never known the satisfaction of it.John went to the bedroom.Most of us must live from the box
and the bottle and the tin-can; we are even feeding our cattle from the
factory and the bag.The farmer now raises a few prime products to sell,
and then he buys his foods in the markets under label and tag; and he
knows not who produced the materials, and he soon comes not to care.No
thought of the seasons, and of the men and women who labored, of the
place, of the kind of soil, of the special contribution of the native
earth, come with the trademark or the brand.And so we all live
mechanically, from shop to table, without contact, and irreverently.May we not once in the year remember the earth in the food that we eat?May we not in some way, even though we live in town |
bedroom | Where is John? | May we not for once
reduce to the very minimum the supply of manufactured and sophisticated
things, and come somewhere near, at least in spirit, to a "Christmas
husbandly fare?"Yet, Thomas Tusser would not confine his husbandly fare to the Christmas
time.In another poem, he gives us "The farmer's daily diet," in which
the sturdy products are still much the same, secured and prepared by
those who partake.All this may be little applicable literally in our
present living, and yet I think it is easily possible, as certainly it
is very desirable, to develop a new attitude toward the table fare,
avoiding much unnecessary and insignificant household labor and lending
an attitude of good morality to the daily sustenance.Much of our eating and feasting is a vicious waste of time, and also of
human energy that might be put to good uses.One can scarcely conceive
how such indirect and uncomfortable and expensive methods could have
come into use.John went to the office.Perhaps they originated with persons of quality in an
aristocratic society, when an abundance of servants must be trained to
serve and when distinctions in eating were a part of the distinction in
rank.But to have introduced these laborious and unintelligent methods
into hotels, where persons tarry for comfort and into homes that do not
need to maintain an extrinsic appearance, is a vain and ludicrous
imitation.The numbers of courses, with more service than food, that one
often meets at the table d'hote of the frequented hotels abroad, are
most exasperating to one who values time and has a serious purpose in
travel and a rightful care for the bodily apparatus.Here is the
performance--it was nothing more than a performance, consisting in
repeated changing of all the dishes, the removing of every fragment of
edibles, and in passing very small separate parcels of food--that it was
my lot to endure on an otherwise happy day in a hotel that had little
else to distinguish it:
Course 1.Fish (very economical), with a potato on the side.Spoonful of green beans (nothing else).Beef and salad (fragmentary).The traveler knows that this species of time-wasting is not unusual;
certainly the food is not unusual and does not merit such considerate
attention, although it may profit by the magnification.All this
contributes nothing to human efficiency--quite the reverse--and
certainly nothing to the rightful gusto in the enjoyment of one's
subsistence.Such laborious uselessness is quite
immoral.Mary journeyed to the garden.I am afraid that our food habits very well represent how far we have
moved away from the essentials and how much we have misled ourselves as
to the standards of excellence.I looked in a cookbook to learn how to
serve potatoes: I found twenty-three recipes, every one of which was
apparently designed to disguise the fact that they were potatoes; and
yet there is really nothing in a potato to be ashamed of.Of course,
this kind of deception is not peculiar to cookery.It is of the same
piece as the stamping of the metal building coverings in forms to
represent brick and stone, although everybody knows that they are not
brick and stone, rather than to make a design that shall express metal
and thereby frankly tell the truth; of the same kind also as the casting
of cement blocks to represent undressed rock, although every one is
aware of the deception, rather than to develop a form that will express
cement blocks as brick expresses brick; of the same order as the
inflating of good wholesome water by carbonic gas; and all the other
deceits in materials on which our common affairs are built.It is, of
course, legitimate to present our foods in many forms that we may secure
variety even with scant and common materials; but danger may lie in any
untruthfulness with which we use the raw materials of life.So cookery has come to be a process of concealment.Not only does it
conceal the materials, but it also conceals the names of them in a
ridiculous nomenclature.Apparently, the higher the art of cookery, the
greater is the merit of complete concealment.I think that one reason
why persons enjoy the simple cooking of farmers and sailors and other
elemental folk, is because of its comparative lack of disguise, although
they may not be aware of this merit of it.We have so successfully
disguised our viands through so many years that it is not "good form" to
make inquiries: we may not smell the food, although the odor should be
one of the best and most rightful satisfactions, as it is in fruits and
flowers.We may smell a parsnip or a potato when it grows in the field,
but not when it is cooked.John went to the garden.We add the extrinsic and meaningless odors of spices and flavorings,
forgetting that odor no less than music hath occasions; each of the
materials has its own odor that the discriminating cook will try to
bring out in its best expression.Were we to be deprived of all these
exotic seasonings, undoubtedly cookery would be the gainer in the end;
nor could we so readily disguise materials that in themselves are not
fit to eat.There is a reason why "all foods taste alike," as we often
hear it said of the cooking in public places.Moreover, we want everything that is out of season, necessitating great
attention to the arts of preserving and requiring still further
fabrication; and by this desire we also lessen the meaning of the
seasons when they come in their natural sequence, bringing their
treasure of materials that are adapted to the time and to the place.We
can understand, then, why it so happens that we neglect the cookery of
the common foods, as seeming to be not quite worth the while, and expend
ourselves with so much effort on the accessories and the frills.I have
been interested to observe some of the instruction in cooking,--how it
often begins with little desserts, and fudge, and a variety of dib-dabs.This is much like the instruction in manual training that begins with
formal and meaningless model work or trivialities and neglects the
issues of life.It is much like some of the teaching in agriculture not
so many years ago, before we attacked very effectively the serious
problems of wheat and alfalfa and forests and markets.Mastery does not
lie in these pieces of play work, nor does the best intellectual
interest on the part of the student reside in them.Result is that one finds the greatest difficulty in securing a really
good baked potato, a well-cooked steak, or a wholesome dish of
apple-sauce that is not strained and flavored beyond recognition.It is
nearly impossible for one to secure an egg fried hard and yet very
tender and that has not been "turned" or scorched on the edges,--this is
quite the test of the skill of the good cook.John journeyed to the hallway.The notion that a hard
fried egg is dangerously indigestible is probably a fable of poor
cookery.One can secure many sophisticated and disguised egg dishes, but
I think skill in plainly cooking eggs is almost an unknown art, perhaps
a little-practised art.Now, it is on these simple and essential things that I would start my
instruction in cookery; and this not only for the gain to good eating
but also for the advantage of vigor and good morals.I am afraid that
our cooking does not set a good example before the young three times
every day in the year; and how eager are the young and how amenable to
suggestion at these three blessed epochs every day in the year!Some unsympathetic reader will say that I am drawing a long bow; yet
undoubtedly our cookery has prepared the public mind for the
adulteration.Knowing the elaboration of many of the foods and fancy
dishes, the use of flavoring and spice and other additions to disguise
unwholesome materials, the addition of coloring matter to make things
attractive, the mixtures, the elaborate designs and trimmings and
concoctions, and various deceptions, one wonders how far is the step
from some of the cookery to some of the adulteration and whether these
processes are really all of one piece.I will leave with my reader a
paragraph assembled from a statement made by a food chemist but a few
years ago, to let him compare adulteration with what is regarded as
legitimate food preparation and note the essential similarity of many of
the processes.I do not mean to enter the discussion of food
adulteration, and I do not know whether these sophistications are true
at the present day; but the statement describes a situation in which we
found ourselves and indicates what had become a staggering infidelity in
the use of the good raw materials.Hamburg steak often contains sodium sulphite; bologna sausage and
similar meats until recently usually contained a large percentage of
added cereal."Pancake flour" often contains little if any buckwheat;
wheat flour is bleached with nitric oxide to improve its appearance.Fancy French peas are with sulphate of copper.Bottled ketchup
usually contains benzoate of soda as a preservative.Japanese tea is
with cyanide of potassium and iron.Prepared mustard usually
contains a large quantity of added starch and is with tumeric.Ground coffee has recently been adulterated with roasted peas.So-called
non-alcoholic bottled beverages often contain alcohol or a
habit-forming drug and are usually with aniline.Candy is
commonly with aniline dye and often coated with paraffine to
prevent evaporation.Cheap candies contain such substances as glue and
soapstone.The higher-priced kinds of molasses usually contain
sulphites.Flavoring extracts seldom are made from pure products and
usually are artificially.Sandra went to the hallway.Jams are made of apple jelly with the
addition of coloring matter and also of seeds to imitate berries from
which they are supposed to be made; the cheap apple jelly is itself
often imitated by a mixture of glucose, starch, aniline dye, and
flavoring.Bakeries in large
cities have used decomposed products, as decayed eggs.Cheap ice-cream
is often made of gelatin, glue, and starch.Cottonseed-oil is sold for
olive-oil.The poison saccharine is often used in place of sugar in
prepared sweetened products.The attentive reader of the public prints in the recent years can
greatly extend this humiliating recital if he choose.It is our habit to
attach all the blame to the adulterators, and it is difficult to excuse
them; but we usually find that there are contributory causes and
certainly there must be reasons._The admiration of good materials_
Not even yet am I done with this plain problem of the daily fare.The
very fact that it is daily--thrice daily--and that it enters so much
into the thought and effort of every one of us, makes it a subject of
the deepest concern from every point of view.The aspect of the case
that I am now to reassert is the effect of much of our food preparation
in removing us from a knowledge of the good raw materials that come out
of the abounding earth.I see a committee of the old worthies in
some fruit-show going slowly and discriminatingly among the plates of
fruits, discussing the shapes and colors and sizes, catching the
fragrance, debating the origins and the histories, and testing them with
the utmost precaution and deliberation; and I follow to hear their
judgment.John went to the bedroom.This kind of apple is very perfect in spherical form, deeply cut at the
stem, well ridged at the shallow crater, beautifully splashed and
streaked with carmine-red on a yellowish green under-color, finely
flecked with dots, slightly russet on the shaded side, apparently a good
keeper; its texture is fine-grained and uniform, flavor mildly subacid,
the quality good to very good; if the tree is hardy and productive,
this variety is to be recommended to the amateur for further trial!The
next sample is somewhat elongated in form, rather below the average in
color, the stem very long and well set and indicating a fruit that does
not readily drop in windstorms, the texture exceedingly melting but the
flavor slightly lacking in character and therefore rendering it of
doubtful value for further test.Another sample lacks decidedly in
quality, as judged by the specimens on the table, and the exhibitor is
respectfully recommended to withdraw it from future exhibitions; another
kind has a very pronounced aromatic odor, which will commend it to
persons desiring to grow a choice collection of interesting fruits;
still another is of good size, very firm and solid, of uniform red
color, slightly oblate and therefore lending itself to easy packing,
quality fair to good, and if the tree bears such uniform samples as
those shown on the table it apparently gives promise of some usefulness
as a market sort.My older friends, if they have something of the
feeling of the pomologist, can construct the remainder of the picture.In physical perfectness of form and texture and color, there is nothing
in all the world that exceeds a well-grown fruit.Let it lie in the palm
of your hand.Feel its firm or soft
and modelled surface.Put it against your cheek, and inhale its
fragrance.Trace its neutral under-colors, and follow its stripes and
mark its dots.If an apple, trace the eye that lies in a moulded basin.Note its stem, how it stands firmly in its cavity, and let your
imagination run back to the tree from which, when finally mature, it
parted freely.This apple is not only the product of your labor, but it
holds the essence of the year and it is in itself a thing of exquisite
beauty.There is no other rondure and no other fragrance like this.I am convinced that we need much to cultivate this appreciation of the
physical perfectness of the fruits that we grow.We cannot afford to
lose this note from our lives, for this may contribute a good part of
our satisfaction of being in the world.The discriminating appreciation
that one applies to a picture or a piece of sculpture may be equally
applied to any fruit that grows on the commonest tree or bush in our
field or to any animal that stands on a green pasture.It is no doubt a
mark of a well-tempered mind that it can understand the significance of
the forms in fruits and plants and animals and apply it in the work of
the day.I sometimes think that the rise of the culinary arts is banishing this
fine old appreciation of fruits in their natural forms.Sandra moved to the bedroom.There are so
many ways of canning and preserving and evaporating and extracting the
juices, so many disguises and so much fabrication, that the fruit is
lost in the process.The tin-can and the bottle seem to have put an
insuperable barrier between us and nature, and it is difficult for us to
get back to a good munch of real apples under a tree or by the fireside.The difficulty is all the greater in our congested city life where
orchards and trees are only a vacant memory or stories told to the
young, and where the space in the larder is so small that apples must be
purchased by the quart.The eating of good apples out of hand seems to
be almost a lost art.Only the most indestructible kinds, along with
leather-skinned oranges and withered bananas, seem to be purchasable in
the market.The discriminating apple-eater in the Old World sends to a
grower for samples of the kinds that he grows; and after the inquirer
has tested them in the family, and discussed them, he orders his winter
supply.The American leaves the matter to the cook and she orders plain
apples; and she gets them.I wonder whether in time the perfection of fabrication will not reach
such a point that some fruits will be known to the great public only by
the picture on the package or on the bottle.Every process that removes
us one step farther from the earth is a distinct loss to the people, and
yet we are rapidly coming into the habit of taking all things at second
hand.My objection to the wine of the grape is not so much a question of
abstinence as of the fact that I find no particular satisfaction in the
shape and texture of a bottle.If one has a sensitive appreciation of the beauty in form and color and
modelling of the common fruits, he will find his interest gradually
extending to other products.Some time ago I visited Hood River Valley
in company with a rugged potato-grower from the Rocky Mountains.We were
amazed at the wonderful scenery, and captivated by the beauty of the
fruits.In one orchard the owner showed us with much satisfaction a
brace of apples of perfect form and glowing colors.Mary travelled to the hallway.When the grower had
properly expounded the marvels of Hood River apples, which he said were |
bedroom | Where is Sandra? | For twenty-five
years this grower had been raising and selecting the old Peachblow
potato, until he had a form much more perfect than the old Peachblow
ever was, with a uniform delicate pink skin, smooth surface, comely
shape, and medium size, and with eyes very small and scarcely sunken;
and my Hood River friend admitted that a potato as well as an apple may
be handsome and satisfying to the hand and to the eye, and well worth
carrying in one's pocket.But this was a high-bred potato, and not one
of the common lot.This episode of the potato allows me another opportunity to enforce my
contention that we lose the fruit or the vegetable in the processes of
cookery.The customary practice of "mashing" potatoes takes all the
individuality out of the product, and the result is mostly so much
starch.Cut a thin slice
across a potato and hold it to the light.Note the interior
undifferentiated mass, and then the thick band of rind surrounding it.The potato flavor and a large part of the nutriment lie in this
exterior.We slice this part away and fry, boil, or otherwise fuss up
the remainder.When we mash it, we go still farther and break down the
potato texture; and in the modern method we squeeze and strain it till
we eliminate every part of the potato, leaving only a pasty mass, which,
in my estimation, is not fit to eat.The potato should be cooked with
the rind on, if it is a good potato, and if it is necessary to remove
the outer skin the process should be performed after the cooking.John went to the office.The
most toothsome part of the potato is in these outer portions, if the
tuber is well grown and handled.We have so sophisticated the potato in
the modern disguised cookery that we often practically ruin it as an
article of food, and we have bred a race of people that sees nothing to
admire in a good and well-grown potato tuber.I now wish to take an excursion from the potato to the pumpkin.In all
the range of vegetable products, I doubt whether there is a more perfect
example of pleasing form, fine modelling, attractive texture and color,
and more bracing odor, than in a well-grown and ripe field pumpkin.Place a pumpkin on your table; run your fingers down its smooth grooves;
trace the furrows to the poles; take note of its form; absorb its rich
color; get the tang of its fragrance.The roughness and ruggedness of
its leaves, the sharp-angled stem strongly set, make a foil that a
sculptor cannot improve.Then wonder how this marvellous thing was born
out of your garden soil through the medium of one small strand of a
succulent stem.We all recognize the appeal of a bouquet of flowers, but we are unaware
that we may have a bouquet of fruits.We have given little attention to
arranging them, or any study of the kinds that consort well together,
nor have we receptacles in which effectively to display them.Yet,
apples and oranges and plums and grapes and nuts, and good melons and
cucumbers and peppers and carrots and onions, may be arranged into the
most artistic and satisfying combinations.Mary journeyed to the garden.I would fall short of my obligation if I were to stop with the fruit of
the tree and say nothing about the tree or the plant itself.In our
haste for lawn trees of new kinds and from the uttermost parts, we
forget that a fruit-tree is ornamental and that it provides acceptable
shade.A full-grown apple-tree or pear-tree is one of the most
individual and picturesque of trees.The foliage is good, the blossoms
as handsome as those of fancy imported things, the fruits always
interesting, and the tree is reliable.Nothing is more interesting than
an orange tree, in the regions where it grows, with its shining and
evergreen leaves and its continuing flowers and fruits.The practice of
planting apples and pears and sweet cherries, and other fruit and nut
trees, for shade and adornment is much to be commended in certain
places.But the point I wish specially to urge in this connection is the value
of many kinds of fruit-trees in real landscape work.We think of these
trees as single or separate specimens, but they may be used with good
result in mass planting, when it is desired to produce a given effect in
a large area or in one division of a property.I do not know that any
one has worked out full plans for the combining of fruit-trees, nuts,
and berry-bearing plants into good treatments, but it is much to be
desired that this shall be done.John went to the garden.Any of you can picture a sweep of
countryside planted to these things that would be not only novel and
striking, but at the same time conformable to the best traditions of
artistic rendering.I think it should be a fundamental purpose in our educational plans to
acquaint the people with the common resources of the region, and
particularly with those materials on which we subsist.If this is
accepted, then we cannot deprive our parks, highways, and school grounds
of the trees that bear the staple fruits.It is worth while to have an
intellectual interest in a fruit-tree.John journeyed to the hallway.I know a fruit-grower who secures
many prizes for his apples and his pears; when he secures a blue ribbon,
he ties it on the tree that bore the fruit.The admiration of a good domestic animal is much to be desired.It
develops a most responsible attitude in the man or the woman.I have
observed a peculiar charm in the breeders of these wonderful animals, a
certain poise and masterfulness and breadth of sympathy.To admire a
good horse and to know just why he admires him is a great resource to
any man, as also to feel the responsibility for the care and health of
any flock or herd.Fowls, pigs, sheep on their pastures, cows, mules,
all perfect of their kind, all sensitive, all of them marvellous in
their forms and powers,--verily these are good to know.If the raw materials grow out of the holy earth, then a man should have
pride in producing them, and also in handling them.As a man thinketh of
his materials, so doth he profit in the use of them.There is a wide-spread feeling that in some way these materials
reflect themselves in a man's bearing.One type of man grows out of the
handling of rocks, another out of the handling of fishes, another out of
the growing of the products from the good earth.All irreverence in the
handling of these materials that come out of the earth's bounty, and all
waste and poor workmanship, make for a low spiritual expression.The farmer specially should be proud of his materials, he is so close to
the sources and so hard against the backgrounds.Moreover, he cannot
conceal his materials.He cannot lock up his farm or disguise his crops.He lives on his farm, and visibly with his products.The architect does
not live in the houses and temples he builds.The engineer does not live
on his bridge.Even the sailor has
his home away from his ship.But the farmer cannot separate himself from
his works.Every bushel of buckwheat and every barrel of apples and
every bale of cotton bears his name; the beef that he takes to market,
the sheep that he herds on his pastures, the horse that he
drives,--these are his products and they carry his name.He should have
the same pride in these--his productions--as another who builds a
machine, or another who writes a book about them.The admiration of a
field of hay, of a cow producing milk, of a shapely and fragrant head of
cabbage, is a great force for good.It would mean much if we could celebrate the raw materials and the
products.Particularly is it good to celebrate the yearly bounty.The
Puritans recognized their immediate dependence on the products of the
ground, and their celebration was connected with religion.I should be
sorry if our celebrations were to be wholly secular.Sandra went to the hallway.We have been much given to the display of fabricated materials,--of the
products of looms, lathes, foundries, and many factories of skill.We
also exhibit the agricultural produce, but largely in a crass and rude
way to display bulk and to win prizes.We now begin to arrange our
exhibitions for color effect, comparison, and educational influence.But
we do not justly understand the natural products when we confine them to
formal exhibitions.They must be incorporated into many celebrations,
expressing therein the earth's bounty and our appreciation of it.The
usual and common products, domesticated and wild, should be gathered in
these occasions, and not for competition or for prize awards or even for
display, but for their intrinsic qualities.An apple day or an apple
sabbath would teach the people to express their gratitude for apples.The moral obligation to grow good apples, to handle them honestly, to
treat the soil and the trees fairly and reverently, could be developed
as a living practical philosophy into the working-days of an
apple-growing people.The technical knowledge we now possess requires
the moral support of a stimulated public appreciation to make it a
thoroughly effective force.John went to the bedroom.Many of the products and crops lend themselves well to this kind of
admiration, and all of them should awaken gratitude and reverence.Nor is it necessary that this
gratitude be expressed only in collected materials, or that all
preaching and all teaching shall be indoors.The best understanding of
our relations to the earth will be possible when we learn how to apply
our devotions in the open places._The keeping of the beautiful earth_
The proper care-taking of the earth lies not alone in maintaining its
fertility or in safeguarding its products.The lines of beauty that
appeal to the eye and the charm that satisfies the five senses are in
our keeping.The natural landscape is always interesting and it is satisfying.Sandra moved to the bedroom.The
physical universe is the source of art.We know no other form and color
than that which we see in nature or derive from it.If art is true to
its theme, it is one expression of morals.If it is a moral obligation
to express the art-sense in painting and sculpture and literature and
music, so is it an equal obligation to express it in good landscape.Of the first importance is it that the race keep its artistic
backgrounds, and not alone for the few who may travel far and near and
who may pause deliberately, but also for those more numerous folk who
must remain with the daily toil and catch the far look only as they
labor.To put the best expression of any landscape into the
consciousness of one's day's work is more to be desired than much
riches.When we complete our conquest, there will be no unseemly
landscapes.The abundance of violated landscapes is proof that we have not yet
mastered.The farmer does not have full command of his situation until
the landscape is a part of his farming.Farms may be units in
well-developed and pleasing landscapes, beautiful in their combinations
with other farms and appropriate to their setting as well as attractive
in themselves.No one has a moral right to contribute unsightly factory premises or a
forbidding commercial establishment to any community.And I--well, I did my best to
appear, if not happy, at least reasonably calm and companionable.It was
a hard job for both of us; certainly my part of it was hard enough.Appearances had to be considered and so we invented a tale of a visit
to relatives in another part of England to account for the unannounced
departure of Miss Morley.This excuse served with the neighbors and
friends not in the secret and, for the benefit of the servants, Hephzy
elaborated the deceit by pretending eagerness at the arrival of the
mails and by certain vague remarks at table concerning letters she was
writing."I AM writing 'em, too, Hosy," she said.Of course I don't mail the letters, but it sort of squares things with
my conscience to really write after talking so much about it.As for her
visitin' relatives--well, she's got relatives somewhere in England, we
know that much, and she MAY be visitin' 'em.At any rate I try to think
she is.Oh, dear, I'most wish I'd had more experience in tellin' lies;
then I wouldn't have to invent so many extra ones to make me believe
those I told at the beginnin'.I wish I'd been brought up a book agent
or a weather prophet or somethin' like that; then I'd have been in
trainin'."Without any definite agreement we had fallen into the habit of not
mentioning the name of Little Frank, even when we were alone together.In consequence, on these occasions, there would be long intervals
of silence suddenly broken by Hephzy's bursting out with a surmise
concerning what was happening in Bayport, whether they had painted the
public library building yet, or how Susanna was getting on with the cat
and hens.She had received three letters from Miss Wixon and, as news
bearers, they were far from satisfactory."That girl makes me so provoked," sniffed Hephzy, dropping the most
recent letter in her lap with a gesture of disgust."She says she's got
a cold in the head and she's scared to death for fear it'll get'set
onto her,' whatever that is.Two pages of this letter is nothin' but
cold in the head and t'other two is about a new hat she's goin' to have
and she don't know whether to trim it with roses or forget-me-nots.If
she trimmed it with cabbage 'twould match her head better'n anything
else.she ought to be thankful she's got a cold in a head
like hers; it must be comfortin' to know there's SOMETHIN' there.You've
got a letter, too, Hosy."From Campbell," I answered, wearily."He wants to know how the novel is
getting on, of course."Mary travelled to the hallway.Well, you write him that it's gettin' on the way a squid gets
ahead--by goin' backwards.Don't let him pester you one bit, Hosy.You
write that novel just as fast or slow as you feel like.He told you to
take a vacation, anyway."Pleasant days they were, so far
as the weather was concerned.I spent them somehow, walking, riding,
golfing, reading.I gave up trying to work; the half-written novel
remained half written.I could not concentrate my thoughts upon it and I
lacked the courage to force myself to try.I wrote Campbell that he must
be patient, I was doing the best I could.He answered by telling me not
to worry, to enjoy myself."I ordered you to travel, not to plant yourself in one place and die
of dry rot.A British oyster is mighty little improvement on a Cape Cod
quahaug.You have been in that rectory about long enough.You'll find it there--or lose it."It may have been good advice--or bad--according to the way in which
it was understood, but, good or bad, it didn't appeal to me.I had no
desire to travel, unless it were to travel back to Bayport, where I
belonged.I felt no interest in Monte Carlo--for the matter of that, I
felt no interest in Mayberry or anywhere else.I was not interested in
anything or anybody--except one, and that one had gone out of my life.Night after night I went to sleep determining to forget and morning
after morning I awoke only to remember, and with the same dull, hopeless
heartache and longing.Our
lease was up on the first of October.The Coles would return then and we
should be obliged to go elsewhere, whether we wished to or not.Hephzy,
although she did not say much about it, was willing to go, I think.Her
"presentiment" had remained only a presentiment so far; no word came
from Little Frank.We had heard or learned nothing concerning her or her
whereabouts.Our neighbors and friends in Mayberry were as kind and neighborly as
ever.For the first few days after our interview with Doctor Bayliss,
Senior, Hephzy and I saw nothing of him or his family.John travelled to the garden.His son had yielded to his
parents' entreaties and had departed for a walking tour through the
Black Forest with some friends.Daniel went back to the bedroom."The invitation came at exactly the right time," said the old gentleman."Herbert was ready to go anywhere or do anything.The poor boy was in
the depths and when his mother and I urged him to accept he did so.We
are hoping that when he returns he will have forgotten, or, if not |
office | Where is Mary? | Heathcroft came and went at various times during the summer.I met him
on the golf course and he was condescendingly friendly as ever.Our talk
concerning Frances, which had brought such momentous consequences to
her and to Hephzy and to me, had, apparently, not disturbed him in the
least.He greeted me blandly and cheerfully, asked how we all were, said
he had been given to understand that "my charming little niece" was no
longer with us, and proceeded to beat me two down in eighteen holes.I played several times with him afterward and, under different
circumstances, should have enjoyed doing so, for we were pretty evenly
matched.His aunt, the Lady of the Manor, I also met.She went out of her way to
be as sweetly gracious as possible.I presume she inferred from Frances'
departure that I had taken her hint and had removed the disturbing
influence from her nephew's primrose-bordered path.At each of our
meetings she spoke of the "invitation golf tournament," several times
postponed and now to be played within a fortnight.She insisted that
I must take part in it.At last, having done everything except decline
absolutely, I finally consented to enter the tournament.It is not
easy to refuse to obey an imperial decree and Lady Carey was Empress of
Mayberry.After accepting I returned to the rectory to find that Hephzy also had
received an invitation.Not to play golf, of course; her invitation was
of a totally different kind."I've got a letter and you can't
guess who it's from."You don't suppose I'd be as excited as all this over a letter
from Susanna Wixon, do you?Hepton, who had the Nickerson cottage last summer.She and her husband
are in Paris and they want us to meet 'em there in a couple of weeks and
go for a short trip through Switzerland.Hepton writes that they're countin'
on our company.They're goin' to Lake Lucerne and to Mont Blanc and
everywhere.The Heptons had been summer neighbors of ours on the Cape for several
seasons.They were friends of Jim Campbell's and had first come to
Bayport on his recommendation.I liked them very well, and, oddly
enough, for I was not popular with the summer colony, they had seemed to
like me."It was very kind of them to think of us," I said."Campbell shouldn't
have given them our address, of course, but their invitation was well
meant.Make our refusal as polite as
possible.""Then you think I'd better say no?"You weren't thinking of accepting, were you?"I'm not sure that our goin' wouldn't be the right
thing.I've been considerin' for some time, Hosy, and I've about come to
the conclusion that stayin' here is bad for you.Maybe it's bad for both
of us.I exclaimed; "this is a change of heart,
Hephzy.A while ago, when I suggested going back to Bayport, you
wouldn't hear of it.You wanted to stay here and--and wait."And I've been waitin', but nothin' has come of it.I've
still got my presentiment, Hosy.I believe just as strong as I ever did
that some time or other she and you and I will be together again.But
stayin' here and seein' nobody but each other and broodin' don't do us
any good.It's doin' you harm; that's plain enough.You don't write and
you don't eat--that is, not much--and you're gettin' bluer and more thin
and peaked every day.You have just got to go away from here, no matter
whether I do or not.And I've reached the point where I'm willin' to go,
too.Our lease isn't
up until October and we can leave the servants here and give them our
address to have mail forwarded.If--if she--that is, if a letter or--or
anything--SHOULD come we could hurry right back.The Heptons are real
nice folks; you always liked 'em, Hosy.And you always wanted to see
Switzerland; you used to say so.Why don't we say yes and go along?"I believed I understood the reason for Campbell's
giving our address to the Heptons; also the reason for the invitation.Jim was very anxious to have me leave Mayberry; he believed travel and
change of scene were what I needed.Doubtless he had put the Heptons up
to asking us to join them on their trip.It was merely an addition to
his precious prescription."I should be poor company on a
pleasure trip like that.There is no reason in
the world why you shouldn't go.Go, by
all means, and enjoy yourself.""I'd do a lot of enjoyin' without you, wouldn't I," she observed."While I was lookin' at the scenery I'd be wonderin' what you had for
breakfast.Every mite of rain would set me to thinkin' of your gettin'
your feet wet and when I laid eyes on a snow peak I'd wonder if you had
blankets enough on your bed.I'd be like that yellow cat we used to have
back in the time when Father was alive.That cat had kittens and Father
had 'em all drowned but one.After that you never saw the cat anywhere
unless the kitten was there, too.She wouldn't eat unless it were with
her and between bites she'd sit down on it so it couldn't run off.She
lugged it around in her mouth until Father used to vow he'd have eyelet
holes punched in the scruff of its neck for her teeth to fit into and
make it easier for both of 'em.It died, finally; she wore it out,
I guess likely.Then she adopted a chicken and started luggin' that
around.I'm a good deal like her, Hosy.I've
took care of you so long that I've got the habit.No, I shouldn't go
unless you did."No amount of urging moved her, so we dropped the subject.The morning of the golf tournament was clear and fine.I shouldered my
bag of clubs and walked through the lane toward the first tee.I never
felt less like playing or more inclined to feign illness and remain at
home.But I had promised Lady Carey and the promise must be kept.There was a group of people, players and guests, awaiting me at the tee.Her ladyship was there, of course; so also was her nephew, Mr.Carleton
Heathcroft, whom I had not seen for some time.Heathcroft was in
conversation with a young fellow who, when he turned in my direction,
I recognized as Herbert Bayliss.I was surprised to see him; I had not
heard of his return from the Black Forest trip.Lady Carey was affable and gracious, also very important and busy.She
welcomed me absent-mindedly, introduced me to several of her guests,
ladies and gentlemen from London down for the week-end, and then bustled
away to confer with Mr.Handliss, steward of the estate, concerning the
arrangements for the tournament.I felt a touch on my arm and, turning,
found Doctor Bayliss standing beside me.He was smiling and in apparent
good humor."The boy is back, Knowles," he said."Yes," said I, "I have seen him, although we haven't met yet.I was
surprised to find him here.He's looking very fit, don't you think?"I had not noticed that young Bayliss was looking either more or
less fit than usual, but I answered as I did because the old gentleman
seemed so very anxious that I should."Yes,"
he said, "he's looking very fit indeed.I think his trip has benefited
him hugely.And I think--Yes, I think he is beginning to forget
his--that is to say, I believe he does not dwell upon the--the recent
happenings as he did.I think he is forgetting; I really think he is.""Indeed," said I. It struck me that, if Herbert Bayliss was forgetting,
his memory must be remarkably short.I imagined that his father's wish
was parent to the thought."He has--ah--scarcely mentioned our--our young friend's name since his
return," went on the doctor."He did ask if you had heard--ah--by the
way, Knowles, you haven't heard, have you?"That's very odd, now isn't it."If he had said it I should not have
believed him.If ever anything was plain it was that the longer we
remained without news of Frances Morley the better pleased Herbert
Bayliss's parents would be."But I say, Knowles," he added, "you and he must meet, you know.He
doesn't hold any ill-feeling or--or resentment toward you."Perhaps it would be just as well not to refer to--to--You understand
me, Knowles.Oh, Herbert, here is
Knowles waiting to shake hands with you."The shake, on his part, was cordial enough, perhaps, but
not too cordial.It struck me that young Bayliss was neither as "fit"
nor as forgetful as his fond parents wished to believe.He looked rather
worn and nervous, it seemed to me.I asked him about his tramping trip
and we chatted for a few moments.Then Bayliss, Senior, was called by
Lady Carey and Handliss to join the discussion concerning the tournament
rules and the young man and I were left alone together."Knowles," he asked, the moment after his father's departure, "have you
heard anything?You're not--"
"I am quite sure.We haven't heard nor do we expect to."He looked away across the course and I heard him draw a long breath."It's deucedly odd, this," he said."How she could disappear so entirely
I don't understand.And you have no idea where she may be?""But--but, confound it, man, aren't you trying to find her?""You know why not as well as I. She left us of her own free will and her
parting request was that we should not follow her.Pardon me, but I think it should be for all her friends.""I'll find her," he declared, fiercely.Handliss stepped to the first
tee, clapped his hands to attract attention and began a little speech.The tournament, he said, was about to begin.Play would be, owing to the
length and difficulty of the course, but eighteen holes instead of the
usual thirty-six.This meant that each pair of contestants would play
the nine holes twice.Handicaps had been fixed as equitably as possible
according to each player's previous record, and players having
similar handicaps were to play against each other.A light lunch and
refreshments would be served after the first round had been completed
by all.Prizes would be distributed by her ladyship when the final round
was finished.Her ladyship bade us all welcome and was gratified by our
acceptance of her invitation.He would now proceed to read the names
of those who were to play against each other, stating handicaps and the
like.He read accordingly, and I learned that my opponent was to be Mr.Heathcroft, each of us having a handicap of two.Considering everything I thought my particular handicap a stiff one.Heathcroft had been in the habit of beating me in two out of three
of our matches.Being the only
outlander on the course I couldn't help feeling that the sporting
reputation of Yankeeland rested, for this day at least, upon my
shoulders.The players were sent off in pairs, the less skilled first.Heathcroft
and I were next to the last.A London attorney by the name of Jaynes
and a Wrayton divine named Wilson followed us.Their rating was one plus
and, judging by the conversation of the "gallery," they were looked upon
as winners of the first and second prizes respectively.Wilson was called, behind his back, "the sporting curate."In gorgeous
tweeds and a shepherd's plaid cap he looked the part.An usually long drive and a lucky putt on the
eighth gave me the round by one.I played with care and tried my
hardest to keep my mind on the game.Heathcroft was, as always, calm and
careful, but between tees he was pleased to be chatty and affable."And how is the aunt with the odd name, Knowles?""Does she
still devour her--er--washing flannels and treacle for breakfast?""She does when she cares to," I replied."She is an independent lady, as
I think you know."I
had my bookselling fellow look up a novel of yours the other day.Began
it that same night, by Jove!I should
have finished it, I think, but some of the chaps at the club telephoned
me to join them for a bit of bridge and of course that ended literature
for the time.Sandra travelled to the bathroom.My respected aunt tells me I'm quite dotty on bridge.She
foresees a gambler's end for me, stony broke, languishing in dungeons
and all that sort of thing.I am to die of starvation, I think.Is it
starvation gamblers die of?'Pon my soul, I should say most of those I
know would be more likely to die of thirst."And how is the pretty niece, Knowles?""When is she coming
back to the monastery or the nunnery or rectory, or whatever it is?""I don't know," I replied, curtly.That would be a calamity, now
wouldn't it?I should mind your notice boards,
of course.But if I were condemned, as you are, to spend a summer among
the feminine beauties of Mayberry, a face like hers would be like a
whisky and soda in a thirsty land, as a chap I know is fond of saying.Oh, and by the way, speaking of your niece, I had a curious experience
in Paris a week ago.Mary travelled to the office.For the moment I began
to believe I really was going dotty, as Auntie fears.He did not tell it during that round, forgot it probably.The longer he kept clear of the subject of my "niece" the
more satisfied I was.We lunched in the pavilion by the first tee.There
were sandwiches and biscuits--crackers, of course--and cakes and sweets
galore.Also thirst-quenching materials sufficient to satisfy even the
gamblers of Mr.The "sporting curate," behind
a huge Scotch and soda, was relating his mishaps in approaching the
seventh hole for the benefit of his brother churchmen, Messrs.Lady Carey was dilating upon her pet subject, the talents
and virtues of "Carleton, dear," for the benefit of the London attorney,
who was pretending to listen with the respectful interest due blood and
title, but who was thinking of something else, I am sure."Carleton,
dear," himself, was chatting languidly with young Bayliss.I was surprised to see him so cordial to Heathcroft; I knew he did not
like Lady Carey's nephew.The second and final round of the tournament began.For six holes
Heathcroft and I broke even.The seventh he won, making us square for
the match so far and, with an equal number of strokes.Halving there would mean a drawn
match between us and a drawing for choice of prizes, provided we were in
the prize-winning class.A win for either of us meant the match itself.Heathcroft, in spite of the close play, was as bland and unconcerned as
ever.As a matter of fact, I wanted to win.Not because of the possible prize, I cared little for that, but for the
pleasure of winning against him.We drove from the ninth tee, each got
a long brassy shot which put us on the edge of the green, and then
strolled up the hill together."I say, Knowles," he observed; "I haven't finished telling you of my
Paris experience, have I. Odd coincidence, by Jove!I was telling young
Bayliss about it just now and he thought it odd, too.I was--some other
chaps and I drifted into the Abbey over in Paris a week or so ago and
while we were there a girl came out and sang.She was an extremely
pretty girl, you understand, but that wasn't the extraordinary part of
it.the very picture of your niece, Miss
Morley.Upon my soul I thought it
was she!She sang extremely well, but not for long.I tried to get near
her--meant to speak to her, you know, but she had gone before I reached
her. |
hallway | Where is Sandra? | I had not said anything--at least I think I had not."Oh, you mustn't be offended," he said, laughing."Of course I knew
it wasn't she--that is, I should have known it if I hadn't been so
staggered by the resemblance.The
face, the voice--everything was like hers.I was so dotty about it that
I even hunted up one of the chaps in charge and asked him who the
girl was.He said she was an Austrian--Mademoiselle Juno or Junotte or
something.I was a fool to imagine anything
else, of course.But you would have been a bit staggered if you had
seen her.I say, I hope I haven't hurt your feelings, old chap.I apologize to you and Miss Morley, you understand.I couldn't help
telling you; it was extraordinary now, wasn't it."He rattled on about that sort of thing making one
believe in the Prisoner of Zenda stuff, doubles and all that.My ball lay nearest the pin and it was his putt.He made
it, a beauty, the ball halting just at the edge of the cup.It took me two and I had to
concentrate my thought by main strength even then.He was very decent about it, proclaimed himself lucky, declared I had,
generally speaking, played much the better game and should have won
easily.I paid little attention to what he said although I did, of
course, congratulate him and laughed at the idea that luck had anything
to do with the result.I no longer cared about the match or the
tournament in general or anything connected with them.His story of the
girl who was singing in Paris was what I was interested in now.I wanted
him to tell me more, to give me particulars.I wanted to ask him a dozen
questions; and, yet, excited as I was, I realized that those questions
must be asked carefully.Before I could ask the first of the dozen Mr.Handliss bustled over to
us to learn the result of our play and to announce that the distribution
of prizes would take place in a few moments; also that Lady Carey wished
to speak with her nephew.The latter sauntered off to join the group by
the pavilion and my opportunity for questioning had gone, for the time.Of the distribution of prizes, with its accompanying ceremony, I seem
to recall very little.Lady Carey made a little speech, I remember that,
but just what she said I have forgotten."Much pleasure in rewarding
skill," "Dear old Scottish game," "English sportsmanship," "Race not to
the swift"--I must have been splashed with these drops from the fountain
of oratory, for they stick in my memory.Then, in turn, the winners were
called up to select their prizes.Wilson, the London attorney, headed
the list; the sporting curate came next; Heathcroft next; and then I.
It had not occurred to me that I should win a prize.In fact I had not
thought anything about it.My thoughts were far from the golf course
just then.Sandra travelled to the bathroom.They were in Paris, in a cathedral--Heathcroft had called it
an abbey, but cathedral he must have meant--where a girl who looked like
Frances Morley was singing.Handliss called my name I answered and stepped
forward.Her Ladyship said something or other about "our cousin from
across the sea" and "Anglo-Saxon blood" and her especial pleasure in
awarding the prize.I stammered thanks, rather incoherently expressed
they were, I fear, selected the first article that came to hand--it
happened to be a cigarette case; I never smoke cigarettes--and retired
to the outer circle.The other winners--Herbert Bayliss and Worcester
among them--selected their prizes and then Mr.Wilson, winner of the
tournament, speaking in behalf of us all, thanked the hostess for her
kindness and hospitality.Her gracious invitation to play upon the Manor-House course Mr.Also the gracious condescension in presenting the
prizes with her own hand.They would be cherished, not only for their
own sake, but for that of the donor.He begged the liberty of proposing
her ladyship's health.The "liberty" was, apparently, expected, for Mr.Handliss had full
glasses ready and waiting.Lady Carey drank ours
in return, and the ceremony was over.I tried in vain to get another word with Heathcroft.He was in
conversation with his aunt and several of the feminine friends and,
although I waited for some time, I, at last, gave up the attempt and
walked home.The Reverend Judson would have accompanied me, but I
avoided him.I did not wish to listen to Mayberry gossip; I wanted to be
alone.Heathcroft's tale had made a great impression upon me--a most
unreasonable impression, unwarranted by the scant facts as he related
them.The girl whom he had seen resembled Frances--yes; but she was an
Austrian, her name was not Morley.That Frances should be singing in a Paris church was most improbable;
but, so far as that went, the fact of A. Carleton Heathcroft's attending
a church service I should, ordinarily, have considered improbable.Suppose the girl he had seen was Frances.But even supposing it was she, what difference did it make--to me?She had asked us not to follow her, to make no attempt to
find her.I had preached compliance with her wish to Hephzy, to Doctor
Bayliss--yes, to Herbert Bayliss that very afternoon.But Herbert
Bayliss was sworn to find her, in spite of me, in spite of the Evil One.And Heathcroft had told young Bayliss the same story he had told me.HE
would not be deterred by scruples; her wish would not prevent his going
to Paris in search of her.I reached the rectory, to be welcomed by Hephzy with questions
concerning the outcome of the tournament and triumphant gloatings over
my perfectly useless prize.I did not tell her of Heathcroft's story.I merely said I had met that gentleman and that Herbert Bayliss had
returned to Mayberry."Hephzy," I asked, "when do the Heptons leave Paris for their trip
through Switzerland?""Today is the eighteenth,
isn't it.They start on the twenty-second; that's four days from now.""Of course you have written them that we cannot accept their invitation
to go along?""Why, no," she admitted, "I haven't.That is, I have
written 'em, but I haven't posted the letter.Shows what livin' in a different place'll do even to
as settled a body as I am.In Bayport I should have said'mailed' the
letter, same as anybody else.I must be careful or I'll go back home
and call the expressman a 'carrier' and a pie a 'tart' and a cracker a
'biscuit.'I remember readin' how David Copperfield's aunt
always used to eat biscuits soaked in port wine before she went to bed.I used to think 'twas dreadful dissipated business and that the old
lady must have been ready for bed by the time she got through.You see
I always had riz biscuits in mind.A cracker's different; crackers don't
soak up much.We'd ought to be careful how we judge folks, hadn't we,
Hosy.""So you haven't posted the letter to the
Heptons."Well--well, to tell you the truth, Hosy, I was kind of hopin' you might
change your mind and decide to go, after all.I wish you would; 'twould
do you good.And," wistfully, "Switzerland must be lovely.I
know just how you feel, you poor boy."I'll--I'll see to it."I put it in my pocket, but I did not
post it that evening.A plan--or the possible beginning of a plan--was
forming in my mind.The little sleep I had was filled
with dreams, dreams from which I awoke to toss restlessly.I rose and
walked the floor, calling myself a fool, a silly old fool, over and
over again.But when morning came my plan, a ridiculous, wild plan from
which, even if it succeeded--which was most unlikely--nothing but added
trouble and despair could possibly come, my plan was nearer its ultimate
formation.At eleven o'clock that forenoon I walked up the marble steps of the
Manor House and rang the bell.The butler, an exalted personage in
livery, answered my ring.Heathcroft had
left for London by the morning train.Her ladyship was in her boudoir.She did not see anyone in the morning, sir.I had no wish to see her
ladyship, but Heathcroft's departure was a distinct disappointment.I
thanked the butler and, remembering that even cathedral ushers accepted
tips, slipped a shilling into his hand.His dignity thawed at the silver
touch, and he expressed regret at Mr."You're not the only gentleman who has been here to see him this
morning, sir," he said."Doctor Bayliss, the younger one, called about
an hour ago.He seemed quite as sorry to find him gone as you are, sir."When I again entered the rectory my mind was
made up.The decision was foolish, insane, even dishonorable perhaps,
but the decision was made."Hephzy," said I, "I have changed my mind.I have
telegraphed the Heptons that we will join them in Paris on the evening
of the twenty-first.Mary travelled to the office.Hephzy's delight was as great as her surprise.She said I was a dear,
unselfish boy.Considering what I intended doing I felt decidedly mean;
but I did not tell her what that intention was.We took the two-twenty train from Charing Cross on the afternoon of the
twenty-first.The servants had been left in charge of the rectory.We
would return in a fortnight, so we told them.It was a beautiful day, bright and sunshiny, but, after smoky, grimy
London had been left behind and we were whizzing through the Kentish
countryside, between the hop fields and the pastures where the sheep
were feeding, we noticed that a stiff breeze was blowing.Further on,
as we wound amid the downs near Folkestone, the bending trees and shrubs
proved that the breeze was a miniature gale.And when we came in sight
of the Channel, it was thickly sprinkled with whitecaps from beach to
horizon."I imagine we shall have a rather rough passage, Hephzy," said I.
Hephzy's attention was otherwise engaged."Why do they call a hill a 'down' over here?""I should think
an 'up' would be better.I
guess that won't bother you and me much.This little mite of water can't
seem very much stirred up to folks who have sailed clear across the
Atlantic Ocean.I used to think Cape
Cod Bay was about all the water there was.Travelin' does make such
a difference in a person's ideas.Do you remember the Englishwoman at
Bancroft's who told me that she supposed the Thames must remind us of
our own Mississippi?""So that's the famous English Channel, is it," she observed, a moment
later."About twenty miles at the narrowest point, I believe," I said.About as far as Bayport to Provincetown.Well, I don't
know whether any of your ancestors or mine came over with William the
Conquerer or not, but if they did, they didn't have far to come.I
cal'late I'll be contented with having my folks cross in the Mayflower.She was inclined to regard the Channel rather contemptuously just then.The steamer was awaiting us at the pier.As the throng of passengers
filed up the gang-plank she suddenly squeezed my arm.And
yet I was almost certain 'twas him.""I thought I did, but I guess I was mistaken.He's just got home; he
wouldn't be startin' off again so soon.No, it couldn't have been him,
but I did think--"
I stopped short."I thought I saw Doctor Herbert Bayliss goin' up those stairs to the
steamboat.It looked like him enough to be his twin brother, if he had
one."I looked about as we stepped aboard the boat, but
if young Bayliss was there he was not in sight.Hephzy rattled on
excitedly."You can't tell much by seein' folks's backs," she declared."I remember
one time your cousin Hezekiah Knowles--You don't remember him, Hosy; he
died when you was little--One time Cousin Hezzy was up to Boston with
his wife and they was shoppin' in one of the big stores.That is, Martha
Ann--the wife--was shoppin' and he was taggin' along and complainin',
same as men generally do.He was kind of nearsighted, Hezzy was, and
when Martha was fightin' to get a place in front of a bargain counter he
stayed astern and kept his eyes fixed on a hat she was wearin'.'Twas a
new hat with blue and yellow flowers on it.Hezzy always said, when he
told the yarn afterward, that he never once figured that there could
be another hat like that one.I saw it myself and, if I'd been in his
place, I'd have HOPED there wasn't anyway.Well, he followed that hat
from one counter to another and, at last, he stepped up and said, 'Look
here, dearie,' he says--They hadn't been married very long, not long
enough to get out of the mushy stage--'Look here, dearie,' he says,
'hadn't we better be gettin' on home?You'll tire those little feet of
yours all out trottin' around this way.'And when the hat turned around
there was a face under it as black as a crow.Sandra travelled to the hallway.He'd been followin' a
darkey woman for ten minutes.She thought he was makin' fun of her feet
and was awful mad, and when Martha came along and found who he'd taken
for her she was madder still.Hezzy said, 'I couldn't help it, Martha.I never saw two craft look more alike from twenty foot
astern.And she wears that hat just the way you do.'That didn't help
matters any, of course, and--Why, Hosy, where are you goin'?All the good seats will be
gone if we don't."I had been struggling through the crowd, trying my best to get a glimpse
of the man she had thought to be Herbert Bayliss.If it was he then my
suspicions were confirmed.Heathcroft's story of the girl who sang in
Paris had impressed him as it had me and he was on his way to see for
himself.But the man, whoever he might be, had disappeared."How the wind does blow," said Hephzy."What are the people doin' with
those black tarpaulins?"In the end Jerningham
accepted a little less; but the deal yielded him a net profit of about
two million dollars.Mary moved to the bathroom.This
convinced Stewardson and the other victims that Jerningham was out of
his mind; but there is no law that enables officers of a trust company
to imprison a gold maniac or to take away his gold, particularly when
his lawyers stand very high in the profession.Five minutes after getting the gold coin in his possession--and drawing
every cent of it--Jerningham told Stewardson he would leave the dust in
the VanTwiller vaults.That reassured Stewardson, who otherwise might
have suspected Jerningham of various crimes.He then sent two cablegrams
to London.One was to
_Kathryn Keogh,_
_Thornton's Hotel, London._
_Your services are no longer needed.The other was to Francis Wolfe--same address.It read:
_You ought to marry Kathryn Keogh.Letter follows._
_Jerningham._
Francis Wolfe showed his cablegram to Miss Keogh and Miss Keogh did not
show hers to Francis Wolfe.A week later Frank asked Miss Keogh to read a letter he had received
from Jerningham, and to tell him what to do.Dear Boy,--We needed a million or two out of Ashton Welles, and the only
way we could see of getting it was by selling to him what he already
had--to wit, the control of the VanTwiller Trust Company.From previous
operations the syndicate I have the honor to |
office | Where is Sandra? | So we planned our
operations very carefully, as we always do.And because I like you I
will tell you how we went about it--that you may profit by our example.First, I had to become instantly and sensationally known as the
possessor of vast wealth.The mere deposit of a million or two in a
bank would not do it.We must have the cash and a stupendous cash-making
property--hence the mines in the Klondike.We sent to Alaska, bought $1,686,000 of gold-dust, put it in boxes,
and put a lot of lead in other boxes--now in the VanT.vaults!--thereby
increasing our less than two million into more than eight--and nobody
hurt thereby!Then the shipment to Seattle, so that every step could be
verified--and the special bullion train to New York; and the eccentric
miner--myself--with his gold--no myth about the gold--what?in a New
York hotel; and of course the reporters were only too willing to help
and to magnify our gold-dust.The _Planet's_ articles were our letters of introduction to the trust
company and to Wall Street.But
how to catch Welles off his guard?Welles must go
to England with you on the same steamer.By winning your friendship
and rousing your romantic interest in an unhappy love-affair--that
would, moreover, explain my interest in Mrs.Of course there
never was any Naida Deering for me to be interested in!Sandra travelled to the bathroom.But you had to meet Welles's wife.Welles take the same steamer that you did?Mary travelled to the office.I admit that much of what we were compelled to do was not gentlemanly;
but, after all, our only crime is the crime of having been business
men--buying something at four dollars and selling it at five or six
dollars.Take my advice, dear boy, and stay on the water-wagon!If you marry Miss
Keogh I think you can show this letter to A. Welles and ask him to give
you a nice position in the trust company.I am sorry I cannot see you again; but believe me, dear boy, that we
are very grateful for your efficient assistance.We would send you a
check--only we need it in our business.Tell Jimmy Parkhurst to tell you
and Amos F. Kidder all about it.Yours truly,
The Plunder Recovery Syndicate, Per Alfred Jerningham.But it was a long time before Frank Wolfe returned to New York--without
Miss Keogh, who flatly refused to marry him.Jerningham had disappeared,
leaving absolutely no trail.Parkhurst introduced Frank Wolfe to Fiske,
but all that came of it was that Fiske added a few fresh notes to his
collection.IV--CHEAP AT A MILLION
I
TOM MERRIWETHER, only son and heir of E. H. Merriwether, finished the
grape-fruit and took up the last of that morning's mail.He had acquired
the feminine habit of reading letters at the table from his father, who
had the wasteful American vice of time-saving.He read the card, frowned, glanced at his father, and seemed to be on
the point of speaking; but he changed his mind, laughed, and tore the
card into bits.The day was Monday, and this was what the card said:
_If Mr.Thomas Thorne Merriwether will go to 777 Fifth Avenue any
forenoon this week and answer just one little question about his past
life he will hear something to his advantage._
Idle men who live in New York are always busy.Tom had many things to
think about; but all of them were about the present or the future.His
past caused him neither uneasiness nor remorse.Merriwether received, among other
invitations, this:
_If Tom Merriwether will call at 777 Fifth Avenue any forenoon this week
and answer one question he will do that which is both kindly--and wise!_
It was in the same handwriting, on the same kind of card, and in the
same kind of ink as the first.Now Tom had the Merriwether imagination.His father exercised it in building railroads into waterless deserts
whereon he clearly saw a myriad men labor, love, and multiply, thereby
insuring freight and passengers to the same railroads.The son had to
invent his romances in New York.Ordinarily the second invitation would have given him something to busy
himself with; but it happened that he was at that moment planning to do
a heartbreaking thing without breaking any heart.Billy Larremore, the
veteran whose devotion to polo was responsible for so many of the
team's victories in the past, was not aware that age had bade him cease
playing.It would break his loyal heart not to play in the forthcoming
international match.Tom Merriwether had been delegated to break the
news.Thinking about it made him forget all about the letter until the
following Monday, when he received the third invitation:
_Merriwether,--Come to 777 Fifth Avenue Tuesday morning at ten-thirty
without fail and answer the question._
He crumpled the card and was about to throw it away when he changed his
mind.Perhaps it would be wise to give it to a detective agency.Somebody wished to put him in the ridiculous position of ringing the
bell of 777, showing the card--and being told to get out.It was to be
regretted that this would seem funny to some of his perennially juvenile
intimates at the Rivulet Club.An hour later, as he walked down the Avenue, he looked curiously at 777.It was one of those newcomer houses erected by speculative builders to
sell furnished to out-of-town would-be climbers or to local stock-market
bankers who, being Hebrews, were too sensible to wish to climb, but were
not sensible enough not to wish to live on Fifth Avenue.Tom resolved to ask Raymond Silliman, who played at being in the
real-estate business, to find out who lived at 777.Meantime he did a
little shopping--wedding-presents--and went to luncheon at his club.He
had not quite finished his coffee when he was summoned to the telephone.Merriwether? said a woman's voice--clear, sweet, and
vibrant, but unknown.This is Miss Hervey--the nurse--Dr.Sandra travelled to the hallway.They asked me to tell you about your father.Don't be
alarmed!
Go on! commanded young Merriwether, sharply.But if you could come home it
probably--Yes, doctor!I am coming! And the conversation ceased
abruptly.He took the solitary taxicab that stood in
front of the club.He afterward recalled the fact that there was only
one where usually there were half a dozen.Eight-sixty-nine Fifth Avenue.Go up Madison to Sixtieth and then turn
into the Avenue.Hurry!
Very good, sir, said the chauffeur.The taxicab dashed madly up Madison and up Fifth Avenue, and finally
stopped--not before the Merriwether home, but in front of Number 777.Before he could ask the chauffeur what he meant by it both doors of the
cab opened at once and two men sandwiched between them Mr.The one on the west, or Central Park, side threateningly
held in his hand a business-like javelin--not at all the kind that
silly people hang on the walls in their childish attempts at decorative
barbarity.The man who half entered the taxicab from the east, or
sidewalk, side held in his left hand a beer-schooner full of a colorless
liquid that smoked, and in his right something completely but loosely
covered by a white-linen handkerchief.Merriwether! said the man with the glass.Hear me first!
Is my father--
I am glad to say he is well and happy, and working in his office
down-town.The message that brought you here was a subterfuge.We arranged it so you had to take this particular
taxicab.Don't stir, please!
What does all this mean? asked Tom, impatiently.I am about to have the honor of telling you, answered the man.He had no hat and wore clerical garments.His clean-shaved face was
pale--almost sallow--and young Merriwether noticed that his forehead
was very high.His dark-brown eyes were full of the earnestness of
all zealots, which makes you dislike to enter into an argument--first,
because of the futility of arguing with a zealot; and, second, because
said zealot probably knows a million times more about the subject than
you and can outargue you without trouble.So Tom simply listened with an
alertness that would not overlook any chance to strike back.This glass contains fuming sulphuric acid.It will sear the face and
destroy the eyesight with much rapidity and completeness.Also--here
he shook off the handkerchief from his right hand and showed a
revolver--this is the very latest in automatics; marvelously efficient;
dumdum bullets; stop an elephant!I am about to solicit a great favor.
Tom Merriwether looked into the earnest, pleading eyes.Then he glanced
on the other side, at the bull-necked husky with the business-like
spear.Mary moved to the bathroom.Then he turned to the clerical garb.I see I am in the hands of my friends! said Tom, pleasantly.The doctor was right, said the man with the glass, as if to himself.You
know, I never carry much cash with me.
We, dear Mr.Merriwether, said the pale-faced man in an amazingly
deferential voice, propose to be the donors.If you will kindly permit
us we shall give you what is more costly than rubies.
Yes? Tom's voice was perhaps less skeptical than sarcastic.Would you be kind enough to accept our invitation--the
fourth, dear Mr.Merriwether--to join us at 777 Fifth Avenue--right
here, sir--and answer one question?Please listen carefully to what I am
saying: You don't have to go.Moreover, if you should go you don't have
to answer any question.We would not, for worlds, compel you.But, for
your own sake, for the sake of your father's peace of mind and of the
Merriwether fortune, for the sake of your happiness in this world and in
the next; for all that all the Merriwethers hold most dear--come with me
and, if you are very wise, answer the question that will be asked you by
the wisest man in all the world.
He must be a regular Solomon-- began Tom, but the man held up the
glass and went on, very earnestly:
Listen, please!If you decide to accept our invitation I shall spill
this acid in the street and I shall give you this revolver.I repeat,
you do not have to answer the question.You will not be harmed or
molested.Will you, in return, give me yours
to follow me at once into 777, and that you will not shoot unless you
sincerely think you are in danger?
Tom Merriwether looked at the pale-faced man a moment.He was willing to
take his chances with that face.Also, he could not otherwise find the
solution of this puzzling affair.I give you my
word.
Instantly the pale-faced man with the high forehead laid the revolver on
the seat beside young Mr.Merriwether and withdrew from the cab.Tom saw
him spill the fuming acid into the gutter.The burly javelin-man took
himself off.The temptation to use the butt of the revolver on the
clerical-garbed man with the earnest eyes came to Tom, but he saw in
a flash that if he should do such a thing he would be compelled in
self-defense to tell a story utterly unbelievable.Moreover, the pale-faced man was a slender little chap of middle age and
no match for big Tom Merriwether.So, assuring himself that the revolver
was in truth loaded and that it worked, he put it in his pocket, kept
his grasp on it there, and got out of the taxicab.His one impelling
motive now was curiosity.With the pistol and his muscles and
his youth, on Fifth Avenue, at two-thirty in the afternoon?The pale-faced man, the empty glass in one hand, walked toward the door
of 777 without so much as turning his head.The door was opened by a man in livery who took Mr.Merriwether's hat
and cane.Tom saw in the furnishings of the house--complete with that
curious unhuman completeness of a modern hotel--the kind of furnishings
that interior decorators usually sell to first-generation rich on
their arrival at Fifth Avenue residenceship.The furniture had every
qualification possessed by furniture in order not to suggest a home to
live in.Wherefore Tom, whose mind always worked quickly, reasoned to
himself:
Rented for the occasion to the man who has made me come to him.
Also Tom noticed four men-servants, all of them well built and all of
them owning faces that somehow were not servant faces.The revolver,
which had seemed amply sufficient outside, seemed less so within the
house.Supposing he killed one--or even two--the other two would down
him in an affray.He tightened his grip on the revolver and planned and
rehearsed a shooting affair in which four men in livery were disabled
with four shots.A great pity E. H. Merriwether was such a very rich
man--a great pity for his son Tom.At a door, on the center panel of which was a monogram in black, red,
and gold the last of the footmen knocked gently.The door was thereupon
opened from within.Thomas Thome Merriwether, 7-7-77! announced the
intelligent-looking footman, with a very pronounced English accent.It was a _nouveau-riche_ library.The Circassian-walnut bookcases and center-table were over-elaborately
carved, and the hangings of rich red velvet were over-elaborately
embroidered.John went to the office.The bronzes on the over-elaborate mantel looked as though
they had been placed there by somebody who was coming back in a minute
to take them away again.Altogether the apartment suggested a salesroom, and there was a note of
incongruity in a golden-oak filing-cabinet of the Grand Rapids school.At one end of the room in an arm-chair, with his back to a terrible
stained-glass window, sat a man of about forty.He had a calm,
remarkably steady gaze, with a sort of leisureliness about it that made
you think of a drawling voice.Also, an assurance--a self-consciousness
of knowledge--that was compelling.His chin was firm and there was a
suggestion of power and of control over power that reminded Tom of
a very competent engineer in charge of a fifty-thousand-horse-power
machine.Kindly be seated, sir, said the man in a tone that subtly suggested
weariness.Tom sat down and looked curiously at the man, who went on:
Sir, I have a question to ask you.If you see fit to answer, be good
enough to answer it spontaneously and in good faith.Do not, I beg you,
in turn, ask me questions--such as, for example, why I wish to know what
I ask.If you decide not to answer you will leave this house unharmed,
accompanied by our profound regret that you should be so unintelligent
at your life's crisis. The man looked at Tom with a meditative
expression, then nodded to himself almost sorrowfully.Sandra journeyed to the office.Tom, though young, was a Merriwether.He said, politely, Let me hear
the question, sir.
He himself was thinking in questions: What can the question be?One question, sir, repeated the stranger.I am listening, sir, Tom assured him, with a quiet, but quite
impressive, earnestness._Where did you spend your vacation at the end of your Freshman year? |
kitchen | Where is John? | Then he
answered:
In Oleander Point, Long Island, in the cottage of Dr.Charles W.
Bonner, who was tutoring me.I had a couple of conditions and I stayed
until the third of September!
Thank you!Merriwether, you wish to
do me and yourself three very great favors.Three!
He looked at Tom with a sort of intelligent curiosity, as of a chemist
conducting an experiment.Let's hear what they are, said young Mr.It was at times like these that he showed whose son he was--alert, his
imagination active, his nerves under control, and his courage steady
and at par.He had, moreover, made up his mind that he would do some
questioning later on.First favor: Concentrate your mind on how you used to spend your
bright, sunshiny days in Oleander Point and your beautiful moonlight
nights.Recall the pleasant people you were friendly with during those
happy weeks.Think!
It was a command, and Tom Merriwether found himself thinking of that
summer.His grip on the revolver in his pocket
relaxed.... He saw his friends.Some of them he had not seen in years.And somehow it seemed to him that all the
girls were pretty and kindly; and in particular--well, there were in
particular three.He could not have told how long his reverie lasted--the mind traverses
long stretches of time, as of space, in seconds.Well? said Tom at length.Thank you, said the man, with the matter-of-fact gratitude a man feels
toward a servant for some attention.He took from his pocket a small black-velvet bag, opened it, and spread
on the table before Tom Merriwether a dozen pearls, ranging in size from
a pea to a filbert.I beg you to select one of these.You may give it
to your valet if you wish, or throw it out of the window.Only accept
it as a souvenir of our meeting.Merriwether, would be favor
number two.
He pointed toward the pearls.Tom picked one--pear-shaped, white,
beautiful--and put it in his waistcoat pocket.The man swept the rest
into one of the drawers of the long library table.I thank you very much, said Tom.He was not sure the pearls were not
genuine.No; please don't, said the man.Presently he asked,
Do you know anything about pearls, sir?
I am no expert, answered Tom.You Merriwethers are
brave enough to be truthful, and wise enough to be cautious.Have you
any opinions?
I think they are beautiful, said Tom.Merriwether, the hope of
the Kingdom of Heaven.The pearl is the symbol of purity, humility,
and innocence.Do you know the legend of the mild maid of God--Saint
Margaret of Antioch?
No.
Margaret is from Margarites--Greek for pearl.And the reason why
faith--But I beg your pardon.Men who live alone talk too much when they
are no longer alone.Merriwether,
did you ever hear of Apollonius of Tyana?
Not until this minute, answered Tom.Sandra travelled to the bathroom.He felt almost tempted to ask whether the poor man was dead, but
refrained because he was honest enough to admit to himself that the
question would savor of bravado.Tom was consumed by curiosity as to
what would be the end of it all.To think of it--on Fifth Avenue, New
York, in broad daylight--all this!How money was to be made out of him he could not yet see.I will show his talisman to you--the Dispeller of Darkness! The
man clapped his hands twice.At the summons a <DW64> walked in.He was
dressed in plain black and wore a fez.The man spoke some guttural words
and the <DW64> salaamed and left the room.Presently he returned with a
silver tray on which were seven gold or gilt candlesticks and candles,
and seven gold or gilt small trays or plates, on each of which was a
pastil.He arranged the seven candlesticks in some deliberate design, carefully
measuring the distance of each from the other, and of all from a
point in the center.He arranged the plates and pastils about the
candlesticks.Then he left the room, to return with a lighted taper,
with which he lit the seven candles and the seven pastils.Tiny spirals
of fragrant smoke rose languidly in the still air.Again the <DW64> left the room and returned with a small parcel wrapped
in a piece of raw silk which he gave to his master.The man began to mutter something to himself and very carefully took off
the silk cover, revealing a wonderfully carved ivory box.He opened the
gold-hinged lid and took out a silver case.He opened that and from it
took a gold box elaborately though crudely chased.He opened the gold
box and within it, oh a little white-velvet pad, was a cross of dull
gold curiously engraved.He put the pad, with the cross on it, in
the middle of the seven lights.On the arms of the cross and at the
intersection Tom saw seven wonderful emeralds remarkable as to size,
beautiful as to color.The gems alone are worth
a king's ransom.Mary travelled to the office.If you consider it merely as a piece of ancient art
there is no telling what a man like Mr.W. H. Garrettson would not give
for it.And as a talisman, with its tried wonder-working powers, there
is, of course, not enough money in all the world to pay for it.
Tom stretched his hand toward it.Do not touch it, I beg, said the man, in a voice in which the
alarm was so evident that Tom drew his hand back as though he had seen
a cobra on the table.It is the most
wonderful object in existence.It is a cross that antedates Christ!
Really?
It is obviously of a much earlier period than the Messiah.Great
scholars have thought it a legend, but here it is before you.It
belonged to Apollonius of Tyana, the wonder-worker.Philostratus, who
wrote the life of that great man, does not mention this talisman; he
dared not!Apollonius, who to this day is not known ever to have died,
gave it to a disciple, who gave it to a friend.
Tom looked interested.It was worn by Arcadius in the fifth century.The Goths took it and Alaric gave it to the daughter of his most trusted
captain, who commanded his citadel of Carcassonne.Clovis, a hundred
years later, secured it at the sack of Toulouse.We have records of its
having been praised by Eligius, the famous jeweler of Dagobert, in the
seventh century.Sandra travelled to the hallway.It was included in the famous treasures of Charlemagne.It went to Palestine during the first and third crusades--the first time
carried by a maid who loved a knight who did not love her.She went as
his squire, he not suspecting her sex until they were safely back in
France, when he married her.Mary moved to the bathroom.The emeralds
came from Mount Zabara.They have the power to drive away the evil
spirits and also to preserve the chastity of the wearer.Moreover, they
give the power to foretell events.Apollonius did--time and again.But alone he, of all the men who have owned it,
never had a love-affair; hence his clairvoyance.Forgive me!
Not at all.It is all so--er--so--
Incredible--yes!There is no reason why you should believe it.It is of
no consequence whether you think me a lunatic or a charlatan.
He said this with a cold indifference that made Tom look incuriously
at the man, whose obvious desire was to excite curiosity.John went to the office.Then the man
said, with an earnestness that in spite of himself impressed the heir of
the Merriwether railroads:
Mr.Thomas Thorne Merriwether, classified in our books as 7-7-77, you
are the man I need for this job!
Indeed? said Tom, politely.Yes, you are. Tom bowed his head and looked resigned.He deliberately
intended to look that way.The man went on, The reason I am so sure is
because I know both who and what you are.
Ah, you know me pretty well, then. Tom could not help the mild
sarcasm.I have known you, young man, for eighty-five years, perhaps longer.
The man spoke calmly.After the name Thomas Thorne
Merriwether you will find 7-7-77.In the cabinet--seventh section,
seventh drawer, card Number 77--you will find clinical data,
physiological and psychological details, anecdotes, and so on, about you
and your father, E. H. Merriwether, and your mother, Josephine Thorne;
your grandfathers, Lyman Grant Merriwether and Thomas Conkling Thorne,
and of your grandmothers, Malvina Sykes Thorne and Lydia Weston
Merriwether.Indeed I know about your great-grandfathers and three of
your great-great-grandparents; but the data in their case are of little
value save as to Ephraim Merriwether, who in seventeen sixty-three
killed in one duel three army officers who laughed at his twisted nose,
bitten and disfigured for life by a wolf-cub he had tried to tame.Facts
not generally known, but, for all that, facts, young Mr.Thomas Thome
Merriwether, which enable me to say that I have known you these hundred
and fifty years--if there is anything in heredity, environment, and
education!Sandra journeyed to the office.And now, shall I tell you what favor number three is?
If you please, said Tom.For the first time he felt that the usual suspicions as to a merrymaking
game could not be justified in this particular instance.It was much too
elaborate for a practical joke.He did not know how the matter would
end; but he did not care.In New York, on Fifth Avenue, on Tuesday
afternoon, he was having what, indeed, was an experience!I beg that you will listen attentively.You will take the Dispeller
of Darkness with you.Do not open the gold box under any circumstances.Tonight go to 7 East Seventy-seventh Street so as to be there at eight
o'clock sharp.Go
up one flight of stairs to the front room--there is only one.You will
stand in the middle of the room, with the talisman resting on the palm
of your hand--thus!The talisman
will be taken from you by a person.Do not try to detain her--this
person.After the talisman is taken from you count a hundred--not too
fast!At the end of your count leave the room and come back here and
tell me whether you have carried out my instructions.Now, young sir,
let me say to you that you don't have to do what I am asking you to do.There is no crime in contemplation--no
attempt is to be made against your life, your fortune, or your morals.I
pledge you my word, sir!
The man looked straight into Tom's eyes.This man
must be crazy--and yet he certainly was not.This interested Tom by
perplexing him as he had never been perplexed in his eight-and-twenty
years.Merriwether, this will be the most important step of your life.Its
bearing on your happiness is vital--also on the success of your great
father's vast plans.I give you my personal word that this is so. There
was a pause.The man went on:
If you care to take reasonable precautions against attack do so.Thus,
keep the revolver you now have in your pocket--it is excellent.You may write a detailed account of what has happened
and leave it with your valet; but mark on it that it is not to be opened
unless you fail to return by 10 p.m.John went back to the bathroom.Also you may, if you wish, station
ten private detectives across the way from 7 East Seventy-seventh
Street, and instruct them to go into the house at a single shout from
you or at the sound of a shot.Believe me, it is not your life that is
in danger, sir!
I believe you, said Tom, reassuringly.Will you do me favor number three? The man looked at Tom with a
steady, unblinking, earnest--one might even say honest--stare.His mind worked not only quickly, but
Merriwether-fashion.He saw all the possibilities of danger, but he saw
the unknown--and the lust of adventure won.He looked the man in the
eyes and said, quietly:
I will.
Thank you.Each of the seven emeralds is
flawless--the only seven flawless emeralds of that size in existence.Two of them have been in great kings' crowns, and the center stone
was in the tiara of seven popes; after which, the Great Green Prophecy
having been fulfilled, it came back to its place on the Cross.Apollonius raised people from the dead, according to eyewitnesses.The
pagans tried to confute the believers in Christian miracles by bringing
forward the miracles of the sage of Tyana--and they did not know that
Apollonius wrought marvels by the Sign of the Son of Man--the Cross!I pray that you will be careful with it.You have understood your instructions?
Tom repeated them.I did not make a mistake, you see.In spite of your father's
millions you will be what your destiny wills.Young man, good luck to
you! The man rose and walked toward the door.Tom Merriwether followed
him and was politely bowed out of the room.From there to the street
entrance the four athletic footmen, with the over-intelligent faces,
took him in tow, one at a time.And it was not until he was out on the
Avenue, headed north, walking toward his own house, that Thomas Thorne
Merriwether, clean-living miltimillionaire idler, shook himself, as
if to scatter the remnants of a dream, felt the butt of the revolver,
hefted the silk-wrapped parcel in which was the talisman, and said,
aloud, so that a couple of pedestrians turned and smiled sympathetically
at the young man, who must be in love, since he talked to himself:
What in blazes is it all about?
II
His perplexing experience developed so insistent a curiosity in Tom
that he grew irritable even as he walked.That some sort of a game was
being worked he had no doubt; but the fact that he could see no object
or motive increased his wrath.He discarded all suggestion of violence,
though he was bound to admit now that anybody could be kidnapped in New
York in broad daylight.He decided to begin by verifying those allusions and references that he
remembered.He walked down the Avenue to the Public Library and there he
read what he could of Apollonius and of Eligius, the marvelous goldsmith
who afterward became Saint Eloi.The helpful and polite library
assistant at length suggested a visit to Dr.Lentz, the gem expert
of Goffony & Company, a man of vast erudition as well as a practical
jeweler.Tom promptly betook himself to the famous jewel-shop.John travelled to the kitchen.They knew the heir of the seventy-five Merri-wether millions, and
impressively ushered him into Dr.Tom shook hands with
the fat little man, whose wonderfully shaped head had on it no hair
worth speaking of, and handed him the |
office | Where is Sandra? | Lentz
looked at it, weighed it in his hand, and, without waiting to be asked
any questions, answered what nearly everybody always asked him:
Persian Gulf.We sell some
like it for about thirty-five hundred dollars.
Thanks, said Tom, and put the pearl in his pocket.If not, the other pearls the man had
shown, nearly all of which were larger, must have been worth from fifty
thousand to a hundred thousand dollars.Such is the power of money that
this young man, destined to be one of the richest men in the world
and, moreover, one who did not particularly think about money, was
nevertheless impressed by the stranger's careless handling of the
valuable pearls.He concluded subconsciously that the talisman was even
more valuable.He took the package from his coat pocket and gave it to
Dr.Raw silk--Syrian, murmured the gem expert, and undid the covering.no! He glared at
young Merriwether, who retreated a step.It's the Raising
of Jairus's Daughter.Same workmanship in similar specimen in the
Lipsanoteca, Museo Civico, Brescia.Sandra travelled to the bathroom.If so, not later than fourth
century.Mary travelled to the office.Sandra travelled to the hallway.H'm!
Is it? said Tom.I don't know much about ivories.
No?Græven!
Thank you.Lentz.
Dr.Lentz opened the little ivory box and pulled out the silver case.Probably eighth century.
B C?
Certainly not.H'm!
Haven't got it here, evaded Tom.The little savant turned to his secretary and said, Bring drawer marked
forty-four, inner compartment, antique-gem safe.
He was examining the little box, nodding his head, and muttering, H'm!H'm! Tom felt the ground slipping away from under the feet of his
suspicions even while his perplexity waxed monumental.And with it came
the satisfaction of a man convincing himself that he is neither wasting
his time nor making himself ridiculous.The clerk returned with a little drawer in which Tom saw about a hundred
and fifty keys.Originals in museums of world! explained Lentz.H'm! He
turned the keys over with, a selective forefinger.It's that one or
this one. And he picked out two.H'm! He inserted the little key and opened the casket.H'm! He
raised his head, looked at Tom fiercely, and then said, coldly, Mr.Merriwether, this has been stolen from the British Museum!
It beautifully complicated matters.Are you sure? he asked, being a Merriwether.H'm! He lifted
it out and examined the back.Possibly taken to India by one
of Alexander's captains--perhaps Lysimachus himself!Smoothed away to put
that--Oh, beasts!Mary moved to the bathroom.Do you know the incantation
to use before opening?
It was in Greek, and--
Of course!
Yes.He said this had belonged to Apollonius of Tyana.
How much does he ask?
It is not for sale.
Inside is a pentagram?
No; a cross, with seven emeralds as big as that, all flawless.'
There are only two such emeralds in the world without flaws and we have
one of them.The other is owned by the Archbishop of Bogota, Colombia.
He said these were flawless and that he has proofs.He says Eligius
studied this--
Mr.Merriwether, you have on your hands either a very dangerous
impostor or else--H'm!John went to the office.Sandra journeyed to the office.How much does he want?
It is not for sale!
H'm!If I can be of use let me know!Lentz walked away, leaving Tom more puzzled
than ever, but now determined to go to 7 East Seventy-seventh Street at
eight o'clock that night.He went home and wrote an account of what had happened, placed it in an
envelope, sealed the envelope, and gave it to his valet.If you don't hear from me by ten o'clock tonight give this to my
father; but don't give it to him one minute before ten.And you stay in
until you hear from me.
Very good, sir.
He then went to the club, ordered an early dinner for two, and invited
his friend Huntington Andrews to go with him.Shortly before eight he stationed Andrews across the way from 7 East
Seventy-seventh Street and told him:
If I am not back here at eight-fifteen come in after me.If you don't
find me go to my house and wait until ten.See
my father.
Tom was Merriwether enough to have in readiness not only an extra
revolver to give to his friend, but also a heavy cane and an electric
torch.Also he drove Huntington to within a hair's-breadth of death by
unsatisfied curiosity.Thomas Thome Merriwether went into the
house of mystery, realizing for the first time how often the mystic
number seven recurred.But no candid student of Irish
history, no impartial observer of Irish affairs, from 1800 to the present
time, can deny that the Union has been in many respects a failure.It has
been an incident, perhaps a result, of the Union, that Presbyterian
Ireland, rebellious from 1795 to 1798, has, we have seen, become attached
to the British connection, and is now devotedly attached to England.The
power of the Imperial Parliament and of its Executive have kept
lawlessness and disorder down in Ireland, and has restrained the evil
passions of Irish factions more than was ever the case under the rule of
the Irish Parliament.The Imperial Parliament, too, has accomplished
reforms in Ireland, if often unwise, in the main beneficent; and, under
the Imperial Executive, justice in Ireland has been administered, for many
years, in a very different way from that which was seen a century ago; its
tribunals are perfectly free and impartial.But the Union was, in itself,
a bad half measure, tainted with iniquity and false promises; it did gross
wrong to Catholic Ireland; the evil consequences are felt to this hour.The Union has not fulfilled the sanguine hopes of Pitt; Ireland, as I have
pointed out, is far more behind Great Britain in wealth than she was sixty
years ago; she is perhaps the poorest country in Europe at the door of the
richest.John went back to the bathroom.The Union, too, has not reconciled the feuds of religion and race
in Ireland; they are as marked as they were a century ago, if not attended
with such deeds of violence; above all, the Union has not made the chief
part of the Irish community attached to England, as Pitt confidently
predicted would certainly happen.Nor can it be denied that the Irish
reforms of the Imperial Parliament have too often been ill-designed and
faulty, especially, as we shall see, as regards the land; and they have
unfortunately, in many instances, been concessions to agitation and
dangerous social movements, and have been effected too late to do real
good.The administration of Ireland reveals the same defects; it has been
marked by good intentions, which, sometimes, have proved gross mistakes;
and notably it has, over and over again, been shifty, vacillating, without
principle, and showing a curious disregard of sound Irish opinion.Unquestionably, too, Ireland has, on many occasions, to the indignation of
true-hearted Irishmen, been made the mere plaything of British faction,
with the worst results to her best interests; this has been perhaps the
most pernicious incident that has followed the Union; and in the immense
revolution which has transformed Ireland, within the last hundred years,
the effects that may be traced to the Union have by no means been wholly
on the side of good.These evil consequences cannot be really questioned; it is very advisable
to consider their causes, and if possible to see how they can be removed
or lessened.They are partly to be ascribed to the fact that Great Britain
and Ireland are countries differing from each other in most important
respects, and standing, so to speak, on different planes of existence;
this alone makes British rule in Ireland difficult, and perplexes and
embarrasses British statesmen.They are partly due to defects in the
English national character, essentially just in intention, and even
generous, but with no sympathy with races of a character unlike its own,
self-asserting, obstinate, sometimes rude and offensive; this has had
marked and evil effects in the affairs of Ireland.They are largely to be
attributed to the nature of Irish administration, seldom consistent, and
changing with party changes: British statesmen appear at the Castle; rule
for a few years; and then depart and give place to successors, who
probably carry out a very different policy.They are largely due to the
nature of the representation of Ireland, notably of late years; the
Nationalist party--and the same remark applies, in some degree, to the
'Tail' of O'Connell--have shown such an aversion to England, have used
such seditious and even criminal language, have been so extravagant and
wild in their demands, and have been such a dangerous element in the House
of Commons, that Englishmen and Scotchmen turn away from Irish questions
with disgust, and Ireland unfortunately has often been the sufferer.But
the most important of these causes, one which may be traced throughout
Irish history, and has been scarcely less evident since the Union, has
been the strange but signal ignorance of Irish affairs--of all, in a word,
that relates to Ireland--which has been but too characteristic of the
British people, and, in a lesser degree, of many British statesmen.John travelled to the kitchen.This
capital fault aroused the _saeva indignatio_, of Swift; it was exposed by
Grattan, O'Connell, even by Lord Clare; it was condemned in severe but
thoughtful language by Burke; it has been conspicuous during the events of
the last twenty years.[34] The resulting mischiefs have been numerous and
grave in the extreme; can nothing be done to mitigate these and to make
them less, consistently with maintaining the Union in its full
completeness?I, for one, have long thought that much could be effected
were the Imperial Parliament occasionally to hold its sessions in Dublin,
and to govern Ireland directly, so to speak, on the spot.This very
measure was proposed by many distinguished Irishmen, during the agitation
for Repeal in 1843-44; it was made the subject of an eloquent eulogy by
Sheil at O'Connell's trial; it was seriously entertained by the Whig
opposition of the day, as we know from a remarkable letter of Lord
Waveney.This policy unfortunately passed out of sight; but even now, I
believe, it would do the greatest good in Ireland.It would be something
that the proposed change would cause the wealth of England and Scotland
largely to flow into a poor country; that Irish absenteeism would be
diminished; that Ireland would become, more than she is now, an attractive
place of resort to the traveller.But it would be far more that the
presence of the Imperial Parliament in College Green would necessarily
largely remove the ignorance of Irish affairs I have just referred to; it
would make English and Scotch members familiar with the requirements, the
feelings, the wishes of Irishmen; as has happily been said, it would
render our Irish legislation and administration 'racy of the Irish soil.'And probably more than any other expedient, it would exorcise the weak
phantom of Home Rule by bringing Irishmen in contact with the majesty of
the Sovereign Assembly of the British Empire.I shall not comment on the
petty inconveniences the scheme might cause; really they are not worthy of
serious attention.The occasional presence of Royalty, too, in Ireland, as was made manifest
during the late Queen's visit, unquestionably would have beneficent
results.It would gratify a sentiment of Celtic nature, always attached to
persons rather than to institutions and laws, and especially attached to
rulers and chiefs, which, in Ireland, has been scarcely gratified before;
it would spread far and wide a happy and good influence; it would
certainly improve the social life of Ireland, and add something to her
scanty material wealth.The maintenance of the Union, however, is the
first requirement of a sound Irish and Imperial policy; one means of
strengthening that fundamental law of these realms, consistently with
strict constitutional justice, nay, if constitutional wrong is not to
continue, has long been apparent to impartial minds.The
over-representation of Ireland, in the House of Commons, is a flagrant
anomaly, acknowledged for years; as I have remarked, it was largely
expected that this important subject would have been taken up before this
by Lord Salisbury's Government, and have been settled in the Parliament of
1895-1900.Taking the test of population alone, Ireland has, compared to
England, Wales, and Scotland, an excess of twenty-three members; taking
the test of population and property combined, she has an excess probably
of from thirty to forty.I am willing to allow that, in this matter, we
ought not to follow arithmetic only; Ireland, a poor country, far away
from Westminster, may have a claim to a representation somewhat more
numerous than mere figures would give her.But can anything be more
unjust, nay, absurd, than that Ireland should have one hundred and three
members, and that the world of London, with a population about the same as
that of Ireland, and probably possessing tenfold wealth, should have
little more than half that number?John moved to the office.This excessive representation must be
reduced, and Irish Nationalists cannot here appeal to the Union; the Union
did not save the Established Church of Ireland, secured by the Treaty in
emphatic terms; and the Union must not be wrested to work gross injustice.The anomaly can be only removed by a large scheme for the redistribution
of seats, founded on sound constitutional principles; and should this
become law, as I confidently hope will be one of the achievements of the
existing Parliament, the Union will acquire a new security, for the
Nationalist vote in the House of Commons would be greatly reduced, and the
Irish Unionist vote would be greatly increased.A very few figures will
prove this: the rural populations of the Unionist counties of Antrim and
Down are upwards of four hundred and thirty thousand souls; the rural
populations of the Home Rule counties of Kildare, Kilkenny, King's,
Longford, Wicklow, and Louth have a population less than three hundred and
ninety-eight thousand;[35] yet Antrim and Down have only eight members,
the other six counties have no less than twelve.Daniel went back to the kitchen.The same disparity runs
through all the Irish counties; in the boroughs of Ireland it is even more
visible.Protestant and Unionist Ireland, in a word, has probably fifteen
or sixteen members too few; Catholic and anti-Unionist Ireland fifteen or
sixteen too many; it is high time this plain wrong should be redressed; it
is unnecessary to point out how this would strengthen the Union.And what
probably is not less important, it would make the representation of
Ireland, not, what it is now, an utterly false index of Irish opinion, but
a reasonably fair and trustworthy index; were the Irish representation cut
down to eighty members, the Nationalists would probably command not more
than fifty seats; the Unionists would command about thirty; and this,
taking all things into account, would be a proportion approaching what is
just.The 'doing' of right, in this matter, has been too long deferred;
loyal Ireland feels strongly upon the subject; the reform would be
altogether in the interest of the State.CHAPTER III
THE QUESTION OF THE IRISH LAND--SKETCH OF THE HISTORY OF THE LAND SYSTEM
OF IRELAND TO THE YEAR 1870
Great importance in the history of Ireland of the conditions of land
tenure--The ancient Celtic land system and its characteristics--The
Norman conquest of Ireland--Norman feudalism in the Irish land--The
|
bathroom | Where is Mary? | The fortunes of many communities, it has truly been said, have been
decisively affected by the conditions of the ownership and the occupation
of the soil.The social, even the political, life of modern Europe has
been, in a great measure, moulded by the land tenures that have grown out
of the feudal system; I need only refer to the history of England, of
France, and of Germany.This remark, however, especially applies to the
events that make up the annals of Ireland; that long and unhappy tale of
misfortunes and errors is intimately associated, all through, with the
land, and with the relations connected with it.Modern research has shown
how grotesque and mischievous was the ignorance of the Tudor lawyers and
statesmen, who described the ancient organisation of the Irish land as a
medley of barbarian and pernicious usages; it was an archaic and imperfect
specimen of the feudal system, with differences indeed, but marked with
its essential features.Norman feudalism, lawless and ill-ordered, was for
centuries, after the first Conquest, placed beside this primitive form of
society, in parts of a country not half subdued; the results were seen in
incessant strife and discord, and in social anarchy, which prevented
civilisation growing up.The Irishry had well-nigh driven the Englishry
into the sea, when Henry VII.tried to make his authority felt in Ireland;
his successor, partly a Celt in blood, and a real statesman, devised a
noble scheme for bringing an ill-governed dependency within the domain of
order and law, by planting an Anglo-Norman and native aristocracy in the
soil, subject to a strong monarchy that would have protected the community
as a whole.was not carried
out; in the great conflict of the sixteenth and the seventeenth centuries,
Ireland was drawn into a long struggle with England, and was repeatedly
made a place of arms for her foes; an era of savage conquest, accomplished
piecemeal, with ruthless confiscation following in its train, was
protracted during nearly a century and a half; and at the close of the
reign of William III., nine-tenths probably of the land of Ireland had
been wrested from its former possessors, and the old Celtic land system
had been destroyed by the sword and by law.Race and religion made this
position of affairs much worse; the age of Protestant ascendency in
Ireland began; in infinitely the greatest part of the island the land was
parcelled out among a caste of owners distinct in blood and faith from the
children of the soil, and lording it over an oppressed peasantry; and the
system was propped up by a code of cruel laws, which maintained and, so to
speak, stereotyped these evil divisions.The lines of the land system of
Ireland were thus finally laid down; a variety of economic and social
causes increased and deepened their extreme harshness; and though they
have gradually been softened, and are now all but effaced, their traces
and the results are still to be seen.The last thirty years have witnessed
repeated attempts to effect radical changes in the modes of the ownership
and the occupation of the land in Ireland; they have wrought a revolution
in Irish landed relations, and have well-nigh turned them upside down; but
the consequences have assuredly not been fortunate.The land system of
Ireland has been made a chaos of economic disorder, of dissensions of
class, of legalised wrong, absolutely incompatible with social progress
and the general welfare.I must glance, for an instant, at the distinctive features of the land
system of Ireland in the Celtic age, for despite the effects of
confiscation and conquest, faint traces of it may still be seen, and have
a kind of influence.[36] As was the case in all communities of the Aryan
stem, the land originally was largely held in collective ownership; but
agriculture developed individual ownership by degrees, though less so in
Ireland than in more progressive countries.The people were settled on the
soil in tribes, clans, and septs, these being the larger and the smaller
units; the modes of the tenure of the land, misinterpreted by Elizabethan
sages, differed widely from each other, but revealed the traditions of old
patriarchal usage and power, especially in their canons of descent and
succession.The feudalisation of the land, as it has been significantly
called, a process which took place in nearly the whole of Europe, was also
witnessed in Ireland, to a certain extent; but this was not so complete
and strongly marked as in France and England.The land, nevertheless, was,
throughout the island, held ultimately from a supreme monarch; it was
divided, under him, among families of princely chiefs, who ruled vast
tracts with scarcely controlled authority; inferior chiefs were subject to
these; the organisation of the land had much in common with the
organisation of the Anglo-Norman manor, and with the position of the Lord
Paramount of every manor, the head of the English State.The Irish kings
and chiefs had lands in demesne; they had a landed and a personal
_noblesse_; the territories they ruled were held by classes strongly
resembling the free tenants, the villeins, and the serfs of the feudal
system.All this, however, was not as perfectly defined as it was in lands
feudalised to a higher degree; and though the Davieses and Spensers were
wholly in error in representing the dependents of the Irish kings and
chiefs as little better than a horde of fighting men and slaves, Ireland
never fully possessed the liberties feudalism secured.The Ceile of
substance, who had lands of his own, seems to have been in an inferior
position to the English freeholder; the Saer stock and Daer stock tenants
held their lands by a tenure like that of the metayers of France; the
Fuidhirs were kept in complete subjection, and had not even the rights of
the villein.The land, too, was still largely held in collective
ownership; in its occupation this is even now seen in backward and poor
districts; and, curiously enough, distinctions were drawn between what was
a 'fair' and a 'rack rent,' words still common in the mouth of the Irish
peasant, and to which recent legislation has given its sanction.As in the case of most lands where anything resembling feudalism
prevailed, with the single exception of England, under her strong
Monarchy, Ireland in these circumstances was torn by continual discord,
increased by the recurring struggles with the Dane.The Celtic kings and
chiefs, nevertheless, were beloved by their people; the land system fell
in with Celtic tribal ideas and sentiments.I pass over the incidents of
the first Norman Conquest; in the course of time, an Anglo-Norman colony
was established, within a Pale ever-varying in extent, and held parts of
the country under feudal conditions, the remaining, and by far the
greatest, parts being left in the possession of the Celtic kings and
princes.Anglo-Norman feudalism, however, was completely different, in
Ireland, from what it was in England; it was not subject to vigorous
kingly rule; it was confined within comparatively small limits.In these
circumstances the Pale fell into the hands of a few leading and great
families; these, as had been largely the case in Scotland, formed a
domineering and oppressive _noblesse_, continually engaged in quarrels
between themselves, and in petty wars with the Celtic chiefs, and
completely superior to the royal power in England.The Geraldines, the
Butlers, the De Burghs, and other great houses, had no law but their own
wills in their vast lordships; their exactions and tyranny became a
byword; their lives were spent in savage feudal strife, and in 'hostings
against the Irish enemy.'Strange to say, too, these scions of a mighty
conquering race fell under the spell of the Celtic genius, and, as it was
said, 'became more Irish than the Irish themselves; they were at least
largely assimilated to a Celtic model, and they adopted many of the usages
of the Celt.It was not much otherwise in the Celtic region outside the
Pale; the Irish chiefs often blended in marriage with the Anglo-Norman
settlers; but they were continually at war with them, and with each
other.Under these conditions, feudalism, in its best aspects, could take
no root, in the land, in Ireland; and there is much reason to believe that
the archaic Irish land system was gradually changed and almost broken up,
the power of the kings and chiefs being greatly increased, and the
position of their dependents being made essentially worse.It is obvious
that in a land, a scene of such disorder and misrule, civilisation and all
that the word implies could not exist; Ireland was probably more barbarous
at the close of the fifteenth century than she had been when she first saw
Henry of Anjou.The Pale had been restricted within ever-narrowing bounds;
generations of colonising 'Englishry' had entered the country, and had
left it in angry despair; the 'Irishry' had encroached on their
conqueror's domain; the work of Strongbow and Fitzstephen appeared to be
undone.Especially it was observed that nothing like a middle class, even
then the best element in the social life of England, had been able to
develop itself in Ireland, and that the humbler classes were always in a
state of wretchedness, ground down by exaction, and exposed to incessant
wrongs of all kinds.'What common folk of all the world'--these were the
words of a State paper of the age--'is so poor, so feeble, so evil be seen
in town and field, so greatly oppressed and trodden underfoot, fares so
evil, with so great misery, and with so wretched a life, as the common
folk of Ireland?'strengthened the authority of the Crown in Ireland; the
Viceroyalty of Poynings marks an epoch in her chequered annals; but the
conduct of the king was shifting and weak; the land fell under the control
of the great House of Kildare; the Irishry were driven back, but in no
sense subdued.Surrey, the victor of Flodden, intreated Henry VIII.to
make the country his own by sheer force of arms; but his master refused in
striking language; and proposed a scheme for bringing Ireland under the
control of the Monarchy, for encouraging civilisation and promoting order,
the wisest that has ever suggested itself to a British statesman.He made
several of 'the degenerate' Norman _noblesse_ peers; he extended the same
dignity to several Irish chiefs; he assembled representatives of Ireland
in a Parliament composed of both races; he appointed commissioners to go
through the country and to punish crime; above all--and this deserves
special notice--he tried to conciliate the Celtic community by bringing
their usages within the cognisance of the law, and giving them effectual
legal sanction; and he condemned the attempts being already made to force
laws on them peculiar to England.Had this enlightened policy been
steadily pursued, the history of Ireland would have run a wholly different
course; but destiny, that has played so sinister a part in Irish affairs,
interfered to thwart the admirable designs of the king.The great
Geraldine rebellion broke out, supported by irregular Celtic risings; from
this time forward, during five generations of man, the era of cruel but
intermittent conquest, accompanied by wholesale confiscation, set in.The
powerful tribe of the O'Connors of Offaly, closely associated with the
fallen House of Kildare, was the first to feel the weight of the arm of
England; its territories were forcibly overrun and annexed, given the name
of the King's and the Queen's Counties, and peopled with a colony of
settlers from England.Celtic Ireland ere long was brought into the
conflict between Elizabeth and Philip II., the representatives of the
faiths that were dividing Christendom; the princely chief, Shane O'Neill,
fell a victim to the English conquerors, though their quarrel with him was
not wholly one of seeking the assistance of a foreign enemy; his vast
domains were, also, in part forfeited, in part handed over to a puppet of
English power.The frightful Desmond rebellion followed; it was directly
encouraged by the Pope and by Spain; after a protracted struggle
approaching a real civil war, the immense lordships of the great Geraldine
House were confiscated, and granted to a colony of English blood.Tyrone,
the real successor of his kinsman, Shane O'Neill, a soldier and statesman
of no ordinary parts, seeing, as he bitterly said, that his 'lands were
marked down by the spoiler,' endeavoured, not without partial success, to
combine a great Irish League against England; he entered into an alliance
with Spain; a Spanish army landed on the southern coast of Munster; after
a long and sanguinary contest, Tyrone yielded, but his resistance had been
so formidable that he was allowed to retain his possessions.The subjugation of a large part of Ireland, in the Elizabethan wars, was
marked by incidents of a most atrocious character.The Government had no
regular army to act in the field; it was compelled largely to rely on
armed levies of the Englishry, and on bodies of the Irishry attached to
the conqueror's standards; for in this, as in nearly all instances
throughout their history, the Irish Celts were at feud with each other;
Celtic Ireland was a house divided against itself.The queen, it has been
written, 'ruled over blood and ashes,' when Mountjoy sheathed his
victorious sword; the memory of this period still lives in Irish
tradition.Mary went back to the bedroom.A season of exhaustion and repose ensued after James I. had
ascended the throne; but the time, in the phrase of Tacitus, had an evil
aspect in peace itself.The Pale had long before this been effaced;
conquest and confiscation had spread over nearly the whole island; the
domination of England was felt almost everywhere.As the result, the whole
of Ireland was made shire land; the old Celtic land system, which still
widely prevailed, was swept away by decisions of the Anglican Courts of
Justice; it was declared to be 'a lewd and not law-worthy thing;' all the
Irish land was subjected to English modes of tenure; they were imposed on
a people which detested these gifts of the stranger; innumerable tribal
rights were destroyed.Ere long the work of confiscation began again; the
domains of Tyrone and of his kinsman O'Donnell were pronounced forfeited
for reasons that have never been ascertained; the Crown was placed in
possession of nearly six counties of Ulster.Up to this time the
settlements of English colonists, which had been made in Ireland by Tudor
conquest, had failed; the colonists had been almost lost in the midst of
the Irishry, who hemmed them around.Mary moved to the bathroom.This immense confiscation was,
however, in part successful; it was carried out on comparatively
enlightened principles; it has produced the famous Plantation of Ulster;
and this, with other settlements in the counties of Antrim and Down, has
established, in a large part of the northern province of Ireland, a hardy
and thriving community, in the main, of Scottish blood.Confiscation,
nevertheless, did not stop here; 'the ravages of war,' in Burke's
language, were 'carried on amidst seeming peace;' enormous tracts were
torn from their former owners on pretexts usually of the flimsiest kind,
and were flung to Court favourites, to jobbing speculators, to greedy
adventurers of the baser sort.By this time three-fourths probably of the
soil of Ireland had passed into the hands of a new race of possessors; the
descendants of Anglo-Norman nobles and of the Celtic princes had been
sufferers well-nigh in the same proportion.At last Strafford marked out
the whole province of Connaught, for what has been called 'his majestic
rapine;' this and other innumerable acts of spoliation and wrong
unquestionably were the paramount cause of the great Celtic rising of
1641.Another and soon to be a most potent element of evils and troubles
had already begun to make its sinister presence felt in Ireland.In the
great religious schism of the sixteenth century, England had become
Protestant, Ireland had remained Catholic, and each had taken opposite
sides in the conflict that followed; though the Elizabethan wars were
rather struggles of race than of faith.But as conquest and confiscation
progressed in Ireland, the Anglican Church, a scion of the Norman Church
of the Pale, was erected on the ruins of its Celtic Catholic rival; the
land more and more became possessed by settlers alien in creed from the
old owners, and |
office | Where is Sandra? | Nevertheless, though
its signs had in some measure appeared, the era of Protestant ascendency
and Catholic subjection had not been developed in Ireland, as yet, in its
worst aspects.The wild Celtic rising of 1641 was followed by a rising of the old
Englishry of the Pale--the descendants of the first Anglo-Norman settlers;
both movements were probably encouraged from France; though widely
different, they ran into each other.The great Civil War was now running
its course in England; Ireland, for the most part, took the side of the
king; the majority of Englishmen were certainly on the side of the
Parliament.I cannot retrace the scenes of the contest in Ireland; after a
fierce and protracted struggle, in which an envoy of the Pope became the
representative of an ill-united Irish League; in which Preston and Ormond
led the forces of the Pale, and Owen Roe O'Neill was at the head of the
Irish Celts,--the whole island was subjugated by the sword of Cromwell, as
it never had been subjugated before.Drogheda and Wexford are names of woe
in the annals of Ireland; but the conquest of the Protector, ruthless as
it was, was not so cruel as that of the Elizabethan soldiers; if deeply
stained with blood, it was rapid and completely decisive.Mary went back to the bedroom.The colony in
Ulster had begun to flourish; Cromwell designed a scheme for the
colonisation of the vanquished country more thorough and extensive than
any which had been designed before.Three-fourths of Ireland had been in
arms against the Parliament; that assembly had made grants by
anticipation of Irish forfeited lands to 'adventurers' who had advanced it
moneys; an opportunity for immense confiscations had arisen; the Protector
was not slow to take advantage of it; his Puritan fanaticism, his hatred
of the Irish people, especially of its 'idolatrous <DW7>s,' his strong
English and religious sympathies, united to confirm him in his purpose.The forfeited lands in four of the Irish counties were appropriated to the
Commonwealth and its uses; those in eighteen were to be granted to the
'adventurers' and the soldiery of the late conquest; those in seven were
to be allotted to the army in England.The grants were to be either free,
or to be purchased at nominal prices; the owners, who had lost their
lands, were to be deported to Connaught--'Hell' was the alternative, the
tradition runs--and 'Courts of Claims,' as they were called, were to be
set up, to adjudicate on the conduct of those who were to be
dispossessed--they were to be subjected to a test which scarcely one could
satisfy--and practically to measure confiscation out under the pretence of
law.By these means Cromwell calculated that some forty thousand
colonists, of English blood and of the Puritan faith, would be poured into
the millions of acres which the sword had placed in the hands of his
Government; these would form a prosperous settlement loyal to England;
would keep rebellion in Ireland for ever down; and would regenerate a land
taken from a race akin to the Amalekites of old.As a foretaste of the new
and glorious order of things, Sir William Petty, a very able man,
remarkably skilful in feathering his own nest, made a cadastral survey of
Ireland, which still remains.Cromwell's scheme of confiscation was thoroughly carried out, spite of
much angry wrangling between the Puritan warriors.The remains of the
defeated Irish armies went, in thousands, into exile in foreign lands;
they were the heralds of the renowned soldiery who, for a century and a
half, were deadly, but honourable foes of the British name.The rule of
the Protector in Ireland was stern but enforced peace; Ireland was
prostrate in the exhaustion of despair; there is much proof that, under
the Cromwellian settlement, the country made a kind of material progress.But Cromwell's great scheme of colonisation failed, as such schemes had
failed in many instances before; a large majority of the 'adventurers' and
the soldiers sold their possessions, usually for a mere nothing: many
'degenerated' like the old Norman families, and, won over by the spells
'of the daughters of Heth,' had, in one or two generations, become'mere
Irish.'The ultimate result of the Cromwellian conquest was to establish
in Ireland three or four thousand owners of the soil, of English blood and
Puritan leanings, without the support of inferior dependents, in the midst
of a vanquished population hostile in race and faith; the sentiments thus
engendered have never died out; to this day 'a Cromwellian landlord' is a
name of reproach in Catholic Ireland.At the Restoration hope for a moment
revived in the hearts of the ruined owners, who had been dispossessed by
Cromwell, and of whom hundreds had fought for the Crown; but this was
dashed by the perfidy of Charles II.Mary moved to the bathroom.and his courtiers; the Cromwellian
forfeitures were, in the main, confirmed; large tracts were given back to
favourites of the Stuarts, but thousands of beggared families lost their
estates for ever through a policy of cruel baseness and wrong.Ireland
remained quiescent for nearly thirty years; she even prospered under the
wise rule of Ormond--one of the noblest figures in her unhappy history;
but the bitter memories of the past lived in the conquered people, though,
as has repeatedly been seen in a Celtic race, they were treasured in
silence, and caused little apparent trouble.ascended the throne
in 1685; he had a great opportunity to mitigate many of the wrongs of
Ireland; he might have removed some of the evils of the Cromwellian
conquest, and have effected changes in the settlement of the land, which,
at least, would have done partial justice.But the unfortunate king was a
bigot, and, in no sense, a statesman; like his father he tried the
desperate policy of making use of Ireland in his designs against English
liberties; he sent Tyrconnell to Dublin, and, in a few months, revolution
had broken out through the country; English and Protestant Ireland was
well-nigh trampled underfoot; Catholic and Celtic Ireland rose up in a
wild hope of revenge.I cannot even glance at the stirring events that
followed; the descendants of ruined barons of the Pale and of Celtic
princes driven from their lands and their homes, joined in a great effort
to raise a large armed force; the rising almost assumed a national aspect;
but after the Boyne and the fall of Limerick, it was finally quelled by
William III.Sandra travelled to the bedroom.The process of confiscation was once more renewed; thousands
of acres were taken forcibly from those who had resisted in the field, and
were handed over to a new race of colonists belonging to the blood and the
creed of the victors; and the shameful violation of a solemn Treaty made
all that was cruel in spoliation worse.The era of conquest in Ireland and of confiscation by force--an agony
prolonged for a century and a half--was brought to an end in the reign of
William III.This is not the place to examine the question on which side,
as between England and Ireland, the balance of the wrongs that were done
inclines; but if much that is cruel and shameful is to be laid to the
charge of England, Ireland, it cannot be forgotten, crossed her path
repeatedly in an age of grave national perils and troubles, and, moreover,
wrecked her own cause by her wretched dissensions.The Irish land had now
nearly all fallen into the hands of a caste of owners, of English and
Scottish descent, and in faith Protestant, divided from a people of
Catholic occupiers for the most part of the Irish race; wide lines of
demarcation had been drawn between them; and there was no middle class to
bridge over the gulf.In a part of Ulster alone where the proprietors and
the holders of the soil were largely of the same religion and blood, was
there the promise of a more auspicious order of things; even here causes
of disunion were not wanting.Nor were these the only vices and dangers of
a land system which has scarcely had a parallel.Enormous tracts had been
bestowed on owners who never saw their estates; absenteeism existed to an
immense extent; their lands, too, had, in thousands of instances, been
underlet to a class of intermediate owners, who were to form a body of
most oppressive landlords.He looked
stern and pale; but the very picture of a warrior.I shall never forget
Craufurd if I live to a hundred years, I think.Slowly and dejectedly crawled our army along.Their spirit of endurance
was now considerably worn out, and judging from my own sensations, I
felt confident that if the sea was much further from us, we must be
content to come to a halt at last without gaining it.I felt something
like the approach of death as I proceeded--a sort of horror, mixed up
with my sense of illness--a reeling I have never experienced before or
since.Still I held on; but with all my efforts, the main body again
left me behind.Had the enemy's cavalry come up at this time I think
they would have had little else to do but ride us down without striking
a blow.It is, however, indeed astonishing how man clings to life.I am certain
that had I lain down at this period, I should have found my last billet
on the spot I sank upon.Suddenly I heard a shout in front, which was
prolonged in a sort of hubbub.Even the stragglers whom I saw dotting
the road in front of me seemed to have caught at something like
hope; and as the poor fellows now reached the top of a hill we were
ascending, I heard an occasional exclamation of joy--the first note of
the sort I had heard for many days.When I reached the top of the hill
the thing spoke for itself.There, far away in our front, the English
shipping lay in sight.[7]
Its view had indeed acted like a restorative to our force, and the
men, at the prospect of a termination to the march, had plucked up
spirit for a last effort.Fellows who, like myself, seemed to have
hardly strength in their legs to creep up the ascent, seemed now to
have picked up a fresh pair to get down with.Such is hope to us poor
mortals!There was, I recollect, a man of the name of Bell, of the Rifles, who
had been during this day holding a sort of creeping race with me,--we
had passed and repassed each other, as our strength served.Bell was
rather a discontented fellow at the best of times; but during this
retreat he had given full scope to his ill-temper, cursing the hour he
was born, and wishing his mother had strangled him when he came into
the world, in order to have saved him from his present toil.He had not
now spoken for some time, and the sight of the English shipping had
apparently a very beneficial effect upon him.He burst into tears as he
stood and looked at it."Harris," he said, "if it pleases God to let me reach those ships, I
swear never to utter a bad or discontented word again."As we proceeded down the hill we now met with the first symptoms of
good feeling from the inhabitants, it was our fortune to experience
during our retreat.A number of old women stood on either side the
road, and occasionally handed us fragments of bread as we passed
them.It was on this day, and whilst I looked anxiously upon the
English shipping in the distance, that I first began to find my
eyesight failing, and it appeared to me that I was fast growing blind.The thought was alarming; and I made desperate efforts to get on.Bell, however, won the race this time.He was a very athletic and
strong-built fellow, and left me far behind, so that I believe at that
time I was the very last of the retreating force that reached the
beach, though doubtless many stragglers came dropping up after the
ships had sailed, and were left behind.As it was, when I did manage to gain the sea-shore, it was only by the
aid of my rifle that I could stand, and my eyes were now so dim and
heavy that with difficulty I made out a boat which seemed the last that
had put off.Fearful of being left half blind in the lurch, I took off my cap, and
placed it on the muzzle of my rifle as a signal, for I was totally
unable to call out.Luckily, Lieutenant Cox, who was aboard the boat,
saw me, and ordered the men to return, and, making one more effort,
I walked into the water, and a sailor stretching his body over the
gunwale, seized me as if I had been an infant, and hauled me on board.His words were characteristic of the English sailor, I thought."Hollo there, you lazy lubber!"he said, as he grasped hold of me, "who
the h-ll do you think is to stay humbugging all day for such a fellow
as you?"The boat, I found, was crowded with our exhausted men, who lay
helplessly at the bottom, the heavy sea every moment drenching them
to the skin.As soon as we reached the vessel's side, the sailors
immediately aided us to get on board, which in our exhausted state
was not a very easy matter, as they were obliged to place ropes in
our hands, and heave us up by setting their shoulders under us, and
hoisting away as if they had been pushing bales of goods on board.cried one of the boat's crew, as I clung to a rope, quite
unable to pull myself up, "heave away, you lubber!"The tar placed his shoulder beneath me as he spoke, and hoisted me up
against the ship's side; I lost my grasp of the rope and should have
fallen into the sea, had it not been for two of the crew.These men
grasped me as I was falling, and drew me into the port-hole like a
bundle of foul clothes, tearing away my belt and bayonet in the effort,
which fell into the sea.Sandra went to the office.It was not very many minutes after I was on board, for I lay where the
sailors had first placed me after dragging me through the port-hole,
ere I was sound asleep.I slept long and heavily, and it was only
the terrible noise and bustle on board consequent upon a gale having
sprung up, that at length awoke me.The wind increased as the night
came on, and soon we had to experience all the horrors of a storm at
sea.The pumps were set to work; the sails were torn to shreds; the
coppers were overset; and we appeared in a fair way, I thought, of
going to the bottom.Meanwhile, the pumps were kept at work night and
day incessantly till they were choked; and the gale growing worse and
worse, all the soldiery were ordered below, and the hatches closed;
soon after which the vessel turned over on one side, and lay a helpless
log upon the water.In this situation an officer was placed over us,
with his sword drawn in one hand, and a lantern in the other, in order
to keep us on the side which was upper-most, so as to give the vessel
a chance of righting herself in the roaring tide.The officer's task
was not an easy one, as the heaving waves frequently sent us sprawling
from the part we clung to, over to the lower-most part of the hold,
where he stood, and he was obliged every minute to drive us back.We remained in this painful situation for, I should think, five or
six hours, expecting every instant to be our last, when, to our great
joy, the sea suddenly grew calm, the wind abated, the vessel righted
herself, and we were once more released from our prison, having tasted
nothing in the shape of food for at least forty-eight hours.Soon after
this we arrived in sight of Spithead, where we saw nine of our convoy,
laden with troops, which had been driven on shore in the gale.After
remaining off Spithead for about five or six days, one fine morning
we received orders to disembark, and our poor bare feet once more
touched English ground.The inhabitants flocked down to the beach to
see us as we did so, and they must have been a good deal surprised at
the spectacle we presented.Our beards were long and ragged; almost
all were without shoes and stockings; many had their clothes and
accoutrements in fragments, with their heads swathed in old rags, and
|
bathroom | Where is Daniel? | Let not the reader, however, think, that even now we were to be
despised as soldiers.Long marches, inclement weather, and want of
food, had done their work upon us; but we were perhaps better than we
appeared, as the sequel shewed.Mary went back to the bedroom.Under the gallant Craufurd we had made
some tremendous marches, and even galled our enemies severely, making
good our retreat by the way of Vigo.But our comrades in adversity, and
who had retired by the other road to Corunna, under General Moore,
turned to bay there, and shewed the enemy that the English soldier is
not to be beaten even under the most adverse circumstances.The field of death and slaughter, the march, the bivouac, and the
retreat, are no bad places in which to judge of men.I have had some
opportunities of judging them in all these situations, and I should
say, that the British are amongst the most splendid soldiers in the
world.Mary moved to the bathroom.Give them fair play, and they are unconquerable.For my own
part, I can only say, that I enjoyed life more whilst on active
service, than I have ever done since; and as I sit at work in my
shop in Richmond Street, Soho, I look back upon that portion of my
time spent in the fields of the Peninsula as the only part worthy of
remembrance.It is at such times that scenes long passed come back upon
my mind as if they had taken place but yesterday.I remember even the
very appearance of some of the regiments engaged; and comrades, long
mouldered to dust, I see again performing the acts of heroes.FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 6: Some of these poor wretches cut a ludicrous figure,
having the men's great-coats buttoned over their heads, whilst their
clothing being extremely ragged and scanty, their naked legs were very
conspicuous.[Footnote 7: Our division, under Craufurd, in this retreat, as I have
before mentioned, made for Vigo.]THE WALCHEREN EXPEDITION.Filling up the ranks--Going out recruiting--Bagging a
blackbird--Coaxing the militia, and hoaxing them--A demon
runner--Winning a commission.After the disastrous retreat to Corunna, the Rifles were reduced to a
sickly skeleton, if I may so term it.Out of perhaps nine hundred of
as active and fine fellows as ever held a weapon in the field of an
enemy's country, we paraded some three hundred weak and crest-fallen
invalids.I myself stood the third man in my own company, which was reduced from
near a hundred men, to _but three_.Indeed, I think we had scarce a
company on parade stronger than ten or twelve men, at the first parade.After a few parades, however, our companies gradually were augmented
(by those of the sick who recovered), but many of those who did not
sink in hospital, were never more of much service as soldiers.The captain of my company was sick, and Lieutenant Hill commanded the
three men who answered for No.I remember he smiled when he looked at me."Harris," he said, "you
look the best man here, this morning.You seem to have got over this
business well.""Yes, Sir," I said, "thank God I feel pretty stout again now, which is
more than many can say."Both battalions of the Rifles had been in that retreat.The first
battalion lay at Colchester at this time.Ours (the second) was
quartered at Hythe.Sandra travelled to the bedroom.Colonel Beckwith commanded the first, and Colonel
Wade the second.I remember the 43rd and 52nd Regiments paraded with
our battalion on this occasion at Hythe, and both having been with us
on the Corunna retreat, cut as poor a figure as we ourselves did.After awhile, some of the strongest and smartest of our men were picked
out to go on the recruiting service, and gather men from the militia
regiments to fill up our ranks.I myself started off with Lieutenant
Pratt, Sergeant-Major Adams, and William Brotherwood, the latter of
whom was afterwards killed at Vittoria by a cannon-ball, which at the
same moment ended Patrick Mahon and Lieutenant Hopwood.[8]
I was a shoemaker in the corps, and had twenty pounds in my pocket
which I had saved up.With this money I hired a gig, and the
Sergeant-Major and myself cut a very smart figure.The only difficulty
was, that neither of us knew how to drive very well, consequently we
overturned the gig on the first day, before we got half way on our
journey, and the shafts being broken we were obliged to leave it behind
us in a small village, midway between Hythe and Rye, and take to our
legs, as was more soldier-like and seemly.We reached Rye the same
night, and I recollect that I succeeded in getting the first recruit
there, a strong, able-bodied chimney-sweep, named John Lee.This fellow
(whose appearance I was struck with as he sat in the taproom of the
"Red Lion" on that night, together with a little boy as black and sooty
as himself) offered to enlist the moment I entered the room, and I took
him at his word, and immediately called for the Sergeant-Major for
approval."There's nothing against my being a soldier," said the sweep, "but my
black face; I'm strong, active, and healthy, and able to lick the best
man in this room.""Hang your black face," said the Sergeant-Major; "the Rifles can't be
too dark: you're a strong rascal, and if you mean it, we'll take you to
the doctor to-morrow and make a Giniril of you the next day."So we had
the sweep that night into a large tub of water, scoured him outside,
and filled him with punch inside, and made a Rifleman of him.The Sergeant-Major, however, on this night, suspected from his
countenance, what afterwards turned out to be the case, that Lee was
rather a slippery fellow, and might repent.So, after filling him
drunk, he said to me--"Harris, _you_ have caught this bird, and _you_
must keep him fast.You must both sleep to-night handcuffed together
in the same bed, or he will escape us;" which I actually did, and the
next morning retraced my steps with him to Hythe, to be passed by the
doctor of our regiment.After rejoining Sergeant-Major Adams at Rye, we started off for
Hastings in Sussex, and on our way we heard of the East Kent Militia
at Lydd; so we stopped there about an hour to display ourselves
before them, and try if we could coax a few of them into the Rifles.We strutted up and down before their ranks arm-in-arm, and made no
small sensation amongst them.When on the recruiting service in those
days, men were accustomed to make as gallant a show as they could,
and accordingly we had both smartened ourselves up a trifle.The
Sergeant-Major was quite a beau, in his way; he had a sling belt to
his sword like a field-officer, a tremendous green feather in his cap,
a flaring sash, his whistle and powder-flask displayed, an officer's
pelisse over one shoulder, and a double allowance of ribbons in his
cap; whilst I myself was also as smart as I dared appear, with my rifle
slung at my shoulder.In this guise we made as much of ourselves as if we had both been
Generals, and, as I said, created quite a sensation, the militia-men
cheering us as we passed up and down, till they were called to order by
the officers.The permission to volunteer was not then given to the East Kent,
although it came out a few days afterwards, and we persuaded many men,
during the hour we figured before them, that the Rifles were the only
boys fit for _them_ to join.After looking up the East Kent, we reached Hastings that same night,
where we found that the volunteering of the Leicester Militia (who were
quartered there) had commenced, and that one hundred and twenty-five
men and two officers had given their names to the 7th Fusileers, and
these, Adams and I determined to make change their minds in our favour
if we could.The appearance of our Rifle uniform, and a little of Sergeant
Adams's[9] blarney, so took the fancies of the volunteers, that we
got every one of them for the Rifle corps, and both officers[10] into
the bargain.I may say that for
three days and nights we kept up the dance and the drunken riot.Every
volunteer got ten guineas bounty, which, except the two kept back for
necessaries, they spent in every sort of excess, till all was gone.The drooping spirits, the grief at parting with
old comrades, sweethearts, and wives, for the uncertain fate of war.And then came on the jeers of the old soldier; the laughter of Adams
and myself, and comrades, and our attempts to give a fillip to their
spirits as we marched them off from the friends they were never to look
upon again; and as we termed it, "_shove them on to glory_"--a glory
they were not long in achieving, as out of the hundred and fifty of the
Leicestershire, which we enlisted in Hastings, scarce one man, I should
say, who served, but could have shewn at the year's end some token
of the fields he had fought in; very many found a grave, and some
returned to Hythe with the loss of their limbs.I remember the story of many of these men's lives; that of one in
particular, named Demon, whom I myself enlisted from the Leicester
Militia, is not a little curious.Demon was a smart and very active
man, and serving as corporal in the light company of the Leicestershire
when I persuaded him to join our corps, where he was immediately made
a sergeant in the 3rd battalion, then just forming; and from which
he eventually rose to be a commissioned officer in one of our line
regiments, but whose number I cannot now remember.The cause which led
to Demon's merits being first noticed was not a little curious, being
neither more nor less than a race.It happened that at Shoreham Cliff, (soon after he joined) a race was
got up amongst some Kentish men, who were noted for their swiftness,
and one of them, who had beaten his companions, challenged any soldier
in the Rifles to run against him for two hundred pounds.The sum was
large, and the runner was of so much celebrity, that although we had
some active young fellows amongst us, no one seemed inclined to take
the chance, either officers or men, till at length Demon stepped forth
and said he would run against this Kentish boaster, or any man on
the face of the earth, and fight him afterwards into the bargain, if
any one could be found to make up the money.Upon this, an officer
subscribed the money, and the race was arranged.The affair made quite a sensation, and the inhabitants of the different
villages for miles around flocked to see the sport; besides which the
men from different regiments in the neighbourhood, infantry, cavalry,
and artillery, also were much interested, and managed to be present,
which caused the scene to be a very gay one.In short, the race
commenced, and the odds were much against the soldier at starting, as
he was a much less man than the other, and did not at all look like the
winner.He however kept well up with his antagonist, and the affair
seemed likely to end in a dead heat, which would undoubtedly have
been the case, but Demon, when close upon the winning-post, gave one
tremendous spring forward, and won it by his body's length.This race, in short, led on to notice and promotion.Sandra went to the office.General Mackenzie
was in command of the garrison at Hythe.He was present, and was highly
delighted at the Rifleman beating the bumpkin, and saw that the winner
was the very cut of a soldier, and in short that Demon was a very smart
fellow, so that, eventually, the news of the race reached the first
battalion then fighting in Spain.Sir Andrew Barnard, as far as I
recollect from hearsay, at the time, was then in command of the Rifles
in Spain; and, as I now remember the story, either he or some other
officer of rank, upon being told of the circumstance, remarked that, as
Demon was such a smart runner in England, there was very good ground
for a Rifleman to use his legs in Spain.Daniel went to the garden.He was accordingly ordered out
with the next draft to that country, where he so much distinguished
himself that he obtained his commission, as already mentioned.I could give many more anecdotes connected with the recruiting at this
time for the three battalions of Rifles, but the above will suffice;
and soon after the incident I have just narrated (our companies being
full of young and active men), we started off with the expedition,
then just formed, for Walcheren.I could not help feeling, when we
paraded, that I stood enranked for this first expedition comparatively
amongst strangers, since in the company I belonged to, not a single
man, except James Brooks, whom I have before named, then paraded with
me who had been a fellow comrade in the fields of Portugal and Spain.I felt also the loss of my old Captain (Leech), whom I much loved
and respected, and who left the second battalion at that time to be
promoted in the first.When I heard of this change, I stepped from the
ranks and offered to exchange into the first, but Lieutenant Hill, who
was present, hinted to Captain Hart (my new commanding officer) not to
let me go, as, if he did, he would perhaps repent it.I will not say
here what the Lieutenant then said of me, but he persuaded Captain Hart
to keep me, as my character had been so good in the former campaign;
and accordingly I remained in the second battalion, and started on the
Walcheren expedition.From Hythe to Deal was one day's march; and I remember looking along
the road at the good appearance the different regiments made as we
marched along.It was as fine an expedition as ever I looked at, and
the army seemed to stretch, as I regarded them, the whole distance
before us to Dover.FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 8: The manner in which these three soldiers met with their
death is extraordinary.As they were creeping from their cover to try
and shoot one of the French generals, who was much exposed, the enemy
pointed a gun at them, and succeeded in sweeping down all three, as
they crawled along.][Footnote 9: The history of Sergeant-Major Adams is somewhat singular.I was his great friend at this time, and he confided some part of
it to me.He had been a croppy, (a rebel) and had fought at Vinegar
Hill.Daniel journeyed to the bathroom.When the rebels were defeated he escaped, and lived some time
in the wilds of Connemara.He afterwards thought it best to enlist in
the Donegal Militia, and then volunteered to the Rifles.Here he soon
rose (whilst in Spain) to the rank of Sergeant.During the retreat to
Corunna, Sergeant-Major Crosby failed, and Craufurd promoted Adams
in his place.Sebastian he was noticed by General Graham, for
his bravery with the forlorn hope, a commission was given him, and he
afterwards joined a regiment in Gibraltar, where he was made Adjutant.He then went to America, where he served with credit till he died.I
believe I was the only man in the regiment who knew of his having been
a rebel, and I kept the secret faithfully till his death.][Footnote 10: The names of these two officers were Chapman and Freere,
and I believe they are living now.]THE WALCHEREN EXPEDITION.The embarkation--Flushing--The Walcheren fever--The doctors at
fault--The Riflemen attacked--The one survivor out of thirty-nine--The
veteran battalion--The independent companies.At Deal, the Rifles embarked in the Superb, a seventy-four, and a
terrible outcry there was amongst the women upon the beach on the
embarkation; for the ill consequences of having too many women amongst
us had been so apparent in our former campaign and retreat, that the
allowance of wives was considerably curtailed on this occasion, and the
distraction of the poor creatures at parting with their husbands was
quite heart-rending; some of them clinging to the men so |
bathroom | Where is Daniel? | In fact, even after we were in the boats and fairly pushed off,
the screaming and howling of their farewells rang in our ears far out
at sea.The weather being fair, and the fleet having a grand and imposing
appearance, many spectators (even from London) came to look at us as we
lay in the Downs, and we set sail (I think on the third day from our
embarkation) in three divisions.A fair wind soon carried us off Flushing, where one part of the
expedition disembarked; the other made for South Beveland, among which
latter I myself was.The five companies of Rifles immediately occupied
a very pretty village, with rows of trees on either side its principal
streets, where we had plenty of leisure to listen to the cannonading
going on amongst the companies we had left at Flushing.The appearance of the country (such as it was) was extremely pleasant,
and for a few days the men enjoyed themselves much.But at the
expiration of (I think) less time than a week, an awful visitation came
suddenly upon us.The first I observed of it was one day as I sat in
my billet, when I beheld whole parties of our Riflemen in the street
shaking with a sort of ague, to such a degree that they could hardly
walk; strong and fine young men who had been but a short time in the
service seemed suddenly reduced in strength to infants, unable to stand
upright--so great a shaking had seized upon their whole bodies from
head to heel.The company I belonged to was quartered in a barn, and
I quickly perceived that hardly a man there had stomach for the bread
that was served out to him, or even to taste his grog, although each
man had an allowance of half-a-pint of gin per day.In fact I should
say that, about three weeks from the day we landed, I and two others
were the only individuals who could stand upon our legs.They lay
groaning in rows in the barn, amongst the heaps of lumpy black bread
they were unable to eat.This awful spectacle considerably alarmed the officers,[11] who were
also many of them attacked.The naval doctors came on shore to assist
the regimental surgeons, who, indeed, had more upon their hands than
they could manage; Dr.Ridgeway of the Rifles, and his assistant,
having nearly five hundred patients prostrate at the same moment.In
short, except myself and three or four others, the whole concern was
completely floored.Under these circumstances, which considerably confounded the doctors,
orders were issued (since all hopes of getting the men upon their legs
seemed gone) to embark them as fast as possible, which was accordingly
done with some little difficulty.The poor fellows made every effort
to get on board; those who were a trifle better than others crawled to
the boats; many supported each other; and many were carried helpless as
infants.Mary went back to the bedroom.At Flushing matters were not much better, except that there the
soldiers had a smart skirmish with their enemies before the fever and
ague attacked them.On ship-board the aspect of affairs did not mend;
the men beginning to die so fast that they committed ten or twelve to
the deep in one day.It was rather extraordinary that myself, and Brooks, and a man named
Bowley, who had all three been at Corunna, were at this moment
unattacked by the disease, and, notwithstanding the awful appearance
of the pest-ship we were in, I myself had little fear of it, I thought
myself so hardened that it could not touch me.It happened, however,
that I stood sentinel (men being scarce) over the hatchway, and Brooks,
who was always a jolly and jeering companion (even in the very jaws
of death) came past me, and offered me a lump of pudding, it being
pudding-day on board.At that moment I felt struck with a deadly
faintness, shaking all over like an aspen, and my teeth chattering in
my head so that I could hardly hold my rifle.Brooks looked at me for a moment, with the pudding in his hand, which
he saw I could not take."Hallo," he said, "why Harris, old boy, _you_
are not going to begin, are you?"I felt unable to answer him, but only muttered out as I trembled, "For
God's sake get me relieved, Brooks!"said Brooks, "it's all up with Harris!You're catched hold of
at last, old chap."In fact I was soon sprawling upon the forecastle, amongst many others,
in a miserable state, our knapsacks and our great-coats over us.In
this state the doctors, during our short voyage, were fully employed;
pails of infusion of bark were carried amongst us and given to the men
in horn tumblers, and thus we arrived at Dover.As I lay on the deck, I looked up at that splendid castle in the
distance.It was identified with old England, and many a languid eye
was cheered by its sight.Men naturally love to die upon their native
land, and I felt I could now do so contentedly!Nay, I have that
frowning English fortress in my eye, at this moment, as I then beheld
it.The Warwickshire Militia were at this time quartered at Dover.They
came to assist in disembarking us, and were obliged to lift many of
us out of the boats like sacks of flour.If any of those militia-men
remain alive, they will not easily forget that piece of duty; for I
never beheld men more moved than they were at our helpless state.Many died at Dover and numbers in Deal; whilst those who had somewhat
rallied, on getting from the land of pestilence, were paraded, in order
to get them on to their old quarters at Hythe.I remember that the 43rd and 52nd Regiments (all that were able)
marched with us this day to Hythe; but I'm afraid we did not (any of
us) cut much of a figure on the road.In fact, such was the shaking
fever we felt, we were left pretty much to our own discretion to get
to our journey's end in the best manner we could.Many, indeed, would
never have got into barracks without assistance.In short, when I sat
down exhausted by the road-side several times during the march, and
looked at the men, I thought it bore in some degree a similitude to the
Corunna retreat; so awfully had disease enfeebled them.The hospital at Hythe being filled with the sick, the barracks became
a hospital, and as deaths ensued, and thinned the wards, the men were
continually removed, making a progress from barrack to hospital, and
from hospital to the grave.The ward of the hospital in which I myself
was, accomodated eleven men, and I saw, from my bed in the corner where
I lay, this ward refilled ten times, the former patients being all
carried out to the grave.I had been gradually removed as the men died,
until I was driven up into a corner of the ward, where I lay, and had
plenty of leisure to observe my comrades in misfortune, and witness
their end.Mary moved to the bathroom.Some I beheld die quietly, and others were seized in various
ways.Many got out of bed in a shivering delirium, and died upon the
floor in the night-time.Having been a shoemaker in the Rifles, I had saved during my service
near two hundred pounds, which I had in the bank at Hythe at this time,
so that I was enabled to procure extra wine and other nourishing
things, and often gave my companions in misfortune a treat also; and
this I think enabled my iron constitution to keep death so long at bay.Sandra travelled to the bedroom.I saw one or two of my old Peninsular comrades, whom I had often seen
fighting bravely in the field, die in this hospital in a miserable
condition, their bodies being swollen up like barrels.Everything was done for us that skill could devise, and nothing could
exceed the kindness and attention of Dr.Hot baths
were brought into the hospital--and many a man died whilst in the bath.I remember hearing, as I lay sick, that the firing over the graves of
our comrades was dispensed with, the men died so fast; and when I got
out, and went to the churchyard to look upon their graves I saw them
lying in two lines there.As they in life had been enranked, so they
lay also in similar order in death.Sandra went to the office.The medical men made every effort to trace the immediate cause of this
mortality amongst us; and almost all the men were examined after death;
but it was of no avail, as nothing could arrest the progress of the
malady after it had reached a certain height.Daniel went to the garden.The doctor, I heard,
generally attributed the deaths, in most cases, to enlargement of the
spleen, as almost all were swollen and diseased in that part.I myself
was dreadfully enlarged in the side, and for many years afterwards
carried "an extra paunch."As soon as the prospect began to brighten, and the men to recover a
little, we managed to muster outside the hospital, some three hundred
of us parading there morning and evening, for the benefit of fresh air;
and medicine was served out to us as we stood enranked, the hospital
orderlies passing along the files, and giving each man his dose from
large jugs which they carried.As we got better, an order arrived to furnish two companies of the
second battalion, and two companies of the third battalion, of Rifles,
for Spain, as they were much wanted there.Accordingly an inspection
took place, and two hundred men were picked out, all of whom were most
anxious to go.I myself was rejected at that time, as unfit, which I
much regretted.Daniel journeyed to the bathroom.However, on making application, after a few days, I was
accepted, principally on the recommendation of Lieutenant Cochrane,
who much wished for me; and I, in consequence, once more started for
foreign service.From Hythe to Portsmouth, where we were to embark, was eight days'
march; but the very first day found out some of the Walcheren lads.I myself was assisted that night to my billet, the ague having again
seized me, and on the third day waggons were put in requisition to get
us along the road.As we proceeded, some of those men who had relapsed
died by the way, and were buried in different places we passed through.At Chichester, I recollect, a man was taken out of the waggon in which
I myself lay, who had died beside me; and at that place he was buried.At Portsmouth I remained one night, billeted with my fellow-travellers
at the Dolphin.Here I was visited by an uncle who resided in the town;
and who was much shocked at seeing me so much reduced, concluding it
was impossible I could survive many days.Such was the sad state we
were again reduced to.The next morning spring-waggons were procured
for us, and we were sent back to Hilsea barracks for the benefit of
medical advice; and I took a farewell of my uncle, expecting never to
see him again.Such, however, was not to be the case, as, out of the
thirty-nine Riflemen who went into Hilsea hospital, I alone survived.It may seem to my readers extraordinary that I should twice be the
survivor of so many of my comrades.Sandra moved to the hallway.I can only, therefore, refer them
to the medical men who attended us, if they yet live, Dr.Ridgeway, of
the Rifles, and Dr.Frazer, who at that time was the surgeon at Hilsea.I must not forget to mention an act of great kindness and humanity
which was performed towards the soldiery whilst we lay sick at Hilsea
Hospital.Lady Grey, who, I believe, was the wife of the Commissioner
of Portsmouth Dockyard at this time, was so much struck with the state
of the sufferers, that she sent, one morning, two carts loaded with
warm clothing for them; giving to each man, of whatsoever regiment, who
had been at Walcheren, two pairs of flannel drawers and two flannel
waistcoats.This circumstance was greatly appreciated by the men, and
many, like myself, have never forgotten it.After this, being the only Rifleman left at Hilsea, Lieutenant Bardell
made application to the General for leave for me to go into Dorsetshire
to see my friends, which was granted; but the doctor shook his head,
doubting I should ever be able to endure the journey.In about a week,
however, I considered myself fit to undertake it; and, accordingly, a
non-commissioned officer of one of the line regiments put me into a
Salisbury coach.A lady and gentleman were my fellow passengers inside,
and we started about four o'clock.They seemed not much to relish
the look of a sick soldier in such close quarters; and, indeed, we
had hardly cleared the town of Gosport before I gave them a dreadful
fright.In short, I was attacked all at once with one of my periodical
ague-fits, and shook to so desperate a degree that they were both
horror-struck, and almost inclined to keep me company in my trembling.The lady thought that both herself and husband were lost, and would
certainly catch the complaint; expressing herself as most unhappy in
having begun her journey on that day.These fits generally lasted an
hour and a quarter, and then came on a burning fever, during which
I called for water at every place where the coach stopped.In fact,
coachman, guard, and passengers, outside and in, by no means liked it,
and expected every minute that I should die in the coach."Here's a nice go," said the coachman, as he stopped at a place called
Whitchurch, "catch me ever taking up a sick soldier again if I can help
it.This here poor devil's going to make a die of it in my coach."It seemed, indeed, as if I had personally offended the burly coachman,
for he made an oration at every place he stopped at, and sent all the
helpers and idlers to look at me, as I sat in his coach, till at last I
was obliged to beg of him not to do so.I had two attacks of this sort during the night, and was so bad that I
myself thought with the coachman, that I should never get out of the
vehicle alive.Never, I should think, had passengers so unpleasant a
journey as the lady and gentleman I travelled with.At length, early in the morning, the coach stopped at a village one
mile from my father's residence, which was on the estate of the present
Marquis of Anglesey.I had left my father's cottage quite a boy, and
although I knew the landlord of the little inn where the coached
stopped, and several other persons I saw there, none recognised me; so
I made myself known as well as I could, for I was terribly exhausted,
and the landlord immediately got four men to carry me home.My father was much moved at beholding me return in so miserable a
plight, as were also my stepmother and my brother.The sun was down in the west, and in its track a cruiser
steamed a mile or two out from the coast, while from under Ari Burnu,
where we had been that morning, a transport put out, rather recklessly
it seemed, and went straight across the open water.From the south and
west there was the continual Br-r-umr-m... br-r-um-m!of big guns, and
over Kaba Tepe way we could see shells bursting.John journeyed to the kitchen.We sat there for an
hour or so, waiting for one of the little specks out on the blue sea
floor to fire or sink, and then, as nothing happened, returned to camp.An orderly brought us supper that night--mutton, bread and cheese,
haricots, stewed fruit, and coffee--and we dined on a little table
outside the tent, with the twilight turning to moonlight and the
sheep-bells tinkling against the opposite hill.Soldiers were carrying
their suppers from the cook tent--not at all the bread-and-cigarette
diet with which one is always being told the hardy Turk is content.He
may be content, but whenever I saw him eating he had meat and rice, and
often stewed fresh beans or fruit--certainly better food than most
Turkish peasants or artisans are accustomed to at home.I sat outside watching the moon rise and listening to the distant
Crack... crack-crack!of rifle and machine-gun fire from over Ari Bumu
|
bathroom | Where is Daniel? | Evidently they were fighting in the trenches we had seen that
morning.The orderly who had served us, withdrawn a little way, was
standing like a statue in the dusk, hands folded in front of him, saying
his last prayer of the evening.Beyond, from a bush-covered tent, came
the jingle of a telephone and 'the singsong voice of the young Turkish
operator relaying messages in German--"Ja!...Mary went back to the bedroom.Kaba Tepe...
Ousedom Pasha... Morgen frith... Hier Multepe!...And to this and the distant rattle of battle we went to sleep.Chapter XII
Soghan-Dere And The Flier Of Ak-Bash
Next morning, after news had been telephoned in that the submarines had
got another battleship, the Majestic, we climbed again into the covered
wagon and started for the south front.We drove down to the sea and
along the beach road through Maidos--bombarded several weeks before,
cross-country from the Aegean, and nothing now but bare, burnt walls--on
to Kilid Bahr, jammed with camels and ox-carts and soldiers, and then on
toward the end of the peninsula.We were now beyond the Narrows and the Dardanelles.To the left, a bit
farther out, were the waters in which the Irresistible, Ocean, and
Bouvet were sunk, and even now, off the point, ten or twelve miles away,
hung the smoke of sister ships.Mary moved to the bathroom.We drove past the big guns of the
forts, past field-guns covering the shore, past masked batteries and
search-lights.Beside us, along the shore road, mule trains and ox-carts
and camel trains were toiling along in the blaze and dust with
provisions and ammunition for the front.Sandra travelled to the bedroom.Once we passed four soldiers
carrying a comrade, badly wounded, on a stretcher padded with leaves.After an hour or so of bumping we turned into a transverse valley, as
level almost as if it had been made for a parade-ground.High hills protected it north and south; a little stream ran down the
centre--it might have been made for a storage base and camp.More
brush-covered tents and arbors for horses were strung along the
hillside, one above the other sometimes, in half a dozen terraces.We drove into the valley, got out and followed the orderly to a
brush-covered arbor, closed on every side but one, out of which came a
well set-up, bronzed, bright-eyed man of fifty or thereabout who
welcomed us like long-lost friends.It was Colonel Shukri Bey, commander of the Fifteenth Division.We were
the first correspondents who had pushed thus far, and as novel to him
apparently as he was charming to us.He invited us into the little
arbor; coffee was brought and then tea, and, speaking German to Suydam
and French to me, he talked of the war in general and the operations at
the end of the peninsula with the greatest good humor and apparent
confidence in the ultimate result.Our talk was continually punctuated by the rumble of the big guns over
the plateau to the south."That's ours"... "That's theirs," he would
explain; and presently, with a young aide-de-camp as guide, we climbed
out of the valley and started down the plateau toward Sedd ul Bahr.The
Allies' foothold here was much wider than that at An Burnu.In the
general landing operations of April 25 and 26 (one force was sent ashore
in a large collier, from which, after she was beached, the men poured
across anchored lighters to the shore) the English and French had
established themselves in Sedd ul Bahr itself and along the cliffs on
either side.This position was strengthened during the weeks of
fighting which followed until they appeared to be pretty firmly fixed on
the end of the peninsula, with a front running clear across it in a
general northwest line, several kilometres in from the point.The
valley we had just left was Soghan-Dere, about seven miles from Sedd ul
Bahr, and the plateau across which we were walking led, on the right, up
to a ridge from which one could look down on the whole battle-field, or,
to the left, straight down into the battle itself.The sun was getting down in the west by this time, down the road from
camp men were carrying kettles of soup and rice pilaf to their comrades
in the trenches, and from the end of the plateau came continuous
thundering and the Crack... crack... crack!The road
was strewn with fragments of shells from previous bombardments, and our
solicitous young lieutenant, fearing we might draw fire, pulled us
behind a bush for a minute or two, whenever the aeroplane, flying back
and forth in the west, seemed to be squinting at us.The enemy could
see so little, he said, that whenever they saw anything at all they
fired twenty shots at it on principle.For two miles, perhaps, we walked, until from the innocent-looking
chaparral behind us there was a roar, and a shell wailed away over our
heads out into the distance.We could see the end of the peninsula, where the coast curves round from
Eski Hissariik toward Sedd ul Bahr, and two of the enemy's cruisers
steaming slowly back and forth under the cliffs, firing, presumably, as
they steamed.Now they were hidden under the shore, now they came in
view, and opposite Eski Hissarlik swung round and steamed west again.In
front of us, just over the edge of the plateau which there began to
<DW72> downward, were the trenches of the Turks' left wing, now under
bombardment.Sandra went to the office.The ridge just hid the shells as they struck, but we could
see the smoke from each, now a tall black column, like the "Jack
Johnsons" of the west, now a yellowish cloud that hung long afterward
like fog--and with it the continuous rattle of infantry fire.Several
fliers were creeping about far up against the 'blue, looking for just
such hidden batteries as that which kept barking behind us, and out in
front and to the right came the low Br--r--um--m!Fighting like this had been going on for weeks, the ships having the
advantage of their big guns by day, the Turks recovering themselves,
apparently, at night.They were on their own ground--a succession of
ridges, one behind the other--and they could not only always see, but
generally looked down on, an enemy who could not, generally, see them.And the enemy's men, supplies, perhaps even his water--for this is a dry
country at all times, and after June there are almost no rains--must
come from his ships.If English submarines were in the Marmora, so,
too, were German submarines off the Dardanelles, and if the Turks were
losing transports the English were losing battleships.The situation held too many possibilities to make prophecy safe--I
merely record the fact that on the afternoon of May 27 I stood on the
plateau above Sedd ul Bahr, and perhaps five miles from it in an air
line, and still found myself a regrettable distance from the Allies'
front.The sun was shining level down the road as we returned to camp, and
soldiers were still tramping peacefully up to the front with their
kettles of food.Daniel went to the garden.Meanwhile the colonel had prepared a little exhibition
for us.Six or eight soldiers stood in line, each with a dish and
spoon, and in the dish a sample of the food for that night.We started
at the top and tasted each: soup, mutton, stewed green beans, new-baked
bread, stewed plums, and a particularly appetizing pilaf, made out of
boiled whole wheat and raisins.Everything was good, and the beaming
colonel declared that the first thing in war was to keep your soldiers
well fed.We dined with him in his tent: soup and several meat courses,
and cherry compote, and at the end various kinds of nuts, including the
cracked hazelnuts, commoner in Turkey than bananas and peanuts at home.He hoped to come to America some day, and thought we must soon develop
the military strength to back our desires for peace, unless there were
to be continual wars.New York's climate, the cost of fruit in Germany,
and other peaceful subjects were touched on, and the colonel said that
it was an honor to have us with him--ours we brilliantly responded--and
a pleasant change from the constant talk and thought of war.He had been six years in the field now, what with the Italian and Balkan
campaigns, and that was a good deal of war at a stretch.After excusing ourselves, though the amiable Turk said that he was in no
hurry, we were led to a sort of tent de luxe, lined in scarlet with
snaky decorations in white, and when the young aid discovered that we
had brought no beds with us, he sent out and in a moment had not only
cots and blankets, but mattresses and sheets and pillows and
pillow-cases.He asked if we had fathers and mothers alive at home, and
brothers and sisters, and if we, too, had been soldiers.Daniel journeyed to the bathroom.It surprised
and puzzled him that we had not, and that our army was so small.He was
only twenty-two and a lieutenant, and he had a brother and father also
in the army.With a great air of mystery he had his orderly dig a bottle
of cognac out from his camp chest, and after we had drunk each other's
health, he gave us his card with his name in Turkish and French.Sandra moved to the hallway.He
brought a table and put on it a night candle in a saucer of water, a
carafe of drinking water, and gave me a pair of slippers--in short, he
did for us in that brush-covered camp in the Gallipoli hills everything
that could be done for a guest in one's own house.John journeyed to the kitchen.You can scarcely know what this meant without having known the
difficulties of mere existence once you left Constantinople and got into
the war zone, and Colonel Shukri Bey and Lieutenant Ahmed Akif will be
remembered by at least two Americans when any one talks of the terrible
Turk.I awoke shortly after daylight, thinking I heard an aeroplane strumming
in the distance, and was drowsily wondering whether or not it was fancy,
when a crash echoed up the valley.It was sunup,
a delicious morning, and far up against the southern sky the little
speck was sailing back toward the west.There was a flash of silver just
under the flier--it was an English biplane--and a moment later another
crash farther away.Sandra went to the office.A few minutes later we
were looking at the remains of the bomb and propeller-like wings, whose
whirling, as it falls, opens a valve that permits it to explode on
striking its mark.Until it had fallen a certain number of metres, we
were told, mere striking the ground would not explode it--a device to
protect the airman in case of accident to his machine or if he is forced
to make a quick landing.In the fresh, still morning, with the camp
just waking up and the curious Turkish currycombs clinking away over by
the tethered horses, our aerial visitor added only a pleasant excitement
to this life in the open, and we went on with our dressing with great
satisfaction, little dreaming how soon we were to look at one of those
little flying specks quite differently.We breakfasted with the colonel in his arbor on bread and ripe olives
and tea, and walked with him round the camp, through a hospital and into
an old farmhouse yard, where the gunsmiths were going over stacks of
captured guns and the damaged rifles of the wounded, while the bees left
behind in some clumsy old box hives buzzed away as of yore.Wiser than
men, the colonel observed.There were English Enfields and French
rifles of the early nineties, and a mitrailleuse to which the Turks had
fitted a new wooden base.There were rifles with smashed barrels, with
stocks bored through by bullets, clean-cut holes that must have gone on
through the men who held them--live men like ourselves; quick choking
instants of terror the ghosts of ---- which we were poking and peering
into there in the warm sunshine!We said good-by to the colonel, for our passes took us but to the
valley, and he had stretched a point in sending us down the plateau the
evening before, and I bumped back to Kilid Bahr.We did not want to
leave this part of the world without a sight of Troy, and as we had duly
presented ourselves in Gallipoli, and were now by way of coming from it
rather than Constantinople, and the Turkish official to whom the orderly
took us wrote, without question, a permission to cross to Chanak Kale,
we sailed with no misgivings.Alas for Troy and looking down on a modern
battle from the heights of Ilium!John moved to the bathroom.A truculent major of gendarmes hurried
us from the Asiatic shore as if we had come to capture it.We might not
land, we might not write a note to the commandant to see if the
permission to stop in Chanak, for which we had wired to Constantinople
the day before, had arrived; we might not telephone--we must go back to
Europe, and write or telephone from there.So back to Europe, and after consultation and telephoning, back to Asia
again, and this time we succeeded in effecting a landing and an audience
with the commander of the defenses of the Dardanelles, Djevad Pasha.He
was sitting under a tree in a garden looking out over the sea gate,
which, with the aid of his two German colleagues, Ousedom Pasha and
Merten Pasha, it was his task to keep shut--a trim Young Turk, more
polished and "European" than the major of gendarmes, but no less firm.An American's wish to see the Troy he might never be so near again bored
him excessively.We could not stay--we might not even spend the night.There was a boat that evening, and on it we must go.Gendarmes guarded us while we waited--we who the night before had slept
in a scarlet-lined tent!--and gendarmes hung at our heels as we and
three patient hamals with the baggage tramped ignominiously through
Chanak Kale's ruined streets.The boat we went by was the same little
side-wheeler we had come down on, crowded with wounded now, mud-stained,
blood-stained, just as they had come from the trenches across the water,
with no place to lie but the bare deck.The stifling hold was packed
with them; they curled up about the engine-room gratings--for it was
cold that night--yet there was no complaint.A tired sigh now and then,
a moan of weariness, and the soldier wrapped his army overcoat a little
closer about him, curled up like a dog on a door-mat, and left the rest
to fate.A big, round, yellow moon climbed up out of Asia and poured
its silver down on them and on the black hills and water, still as some
inland lake.The side-wheeler tied up at Ak-Bash for the night, and it was not until
the middle of the next morning that it was decided that she should cross
and leave her wounded at Lapsaki instead of going on up to
Constantinople.We lugged our baggage off and hunted up our old friend,
the Hamburg-American captain, to see what might be done till some other
craft appeared.He finally put us aboard a sort of enlarged tug which
might be going up that afternoon or evening.The sun blazing down on the crowded fiat; on
boxes, sacks, stevedores wrapped up in all the variegated rags of the
East shuffling in and out of the ships; on gangs digging, piling lumber,
boiling water, cooking soup; on officers in brown uniforms and brown
lamb's-wool caps; on horses, ox-teams, and a vast herd of sheep, which
had just poured out of a transport and spread over the plain, when from
the hill came two shots of warning.The gangs scattered like water-bugs when a stone is thrown into the
water.They ran for the hill, dropped into trenches; to the beach and
threw themselves flat on the sand; into the water--all, as they ran,
looking up over their shoulders to where, far overhead, wh |
kitchen | Where is Sandra? | A hidden battery roared and--pop!--a little puff of cotton floated in
the sky under the approaching flier.Another and another--all the
nervous little batteries in the hills round about were coming to our
rescue.The bird-man, safely above them, drew on without flinching.We
had looked up at aeroplanes many times before and watched the pretty
chase of the shrapnel, and we leaned out from under the awning to keep
the thing in view."Look," I said to Suydam; "she's coming right over
us!"And then, all at once, there was a crash, a concussion that hit the
ear like a blow, a geyser of smoke and dust and stones out on the flat
in front of us.Through the smoke I saw a horse with its pack undone and
flopping under its belly, trotting round with the wild aimlessness of
horses in the bull-ring after they have been gored.Men were running,
and, in a tangle of wagons, half a dozen oxen, on the ground, were
giving a few spasmodic kicks.Men streaked up from the engine-room and across the wharf--after all,
the wharf would be the thing he'd try for--and I found myself out on the
flat with them just as there came another crash, but this time over by
the Barbarossa across the bay.Black smoke was pouring from the Turkish
cruiser as she got under way, and, with the shrapnel puffs chasing
hopelessly after, the flier swung to the southward and out of right.Officers were galloping about yelling orders; over in the dust where the
bomb had struck, a man was sawing furiously away at the throats of the
oxen (there were seven of them, and there would be plenty of beef in
camp that night at any rate); there was a dead horse, two badly wounded
men and a hundred feet away a man lying on his face, hatless, just as he
had been blown there: dead, or as good as dead.It appeared that two
fliers had come from opposite directions and most of the crowd had seen
but the one, while the other dropped the bomb.It had struck just
outside the busiest part of the camp, aimed very likely at the stores
piled there.It had made a hole only five or six feet wide and two or
three feet deep, but it had blown everything in the neighborhood out
from it, as the captain had said.Holes you could put your fist in were
torn in the flanks of the oxen by flying stones and chunks of metal, and
the tires of some of the wagons, sixty or seventy feet away, had been
cut through like wax.The ground was cleared, the men returned to work, and we even went in
swimming, but at every unexpected noise one looked upward, and when
about five o'clock the crowd scattered again, I will confess that I
watched that little speck buzzing nearer, on a line that would bring him
straight overhead, with an interest considerably less casual than any I
had bestowed on these birds before.There we were, confined in our
little amphitheatre; there was that diabolical bird peering down at us,
and in another minute, somewhere in that space, would come that
earth-shaking explosion--a mingling of crash and vohou'!There was no
escaping it, no dodging it, nothing to get under but empty air.I had decided that the beach, about a hundred yards away from the
wharfs, was the safest place and hurried there; but the speck overhead,
as if anticipating me, seemed to be aiming for the precise spot.It is
difficult under such circumstances to sit tight, reasoning calmly that,
after all, the chances of the bomb's not landing exactly there are a
good many to one--you demand at least the ostrich-like satisfaction of
having something overhead.So I scurried over to the left to get out
from under what seemed his line of flight, when what should he do but
begin to turn!To fly across as he had that
morning was one thing, but to pen one up in a nice little pocket in the
hills, and then on a vertical radius of three or four thousand feet, to
circle round over one's head--anything yet devised by the human
nightmare was crude and immature to this.If
behind, and travelling at fifty or sixty miles an hour, the bomb would
carry forward--just enough probably to bring it over; and if apparently
over, still the bomb would have been several seconds in falling--it
might be right on top of us now!Should we run backward or forward: Here
was a place, in between some grain-bags.But the grain-bags were open
toward the wharf, and the wharf was what he was aiming at, and a plank
blown through you--No, the trench was the thing, but--Quick, he is
overhead!The beach, the bags, the ditch, all the way round the camp, and Suydam
galloping after.Somewhere in the middle of it a hideous whiffling wail
came down the sky: Trrou... trrou...The bomb
had hit the water just off the end of the pier.There was another Trrou... trrou!another geyser of water, and the bird
had flown on.I was on the edge of the camp by this time and that strange afternoon
ended, when one of a gang of ditch-diggers, swathed in bright-
rags, addressed me in English, a Greek-Turk from the island of Marmora,
who, climbing out of the trench in which he and his gang had been
hiding, announced that he had lived in New York for five years, in
Fortieth Street, and worked for the Morgan Line, and begged that I get,
him out of this nerve-racking place and where he belonged, somewhere on
board ship.There were crowds like him--Greeks, Armenians, Turks, not
wanted as soldiers but impressed for this sort of work.They were
unloading fire-wood long after dark that night, when our boat at last
got under way.We paused till sunup at Lapsaki, crept close to shore
through the Marmora, and once through floating wreckage--boards and a
galvanized-iron gasolene tank--apparently from some transport sunk by a
submarine, and after dark, with lights out as we had started, round the
corner of Stamboul.Chapter XIII
A War Correspondents' Village
The press department of the Foreign Office in Vienna duly presented the
application to the press bureau of the Ministry of War; the latter
conveyed it to the "Kaiserliche und Konigliche Armee-Oberkommando
Kriegs-Presse-Quartier," a day's railroad journey nearer the front; the
commandant made his recommendation to the chief of the General Staff.The permission itself percolated back to Vienna presently, and early
next morning I took the Teschen express.It was one of those semi-military trains which run into this region
behind the front--officers and couriers, civilians with military passes,
just before we started a young officer and his orderly saying good-by to
their wives.He was one of those amiable, blue-eyed young Austrians who
seem a sort of cross between German and French, and the orderly was much
such another man, only less neatly made and sensitive, and there were
the same differences in their wives and their good-bys.The orderly saluted his officer, turned, clicked his heels, and saluted
his officer's lady before he embraced his solid wife.The latter,
rather proud to be in such company, beamed like a stove as the two men
looked down from the car steps, but the girlish wife of the captain bit
her lips, looked nervously from side to side, winked faster and faster
until the tears began to roll down her cheeks.Then the train started,
the orderly waving his hand, but the young officer, leaning quickly
forward, drew his wife toward him and kissed her on one of the wet
eyelids.We crossed into Hungary, rolled northeastward for five or six hours into
the Vag valley, with its green hills and vineyards and ruined castles,
and finally came to a little place consisting almost entirely of
consonants, in the Tatra foot-hills.Two blond soldiers in blue-gray
saluted, took my luggage, showed me to a carriage, and drove to a
village about a mile away--a little white village with a factory chimney
for the new days, a dingy chateau for the old, and a brook running
diagonally across the square, with geese quacking in it and women
pounding clothes.Daniel went to the kitchen.It was mid-afternoon, yet lunch had been kept waiting, and the officer
who received me said he was sorry I had bothered to eat on the train.He
told me where lodgings had been made ready, and that an orderly would
take me there and look after my personal needs.They dined at eight,
and at five, if I felt like it, I would probably find some of them in
the coffee-house by the chateau.Meanwhile the first thing to do was to
take one's cholera vaccination--for no one could go to the Galician
front without being geimpft--and just as soon as I could take the
second, a week later, we should start for the Russian front.In this
fashion were strangers welcomed to the "Presse-Quartier," or rather to
that part of it--this little Hungarian village--in which correspondents
lived during the intervals of their trips to the front.Their court is, next to that of Spain, the most
formal in Europe, and ordinary life still retains many of the older
courtesies.Every time I came into my hotel in Vienna the two little
boys at the door jumped up and extended their caps at arm's length; an
assistant porter, farther in, did the same; the head porter behind the
desk often followed, and occasionally all four executed the manoeuvre at
once, so that it was like a musical comedy but for the music.The ordinary salutation in Vienna, as common as our "hello!"is "I have
the honor" (Ich habe die Ehre!).In Hungary--of course one mustn't tell
a Hungarian that he is "Austrian"--people tell you that they are your
humble servants before they say good morning, and those who really are
humble servants not only say "Kiss the hands," but every now and then do
it.It was natural, therefore, perhaps, that the Austro-Hungarians
should treat war correspondents--often, in these days, supposed to be
extinct--not only seriously but with a certain air.They had not only
the air but indeed a more elaborate organization than any of the other
belligerents.At the beginning of the war England permitted no correspondents at all
at the front.France was less rigid, yet it was months before groups of
observers began to be taken to the trenches.Germany took correspondents to the front from the first, but these
excursions came at irregular intervals, and admission to them involved a
good deal of competitive wire-pulling between the correspondents
themselves.The Austro-Hungarians, on the other hand, prepared from the
first for a large number of civilian observers, including news and
special writers, photographers, illustrators, and painters, and, to
handle them satisfactorily, organized a special department of the army,
this Presse-Quartier, once admitted to which--the fakirs and
fly-by-nights were supposed to be weeded out by the preliminary red tape
--they were assumed to be serious workmen and treated as the army's
guests.The Presse-Quartier was divided into two sections: an executive section,
with a commandant responsible for the arrangement of trips to the
various fronts, and the general business of censorship and publicity;
and an entertainment section, so to speak, also with its commandant,
whose business it was to board, lodge, and otherwise look after
correspondents when they were not on trips to the front.At the time I
visited the Presse-Quartier, the executive section was in Teschen; the
correspondents lived in Nagybiesce, two or three hours' railroad journey
away.It was to this village--the most novel part of the scheme--that I had
come that afternoon, and here some thirty or forty correspondents were
living, writing past adventures, setting forth on new ones, or merely
inviting their souls for the moment under a regime which combined the
functions of tourists' bureau, rest-cure, and a sort of military club.For the time being they were part of the army--fed, lodged, and
transported at the army's expense, and unable to leave without formal
military permission.They were supposed to "enlist for the whole war,"
so to speak, and most of the Austro-Hungarian and German correspondents
had so remained--some had even written books there--but observers from
neutral countries were permitted to leave when they felt they had seen
enough.Isolated thus in the country, the only mail the military field post, the
only telegrams those that passed the military censor, correspondents
were as "safe" as in Siberia.They, on the other hand, had the
advantage of an established position, of living inexpensively in
pleasant surroundings, where their relations with the censor and the
army were less those of policemen and of suspicious character than of
host and guest.To be welcomed here, after the usual fretful dangling
and wire-pulling in War Office anterooms and city hotels--with hills and
ruined castles to walk to, a brook rippling under one's bedroom window,
and all the time in the world--seemed idyllic enough.We were quartered in private houses, and as there was one man to a
family generally, he was put in the villager's room of honor, with a
tall porcelain stove in the corner, a feather bed under him, and another
on top.Each man had a soldier servant who looked after boots and
luggage, kept him supplied with cigars and cigarettes from the Quartier
commissariat--for a paternal government included even tobacco!--and
charmed the simple republican heart by whacking his heels together
whenever spoken to and flinging back "Jawohl!"We breakfasted separately, whenever we felt like it, on the rolls with
the glass of whipped cream and coffee usual in this part of the world;
lunched and dined--officers and correspondents--together.There were
soldier waiters who with military precision told how many pieces one
might take, and on every table big carafes of Hungarian white wine,
drunk generally instead of water.The commandant and his staff, including a doctor, and the officer guides
not on excursions at the moment, sat at the head of the long U-shaped
table.Any one who came in or went out after the commandant was seated
was supposed to advance a bit into this "U," catch his eye, bow, and
receive his returning nod.The silver click of spurs, of course,
accompanied this salute when an officer left the room, and the
Austro-Hungarian and German correspondents generally snapped their heels
together in semi-military fashion.All our goings and comings, indeed,
were accompanied by a good deal of manner.People who had seen each
other at breakfast shook hands formally half an hour later in the
village square, and one bowed and was bowed to and heard the singsong...
"'habe die Ehre!"Nagybiesce is in northern Hungary, and the peasants round about were
Slovaks--sturdy, solid, blond people with legs the same size all the way
down.Many of them still reaped with scythes and thrashed on the barn
floor with old-fashioned flails, and one afternoon there was a curious
plaintive singing under my window--a party of harvesters, oldish men and
brown, barefooted peasant girls, who had finished their work on a
neighboring farm, and were crossing our village on their way to their
own.The Quartier naturally stirred things up a good deal in Nagybiesce.There was one week when we could not go into the street without being
surrounded by little girls with pencils and cards asking for our
"autogram."Sandra went to the kitchen.The candy shop kept by two girl wives whose husbands were at
the front did a vast business, and the young women had somebody to talk
to all day long.The evening the news came that Warsaw had fallen,
candles were lighted in all the windows on the square, and the band with
the villagers behind it came to serenade us as we were at dinner.The
commandant bowed from the window, but a young Hungarian journalist
leaned out and without a moment's hesitation poured forth a torrent for |
hallway | Where is Mary? | I told him that
such impromptu oratory seemed marvellous, but he dismissed it as
nothing.he explained, with a wave of his hand.One day a man came into lunch with the news that he was off on the best
trip he'd had yet--he was going back to Vienna for his skis, to go down
into the Tyrol and work along the glaciers to the battery positions.Another man, a Budapest painter, started off for an indefinite stay with
an army corps in Bessarabia.He was to be, indeed, part of the army for
the time being, and all his work belonged to the army first.As this is
being written a number of painters sent out on similar expeditions have
been giving an exhibition in Vienna--portraits and pencil sketches much
like those Frederic Remington used to make.Foreigners not intending to
remain in Austria-Hungary could not expect such privileges, naturally;
but if they were admitted to the Quartier at all they were sent on the
ordinary group excursions like the home correspondents themselves.Indeed, the wonder was--in view of the comparative ease with which
neutral correspondents drifted about Europe: the naivete, to put it
mildly, with which the wildest romances had been printed in American
newspapers, that we were permitted to see as much as we did.When a group started for the front, it left Nagybiesce in its own car,
which, except when the itinerary included some large city--Lemberg, for
instance--served as a little hotel until they came back again.The car
was a clean, second-class coach, of the usual European compartment kind,
two men to a compartment, and at night they bunked on the long
transverse seats comfortably enough.We took one long trip of a
thousand miles or so in this way, taking our own motor, on a separate
flat car, and even an orderly servant for each man.Each of these
groups was, of course, accompanied by an officer guide--several were
detailed at the Quartier for this special duty--whose complex and
nerve-racking task it was to answer all questions, make all
arrangements, report to each local commandant, pass sentries, and
comfortably waft his flock of civilians through the maze of barriers
which cover every foot, so to speak, of the region near the front.The things correspondents were permitted to see differed from those seen
on the other fronts less in kind than in quantity.Daniel went to the kitchen.More trips were
made, but there is and can be little place for a civilian on a "front,"
any spot in which, over a strip several miles wide, from the heavy
artillery positions of one side to the heavy artillery of the other, may
be in absolute quiet one minute and the next the centre of fire.There
is no time to bother with civilians during an offensive, and, if a
retreat is likely, no commander wishes to have country described which
may presently be in the hands of the enemy.Hidden batteries in action,
reserves moving up, wounded coming back, fliers, trenches quiet for the
moment--this is about as close to actual fighting as the outsider, under
ordinary circumstances, can expect to get on any front.The difference
in Austria-Hungary was that correspondents saw these things, and the
battle-fields and captured cities, not as mere outsiders, picked up from
a hotel and presently to be dropped there again, but as, in a sense, a
part of the army itself.They had their commandant to report to, their
"camp" and "uniform"--the gold-and-black Presse-Quartier arm band--and
when they had finished one excursion they returned to headquarters with
the reasonable certainty that in another ten days or so they would start
out again.Chapter XIV
Cannon Fodder
At the head of each iron bed hung the nurse's chart and a few words of
"history."These histories had been taken down as the wounded came in,
after their muddy uniforms had been removed, they had been bathed, and
could sink, at last, into the blessed peace and cleanness of the
hospital bed.Sandra went to the kitchen.And through them, as through the large end of a
telescope, one looked across the hot summer and the Hungarian fields,
now dusty and yellow, to the winter fighting and freezing in the
Carpathians."Possibly," the doctor said, "you would like to see one of these cases."The young fellow was scarce twenty, a strapping boy with fine teeth and
intelligent eyes.He looked quite well; you could imagine him pitching
hay or dancing the czardas, with his hands on his girl's waist and her
hands on his, as these Hungarian peasants dance, round and round, for
hours together.But he would not dance again, as both his feet had been
amputated at the ankle and it was from the stumps that the doctor was
unwrapping the bandages.The cavalry opened
right and left, and the enemy found themselves face to face with a
steady line of infantry; who at once advanced, the general himself
leading them, at the head of the 76th Regiment.A tremendous fire was opened upon them by the Mahratta guns but,
when within a hundred paces of the enemy, the whole line fired a
volley, and then charged with the bayonet.The enemy did not stand
for a moment but, seized by a panic, fled in all directions,
pursued by the cavalry and the horse artillery battery.These
followed them as far as the banks of the Jumna, and great numbers
of the enemy lost their lives in endeavouring to cross the river.The British loss, in killed and wounded, was nearly six hundred
men; while that of the enemy was estimated at two thousand.Sixty-eight pieces of cannon, two waggons laden with treasure, and
thirty-seven with ammunition fell into the hands of the victors
who, on the 14th, crossed the Jumna, and took possession of the
city without opposition; being welcomed enthusiastically by the
population, who had long groaned under the terrible oppression of
their Mahratta masters.Two days later, General Lake paid a visit to the unfortunate
emperor, who was now eighty-three years old.He had been blinded by
his brutal conquerors, and lived in a state of misery, and poverty,
greater than that of any of the tillers of the fields of the wide
empire over which he had once ruled.He lived for another three
years, and was succeeded by his son, Mirza Akbar.Leaving a force at Delhi, General Lake marched southward, as the
strong town of Agra was still in the possession of Scindia's
troops.He arrived before the city on the 4th of October and, in
three days, had cut off their communication with the surrounding
country; his cavalry being assisted by five thousand horse, sent by
the Rajah of Bhurtpoor, who had, as soon as he heard of the fall of
Alighur, hastened to enter into an alliance with the British.The garrison was strong, and seven battalions of Scindia's regular
infantry were encamped on the glacis, and held possession of the
town.The garrison, however, refused to admit them into the fort;
as they had determined to share, among themselves, the large amount
of treasure deposited there.The troops had been
commanded by English officers, in Scindia's service, and these had
been imprisoned as soon as the war broke out.No answer was,
therefore, made to the summons to surrender.On the morning of the 10th, Scindia's infantry were attacked.They
fought stoutly, but were finally defeated, and their twenty-six
brass guns captured.John moved to the bedroom.Two days later, two thousand five hundred of
them, who had retired when defeated, and taken shelter under the
guns of the fort, came over in a body and took service with the
British.Siege operations were at once commenced and, on the 17th, a battery
of eight eighteen-pounders opened fire, with such effect that a
breach was almost effected; when the garrison released the British
officers, and sent them to the camp to offer to surrender.They
were allowed to do so, and to leave the fort with their clothes,
but without arms.Six thousand then marched out under these
conditions.One hundred and sixty-four pieces of cannon, with a vast quantity
of ammunition and stores, were found in the fort; together with
twenty-two lakhs of rupees, which were divided among the captors.On the 20th, Harry, with his little party, joined the army.He and
his troopers had, at Benares, resumed their uniform.He at once
waited on General Lake, and handed him the despatch in which
General Wellesley had described the victory at Assaye."This is great news, indeed, sir," the general said, "but I cannot
understand how you have brought it here so speedily.""I rode in disguise through Berar, sir, and of course the troopers
were also disguised.Except that I was attacked in one village--where
I was recognized by a peasant who had seen me, when I was staying as
the Governor General's envoy at Nagpore, before the capture of
Seringapatam--I got through without difficulty.""Yes; I heard from the Marquis of Wellesley that the rajah had been
kept from declaring against us, by a young officer of great
ability, whom he had sent to Nagpore for the purpose, and who
narrowly escaped assassination there when the news of the fall of
Seringapatam was received.I think he said that you had a perfect
knowledge of Mahratti, and also of Hindustani; and that he had sent
you to accompany his brother, General Wellesley."Well, the news of Assaye is welcome, indeed, and Scindia will be
very chary of weakening his army in the Deccan by sending
reinforcements in this direction."I see, sir, that General Wellesley has begged me to temporarily
place you on my staff as, in the present troubled state of the
country, it would be dangerous to endeavour to make your way back
to him.Of course, I will gladly do so, for your knowledge of the
languages will be very useful to me, for none of my staff can speak
either of them well."General Lake sent for the head of his staff, introduced Harry to
him, and informed him of the news that he had brought; and then
ordered a general salute to be fired, by all the available guns in
the fort and artillery batteries.It was not long before the roar
of cannon began, telling the army that a splendid victory had been
won in the west; and a short time later notices were affixed to the
gates of the forts, and other public places, relating how General
Wellesley, with but four thousand five hundred men, had routed the
army of Holkar and the Rajah of Berar--amounting in all to over
fifty thousand, of whom ten thousand five hundred were disciplined
troops, commanded by Frenchmen.The news excited the utmost
enthusiasm among the troops, as the disproportion of numbers was
far greater than it had been at the battle of Delhi.A few days later, the news was received that seven of Scindia's
regular battalions had just arrived, from the Deccan, under the
command of a French officer; and had been joined by five others,
the whole amounting to nine thousand well-trained infantry, with
five thousand cavalry and seventy-five guns.As it was understood
that they were intending the recapture of Delhi, General Lake
marched against them on the 27th of October and, pressing forward
with all speed, came up with them on the morning of the 1st of
November.They at once retreated; and General Lake, whose infantry
was still some distance in the rear, determined to attack them, at
once.As they retired, the enemy cut the bank of a large tank and
flooded the ground, thereby impeding the advance of the cavalry,
and giving time to Scindia's men to take up a strong position
between the villages of Laswaree and Mohaulpore.[Illustration: Plan of the Battle of Laswaree.]Their right was protected by a deep ravine; their rear by a
rivulet; their front was lined with their seventy-five guns,
chained together so as to protect the artillerymen from a charge of
horse.The ground in front of them was covered with deep grass,
which partially concealed their disposition.The three brigades of cavalry charged boldly up, but were received
with a terrible fire, and fell back with much loss and, seeing the
impossibility of carrying the enemy's position without infantry,
General Lake deferred making another attack until they came up.As
soon as these and the artillery reached the spot, he prepared for
an assault.The Mahrattas had, in the meantime, changed their position; and
drawn up one line in front and one in rear of the village of
Mohaulpore.The French officer who had been in command of their
army had, two days before, left their camp and ridden to meet
General Lake's army; and had there surrendered, and a Mahratta
officer had succeeded him in command.Shaken by the repeated
successes of the British, he now offered to surrender his guns.An
hour was given him to do so but, as no movement was made at the end
of that time, orders were given for the advance.The infantry consisted of the 76th Regiment and six battalions of
Sepoys.One of the three brigades of cavalry was directed to
support them; another was sent to the right to watch the enemy, and
to take advantage of any confusion that might appear among them;
the third brigade formed the reserve.The four batteries of
artillery were to support the attack.General Lake's plan was to
turn the enemy's right flank, and he moved off his infantry along
the bank of a rivulet which ran round near the right angle of the
enemy's new position.The high grass, for a time, concealed the
movement but, as soon as the Mahrattas perceived it they threw back
their right flank, and opened a tremendous fire upon the village.The British artillery now opened, but the enemy's cannon were far
superior in number, and were well served; and the ranks of the
76th, who were in front of the advance, were terribly thinned.The
general was with them and, as soon as a battalion and a half of
Sepoys had come up, led them against the enemy's position.The latter now opened with canister and, the ground being of a
broken character, the formation of the assailants' line was to some
extent disordered and the Mahratta cavalry charged.They were
repulsed by heavy volleys from the infantry, but they rallied and,
being reinforced, were about to resume the attack, when the general
ordered the 29th Dragoons to charge.They burst through both lines
of the enemy's infantry, wheeled round and charged the cavalry, and
drove them from the field; and then turning again, fell on the rear
of the second line, which was now hotly engaged with the British
infantry who, following the Dragoons at the double, had rushed
forward on the guns, captured them, and driven the first line back
on the second.The rest of the British infantry had now come up; but Perron's
regular infantry, who were all drawn from hill districts, and had
been victorious in many a fight, resisted to the last.Two thousand
were surrounded and made prisoners, but the rest all fought until
they fell.The victory of Laswaree cost the British eight hundred and
twenty-four men, killed and wounded; but it completed the overthrow
of the whole of the regiments trained by Perron and de Boigne, and
laid the tract of country watered by the Jumna under the power of
the British.Harry, who had accompanied the general, having carried the order to
the Dragoons to charge, rode with them and came unhurt out of the
desperate fight.A few days later the army quitted Laswaree and moved towards Agra,
resting for a fortnight at Besawur.Mary went to the hallway.The great successes gained by
both the British armies had had their effect, and a number of
rajahs came in to make a treaty of alliance.General Lake's force,
after a short rest, then marched southward, and took up a position
at Biana.While these events had been going on, a detachment from the army
had entered Bundelcund.This had been under the control of the
Peishwa but, by an agreement made with him in August, it was ceded
to the Company; he receiving, in exchange, grants in the southern
Mahratta country, and near Surat.He sent orders to this effect to
his officers.Shamsheer, a descendant of the first Peishwa, refused to obey him;
and |
hallway | Where is Sandra? | Shamsheer then
treated for peace but, after having delayed the advance for two
months, finally broke off negotiations, suddenly; and the British
at once laid siege to Calpee, which capitulated on the 4th of
December.Finding himself unable to resist the farther advance of
the British, Shamsheer then surrendered.In October, Ambajee Inglia, who had acted as Scindia's
representative and held, under him, extensive territories, had
offered to renounce his dependence on Scindia, and become a
tributary of the British.Negotiations were, as usual, spun out to
a great length; but a treaty was concluded with him, on the 16th of
December, by which he agreed to surrender Gwalior and the lands to
the north of it, and to remain as an independent sovereign of the
other territories in his possession.A corps, under Colonel White, was sent to take possession of the
fortress.The commandant refused to recognize the arrangement but,
upon batteries being erected, a breach was soon effected, and the
garrison surrendered.The news came that Scindia had broken his treaty, and had been
defeated with great slaughter by General Wellesley, who afterwards
besieged the strong fortress of Gawilghur.Guns were brought up,
with great difficulty, over thirty miles of mountains and ravines.They opened fire on the 13th of December and, as soon as a breach
was practicable, the place was carried by storm, and a large
quantity of guns and ammunition fell into the hands of the British.The Rajah of Berar, terrified at the defeat of Scindia, now sent to
ask for peace, and ceded the district of Cuttack; thereby placing
the whole of the maritime provinces, between Madras and Calcutta,
in the hands of the British.Scindia, finding himself forsaken by
his ally, also made peace, surrendering a considerable portion of
his territories.Daniel went to the kitchen.1804 opened quietly, but peace was not long maintained.Holkar had,
after his expulsion from Poona, made peace with Scindia and, when
hostilities commenced, had waited to see the result before
committing himself.At first he viewed with satisfaction the
misfortunes that had befallen Scindia and the Rajah of Berar but,
when he saw that they were threatened with annihilation, he
prepared to aid them.He had, however, delayed too long and, when
Scindia and the Rajah of Berar had been obliged to crave for peace,
he kept his army on the frontier of the Rajah of Jaipore, now a
British ally.General Lake addressed a letter to him, saying that the British
Government were willing to leave him unmolested; but requiring, as
a pledge of his good intentions, that he should withdraw into his
own territory.Holkar sent back a long list of demands, which were
impossible to satisfy; and also addressed a letter to General--now
Sir Arthur--Wellesley, threatening to overrun the whole country,
unless some of the districts in the Deccan were ceded to him and,
after sending off this letter, he began raiding the territory of
Jaipore.Colonel Murray was therefore sent to aid the rajah, and to
march in the direction of Holkar's capital; while Lord Lake marched
westward, until he neared Jaipore.On the 15th of May a detachment captured the strong fort of
Rampoora, the sole fortress which Holkar possessed north of the
Chumbul river; and Holkar immediately fell back.The heat being now
intense, the general left Colonel Monson, with five battalions of
Sepoys and three thousand irregular horse, sent by Rajpoot allies,
and returned to Agra, losing numbers of his men on the march, by
sunstroke.The latter, intending to
cooperate with Colonel Murray, entered Holkar's territory and, on
the way, captured a strong hill fort.Sandra went to the kitchen.He afterwards advanced fifty
miles beyond the range of mountains that formed the frontier.John moved to the bedroom.On the 7th of July he heard that Holkar was advancing, with his
whole army, to meet him.Monson's force was much weakened by the
absence of two detachments, one of which had garrisoned the hill
fort that had been captured, and another had gone to fetch a supply
of grain.Almost at the same time he heard a report that Colonel
Murray intended to fall back.After consulting with Harry, who, as one of Lord Lake's staff, was
considered as his special representative, it was agreed that it
would be madness, with so small a force, to give battle to Holkar
and, at four in the morning on the following day, Monson sent off
his baggage and stores; and remained, with his troops drawn up in
order of battle, until nine o'clock; leaving the irregular cavalry,
under Lieutenant Lucan, to follow in half an hour, and bring him
intelligence of Holkar's movements.Monson marched twelve miles when a trooper of the irregular cavalry
overtook him, with the news that they had been completely defeated
by Holkar's army, and that Lucan had been made prisoner.The
retreat was continued, and the force reached the pass across the
mountains on the evening of the following day, and took up a
position there.Holkar's cavalry appeared next morning and, on the
11th, Holkar himself arrived and sent in a demand for the surrender
of the cannon and muskets.This was refused, and Holkar, dividing
his horse into three bodies, charged the detachment vigorously in
front and both flanks; but the defenders again and again repulsed
the attack.Holkar then drew off about four miles, and was joined
by the artillery and infantry."If we had a regiment of British infantry with us, sir, I should
say that we might attack them, with success; but with only four
battalions of Sepoys, it seems to me that a retreat would be the
better choice of two evils.The rain is pouring down unceasingly, and I doubt whether we shall
be able to get the guns along; but we ought to be able to march as
fast as Holkar's infantry and, as to his cavalry, we can certainly
beat them off."The enemy's cavalry swarmed round them,
but dared not attack; and the force arrived safely at Kotah, where
they expected to find food and shelter.The rajah, however, closed
the gates and refused to admit them; and the force pressed on
towards a ford on the Chumbul.The distance was only seven miles
but, from the incessant rain and the state of the road, a whole day
was spent in accomplishing it.The ford was impassable, but during the night it subsided a little,
and they were able to cross.A day's halt was necessary, in order
to procure some grain; and on the 15th, when the march was
continued, the guns sank so deep in the mud that they could not be
extricated, and they were therefore spiked and abandoned.Two days later the force reached another river, but it was so
swollen that it was unfordable.The artillerymen were sent across,
on elephants; but ten days were spent in carrying the rest of the
troops over, partly on elephants and partly on rafts.Mary went to the hallway.Terrible
privation was suffered, and many men were drowned in crossing;
while the wives and children of the Sepoys who, by some gross
mismanagement, were left to the last, were slaughtered by the enemy
under the eyes of their husbands and fathers.On the 29th the corps reached Rampoora; where a reinforcement of
two battalions of Sepoys, six guns, and a body of cavalry, together
with a supply of grain forwarded by Lord Lake from Agra, awaited
them.Notwithstanding this reinforcement, Colonel Monson considered
it his duty to continue his retreat and, on the 22nd of August,
reached the Banass, which was also in flood.Some boats, however,
were found, and a portion of the troops were carried across.Early the next morning Holkar's cavalry appeared, and encamped at a
distance of four miles.The next day the river was fordable, and
most of the baggage and four battalions crossed.The enemy's
cavalry also crossed in great numbers, both to the right and left
of the British position.Their artillery and infantry arrived in the afternoon, and opened
fire on the battalions still left on the bank.Seeing that they were being decimated by the guns, he called
upon the Sepoys to charge.This they did with great spirit, drove
back the enemy, and captured some of the guns; but the Mahrattas
soon rallied and, led by Holkar himself, charged in such
overwhelming numbers that the handful of troops was nearly
annihilated.Harry, seeing that all was lost, cut his way through
the enemy's horse and succeeded in crossing the river.[Illustration: Harry succeeded in crossing the river.]Colonel Monson continued his retreat, and reached Kooshalpur on the
night of the 25th.He found that the native officer in command
there had declared for Holkar; but that the fort, which contained
the elephants and baggage, still held out.That evening Monson
learnt that some of his Sepoy officers were in communication with
Holkar; and two companies, and a large portion of the native
cavalry deserted.The whole of the enemy's cavalry now encamped round the detachment.At seven in the evening Colonel Monson continued his march, forming
his troops into an oblong, which the enemy in vain attempted to
break.Mary travelled to the kitchen.On the night of the 27th, after halting for a few hours, he
moved again, at one in the morning; but had no sooner cleared the
broken ground than the enemy's cavalry made a desperate charge.This was repulsed with great coolness, the Sepoys reserving their
fire till the enemy were within bayonet reach.At sunset the troops, worn out by fatigue and hunger, arrived at
the Biana pass; but the enemy brought up their guns, and the
retreat was continued.The confusion in the ranks, which had been
increasing all day, now extended; and the troops broke and fled to
Agra, pursued by straggling parties of the enemy for the greater
portion of the distance.In consequence of this disastrous affair, it was decided that Lord
Lake should immediately take the field; although the wet weather
still continued, and a large tract of country was under water.Four
weeks after the arrival of Monson, with his fugitives, the army
marched out of their cantonment, and encamped on the right bank of
the river.Holkar's army numbered ninety-two
thousand men, of whom sixty-six thousand were cavalry, and he had
with him ninety-two cannon.He had advanced to Muttra, which had
been abandoned at his approach."I have another dangerous mission for you, Captain Lindsay.I
consider it more than possible that Holkar will make an attempt to
recapture Delhi.Sandra journeyed to the hallway.Colonel Ochterlony, in command there, must be
warned of the probability of an attack.He may be in ignorance of
what is passing here.You will bear this despatch, urging on him to
do all that he can to place the town in a state of defence, and to
summon to his assistance as many irregulars as possible from the
neighbouring chiefs.I
leave it to you whether to go in uniform, or in disguise.""I think, sir, that I had better disguise myself as, doubtless,
Holkar's cavalry are spread all over the country intent on
plundering and, should I fall in with them, I ought to have no
difficulty in passing myself off as one of themselves.I will leave
my uniform here, to be brought on with the baggage.They might take
it into their heads to search my saddlebags.""I think that would be the wisest plan," the general said."You
will, of course, remain at Delhi till reinforcements arrive there.The despatches will be ready for you, in an hour's time."There was no difficulty in obtaining dye at Agra, and Harry stained
himself from head to foot, put on the disguise in which he had
ridden with the news of Assaye and, after receiving the despatch,
started at once.The direct road lay through Muttra but, as
Holkar's main body was at this town, he rode to the northeast as
far as Secundara.There was no occasion for any great haste, for it
was certain that some little time must elapse before Holkar could
march from Muttra; and he accordingly stopped for the night at
Coringunga, having ridden about fifty miles.He speedily secured a
room, and Abdool at once set to, to prepare a meal.While it was
being cooked, there was a sound of a body of horse entering the
village."It is unfortunate that we have stopped here, Abdool," he said.Ten minutes later the door opened, and an officer of Holkar's
irregular horse entered."I hear that you have just arrived," he said."Yes; I rode in but half an hour ago."There seems no chance of fighting, at present; and I
therefore left the army to pay a visit, for a day or two, to some
friends."I will, with pleasure," the officer said, "for I have ridden from
Muttra, and may have to wait an hour before my supper is ready for
me.The officer unbuckled his sword, and seated himself on the ground,
the room being entirely unfurnished."Were you in that affair, when we chased the English dogs from
beyond the mountains to Agra?""Yes, I was in it; and never wish to campaign in such weather
again.I was wet through for three weeks; and hardly feel that I
have got dry, yet.""They are brave fellows, those Sepoys in the English service.""It seemed that we must destroy
them; and yet they withstood our attacks, weary and exhausted as
they must have been.The worst of it was that, after all our
exertions, there was no booty to be obtained."One doesn't feel so disposed to risk one's
life, when there is nothing to be gained.We did not even succeed
in capturing their treasure chest.If we could have brought our
infantry up, we should have destroyed them; but they had to march
at the same rate as the guns; and in such weather they could get
along but slowly, for it often required the bullocks of four guns
to drag one through those quagmires."That was where the English had the advantage over us.The road
was, no doubt, bad enough for them; it was infinitely worse for us,
after they had cut it up in passing."It was a mistake when Scindia began to form regiments of infantry,
and Holkar and the Peishwa imitated him.Before that, we had India
at our mercy.What power could withstand a hundred thousand
horsemen, here today, there tomorrow?Then, we had it in our power
to waste all the country, and to starve out the fortresses from
Cuttack to the north.Our territory extended from the great
mountains on the east, to the sea in the west."Now we can only move at the pace of footmen; and while, formerly,
no infantry would venture to withstand our charge; now, as you see,
a handful of Sepoys set us at defiance, repulsed our charges, and
gained Agra simply because our guns and infantry could not arrive
to help us.""There can be no doubt that you are right," Harry agreed; "but I
cannot blame Scindia and Holkar for forming regiments of infantry,
trained by foreign officers.They had seen how the regiments so
raised, by the English, had won great victories in the Carnatic and
Bengal; and they did not think at that time that, ere long, they
might become formidable to the Mahrattas.Scindia and Holkar raised
their regiments, not to fight against the strangers, but against
each other.It was their mutual hostility that so diminished the
strength of the Mahrattas.When dogs fight dogs, the wild boar
ravages the land.""It is true enough," the other said."As a nation we might have
ruled Asia but, divided among ourselves, wasting our forces against
each other, we have allowed the stranger to wrest province after
province from us."Now, I will go out and see that the men have all got quarters, and
that the people of the village are feeding them, as they should.In
truth, we have been having a bad time, lately.""Yes, indeed; I thought myself lucky, sometimes, to get a handful
of grain after twenty hours in the saddle. |
kitchen | Where is Mary? | We must drive the strangers back
towards Allahabad; recover Benares, Agra, and Delhi; and then we
shall be able to rest in peace, for a time, before we settle
accounts with Scindia, and the others who have made a disgraceful
peace with the English.We shall never have peace in the Deccan
till we sack and destroy Bombay, and force the last Englishman to
take to his ships."Harry started with Abdool before daybreak the next morning and,
riding all day, reached Delhi late in the evening.Putting up the
horses, he proceeded to the house occupied by Colonel Ochterlony,
the Resident."Will you tell the colonel," he said, "that I am an officer with
despatches from General Lake?"Colonel Burns, the commander of the
garrison, was with the Resident.Neither was surprised that the
messenger should be a native, for they knew the difficulties a
British officer would encounter in travelling from Agra."I have ridden with a despatch for you, Colonel, from General Lake.I am Captain Lindsay, and have the honour of serving on the
general's staff.""I am glad to see you, sir," Ochterlony said, kindly."Your name is
pretty well known, to all of us, as that of an officer who has
successfully carried out several dangerous enterprises; and this
cannot have been one of the most dangerous of them, for indeed, in
that disguise I do not think that anyone would entertain the
slightest suspicion that you are not what you appear to be."I am told you speak Mahratta perfectly.""I was brought up among the Mahrattas, sir.I have got through
easily, and only once came upon a body of Holkar's cavalry."The colonel rang the bell, and directed a servant who came in to
bring in wine and refreshments.He then opened the despatches
which, after reading, he passed across to Colonel Burns."Of course, we have heard reports of the disaster to Monson's
force.I was with them, and they suffered
terribly.They lost their guns and baggage, and at least a third of
their infantry.""It is unfortunate, very unfortunate, Captain Lindsay.Daniel went to the kitchen.We have had
so many victories, of late, that the natives must have almost
concluded that we were invincible; but this check will encourage
them, and will doubtless bring many waverers over to their side.""I don't think that it was, in any way, Colonel Monson's fault.Sandra went to the kitchen.His
column was to join that of Colonel Murray--who, however, doubtless
learning the great strength Holkar had with him, fell back--and
with only five battalions of Sepoys, and a dozen guns, it was
practically impossible that Monson could, single handed, resist the
attack of ninety thousand men.If he had had with him a couple of
British battalions, and a regiment or two of our cavalry, he might
have held the passes but, alone, it did not seem to me possible
that he could do so; especially when the enemy's cavalry could have
crossed the hills at other points, and taken them in the rear.Even
if he had resisted all attacks, he must have been starved out."As being, in a sort of way, representative of General Lake,
Colonel Monson was good enough to ask my opinion; and I quite
agreed with him that the best plan was to fall back.We believed,
of course, that we should find shelter at Kotah, but two days'
march in the rear and, had not the rajah declared for Holkar, and
shut his gates, all would have been well; for we beat off all
attacks, on our way there.It was his treachery, and that of the
commandant of Kooshalpur, that caused the disaster.""Holkar is at Muttra, and Lake is about to march against him?"If Holkar gives battle there he will, no doubt, be
defeated but, as this despatch will have informed you, General Lake
feared much that, as he advances, Holkar will content himself with
harassing him on the march with a cloud of horsemen while, with the
main body of his army, he marches rapidly north, to endeavour to
recapture Delhi and obtain possession of the Emperor's person.It
is to warn you of that danger that I have ridden here.""The danger is, no doubt, serious," the Resident said; "and the
town is certainly in no position for defence.The walls are in a
most dilapidated condition, and would crumble after a few hours'
cannonade.Colonel Burns's force is wholly inadequate to defend a
city of some ten miles in circumference.The irregular troops
cannot be relied upon, in case of need.However, we must do what we
can and, as we may be sure that General Lake will hasten on with
all speed, we shall not have to hold out for many days."Now, Captain Lindsay, as you say that you only left Agra yesterday
morning, and have ridden some eighty miles, today, I am sure you
have need of rest.The general has told me to employ you on any
duty that I may think requisite; therefore, if you will come here
at eight o'clock tomorrow morning, I shall be glad, indeed, of your
services."I left them at a khan, a few minutes' walk from here.""Then if you will go down, and tell your man to bring them up, they
can be put up in the stables here.John moved to the bedroom.I have already ordered a room to
be prepared for you.Mary went to the hallway.The next morning Harry, after taking the early breakfast a servant
brought to his room, went down to Colonel Ochterlony's office."I have not brought my uniform with me, Colonel," he said, "for I
might have been searched."Two of my escort shall ride with you, which
will be sufficient to show that you represent me.Here is a list of
the zemindars within fifteen miles of the city.You will, today,
visit as many of them as possible, and request them to ride in to
see me, tomorrow morning.I have directed that you are to have one
of my horses for, after the work yours has just had, it will need
two or three days' rest."Say nothing about the possibility of Holkar's coming here.They
might hang back, if you did so.I would rather meet them as a body,
and open the matter to them, myself.You will be able to see, by
their manner, if any of them have thought of the possibility of the
city being besieged.Mary travelled to the kitchen.If they have, some of them will possibly
excuse themselves coming; though I think that the great majority
will come, for they must know well enough that, if Holkar took the
city, his troops would ravage the country, as they have done all
the villages through which they have passed; and that, therefore,
it is to their interest to aid in its defence."I am going now to see the Emperor, and to obtain from him an order
for all the able-bodied men of the city to set to work, under my
orders and those of Colonel Burns, to repair the fortifications at
the points where an enemy would naturally attack them."In any case, where you see that those you call upon make excuses
for not coming in, you have my full authority for telling them that
all who do not do so will be regarded as our enemies, and will be
severely punished, and their estates forfeited.No excuse,
whatever, will be accepted unless, on your arrival, you find that a
man is seriously ill; in which case you will order that his son, or
some near relation, be sent to represent him."For the next three days, Harry spent his whole time on horseback
and, although it was evident to him that several of those he
visited were averse to going into Delhi, none of them ventured to
incur the displeasure of the English Resident by an absolute
refusal.Each morning, therefore, Colonel Ochterlony received those
Harry had visited on the previous day.He told them, frankly, that
it was possible that Holkar might appear before the walls; but
assured them that he had no doubt of being able to resist all
attacks, until General Lake arrived, which he would be sure to do
in a few days.In the meantime, great numbers of men laboured at the walls.The
battlements had in some cases fallen, and the gaps were filled up
with sandbags.The moat, which had been neglected for many years,
was cleared out; and the side made steeper, so that an attacking
party would have to use ladders, both for descending into it and
climbing out.The bastions were repaired, as far as could be done;
and the houses in the lane that ran round, inside the wall, were
all loopholed for musketry.Many of the irregular cavalry had deserted; but the Sepoys stood
firm, knowing how terrible were the cruelties perpetrated, by
Holkar, on all who fell into his hands.Their number was small; but
they were, to some extent, strengthened by the levies brought in by
the zemindars.There was no time to be lost for, on the 2nd of September, General
Lake had approached to within a mile of Muttra; which had already
been abandoned by Holkar, whose horsemen made their appearance
before Delhi on the 7th.The irregular cavalry and those of the
zemindars were ordered to attack them but, as soon as they left the
town, they dispersed and rode away.The next day the enemy's infantry and artillery came up, and a
heavy fire was immediately opened on the southeast angle of the
city wall.In twenty-four hours the whole of the parapet was
demolished, and some partial breaches made in the wall itself.The
Sepoys, encouraged by the presence and efforts of Ochterlony and
Burns, stood their ground with great courage and, at nightfall,
laboured incessantly at repairing the breaches, and in making a new
parapet with sandbags.Towards morning they formed up; passed out through one of the
breaches, led by their officers; made a rush at the battery that
had been doing so much damage, bayoneted or drove off the enemy
stationed there, and spiked the guns.In the meantime, some guns had been playing against the southern
walls.But
reflection, probably, brought better counsel, for, as it happened,
there were no more contributions, for the time being, to the roll of
martyrs.[Illustration]
CHAPTER IV.GRADUAL SPREAD OF LIGHTNING CONDUCTORS IN EUROPE.In singular contrast with the burst of applause with which the whole
scientific world of Europe received the great discovery of Benjamin
Franklin, was the extreme slowness of the actual introduction
into Europe of lightning conductors.The opposition they met
with in Franklin’s own country was trifling to that which they
encountered in the principal states of Europe, more particularly
in England and France.It was natural, perhaps, that the lower
classes--ultra-conservative, through the mere effect of ignorance, in
every country in the world--should see danger in the setting-up of
iron rods which, as they were told, drew lightning from the skies;
and it was, perhaps, equally natural that religious fanatics should
regard them with extreme suspicion, as removing one of their imagined
instruments of heaven for punishing sinful mortals.Both these classes,
the untaught multitude and the bigoted zealots, opposed in Europe,
as they did in America, the establishment of lightning conductors;
but to the strength of these parties was unexpectedly added a third
in a not numerous but powerful section of learned literary men.They
were chiefly French, but had many adherents in England, as well as in
Germany, the _savants_ of both countries looking then upon France as
the seat of all science, and indeed human knowledge.The opposition raised against lightning conductors in France was
entirely personal, its origin being due to the wounded vanity of a
very estimable but likewise a very weak man, the already mentioned
Abbé Nollet.Born in 1700, the Abbé had very early in life gained
renown for his scientific researches, and after a while devoted much
of his time to electrical experiments, in conjunction with two other
celebrated men, Dufay and De Réaumur.Sandra journeyed to the hallway.When the report of Franklin’s
discoveries arrived in Europe, the Abbé Nollet was generally looked
upon as the greatest of living ‘electricians,’ and the general homage
paid to him having roused his self-esteem to an inordinate degree, he
got fiercely irritated that another man, a previously quite unknown
person, in a distant land, should have dared to snatch from him his
scientific laurels.Accordingly, he used all his influence among the
public, in the scientific world, and at the French court, where he held
a high position as tutor of the King’s children, not only to depreciate
Franklin’s lightning conductors, but to set them down as something like
an imposture.In various treatises and articles published in learned
papers, Abbé Nollet sought to prove that the person called Benjamin
Franklin--in whose very existence he formerly refused to believe, but
which he now grudgingly acknowledged--was an individual unacquainted
even with the first principles of the science of electricity, and that
his proposal for protecting houses against lightning was so absurd
as not to be worth engaging the attention of any thinking man.More
than this, he argued that the proposed lightning conductors were not
only inefficacious, but positively dangerous.By thus joining in the
vulgar cry of lightning being, so to speak, sucked from the clouds
by Franklin’s conductors, the learned Abbé had the satisfaction of
retarding their introduction in his own, as well as other European
countries, for a number of years.In France itself the thus awakened resistance to the setting-up of
lightning conductors was strikingly shown by an incident which occurred
at the town of St.A manufacturer settled
here, who had been in America, and there learnt to appreciate the
usefulness of Franklin’s lightning conductors, had one made for his
own house, and quietly fixed it to wall and roof.But the populace no
sooner heard of it when there arose a public disturbance, and the iron
rod was torn down by force.So far from repressing the rioters, the
municipality of St.Omer, acting under priestly influence, forbade the
manufacturer to erect another lightning conductor, on the ground that
it was ‘against law and religion.’ Thereupon the bold manufacturer, a
man of English descent, to try his right, appealed to the tribunals,
and the judges at last, after protracted pleadings, not being able to
discover any statutes against the fastening of metal rods to buildings,
declared that the thing might be done, but with precautions.The lawyer
who pleaded the case of the lightning conductors before the French
tribunals at this momentous period was a very young man, quite unknown
to fame at the time, but destined for a superabundance of it.Perhaps the violent opposition which the erection of lightning
conductors--or ‘Franklin rods,’ as they were often called--met almost
everywhere, would have proved more effective than it ultimately turned
out, had not the great discoverer himself showed admirable temper in
meeting his enemies, thus pouring oil upon the stormy waters.His
calmness and confidence is admirably shown in a letter, dated July 2,
1768, addressed to Professor John Winthrop, of Cambridge, in answer to
one in which astonishment was expressed at the ‘force of prejudice,
even in an age of so much knowledge and free inquiry,’ of not placing
lightning conductors upon all elevated buildings.Franklin--or he must
now be called Dr.Sandra travelled to the bedroom.Franklin, having received the degrees of LL. D.and D. C. L. from the universities of St.Andrew’s, Edinburgh, and
Oxford--was residing in England at the time, as agent of the people of
Pennsylvania.Daniel journeyed to the garden.He was thoroughly acquainted with the state of public
feeling, yet so far from being angry, smiled down upon it like a
true philosopher.‘It is perhaps not so extraordinary,’ he wrote to
his friend, ‘that unlearned men, such as commonly compose our church
vestries, should not yet be acquainted with, and sensible of, the
benefits of metal conductors in averting the stroke of lightning, and
preserving our houses from its violent effects, or that they should
still |
garden | Where is Daniel? | A late piece
of the Abbé Nollet, printed last year in the Memoirs of the French
Academy of Sciences, affords strong instances of this; for though
the very relations he gives of the effects of lightning in several
churches and other buildings show clearly that it was conducted from
one part to another by wires, gildings, and other pieces of metal
that were _within_, or connected with the building, yet in the same
paper he objects to the providing of metallic conductors _without_ the
building, as useless or dangerous.He cautions people not to ring the
church bells during a thunderstorm, lest the lightning, in its way to
the earth, should be conducted down to them by the bell ropes, which
are but bad conductors; and yet he is against fixing metal rods on the
outside of the steeple, which are known to be much better conductors,
and through which lightning would certainly choose to pass, rather than
through dry hemp.And though, for a thousand years past, church bells
have been solemnly consecrated by the Romish Church, in expectation
that the sound of such blessed bells would drive away thunderstorms,
and secure buildings from the stroke of lightning; and, during so long
a period, it has not been found by experience, that places within
the reach of such blessed sound are safer than others where it is
never heard, but that, on the contrary, the lightning seems to strike
steeples by choice, and at the very time the bells are ringing, yet
still they continue to bless the new bells, and jangle the old ones
whenever it thunders.’
‘One would think,’ continues Dr.Franklin, with exquisite humour,
‘that it was now time to try some other trick.Ours is recommended,
whatever the able French philosopher may say to the contrary, by more
than twelve years’ experience, during which, among the great number of
houses furnished with iron rods in North America, not one so guarded
has been materially hurt by lightning, and many have been evidently
preserved by their means; while a number of houses, churches, barns,
ships, &c., in different places, unprovided with rods, have been struck
and greatly damaged, demolished, or burnt.Probably, the vestries of
English churches are not generally well acquainted with these facts;
otherwise, since as good Protestants they have no faith in the blessing
of bells, they would be less excusable in not providing this other
security for their respective churches, and for the good people that
may happen to be assembled in them during a tempest, especially as
these buildings, from their greater height, are more exposed to the
stroke of lightning than our common dwellings.’
While Franklin thus wrote of ‘the great number of houses furnished with
iron rods in North America,’ there was not a single public building
so protected in England.Daniel went to the kitchen.Several private persons had adopted them for
their houses, following the example of Dr.William Watson--subsequently
Sir William--vice-president of the Royal Society, who had been the
first to set up a lightning conductor in England, erecting one over
his cottage at Payneshill, near London, in 1762.But notwithstanding
the evident utility of the ‘Franklin rods,’ they were refused where
they were most wanted--for larger buildings, and particularly for
churches.The ‘unlearned men, such as commonly compose our church
vestries,’ openly declared against them, and among the clergy there
was a steady, if often silent, antagonism to their introduction.The
first movement towards its being upset was given by an occurrence which
caused much commotion, and gave rise to a vast amount of discussion.On Sunday, June 18, 1764, a few minutes before three in the afternoon,
the splendid steeple of St.Bride’s Church, in the city of London, one
of the architectural monuments of Sir Christopher Wren, was struck by
lightning, the flash being intensely vivid, blinding several people.The damage done was so serious that about ninety feet of the steeple
had to be taken down entirely, while great and expensive repairs
were required for the rest.Watson, as the first introducer, so
one of the chief promoters of Franklin’s invention in England, took
this opportunity of publishing in the ‘Philosophical Transactions’
a detailed account of the effects of lightning upon St.Bride’s
steeple, explaining the potency of conductors in the very action of the
electric force.He showed how the lightning first struck the metallic
weathercock at the top of the steeple, and ran down, without injuring
anything, the large iron bars by which it was supported.At the bottom
of the bars, the electric force shattered a number of huge stones into
fragments, to make its way to some other pieces of iron, inserted into
the walls to give them strength.So it went on till there were no more
metals, when havoc and destruction became the greatest.Watson conclusively proved, the beautiful steeple of St.Sandra went to the kitchen.Bride was
wilfully made over to ruin for want of a few hundred yards of iron, or
other metal, which would lead the electric force harmlessly from the
weathercock on the summit into the earth.He finished by telling in
the plainest terms, to all on whom devolved the duty of taking care of
churches, that it was neglectful, even to criminality, not to protect
them by conductors against the always imminent danger of being struck
by lightning.Watson, deeply impressive by the power of the
indisputable facts on which it was based, had a considerable effect
in rousing public opinion, finding its way even into the dull ears of
‘such as commonly compose church vestries.’ Among the most important
results was a step taken, after long and solemn deliberations,
extending over several years, by the Dean and Chapter of St.They made an application to the Royal Society, asking for advice as
to the best means of protecting the great cathedral, Sir Christopher
Wren’s noblest creation, against the perils of lightning.The
application was made on March 22, 1769, as recorded under that date in
the ‘Gentleman’s Magazine.’ ‘A letter from the Dean and Chapter of St.Paul’s,’ it was stated, ‘was read at the Royal Society, requesting the
direction of that learned body for the sudden effects of lightning.It was referred to a committee consisting of Dr.Wilson, who,
after having examined the building, are to report their opinion.’ The
committee thus nominated embraced all the most eminent men of the
day who had studied the phenomena of electricity, and in the order
in which they ranked.Next to the great discoverer of the lightning
conductor himself, Dr.Watson could claim to stand; and next to him Mr.John moved to the bedroom.John Canton, a most painstaking and intelligent worker in the field,
inventor of the pith-ball electrometer, and other instruments.But a curious element of discord pervaded from the first this small
conclave of learned men, chosen to decide the not unimportant question
as to the best means of providing the cathedral of St.That the noble building should be so protected,
all were agreed; and it was clearly understood, besides, that if once
St.Paul’s had lightning conductors, all the other cathedrals and
principal churches of England would follow suit.What they differed
upon was not this, but the best form of lightning conductors.Franklin’s steadfast assertion that points to the elevated rods were
not only far preferable to any other form of conductors, but the only
really protective ones, was adopted by Dr.Mary went to the hallway.Canton; but
they were opposed by Mr.Wilson, who asserted, with some degree of
vehemence, that points were dangerous, and that balls on the summit of
the rods afforded infinitely better protection.Standing alone in this
view among the eminent members of the committee of the Royal Society,
his arguments naturally had no effect, and the recommendation to the
Dean and Chapter of St.Paul’s was to protect the cathedral by pointed
lightning conductors.‘Franklin rods’ were
attached to Wren’s splendid structure, worthy to be the introducer of
them, on a large scale, in Europe.The dispute as to pointed conductors, or balls, was by no means brought
to a termination by the decision that was come to regarding St.Endless pamphlets were published on the subject, and it went so far as
to being turned into a political question.As priests scented heresy
in the daring attempt to draw lightning from the clouds, so the court
faction and ultra-conservatives of England smelt republicanism in the
erection of iron rods designed by the representative of the disaffected
American colonies.The king was understood to have given his own high
opinion entirely against points, and in favour of balls, declaring his
preference by ordering a cannon ball of large size to be placed on
the top of a conductor erected over the royal palace at Kew.Meeting
such high patronage, the ‘anti-Franklinians’ only sought an occasion
to break out into open scientific warfare, and they were not long in
finding it.On May 15, 1777, a large public building at Purfleet, on
the Thames, serving as a storehouse for war material, was struck and
greatly damaged by lightning, although protected by a pointed lightning
conductor.Thereupon arose an instant outcry against the system
advocated by Dr.From much evidence adduced, there could be
no doubt that the building at Purfleet had been hurt simply because the
conductor was defective in parts, and was besides not laid deep enough
into the ground; still this did not stop the clamour raised.Mary travelled to the kitchen.Wilson, the members of the Royal Society
entered into hot discussions about the respective merits of pointed
and round conductors.The feeling of the partisans of the latter side
ran so high on this occasion, that Sir John Pringle had to resign the
presidency of the Royal Society, which post he had ably filled since
1772, for making himself an advocate of points against balls.When the
fever of the learned men had cooled down a little, it was resolved to
settle the great question of points _versus_ balls by a series of
experiments, to be held in the Pantheon, a large building in Oxford
Street, dome-like in the interior.The arrangement, in fact, carried
out under the direction of Mr.Sandra journeyed to the hallway.Wilson, leader of the ‘ball’ party, was
to create an artificial thunderstorm--or, as it should properly be
called, ‘lightning storm’--by means of powerful electrical batteries,
to be discharged upon conductors of various forms.His Majesty George
III., greatly interested in the subject, and cherishing fond hopes that
cannon-balls would carry off the victory in the scientific dispute,
as well as in the graver political one with Franklin’s countrymen,
undertook to pay all the expenses of the Pantheon experiments, and
they took place accordingly on an elaborate scale.Sandra travelled to the bedroom.But though prepared
entirely with a view of showing the inefficiency of Dr.Franklin’s
points, they proved absolutely the contrary.Artificial, like real,
lightning clearly showed its preference for a lancet over a ball; it
would glide down the former quietly, but fall heavily, mostly with an
explosion, upon the latter.However, the question being in reality less
a scientific controversy than a dispute arising from the fiery heat
of political passions, it was by no means set at rest by the Pantheon
trials.‘Franklin rods’ were more than ever abhorred by a multitude of
persons, learned and unlearned, after the great citizen of Philadelphia
had set his hand, on July 4, 1776, to the declaration of independence
of the ‘United States of America,’ and more than a quarter of a century
had to elapse, a new generation of men growing up, before there arose
clear and unimpassioned views about lightning conductors.While thus the battle of the rods was being fought in England, it raged
no less hotly on the continent of Europe.Here there was religious
prejudice alone at work, the political sympathies running in favour
of anything coming from America.But priestly animosity by itself
proved as strong an obstacle as any other to the erection of lightning
conductors.Where it did not exist, they sprang up with rapidity; but
wherever its influence was felt, the movement was arrested.In the
most enlightened parts of Germany, the seat and home of Protestantism,
the ‘Franklin rods’ early made their appearance.The first lightning
conductor set up over a public building in Europe was erected early
in 1769 on the steeple of the church of St.Jacob, Hamburg; and so
rapid was the spread of them that, at the end of five years from
this date, there were estimated to be over seven hundred conductors
within a circle of ten miles of the old Hanse town.To this day
they are comparatively more numerous in this district than anywhere
else in Europe.In contrast with Northern Protestant Germany, the
Roman Catholic South refused the ‘Franklin rods,’ and so did France,
although making a hero of Franklin personally.For many years after
young Robespierre pleaded the case of lightning conductors before the
tribunal of St.Omer, the strongest abhorrence to them was expressed
by the priests and their mob following in almost all parts of France,
and the active antagonism did not cease till after the outbreak of the
great revolution.It was the same in most countries of southern and central Europe.Even
in Geneva, famous for the enlightenment of its citizens, the populace
made an attempt to pull down the first lightning conductor.It was
erected, in the summer of 1771, by the celebrated naturalist, Professor
Horace de Saussure, over his own house, after directions furnished
by Dr.Daniel journeyed to the garden.But notwithstanding that the professor was himself
highly respected, his lightning conductor created general abhorrence,
and to appease it he found it necessary to issue a public address or
‘manifesto,’ as he called it, to his fellow-citizens.Sandra journeyed to the office.The address,
dated November 21, 1771, was strangely characteristic of the times.‘I
hear with regret,’ Professor de Saussure declared, ‘that the conductor
which I have placed over my house to protect it against lightning, as
well as to observe, occasionally, the electricity of the clouds, has
spread terror among many persons, who seem to fear that by this means
I draw upon the heads of others those dangers from which I myself
wish to escape.Now, I beg you to believe that I would never have
decided upon erecting this apparatus, if I had not been fully persuaded
both of its harmlessness and its utility.There is no possibility of
its causing damage to my own house, or of doing harm to others.All
those who are now labouring under fear would be precisely of the same
opinion, if they had entered upon the same inquiries to which I am
called in the course of my studies.’ After which the professor goes
on minutely to describe the ‘electric conductor,’ which he had been
bold enough to place over his house, dwelling upon the fact of its
having protected, as he believed, already his own residence from being
struck by lightning, and of having been found, likewise, universally
efficacious in the same manner in ‘the English colonies of North
America.’ The citizens of Geneva, much given to reasoning, earnestly
read and studied the ‘manifesto’ of Professor de Saussure, and the
consequence was, not only that he was spared further attacks and
reproaches, but that there arose soon over the churches and houses of
the town some hundreds of lightning conductors.In Italy the progress in the erection of conductors was accompanied
by some very curious incidents.The priests here, as in other Roman
Catholic countries, actively opposed their introduction, and to do
so more effectively, they craftily attached to them a stinging name,
calling them ‘heretical rods.’ As a consequence, the mob fiercely
opposed the putting-up of any such accursed pieces of metal, and
whenever the attempt was made to fasten them to houses, it met
with forcible opposition.However, some of the highly accomplished
professors of the universities of Italy, enthusiastic in their
reception of Franklin’s discovery, proved themselves victorious
over both priests and mob.They got the Grand Duke Leopold of
Tuscany--subsequently German Emperor, under the title of Leopold I.--a
man of high scientific acquirements, to place lightning conductors
over his own palace, as well as over allSandra journeyed to the kitchen. |
hallway | Where is Daniel? | Here the mob and priest rule ceased, and only silent
curses could be levelled against the ‘heretical rods.’ Another still
more important step in advance was made by the influence of the
Abbé Giuseppe Toaldo, a warm admirer of Franklin, in correspondence
with him, and author of various scientific works, among them one on
lightning conductors.He had some influence with the ecclesiastical
authorities at Siena, in Tuscany, and brought it to bear upon them by
getting them to consent to make trial, in a manner so as not to excite
public attention, of one of the ‘heretical rods,’ over the cathedral.This was only permitted on account of the extreme danger in which the
edifice stood, having been struck several times by lightning, and
greatly damaged.Placed on the summit of the highest of the three hills
on which stands the ancient city of Siena, the cathedral was opposed
to the dangers brought in the womb of every passing thunderstorm, and
they were all the greater as the building, erected by Pisano in the
thirteenth century, was deemed to be priceless, being one of the most
magnificent structures of the kind in Italy, of red and white marble,
filled with the choicest specimens of art, statues, pictures, gold and
jewelry.It seemed well worth risking a little heresy to guard such
treasures.Very silently, in the dark of night, the priests of the Siena
cathedral, directed by Abbé Toaldo, laid their iron rods along the
walls of the building, but inside, planting them deep into the
ground, and with the pointed summit only a few feet above the highest
point of the steeple, so as to be scarcely perceptible from below by
the naked eye.Still the secret of what had been done could not be
entirely kept from the multitude.Some of the workmen, engaged in the
operation of fixing the iron rods to the inner walls and steeple of the
cathedral, whispered about what they had been doing, trembling at the
evil consequences of their work, notwithstanding having received full
absolution from their employers.Murmurs were now heard everywhere,
and there were signs of a popular outbreak, just when one of the many
thunderstorms regularly visiting the mountain city crept over it on
April 18, 1777.Portentously the black clouds laid themselves thicker
and thicker over the high cathedral, till all the people of Siena
crept forth from their houses, awaiting in breathless expectation the
terrors to come.Daniel travelled to the kitchen.Then the dark masses discharged their fiery streams;
flash followed flash, till one, a long hissing tongue of flame, fell
down upon the cathedral steeple, distinctly visible to thousands
of beholders.A few minutes after, a ray of sunshine pierced the
dark clouds, and to the bewildering astonishment of the masses, the
cathedral was standing there absolutely unhurt.As if to exhibit its
wonderful power, the gilded point of the lightning conductor stood
out brilliantly in the sun, pointing in radiant silence up to heaven.‘Maraviglia, maraviglia!’ cried people and priests in chorus.High
mass was held forthwith in the wonderfully preserved cathedral, and
on the same day the magistrates of Siena went into the town hall and
had a record made in the book containing the annals of the city, to
make known to all posterity that their noble cathedral had just been
preserved from destruction by the astounding influence of an ‘heretical
rod.’ Though not in the least intended to be sarcastic, the irony could
not have been more complete.There was a most remarkable historical concurrence between the gradual
introduction of lightning conductors into Europe and that of the art of
vaccination.Both the great scientific discoveries had the same end in
view for the benefit of mankind, the one teaching the art of drawing
the dangerous electric fire of the clouds harmlessly into the earth,
and the other that of extracting the poisonous seed of disease from
the human body.Both were brought forward with the noblest intentions;
and both encountered the most violent opposition from religious
fanatics, the same in substance, as interfering with the decrees of
Providence, and the ordained wrath of heaven.Both triumphed in the
end, and almost exactly at the same time, though the battle of the
great medical discovery lasted longer, and was more fiercely fought
than that of Franklin’s invention.To make the analogy between the
progress of lightning conductors and of vaccination complete, it so
happened that in at least one conspicuous instance the same man was
an important agent in forwarding the success of both discoveries.Johan Ingenhousz, a native of Breda, in the
Netherlands, born in 1730.A man of great natural gifts, he came to
England when about thirty years of age, practising as a physician, and
attending specially to the so-called Suttonian method of inoculation
against the small-pox, then an entirely new branch of medical science.At the same time he eagerly embarked in electrical experiments, got
into correspondence with Benjamin Franklin, and, having made many
friends, was elected a fellow of the Royal Society in 1769.Ingenhousz became a favourite at court, owing chiefly
to his perfect knowledge of German, which resulted in his being
recommended to a highly profitable as well as distinguished mission.The famous Imperial lady, the Elizabeth of her age, Maria Theresa of
Austria, had read of the benefits of vaccination, then chiefly known in
England, and wishing to confer them on her own family and friends, she
asked King George the Third to recommend to her some able physician,
who could come to Vienna for the purpose.Johan Ingenhousz, a recommendation warmly supported by the President of
the Royal Society, Sir John Pringle, who had taken an affection for the
young Dutch physician on account of his electrical researches, which
had resulted in the invention of a novel apparatus, subsequently known
as the plate electrical machine.Ingenhousz set out for Vienna in 1772, was received with marked
honours by the great Empress, and having done his work, and wishing to
visit Italy, received an autograph letter of Maria Theresa to her son,
Grand Duke Leopold of Tuscany.At the court of this enlightened prince,
Dr.Ingenhousz resided for some time, practising vaccination, but also
engaged in electrical experiments, which created the greatest interest.It was partly by his advice that the Grand Duke consented, in the
teeth of desperate priestly opposition, to erect one of Franklin’s
lightning conductors over his own palace, and to set them up likewise
for the protection of all the powder magazines in Tuscany.Ingenhousz went forward to Padua, invited by some of the professors
of the university, and by the famous senator of Venice, Angelo Querini,
who had a magnificent palace in the neighbourhood of the city.In this
palace, bearing the name of Altichiera, the ‘English doctor,’ as he
was called, was made to reside, practising vaccination, the same as
at the court of Florence, but following as a favourite occupation the
setting-up of ‘heretical rods.’ Altichiera itself had the first erected
in May 1774, and soon after Dr.Ingenhousz had the satisfaction of
planting another over the astronomical observatory of the university
of Padua, in the presence of an enormous crowd of students who lustily
applauded, and of an angry multitude, kept in the background less by
persuasion than the strong arms of the young men.As at Siena, so at
Padua, the mob became pacified not long after by seeing the lightning
fall upon the observatory, much exposed by its situation, and which had
often been struck before, without doing the least damage.Ingenhousz went to Venice, in company of his friend and patron,
Senator Angelo Querini.Daniel went to the hallway.Here his efforts to spread the knowledge of
lightning conductors, together with vaccination, had the best results.Mark and other public buildings were surmounted
before long by the awe-striking ‘heretical rods,’ and on May 9, 1778,
the Senate of Venice issued a decree ordering the erection of lightning
conductors throughout the republic.It was the first recognition of the
value of conductors by any government of Europe, or, indeed, of the
world.CHAPTER V.
METALS AS CONDUCTORS OF ELECTRICITY.In the history of human inventions and discoveries, the idea of the
lightning conductor is almost the sole one which sprang, all but
perfect, from one brain, like Minerva, in Greek mythology, from
Jupiter’s head.Benjamin Franklin discovered the lightning conductor,
and, except some important improvements in its manufacture, due
to the progress of the metallurgical arts, the conductor remains
the same, in essence, as designed by the world-famous citizen of
Philadelphia.Though one of the
most brilliant discoveries in the annals of mankind, the lightning
conductor, by itself, is one of the simplest of things.Franklin
found by experiments, that the mysterious so-called ‘electric fluid’
had a tendency to make its way in preference through metals, and so
he recommended the laying-down of a metallic line from the clouds to
the earth to prevent damage to surrounding objects, such as buildings
and the human beings within them.More than this he did not know; and
more than this we, to this day, do not know.Of the inner nature, or
constitution, of that grand cosmic discharge of electricity to which
the name of lightning is given, no scientific explanation can be given.We are utterly ignorant of it, and in all probability ever will be.But while the general principle laid down by Franklin, that metals
will conduct the electric force harmlessly from the clouds to the
earth, remains the same, very much has been learnt, in the progress of
scientific investigation, as regards the varying conducting capacity of
different metals.The first conductors were invariably rods of iron,
this metal being preferred by Franklin and his immediate followers
as cheap, ready at hand, and answering all purposes in practice.But
it was gradually found by experiments that there are other metals
through which the electric force will make its way more rapidly than
through iron.One of the earliest investigators of this subject was
Sir Humphrey Davy, the celebrated inventor of the miner’s safety lamp.It was while studying the decomposition of the fixed alkalies by
galvanism, and tracing the metallic nature of their bases, to which
he gave the names of sodium and potassium, that the great chemist
and natural philosopher was brought to enter upon an examination of
what may be called the permeability of the different metals by the
electric force.The result of his investigations, as stated by him,
was that silver stood highest as a conductor of electricity; next to
it coming copper; then gold; next, lead; then platinum; then the new
metal called palladium--discovered by Wollaston, 1803, in platinum--and
lastly, iron.These were the principal metals experimented upon by
Sir Humphrey Davy, and the net result of his inquiries was expressed
summarily in the fact of copper being more than six times, and silver
more than seven times, as good a conductor as iron.Taking copper at
100, Sir Humphrey Davy drew up the following table of the electrical
conductivity of the seven metals:—
Silver 109·10
Copper 100·00
Gold 72·70
Lead 69·10
Platinum 18·20
Palladium 16·40
Iron 14·60
The practical result of these experiments was that it came to be
recognised that, among the metals, copper might be employed to
greater advantage as a lightning conductor than iron: a much lesser
substance of it doing the same service of passing a given quantity of
electricity from the clouds harmlessly into the earth.Sir Humphrey Davy was followed in his researches on the conductivity
of the different metals by the electric force, by a number of other
scientific men.His immediate successor in entering upon this line
of observations was a French naturalist of eminence, Antoine C.
Becquerel.Perhaps no man after Benjamin Franklin studied the phenomena
of electricity with such thorough insight, free from all misleading
theoretical delusions, as Becquerel.He was educated at the Polytechnic
School of Paris, and in 1810, at the age of twenty-two, entered the
army as an officer of engineers, but quitted it five years afterwards
with the rank of colonel, to devote himself entirely to scientific
pursuits.Geology and mineralogy first engaged his attention, but he
soon quitted these studies to devote himself, heart and soul, to the
observation of the phenomena of electricity, which fascinated him as
much as they had done Benjamin Franklin.The result was the discovery
of a great many facts previously unknown, making Becquerel, amongst
others, one of the founders of the science of electro-chemistry.The result of his researches concerning the conducting power of the
electric force by different metals may be stated as follows:
Copper 100·00
Gold 93·60
Silver 73·50
Zinc 28·55
Platinum 16·40
Iron 15·80
Tin 15·50
Lead 8·30
Mercury 3·45
It will be seen, in comparing this statement with the result of the
investigations of Sir Humphrey Davy, that while the latter places
silver before copper in conductivity, Becquerel puts copper at the
head of the list.Probably, the explanation of this difference in the
result of scientific research, by two men equally learned and equally
able, may be found in the fact that the conductivity of copper varies
greatly according to the purity of the metal.It has been ascertained
that absolutely pure copper of the finest kind--such as that existing
in the Isle of Cyprus, youngest of mother Britannia’s colonial
children--has a conducting power of upwards of twenty per cent.Unquestionably there is a highly intellectual
current, or, if you would prefer to call it so, undercurrent, which
comes to brilliant manifestations here and there; sometimes most
unexpectedly, amid squalor and debris.The huge electric globes cast a cold and glaring light over the gloomy
square in front of the Moscow station.A dense crowd invades passages,
halls, and waiting-rooms, and, like the swelling tide, groans, surges,
and finally overflows the platforms.Travelling in Russia has a
different meaning altogether from that which it possesses elsewhere--it
really means a removal: a regular deplacement.Then, people seem to
leave for ever: all their belongings appear to follow them, so enormous
and so diverse is their kit.From simple boxes and knapsacks to kitchen
utensils and even furniture, it embraces everything one could desire in
one's own abode.And afterwards, when they take leave, their shaking of
hands, embracing, and tears, give the impression that they never are to
meet again.And this is only the local train, taking me as far as
Moscow.What will it be there, at the Siberian terminus?The journey lasts only one night, across the famous wheat-growing
plains, and to-morrow, in the early hours of the morn, I hope to reach
the ancient capital of the Tsars.I want to break my journey to see the
ancient metropolis of the mighty rulers, to revisit all the famous
scenes where so many important chapters of eastern history were once
displayed to view.I want to see again the towering Kremlin, with its
mosaic basilicas and treasure-houses, slumbering at present in quiet
dreams of the past under their golden domes.And I want to get prepared
and acclimatized to a certain extent for Siberia; for Moscow belongs
altogether to the other continent; it is really the capital of Asia.III
THROUGH EUROPEAN RUSSIA
The fading disc of the sinking sun disappears slowly beneath the horizon
of the waving corn-fields.It was
uneventful, calm, but it has not lacked interest.We have ploughed
through endless fields of rich land, with a peaceful agricultural
aspect.Here and there a few scattered villages of dark mud huts, and
large white churches.Sometimes there is |
hallway | Where is Mary? | They are very long and of only one storey high, half hidden by ancient
trees.On the high roads peasants are just returning in endless streams,
with carts and kettles, from their daily work.However far off they may
have been working, they always return home for the night, for Russian
peasants seldom live on their farms.The whole picture speaks of such
perfect peace: the slowly moving and singing workmen, and the little
villages bathed in the afterglow, express such simple happiness, that I
can scarcely realize that some of those very districts have been the
scene of violence and cruel outrages.Daniel travelled to the kitchen.It is indeed difficult to believe
the reports of the latest troubles and dissatisfaction which have burst
forth in the midst of the quietest of mujiks.How difficult it is to
understand the inner feelings of these quaint folk!Sleepy as they may
look, uncultured, and a couple of centuries behind the rest of the
world, they can yet occasionally awaken; and when they awake, their
passions burst out like as a stream of lava without restraint.During the day we stop at many smaller and larger places, nearly all
insignificant, and generally very far from the station--sometimes so far
that I can scarcely understand the reason of our stopping.For miles and
miles around there is no human habitation, and we wonder by whose hands
all those fields are worked.The most important township seemed to be
Marsanka.It is a typical Russian country town, with its wooden houses,
each surrounded by a flower-garden, and each garden fenced by
lattice-work.The houses and gates are all painted in bright colours.A
river encloses the entire place like a loop, and beyond the river are
low-lying hills.The main feature of the place is given by innumerable
windmills, of all sizes and of every imaginable construction--all
equally conspicuous, equally high, and equally equipped with gigantic
sails.They all whirl--they all work as if they would never stop.I do
not think I ever saw so many windmills within view at one time; I
counted more than a hundred.What a fertile country it must be, to keep
so many busy![Illustration: MARSANKA AFTER A WATER COLOUR DRAWING BY THE AUTHOR "The
main feature of the place is given by innumerable windmills" To face
page 28]
It is night as we arrive at Pienza, and we can see nothing except the
railway station; but, as I hear, this is the main sight of the place.A
fine building, though constructed of wood.I must also add that the
stations all along the line are fine and convenient.They are well kept,
a great many have restaurants, abundantly stocked, with richly laid out
tables, and fair attendance.Prices are high, but this is to be
expected, considering the distance from which they sometimes procure
their provisions.Here at Pienza I find even luxury.Grapes and
peaches from the Crimea, wine from Germany and France, and all kinds of
American and English conserves; and, as ornamentation, fine old French
candelabra, derived probably from some ruined noble's residence.A great many officers and a great many
officials, all dressed in uniform.Some are travellers, some have just
come from the town for mere amusement.Daniel went to the hallway.The great express has not yet
lost its novelty, and twice a week is the object of universal
admiration.Our train consists of two first-class and three second-class
carriages, a dining-car, luggage-van, tender, and engine.A long
corridor leads from one end to the other, and affords a convenient walk
for daily exercise.The compartments are nicely fitted up; the one I
occupy, a so-called saloon, affords me a comfortable home during the
journey.The dining-car is fitted up in American style; and, as I see,
all the seats are taken from morning till night.To my fellow-passengers
their meals seem to be their only occupation, for if the train stops,
and there is a restaurant, they alight and commence each time a fresh
meal.Indeed, my fellow-passengers are great eaters and great talkers;
they seem to speak about everything with the same ease and unreserve.Especially when they start on their own countrymen and government,
there is no end to their sarcasm and witty remarks.To any one liking to
hear about the local conditions, the Siberian journey gives an
exceptional opportunity.People soon become acquainted, and if so they
are delighted to find somebody to whom to grumble.Before twenty-four
hours had passed I learnt more about the corn-fields and little villages
we skirted; about Russian agricultural and industrial aspirations; about
agrarian Plehve and M. de Witte's commercial enterprises than I ever
should have expected.[Illustration: SAMARA "I shall make a short stay at Samara" To face page
30]
It seems that Russia is at present passing through a serious crisis
which affects everybody, rich and poor--especially the latter.The
conditions of the peasantry are often very hard, though the reports we
read are generally exaggerated.Education and moral training might do a
great deal to lift them out of their stagnant state, to inspire
self-reliance, and awaken sound ambitions; but this is exactly what
appears to be lacking, and where so much good could be done.And the
people deserve education, for these Russian peasants, as a whole, are a
fine stock--strong and healthy, easy to lead, and not difficult to
improve.Even more, they have generally an unspoilt heart, and are
capable of gratitude.What I hear unanimously abused is the local
administration.If I were to believe half what I heard about the
unworthiness of the official employes, their untruthfulness and
bribery, it would be bad enough, and would easily explain the reason of
the continuous outbreaks.The antagonism between the so-called
Progressives and Conservatives is becoming more intolerant, and
strivings for reform on a smaller or larger scale seem to be universal.Some are hopeful, some pessimistic; some see Russia's future secured on
the same old patriarchal and primitive foundations, others believe in
commercial prosperity, trade, and advance.It is a great problem, and it
is equally interesting to listen to the advocate of one or other theory.Mary travelled to the hallway.Yet I am afraid that in their sanguine anticipations they are equally
far from what will prove to be the reality.All the talk I listen to serves as a description of, or comment on, the
uninterrupted panorama which unfolds itself without ceasing before us as
we glide swiftly along.It is a kind of prologue to the epic of this
land which we shall soon leave altogether.To-morrow we shall cross the Volga by the famous steel bridge of nearly
a mile.I shall make a short stay at Samara, and shall visit its
well-known orphanages, asylums, and other charitable establishments
which the town is so proud of; and, somewhat farther towards the east,
the train will wind along the Ural Mountains to Siberia.IV
WESTERN SIBERIA
At half-past nine in the morning we cross the boundary of the two
continents.A kind of mysterious feeling impresses
itself on my mind.Encouraging
hopes awaken, which I trust will give me endurance to carry out my work
and aims.What an unlimited area for higher
aspirations!Modest as our endeavours may be, the result may prove
incalculable in the future.From a commercial, civilizing, or spiritual
point of view, there is an equally vast field for action.[Illustration: ON THE VOLGA "The famous steel bridge of nearly a mile"
To face page 32]
Our last day in Europe passed on the Baskir land--a high plateau, a
severe and cold region, covered with rich pasture and inhabited by a
semi-nomadic race of the same name.Fine people they are, of heavy
countenance and magnificent frame; very conservative in their habits,
very clannish in their intimacies, and even today living from preference
in tents.They wear sheepskins; cover their heads, like Eskimos, with
furs; and, instead of boots, roll round their feet and legs skins
fastened like a classic sandal with endless straps of leather.They look
uncouth, but picturesque.This race is one of the finest of the Tartar stock, and I am sorry to
learn that they are slowly dying out.We stop at different places, and on each platform there are many
Baskirs, men and women all looking very much alike.They are bringing
from their encampments milk, eggs, and poultry, to sell.I ask several
of them the prices of their goods, and I am astonished at the cheapness
of the market.The price of meat per pound amounts to the trifle of five
kopecks; while for twenty roubles one may buy a horse, and a good one
too.The soil is rich, its fertility is exceptional, and it possesses
every quality for agricultural purposes.John went to the hallway.The future of the district is
bound to be prosperous, and, what is more, the climate is most
invigorating--raw and windy, but withal reminding me very much of the
northern Scottish moors.Even the scenery, when it becomes a little more
hilly, has a certain likeness to Scotland, and the same charm of
solitude and melancholy.All this district impressed me very much, both
from a geographical and an ethnological point of view, and by its
magnitude it cannot fail to appeal to our minds.The famous Ural range, I must simply confess, did not come up to my
expectations.I understand the beauty of glaciers and snow-clad peaks,
barren as they may be, and I fully appreciate all the beauty of a vast
plain, or the charm of a sand-covered desert; but the medium--what is
neither one nor the other, neither handsome nor grand, but what so many
admire and call "pretty scenery"--never appeals to me.What interested
me more was the economic possibility of this long stretch of <DW72>s.The
extent of the treasures of this range is yet unknown, though there are
mines which were flourishing in the eighteenth century.Suleta's shafts
were sunk in 1757, and are still under the workman's tools.The mines
belong largely to the Crown; they are partly worked by societies, and
some are private property.The Strogonoffs and Beloselskys have all made
their great wealth in these mines.Some of them seem to be
inexhaustible.What is more, besides gold, silver, lead, iron, almost
every mineral seems to be contained in their depths.We met a great many
workmen as we stopped, apparently without any reason, on our way,
winding up endless zigzags to the top of the mountain.I am rather
astonished that they do not in the least look like miners.They are
neither blackened by coal-dust or smoke, nor have they the gloomy
expression and sad countenance of those people who are bound to work and
live underground, deprived of the rays of the sun for the greater part
of their lives.They look much more like farmers--people of bright
disposition.I hear the wages are low; but their needs are small, so
that they can easily procure all that seems necessary to their
happiness.On the top of the mountain there stands a lofty granite
obelisk, with a short but significant inscription.There are only two
words: on one side "Europe," on the other "Asia."[Illustration: SIBERIAN HOME "Very conservative in their habits" To face
page 34]
We are in Western Siberia, in the midst of an expanse of steppe.It
seems to be boundless, and it has nothing to mark its space.It is like
a sea, with all the suggestiveness of the ocean.Our train crawls like a
black reptile, like a monster of a fairy tale, breathing its steam and
black smoke against the cloudless sky.Pale blue, cold
and without a single cloud.I am afraid I must again contradict the
general opinion of travellers about this corner of the earth.I have
repeatedly heard travellers tell of the gloom and tediousness of the
journey across it.Instead of gloom,
I rather think repose would be a more appropriate expression to describe
its true character; and tediousness is really a question of personal
disposition.I again break my journey at several places, and always find more of
interest and more new material for study than I should have dared to
anticipate.Western Siberia is a marvellous territory, and it possesses
all that is required to make a country flourishing.I quite understand
the great interest which it arouses, and it is natural that the country
should invest money lavishly for the furtherance of its progress.They
have built up in a comparatively short time some important townships.Petropaulovsk, and especially Omsk, Tobolsk, and Tomsk, are already
well-known centres, provided with richly endowed public institutions.The Government maintains some large schools and colleges, and does
everything in its power to attract new settlers to the uninhabited
regions.[Illustration: A SIBERIAN TOWN "They have built up in a comparatively
short time some important townships" To face page 36]
The colonization of Siberia is one of the most important national
questions--to people thousands and thousands of square miles; to exploit
all its resources; to make a country where there is now only surface and
space.Land is
granted under the most favourable conditions; there is no taxation for
the first three years, seed is provided on easy terms, and, if required,
agricultural implements and machinery are sold on the instalment system.The journey is nearly free, the fare being reduced to a few kopecks per
hundreds of miles.Petropaulovsk is bound to become one day the junction
of Central Asia, when railway lines will run to the north along the Obi
valley and south _via_ Atmolinsk, to Tashkend and Bokhara.All this is
well thought out, and already carefully planned.Its accomplishment
seems to be a mere question of time, and, as indeed is well known as an
historical fact, time has never seemed to be an obstacle to the
achievement of any aspiration conceived by Russia.The long line across the vast desert area is marked at intervals by
smaller or larger railway stations.one might
ask, as there is nothing in sight.No town, no village, not even one
human habitation.But, we are told, Government will soon build a
township.It already has a name, and some of those imaginary cities even
have a small Greek basilica, surmounted with glaring green cupolas.Again, some are partly finished, and their wide streets are bordered by
a few wooden buildings.At the corners there are commodious shops; on
the open square very likely a school; near it store-houses for wheat and
temporary lodgings for settlers.It all looks so attractive from the
railway station that I wonder if they do it on purpose to make it
tempting.Some of these new places do not entirely lack artistic beauty, and
certainly they all have the same characteristic of appearing very
national, holding firmly to the native taste and following the Muscovite
style of architecture.Everything, it must be confessed, is in keeping
with the surroundings, and at the same time practical and adequate to
the locality.The new settler builds a small house of wood, and at the
same time tries to make it look neat by carving it elaborately if he
can, and never fails to paint the wood in all kinds of bright colours.V
CENTRAL SIBERIA
From unlimited pastures we pass to endless forests.For days we are
surrounded by magnificent vegetation, including beautiful trees of
varied hues.There are dark oaks and pale elms, copper beeches and
silver birches, the colour of which is just turning.The foliage is
fading, and as one pierces through their depths the leaves shake and
rustle and pour down in golden showers.Unknown, unpenetrated, striking in its virgin prime.[Illustration: RAILWAY CHURCH SERVICE "A rolling Greek basilica" To face
page 38]
The railway cuts through in a straight line for hundreds of miles, and
there is nothing to be seen on either side but centenarian trees and
feathery ferns.What a field of exploration for a botanist!What a
collection of beautiful herbs and mosses!The colour of them is so deep and glorious, and the green of the grass
is of the richest shade.Many of the species are scarcely known yet,
and it is quite astonishing to find, in these far |
hallway | Where is John? | If the flora is so
surprising, the fauna is even more so: animals of every size and of
every description, from large bears to tiny squirrels.There are many
kinds of quadrupeds: wolves, foxes, snow-leopards, wild goats, martens,
sables, ermines, and all the innumerable members of the feline race.But
what are even more interesting than the animal nature are the fossils
found along the banks of the rivers and deep in the gloom of the earth.Some magnificent specimens of antediluvian skeletons have been
excavated, and these are zealously kept in the museums of St.Petersburg, Moscow, and Irkutsk.Daniel travelled to the kitchen.And for the ornithologist it is a
perfect land for research.The birds and their lives seem to have in
Siberia a most interesting past, and the laws of migration offer a
special field of observation.Some come from as far as Australia, while
others choose for their winter home New Zealand.The theories explaining
this mystery of nature are rather conflicting, and scientists have
devised various explanations of these far-distant wanderings.The
butterflies and beetles are unique also; in fact, it is a world in
itself lost in far-away Siberia.The long track between Tomsk and Irkutsk has the reputation of being
the dreariest and the most desolate part of the journey.I did not
expect to find much, which may very likely be the reason that I was so
surprised to come across towns like Krasnoyark, Kanks, and Udinsk.The
first, especially, is an important centre for trade and business.Besides wheat and other cereals, it is the great depot for the
increasing exportation of skins, furs, tallow, grease, and lately
butter.The export of butter is becoming of the greatest importance in
Siberia.Farming is increasing from day to day, and the Danes accomplish
a great deal in this respect.The yearly export to Europe, especially to
the English market, is quite astonishing, even more so when we take into
consideration that there are no winter pastures, and that all the cattle
must be kept on stable food.It is easy to understand the amount of
labour and care it requires, and yet it must pay, considering the number
of Danish families which come yearly to settle down in Siberia.For some
time Krasnoyark has been the terminus of the Western Siberian line, and
it derives its present importance partly from this fact.Udinsk is
growing rapidly too, and is the centre of a vast area.Around its
station I saw an enormous encampment of small Russian tarantas, or cars,
heavily laden with piles of sacks.Barns near the line were packed with
wheat and corn; and yet these stores do not seem to remain there
long, for all through the journey we constantly passed trains loaded
with cereals.What will it be when all of this enormous land, the whole
of Siberia, is under cultivation![Illustration: _Photo, Levitsky_ _Copyright, Nops Ltd._ M. DE PLEHVE To
face page 40]
It was most interesting to watch all these and many other features; to
realize all that has been done already since the railway was
constructed, and to conjecture the country in its full development; for
nature seems to have provided it with everything.I am more and more
astonished to find "dreadful Siberia" in reality as rich as, or even
richer than its neighbour across the sea--the beautiful Canada.Behind the green forest a dark blue wall seems to fence the plain in
towards the south.Its length is six hundred
verst, and its peaks seem to be crushed under the heavy clouds.The Altai district has some of the most beautiful
scenery of the whole globe.It is densely wooded, and dotted with lakes
and watered by endless streams and rivers, for the largest streams of
Asia flow from there to the Polar Sea.The mighty Yenisei, Lena, Obi,
all have their sources among this wilderness.The Altai range was the
cradle of the most ancient races, for the earliest inhabitants of the
earth belonged to the same stock as the Finnish and Turanian, and
prehistorical remains of them are to be found to this day.Even
Herodotus mentions these early folk.Later on Mongolian hordes swept
over the calm valleys, and the present populace show visible traces of
the extraordinary mixture of the different races which arose in or
overran this country.What
extraordinary might some of them acquired!With what striking lines they
have filled the pages of history!And as in those days long gone by,
some of those tribes still preserve their independence and unlimited
freedom.They have even kept the old name of the highest peak, and call
it, as ever before, Chin-Chan, the golden mountain.I was roused from my reflections by the clanging of the railway bell at
the Irkutsk station.At last I had arrived at the largest town, what
people here call the "Paris" of Siberia.Since yesterday morning I have
been travelling in the territory of the government bearing the same
name, of which it is the administrative centre.The district of Irkutsk
is enormous, with its five divisions of Nijni-Oudinsk, Balagansk,
Kirinsk, Irkutsk, and Erbolinsk, of which each is a territory in itself.It extends south to China, and submerges north into the Arctic Ocean.Besides the flat pasture regions, it has
mountains towering up to Alpine elevations.Moonkov-Sarde is 11,430 feet
high.The fertility of the soil is equalled by the richness of the
mines; but this vast area contains scarcely a million people.The
northern part of it is entirely barren, and hardly explored at all.The
present populace derive their origin from Mongolian lineage.The most
numerous are the Buriats, Tungus, and Kalmuks, who lead nomadic lives,
and for occupation rear their herds, hunt, and fish.Daniel went to the hallway.They are not yet
acquainted with agriculture, and when they settle by the sides of rivers
and fertile districts they leave the land to be cultivated by the Slavs,
and acquire their tools and requisites by the simple method of exchange.In the south there are a great many
Buddhists, and Mohammedanism appeals especially to the Tartars.Of all the strange folk by whom Siberia is inhabited, general curiosity
seems to be most interested in the convicts, of whom, during the last
century alone, more than one hundred thousand were sent into exile.Only
half of them ever returned to their homes again--many died; and only a
small contingent settled down after the expiration of the punishment.But all this has often been narrated and described by famous authors:
sometimes in such vivid colours, depicted in all its gloom, lamented
with sighs of agony, that on visiting some of the prisons and workhouses
I am quite astonished to find them far above my expectations.Considering the ordinary condition of a Russian criminal, the
difference between home and prison is not harder than in any other
country.If the officials and jailers are men with human sympathies,
there is every opportunity of spending their time in a way which will
lead to general improvement.Where the misery really comes in is with
those who are of a higher culture and greater refinement, and who are,
justly or unjustly, punished for some uproar, and who suffer merely for
their convictions.To give an adequate idea of the Irkutsk station on a foggy and rainy
autumn night, at the hour when the express arrives, is simply beyond
possibility.And to describe the way of getting from the station to the
town is even more so.To begin with, the railway station does not look
like a station in other parts of the world at all.Roads or streets
cannot be seen, and a town, in our acceptation of the word, does not
exist.The words seem to change and to lose their meanings there.If it
had been light I should have tried to take some pictures of the
desolation; but it is pitch dark, so I will confine myself for the
moment to putting down a few notes--my first impressions.Mary travelled to the hallway.The door of my compartment is torn
open with violence, some brigand-looking men jump in, and as suddenly
as they came disappear again, but alas!How long it
took to gather and regain it altogether, I do not remember; and the
extent of my walks from one end of the long platforms to the other I
cannot calculate.On the chilly platform of Irkutsk station all ideas of
time and space vanish completely.I think I should be seeking to the
present hour if a martial-looking officer had not come to my help.His
height is imposing, his gestures commanding, and his voice resounding.He uses all his enviable qualities at once, and all for the same
purpose--to find my kit.He fights his way to achieve this by cutting
through ground heavily barricaded by cases, sacks, travelling-bags, and
furniture.He makes people stand up and clear out of his way, scolds and
threatens all the porters and every mujik he comes across.And, strange
as it seems to me, his efforts are crowned with success.I thank him heartily for his kindness and
express my sincere hope that, owing to his great strategical abilities,
I may find him, if ever I return to Siberia, promoted to the rank of
general.At the same time I cannot omit remarking that the general
civility and kindness which were shown to me, by employes and passengers
alike, were most gratifying.Everybody seemed to wish to help, to give
information, and offer whatever they possessed.Their manners, from the
highest to the lowest, were irreproachable.I will go further, and say
that on no railway have I ever met guards showing more attention and
more good-nature.The electric bells of
the different compartments seemed to tinkle incessantly, as if the only
occupation of some of the travellers was to ask what they already know,
and to order what they do not require.Whips crack, horses neigh, coachmen yell, travellers scream, porters
quarrel.Such is the scene which awaits me in front of the station.I
secure one of the many small droshkies, of which there are hundreds, and
all shaky and open like the public vehicles of sunny Naples.The only
difference is that instead of sunbeams there is sleet falling on us from
above.My belongings are put on another droshky, skilfully fitted
together like an elaborate mosaic.We start in a sea of mud--dark and
liquid as a sauce--which covers everything like a shiny varnish.The
depths beneath must be great, for sometimes my droshky is nearly
submerged, and the lava-like stream floods our small vehicle.But it
seems to be built for use on land or on water, for sometimes I have a
sensation of floating in a canoe, rather than rolling along on wheels.We reach terra firma in the shape of a bridge formed of logs, nailed and
tied together.John went to the hallway.The bridge is long, but at last, on coming to the end of
it, the driver announces with pride, "We are at Irkutsk."for I do not see any buildings or any sign of a town.It takes some time before I can distinguish in the depths of the night
high palisades, looking very much like those surrounding soldiers'
encampments in the Middle Ages.Above the palisades a few roofs emerge,
low and sloping, very much like a tent.But at a sharp turn a brilliant
electric globe spreads its beams, like those of a lighthouse at sea, to
lead the wanderer to a secure harbour.Following its course, we land at
the doorway of the famous Hotel du Metropole.I shall certainly not forget it, and hope never to see
it again, for I think it contains all that Western bad taste and Eastern
filth combined can produce.Along a passage carpeted with red Brussels
and mud a waiter, in evening dress, but apparently without linen, shows
me to an apartment furnished with green plush, but devoid of bedding.I
am told that travellers are expected to bring their own sheets and
blankets.I have none, and after some rushing about I am provided with
sheets which I prefer not to use, and would rather content myself for my
night's rest with an easy chair and some travelling-rugs.There is,
moreover, no washstand, for the queer apparatus in the corner, bearing,
apparently as an ornament, only one basin about the size of a
finger-bowl, cannot be so described.And if you call for
any they bring a few drops in a cream-jug.The windows are nailed up all the year through.On trying to
open one it nearly fell to pieces.So if people nowadays ask me what
hotels in Siberian towns are like, I am bound to say you have plush and
gold, but no fresh air and no hot water!VI
THE SIBERIAN METROPOLIS
[Illustration: IRKUTSK "As I walk down to the Angara's banks I am short
of adjectives" To face page 48]
How shall I record all the tumultuous impressions of the first
twenty-four hours passed in Irkutsk?After the gloom of the night a
brilliant morning broke forth, brilliant as it is only seen on these
high plateaux.As I took my first glance round, everything seemed to
swim in a blaze of light.The small log houses seemed to have grown into
palaces.The palisades presented colours of hundreds of different
shades.Monuments and gilded domes seemed to have arisen out of the
ground.All the gloomy picture of last night vanished altogether,
dispersed by the light of the sun like the melting away of a nightmare.Painter, sculptor, and
architect, he can construct and raise marvels out of nothing, and
make us see and admire where all is only glamour.As I walk down to the Angara's banks I am short of adjectives.Language
fails to describe the pureness of the atmosphere, the variety of the
tints of the distant mists, and the whole scenery of the plain with its
vibrating mirages.I think it is at the early hours of the morn and at
sunset that one can best realize the charm of this strange country,
understand the dreamy legends which were born on the soil, realize the
soul of its people, and penetrate into its wondrous atmosphere, full of
enigmas and mysteries.Irkutsk is a large and important centre, the seat of the military and
civil governors, of the Catholic bishop, of the commander of the forces.There are high schools, many public institutions, and factories.Irkutsk
is a famous commercial town, and is one of the most prominent markets
for international trade.The high street is an endless row of shops,
full of goods made in Germany, and some in America.I do not see much
English merchandise; but, as I hear, English commercial interests are
only represented in a few of the larger mines and building enterprises.It is a fine
stone building, rich in all that relates to the origin, history, and
folk-lore of Siberia.A few hours passed in its halls give one a most
extensive insight into the conditions of the different races and tribes
which have peopled these regions for centuries.Irkutsk from a social standpoint seems to offer some advantages too.Government employes, officers, and others regard it as a special favour
to get an appointment here.There is a great deal of entertainment, and
in the centre of the town is a most pretentious building--the Imperial
Opera House.Life is expensive, and the population shows a great
tendency to luxury, and even more, what one might call waste.Money is
spent easily and uselessly, as is generally the case in growing places
and recent settlements.In this respect there is a slight resemblance
between Irkutsk and a Western American ranch or an Australian mining
town; and in the afternoon, when everybody promenades on the wooden
pavements, which run like bridges across and along the muddy streets,
the inhabitants show exactly the same variety of origin and of social
condition as in those towns beyond the seas.Sandra moved to the garden.Poles are numerous too, and all
the different Baltic provinces have a fair number of representatives.Russians are not commercial
people as a rule.And there is a large Chinese colony, mostly occupied
with the famous overland tea trade _via_ Kiahta.They walk for hours
and hours up and down all these endless pathways, and a great many sit,
covered with furs, in front of their house doors to see the show.About
eight o'clock everything becomes quiet; streets are deserted, doors are
closed, shutters fastened, lights extinguishedMary went to the kitchen. |
bathroom | Where is John? | I should, after all, recommend travellers to stop for
a few days in some of the largest Siberian towns, in spite of the rough
hotels and the primitive ways; it gives such a definite idea of their
buildings, inhabitants, and mode of living, as could never be procured
from books.VII
TRANS-BAIKALIA
I have arrived at the climax of the journey.It is the most celebrated passage of the whole overland journey;
the scenery is fine: an extensive sheet of water, brilliant like a
mirror, surrounded by high mountains and majestic rocks; but I am
inclined to repeat what I said before about hilly scenery: lake
districts do not appeal to me.A sea in its greatness, and a marsh in
its diverse variations of colour, are both perfect in their artistic
values, only different in conception.Daniel travelled to the kitchen.The former imposing, like a
picture of Meesdag; the latter, hazy like a Corot, each perfect in its
style.But a lake, even the prettiest, does not rise above the effects
of a chromo-lithograph.Lake Baikal, viewed from the north, loses its
banks, and so has the advantage of appearing as an ocean.[Illustration: LAKE BAIKAL "There are some enormous rocks as if thrown
in by the hand of a Titan" To face page 52]
The whole distance is flat, veiled in silver mists and pierced through
here and there by the crystal peaks of the distant mountains.There are
a few islands scattered about, some enormous rocks, as if thrown in by
the hand of a Titan.All of them, I am told, were inhabited by dwarfs and fairies,
possessed of marvellous gifts, and belonging to a wondrous past.At
least the mythical minds of these archaic people endowed each striking
spot with a different tale, and there are many such, especially on the
south-eastern shore, which displays a great variety of scenery, and this
proves to be a serious hindrance to the completion of the railway track.The line around Lake Baikal is not completed yet, for there are several
tunnels still to be bored and a great many rocks to be cut through;
but it is, after all, the only portion of the track which offers any
serious difficulty to the engineer.His house is white and trimm'd with green,
For many miles it may be seen;
It shines as bright as any star,
The fame of it has spread afar.Lord Dexter, thou, whose name alone
Shines brighter than king George's throne;
Thy name shall stand in books of fame,
And Princes shall his name proclaim.Lord Dexter hath a coach beside,
In pomp and splendor he doth ride;
The horses champ the silver bitt,
And throw the foam around their feet.The images around him stand,
For they were made by his command;
Looking to see Lord Dexter come,
With fixed eyes they see him home.Four lions stand to guard the door,
With their mouths open to devour
All enemies who do disturb
Lord Dexter or his shady grove.Lord Dexter, like king Solomon,
Hath gold and silver by the ton,
And bells to churches he hath given,
To worship the great king of heaven.His mighty deeds they are so great,
He's honor'd both by church and state,
And when he comes all must give way,
To let Lord Dexter bear the sway.When Dexter dies all things shall droop,
Lord East, Lord West, Lord North shall stoop,
And then Lord South with pomp shall come,
And bear his body to the tomb.His tomb most charming to behold,
A thousand sweets it doth unfold;
When Dexter dies shall willows weep,
And mourning friends shall fill the street.Daniel went to the hallway.May Washington immortal stand,
May Jefferson by God's command
Support the right of all mankind,
John Adams not a whit behind.America with all your host,
Lord Dexter in a bumper toast;
May he enjoy his life in peace,
And when he's dead his name not cease.In heaven may he always reign,
For there's no sorrow, sin, nor pain:
Unto the world I leave the rest,
For to pronounce Lord Dexter blest.,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,
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* * * * *
Transcriber's Note: The block of punctuation (on a page by itself) is
inexplicably left unexplained in this edition.To assure himself that his report would be up to date, Flannery went
to the rear of the office and looked into the cage.The pigs had been
transferred to a larger box--a dry goods box."Wan, -- two, -- t'ree, -- four, -- five, -- six, -- sivin, -- eight!""Sivin spotted an' wan all black.All well an' hearty an'
all eatin' loike ragin' hippypottymusses.Mary travelled to the hallway.He went back to his desk and
wrote.Morgan, Head of Tariff Department," he wrote."Why do I say <DW55>
pigs is pigs because they is pigs and will be til you say they ain't
which is what the rule book says stop your jollying me you know it as
well as I do.As to health they are all well and hoping you are the
same.P. S. There are eight now the family increased all good eaters.P.
S. I paid out so far two dollars for cabbage which they like shall I put
in bill for same what?"Morgan, head of the Tariff Department, when he received this letter,
laughed.he said, "Flannery is right, 'pigs is pigs.'I'll have to
get authority on this thing.John went to the hallway.Meanwhile, Miss Kane, take this letter:
Agent, Westcote, N. J. Regarding shipment guinea-pigs, File No.Rule 83, General Instruction to Agents, clearly states that agents
shall collect from consignee all costs of provender, etc., etc.,
required for live stock while in transit or storage.You will proceed to
collect same from consignee."Flannery received this letter next morning, and when he read it he
grinned."Proceed to collect," he said softly."How thim clerks do loike to be
talkin'!Me proceed to collect two dollars and twinty-foive cints off
Misther Morehouse!I wonder do thim clerks know Misther Morehouse?'Misther Morehouse, two an' a quarter, plaze.''Cert'nly, me dear frind Flannery.Flannery drove the express wagon to Mr.he cried as soon as he saw it was Flannery."So you've come to
your senses at last, have you?"I hev no box," said Flannery coldly."I hev a bill agin Misther John
C. Morehouse for two dollars and twinty-foive cints for kebbages aten by
his <DW55> pigs.Sandra moved to the garden."Do you mean to say that two
little guinea-pigs--"
"Eight!""Papa an' mamma an' the six childer.Mary went to the kitchen.Morehouse slammed the door in Flannery's face.Flannery
looked at the door reproachfully."I take ut the con-sign-y don't want to pay for thim kebbages," he said."If I know signs of refusal, the con-sign-y refuses to pay for wan dang
kebbage leaf an' be hanged to me!"Morgan, the head of the Tariff Department, consulted the president
of the Interurban Express Company regarding guinea-pigs, as to whether
they were pigs or not pigs.The president was inclined to treat the
matter lightly."What is the rate on pigs and on pets?""Pigs thirty cents, pets twenty-five," said Morgan."Then of course guinea-pigs are pigs," said the president."Yes," agreed Morgan, "I look at it that way, too.A thing that can come
under two rates is naturally due to be classed as the higher.But are
guinea-pigs, pigs?"Come to think of it," said the president, "I believe they are more like
rabbits.Sort of half-way station between pig and rabbit.I think the
question is this--are guinea-pigs of the domestic pig family?The president put the papers on his desk and wrote a letter to Professor
Gordon.Unfortunately the Professor was in South America collecting
zoological specimens, and the letter was forwarded to him by his wife.As the Professor was in the highest Andes, where no white man had ever
penetrated, the letter was many months in reaching him.John moved to the garden.The president
forgot the guinea-pigs, Morgan forgot them, Mr.Morehouse forgot them,
but Flannery did not.One-half of his time he gave to the duties of
his agency; the other half was devoted to the guinea-pigs.Long before
Professor Gordon received the president's letter Morgan received one
from Flannery."About them <DW55> pigs," it said, "what shall I do they are great in
family life, no race suicide for them, there are thirty-two now shall
I sell them do you take this express office for a menagerie, answer
quick."Morgan reached for a telegraph blank and wrote:
"Agent, Westcote.He then wrote Flannery a letter calling his attention to the fact that
the pigs were not the property of the company but were merely being held
during a settlement of a dispute regarding rates.He advised Flannery to
take the best possible care of them.Flannery, letter in hand, looked at the pigs and sighed.The dry-goods
box cage had become too small.He boarded up twenty feet of the rear
of the express office to make a large and airy home for them, and went
about his business.He worked with feverish intensity when out on his
rounds, for the pigs required attention and took most of his time.Some
months later, in desperation, he seized a sheet of paper and wrote
"160" across it and mailed it to Morgan.Morgan returned it asking for
explanation.Flannery replied:
"There be now one hundred sixty of them <DW55> pigs, for heavens sake let
me sell off some, do you want me to go crazy, what."Not long after this the president of the express company received a
letter from Professor Gordon.It was a long and scholarly letter, but
the point was that the guinea-pig was the Cava aparoea while the common
pig was the genius Sus of the family Suidae.He remarked that they were
prolific and multiplied rapidly."They are not pigs," said the president, decidedly, to Morgan."The
twenty-five cent rate applies."Morgan made the proper notation on the papers that had accumulated in
File A6754, and turned them over to the Audit Department.John went back to the bathroom.The Audit
Department took some time to look the matter up, and after the usual
delay wrote Flannery that as he had on hand one hundred and sixty
guinea-pigs, the property of consignee, he should deliver them and
collect charges at the rate of twenty-five cents each.Flannery spent a day herding his charges through a narrow opening in
their cage so that he might count them.he wrote, when he had finished the count, "you are way off
there may be was one hundred and sixty <DW55> pigs once, but wake up don't
be a back number.I've got even eight hundred, now shall I collect
for eight hundred or what, how about sixty-four dollars I paid out for
cabbages."It required a great many letters back and forth before the Audit
Department was able to understand why the error had been made of billing
one hundred and sixty instead of eight hundred, and still more time for
it to get the meaning of the "cabbages."Flannery was crowded into a few feet at the extreme front of the
office.The pigs had all the rest of the room and two boys were employed
constantly attending to them.The day after Flannery had counted the
guinea-pigs there were eight more added to his drove, and by the time
the Audit Department gave him authority to collect for eight hundred
Flannery had given up all attempts to attend to the receipt or the
delivery of goods.He was hastily building galleries around the express
office, tier above tier.He had four thousand |
hallway | Where is Mary? | Daniel travelled to the kitchen.Immediately following its authorization the Audit Department sent
another letter, but Flannery was too busy to open it.They wrote another
and then they telegraphed:
"Error in guinea-pig bill.Collect for two guinea-pigs, fifty cents.Flannery read the telegram and cheered up.He wrote out a bill as
rapidly as his pencil could travel over paper and ran all the way to the
Morehouse home.The house stared at
him with vacant eyes.Daniel went to the hallway.The windows were bare of curtains and he could see
into the empty rooms.A sign on the porch said, "To Let."Flannery ran all the way back to the express office.Sixty-nine guinea-pigs had been born during his absence.He ran out
again and made feverish inquiries in the village.Morehouse had not
only moved, but he had left Westcote.Flannery returned to the express
office and found that two hundred and six guinea-pigs had entered the
world since he left it.Mary travelled to the hallway.He wrote a telegram to the Audit Department."Can't collect fifty cents for two <DW55> pigs consignee has left town
address unknown what shall I do?The telegram was handed to one of the clerks in the Audit Department,
and as he read it he laughed.He ought to know that the thing to do is to
return the consignment here," said the clerk.He telegraphed Flannery to
send the pigs to the main office of the company at Franklin.When Flannery received the telegram he set to work.The six boys he
had engaged to help him also set to work.They worked with the haste of
desperate men, making cages out of soap boxes, cracker boxes, and all
kinds of boxes, and as fast as the cages were completed they filled them
with guinea-pigs and expressed them to Franklin.Day after day the cages
of guineapigs flowed in a steady stream from Westcote to Franklin,
and still Flannery and his six helpers ripped and nailed and
packed--relentlessly and feverishly.At the end of the week they had
shipped two hundred and eighty cases of guinea-pigs, and there were in
the express office seven hundred and four more pigs than when they began
packing them.Warehouse full," came a telegram to Flannery.He
stopped packing only long enough to wire back, "Can't stop," and kept
on sending them.On the next train up from Franklin came one of
the company's inspectors.He had instructions to stop the stream of
guinea-pigs at all hazards.As his train drew up at Westcote station
he saw a cattle car standing on the express company's siding.When he
reached the express office he saw the express wagon backed up to the
door.Six boys were carrying bushel baskets full of guinea-pigs from the
office and dumping them into the wagon.Inside the room Flannery, with'
his coat and vest off, was shoveling guinea-pigs into bushel baskets
with a coal scoop.He was winding up the guinea-pig episode.John went to the hallway.He looked up at the inspector with a snort of anger."Wan wagonload more an, I'll be quit of thim, an' niver will ye catch
Flannery wid no more foreign pigs on his hands.They near was
the death o' me.Sandra moved to the garden.Nixt toime I'll know that pigs of whaiver nationality
is domistic pets--an' go at the lowest rate."He began shoveling again rapidly, speaking quickly between breaths."Rules may be rules, but you can't fool Mike Flannery twice wid the same
thrick--whin ut comes to live stock, dang the rules.So long as Flannery
runs this expriss office--pigs is pets--an' cows is pets--an' horses
is pets--an' lions an' tigers an' Rocky Mountain goats is pets--an' the
rate on thim is twinty-foive cints."He paused long enough to let one of the boys put an empty basket in the
place of the one he had just filled.There were only a few guinea-pigs
left.As he noted their limited number his natural habit of looking on
the bright side returned."Well, annyhow," he said cheerfully, "'tis not so bad as ut might be.What if thim <DW55> pigs had been elephants!"CHAPTER VIII
Concerning Coutances and Some Parts of the Cotentin
When at last it is necessary to bid farewell to Mont St Michel, one is not
compelled to lose sight of the distant grey silhouette for a long while.It
remains in sight across the buttercup fields and sunny pastures on the road
to Pontaubault.Then again, when climbing the zig-zag hill towards
Avranches the Bay of Mont St Michel is spread out.You may see the mount
again from Avranches itself, and then if you follow the coast-road towards
Granville instead of the rather monotonous road that goes to its
destination with the directness of a gun-shot, there are further views of
the wonderful rock and its humble companion Tombelaine.Keeping along this pretty road through the little village of Genets, where
you actually touch the ocean, there is much pretty scenery to be enjoyed
all the way to the busy town of Granville.It is a watering-place and a
port, the two aspects of the town being divided from each other by the
great rocky promontory of Lihou.If one climbs up right above the place
this conformation is plainly visible, for down below is the stretch of
sandy beach, with its frailly constructed concert rooms and cafes
sheltering under the gaunt red cliffs, while over the shoulder of the
peninsula appears a glimpse of the piers and the masts of sailing ships.There is much that is picturesque in the seaport side of the town,
particularly towards evening, when the red and green harbour-lights are
reflected in the sea.There are usually five or six sailing ships loading
or discharging their cargoes by the quays, and you will generally find a
British tramp steamer lying against one of the wharves.The sturdy
crocketed spire of the sombre old church of Notre Dame stands out above the
long line of shuttered houses down by the harbour.It is a wonderful
contrast, this old portion of Granville that surmounts the promontory, to
the ephemeral and gay aspect of the watering-place on the northern side.But these sort of contrasts are to be found elsewhere than at Granville,
for at Dieppe it is much the same, although the view of that popular resort
that is most familiar in England, is the hideous casino and the wide sweep
of gardens that occupy the sea-front.Those who have not been there would
scarcely believe that the town possesses a castle perched upon towering
cliffs, or that its splendid old church of Saint-Jacques is the real glory
of the place.Granville cannot boast of quite so much in the way of
antiquities, but there is something peculiarly fascinating about its dark
church, in which the light seems unable to penetrate, and whose walls
assume almost the same tones as the rocks from which the masonry was hewn.I should like to describe the scenery of the twenty miles of country that
lie between Granville and Coutances, but I have only passed over it on one
occasion.It was nine o'clock in the evening, and the long drawn-out
twilight had nearly faded away as I climbed up the long ascent which
commences the road to Coutances, and before I had reached the village of
Brehal it was quite dark.The road became absolutely deserted, and although
one or two people on bicycles passed me about this time, they were carrying
no lamps as is the usual custom in France, where the rules governing the
use of a _bicyclette_ are so numerous and intricate, but so absolutely
ignored.My own lamp seemed to be a grave distraction among the invisible
occupants of the roadside meadows, and often much lowing rose up on either
side.The hedges would suddenly whirr with countless grasshoppers,
although, no doubt, they had been amusing themselves with their monotonous
noises for hours.The strange sound seemed to follow me in a most
persistent fashion, and then would be merged into the croaking of a vast
assemblage of frogs.These sounds, however, carry with them no real menace,
however late the hour, but there is something which may almost strike
terror into the heart, though it might almost be considered foolish by
those who have not experienced a midnight ride in this country.The clipped
and shaven trees that in daylight merely appear ridiculous, in the darkness
assume an altogether different character.To the vivid imagination, it is
easy to see a witch's broom swaying in the wind; a group of curious and
distorted stems will suggest a row of large but painfully thin brownies,
holding hands as they dance.Every moment, two or three figures of gaunt
and lanky witches in spreading skirts will alarm you as they suddenly
appear round a corner.When they are not so uncanny in their outlines, the
trees will appear like clipped poodles standing upon their hind legs, or
they will suddenly assume the character of a grove of palm trees.After a
long stretch of this sort of country, it is pleasant to pass through some
sleeping village where there are just two or three lighted windows to show
that there are still a few people awake besides oneself in this lonely
country.I can imagine that the village of Hyenville has some claims to
beauty.I know at least that it lies in a valley, watered by the river
Sienne, and that the darkness allowed me to see an old stone bridge, with a
cross raised above the centre of the parapet.Soon after this I began to
descend the hill that leads into Coutances.A bend in the road, as I was
rapidly descending, brought into view a whole blaze of lights, and I felt
that here at last there were people and hotels, and an end to the ghostly
sights of the open country.Then I came to houses, but they were all quite
dark, and there was not a single human being in sight.Following this came
a choice of streets without a possibility of knowing which one would lead
in the direction of the hotel I was hoping to reach; but my perplexity was
at length relieved by the advent of a tall youth whose cadaverous features
were shown up by the street lamp overhead.He gave his directions clearly
enough, but although I followed them carefully right up the hill past the
cathedral, I began to think that I had overshot the mark, when another
passer-by appeared in the silent street.I found that I was within a few
yards of the hotel; but on hurrying forward, I found to my astonishment,
that the whole building was completely shut up and no light appeared even
within the courtyard.As I had passed the cathedral eleven reverbrating
notes had echoed over the town, and it seemed as though Coutances had
retired earlier on this night of all nights in order that I might learn
to travel at more rational hours.Going inside the courtyard, my anxiety
was suddenly relieved by seeing the light of a candle in a stable on the
further side; a man was putting up a horse, and he at once volunteered
to arouse some one who would find a bedroom.After some shouting to the
gallery above, a maid appeared, and a few minutes afterwards mine host
himself, clad in a long flannel night robe and protecting a flickering
candle-flame with his hand, appeared at a doorway.His long grey beard
gave him a most venerable aspect.The note of welcome in his cheery
voice was unmistakable and soon the maid who had spoken from the balcony
had shown the way up a winding circular staircase to a welcome exchange
to the shelter of a haystack which I had begun to fear would be my only
resting-place for the night.In the morning, the Hotel d'Angleterre proved to be a most picturesque
old hostelry.Galleries ran round three sides of the courtyard, and the
circular staircase was enclosed in one of those round towers that are
such a distinctive feature of the older type of French inn.The long main street does not always look deserted and in daylight it
appeared as sunny and cheerful as one expects to find the chief
thoroughfare of a thriving French town.Coutances stands on such a bold
hill that the street, almost of necessity, drops precipitously, and the
cathedral which ranks with the best in France, stands out boldly from all
points of view.Mary went to the kitchen.It was principally built in the thirteenth century, but a
church which had stood in its place two centuries before, had been
consecrated by Bishop Geoffrey de Montbray in 1056, in the presence of Duke
William, afterwards William I. of England.The two western towers of the
present cathedral are not exactly similar, and owing to their curious
formation of clustered spires they are not symmetrical.It is for this
reason that they are often described as being unpleasing.I am unable to
echo such criticism, for in looking at the original ideas that are most
plainly manifest in this most astonishing cathedral one seems to be in
close touch with the long forgotten builders and architects whose notions
of proportion and beauty they contrived to stamp so indelibly upon their
masterpiece.From the central tower there is a view over an enormous sweep
of country which includes a stretch of the coast, for Coutances is only
half a dozen miles from the sea.This central tower rises from a square
base at the intersection of the transepts with the nave.It runs up almost
without a break in an octagonal form to a parapet ornamented with open
quatrefoils.The interior has a clean and fresh appearance owing to the
recent restorations and is chiefly remarkable for the balustraded triforium
which is continued round the whole church.John moved to the garden.In many of the windows there is
glass belonging to the sixteenth century and some dates as early as the
fourteenth century.John went back to the bathroom.Besides the cathedral, the long main street of Coutances possesses the
churches of St Nicholas and St Pierre.In St Nicholas one may see a
somewhat unusual feature in the carved inscriptions dating from early in
the seventeenth century which appear on the plain round columns.Here, as
in the cathedral, the idea of the balustrade under the clerestory is
carried out.The fourteen Stations of the Cross that as usual meet one in
the aisles of the nave, are in this church painted with a most unusual
vividness and reality, in powerful contrast to so many of these crucifixion
scenes to be seen in Roman Catholic churches.The church of St Pierre is illustrated here, with the cathedral beyond, but
the drawing does not include the great central tower which is crowned by a
pyramidal spire.This church belongs to a later period than the cathedral
as one may see by a glance at the classic work in the western tower, for
most of the building is subsequent to the fifteenth century.St Pierre and
the cathedral form a most interesting study in the development from Early
French architecture to the Renaissance; but for picturesqueness in domestic
architecture Coutances cannot hold up its head with Lisieux, Vire, or
Rouen.There is still a remnant of one of the town gateways and to those
who spend any considerable time in the city some other quaint corners may
be found.Mary went to the hallway.From the western side there is a beautiful view of the town with
the great western towers of the cathedral rising gracefully above the
quarries in the Bois des Vignettes.Another feature of Coutances is the
aqueduct.It unfortunately does not date from Roman times when the place
was known as Constantia, for there is nothing Roman about the ivy-clad
arches that cross the valley on the western side.Daniel moved to the kitchen.From Coutances northwards to Cherbourg stretches that large tract of
Normandy which used to be known as the Cotentin.At first the country is
full of deep valleys and smiling hills covered with rich pastures and
woodland, but as you approach Lessay at the head of an inlet of the sea the
road passes over a flat heathy desert.The church at Lessay is a most
perfect example of Norman work.The situation is quite pretty, for near by
flows the little river Ay, and the roofs are brilliant with orange lichen.The great square tower with its round-headed Norman windows, is crowned
with a cupola.With the exception of the windows in the north aisle the
whole of the interior is of pure Norman work.There is a double triforium
and the round, circular arches rest on ponderous pillars and there is also
a typical Norman semi |
hallway | Where is John? | The village, which is a very ancient
one, grew round the Benedictine convent established here by one Turstan
Halduc in 1040, and there may still be seen the wonderfully picturesque
castle with its round towers.Following the estuary of the river from Lessay on a minor road you come to
the hamlet of St Germain-sur-Ay.The country all around is flat, but the
wide stretches of sand in the inlet have some attractiveness to those who
are fond of breezy and open scenery, and the little church in the village
is as old as that of Lessay.One could follow this pretty coast-line
northwards until the seaboard becomes bold, but we will turn aside to the
little town of La Haye-du-Puits.There is a junction here on the railway
for Carentan and St Lo, but the place seems to have gone on quite unaltered
by this communication with the large centres of population.The remains of
the castle, where lived during the eleventh century the Turstan Halduc just
mentioned, are to be seen on the railway side of the town.The dungeon
tower, picturesquely smothered in ivy, is all that remains of this Norman
fortress.The other portion is on the opposite side of the road, but it
only dates from the sixteenth century, when it was rebuilt.Turstan had a
son named Odo, who was seneschal to William the Norman, and he is known to
have received certain important lands in Sussex as a reward for his
services.During the next century the owner of the castle was that Richard
de la Haye whose story is a most interesting one.He was escaping from
Geoffrey Plantagenet, Count of Anjou, when he had the ill luck to fall in
with some Moorish pirates by whom he was captured and kept as a slave for
some years.He however succeeded in regaining his liberty, and after his
return to France, he and his wife, Mathilde de Vernon, founded the Abbey of
Blanchelande.The ruins of this establishment are scarcely more than two
miles from La Haye du Puits, but they unfortunately consist of little more
than some arches of the abbey church and some of the walls of the lesser
buildings.Immediately north of La Haye there is some more heathy ground, but it is
higher than the country surrounding Lessay.A round windmill, much
resembling the ruined structure that stands out conspicuously on the bare
tableland of Alderney, is the first of these picturesque features that
we have seen in this part of the country.It is worth mention also on
account of the fact that it was at St Sauveur-le-Vicomte, only about seven
miles distant, that the first recorded windmill was put up in France about
the year 1180, almost the same time as the first reference to such
structures occurs in England.John went back to the hallway.St Sauveur has its castle now occupied by the
hospital.It was given to Sir John Chandos by Edward III.after the Treaty
of Bretigny in 1360, and that courageous soldier, who saw so much fighting
in France during the Hundred Years War, added much to the fortress which
had already been in existence since very early times in the history of the
duchy.A road runs from St Sauveur straight towards the sea.It passes the corner
of a forest and then goes right down to the low sandy harbour of Port Bail.It is a wonderful country for atmospheric effects across the embanked
swamps and sandhills that lie between the hamlet and the sea.One of the
two churches has a bold, square tower, dating from the fifteenth
century--it now serves as a lighthouse.The harbour has two other lights
and, although it can only be entered at certain tides, the little port
contrives to carry on a considerable export trade of farm produce, most of
it being consumed in the Channel Islands.The railway goes on to its terminus at Cartaret, a nicely situated little
seaside village close to the cape of the same name.Here, if you tire of
shrimping on the wide stretch of sands, it is possible to desert Normandy
by the little steamer that during the summer plies between this point and
Gorey in Jersey.Modern influences have given Cartaret a more civilised
flavour than it had a few years ago, and it now has something of the aspect
of a watering-place.Northwards from Cartaret, a road follows the
coast-line two or three miles from the cliffs to Les Pieux.Then one can go
on to Flamanville by the cape which takes its name from the village, and
there see the seventeenth century moated manor house.Cherbourg, the greatest naval port of France, is not often visited by those
who travel in Normandy, for with the exception of the enormous breakwater,
there is nothing beyond the sights of a huge dockyard town that is of any
note.The breakwater, however, is a most remarkable work.It stands about
two miles from the shore, is more than 4000 yards long by 100 yards wide,
and has a most formidable appearance with its circular forts and batteries
of guns.The church of La Trinite was built during the English occupation and must
have been barely finished before the evacuation of the place in 1450.Since
that time the post has only been once attacked by the English, and that was
as recently as 1758, when Lord Howe destroyed and burnt the forts, shipping
and naval stores.Leaving Cherbourg we will take our way southwards again to Valognes, a town
which suffered terribly during the ceaseless wars between England and
France.It was
captured by the English seventy-one years afterwards and did not again
become French until that remarkable year 1450, when the whole of Normandy
and part of Guienne was cleared of Englishmen by the victorious French
armies under the Count of Clermont and the Duke of Alencon.The Montgommery, whose defeat at Domfront castle has already been
mentioned, held Valognes against the Catholic army, but it afterwards was
captured by the victorious Henry of Navarre after the battle of Ivry near
Evreux.Valognes possesses a good museum containing many Roman relics from the
neighbourhood.A short distance from the town, on the east side, lies the
village of Alleaume where there remain the ivy-grown ruins of the castle in
which Duke William was residing when the news was brought to him of the
insurrection of his barons under the Viscount of the Cotentin.It was at
this place that William's fool revealed to him the danger in which he
stood, and it was from here that he rode in hot haste to the castle of
Falaise, a stronghold the Duke seemed to regard as safer than any other in
his possession.Still farther southwards lies the town of Carentan, in the centre of a
great butter-making district.It is, however, a dull place--it can scarcely
be called a city even though it possesses a cathedral.The earliest part of
this building is the west front which is of twelfth century work.The spire
of the central tower has much the same appearance as those crowning the two
western towers at St Lo, but there is nothing about the building that
inspires any particular enthusiasm although the tracery of some of the
windows, especially of the reticulated one in the south transept, is
exceptionally fine.CHAPTER IX
Concerning St Lo and Bayeux
The richest pasture lands occupy the great butter-making district that lies
north of St Lo.The grass in every meadow seems to grow with particular
luxuriance, and the sleepy cows that are privileged to dwell in this choice
country, show by their complaisant expressions the satisfaction they feel
with their surroundings.It is wonderful to lie in one of these sunny
pastures, when the buttercups have gilded the grass, and to watch the
motionless red and white cattle as they solemnly let the hours drift past
them.During a whole sunny afternoon, which I once spent in those pastoral
surroundings, I can scarcely remember the slightest movement taking place
among the somnolent herd.There was a gentle breeze that made waves in the
silky sea of grass and sometimes stirred the fresh green leaves of the
trees overhead.The birds were singing sweetly, and the distant tolling of
the cathedral bells at Carentan added a richness to the sounds of nature.Imagine this scene repeated a thousand times in every direction and you
have a good idea of this strip of pastoral Normandy.About four miles north of St Lo, the main road drops down into the pleasant
little village of Pont Hebert and then passes over the Vire where it flows
through a lovely vale.In either direction the brimming waters of the river
glide between brilliant green meadows, and as it winds away into the
distance, the trees become more and more blue and form a charming contrast
to the brighter colours near at hand.To come across the peasants of this pretty country in the garb one so
frequently sees depicted as the usual dress of Normandy, it is necessary to
be there on a Sunday or some fete day.On such days the wonderful frilled
caps, that stand out for quite a foot above the head, are seen on every
peasant woman.They are always of the most elaborate designs, and it is
scarcely necessary to say that they are of a dazzling whiteness.The men
have their characteristic dark blue close-fitting coats and the
high-crowned cap that being worn on week days is much more frequently in
evidence than the remarkable creations worn by the womenfolk.There is a long climb from Pont Hebert to St Lo but there are plenty of
pretty cottages scattered along the road, and these with crimson stonecrop
on the roofs and may and lilac blossoming in the gardens, are pictures that
prevent you from finding the way tedious.At last, from the considerable
height you have reached, St Lo, dominated by its great church, appears on a
hill scarcely a mile away.The old town, perched upon the flat surface of a
mass of rock with precipitous sides, has much the same position as
Domfront.But here we are shut in by other hills and there is no unlimited
view of green forest-lands.The place, too, has a busy city-like aspect so
that the comparison cannot be carried very far.When you have climbed the
steep street that leads up through a quaint gateway to the extensive
plateau above, you pass through the Rue Thiers and reach one of the finest
views of the church.On one side of the street, there are picturesque
houses with tiled roofs and curiously clustered chimneys, and beyond them,
across a wide gravelly space, rises the majestic bulk of the west front of
Notre Dame.From the wide flight of steps that leads to the main entrance,
the eye travels upwards to the three deeply-recessed windows that occupy
most of the surface of this end of the nave.Then the two great towers,
seemingly similar, but really full of individual ornament, rise
majestically to a height equal to that of the highest portion of the nave.Then higher still, soaring away into the blue sky above, come the enormous
stone spires perforated with great multi-foiled openings all the way to the
apex.Both towers belong to the fifteenth century, but they were not built
at quite the same time.In the chancel there is a double arcade of graceful
pillars without capitals.There is much fine old glass full of beautiful
colours that make a curious effect when the sunlight falls through them
upon the black and white marble slabs of the floor.Wedged up against the north-west corner of the exterior stands a
comparatively modern house, but this incongruous companionship is no
strange thing in Normandy, although, as we have seen at Falaise, there are
instances in which efforts are being made to scrape off the humble domestic
architecture that clings, barnacle-like, upon the walls of so many of the
finest churches.On the north side of Notre Dame, there is an admirably
designed outside pulpit with a great stone canopy overhead full of
elaborate tracery.It overhangs the pavement, and is a noticeable object as
you go towards the Place de la Prefecture.On this wide and open terrace, a
band plays on Sunday evenings.There are seats under the trees by the stone
balustrade from which one may look across the roofs of the lower town
filling the space beneath.The great gravelly Place des Beaux-Regards that
runs from the western side of the church, is terminated at the very edge of
the rocky platform, and looking over the stone parapet you see the Vire
flowing a hundred feet below.This view must have been very much finer
before warehouses and factory-like buildings came to spoil the river-side
scenery, but even now it has qualities which are unique.Facing the west
end of the church, the most striking gabled front of the Maison Dieu forms
part of one side of the open space.This building may at first appear
almost too richly carved and ornate to be anything but a modern
reproduction of a mediaeval house, but it has been so carefully preserved
that the whole of the details of the front belong to the original time of
the construction of the house.The lower portion is of heavy stone-work,
above, the floors project one over the other, and the beauty of the
timber-framing and the leaded windows is most striking.St Lo teems with soldiers, and it has a town-crier who wears a dark blue
uniform and carries a drum to call attention to his announcements.In the
lower part of the town, in the Rue des Halles, you may find the corn-market
now held in the church that was dedicated to Thomas a Becket.The building
was in course of construction when the primate happened to be at St Lo and
he was asked to name the saint to whom the church should be dedicated.His
advice was that they should wait until some saintly son of the church
should die for its sake.Strangely enough he himself died for the
privileges of the church, and thus his name was given to this now
desecrated house of God.The remains of the fortifications that crown the rock are scarcely
noticeable at the present time, and it is very much a matter of regret that
the town has, with the exception of the Tour Beaux-Regards, lost the walls
and towers that witnessed so many sieges and assaults from early Norman
times right up to the days of Henry of Navarre.It was one of the towns
that was held by Geoffrey Plantagenet in Stephen's reign, and it was burnt
by Edward III.Then again in the religious
wars of the sixteenth century, a most terrific attack was made on St Lo by
Matignon who overcame the resistance of the garrison after Colombieres, the
leader, had been shot dead upon the ramparts.It is fortunate for travellers in hot weather that exactly half-way between
St Lo and Bayeux there lies the shade of the extensive forest of Cerisy
through which the main road cuts in a perfectly straight line.At Semilly
there is a picturesque calvary.The great wooden cross towers up to a
remarkable height so that the figure of our Lord is almost lost among the
overhanging trees, and down below a double flight of mossy stone steps
leads up to the little walled-in space where the wayfarer may kneel in
prayer at the foot of the cross.Onward from this point, the dust and heat
of the roadway can become excessive, so that when at last the shade of the
forest is reached, its cool glades of slender beech-trees entice you from
the glaring sunshine--for towards the middle of the day the roadway
receives no suggestion of shadows from the trees on either side.In this part of the country, it is a common sight to meet the peasant women
riding their black donkeys with the milk cans resting in panniers on either
side.The cans are of brass with spherical bodies and small necks, and are
kept brilliantly burnished.The forest left behind, an extensive pottery district is passed through.The tuilleries may be seen by the roadside in nearly all the villages,
Naron being entirely given up to this manufacture.Daniel journeyed to the bedroom.Great embankments of
dark brown jars show above the hedges, and the furnaces in which the
earthenware is baked, are almost as frequent as the cottages.There are
some particularly quaint, but absolutely simple patterns of narrow necked
jugs that appear for sale in some of the shops at Bayeux and Caen.Soon the famous Norman cathedral with its three lofty spires appears
straight ahead.In a few minutes the narrow streets of this historic city
are entered.The place has altogether a different aspect to the busy and
cheerful St Lo.The ground is almost level, it is difficult to find any
really striking views |
bedroom | Where is Daniel? | Perhaps it is because of the evil influence of Caen, but
certainly Bayeux lacks the cleanliness and absence of smells that
distinguishes Coutances and Avranches from some of the other Norman towns.It is, however, rich in carved fronts and timber-framed houses, and
probably is the nearest rival to Lisieux in these features.The visitor is
inclined to imagine that he will find the tapestry for which he makes a
point of including Bayeux in his tour, at the cathedral or some building
adjoining it, but this is not the case.It is necessary to traverse two or
three small streets to a tree-grown public square where behind a great
wooden gateway is situated the museum.As a home for such a priceless relic
as this great piece of needlework, the museum seems scarcely adequate.It
has a somewhat dusty and forlorn appearance, and although the tapestry is
well set out in a long series of glazed wooden cases, one feels that the
risks of fire and other mischances are greater here than they would be were
the tapestry kept in a more modern and more fire-proof home.Queen Mathilda
or whoever may have been either the actual producer or the inspirer of the
tapestry must have used brilliant colours upon this great length of linen.John went back to the hallway.During the nine centuries that have passed since the work was completed the
linen has assumed the colour of light brown canvas, but despite this, the
greens, blues, reds, and buffs of the stitches show out plainly against the
unworked background.There is scarcely an English History without a
reproduction of one of the scenes portrayed in the long series of pictures,
and London has in the South Kensington Museum a most carefully produced
copy of the original.Even the chapter-house of Westminster Abbey has its
reproductions of the tapestry, so that it is seldom that any one
goes to Bayeux without some knowledge of the historic events portrayed in
the needlework.There are fifty-eight separate scenes on the 230 feet of
linen.They commence with Harold's instructions from Edward the Confessor
to convey to William the Norman the fact that he (Harold) is to become king
of England.Then follows the whole story leading up to the flight of the
English at Senlac Hill.Even if this wonderful piece of work finds a more secure resting-place in
Paris, Bayeux will still attract many pilgrims for its cathedral and its
domestic architecture compare favourably with many other Norman towns.The misfortunes that attended the early years of the life of the cathedral
were so numerous and consistent that the existence of the great structure
to-day is almost a matter for surprise.It seems that the first church made
its appearance during the eleventh century, and it was in it that Harold
unwittingly took that sacred oath on the holy relics, but by some accident
the church was destroyed by fire and there is probably nothing left of this
earliest building except the crypt.Eleven years after the conquest of
England, William was present at Bayeux when a new building built by his
half-brother Odo, Bishop of Bayeux, was consecrated.Ten years after his
death, however, this second church was burnt down.They rebuilt it once
more a few years later, but a third time a fire wrought much destruction.The portions of the cathedral that survived this century of conflagrations
can be seen in the two great western towers, in the arches of the Norman
nave, and a few other portions.The rest of the buildings are in the Early
French period of pointed architecture, with the exception of the central
tower which is partly of the flamboyant period, but the upper portion is as
modern as the middle of last century.The spandrels of the nave arcades are
covered over with a diaper work of half a dozen or more different patterns,
some of them scaly, some representing interwoven basket-work, while others
are composed simply of a series of circles, joined together with lines.There are curious little panels in each of these spandrels that are carved
with the most quaint and curious devices.Some are strange, Chinese-looking
dragons, and some show odd-looking figures or mitred saints.The panel
showing Harold taking the oath is modern.There is a most imposing pulpit
surmounted by a canopy where a female figure seated on a globe is
surrounded by cherubs, clouds (or are they rocks?)At a shrine dedicated to John the Baptist, the altar bears a painting in
the centre showing the saint's dripping head resting in the charger.Quite
close to the west front of the cathedral there stands a house that still
bears its very tall chimney dating from mediaeval times.Not far from this
there is one of the timber-framed fifteenth century houses ornamented with
curious carvings of small figures, and down in the Rue St Malo there is an
even richer example of the same type of building.On the other side of the
road, nearer the cathedral, a corner house stands out conspicuously.[Illustration: AN ANCIENT HOUSE IN THE RUE ST MALO, BAYEUX]
It is shown in the illustration given here and its curious detail makes it
one of the most quaint of all the ancient houses in the city.Some of these old buildings date from the year 1450, when Normandy was
swept clear of the English, and it is probably owing to the consideration
of the leader of the French army that there are any survivals of this time.The Lord of Montenay was leading the Duke of Alencon's troops and with him
were Pierre de Louvain, Robert Conigrain and a number of free archers.After they had battered the walls of Bayeux with their cannon for fifteen
days, and after they had done much work with mines and trenches, the French
were ready for an assault.The King of France, however, and the notables
who have been mentioned "had pity for the destruction of the city and would
not consent to the assault."Without their orders, however, the troops,
whose ardour could not be restrained, attacked in one place, but not having
had the advice of their leaders the onslaught was quite indecisive, both
sides suffering equally from arrows and culverins.It was soon after this
that Matthew Gough, the English leader, was obliged to surrender the city,
and we are told that nine hundred of the bravest and the best soldiers of
the Duchy of Normandy came out and were allowed to march to Cherbourg.The
French lords "for the honour of courtesy" lent some of their horses to
carry the ladies and the other gentlewomen, and they also supplied carts to
convey the ordinary womenfolk who went with their husbands."It was," says
Jacques le Bouvier, who describes the scene, "a thing pitiful to behold.Some carried the smallest of the children in their arms, and some were led
by hand, and in this way the English lost possession of Bayeux."[Illustration: THE GATEWAY OF THE CHATEAU]
CHAPTER X
Concerning Caen and the Coast Towards Trouville
Caen, like mediaeval London, is famed for its bells and its smells.If you
climb up to any height in the town you will see at once that the place is
crowded with the spires and towers of churches; and, if you explore any of
the streets, you are sure to discover how rudimentary are the notions of
sanitation in the historic old city.If you come to Caen determined to
thoroughly examine all the churches, you must allow at least two or three
days for this purpose, for although you might endeavour to "do" the place
in one single day, you would remember nothing but the fatigue, and the
features of all the churches would become completely confused.My first visit to Caen, several years ago, is associated with a day of
sight-seeing commenced at a very early hour.I had been deposited at one of
the quays by the steamer that had started at sunrise and had slowly glided
along the ten miles of canal from Ouistreham, reaching its destination at
about five o'clock.The town seemed thoroughly awake at this time, the
weather being brilliantly fine.White-capped women were everywhere to be
seen sweeping the cobbled streets with their peculiarly fragile-looking
brooms.It was so early by the actual time, however, that it seemed wise to
go straight to the hotel and to postpone the commencement of sight-seeing
until a more rational hour.My rooms at the hotel, however, were not yet
vacated, so that it was impossible to go to my bedroom till eight o'clock.The hotel courtyard, though picturesque, with its three superimposed
galleries and its cylindrical tower containing the staircase, was not, at
this hour in the morning at least, a place to linger in.It seemed
therefore the wisest plan to begin an exploration of some of the adjoining
streets to fill the time.Both sides ceased from
diplomatic communications, and in February 1793 France issued her
Declaration of War.From that moment Pitt's power was at an end.His pride, his immoveable
firmness, and the general confidence of the nation, still kept him at
the head of affairs; but he could do little save drift along with a tide
of popular feeling which he never fully understood.Around him the
country broke out in a fit of passion and panic which rivalled the
passion and panic over sea.The confidence of France in its illusions
as to opinion in England deluded for the moment even Englishmen
themselves.Daniel journeyed to the bedroom.The partisans of Republicanism were in reality but a few
handfuls of men who played at gathering Conventions, and at calling
themselves citizens and patriots, in childish imitation of what was
going on across the Channel.But in the mass of Englishmen the dread of
these revolutionists passed for the hour into sheer panic.Even the bulk
of the Whig party believed property and the constitution to be in peril,
and forsook Fox when he still proclaimed his faith in France and the
Revolution.The "Old Whigs," as they called themselves, with the Duke of
Portland, Earls Spencer and Fitzwilliam, and Mr.Windham at their head,
followed Burke in giving their adhesion to the Government.Pitt himself,
though little touched by the political reaction which was to constitute
the creed of those who represented themselves as "Pittites," was shaken
by the dream of social danger, which was turning the wisest heads about
him.For a moment at least his cool good sense bent to believe in the
existence of "thousands of bandits" who were ready to rise against the
throne, to plunder every landlord, and to sack London."Paine is no
fool," he said to his niece, who quoted to him a passage from the
_Rights of Man_, in which that author had vindicated the principles of
the Revolution."He is perhaps right; but if I did what he wants I
should have thousands of bandits on my hands to-morrow and London
burnt."It was this sense of social danger which alone reconciled him to
the war.It would have been impossible indeed for Pitt, or for any other
English statesman, to have stood idly by while France annexed the
Netherlands and marched to annex Holland.He must in any case have
fought even had France not forced him to fight by her declaration of
war.But bitter as the need of such a struggle was to him, he accepted
it with the less reluctance that war, as he trusted, would check the
progress of "French principles" in England itself.The worst issue of this panic was the series of legislative measures in
which it found expression.The Habeas Corpus Act was suspended, a bill
against seditious assemblies restricted the liberty of public meeting,
and a wider scope was given to the Statute of Treasons.Prosecution
after prosecution was directed against the Press; the sermons of some
dissenting ministers were indicted as seditious; and the conventions of
sympathizers with France were roughly broken up.The worst excesses of
this panic were witnessed in Scotland, where young Whigs, whose only
offence was an advocacy of parliamentary reform, were sentenced to
transportation, and where a brutal Judge openly expressed his regret
that the practice of torture in seditious cases should have fallen into
disuse.But the panic soon passed away for sheer want of material to
feed on.The bloodshed and anarchy of the Jacobin rule disgusted the
last sympathizers with France.To staunch Whigs like Romilly, the
French, after the massacres of October, seemed a mere "nation of
tigers."Sandra went back to the bedroom.The good sense of the nation discovered the unreality of the
dangers which had driven it to its short-lived frenzy; and when the
leaders of the Corresponding Society, a body which expressed sympathy
with France, were brought to trial in 1794 on a charge of high treason,
their acquittal told that all active terror was over.So far indeed was
the nation from any danger of social overthrow that, save for occasional
riots to which the poor were goaded by sheer want of bread, no social
disturbance troubled England during the twenty years of struggle which
lay before it.But though the public terror passed, it left a terrible
legacy behind.The blind reaction against all reform which had sprung
from the panic lasted on when the panic was forgotten.For nearly a
quarter of a century it was hard to get a hearing for any measure which
threatened change to an existing institution, beneficial though the
change might be.Even the philanthropic movement which so nobly
characterized the time found itself checked and hampered by the dread of
revolution.Easy however as Pitt found it to deal with "French principles" at home,
he found it less easy to deal with French armies abroad.The very
excellences of his character indeed unfitted him for the conduct of a
war.He was at heart a Peace Minister; he was forced into war by a panic
and enthusiasm which he shared in a very small degree; and he was
utterly destitute of his father's gift of entering instinctively into
the sympathies and passions around him, and of rousing passions and
sympathies in return.At first indeed all seemed to go ill for France.When the campaign of 1793 opened she was girt in along her whole
frontier by a ring of foes.The forces of the House of Austria, of the
Empire, and of the King of Prussia, pressed her to the north and the
east; those of Spain and Sardinia attacked her in the south; and the
accession of England to this league threatened to close the sea against
her.The efforts of these foreign foes were seconded too by civil war.The peasants of Poitou and Brittany, estranged from the revolution by
its attack on the clergy, rose in revolt against the government at
Paris; while Marseilles and Lyons were driven into insurrection by the
violent leaders who now seized on power in the capital.The campaign
opened therefore with a series of terrible reverses.In spite of the
efforts of General Dumouriez the French were foiled in their attack on
Holland and driven, after a disastrous defeat at Neerwinden, from the
Netherlands.At the moment when the Duke of York with ten thousand
English troops joined the Austrian army on the northern border of
France, a march upon Paris would have crushed the revolution.At this moment indeed the two German powers were far
from wishing honestly for the suppression of the Republic and the
re-establishment of a strong monarchy in France.Such a restoration
would have foiled their projects of aggrandizement in Eastern Europe.The strife on the Rhine had set Russia free, as Pitt had foreseen, to
carry out her schemes of aggression; and Austria and Prussia saw
themselves forced, in the interest of a balance of power, to share in
her annexations at the cost of Poland.But this new division of Poland
would have become impossible had France been enabled by a restoration of
its monarchy to take up again its natural position in Europe, and to
accept the alliance which Pitt would in such a case have offered her.Sandra moved to the bathroom.The policy of the German courts therefore was to prolong an anarchy
which left them free for the moment to crush Poland, and which they
counted on crushing in its turn at a more convenient time; and the
allied armies which might have marched upon Paris were purposely
frittered away in sieges in the Netherlands and the Rhine.[Sidenote: The revival of France.]Such a policy gave France all that she needed to recover from the shock
of her past disasters: it gave her time.Whatever were the crimes and
tyranny of her leaders, the country felt in spite of them the value of
the Revolution, and rallied enthusiastically to its support.The
strength of the revolt in La Vendee was broken.The insurrection in the
south was drowned in blood.The Spanish invaders were held at bay at the
foot of the Pyrenees, and the Piedmontese were driven from Nice and
Savoy.At the close of the year a fresh blow fell |
garden | Where is John? | The town called for foreign aid against the government at Paris;
and Lord Hood entered the port with an English squadron, while a force
of 11,000 men, gathered hastily from every quarter, was despatched under
General O'Hara as a garrison.But the successes against Spain and Savoy
freed the hands of France at this critical moment: the town was at once
invested, and the seizure of a promontory which commanded the harbour, a
step counselled by a young artillery officer, Napoleon Buonaparte,
brought about the withdrawal of the garrison and the surrender of
Toulon.The success was a prelude of what was to come.At the opening of
1794 a victory at Fleurus, which again made the French masters of the
Netherlands, showed that the tide had turned.France was united within
by the cessation of the Terror and of the tyranny of the Jacobins, while
on every border victory followed the gigantic efforts with which she
met the coalition against her.Prussia, more intent on her gains in the east
than on any battle with the revolution on the west, prepared to follow
Spain's example by the withdrawal of her armies from the Rhine.It was
only by English subsidies that Austria and Sardinia were still kept in
the field; and the Rhine provinces were wrested from the first, while
the forces of Sardinia were driven back from the Riviera and the
Maritime Alps into the plain of Piedmont.Pichegru crossed the Waal in midwinter with an overwhelming
force, and the wretched remnant of ten thousand men who had followed the
Duke of York to the Netherlands, thinned by disease and by the hardships
of retreat, re-embarked for England.In one quarter only had the fortune of war gone against the French
republic.The victories of Rodney at the close of the strife with
America had concentrated English interest on the fleet.Even during the
peace, while the army was sacrificed to financial distress, great
efforts were made to preserve the efficiency of the navy; and the recent
alarms of war with Russia and Spain had ended in raising it to a
strength which it had never reached before.But France was as eager as
England herself to dispute the sovereignty of the seas, and almost
equal attention had been bestowed on the navy which crowded the great
harbours of Toulon and Brest.In force as in number of ships it was
equal in effective strength to that of England; and both nations looked
with hope to the issue of a contest at sea.No battle marked the first
year of the war; but, as it ended, the revolt of Toulon gave a fatal
wound to the naval strength of France in the almost total destruction of
her Mediterranean fleet.That of the Channel however remained unhurt;
and it was this which Lord Howe at last encountered, off Brest in 1794,
in the battle which is known by the name of the day on which it was
fought--The "First of June."The number of ships on either side was
nearly the same, and the battle was one of sheer hard fighting, unmarked
by any display of naval skill.But the result was a decisive victory for
England, and the French admiral, weakened by a loss of seven vessels and
three thousand men, again took refuge in Brest.[Sidenote: Break-up of the Coalition.]The success of Lord Howe did somewhat to counteract the discouragement
which sprang from the general aspect of the war.At the opening of 1795
the coalition finally gave way.Holland had been detached from it by
Pichegru's conquest, and the Batavian republic which he set up there was
now an ally of France.In the spring Prussia bought peace at Basle by
the cession of her possessions west of the Rhine.Peace with Spain
followed in the summer, while Sweden and the Protestant cantons of
Switzerland recognized the republic.These terrible blows were hardly
met by the success of the Austrian army in relieving Maintz, or by the
colonial acquisitions of England.The latter indeed were far from being
inconsiderable.Most of the West-Indian Islands which had been held by
France now fell into British hands; and the alliance of Holland with the
French threw open to English attack the far more valuable settlements of
the Dutch.The surrender of Cape Town in September gave England the
colony of the Cape of Good Hope, the nucleus of what has since grown
into a vast southern settlement which is destined to play a great part
in the history of Africa.At the close of the year the Island of Ceylon
was added to our Indian dependencies.Both of these acquisitions were
destined to remain permanently attached to England, though at the moment
their value was eclipsed by the conquest of the Dutch colonies in the
Pacific, the more famous Spice Islands of the Malaccas and Java.But,
important as these gains were in their after issues, they had no
immediate influence on the war.The French armies prepared for the
invasion of Italy; while in France itself discord came well-nigh to an
end.A descent by a force of French emigrants on the coast of Brittany
ended in their massacre at Quiberon and in the final cessation of the
war in La Vendee; while the royalist party in Paris was crushed as soon
as it rose against the Convention by the genius of Napoleon Buonaparte.[Sidenote: Pitt's effort for peace.]But the fresh severities against the ultra-republicans which followed on
the establishment of a Directory after this success indicated the
moderate character of the new government, and Pitt seized on this change
in the temper of the French Government as giving an opening for peace.The dread of a Jacobin propagandism was now all but at an end.In spite
of an outbreak of the London mob, whose cries meant chiefly impatience
of dear bread, but which brought about a fresh suspension of the Habeas
Corpus Act and the introduction of a Bill "for the prosecution of
seditious meetings," the fear of any social disturbance or of the spread
of "French principles" in England was fast passing away from men's
minds.The new constitution which France accepted in 1795 showed that
the tendencies of the French themselves were now rather to order than to
freedom.The old grounds for the struggle therefore had ceased to exist;
while the pressure of it grew hourly more intolerable.Pitt himself was
sick of the strife.The war indeed had hardly begun when he found
himself without the means of carrying it on.The English navy was in a
high state of efficiency; but the financial distress which followed the
American war had brought with it a neglect of the army.John went back to the hallway.The army was not
only small, but without proper equipment; and the want of military
experience among its soldiers was only equalled by the incapacity of
their leaders."We have no general," Lord Grenville wrote bitterly, "but
some old woman in a red riband."Wretched, too, as had been the conduct
of the war, its cost was already terrible; for if England was without
soldiers she had wealth, and in default of nobler means of combating the
revolution Pitt had been forced to use wealth as an engine of war.He
became the paymaster of the coalition, and his subsidies kept the allied
armies in the field.But the immense loans which these called for, and
the quick growth of expenditure, undid all the financial reforms on
which the young minister prided himself.Daniel journeyed to the bedroom.Taxation, which had reached its
lowest point at the outbreak of the contest, mounted ere a few years
were past to a height undreamed of before.The debt rose by leaps and
bounds.In three years nearly eighty millions had been added to it, a
sum greater than that piled up by the whole war with America, and in the
opening of 1796 votes were taken for loans which amounted to twenty-five
millions more.[Sidenote: The dogged temper of England.]Nor was this wreck of his financial hopes Pitt's only ground for
desiring a close of the war.From the first, as we have seen, he had
been keenly sensitive to the European dangers which the contest
involved; nor had he shown, even in his moment of social panic, the
fanatical blindness of men like Burke to the evils which had produced
the revolution, or to the good which it had wrought.But he could only
listen in silence while the Marquis of Lansdowne, the Lord Shelburne of
earlier days and the successor of Chatham as the advocate of a more
liberal policy, met the rhetoric of Burke by a cool demonstration of the
benefit which the recent change had brought to the mass of the French
people, and by pointing to the profit which Russia was drawing from the
struggle in the west.In their wide-reaching view of European affairs,
in their justice to the revolution, Shelburne and Pitt stood alone.Around them men were hardened and blinded by passion.The old hatred
between nation and nation, which Pitt had branded as irrational, woke up
fiercer than ever at the clash of arms, for with it was blended a
resentment that had smouldered in English breasts ever since the war
with America at the blow which France had dealt England in that hour of
her weakness, and a disgust which only slowly grew fainter at her
overthrow of every social and political institution that Englishmen held
dear.On the dogged temper of the nation at large the failure of the
coalition produced little effect.It had no fear of fighting France
single-handed, nor could it understand Pitt's suggestion that a time
had come for opening negotiations with a view to peace.Public opinion
indeed went hotly with Burke in his denunciation of all purpose of
relaxing England's hostility against the revolution, a denunciation
which was embodied in his "Letters on a Regicide Peace," the last outcry
of that fanaticism which had done so much to plunge the world in blood.Sandra went back to the bedroom.But though Pitt stood all but alone, he was firm in his purpose to bring
the war, if he could, to a close.What specially moved him was not the
danger on the Continent, whether that danger sprang from French
victories or from aggression in the east.Vain as the expectations of the French revolutionists had proved in the
case of England, they had better ground for their hopes elsewhere.Even
before the outbreak of the war Pitt had shown how keen was his sense of
a possible danger from Ireland.In that wretched country the terrible
fruits of a century of oppression and wrong were still to reap.From the
close of the American war, when her armed Volunteers had wrung
legislative independence from the Rockingham ministry, Ireland had
continued to be England's difficulty.She was now "independent"; but her
independence was a mere name for the uncontrolled rule of a few noble
families.The victory of the Volunteers had been won simply to the
profit of "undertakers," who returned a majority of members in the
Irish House of Commons, while they themselves formed the Irish House of
Lords.The suspension of any effective control or interference from
England left Ireland at these men's mercy, and they soon showed that
they meant to keep it for themselves.When the Catholics claimed
admission to the franchise or to equal civil rights as a reward for
their aid in the late struggle, their claim was rejected.A similar
demand of the Presbyterians, who had formed a good half of the
Volunteers, for the removal of their disabilities was equally set aside.Even Grattan, when he pleaded for a reform which would make the
Parliament at least a fair representative of the Protestant Englishry,
utterly failed.The ruling class found government too profitable to
share it with other possessors.It was only by hard bribery that the
English viceroys could secure their co-operation in the simplest
measures of administration."If ever there was a country unfit to govern
itself," said Lord Hutchinson, "it is Ireland.Sandra moved to the bathroom.A corrupt aristocracy, a
ferocious commonalty, a distracted Government, a divided people!"[Sidenote: Irish Emancipation.]The real character of this Parliamentary rule was seen in the rejection
of Pitt's offer of free trade.In Pitt's eyes the danger of Ireland lay
above all in the misery of its people.Although the Irish Catholics were
held down by the brute force of their Protestant rulers, he saw that
their discontent was growing fast into rebellion, and that one secret
at any rate of their discontent lay in Irish poverty, a poverty
increased if not originally brought about by the jealous exclusion of
Irish products from their natural markets in England itself.One of his
first commercial measures therefore, as we have seen, aimed at putting
an end to this exclusion by a bill which established freedom of trade
between the two islands.But though he met successfully the fears and
jealousies of the English farmers and manufacturers he was foiled by the
factious ignorance of the Irish landowners, and his bill was rejected by
the Irish Parliament.So utterly was he discouraged that for the moment
he ceased from all further attempts to improve the condition of Ireland.But the efforts which the French revolutionists made to excite rebellion
amongst the Irish roused him to fresh measures of conciliation and good
government.John went to the office.The hopes of some reform of the Irish Parliament had been
fanned by the eloquence of Grattan and by the pressure of the United
Irishmen, an association which had sprung up in Ulster, where Protestant
dissenters, who were equally excluded with Catholics from any share in
political power, formed the strongest part of the population.These
hopes however were growing every day fainter.To the Irish aristocracy
parliamentary reform meant the close of a corrupt rule which had gone on
unchecked since the American war.But to the Irish Catholic it meant
far more; it meant his admission, not only to the electoral franchise,
but in the end to all the common privileges of citizenship from which he
was excluded, his "emancipation," to use the word which now became
common, from the yoke of slavery which had pressed on him ever since the
Battle of the Boyne.[Sidenote: The United Irishmen.]To such an emancipation Pitt was already looking forward.In 1792, a
year before the outbreak of war with France, he forced on the Irish
Parliament measures for the admission of Catholics to the electoral
franchise and to civil and military office within the island, which
promised a new era of religious liberty.The hope of conciliation was lost in the fast rising tide of religious
and social passion.John travelled to the garden.As the dream of obtaining Parliamentary reform died
away the United Irishmen of the North drifted into projects of
insurrection and a correspondence with France.The news of the French
Revolution fell with a yet more terrible effect on the Catholic
peasantry, brooding over their misery and their wrongs.Their discontent
broke out in social disorder, in the outrages of secret societies of
"Defenders" and "Peep o' Day Boys," which spread panic among the ruling
classes.It was only by sheer terror and bloodshed that the Protestant
landowners, who banded together in "Orange" societies to meet the secret
societies about them, could hold the country down.Outrages on the one
side, tyranny on the other, deepened the disorder and panic every day,
and the hopes of the reformers grew fainter as the terror rose fast
around them.The maddened Protestants scouted all notions of further
concessions to men whom they looked upon as on the verge of revolt; and
Grattan's motions for reform were defeated by increasing majorities.On
the other hand the entry of the anti-revolutionary Whigs into Pitt's
ministry revived Grattan's hopes, for Burke and his followers were
pledged to a liberal policy towards Ireland, and Lord Fitzwilliam, who
came over as viceroy in 1794, encouraged Grattan to bring in a bill for
the entire emancipation of the Catholics at the opening of the next
year.Such a step can hardly have been taken without Pitt's assent; but
the minister was now swept along by a tide of feeling which he could not
control.The Orangemen threatened revolt, the Tories in Pitt's own
Cabinet recoiled from the notion of reform, and Lord Fitzwilliam was not
only recalled, but replaced by Lord Camden, an avowed enemy of all
change or concession to the Catholics.From that moment the United
Irishmen became a revolutionary society; and one of their leaders, Wolfe
Tone, made his way to France, in the spring of 1796, to seek aid in a
national rising.It is probable that Tone's errand was known to Pitt; it is certain that
Lord Edward Fitzgerald, another of the patriot leaders, who had been
summoned to carry on more definite negotiations in Basle, revealed
inadvertently as he returned the secret of his hopes to an agent of the
English Cabinet.Vague as were the offers of the United Irishmen, they
had been warmly welcomed by the French Government.Masters at home, the
Directory were anxious to draw off the revolutionary enthusiasm which
the French party of order dreaded as much as Burke himself to the
ch |
bathroom | Where is Sandra? | They were already planning that descent of
their army in the Alps upon Lombardy which was to give a fatal blow to
one of their enemies, Austria; and they welcomed the notion of a French
descent upon Ireland and an Irish revolt, which would give as fatal a
blow to their other enemy, England.An army of 25,000 men under General
Hoche was promised, a fleet was manned, and preparations were being made
for the expedition during the summer.But the secret was ill kept, and
the news of such an attempt was, we can hardly doubt, the ground of the
obstinacy with which Pitt persisted in the teeth of the national feeling
and of Burke's invectives in clinging to his purpose of concluding a
peace.In October 1796 Lord Malmesbury was despatched to Paris and
negotiations were finally opened for that purpose.The terms which Pitt
offered were terms of mutual restitution.France was to evacuate
Holland and to restore Belgium to the Emperor.John went back to the hallway.England on the other hand
was to restore the colonies she had won to France, Holland, and Spain.As the English Minister had no power of dealing with the territories
already ceded by Prussia and other states, such a treaty would have left
France, as her eastern border, the line of the Rhine.But even had they
desired peace at all, the Directors would have scorned it on terms such
as these.While Malmesbury was negotiating indeed France was roused to
new dreams of conquest by the victories of Napoleon Buonaparte.The
genius of Carnot, the French Minister of War, had planned a joint
advance upon Vienna by the French armies of Italy and the Rhine, the one
under Buonaparte, the other under Moreau.Moreau, though he pushed forward through every obstacle to
Bavaria, was compelled to fall back by the defeat of a lieutenant; and
was only enabled by a masterly retreat through the Black Forest to reach
the Rhine.But the disaster of Moreau was more than redeemed by the
victories of Buonaparte.With the army which occupied the Riviera and
the Maritime Alps the young general marched on Piedmont at the opening
of the summer, separated its army from the Austrian troops, and forced
the king of Sardinia to conclude a humiliating peace.A brilliant
victory at the bridge of Lodi brought him to Milan, and drove the
Austrians into the Tyrol.Lombardy was in the hands of the French, the
Duchies south of the Po pillaged, and the Pope driven to purchase an
armistice at enormous cost, before the Austrian armies, raised to a
force of 50,000 men, again descended from the Tyrol for the relief of
Mantua.But a fatal division of their forces by the Lake of Garda
enabled Buonaparte to hurl them back broken upon Trent, and to shut up
their general, Wurmser, in Mantua with the remnant of his men; while
fresh victories at the bridge of Arcola and at Bassano drove back two
new Austrian armies who advanced to Wurmser's rescue.Daniel journeyed to the bedroom.[Sidenote: The Terror of Ireland.]It was the success of Buonaparte which told on the resolve of the
Directory to reject all terms of peace.Sandra went back to the bedroom.After months of dilatory
negotiations the offers of Lord Malmesbury were definitely declined, and
the English envoy returned home at the end of the year.Every hour of
his stay in Paris had raised higher hopes of success against England in
the minds of the Directory.At the moment of his arrival Spain had been
driven to declare war as their ally against Britain; and the Spanish and
Dutch fleets were now at the French service for a struggle at sea.The
merciless exactions of Buonaparte poured gold into the exhausted
treasury; and the energy of Hoche rapidly availed itself of this supply
to equip a force for operations in Ireland.At the opening of December
he was ready to put to sea with a fleet of more than forty sail and
25,000 men; and the return of Lord Malmesbury was the signal for the
despatch of his expedition from Brest.The fleet at Toulon, which was
intended to co-operate with that at Brest, and which had sailed through
the Straits of Gibraltar for that purpose, was driven into Port l'Orient
by an English squadron: but contrary winds baffled the fleet which was
watching Hoche, and his armament slipped away with little hindrance
towards the Irish coast.Had it reached Ireland unbroken and under such
a general, the island might well have been lost to the English Crown.But the winds fought against France, as they had fought against the
Armada of Spain; and the ships were parted from one another by a gale
which burst on them as they put to sea.Seventeen reached Bantry Bay,
but hearing nothing of their leader or of the rest, they sailed back
again to Brest, in spite of the entreaties of the soldiers to be
suffered to land.Another division reached the Shannon to be scattered
and driven home again by a second storm.Twelve vessels were wrecked or
captured, and the frigate in which Hoche had embarked returned to port
without having seen any of its companions.Sandra moved to the bathroom.The invasion had failed, but
the panic which it roused woke passions of cruelty and tyranny which
turned Ireland into a hell.Soldiers and yeomanry marched over the
country torturing and scourging the "croppies," as the Irish peasantry
were termed from their short-cut hair; robbing, ravishing, and murdering
at their will.John went to the office.The lightest suspicion, the most unfounded charges, were
taken as warrants for bloodshed.So hideous were these outrages that the
news of them as it reached England woke a thrill of horror in the minds
of even the blindest Tories; but by the landowners who formed the Irish
Parliament they were sanctioned in a Bill of Indemnity and protected for
the future by an Insurrection Act.The terror however only woke a
universal spirit of revolt.Ireland drank in greedily that hatred of
England and of English rule which all the justice and moderation of
later government has failed to destroy; and the United Irishmen looked
with more passionate longing than ever to France.[Sidenote: The struggle for the Sea.]Nor had France abandoned the design of invasion; while her victories
made such a design every day more formidable.The war was going steadily
in her favour.A fresh victory at Rivoli, the surrender of Mantua, and
an advance through Styria on Vienna, enabled Buonaparte to wring a peace
from England's one ally, Austria.The armistice was concluded in April
1797, and the final treaty which was signed at Campo Formio in October
not only gave France the Ionian Islands, a part of the old territory of
Venice (whose Italian possessions passed to the Emperor), as well as the
Netherlands and the whole left bank of the Rhine, but united Lombardy
with the Duchies south of the Po and the Papal States as far as the
Rubicon into a "Cisalpine Republic," which was absolutely beneath her
control.The withdrawal of Austria left France without an enemy on the
Continent, and England without an ally.The stress of the war was
pressing more heavily on her every day.A mutiny in the fleet was
suppressed with difficulty.The news of Hoche's expedition brought about
a run for gold which forced on the Bank a suspension of specie payments.It was in this darkest hour of the struggle that Burke passed away,
protesting to the last against the peace which, in spite of his previous
failure, Pitt was again striving to bring about by fresh negotiations at
Lille.Peace seemed more needful than ever to him now that France was
free to attack her enemy with the soldiers who had fought at Arcola and
Rivoli.Their way, indeed, lay across the sea, and at sea Britain was
supreme.But her supremacy was threatened by a coalition of naval forces
such as had all but crushed her in the American war.Again the Dutch and
Spanish fleets were allied with the fleets of France; and it was
necessary to watch Cadiz and the Scheldt as well as Brest and Toulon.A
single victory of the three confederates, or even such a command of the
Channel as they had held for months during the war with America, would
enable the Directory to throw overwhelming armies not only on the shores
of England, but on the shores of Ireland, and whatever might be the
fate of the one enterprise, there could be little doubt of the success
of the other.The danger was real; but it had hardly threatened England
when it was dispelled by two great victories.The Spanish fleet, which
put out to sea with twenty-seven sail of the line, was met on the
fourteenth of February 1797 by Admiral Jervis off Cape St.Vincent with
a force of but fifteen; and driven back to Cadiz with a loss of four of
its finest vessels.Disheartened as they were, however, their numbers
still exceeded that of the force which blockaded them; and France
counted with confidence on the fleet of Holland, which was ordered to
join its own fleet at Brest.The aim of this union was to protect a
fresh force in its descent upon Ireland, where the United Irishmen now
declared themselves ready for revolt.But a yet sterner fortune awaited
the Dutch than that which had fallen on the Spaniards.Their admiral, De
Winter, who had quitted the Texel during a storm with eleven sail of the
line and four frigates, fell in on the eleventh of October with a far
larger fleet under Admiral Duncan off Camperdown.The Hollanders fought
with a stubborn courage worthy of their old renown, and it was only when
their ships were riddled with shot into mere wrecks that they fell into
the hands of the English.The French project for an expedition to Ireland hung on the junction of
the Dutch fleet with that of Brest, and the command of the Channel
which this junction would have given them.Such a command became
impossible after the defeat of Camperdown.But the disappointment of
their hopes of foreign aid only drove the adherents of revolt in Ireland
to a rising of despair.The union of the national party, which had
lasted to some extent from the American war, was now broken up.The
Protestants of Ulster still looked for aid to France.The Catholics, on
the other hand, were alienated from the French by their attack on
religion and the priesthood; and the failure of the French expedition,
while it damped the hopes of the Ulstermen, gave force to the demands of
the Catholic party for a purely national rising.So fierce was this
demand that the leaders of the United Irishmen were forced to fix on the
spring of 1798 for the outbreak of an insurrection, in which Lord Edward
Fitzgerald, who had some small military experience, was to take the
command.But while yielding on this point to the Catholic section of
their party they conciliated the Protestants by renewed appeals for aid
to the Directory.In spite of its previous failures France again
promised help; and a division was prepared during the winter for service
in Ireland.But the passion of the nation was too intense to wait for
its arrival.The government too acted with a prompt decision in face of
the danger, and an arrest of Lord Edward Fitzgerald with three of their
chief leaders in February 1798 broke the plans of the insurgents.On the
23rd of May, however, the day fixed for the opening of the revolt, the
Catholic peasantry of the south rose in arms.Elsewhere their disorderly
gatherings were easily dispersed by the yeomanry; but Wexford
surrendered to 14,000 insurgents who marched on it, headed by a village
priest, and the town at once became the centre of a formidable revolt.Fortunately for the English rule the old religious hatred which had so
often wrecked the hopes of Ireland broke out in the instant of this
triumph.The Protestant inhabitants of Wexford were driven into the
river or flung into prison.Another body of insurgents, frenzied by the
cruelties of the royal troops, massacred a hundred Protestants in cool
blood.The atrocities of the soldiers and the yeomanry were avenged with
a fiendish ruthlessness.Loyalists were lashed and tortured in their
turn, and every soldier taken was butchered without mercy.The result of
these outrages was fatal to the insurrection.The Ulster Protestants,
who formed the strength of the United Irishmen, stood sullenly aloof
from rebels who murdered Protestants.The Catholic gentry threw
themselves on the side of the government against a rising which
threatened the country with massacre and anarchy.Few in fact had joined
the insurgents in Wexford when Lord Lake appeared before their camp
upon Vinegar Hill with a strong force of English troops on the 21st of
May."I'm that," said he, "and more.John travelled to the garden.And would you believe
it," said he, "the night I was born my mother was making a cake!"(2) He had the Old Age Pension.THE LUSMOR
The _lusmor_, or "great herb"--foxglove,
That stars the green skirt of the meadow,
is known to the peasantry by a variety of other names, as for example,
_sian sleibhe_, "sian of the hills" (it grows plentifully on the high,
rough places); _mearachan_, "fairy-thimble"; _ros greine_, "little
rose of the sun"; and _lus na mban-sidhe_, "herb of the elf-women, or
witch-doctors," etc., etc.It is bell-shaped, and has a purplish-red
colour.Joyce observes, it is a most potent herb, for it is a
great fairy plant; and those who seek the aid of the _Daoine Maithe_,
or Good People, in the cure of diseases or in incantations of any kind,
often make use of
Drowsy store,
Gathered from the bright _lusmor_,
to add to the power of their spells.It is a favourite flower in
Highland, otherwise Gaelic Scotland; and the clan Farquhar, "hither
Gaels," have assumed it for their badge.DERRY PEOPLE
Donegal is what I call "county-proud."Speaking of Derry--the marching
county--an old woman said to me the other day: "Och, there's no
gentility about the Derry people.They go at a thing like a day's
work!"A CLOCK
I was going along the road this evening when I came on a clock
(some would call it a black beetle), travelling in the direction of
Narin.The poor thing seemed to have its mind set on getting there
before dark--a matter of three miles, and half an hour to do it in!The
sense of tears in me was touched for the clock, and I stooped down
to watch it crawling laboriously along in the dust, over a very rough
road, tired and travel-stained, as if it had already come a long way;
climbing stones (miniature Errigals) twenty times as high as itself;
circumventing others, falling into ruts headlong, and rising again none
the worse for its awful experience; keeping on, on, on, "with a mind
fixed and a heart unconquered."I couldn't help laughing at first,
but after five minutes I felt a sort of strange kinship with the
clock--it was a wayfarer like myself, "a poor earth-born companion
and fellow-mortal"--and I stood watching it, hat in hand, until it
disappeared out of view.The last I saw of it was on the top of a stone
on rising ground, silhouetted against the sunset.CARRICK GLEN
Here there is quiet; quiet to think, quiet to read, quiet to listen,
quiet to do nothing but lie still in the grass and vegetate.The water
falls (to me there is no music more beautiful); a wayfarer passes now
and again along the road on his way into Carrick; the sea-savour is
in my nostrils; the clouds sail northward, white and luminous, far up
in the sky; their shadows checker the hills.If the Blue Bird is to be
found this side of heaven, surely it must be here![Illustration: A WAYFARER.]John went to the bedroom.A SHUILER
I was talking to a stonebreaker on the road between Carrick and Glen
when a shuiler passed, walking very fast."A supple lad, that," says
the stonebreaker.Mary went back to the kitchen."The top o' the road's |
bedroom | Where is Mary? | Look
at him--he's lucky far down the hill already."He dropped his hammer,
and burst into a fit of laughing."He's as many feet as a cat!"TURKEYS IN THE TREES
One of the gruesomest sights I ever saw in my life--turkeys roosting
among the branches of the trees at a house above Lochros.You would
think they were birds with evil spirits in them, they kept so quiet in
the half-darkness, and looked so solemn.A PARTY OF TINKERS
A party of tinkers on the high road--man, wife, children, ass and
cart.A poor, back-gone lot they are surely.The man trails behind
carrying one of the children in a bag over his back.The woman pushes
on in front, smiling broadly out of her fat, drunken face."Oh,
God love ye for a gentleman," she whines in an up-country _barrog_
which proclaims her a stranger to the place."Give us the lucky hand,
gentleman, and may the Golden Doors never be shut against ye.John went back to the hallway.Spare a
decent poor body a copper, and I'll say seven 'Hail Mary's' and seven
'Glory be to the Father's' for ye every night for a week.Give us the
lucky hand, gentleman."I throw her a penny, not so much out of charity
as to get rid of her, and the cavalcade moves on.Over the hill I hear
her voice raised in splendid imprecation on the husband.Daniel journeyed to the bedroom.Such
speech one only hears from peasants and strolling folk, who are in
touch with the elemental things--the wonders and beauties and cruelties
of life.TEELIN, BUNGLASS, AND SLIEVE LEAGUE
It is a lovely summer's day, warm and fragrant and sunny.We have just
come from Mass at Carrick chapel, and are following the road that leads
south by the harbour up to Teelin village.Numbers of people are on
the road with us--mostly women and girls, for the men have remained
behind to smoke and to talk over the week's happenings in the different
ends of the parish.The groups go in ages--the old women with the old
women, the marriageable girls with the marriageable girls, the younger
girls with the girls of their own age.There is a crowd of little boys,
too--active as goats, dressed in corduroys or homespuns, and discussing
in Irish what they will do with themselves in the afternoon.Some
will go bathing in the harbour, others will go up to the warren by
Loch O'Mulligan to hunt rabbits, others will remain in the village
to watch the men and bigger boys play at skittles in a cleared space
by the high road.I pick up with a quiet-eyed lad--the makings of a
priest or a scholar, by his look--and in a short time I am friends with
the crowd.If one could see me behind I must look like the Pied Piper
of Hamelin, so many children have I following alongside me and at my
heels.Sandra went back to the bedroom.Sandra moved to the bathroom.They come to know by my talk that I am interested in Irish--an
enthusiast, in fact--and they all want to tell me at once about the
Feis at Teelin, and about the great prizes that were offered, and how
one out of their own school, a little fellow of eight years, won first
prize for the best telling of a wonder-tale in the vernacular.The
quiet-eyed lad asks me would I like to see Bunglass and the great view
to be had of Slieve League from the cliff-head.I tell him that I am
going there, and in an instant the crowd is running out in front of us,
shouting and throwing their caps in the air--delighted, I suppose,
at the prospect of a scramble for coppers on the grass when we get
to the end of our journey.For boys are boys the world over, let the
propagandists carp as they will!and when I was young myself I would
wrestle a ghost under a bed for a halfpenny--so my grandmother used to
tell me, and she was a very wise and observant woman.We have come to
Teelin village--a clean, whitewashed little place on a hill, built "all
to one side like Clogher"--and from there we strike up to the right by
a sort of rocky, grass-covered loaning which leads to the cliffs.We
pass numbers of houses on the way, each with a group of gaily-dressed
peasants sunning themselves at the door.The ascent is gradual at
first, but as we go on it gets steeper, and after a while's climbing
we begin to feel the sense of elevation and detachment.The air is
delightfully warm, and the fragrance of sea and bracken and ling is in
our hearts.In time we reach Carrigan Head, with its martello tower,
seven hundred feet odd over the Atlantic.Southwards the blue waters of
Donegal Bay spread themselves, with just the slightest ripple on their
surface, glinting in the warm sunlight.John went to the office.In the distance the heights of
Nephin Beag and Croagh Patrick in Mayo are faintly discernible, and
westwards the illimitable ocean stretches to the void.From Carrigan
Head we follow a rough mountain trail, and in a short time reach
Loch O'Mulligan, a lonely freshwater tarn, lying under the shadow of
Slieve League.Back of the loch a grassy hill rises.We climb this,
the younger boys leading about fifty yards in front, jumping along the
short grass and over the stones like goats.Arrived at a point called
in Irish _Amharc Mor_, or "Great View," a scene of extraordinary
beauty bursts on us.We are standing on Scregeighter, the highest of
the cliffs of Bunglass.A thousand and twenty-four feet below us, in a
sheer drop, the blue waters of Bunglass advance and recede--blue as a
sapphire, shading into emerald and white where they break on the spit
of grass-covered rock rising like a _sceilg-draoidheachta_, or "horn of
wizardy," out of the narrow bay.Right opposite us is Slieve League,
its carn a thousand feet higher than the point on which we stand.In
the precipitous rock-face, half-way up, is a scarped streak called
_Nead an Iolair_, or the Eagle's Nest.The colouring is wonderfully
rich and varied--black, grey, violet, brown, red, green--due, one
would think, to the complex stratification and to the stains oozing
from the soft ores, clays, and mosses impinging between the layers.We
step back from the cliff-edge, and sit down on a flat slab of stone,
the better to enjoy the view, and the boys spread themselves out in
various attitudes over the short grass before and behind us.They
are conversing among themselves in Irish, speaking very rapidly, and
with an intonation that is as un-English as it can possibly be.The
thickened l's and thrilled r's are especially noticeable.To hear these
children speak Irish the way they do makes one feel that the language
of Niall Naoi Giallach is not dead yet, and has, indeed, no signs of
dying.One could spend a day in this place sunning oneself on the cliff-head,
or loafing about on the grass, enjoying the panorama of mountain and
sea and sky spread in such magnificence on all sides.But we have
promised to be back in Carrick for lunch, and already the best part
of the forenoon is gone."_Cad a-chlog e anois?_" I ask one of the
boys.He looks into the sky, calculates for a while, and answers: "_Ta
se suas le h-aon anois.(It is upwards of one
o'clock now.In a remote, open country like this the
children are wonderfully astute, and well up in the science of natural
things.Coming up the hill I had noticed a number of strange birds, and
when I asked the crowd the names of them in Irish they told me without
once having to stop to think.We are ready to go now, but before
setting out we decide on having a scramble.My friend, R. M., takes
a sixpence from his pocket, puts it edge down on the turf, and digs it
in with his heel, covering it up so that no sign of it is visible.He
then brings the boys back over the grass about a hundred yards,
handicapping them according to age and size.One boy, the youngest, has
boots on, and he is put in front.At a given signal--the dropping of
a handkerchief--the race is started, and in the winking of an eye the
crowd is mixed up on the grass, one boy's head here, another's heels
there, over the spot where the sixpence is hidden.Five minutes and
more does the scramble last, the boys pushing and shoving for all they
are worth, and screaming at the top of their voices.Then the lad who
reached the spot first crawls out from underneath the struggling mass,
puffing and blowing, his hair dishevelled, the coat off him, and the
sixpence in his hand!John travelled to the garden.We have got back to Carrick, an hour late for lunch, and with the
appetites of giants.We met many people on the road as we returned,
all remarkably well-dressed--young men in the blue serge favoured by
sailors, and girls in white; a clerical student, home on holidays from
Maynooth, discussing the clauses of Mr.Birrell's latest Land Bill
with a group of elderly folk; big hulking fellows with bronzed faces,
in a uniform that I hadn't seen before, but which a local man told me
was that of the Congested Districts Board; and pinafored children.One
young man we noticed sitting on a rock over the water with his boots
off, washing his feet, and several boys sailing miniature boats made
out of the leaves of flaggers.THE SHOOTING STAR
I was out the other evening on the shore to the northward of Lochros,
watching the men taking in the turf from the banks where it had been
footed and dried.The wind was quiet, and there was a great stir of
traffic on the road--men with creels, horses and carts, asses and
children driving them.An old woman (a respectable beggar by her look)
came by, and we started to talk.We were talking of various things--the
beauty of the evening, the plentifulness of the turf harvest, the
sorrows of the poor, and such like--when she stopped suddenly, and
looked up into the sky."Look, look," she said, "a
shooting star!"There was a trail of silver light
in the air--a luminous moment--then darkness."That's a soul going up
out of purgatory," she said.SUNDAY ON THE ROAD BETWEEN CARRICK AND GLENGESH
Sunday on the road between Carrick and Glengesh.We pass a group of country boys playing skittles in
the middle of the road--quite a crowd of them, big, dark fellows,
of all ages between twenty and thirty-five.Some are lolling on the
ditch behind, and one has a flute.Farther on we come on a string
of boys and girls paired off in twos with their arms about each
other's waists, like a procession on Bride's Sunday.The front pair
are somewhat ill-matched.The man is old and awkward in his walk,
yet cavalierly withal; the girl is young and pretty, with a charming
white laundered dress and flowers in her hair.As our car passes they
wave their hands to us as a sign that they are enjoying the fun quite
as much as we are.Below us
the road ribbons away through miles of bog to Slieve League.John went to the bedroom.There is
a delightful warmth and quietness in the air.The smoke of the cabin
chimneys, as far as one can see, rises up in straight grey lines,
"pillaring the skies of God."The whole landscape is suffused with
colour--browns and ambers and blues--melting into infinity.A ROANY BUSH
"Do you see that bush over there?"said an old man to me one day on the
road near Leckconnell--a poor village half-way between Ardara and Gull
Island.Mary went back to the kitchen."It's what they call a roany bush.Well, it's green now, but in
a month's time it'll be as red as a fox's diddy, and you wouldn't know
it for berries growing all over it."AUGUST EVENING
August evening, moonrise.I heard the
neighing of them half an hour ago as I came down the glen, and now I
can see them, a red, ragged cavalcade, and a cloud of dust about their
heels.There are some fourteen ponies in the drift, and three young
fellows with long whips are driving them.They give me the time of
day as I pass.One of them turns back and shouts after me: "Would you
happen to have a match on you, gaffer?"He is a stout-built lad, with
a red face, and a mat of black hair falling over his eyes.I feel in my
pocket for a box, and give him share of what I have.He thanks me, and
I pass on.The air is damp and fragrant, and wisps of fog lie along the
ditches and in the hollow places under the hills.The newly-risen moon
touches them with wonder and colour.NEAR INVER
A yellow day in harvest.A young girl with a piece of drawn-thread work
in her lap, sunning herself in the under wisp of her father's thatch.I
come on her suddenly round a bend in the road.She is taken by surprise
(almost as completely as _I_ am).draws her legs in, settles
her clothing, half smiles, then hangs her head, blushing with all the
_pudor_ of abashed femininity.ALL SUBTLE, SECRET THINGS
All subtle, secret things--the smell of bees, twilight on water, a
woman's presence, the humming of a lime-tree in full leaf, a bracken
stalk cut through to show the "eagle" in it--all speak to me as to an
intimate.A MADMAN
I passed an old fellow to-day between Ardara and Narin, doubled up in
the ditch with his chin on his knees, and staring at me out of two red
eyes that burned in his head like candles.Mary went back to the garden.I asked of a stonebreaker, a perch further
down the road."Oh, never heed him," says he--"he's mad.There's a
full moon the-night, and he ever goes off at the full o' the moon.God, you'd think he was giving his last 'keeks,'
to hear him sometimes!"LAGUNA
Under Crockuna; a thousand feet up.A
cluster of hovels on the tableland; one set this way, another that,
huddling together for company sake, it seems, in this abomination of
desolation.A drift of young children play about on a green cleared
space between the holdings.(In Donegal one sees young children
everywhere.)They run off like wild-cats at our approach, screaming
loudly and chattering in Irish as they run.A rick of turf, thatched
with winter-stales; a goat tethered; a flock of geese; tufts of dyed
wool--red and green and indigo--spread on stones to dry; the clack of a
loom from the house nearest us; a dog working sheep beyond.NEAR LETTERKENNY
A sheepdog with a flock of geese (a most unusual charge, I'm sure)
halted by a bridge on their way to market.The owner squats smoking
under the parapet--a darkavis'd man, with the slouch hat, slow eye, and
wide, mobile mouth of Donegal.Mary journeyed to the bedroom.[Illustration: A CLACHAN OF HOUSES.]SHAN MAC ANANTY
Up Glengesh.The hills of the Pass close in darkly on either side of
me.The brown road rises between them in |
bedroom | Where is Daniel? | There is the smell of bog-myrtle and ling in the air,
and the sound of running water.I am going along
quiet and easy-like, with hardly a thought in my head, when near a
sodded shelter, almost hidden from view in a cluster of fuchsia bushes,
I come on a little lad of about three years of age.He can't be older,
I fancy, he is so small.He runs out in front of me, scared somewhat at
my approach, as quaint a figure as ever I looked at.I shout at him and
he stops, pulling the hat which he wears--and it is big enough to be
his father's--over his face, and laughing shyly at me out of one corner
of it.His hands are wet, I notice, a blae-red colour, and sticking
with grass--as if he had been "feeling" for minnows in the stream which
runs alongside the road.He has a pair of homespun jumpers on, very
thick, and dyed a crude indigo colour, a shirt and vest, and his legs
are bare and wet up to the knees.I ask him in English "where he comes
from," "who is his father," "who is his mother," "where he lives?"He
doesn't answer, only pulls the hat deeper over his head, and laughs
into it.I put the question to him then in Irish.The
words were hardly out of my mouth when he gave a leap in the air.I
felt as if something had struck me in the face--something soft and
smothering, like a bag of feathers--and I was momentarily blinded.When
I looked again who should I see but Shan Mac Ananty, my _leaprachan_
friend from Scrabo in Down, running out in front of me, in a whirl of
dust, it seemed--a white, blinding cloud--giving buck-jumps in the air,
and dancing and capering about in the most outlandish fashion possible.I said, when I had recovered my breath.I wasn't a
bit afraid, only winded.Then with a quaint grimace: "What are _you_ doing up here?""And what are you doing up here yourself, Shan?""I thought
Scrabo was your playground.""You're right, son," says he."The old fort _is_ my playground, but the
smoke--the smoke from the mill chimneys--chases me away at times, and
I come up here for an airing.And, anyway, you mustn't forget that I'm
king of the fairies of Leath-Chuinn," says he.And do you be in
Donegal often?""I travel the townlands in turn from
Uisneach to Malin," says he, "and it takes me a year and a day to do
the round.I saw you at Scrabo in June last," says he, "but you didn't
see me.""On the night of the twenty-third," says he."There wasn't a fire
lighting as far as I could see; and I could see from Divis to the Horns
of Boirche, and from that over to Vannin."[Illustration: A GAP BETWEEN THE HILLS.]"Ah," says he, "they're
changed times.I was an old man when Setanta got his hero-name,(3)
and look at me now," says he, "clean past my time.No one knows me,
barring yourself there.No one can talk to me; and at Scrabo it's
worse than here.They're all planters there," says he, "all strange,
dour folk, long in the jaw and seldom-spoken, and with no heart in the
old customs.Never a John's-Fire lighted, never a dance danced, never a
blessing said, never a.(3) Cuchulain, the Hound of Ulster, a contemporary of Conchubhair
MacNeassa, who was--so tradition has it--born on the same night as
Christ.Nothing in sight for miles--nothing living--only a magpie walking
the road, and a _toit_ of blue smoke from a cabin away down in the
glen.A POOR CABIN
A poor cabin, built of loose whin rubble; no mortar or limewash; thatch
brown and rotting.Dung oozing out of door in pig-crew to north, and
lying in wet heaps about causey stones.A brier, heavy with June roses,
growing over south gable-end; rare pink bloom, filling the air with
fragrance.THE FLAX-STONE
Outside nearly every house in Donegal--at least in the north-western
parts of it--is the _Cloch Lin_, or "Flax-Stone."This is a huge
wheel of granite, half a ton or more in weight, revolving on the end
of a wooden shaft which itself turns horizontally on an iron spike
secured firmly in the ground.The purpose it serves is to "break"
the flax after it has been retted and dried.On the long arm of the
shaft tackling is fixed for the horse supplying the motive power--much
in the same way as it is in a pug-mill or puddling machine used in
the old days by brick-makers.The flax is strewn in swaths under the
wheel, which passes over it repeatedly, disintegrating the fibre.The
scutch-mill, of course, is a more expeditious way of doing the work,
but Donegal folk are conservative and stick to the old method--which
must be as old, indeed, as the culture of flax itself is in the
country.AFTER SUNSET
I was coming through Ardara wood the other evening just after
sunset.There was a delightful smell of wet larch and bracken in the
air.The road was dark--indeed, no more than a shadow in the darkness;
but a streak of silver light glimmered through from the west side
over the mountains and lay on the edge of the wood, and thousands
of stars trembled in the branches, touching them with strangeness
and beauty.As I approached the village I met an old woman--I knew
she was old by her voice--who said to me: "Isn't it a fine evening,
that?""And look," said she, "at all the stars hung
up in the trees!"Farther on I came on a number of women and girls,
all laughing and talking through other in the half-darkness.I was out
of the wood now and almost into the village, and there was light enough
to see that they were carrying water--some with one pail, others with
two--from the spring well I passed on my way up.This, I believe, is
a custom in Ardara.(4) The grown girls of the village go out every
evening after dark-fall, if the weather happens to be good.They meet
at the well, spend half an hour or so chatting and talking together,
and then saunter home again in groups through the darkness, carrying
their pails, just as I saw them on this particular evening.When I
got to the village the windows were nearly all lit up.The white and
white-grey houses looked strange and unearthly in the darkness.The
doors were open, and one could see a dark figure here and there out
taking the air.Over the roofs the stars shone and the constellations
swung in their courses--the Dog's Tail, the Dragon, the Plough, the
Rule, and the Tailor's Three Leaps; and although there was no moon one
could see the smoke from the chimneys wavering up into the sky in thin
green lines.The fragrance of peat hung heavily on the senses.There
wasn't a sound--only a confused murmur of voices, like the wind among
aspen-trees, and the faint singing of a fiddle from a house away at
the far end of the street.I passed through
the Diamond, down the long main street next the shore, and like Red
Hanrahan of the stories, into "that Celtic twilight, in which heaven
and earth so mingle that each seems to have taken upon itself some
shadow of the other's beauty."(4) In fact, a "go of water" is a byword there--"Many a girl met
her man in a go of water!"THE DARKNESS AND THE TIDE
"What time o' day is it?"My interrogator was an old man I met the
other evening in a loaney running down from the back of Lochros to
the sands of Lochros Beag Bay, near where the old fish-pass used to
be.I looked at my watch, and told him it was five-and-twenty past
seven."Oh," said he, "is it so much as that?The darkness and the
tide'll soon be coming in, then."ERRIGAL
The hill of Errigal climbs like a wave to the sky.A pennon of
white cloud tosses on its carn.They <DW72>
precipitously.They are streaked and mottled here and there
with patches of loose stone, bleached to a soft violet colour
with rain.Not a leaf of grass, not a frond of fern roots on these
patches.Loch Nacung, a cold spread of water,
gleams at the bottom, white as a shield and green at the margin with
sedge.Dunlewy chapel, with its round tower--a black silhouette in the
'tweenlight--and the walls of the Poisoned Glen beyond.Daniel journeyed to the kitchen.THE SORE FOOT
"It's a provident thing," a tramp said to me the other day, "to lay
something by for the sore foot."ASHERANCALLY
A roar, as of breaking seas.We are approaching the open Atlantic,
but though its salt is bitter on our lips, our view is obscured
by sand-dunes.Then, as we round a bend in the road, the Fall of
Asherancally breaks suddenly on us, tumbling through a gut in the
mountainside--almost on to the road it seems.We
watch the brown bulk of water dropping from the gut-head and dancing
in foam on the rocks a hundred feet below.One
might shout at the top of one's voice, and yet not be heard.The air is
iridescent with spindrift, which shines in the sun and sprays coolingly
on our cheeks.We lean on the bridge parapet, watching and listening.[Illustration: LOCH NACUNG--MOONRISE.]ORANGE GALLASES
I came across an old man to-day out in Lochros--a shock-headed old
fellow in shirt and trousers, carrying water from a spring well near
the Cross, and a troop of dogs snapping at his heels."You don't seem
to be popular with the dogs?""Oh, let them snap,"
says he."It's not me they're snapping at, but my orange gallases!"THE HUMAN VOICE
The human voice--what a wonder and mystery it is!"All power," said
Whitman, "is folded in a great vocalism."I spoke to a man to-day
on the roadside, near Maghery.He was a poor, raggedy fellow, with a
gaunt, unshaven chin and wild eyes, and a couple of barefooted children
played about the mud at his feet.He answered me in a voice that
_thrilled_ me--deep, chestfull, resonant; a voice, that had he been
an educated man, might have won fame for him, as a politician, say, or
a preacher, or an actor.And voices like his are by no means uncommon
along the western seaboard of Ireland.Men address you on the road in
that frank, human, comrade-like way of Irishmen, out of deep lungs and
ringing larynxes that bring one back to the time when men were giants,
and physique was the rule rather than the exception.In such voices
one can imagine the Fenians to have talked one with the other, Fionn
calling to Sgeolan, and Oisin chanting the divine fragments of song he
dreamed in the intervals of war and venery.Will Ireland ever recapture
the heroic qualities--build personality, voice, gesture--or, as Whitman
puts it: "Litheness, majestic faces, clear eyes"--that were hers down
to a comparatively late period, and in places have not quite died out
even yet?LOCH ALUINN
A grey loch, lashed into foam by wind from nor' westward,
lapping unquietly among reeds that fringe its margin.Boulders
everywhere--erratics from the Ice Age--bleached white with rain.Crotal
growing in their interstices, wild-mint, purple orchises and the kingly
osmunda fern.A strip of tilled land beyond--green corn, for the most
part, and potatoes.Slieve a-Tooey in the distance, a blue shadowy
bulk, crossed and recrossed by mist-wreaths chasing one another over it
in rapid succession.THE OPEN ROAD
The open road, the sky over it, and the hills beyond.The hills beyond,
those blue, ultimate hills; the clouds that look like hills; the
mystery plucked out of them, and lo, the sea, stretching away into the
vast--white-crested, grey, inscrutable--with a mirage dancing on its
furthest verge![ Transcriber's Note:
The following changes have been made to the original text.The first
line presents the text as printed in the original, the second the
amended text."The words of the maker o poems are the general light and dark."One
"The words of the maker of poems are the general light and dark."One
survival of a pagan right of our forefathers.survival of a pagan rite of our forefathers.'Glory be to the Father's, for ye every night for a week.Give us the
'Glory be to the Father's' for ye every night for a week.And I suppose that the very feeling which made
you so kind and faithful to us, strangers, made you faithful to--to that
horrid old _Lancet_, too.Sharp your very
nicest bed and breakfast, for he is tired and suffering."'Tis always ready, lassie, though few come
nowadays, to use it.Daniel went back to the bedroom.After I show him I'll come for you,
Lady Jess."Jessica had not overpraised the neatness and comfort of this
out-of-the-way hostelry, and Ninian Sharp slept dreamlessly till
joyous voices outside his window roused him to the fact that morning
and hunger had arrived together.Remembering, too, the long ride
that lay before him and the necessity of finding a horse for it, he rose
and hastily dressed.He had lost his neuralgic pains and his spirits
were again such as Jessica had always seen him show.She, too, was
up and waiting, and it looked as if her ovation had begun; for she was
already the center of an admiring group yet held closest to the side of
a big ranchman, grizzled and rugged, but beaming upon her and all the
rest like an incarnate joy."Samson, Samson, here he is!Sharp, this is my
biggest 'boy'!"'Looks like you'd be quite a man
when you get growed up,'" quoted the joker, giving Samson's hand a
cordial grasp.You do all the world proud, and that's my
sentiment to a t-i-o-n, sir!Ninian, he's brought--my mother has sent you the horse that
nobody else has ridden since my father did.Nimrod, the swiftest,
gentlest thoroughbred that anybody ever rode."Why, how could she know that we were coming?""Him and John Benton was over
yesterday, but to-day it was my turn.One of us has been every day
since the captain left Sobrante; and since the good news arrived there's
always been a led horse for you, sir.Would have been till the day
of judgment, too, if you hadn't struck us afore.Reckon you aren't
acquainted with our little settlement, sir.""Reckon I wasn't, but I'm beginning to be.And it solves the difficulty of finding a mount out to the ranch.I'm not much of a horseman, though.I don't know but I'd better stick
to Scruff and leave Nimrod to Lady Jess."Samson wheeled around and eyed the stranger, curiously.Then he advanced
and held out his hand again.You're a man, even if you do live in |
kitchen | Where is Sandra? | If you can't stick I'll hold you on.This was Jessica's chance, and before they sat down to the bounteous
meal which Janet had been hours in preparing she managed to draw Ninian
aside and whisper a request, to which he nodded prompt assent.So nobody
but they two knew what was meant when, as the three mounted and were
about to ride away, she asked Samson:
"Do you know the trail to El Desierto?"What in the name of reason put such a
forsaken hole into your head on this joyful occasion?""Never mind what, and never mind speech-making, dear old fellow.I have
to call at El Desierto on my way to Sobrante and would like to know the
shortest road.""Is she--has she got a little 'touched' down there in your City of
Angels and Scamps, eh?""Samson, am I still the captain, or am I not?"You, Aleck, hitch up a board and take
that trunk of Miss Trent's to her country seat, and be quick about
it.Here's for El Desierto and no
questions asked.CHAPTER XXI
BACK AT SOBRANTE
For an hour and a half they rode swiftly along a comparatively level
trail, though to Ninian Sharp's untrained eyes there was no road
visible.How Samson managed to pick his way so undeviatingly over the
dried herbage and sandy soil was a mystery; but neither the guide nor
Jessica found anything strange in this.Those who live in wide solitudes
grow keen of sight and hearing, and there were tiny roughnesses here and
there which clearly marked to these experienced ranch people where
other feet had passed that way.Presently the roughness increased, and the trail climbed steadily toward
a mesa, which seemed to the reporter but ten rods distant, yet was, in
reality, as many miles.Scruff's been so idle all these weeks and
grown so lazy he'll hardly move.""He'll get over that as soon as he meets up with the tackers.My, but
they've led Aunt Sally a life!And taken more medicine than was due
'em during the natural course of their lives.Daniel journeyed to the kitchen.Say, Sharp, do you enjoy
picra?"Here, take this vial, I present it to
you with my compliments.With the good will
of the whole outfit.""But, beg pardon, I have no use for--picra."You'll have to have it, outside or in.Then, when Aunt Sally appears with her
little dish and spoon, produce this from your pistol pocket and knock
her plumb speechless.Samson rose in his stirrups and pointed forward with his crop.Upon
a barren, wide-stretching tableland stood a cluster of adobe huts.Behind
them a clump of live oaks, beside them a sandy, curving streak, an
arroyo, lighter in hue than the surrounding soil, but parched and dry
as if part of the desert itself; behind them, three mighty, jagged,
upward-pointing rocks.The weirdest, lonesomest, God-for-sakenest habitation
that fools ever made or lived in, quoted the joker, giving Samson's hand
a cordial grasp.For Jessica had also caught sight of the desolate homestead and, having
too low stirrups for standing, had sprung to Scruff's back and poised
thus on his saddle, was straining her eager, excited gaze toward the
distant El Desierto.She has gone queer, and that's a fact.Does the mite
think that there little donkey can outrun your horse or mine?After her,
stranger, lest she do some harm to herself."Ninian smiled softly and touched Nimrod lightly, and in a moment all
three were again racing over the mesa, side by side, the girl foremost,
and the men reining in their horses lest they should forestall her of the
goal to which she aspired.The reporter, as eager and almost as wise
as she, but good Samson completely in the dark and growing a trifle angry
over the fact.When they came up to it the place seemed utterly deserted.The doors
opened to the touch and in all but one of the three small buildings the
windows were broken.The third was in better repair and was evidently
sometimes still used by somebody.There was a bed, or cot, spread with
blankets, a coal-oil stove, some canned meats and biscuits, and a
well-wrapped gun.They are the very same as in my dream and he told me of them
when he drew the map.He drew it forth and held it so that Samson, too, could see.In the dream there was a little cave beneath the rocks and in the
cave a box.You know it, Samson, the black tin box in which the valuable
papers were kept.We could find it nowhere, mother nor I, but I shall
find it here and in it--oh!in it--there will be that title deed!You
look, 'boys,' I can't, I tremble so."Samson forced his great length downward and inward under the bowlders
and found, as Jessica had felt sure, a small but perfectly dry and
well-protected cave.The rocks and live oaks screened it from the sight
of those who did not know it existed, and it would never have been
suspected that there was aught but solid ground beneath those jagged
stones.The horses and Scruff were willing to stand without tying, and Ninian
was, in any case, too excited now to have remembered them.He saw that
Lady Jess was trembling, indeed, and trembled himself.If this should
prove a disappointment, how would she bear it?From the little cave there presently issued a
mighty shout.That is it would have been mighty had the space been large
enough to give it vent.As it was, it came like the subdued roar of a
wild animal, and it was almost surprising to see the soles of Samson's
boots emerge from the opening instead of furry feet.When he had crawled outward so far that he could lift himself upright,
the sailor leaped so high that Ninian felt as if he were the one who
had gone "queer" instead of Jessica, suspected.But this reason was
obvious; for there in his hand was the veritable black tin box familiar
to the girl from her earliest memory, and seen often enough by the herder
to be instantly recognized.When, at last, the box was in her own hands Jessica became very quiet,
though her voice still trembled as she said:
"This belongs to my mother.If the deed for which she looked were not there it
would be but a fresh distress to her.It is your interest as
well as hers, and if it is not there you can save her, at least, one
disappointment on this day of your return."The opinions of her two friends prevailed; and, since they had no key,
Samson's great knife forced the lock, and stored within were papers and
vouchers of great value to Sobrante, which the faithless manager had
carried away for his own purposes.There it lay at the very bottom of the pile, and
Jessica knew it at once for the queer paper which her father had shown
her on the night before his death.For a time she could only weep over it and caress it, remembering the
dear hands which had held it before her, and the unforgotten voice which
had explained its value and all about the necessary "recording" which
must be made.Then she rallied, remembering, also, that other precious
parent, alive and waiting for her and it.I, myself, must keep and carry this."She fastened it within her blouse and kept one hand upon it all the rest
of the way.A brief and happy way, which ended in a mother's arms and in
the wild welcome of every dweller at Sobrante.And when the mother's
arms set their recovered treasure free for a moment there were all the
"boys" ready and waiting to seize and carry her from point to point,
telling how careful had been each one's stewardship and how they would
never let her go again.As for Ninian Sharp he did not recognize himself in the hero they all
made of him, nor did even Aunt Sally presume to offer him, so wonderful
a man, a nauseous dose.But she was overheard to remark to Wun Lung, who
had also joined the company unforbidden by his arch enemy:
"I do believe, Wun Lungy, that if ever that there handsome young man
should go and get married I'd set him up in my fifty-five thousand five
hundred and fifty-five piece bedquilt.I did lay out to bequeath it to
Jessica, but, la!I can piece her another, just as willin' as not.What
you say, Wun Lungy?"For a time joy and surprise turned Ned and Luis speechless; yet they
were sent to bed late that night, each hugging a sharp-edged train of
tin cars and breathing, "Choo!as if a railway were a common
sight instead of an unknown one.But there came at last a quiet hour for mother and child, when they sat
in close embrace, telling all that had befallen each during the days of
separation.if dear Ephraim were only here, mother!I said it should not be
a month before that title deed was found, and the month will not be up
until to-morrow.It was bitter hard to leave him alone in
that hospital, well-liked and cared for though he is.If it hadn't been
for him I could never have gone.And the 'boys' would have made such a
hero of him.Can't you guess how proud
they'd have been of him, mother?"Trent did not reply, Jessica looked up quickly and saw that
dear face so near her own still clouded by a shadow of trouble.You look as if you were not perfectly,
absolutely happy, and yet how can you be else--to-night?"So glad and thankful that I cannot put it
into words.My darling, at present, not for some days,
if I were you I would not talk about Ephraim.He is alive and getting well, so far as I know.There has been no
later news than yours.Only this: the 'boys'
have taken some queer notion about our 'Forty-niner,' and so I say he
is probably happier just where he is to-night than if he were back at
Sobrante."and about such a simple, honest, splendid
old fellow as my Ephraim?Daniel went back to the bedroom.I seem to be sent into the
world to solve other people's'mysteries,' and I'll solve his."This is a story
which must be related another time.But for the time Jessica was happy
and all went well.Had I not Washington, Patrick Henry,
Light-Horse Harry Lee, and others, ready for the first Revolution?and
if there comes another,--which God forbid!--have I not plenty more
just like them?"Here she laughed with delight as she called over their names: "Robert
Lee, Jackson, Joe Johnstone, Stuart, Early, Floyd, Preston, the
Breckinridges, Scott, and others like them, brave and true as steel.And if my old 'ruts and
grooves' produce men like these, should they be abandoned?Can any
'advanced age' produce better?"Then there are my soldiers of the Cross.Do I not yearly send out a
faithful band to be a'shining light,' and spread the Gospel North,
South, East, West, even into foreign lands?Is not the only Christian
paper in Athens, Greece, the result of the love and labor of one of my
soldiers?[2]
[2] Rev."And can I not send out men of science, as well as warriors,
statesmen, and orators?There is Maury on the seas, showing the world
what a man of science can do.If my 'old-fogy' system has produced men
like these, must it be abandoned?"Here the old Mother of States settled herself back in her chair, a
smile of satisfaction resting on her face, and she ceased to think of
_change_.Telling our mother of all the wonders and pleasures of New York, she
said:
"You were so delighted I judge that you would like to sell out
everything here and move there!""But you would miss many pleasures you have in our present home.""We would have no time to miss anything," said my sister, "in that
whirl of excitement!But," she continued, "I believe one might as well
try to move the Rocky Mountains to Fifth Avenue as an old Virginian!They have such a horror of selling out and moving.""It is not so easy to sell out and move," replied our mother, "when
you remember all the <DW64>s we have to take care of and support.""Yes, the <DW64>s," we said, "are the weight continually pulling us
down!Will the time _ever_ come for us to be free of them?""They were placed here," replied our mother, "by God, for us to take
care of, and it does not seem that we can change it.When we
emancipate them, it does not better their condition.Those left free
and with good farms given them by their masters soon sink into poverty
and wretchedness, and become a nuisance to the community.We see how
miserable are Mr.Randolph's[3] <DW64>s, who with their freedom
received from their master a large section of the best land in Prince
Edward County.My own grandfather also emancipated a large number,
having first had them taught lucrative trades that they might support
themselves, and giving them money and land.But they were not
prosperous or happy.L. emancipated all hers and sent them to
Liberia; but she told me the other day that she was convinced it had
been no kindness to them, for she continually receives letters begging
assistance, and yearly supplies them with clothes and money."Sandra travelled to the bathroom.[3] John Randolph of Roanoke.So it seemed our way was surrounded by walls of circumstances too
thick and solid to be pulled down, and we said no more.Some weeks after this conversation we had a visit from a friend--Dr.Bagby--who, having lived in New York, and hearing us express a wish to
live there, said:
"What!exchange a home in old Virginia for one on Fifth Avenue?You
don't know what you are talking about!It is not even called 'home'
there, but '_house_,' where they turn into bed at midnight, eat
stale-bread breakfasts, have brilliant parties--where several hundred
people meet who don't care anything about each other.They have no
soul life, but shut themselves up in themselves, live for themselves,
and never have any social enjoyment like ours.""But," we said, "could not our friends come to see us there as well as
anywhere else?""Your hearts would soon be as cold and dead
as a marble door-front.You wouldn't want to see anybody, and nobody
would want to see you.""I know all about it; and"--he continued--"I know you could not find
on Fifth Avenue such women as your mother and grandmother, who never
think of themselves, but are constantly planning and providing for
others, making their homes comfortable and pleasant, and attending to
the wants and welfare of so many <DW64>s.And that is what the women
all over the South are doing, and what the New York women cannot
comprehend.How can anybody know, except ourselves, the personal
sacrifices of our women?""Well," said my sister, "you need not be so severe and eloquent
because we thought we should like to live in New York!If we should
sell all we possess, we could never afford to live there.Besides, you
know our mother would as soon think of selling her children as her
servants.""But," he replied, "I can't help talking, for I hear our people
abused, and called indolent and self-indulgent, when I know they have
valor and endurance enough.And I believe so much'material progress'
leaves no leisure for the highest development of heart and mind.Sandra moved to the kitchen.Where
the whole energy of a people is applied to making money, the souls of
men become dwarfed.""We do not feel," we said, "like abusing Northern people, in whose
thrift and enterprise we found much to admire; and especially the
self-reliance of their women, enabling them to take care of themselves
and to travel from Maine to the Gulf without escort, while we find it
impossible to travel a day's journey without a special protector.""That is just what I don't like," said he, "to see a woman in a crowd
of strangers and needing |
bedroom | Where is Sandra? | "This dependence upon your sex," we replied, "keeps you so vain.""We should lose our gallantry altogether," said he, "if we found you
could get along without us."After some months--ceasing to think and speak of New York--our lives
glided back into the old channel, where the placid stream of life had
many isles of simple pleasures.In those days we were not whirled over the iron track in a crowded
car, with dirty, shrieking children and repulsive-looking people.We
were not jammed against rough people, eating ill-smelling things out
of ill-looking baskets and satchels, and throwing the remains of pies
and sausages over the cushioned seats.our journeys were performed in venerable carriages, and our
lunch was enjoyed by some cool, shady spring where we stopped in a
shady forest at mid-day.[Illustration: "LUNCH BY SOME COOL, SHADY SPRING."--_Page 66._]
Our own ancient carriage my sister styled "the old ship of Zion,"
saying it had carried many thousands, and was likely to carry many
more.And our driver we called the "Ancient Mariner."He presided on
his seat--a lofty perch--in a very high hat and with great dignity.Having been driving the same carriage for nearly forty years--no
driver being thought safe who had not been on the carriage box at
least twenty years,--he regarded himself as an oracle, and, in
consequence of his years and experience, kept us in much awe,--my
sister and myself never daring to ask him to quicken or <DW44> his
pace or change the direction of his course, however much we desired
it.We will ever remember this thraldom, and how we often wished one
of the younger <DW64>s could be allowed to take his place; but my
grandmother said "it would wound his feelings, and, besides, be very
unsafe" for us.Daniel journeyed to the kitchen.At every steep hill or bad place in the road it was an established
custom to stop the carriage, unfold the high steps, and "let us
out,"--as in pictures of the animals coming down out of the ark!This
custom had always prevailed in my mother's family, and there was a
tradition that my great-grandfather's horses, being habituated to stop
for this purpose, refused to pull up certain hills, even when the
carriage was empty, until the driver had dismounted and slammed the
door, after which they moved off without further hesitation.This custom of walking at intervals made a pleasant variety, and gave
us an opportunity to enjoy fully the beautiful and picturesque scenery
through which we were passing.Those were the days of leisure and pleasure for travelers; and when we
remember the charming summer jaunts annually made in this way, we
almost regret the steam horse, which takes us now to the same places
in a few hours.We had two dear friends, Mary and Alice, who with their old carriages
and drivers--the facsimiles of our own--frequently accompanied us in
these expeditions; and no generals ever exercised more entire command
over their armies than did these three black coachmen over us.I smile
now to think of their ever being called our "slaves."Yet, although they had this domineering spirit, they felt at the same
time a certain pride in us, too.On one occasion, when we were traveling together, our friend Alice
concluded to dismount from her carriage and ride a few miles with a
gentleman of the party in a buggy.She had not gone far before the
alarm was given that the buggy horse was running away, whereupon our
black generalissimos instantly stopped the three carriages and
anxiously watched the result.Old Uncle Edmund, Alice's coachman,
stood up in his seat highly excited, and when his young mistress, with
admirable presence of mind, seized the reins and stopped the horse,
turning him into a by-road, he shouted at the top of his voice: "Dar,
now!I always knowed Miss Alice was a young 'oman of de mos' amiable
courage!"--and over this feat he continued to chuckle for the rest of
the day.The end of these pleasant journeys always brought us to some old
plantation home, where we met a warm welcome not only from the white
family, but from the servants who constituted part of the
establishment.One of the most charming places to which we made a yearly visit was
Oaklands, a lovely spot embowered in vines and shade-trees.The attractions of this home and family brought so many visitors
every summer, it was necessary to erect cottages about the grounds,
although the house itself was quite large.And as the yard was usually
filled with persons strolling about, or reading, or playing chess
under the trees, it had every appearance, on first approach, of a
small watering-place.The mistress of this establishment was a woman
of rare attraction, possessing all the gentleness of her sex, with
attributes of greatness enough for a hero.Tall and handsome, she
looked a queen as she stood on the portico receiving her guests, and,
by the first words of greeting, from her warm, true heart, charmed
even strangers.Without the least "variableness or shadow of turning," her excellences
were a perfect continuity, and her deeds of charity a blessing to all
in need within her reach.No undertaking seemed too great for her, and
no details--affecting the comfort of her home, family, friends, or
servants--too small for her supervision.The church, a few miles distant, the object of her care and love,
received at her hands constant and valuable aid, and its minister
generally formed one of her family circle.No wonder, then, that the home of such a woman should have been a
favorite resort for all who had the privilege of knowing her.Daniel went back to the bedroom.And no
wonder that all who enjoyed her charming hospitality were spellbound,
and loath to leave the spot where it was extended.In addition to the qualities I have attempted to describe, this lady
inherited from her father, General Breckinridge, an executive talent
which enabled her to order and arrange her domestic affairs perfectly;
so that from the delicious viands upon her table to the highly
polished oak of the floors, all gave evidence of her superior
management and the admirable training of her servants.Nor were the hospitalities of this establishment dispensed to the gay
and great alone: they were shared alike by the homeless and the
friendless, and many a weary heart found sympathy and shelter there.Oaklands was famous for many things: its fine light-bread, its
cinnamon cakes, its beat biscuit, its fricasseed chicken, its butter
and cream, its wine-sauces, its plum-puddings, its fine horses, its
beautiful meadows, its sloping green hills, and last, but not least,
its refined and agreeable society collected from every part of our own
State, and often from others.For an epicure no better place could have been desired.And this
reminds me of a retired army officer, a _gourmet_ of the first water,
whom we often met there.His sole occupation was visiting his friends,
and his only subjects of conversation were the best viands and the
best manner of cooking them!When asked whether he remembered certain
people at a certain place, he would reply: "Yes, I dined there ten
years ago, and the turkey was very badly cooked--not quite done
enough!"the turkey evidently having made a more lasting impression
than the people.This gentleman lost an eye at the battle of Chapultepec, having been
among the first of our gallant men who scaled the walls.But a young
girl of his acquaintance always said she knew it was not bravery so
much as "curiosity, which led him to go peeping over the walls, first
man!"This was a heartless speech, but everybody repeated it and
laughed, for the colonel _was_ a man of considerable "curiosity."Like all old homes, Oaklands had its bright as well as its sorrowful
days, its weddings and its funerals.Many yet remember the gay wedding
of one there whose charms brought suitors by the score and won hearts
by the dozen.The brilliant career of this young lady, her conquests
and wonderful fascinations, behold!are they not all written upon the
hearts and memories of divers rejected suitors who still survive?And, apropos of weddings, an old-fashioned Virginia wedding was an
event to be remembered.The preparations usually commenced some time
before, with saving eggs, butter, chickens, etc.; after which ensued
the liveliest egg-beating, butter-creaming, raisin-stoning,
sugar-pounding, cake-icing, salad-chopping, cocoanut-grating,
lemon-squeezing, egg-frothing, wafer-making, pastry-baking,
jelly-straining, paper-cutting, silver-cleaning, floor-rubbing,
dress-making, hair-curling, lace-washing, ruffle-crimping,
tarlatan-smoothing, trunk-moving,--guests arriving, servants running,
girls laughing!Imagine all this going on simultaneously for several successive days
and nights, and you have an idea of "preparations" for an
old-fashioned Virginia wedding.The guests generally arrived in private carriages a day or two before,
and stayed often for a week after the affair, being accompanied by
quite an army of <DW64> servants, who enjoyed the festivities as much
as their masters and mistresses.A great many years ago, after such a wedding as I describe, a dark
shadow fell upon Oaklands.The eldest daughter, young and beautiful, soon to marry a gentleman[4]
of high character, charming manners, and large estate, one night,
while the preparations were in progress for her nuptials, saw in a
vision vivid pictures of what would befall her if she married.The
vision showed her: a gay wedding, herself the bride; the marriage
jaunt to her husband's home in a distant county; the incidents of the
journey; her arrival at her new home; her sickness and death; the
funeral procession back to Oaklands; the open grave; the bearers of
her bier--those who a few weeks before had danced at the wedding;
herself a corpse in her bridal dress; her newly turfed grave with a
bird singing in the tree above.This vision produced such an impression that she awakened her sister
and told her of it.For three successive nights the vision appeared, which so affected her
spirits that she determined not to marry.Sandra travelled to the bathroom.But after some months,
persuaded by her family to think no more of the dream which
continually haunted her, she allowed the marriage to take place.All was a realization of the vision: the wedding, the journey to her
new home,--every incident, however small, had been presented before
her in the dream.As the bridal party approached the house of an old lady near Abingdon,
who had made preparations for their entertainment, servants were
hurrying to and fro in great excitement, and one was galloping off for
a doctor, as the old lady had been suddenly seized with a violent
illness.Even this was another picture in the ill-omened vision of
the bride, who every day found something occurring to remind her of
it, until in six months her own death made the last sad scene of her
dream.And the funeral procession back to Oaklands, the persons
officiating, the grave,--all proved a realization of her vision.After this her husband, a man of true Christian character, sought in
foreign lands to disperse the gloom overshadowing his life.But
whether on the summit of Mount Blanc or the lava-crusted Vesuvius;
among the classic hills of Rome or the palaces of France; in the
art-galleries of Italy or the regions of the Holy Land,--he carries
ever in his heart the image of his fair bride and the quiet grave at
Oaklands.Another charming residence, not far from Oaklands,[5] which attracted
visitors from various quarters, was Buena Vista, where we passed many
happy hours of childhood.[5] General Watts's place, Roanoke.This residence--large and handsome--was situated on an eminence
overlooking pastures and sunny <DW72>s, with forests and mountain views
in the distance.The interior of the house accorded with the outside, every article
being elegant and substantial.The owner,[6] a gentleman of polished manners, kind and generous
disposition, a sincere Christian and zealous churchman, was honored
and beloved by all who knew him.[6] George P. Tayloe, Esq.His daughters, a band of lovely young girls, presided over his house,
dispensing its hospitality with grace and dignity.Their mother's
death, which occurred when they were very young, had given them
household cares which would have been considerable but for the
assistance of Uncle Billy, the butler,--an all-important character
presiding with imposing dignity over domestic affairs.His jet-black face was relieved by a head of gray hair with a small,
round, bald centerpiece; and the expression of his face was calm and
serene as he presided over the pantry, the table, and the tea-waiters.Sandra moved to the kitchen.His mission on earth seemed to be keeping the brightest silver urns,
sugar-dishes, cream-jugs, and spoons; flavoring the best ice-creams;
buttering the hottest rolls, muffins, and waffles; chopping the best
salads; folding the whitest napkins; handing the best tea and cakes in
the parlor in the evenings; and cooling the best wine for dinner.Indeed, he was so essentially a part of the establishment that in
recalling those old days at Buena Vista the form of Uncle Billy comes
silently back from the past and takes its old place about the parlors,
the halls, and the dining-room, making the picture complete.[Illustration: "HIS MISSION ON EARTH SEEMED TO BE KEEPING THE
BRIGHTEST SILVER URNS."--_Page 78._]
And thus upon the canvas of every old home picture come to their
accustomed places the forms of dusky friends, who once shared our
homes, our firesides, our affections,--and who will share them, as in
the past, never more.Of all the plantation homes we loved and visited, the brightest,
sweetest memories cluster around Grove Hill,[7] a grand old place in
the midst of scenery lovely and picturesque, to reach which we made a
journey across the Blue Ridge--those giant mountains from whose
winding roads and lofty heights we had glimpses of exquisite scenery
in the valleys below.[7] The old seat of the Breckinridges, Botetourt County.Thus winding slowly around these mountain heights and peeping down
from our old carriage windows, we beheld nature in its wildest
luxuriance.The deep solitude; the glowing sunlight over rock, forest,
and glen; the green valleys deep down beneath, diversified by
alternate light and shadow,--all together photographed on our hearts
pictures never to fade.Not all the towers, minarets, obelisks, palaces, gem-studded domes of
"art and man's device," can reach the soul like one of these
sun-tinted pictures in their convex frames of rock and vines!Arrived at Grove Hill, how enthusiastic the welcome from each member
of the family assembled in the front porch to meet us!How deliciously cool the wide halls, the spacious parlor, the
dark polished walnut floors!How gay the
spirits of all assembled!Sandra journeyed to the bedroom.One was sure of meeting here pleasant people from Virginia, Baltimore,
Florida, South Carolina, and Kentucky, with whom the house was filled
from May till November.How delightfully passed the days, the weeks!Mary went to the kitchen.What merry excursions,
fishing-parties, riding-parties to the Indian Spring, the Cave, the
Natural Bridge!What pleasant music, and tableaux, and dancing, in the
evenings!For the tableaux we had only to open an old chest in the garret and
help ourselves to rich embroidered white and scarlet dresses, with
other costumes worn by the grandmother of the family nearly a hundred
years before, when her husband was in public life and she one of the
queens of society.What sprightly _conversazioni_ in our rooms at night!--young girls
_will_ become confidential and eloquent with each other at night,
however reserved and quiet during the day.Late in the night these talks continued, with puns and laughter, until
checked by a certain young gentleman, now a minister, who was wont to
bring out his flute in the flower-garden under our windows, |
bathroom | Where is Daniel? | A characteristic conversation ran
thus:
"Girls!"said one, "would it not be charming if we could all take a
trip together to Niagara?"replied another, "the idea of us poor Virginia girls taking a
trip!""Indeed," said one of the Grove Hill girls, "it would be impossible.For here are we on this immense estate,--four thousand acres, two
large, handsome residences, and three hundred <DW64>s,--regarded as
wealthy, and yet, to save our lives, we could not raise money enough
for a trip to New York!""Nor get a silk-velvet cloak!"I have been longing and longing for
a silk-velvet cloak, but never could get the money to buy one.But
last Sunday, at the village church, what should I see but one of the
Joneses sweeping in with a long velvet cloak almost touching the
floor!And you could set her father's house in our back hall!But,
then, she is so fortunate as to own no <DW64>s.""No <DW64>s
to support!We could go to New York and Niagara, and have velvet
cloaks, too, if we only had no <DW64>s to support!But all _our_ money
goes to provide for them as soon as the crops are sold!""Yes," said one of the Grove Hill girls; "here is our large house
without an article of modern furniture.The parlor curtains are one
hundred years old, the old-fashioned mirrors and recess tables one
hundred years old, and we long in vain for money to buy something
new."said one of the sprightliest girls, "we can get up some of our
old diamond rings or breastpins which some of us have inherited, and
travel on appearances!We have no modern clothes, but the old rings
will make us look rich!And a party of _poor, rich Virginians_ will
attract the commiseration and consideration of the world when it is
known that for generations we have not been able to leave our
plantations!"After these conversations we would fall asleep, and sleep profoundly,
until aroused next morning by an army of servants polishing the hall
floors, waxing and rubbing them with a long-handled brush weighted by
an oven lid.This made the floor like a "sea of glass," and dangerous
to walk upon immediately after the polishing process, being especially
disastrous to small children, who were continually slipping and
falling before breakfast.The lady[8] presiding over this establishment possessed a cultivated
mind, bright conversational powers, and gentle temper, with a force of
character which enabled her judiciously to direct the affairs of her
household, as well as the training and education of her children.She always employed an accomplished tutor, who added to the
attractiveness of her home circle.She helped the boys with their Latin, and the girls with their
compositions.Daniel journeyed to the kitchen.In her quiet way she governed, controlled, suggested
everything; so that her presence was required everywhere at once.While in the parlor entertaining her guests with bright, agreeable
conversation, she was sure to be wanted by the cooks (there were six!)to "taste or flavor" something in the kitchen; or by the gardener, to
direct the planting of certain seeds or roots,--and so with every
department.Even the minister--there was always one living in her
house--would call her out to consult over his text and sermon for the
next Sunday, saying he could rely upon her judgment and
discrimination.Never thinking of herself, her heart overflowing with sympathy and
interest for others, she entered into the pleasures of the young as
well as the sorrows of the old.If the boys came in from a fox or deer chase, their pleasure was
incomplete until it had been described to her and enjoyed with her
again.The flower-vases were never entirely beautiful until her hand had
helped to arrange the flowers.The girls' laces were never perfect until she had gathered and crimped
them.Her sons were never so happy as when holding her hand and caressing
her.Daniel went back to the bedroom.And the summer twilight found her always in the vine-covered
porch, seated by her husband,--a dear, kind old gentleman,--her hand
resting in his, while he quietly and happily smoked his pipe after the
day's riding over his plantation, interviewing overseers, millers, and
blacksmiths, and settling up accounts.One more reminiscence, and the Grove Hill picture will be done.No
Virginia home being complete without some prominent <DW64> character,
the picture lacking this would be untrue to nature, and without the
finishing touch.And not to have "stepped in" to pay our respects to
old Aunt Betsy during a visit to Grove Hill would have been looked
upon--as it should be to omit it here--a great breach of civility; for
the old woman always received us at her door with a cordial welcome
and a hearty shake of the hand."Lor' bless de child'en!"An'
why didn't your ma[9] come?She always
was so good an' so pretty.Seems to me it aint been no time sence she
and Miss Emma"--her own mistress--"use' to play dolls togedder, an' I
use' to bake sweet cakes for dem, an' cut dem out wid de pepper-box
top for dar doll parties; an' dey loved each other like sisters."[Illustration: "HOW DEY DOES GROW!"Sandra travelled to the bathroom.--_Page 86._]
"Well, Aunt Betsy," we would ask, "how is your rheumatism now?""Lor', honey, I nuver spec's to git over dat.But some days I can
hobble out an' feed de chickens; an' I can set at my window an' make
the black child'en feed 'em, an' I love to think I'm some 'count to
Miss Emma.An' Miss Emma's child'en can't do 'thout old 'Mammy
Betsy,' for I takes care of all dar pet chickens.Me an' my ole man
gittin' mighty ole now; but Miss Emma an' all her child'en so good to
us we has pleasure in livin' yet."At last the shadows began to fall dark and chill upon this once bright
and happy home.Old Aunt Betsy lived to see the four boys--her mistress's brave and
noble sons--buckle their armor on and go forth to battle for the home
they loved so well,--the youngest still so young that he loved his pet
chickens, which were left to "Mammy Betsy's" special care; and when
the sad news at length came that this favorite young master was
killed, amid all the agony of grief no heart felt the great sorrow
more sincerely than hers.Another and still another of these noble youths fell after deeds of
heroic valor, their graves the battlefield, a place of burial fit for
men so brave.Only one--the youngest--was brought home to find a
resting-place beside the graves of his ancestors.The old man, their father, his mind shattered by grief, continued day
after day, for several years, to sit in the vine-covered porch, gazing
wistfully out, imagining sometimes that he saw in the distance the
manly forms of his sons, returning home, mounted on their favorite
horses, in the gray uniforms worn the day they went off.Then he, too, followed, where the "din of war, the clash of arms," is
heard no more.To recall these scenes so blinds my eyes with tears that I cannot
write of them.They have no language
and are given no language, because no other heart could understand,
nor could they be alleviated if shared.It will have been observed from these reminiscences that the mistress
of a Virginia plantation was more conspicuous, although not more
important, than the master.In the house she was the mainspring, and
to her came all the hundred or three hundred <DW64>s with their
various wants and constant applications for medicine and every
conceivable requirement.Attending to these, with directing her household affairs and
entertaining company, occupied busily every moment of her life.While
all these devolved upon her, it sometimes seemed to me that the master
had nothing to do but ride around his estate on the most delightful
horse, receive reports from overseers, see that his pack of hounds was
fed, and order "repairs about the mill"--the mill seemed always
needing repairs!Sandra moved to the kitchen.Sandra journeyed to the bedroom.This view of the subject, however, being entirely from a feminine
standpoint, may have been wholly erroneous; for doubtless his mind
was burdened with financial matters too weighty to be grasped and
comprehended by our sex.Nevertheless, the mistress held complete sway in her own domain; and
that this fact was recognized will be shown by the following incident:
A gentleman, a clever and successful lawyer, one day discovering a
<DW64> boy in some mischief about his house, and determining forthwith
to chastise him, took him into the yard for that purpose.Breaking a
small switch, and in the act of coming down with it upon the boy, he
asked: "Do you know, sir, who is master on my place?"Throwing aside the switch, the gentleman ran into the house, laughed a
half hour, and thus ended his only experiment at interfering in his
wife's domain.His wife, "Miss Charlotte," as the <DW64>s called her, was gentle and
indulgent to a fault, which made the incident more amusing.It may appear singular, yet it is true, that our women, although
having sufficient self-possession at home, and accustomed there to
command on a large scale, became painfully timid if ever they found
themselves in a promiscuous or public assemblage, shrinking from
everything like publicity.Still, these women, to whom a whole plantation looked up for guidance
and instruction, could not fail to feel a certain consciousness of
superiority, which, although never displayed or asserted in manner,
became a part of themselves.They were distinguishable everywhere--for
what reason, exactly, I have never been able to find out, for their
manners were too quiet to attract attention.Yet a captain on a
Mississippi steamboat said to me: "I always know a Virginia lady as
soon as she steps on my boat."I asked, supposing he would say: "By their plain
style of dress and antiquated breastpins."Said he: "I've been running a boat from Cincinnati to New Orleans for
twenty-five years, and often have three hundred passengers from
various parts of the world.But if there is a Virginia lady among
them, I find it out in half an hour.They take things quietly, and
don't complain.Well, she has
been complaining all the way up the Mississippi River.The cabin-maid and steward are worn out with trying to
please her.She says it is because the mosquitoes bit her so badly
coming through Louisiana.But we are almost at Cincinnati now, haven't
seen a mosquito for a week, and she is still complaining!"Then," he continued, "the Virginia ladies look as if they could not
push about for themselves, and for this reason I always feel like
giving them more attention than the other passengers."And these remarks of the captain convinced me--I had thought it
before--that Virginia women should never undertake to travel, but
content themselves with staying at home.However, such restriction
would have been unfair unless they had felt like the Parisian who,
when asked why the Parisians never traveled, replied: "Because all the
world comes to Paris!"Indeed, a Virginian had an opportunity for seeing much choice society
at home; for our watering-places attracted the best people from other
States, who often visited us at our houses.On the Mississippi boat to which I have alluded it was remarked that
the <DW64> servants paid the Southerners more constant and deferential
attention than the passengers from the non-slaveholding States,
although some of the latter were very agreeable and intelligent, and
conversed with the <DW64>s on terms of easy familiarity,--showing,
what I had often observed, that the <DW64> respects and admires those
who make a "social distinction" more than those who make none.CHAPTER X.
We were surprised to find in an "Ode to the South," by Mr.M. F.
Tupper, the following stanza:
"Yes, it is slander to say you oppressed them:
Does a man squander the prize of his pelf?Was it not often that he who possessed them
Rather was owned by his servants himself?"This was true, but that it was known in the outside world we thought
impossible, when all the newspaper and book accounts represented us as
miserable sinners for whom there was no hope here or hereafter, and
called upon all nations, Christian and civilized, to revile,
persecute, and exterminate us.Such representations, however, differed
so widely from the facts around us that when we heard them they failed
to produce a very serious impression, occasioning often only a smile,
with the exclamation: "How little those people know about us!"We had not the vanity to think that the European nations cared or
thought about us, and if the Americans believed these accounts, they
defamed the memory of one held up by them as a model of Christian
virtue--George Washington, a Virginia slave-owner, whose kindness to
his "people," as he called his slaves, entitled him to as much honor
as did his deeds of prowess.But to return to the two last lines of the stanza:
"Was it not often that he who possessed them
Rather was owned by his servants himself?"I am reminded of some who were actually held in such bondage;
especially an old gentleman who, together with his whole plantation,
was literally possessed by his slaves.This gentleman[10] was a widower, and no lady presided over his house.[10] William M. Radford, of Greenfield, Botetourt County.His figure was of medium height and very corpulent.His features were
regular and handsome, his eyes were soft brown, almost black, and his
hair was slightly gray.The expression of his countenance was so full
of goodness and sympathy that a stranger meeting him in the road might
have been convinced at a glance of his kindness and generosity.He was never very particular about his dress, yet never appeared
shabby.Although a graduate in law at the university, an ample fortune made it
unnecessary for him to practice his profession.Still his taste for
literature made him a constant reader, and his conversation was
instructive and agreeable.Mary went to the kitchen.His house was old and rambling, and--I was going to say his servants
kept the keys, but I remember there were _no keys_ about the
establishment.Even the front door had no lock upon it.Everybody
retired at night in perfect confidence, however, that everything was
secure enough, and it seemed not important to lock the doors.The <DW64> servants who managed the house were very efficient,
excelling especially in the culinary department, and serving up
dinners which were marvels.The superabundance on the place enabled them not only to furnish
their master's table with the choicest meats, vegetables, cakes,
pastries, etc., but also to supply themselves bountifully, and to
spread in their own cabins sumptuous feasts, and wedding and party
suppers rich enough for a queen.To this their master did not object, for he told them "if they would
supply his table always with an abundance of the best bread, meats,
cream, and butter, he cared not what became of the rest."The well-filled
barns, the stores of bacon, lard, flour, etc., literally belonged to
the <DW64>s, who allowed their master a certain share!Daniel moved to the bathroom.Sandra moved to the office.Doubtless they entertained the sentiment of a <DW64> boy who, on being
reproved by his master for having stolen and eaten a turkey, replied:
"Well, massa, you see, you got less turkey, but you got dat much more
niggah!"Such spot's at Cumae, where the mountains smoke,
Charged with the pungent sulphur, and increased
With steaming springs.And such a spot there is
Within the walls of Athens, even there
On summit of Acropolis, beside
Fane of Tritonian Pallas bountiful,
Where never cawing crows can wing their course,
Not even when smoke the altars with good gifts,--
But evermore they flee--yet not from wrath
|
kitchen | Where is Mary? | In Syria also--as men say--a spot
Is to be seen, where also four-foot kinds,
As soon as ever they've set their steps within,
Collapse, o'ercome by its essential power,
As if there slaughtered to the under-gods.Lo, all these wonders work by natural law,
And from what causes they are brought to pass
The origin is manifest; so, haply,
Let none believe that in these regions stands
The gate of Orcus, nor us then suppose,
Haply, that thence the under-gods draw down
Souls to dark shores of Acheron--as stags,
The wing-footed, are thought to draw to light,
By sniffing nostrils, from their dusky lairs
The wriggling generations of wild snakes.How far removed from true reason is this,
Perceive thou straight; for now I'll try to say
Somewhat about the very fact.And, first,
This do I say, as oft I've said before:
In earth are atoms of things of every sort;
And know, these all thus rise from out the earth--
Many life-giving which be good for food,
And many which can generate disease
And hasten death, O many primal seeds
Of many things in many modes--since earth
Contains them mingled and gives forth discrete.And we have shown before that certain things
Be unto certain creatures suited more
For ends of life, by virtue of a nature,
A texture, and primordial shapes, unlike
For kinds alike.Then too 'tis thine to see
How many things oppressive be and foul
To man, and to sensation most malign:
Many meander miserably through ears;
Many in-wind athrough the nostrils too,
Malign and harsh when mortal draws a breath;
Of not a few must one avoid the touch;
Of not a few must one escape the sight;
And some there be all loathsome to the taste;
And many, besides, relax the languid limbs
Along the frame, and undermine the soul
In its abodes within.To certain trees
There hath been given so dolorous a shade
That often they gender achings of the head,
If one but be beneath, outstretched on the sward.There is, again, on Helicon's high hills
A tree that's wont to kill a man outright
By fetid odour of its very flower.And when the pungent stench of the night-lamp,
Extinguished but a moment since, assails
The nostrils, then and there it puts to sleep
A man afflicted with the falling sickness
And foamings at the mouth.A woman, too,
At the heavy castor drowses back in chair,
And from her delicate fingers slips away
Her gaudy handiwork, if haply she
Hath got the whiff at menstruation-time.Once more, if thou delayest in hot baths,
When thou art over-full, how readily
From stool in middle of the steaming water
Thou tumblest in a fit!How readily
The heavy fumes of charcoal wind their way
Into the brain, unless beforehand we
Of water've drunk.But when a burning fever,
O'ermastering man, hath seized upon his limbs,
Then odour of wine is like a hammer-blow.And seest thou not how in the very earth
Sulphur is gendered and bitumen thickens
With noisome stench?--What direful stenches, too,
Scaptensula out-breathes from down below,
When men pursue the veins of silver and gold,
With pick-axe probing round the hidden realms
Deep in the earth?--Or what of deadly bane
The mines of gold exhale?O what a look,
And what a ghastly hue they give to men!Daniel journeyed to the kitchen.And seest thou not, or hearest, how they're wont
In little time to perish, and how fail
The life-stores in those folk whom mighty power
Of grim necessity confineth there
In such a task?Thus, this telluric earth
Out-streams with all these dread effluvia
And breathes them out into the open world
And into the visible regions under heaven.Thus, too, those Birdless places must up-send
An essence bearing death to winged things,
Which from the earth rises into the breezes
To poison part of skiey space, and when
Thither the winged is on pennons borne,
There, seized by the unseen poison, 'tis ensnared,
And from the horizontal of its flight
Drops to the spot whence sprang the effluvium.And when 'thas there collapsed, then the same power
Of that effluvium takes from all its limbs
The relics of its life.Daniel went back to the bedroom.That power first strikes
The creatures with a wildering dizziness,
And then thereafter, when they're once down-fallen
Into the poison's very fountains, then
Life, too, they vomit out perforce, because
So thick the stores of bane around them fume.Sandra travelled to the bathroom.Again, at times it happens that this power,
This exhalation of the Birdless places,
Dispels the air betwixt the ground and birds,
Leaving well-nigh a void.And thither when
In horizontal flight the birds have come,
Forthwith their buoyancy of pennons limps,
All useless, and each effort of both wings
Falls out in vain.Here, when without all power
To buoy themselves and on their wings to lean,
Lo, nature constrains them by their weight to slip
Down to the earth, and lying prostrate there
Along the well-nigh empty void, they spend
Their souls through all the openings of their frame.Sandra moved to the kitchen.*****
Further, the water of wells is colder then
At summer time, because the earth by heat
Is rarefied, and sends abroad in air
Whatever seeds it peradventure have
Of its own fiery exhalations.Sandra journeyed to the bedroom.Mary went to the kitchen.The more, then, the telluric ground is drained
Of heat, the colder grows the water hid
Within the earth.Further, when all the earth
Is by the cold compressed, and thus contracts
And, so to say, concretes, it happens, lo,
That by contracting it expresses then
Into the wells what heat it bears itself.Daniel moved to the bathroom.'Tis said at Hammon's fane a fountain is,
In daylight cold and hot in time of night.This fountain men be-wonder over-much,
And think that suddenly it seethes in heat
By intense sun, the subterranean, when
Night with her terrible murk hath cloaked the lands--
What's not true reasoning by a long remove:
I' faith when sun o'erhead, touching with beams
An open body of water, had no power
To render it hot upon its upper side,
Though his high light possess such burning glare,
How, then, can he, when under the gross earth,
Make water boil and glut with fiery heat?--
And, specially, since scarcely potent he
Through hedging walls of houses to inject
His exhalations hot, with ardent rays.Why, this, indeed:
The earth about that spring is porous more
Than elsewhere the telluric ground, and be
Many the seeds of fire hard by the water;
On this account, when night with dew-fraught shades
Hath whelmed the earth, anon the earth deep down
Grows chill, contracts; and thuswise squeezes out
Into the spring what seeds she holds of fire
(As one might squeeze with fist), which render hot
The touch and steam of the fluid.Next, when sun,
Up-risen, with his rays has split the soil
And rarefied the earth with waxing heat,
Again into their ancient abodes return
The seeds of fire, and all the Hot of water
Into the earth retires; and this is why
The fountain in the daylight gets so cold.Besides, the water's wet is beat upon
By rays of sun, and, with the dawn, becomes
Rarer in texture under his pulsing blaze;
And, therefore, whatso seeds it holds of fire
It renders up, even as it renders oft
The frost that it contains within itself
And thaws its ice and looseneth the knots.There is, moreover, a fountain cold in kind
That makes a bit of tow (above it held)
Take fire forthwith and shoot a flame; so, too,
A pitch-pine torch will kindle and flare round
Along its waves, wherever 'tis impelled
Afloat before the breeze.No marvel, this:
Because full many seeds of heat there be
Within the water; and, from earth itself
Out of the deeps must particles of fire
Athrough the entire fountain surge aloft,
And speed in exhalations into air
Forth and abroad (yet not in numbers enow
As to make hot the fountain).And, moreo'er,
Some force constrains them, scattered through the water,
Forthwith to burst abroad, and to combine
In flame above.Even as a fountain far
There is at Aradus amid the sea,
Which bubbles out sweet water and disparts
From round itself the salt waves; and, behold,
In many another region the broad main
Yields to the thirsty mariners timely help,
Belching sweet waters forth amid salt waves.Just so, then, can those seeds of fire burst forth
Athrough that other fount, and bubble out
Abroad against the bit of tow; and when
They there collect or cleave unto the torch,
Forthwith they readily flash aflame, because
The tow and torches, also, in themselves
Have many seeds of latent fire.Indeed,
And seest thou not, when near the nightly lamps
Thou bringest a flaxen wick, extinguished
A moment since, it catches fire before
'Thas touched the flame, and in same wise a torch?And many another object flashes aflame
When at a distance, touched by heat alone,
Before 'tis steeped in veritable fire.Sandra moved to the office.This, then, we must suppose to come to pass
In that spring also.And I'll begin to treat by what decree
Of nature it came to pass that iron can be
By that stone drawn which Greeks the magnet call
After the country's name (its origin
Being in country of Magnesian folk).This stone men marvel at; and sure it oft
Maketh a chain of rings, depending, lo,
From off itself!Sandra travelled to the hallway.Nay, thou mayest see at times
Five or yet more in order dangling down
And swaying in the delicate winds, whilst one
Depends from other, cleaving to under-side,
And ilk one feels the stone's own power and bonds--
So over-masteringly its power flows down.In things of this sort, much must be made sure
Ere thou account of the thing itself canst give,
And the approaches roundabout must be;
Wherefore the more do I exact of thee
A mind and ears attent.First, from all things
We see soever, evermore must flow,
Must be discharged and strewn about, about,
Bodies that strike the eyes, awaking sight.From certain things flow odours evermore,
As cold from rivers, heat from sun, and spray
From waves of ocean, eater-out of walls
Along the coasts.Nor ever cease to seep
The varied echoings athrough the air.John went to the kitchen.Then, too, there comes into the mouth at times
The wet of a salt taste, when by the sea
We roam about; and so, whene'er we watch
The wormwood being mixed, its bitter stings.To such degree from all things is each thing
Borne streamingly along, and sent about
To every region round; and nature grants
Nor rest nor respite of the onward flow,
Since 'tis incessantly we feeling have,
And all the time are suffered to descry
And smell all things at hand, and hear them sound.Now will I seek again to bring to mind
How porous a body all things have--a fact
Made manifest in my first canto, too.For, truly, though to know this doth import
For many things, yet for this very thing
On which straightway I'm going to discourse,
'Tis needful most of all to make it sure
That naught's at hand but body mixed with void.A first ensample: in grottos, rocks o'erhead
Sweat moisture and distil the oozy drops;
Likewise, from all our body seeps the sweat;
There grows the beard, and along our members all
And along our frame the hairs.Through all our veins
Disseminates the foods, and gives increase
And aliment down to the extreme parts,
Even to the tiniest finger-nails.Likewise,
|
garden | Where is Daniel? | And, again, there flit
Voices through houses' hedging walls of stone;
Odour seeps through, and cold, and heat of fire
That's wont to penetrate even strength of iron.Again, where corselet of the sky girds round
*****
And at same time, some Influence of bane,
When from Beyond 'thas stolen into [our world].And tempests, gathering from the earth and sky,
Back to the sky and earth absorbed retire--
With reason, since there's naught that's fashioned not
With body porous.Furthermore, not all
The particles which be from things thrown off
Are furnished with same qualities for sense,
Nor be for all things equally adapt.A first ensample: the sun doth bake and parch
The earth; but ice he thaws, and with his beams
Compels the lofty snows, up-reared white
Upon the lofty hills, to waste away;
Then, wax, if set beneath the heat of him,
Melts to a liquid.And the fire, likewise,
Will melt the copper and will fuse the gold,
But hides and flesh it shrivels up and shrinks.The water hardens the iron just off the fire,
But hides and flesh (made hard by heat) it softens.The oleaster-tree as much delights
The bearded she-goats, verily as though
'Twere nectar-steeped and shed ambrosia;
Than which is naught that burgeons into leaf
More bitter food for man.A hog draws back
For marjoram oil, and every unguent fears
Fierce poison these unto the bristled hogs,
Yet unto us from time to time they seem,
As 'twere, to give new life.But, contrariwise,
Though unto us the mire be filth most foul,
To hogs that mire doth so delightsome seem
That they with wallowing from belly to back
Are never cloyed.A point remains, besides,
Which best it seems to tell of, ere I go
To telling of the fact at hand itself.Since to the varied things assigned be
The many pores, those pores must be diverse
In nature one from other, and each have
Its very shape, its own direction fixed.John went to the hallway.And so, indeed, in breathing creatures be
The several senses, of which each takes in
Unto itself, in its own fashion ever,
Its own peculiar object.For we mark
How sounds do into one place penetrate,
Into another flavours of all juice,
And savour of smell into a third.Moreover,
One sort through rocks we see to seep, and, lo,
One sort to pass through wood, another still
Through gold, and others to go out and off
Through silver and through glass.For we do see
Through some pores form-and-look of things to flow,
Through others heat to go, and some things still
To speedier pass than others through same pores.Of verity, the nature of these same paths,
Varying in many modes (as aforesaid)
Because of unlike nature and warp and woof
Of cosmic things, constrains it so to be.Wherefore, since all these matters now have been
Established and settled well for us
As premises prepared, for what remains
'Twill not be hard to render clear account
By means of these, and the whole cause reveal
Whereby the magnet lures the strength of iron.First, stream there must from off the lode-stone seeds
Innumerable, a very tide, which smites
By blows that air asunder lying betwixt
The stone and iron.And when is emptied out
This space, and a large place between the two
Is made a void, forthwith the primal germs
Of iron, headlong slipping, fall conjoined
Into the vacuum, and the ring itself
By reason thereof doth follow after and go
Thuswise with all its body.And naught there is
That of its own primordial elements
More thoroughly knit or tighter linked coheres
Than nature and cold roughness of stout iron.Wherefore, 'tis less a marvel what I said,
That from such elements no bodies can
From out the iron collect in larger throng
And be into the vacuum borne along,
Without the ring itself do follow after.And this it does, and followeth on until
'Thath reached the stone itself and cleaved to it
By links invisible.Moreover, likewise,
The motion's assisted by a thing of aid
(Whereby the process easier becomes),--
Namely, by this: as soon as rarer grows
That air in front of the ring, and space between
Is emptied more and made a void, forthwith
It happens all the air that lies behind
Conveys it onward, pushing from the rear.For ever doth the circumambient air
Drub things unmoved, but here it pushes forth
The iron, because upon one side the space
Lies void and thus receives the iron in.Daniel moved to the garden.This air, whereof I am reminding thee,
Winding athrough the iron's abundant pores
So subtly into the tiny parts thereof,
Shoves it and pushes, as wind the ship and sails.The same doth happen in all directions forth:
From whatso side a space is made a void,
Whether from crosswise or above, forthwith
The neighbour particles are borne along
Into the vacuum; for of verity,
They're set a-going by poundings from elsewhere,
Nor by themselves of own accord can they
Rise upwards into the air.Again, all things
Must in their framework hold some air, because
They are of framework porous, and the air
Encompasses and borders on all things.Thus, then, this air in iron so deeply stored
Is tossed evermore in vexed motion,
And therefore drubs upon the ring sans doubt
And shakes it up inside....
*****
In sooth, that ring is thither borne along
To where 'thas once plunged headlong--thither, lo,
Unto the void whereto it took its start.It happens, too, at times that nature of iron
Shrinks from this stone away, accustomed
By turns to flee and follow.Yea, I've seen
Those Samothracian iron rings leap up,
And iron filings in the brazen bowls
Seethe furiously, when underneath was set
The magnet stone.So strongly iron seems
To crave to flee that rock.Such discord great
Is gendered by the interposed brass,
Because, forsooth, when first the tide of brass
Hath seized upon and held possession of
The iron's open passage-ways, thereafter
Cometh the tide of the stone, and in that iron
Findeth all spaces full, nor now hath holes
To swim through, as before.'Tis thus constrained
With its own current 'gainst the iron's fabric
To dash and beat; by means whereof it spues
Forth from itself--and through the brass stirs up--
The things which otherwise without the brass
It sucks into itself.In these affairs
Marvel thou not that from this stone the tide
Prevails not likewise other things to move
With its own blows: for some stand firm by weight,
As gold; and some cannot be moved forever,
Because so porous in their framework they
That there the tide streams through without a break,
Of which sort stuff of wood is seen to be.Therefore, when iron (which lies between the two)
Hath taken in some atoms of the brass,
Then do the streams of that Magnesian rock
Move iron by their smitings.Yet these things
Are not so alien from others, that I
Of this same sort am ill prepared to name
Ensamples still of things exclusively
To one another adapt.Thou seest, first,
How lime alone cementeth stones: how wood
Only by glue-of-bull with wood is joined--
So firmly too that oftener the boards
Crack open along the weakness of the grain
Ere ever those taurine bonds will lax their hold.The vine-born juices with the water-springs
Are bold to mix, though not the heavy pitch
With the light oil-of-olive.And purple dye
Of shell-fish so uniteth with the wool's
Body alone that it cannot be ta'en
Away forever--nay, though thou gavest toil
To restore the same with the Neptunian flood,
Nay, though all ocean willed to wash it out
With all its waves.Again, gold unto gold
Doth not one substance bind, and only one?And is not brass by tin joined unto brass?And other ensamples how many might one find!Nor is there unto thee a need
Of such long ways and roundabout, nor boots it
For me much toil on this to spend.More fit
It is in few words briefly to embrace
Things many: things whose textures fall together
So mutually adapt, that cavities
To solids correspond, these cavities
Of this thing to the solid parts of that,
And those of that to solid parts of this--
Such joinings are the best.Again, some things
Can be the one with other coupled and held,
Linked by hooks and eyes, as 'twere; and this
Seems more the fact with iron and this stone.Now, of diseases what the law, and whence
The Influence of bane upgathering can
Upon the race of man and herds of cattle
Kindle a devastation fraught with death,
I will unfold.And, first, I've taught above
That seeds there be of many things to us
Life-giving, and that, contrariwise, there must
Fly many round bringing disease and death.When these have, haply, chanced to collect
And to derange the atmosphere of earth,
The air becometh baneful.And, lo, all
That Influence of bane, that pestilence,
Or from Beyond down through our atmosphere,
Like clouds and mists, descends, or else collects
From earth herself and rises, when, a-soak
And beat by rains unseasonable and suns,
Our earth hath then contracted stench and rot.Seest thou not, also, that whoso arrive
In region far from fatherland and home
Are by the strangeness of the clime and waters
Distempered?--since conditions vary much.For in what else may we suppose the clime
Among the Britons to differ from Aegypt's own
(Where totters awry the axis of the world),
Or in what else to differ Pontic clime
From Gades' and from climes adown the south,
On to black generations of strong men
With sun-baked skins?Even as we thus do see
Four climes diverse under the four main-winds
And under the four main-regions of the sky,
So, too, are seen the colour and face of men
Vastly to disagree, and fixed diseases
To seize the generations, kind by kind:
There is the elephant-disease which down
In midmost Aegypt, hard by streams of Nile,
Engendered is--and never otherwhere.In Attica the feet are oft attacked,
And in Achaean lands the eyes.And so
The divers spots to divers parts and limbs
Are noxious; 'tis a variable air
That causes this.Thus when an atmosphere,
Alien by chance to us, begins to heave,
And noxious airs begin to crawl along,
They creep and wind like unto mist and cloud,
Slowly, and everything upon their way
They disarrange and force to change its state.It happens, too, that when they've come at last
Into this atmosphere of ours, they taint
And make it like themselves and alien.Therefore, asudden this devastation strange,
This pestilence, upon the waters falls,
Or settles on the very crops of grain
Or other meat of men and feed of flocks.Or it remains a subtle force, suspense
In the atmosphere itself; and when therefrom
We draw our inhalations of mixed air,
Into our body equally its bane
Also we must suck in.In manner like,
Oft comes the pestilence upon the kine,
And sickness, too, upon the sluggish sheep.Nor aught it matters whether journey we
To regions adverse to ourselves and change
The atmospheric cloak, or whether nature
Herself import a tainted atmosphere
To us or something strange to our own use
Which can attack us soon as ever it come.THE PLAGUE ATHENS
'Twas such a manner of disease, 'twas such
Mortal miasma in Cecropian lands
Whilom reduced the plains to dead men's bones,
Unpeopled the highways, drained of citizens
The Athenian town.For coming from afar,
Rising in lands of Aegypt, traversing
Reaches of air and floating fields of foam,
At last on all Pandion's folk it swooped;
Whereat by troops unto disease and death
Were they |
bedroom | Where is John? | At first, they'd bear about
A skull on fire with heat, and eyeballs twain
Red with suffusion of blank glare.Their throats,
Black on the inside, sweated oozy blood;
And the walled pathway of the voice of man
Was clogged with ulcers; and the very tongue,
The mind's interpreter, would trickle gore,
Weakened by torments, tardy, rough to touch.Next when that Influence of bane had chocked,
Down through the throat, the breast, and streamed had
E'en into sullen heart of those sick folk,
Then, verily, all the fences of man's life
Began to topple.From the mouth the breath
Would roll a noisome stink, as stink to heaven
Rotting cadavers flung unburied out.John went to the hallway.And, lo, thereafter, all the body's strength
And every power of mind would languish, now
In very doorway of destruction.Daniel moved to the garden.And anxious anguish and ululation (mixed
With many a groan) companioned alway
The intolerable torments.Night and day,
Recurrent spasms of vomiting would rack
Alway their thews and members, breaking down
With sheer exhaustion men already spent.John went back to the bedroom.And yet on no one's body couldst thou mark
The skin with o'er-much heat to burn aglow,
But rather the body unto touch of hands
Would offer a warmish feeling, and thereby
Show red all over, with ulcers, so to say,
Inbranded, like the "sacred fires" o'erspread
Along the members.The inward parts of men,
In truth, would blaze unto the very bones;
A flame, like flame in furnaces, would blaze
Within the stomach.Nor couldst aught apply
Unto their members light enough and thin
For shift of aid--but coolness and a breeze
Ever and ever.Some would plunge those limbs
On fire with bane into the icy streams,
Hurling the body naked into the waves;
Many would headlong fling them deeply down
The water-pits, tumbling with eager mouth
Already agape.The insatiable thirst
That whelmed their parched bodies, lo, would make
A goodly shower seem like to scanty drops.Their frames
Forspent lay prone.With silent lips of fear
Would Medicine mumble low, the while she saw
So many a time men roll their eyeballs round,
Staring wide-open, unvisited of sleep,
The heralds of old death.And in those months
Was given many another sign of death:
The intellect of mind by sorrow and dread
Deranged, the sad brow, the countenance
Fierce and delirious, the tormented ears
Beset with ringings, the breath quick and short
Or huge and intermittent, soaking sweat
A-glisten on neck, the spittle in fine gouts
Tainted with colour of crocus and so salt,
The cough scarce wheezing through the rattling throat.Aye, and the sinews in the fingered hands
Were sure to contract, and sure the jointed frame
To shiver, and up from feet the cold to mount
Inch after inch: and toward the supreme hour
At last the pinched nostrils, nose's tip
A very point, eyes sunken, temples hollow,
Skin cold and hard, the shuddering grimace,
The pulled and puffy flesh above the brows!--
O not long after would their frames lie prone
In rigid death.And by about the eighth
Resplendent light of sun, or at the most
On the ninth flaming of his flambeau, they
Would render up the life.If any then
Had'scaped the doom of that destruction, yet
Him there awaited in the after days
A wasting and a death from ulcers vile
And black discharges of the belly, or else
Through the clogged nostrils would there ooze along
Much fouled blood, oft with an aching head:
Hither would stream a man's whole strength and flesh.And whoso had survived that virulent flow
Of the vile blood, yet into thews of him
And into his joints and very genitals
Would pass the old disease.And some there were,
Dreading the doorways of destruction
So much, lived on, deprived by the knife
Of the male member; not a few, though lopped
Of hands and feet, would yet persist in life,
And some there were who lost their eyeballs: O
So fierce a fear of death had fallen on them!And some, besides, were by oblivion
Of all things seized, that even themselves they knew
No longer.And though corpse on corpse lay piled
Unburied on ground, the race of birds and beasts
Would or spring back, scurrying to escape
The virulent stench, or, if they'd tasted there,
Would languish in approaching death.But yet
Hardly at all during those many suns
Appeared a fowl, nor from the woods went forth
The sullen generations of wild beasts--
They languished with disease and died and died.In chief, the faithful dogs, in all the streets
Outstretched, would yield their breath distressfully
For so that Influence of bane would twist
Life from their members.Nor was found one sure
And universal principle of cure:
For what to one had given the power to take
The vital winds of air into his mouth,
And to gaze upward at the vaults of sky,
The same to others was their death and doom.In those affairs, O awfullest of all,
O pitiable most was this, was this:
Whoso once saw himself in that disease
Entangled, ay, as damned unto death,
Would lie in wanhope, with a sullen heart,
Would, in fore-vision of his funeral,
Give up the ghost, O then and there.For, lo,
At no time did they cease one from another
To catch contagion of the greedy plague,--
As though but woolly flocks and horned herds;
And this in chief would heap the dead on dead:
For who forbore to look to their own sick,
O these (too eager of life, of death afeard)
Would then, soon after, slaughtering Neglect
Visit with vengeance of evil death and base--
Themselves deserted and forlorn of help.But who had stayed at hand would perish there
By that contagion and the toil which then
A sense of honour and the pleading voice
Of weary watchers, mixed with voice of wail
Of dying folk, forced them to undergo.This kind of death each nobler soul would meet.The funerals, uncompanioned, forsaken,
Like rivals contended to be hurried through.*****
And men contending to ensepulchre
Pile upon pile the throng of their own dead:
And weary with woe and weeping wandered home;
And then the most would take to bed from grief.Nor could be found not one, whom nor disease
Nor death, nor woe had not in those dread times
Attacked.By now the shepherds and neatherds all,
Yea, even the sturdy guiders of curved ploughs,
Began to sicken, and their bodies would lie
Huddled within back-corners of their huts,
Delivered by squalor and disease to death.O often and often couldst thou then have seen
On lifeless children lifeless parents prone,
Or offspring on their fathers', mothers' corpse
Yielding the life.And into the city poured
O not in least part from the countryside
That tribulation, which the peasantry
Sick, sick, brought thither, thronging from every quarter,
Plague-stricken mob.All places would they crowd,
All buildings too; whereby the more would death
Up-pile a-heap the folk so crammed in town.Ah, many a body thirst had dragged and rolled
Along the highways there was lying strewn
Besides Silenus-headed water-fountains,--
The life-breath choked from that too dear desire
Of pleasant waters.Ah, everywhere along
The open places of the populace,
And along the highways, O thou mightest see
Of many a half-dead body the sagged limbs,
Rough with squalor, wrapped around with rags,
Perish from very nastiness, with naught
But skin upon the bones, well-nigh already
Buried--in ulcers vile and obscene filth.All holy temples, too, of deities
Had Death becrammed with the carcasses;
And stood each fane of the Celestial Ones
Laden with stark cadavers everywhere--
Places which warders of the shrines had crowded
With many a guest.For now no longer men
Did mightily esteem the old Divine,
The worship of the gods: the woe at hand
Did over-master.Nor in the city then
Remained those rites of sepulture, with which
That pious folk had evermore been wont
To buried be.For it was wildered all
In wild alarms, and each and every one
With sullen sorrow would bury his own dead,
As present shift allowed.And sudden stress
And poverty to many an awful act
Impelled; and with a monstrous screaming they
Would, on the frames of alien funeral pyres,
Place their own kin, and thrust the torch beneath
Oft brawling with much bloodshed round about
Rather than quit dead bodies loved in life.The Camel Corps 40
9.The English General's Syces 49
10.Mary journeyed to the garden.Registering Fellaheen for the Conscription 56
11.The "Fostat" becalmed 62
13.At Philae 67
14.A "Lament" in the Desert 70
15.Abu Simbel at Sunrise 76
16.Madame's "At Home" Day; Servants at the Gate 81
17.Syndioor on the Lower Nile 88
THE CAPE
18."In the Hollow of His Hand" 97
19.A Corner of our Garden at Rosebank 104
20.The Inverted Crescent 113
21.The Cape "Flats" 120
ITALY
22.Bringing in the Grapes 123
23.A Son of the Soil, Riviera di Levante 126
24.Ploughing in Tuscany 145
25.The Bersaglieri at the Fountain, Perugia 152
26.A Meeting on the Pincian: French and German
Seminarists 161
27.A Lenten Sermon in the Colosseum 164
28 |
kitchen | Where is Sandra? | The Start for the Horse Race, Rome 168
Also head and tail pieces in black and white on pp.2, 3, 15, 27,
28, 30, 31, 54, 55, 76, 77, 88, 90, 91, 104, 105, 122, 123,
142, 143, and 160.[Illustration: OUR ESCORT INTO GLENARAGH]
I
IN THE WEST OF IRELAND
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
CHAPTER I
GLENARAGH
My diary must introduce you to Glenaragh, where I saw a land whose
beauty was a revelation to me; a new delight unlike anything I had seen
in my experiences of the world's loveliness.To one familiarized from
childhood with Italy's peculiar charm, a sudden vision of the Wild West
of Ireland produces a sensation of freshness and surprise difficult
adequately to describe.
"--_June_ '77.--At Killarney we left the train and set off on one of the
most enchanting carriage journeys I have ever made, passing by the
lovely Lough Leane by a road hedged in on both sides with masses of the
richest May blossom.For some distance the scenery was wooded and soft,
almost too perfect in composition of wood, lake, river, and mountain;
but by degrees we left behind us those scenes of finished beauty, and
entered upon tracts of glorious bog-land which, in the advancing
evening, impressed me beyond even my heart's desire by their breadth of
colour and solemn tones.I was beginning to taste the salt of the Wilds."The scenery grew more rugged still, and against ranges of distant
mountains jutted out the strong grey and brown rocks, the stone cairns
and cabins of the Wild West land."To be a figure-painter and full of interest in mankind does not mean
that one cannot enjoy, from the depths of one's heart, such scenes as
these, where what human habitations there are, are so like the stone
heaps that lie over the face of the land that they are scarcely
distinguishable from them.When observed they only convey to the mind
the sense of the feebleness of man, overpowered as he is here by the
might of the primeval landscape.This human atom stands timidly at his
black cabin door to see the stranger pass, often half-witted through
privation; or he silently tills the little patch of land he has borrowed
from the strong and barbarous earth that yields him so little."The mighty 'Carran Thual,' one of the mountain group which rises out of
Glenaragh and dominates the whole land of Kerry, was ablaze with burning
heather, its peak sending up a glorious column of smoke which spread out
at the top for miles and miles and changed its exquisite smoke tints
every minute as the sun sank lower.As we reached the rocky pass that
took us by the wild and remote Lough Acoose that sun had gone down
behind an opposite mountain, and the blazing heather glowed brighter as
the twilight deepened, and circles of fire played fiercely and weirdly
on the mountain-side.Our Glen gave the 'Saxon lady' its grandest
illumination on her arrival."Wild strange birds rose from the bracken as we passed, and flew
strongly away over lake and mountain torrent, and the little black Kerry
cows all watched us go by with ears pricked and heads inquiringly
raised.The last stage of the journey had a brilliant _finale_.A herd
of young horses was in our way in the narrow road, and the creatures
careered before us, unable or too stupid to turn aside into the ditches
by the roadside to let us through.John went to the hallway.We could not head them, and for fully
a mile did those shaggy wild things caper and jump ahead, their manes
flying out wildly with the glow from the west shining through them.Some
imbecile cows soon joined them in the stampede, for no imaginable
reason, unless they enjoyed the fright of being pursued, and the
ungainly progress of those recruits was a sight to behold,--tails in the
air and horns in the dust.The troop led the way right into the eye of
the sunset.* * * * *
"--_June_ 1877.--We rode in to-night after a long excursion amidst the
mountains of this wild land of Kerry, rode down into the glen where our
little inn stands in a clump of birch and arbutus trees.That northern
light which in these high latitudes and at this season carries the
after-light of the sunset on into the dawn, lighted our path for the
last hour with surprising power.Were we sufficiently far north, of
course, the sun itself would not dip below the horizon at all, but here
we have only the upper portion of his aureole from his setting to his
rising.the wild freedom of these mountain paths, the scent of the
cabin turf fires, the round west wind rolling through the heather; what
cool wells of memories they fill up for the thirsty traveller in desert
places far away.This is the first land it has swept
with its wings since it left the coasts of Labrador.For purity, for
freshness, for generosity, give me the Wild West wind of Ireland."'Carran Thual' is still on fire; it signals each night back to the
northern light across the glen in a red glare of burning heather.The
moon, now in her first quarter, looks green-gold by contrast with all
this red of sky and flame, and altogether our glen gives us, these
nights, such a display of earthly and heavenly splendour that it seems
one should be a spectator all night of so much beauty.And to this
concert of colour runs the subtle accompaniment of rushing water, for
all these mountains are laced with silvery torrents leaping down to the
lakes and rivers that reflect the glory of the sky.loveliest
of wild valleys, where is the poet that should make thee the theme of
his songs?"Coming through 'Windy Gap' in this illuminated gloaming we met a lonely
horseman riding fast, a rope for his bridle, his pony very shaggy.He
passed us over the rocks and rolling stones, and, looking back, we saw
his bent figure jet black against the west for a moment, ere he dipped
down through the 'Gap' out of sight.Some peasant
was dying on the mountain-side beyond, and the priest was anxious to be
in time with the Viaticum."A strange little creature came out of the kitchen of the inn to see us
after supper, and I made the acquaintance of a Leprechaun.Tiny, grey,
bald little manikin; a 'fairy,' the people call him.I do not want to
know why they are like that.I would rather leave them mysterious and
unexplained.* * * * *
"The people speak Gaelic here, amongst themselves, and the priest
preaches in it in the little chapel with the mud floor up on the hill
over the torrent.The language and the torrent seem to speak alike,
hurrying headlong.[Illustration: "A CHAPEL-OF-EASE," CO.KERRY]
"But the chapel!Daniel moved to the garden.Shall I ever forget the tub of holy water, on my first
Sunday, placed before the rickety little altar on the mud floor, where
the people, on coming in, splashed the water up into their faces?The
old women had all brought big bottles from their homes in far-away glens
to fill at the tub, and nothing could surpass the comicality of
their attitudes as they stooped over their pious business, all wearing
the hooded cloak that made them look as broad as they were long.One old
lady, in her nice white cap, monopolized the tub an unconscionably long
time, for, catching sight of her wind-tossed tresses in that
looking-glass, she finished her devout ablutions by smoothing her few
grey hairs with her moistened fingers into tidy bands, with alternate
signs of the cross.The windows were all broken, and the men and boys
stuffed the holes with their hats and caps to keep out the mountain
blast."Last Sunday, a very hot day, the tub happened to be placed outside the
door, and it was well my horse was not tied up within reach, or a former
catastrophe might have been repeated, and a 'blessed baist' have carried
me home.The heat in the rickety little gallery, where the 'quality'
have their seats, was such that I went out into the open air and
followed the rest of the service with a rock for my hassock, and two
rosy pigs toddling about me in that friendly way I notice as
characteristic of all the animals in these parts.They seem to feel they
are members of the family, and you see calves, goats, pigs, and donkeys
sauntering in and out of the cabin doors in a free-and-easy harmony
with the human beings which takes my fancy greatly.But the beasts are
by far the happiest; their lives seem passed in perfect contentment and
satisfaction, whereas the poor human animals have a hard struggle for
existence in this stony and difficult land of Kerry."The other day when W. and I dismounted at a cabin door on a wild
mountain that holds, still higher up, a little dark lake which the
people declare has no bottom to it, and on the shores of which 'worms as
big as a horse' come out and bellow in the evenings, the gaunt pig that
seemed to act watch-dog charged at me like a wild boar and sent me home
in 'looped and windowed raggedness.'I never thought to find excess of
zeal in a pig!The inmates of the cabin could not do enough for us to
make up for such want of reticence.John went back to the bedroom."On one occasion at church in Tipperary, I noticed a rather satanic goat
come pattering up the church and occupy an empty pew, where he lay down
with perfect self-complacency and remained quiescent, chewing the cud,
while we knelt; but each time the congregation stood up, up jumped the
goat, his pale eyes and enormous horns just appearing over the high
front of the pew.Then as we knelt again he would subside also, till he
was startled to his feet once more by the rustle of the people rising,
and then his wild head was again visible over the top of the pew,
staring about him.Not a single person took any notice of the weird
creature or seemed to think him out of place or at all funny.And so he
continued to rise and fall with the rest to the end."Our chapel here is too small for the congregation that streams in from
places as far as fifteen miles away among the mountains, and on one
pouring wet Sunday I saw the strangest rendering of what is called 'a
chapel-of-ease.'Not much 'ease' there, for some dozen men and youths
who could find no place inside were kneeling about the door in running
water, with a stone placed under each knee.Every day I see some
incident or episode which has for me a surprise and all the charm of a
new and striking experience.I feel more 'abroad' in this country than I
do on the Continent.A friend journeying to our inn and
missing the road got belated in the defiles of the 'Reeks.'Dismounting
at one of those mud cabins, which, at a little distance, are
indistinguishable from their rocky surroundings, to ask the way, he was
invited inside and offered a meal.The light was waning, so two little
girls stood on either side of the stranger, each holding a bit of
lighted candle as he sat at table.These wild-eyed and ragged little
creatures made a pretty pair of dining-table candlesticks!I wish I
could have seen them in the dim twilight of the black, smoke-dimmed
cabin interior, their faces lighted by the candle flame."The beauty of the children here is a constant pleasure to me.Mary journeyed to the garden.We are
here in the land of blue eyes and black lashes, or golden ones, when the
hair, as it so frequently is, is ruddy.I wish a painter of female beauty could have seen the girl we
passed to-day who was minding some calves in a bit of bog-land bordered
with birch-trees.It was a symphony of green; her head shawl was green
plaid, her petticoat another tone of green, the background and all her
surroundings gave every cool and delicious variation of green, and her
ruddy limbs and red-gold hair, tossed by the breeze and shone through by
the sun, looked richer in colour by the contrast.Her great blue eyes
looked shyly at us and the shawl soon covered her laughing face.What a
sweet picture, 'In the Green Isle'!Sandra went back to the kitchen."Every day I am more and more struck with the light-heartedness and
gaiety of the animals.Whether it is emphasized by the poverty-stricken
and quiet, saddened, demeanour of the human beings in these parts I
cannot tell, but certainly the beasts seem to have the best of it.As to
the dogs that belong to the mud cabins, never have I seen such jolly
dogs, full of comic ways, especially when in puppy-hood, and all so
valiant in confronting us as we near their strongholds.But on our near
approach that puppy who looks mighty fierce afar off usually bolts under
some door and sticks there.Then the pigs, who generally are less
valiant than our wild boar of Lough Cluen, seized with apparent panic,
rush round and round in the yard, and the flurried ducks that scuttle
from under our horses' hoofs end by falling on their sides in the
ditches--surely all in fun?And invariably the cows and calves by the
way-side prefer to be pursued along the roads, and keep up a splendid
burst of galloping with tails in the air for miles before a tumble
happening to one of them suggests a movement to the rear.All the lower
creatures are 'jolly dogs' here, and only man is care-worn."In the autumn we came back to our well-loved glen, and I gathered
materials there for my first _married_ Academy picture--the 'Recruits
for the Connaught Rangers.'W. found me two splendid 'bog-trotters' for
models.The elder of the two had the finer physique, and it was
explained to me that this was owing to his having been reared on
herrings as well as potatoes, whereas the other, who lived up in the
mountains, away from the sea, had not known the luxury of the herring.I
wish we could get more of these men into our army.W. at that time was
developing suggestions for forming a Regiment of Irish Guards, and I was
enthusiastic in my adhesion to such a project and filling the imaginary
ranks with big men like my two models.However, he was some twenty-three
years too soon, and the honour had to be won for Ireland through yet
another big war.[Illustration]
CHAPTER II
COUNTY MAYO IN 1905
I wish you would make a summer tour to Mayo.Daniel went to the hallway.It is simple; yet what a
change of scene, of sensations, of thoughts one secures by this simple
and direct journey--Euston, Holyhead, Dublin, Mulranny.You travel right
across Ireland, getting a very informing vista of the poverty and
stagnation of those Midland counties till your eyes greet the glorious
development of natural beauty on the confines of the sea-girt Western
land.I went there tired from London and came on a scene of the most
perfect repose imaginable, with the sound of the motor buses still
buzzing in my ears.Mulranny is supremely healthy--a place of rosy cheeks and sunburn,
bracing yet genial, clear-aired, majestic in its scenery, unspoilt.As
you near your journey's end and enter Mayo the change in the scenery
from the emptiness of Roscommon develops rapidly.Magnificent mountains
rise on the horizon, and the grandeur of the landscape grows into
extraordinary |
bathroom | Where is John? | The great cone
of Croagh Patrick rises in striking isolation at first, and then the
surrounding mountains, one by one, join it in lovely outlines against
the fresh _clean_ sky.It was a beautiful afternoon when I was
introduced to this memorable landscape, and the waters of the Bay were
quite calm.After sunset the crescent moon gave the culminating charm to
the lovely scene in the west, while to the south the red planet Mars
flamed above Croagh Patrick, and all this beauty was mirrored in the
Bay.John went to the hallway.What an emancipation from the fret and fuss of little Piccadilly in
a hot July to find oneself before these mountain forms and colours that
have not changed since the cooling of the earth.You might travel
farther a great way and not find such a virgin land.[Illustration: CROAGH PATRICK]
And there is Achill Island, a one-day's excursion from Mulranny,
poignantly melancholy in its beauty and remoteness beyond anything I
have seen in the west.Achill has often been described; it holds the
traveller's attention with a wild appeal to his heart; but I don't know
that one little detail of that land "beyond the beyond" has ever been
described.It is Achill's mournful little Pompeii, a village of the
dead, on a bare hillside, which we passed one day on our way to an
unfrequented part of the island.Daniel moved to the garden.This village was deserted in the awful
famine year of '47, some of the inhabitants creeping away in fruitless
search of work and food to die farther afield, others simply sinking
down on the home sod that could give them nothing but the grave.In the
bright sunshine its roofless cabins and grass-grown streets looked more
heart-breaking than they might have done in dismal rain.I wish I could
have made a sketch of it as I saw it that day--a subject strongly
attracting the attention of the mind rather than the eye.Everywhere in this country there is that heart-piercing contrast between
natural beauty and human adversity--that companionship of sun and
sorrow.But the light and the darkness seem blended by the unquestioning
faith of these rugged Christians into a solemn unity and harmony before
which any words of mine sound only like so much dilettantism.A rough, plain little building,
too formless to be picturesque, packed with peasant men, women, and
children.Where but in Ireland could such a scene take place as I
witnessed there?The priest, before the beginning of the service, gave a
tremendous swish of holy water to the congregation with a mop out of a
zinc pail, from the altar.John went back to the bedroom.He had previously heard nearly half the
congregation's confessions, men, women, boys, and girls kneeling in turn
beside his chair at one side of the altar, without any sort of screen.I
wondered, as they pressed round him, that they did not overhear each
other, but indeed I reflected that would be "no matther whativer," as
these people must have but little to tell!The server ran a match along the earthen floor to light the two
guttering, unequal candles on the altar, and at the end of Mass he
produced the mop and zinc pail again._Swish_ went the holy water once
more from the mop, wielded by the athletic sword-arm of the gigantic
young priest.For fear the nearer people should have been but poorly
sprinkled under that far-reaching arc of water, which went to the very
end wall of the chapel, he soused the mop again with a good twist and
gave everybody in the front benches a sharp whack full in their faces,
tactfully leaving us out.Mary journeyed to the garden.They received it with beaming and grateful
smiles.There are wonderful studies of old men's and women's heads here full of
that character which in the more "educated" parts of Ireland the School
Board seems to be rubbing out, and I was delighted to see the women and
girls wearing the head-shawls and white caps and the red petticoats that
charmed me in Kerry in '77.The railway is sure to bring the dreadful
"Frenchy" hat here in time, and then good-bye to the comely appearance
of these women.Their wild beauty undergoes an extraordinary change
under the absurd hat and feathers--these winsome colleens then lose all
their charm.Yet I must thank this same railway for having brought us to this haven
of rest, right up to the doors of a charming, very modern hotel, on
quite different lines from the dear little inn that fascinated me in
the old Glenaragh days.In its way it is fascinating too, for here you
have all the up-to-date amenities in the very heart of the wildest
country you could wish for.The electric light is generated by the
mountain streams and the baths filled from the glorious bay that lies
below the hotel terraces, a never-failing delight in all its moods of
sun and shadow, wind and calm.Sad it is to see so many cabins deserted.The strength of the country is
ebbing away.The few people that are left are nice and wholesome in mind
and manner; they have the quiet urbanity of the true peasant all the
world over.They remind me of the Tuscan in this particular, but, of
course, they have not his light-heartedness.Sandra went back to the kitchen.More seriousness, I should
think, these Irish have.I was sketching sheep, for a contemplated
picture, in the evenings on the lovely marshes by the sea, and one
evening a widow, left completely lonely in her little cabin on the
heights above by the departure for America of her last child, came down
to fetch home her solitary sheep from amongst the others, and I told her
I thought these creatures were leading a very happy life."Yes," she
answered, pausing for a moment and looking down on the flock, "and they
are without sin."[Illustration: CLEW BAY, CO.MAYO]
At the ringing of the Angelus the work in the fields, the bogs, the
potato patches stops till the words of St.Luke's Gospel have been
repeated, just as we remember them said in Italy.It was a surprise--and
one of great interest to me--when I first saw peasants saying the
Angelus under a northern sky.My studies of the wild mountain sheep on the marshes came to an abrupt
close.I was reposing under a rock (it was well on in July) with palette
and panels ready, waiting for the sunset and its after-glow, to get
final precious notes of colour upon the fleeces.One particular sheep
had been a very useful model.It ambled in a graceful way on three legs
and we called it "Pacer."I became aware of an opaque body rising
between my closed eyes and the sun, and looking up I beheld the head of
"Pacer" peering at me over the edge of the rock over my head.But what
had happened to "Pacer's" neck?I jumped up and beheld a
shorn "Pacer" and all the flock in the same lamentable condition.It had
all happened in twenty-four hours.I want to bring before your mind two little rocky islands with green
summits off the coast of Clare, not far from here.Of all the
wind-swept little islands none could be more wind-swept.On one, the
smallest, I heard that a ferocious and unmanageable billy-goat was
deposited as a useless member of the community, and one night he was
blown out to sea--a good riddance.On the other you perceive, through
the spray, little nodules on the turf--the graves of unbaptized infants.And the sea-gulls along the cliffs are for ever crying like legions of
children.* * * * *
By returning from Mulranny by way of Tipperary and the Rosslare route to
England you can voyage down the Shannon and have an experience not
lightly to be foregone.This is the "lordly Shannon," a great wide,
slowly-flowing and majestic river of dark, clear, bluish water--blue
shot with slate.You sit at the bows of the little steamboat which takes
you from Athlone to Killaloe, so that neither smoke nor screw interferes
with your enjoyment of the lovely scenes you are to pass through.If the
time is July (_the_ time to choose) you are at once greeted on clearing
the little grey town of Athlone with the most exquisite scent from the
level banks which form two wide belts of creamy meadow-sweet all the way
to the end, at Lough Derg.These belts are interrupted, once only, by
the lock at Shannon Bridge, that little gathering of houses and gaunt
dismantled barracks and breastworks built in the days of the threatened
French invasion.Near here lived Charlotte Bronte's husband till his
death only the other day.You will see in the Shannon a mighty waterway for commerce, left to the
wild things that haunt it; and it has haunted me ever since that July
day on which I saw it with a sense of regret that the condition of
Ireland makes such a river out of scale with the requirements of the
country.It flows for the wild birds, the cattle, the fishes, and for
its own pleasure; and it flowed for mine that day, for I let no phase of
it escape me and gladly added its sonorous name to the long list of
those of the great rivers of the world I have already seen.We hardly saw a soul along the banks, but many kinds of aquatic birds,
flying, diving, and swimming, enlivened the voyage with their funny
ways, scurrying out of the track of the puffing little steamer.Along
the whole course of the great stream there stood at regular intervals,
planted in more hopeful days, navigation posts, marking the channel for
the ships that never come, and on these scarlet signs perched black
cormorants eyeing us like vultures.The herons rose slowly from the
meadow-sweet and the sedges, with their long flapping wings; the cattle
standing in the water followed us with their mild eyes.Daniel went to the hallway.It was all
beautiful, mournful, eloquent, and when the ruins of Clonmacnoise hove
in sight I heard the spirit of Ireland speaking to me from the grave.Perhaps nowhere,
even in depopulated Ireland, can a more desolate, abandoned plot of land
than this be seen.And yet this great monastery and university, founded
in A.D.544, and at the height of her renown in the eighth century while
our country was in a very immature state, was a European centre to which
scholars on the Continent came to study; which was quoted and referred
to by them as a conspicuous authority, and which for long was in what I
might call brisk communication with the centres of learning abroad, if
"brisk" was not too bizarre a word in such a place to-day.A more
mournful oblivion never fell on any once flourishing centre of active
thought and teaching.[Illustration: A LITTLE IRISH RIVER]
The slow havoc of time amongst these seven remaining little churches and
blunt round towers was one day accelerated by Cromwell's gunpowder,
which has left the "Guest House" of the monastery a heap of ruins split
into ugly shapes quite out of keeping with the rest.As the grey group passed away from sight I thought I had never known
more eloquent silence than that which enfolds the ruins bearing the
sounding name of Clonmacnoise.Will the electric chain ever be linked up again that carried Ireland's
intellect and mental energy to the Continent in those remote times, and
round again from the great sources of learning there, with fresh
material to enrich her own store?You will have the wish to "Come back to Erin, Mavourneen," after making
this little tour.To me Ireland is very appealing, though I owe her a
grudge for being so tantalizing and evasive for the painter.The low
clouds of her skies cause such rapid changes of sun and shadow over her
landscapes that it requires feats of technical agility to catch them on
the wing beyond my landscape powers.My only chance is to have unlimited
time and thus be able to wait a week, if necessary, for the particular
effect to come round again.An artist I heard of thought he had "bested"
the Irish weather and its wiles when he set up this clever system: six
canvasses he spread out before him on the ground in a row, each with a
given arrangement of light and shade sketched out ready.But when the
psychological moment arrived he was so flurried, that while he was
wildly running his hand up and down the row of canvasses for the right
one he could never find it in time.A nice dance you are led, sketching in Ireland, altogether!You are, for
instance, intent on dashing down the plum-like tones of a distant
mountain, when lo!that mountain which in its purple mystery seemed some
fifteen miles away, in a moment flashes out into such vivid green that,
as the saying is here, "you might shake hands with it," so close has it
come.Even its shape is changed, for peaks and buttresses start forth in
the sunburst where you imagined unbroken <DW72>s a few minutes before.Shadowed woods spring into dark prominence by the sudden illumination of
the fields behind them and as suddenly are engulfed in the golden haze
of a shaft of light that pierces the very clouds whose shadows had a
minute before given them such a startling prominence on the light
background.Unsuspected lovelinesses leap forth while those we saw
before are snatched away, and the sunlight for ever wanders up and
along the mountain sides, as some one has finely said, "like the light
from a heavenly lantern."What those changes from beauty to beauty do towards sunset I leave you
to imagine.I have never seen Ireland at all worthily painted.I think
we ought to leave her to her poets and to the composers of her matchless
music.John went back to the bathroom.[Illustration]
[Illustration]
II
EGYPT
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
CHAPTER I
CAIRO
To the East!What a thrill of pleasure those words caused me when they
meant that I was really off for Egypt.Daniel went back to the kitchen.The East has always had for me an
intense fascination, and it is one of the happiest circumstances of my
life that I should have had so much enjoyment of it.My childish sketch-books, as you remember, are full of it, and so are my
earliest scribblings.To see the reality of my fervid imaginings,
therefore, was to satisfy in an exquisite way the longing of all my
life.The Gordon expedition was my opportunity, and it was a bold and happy
conception of W.'s that of my going out with the two eldest little ones
to join him on the Nile when the war should be over.I may say I--and
the British Army--had the Nile pretty well to ourselves, for few
tourists went up the year I was there.But I had to wait some time at
Cairo and at Luxor before all trouble had been put an end to by the
battle of Ginniss, which closed the recrudescence of rebellion that
burst out after the great Khartoum campaign.The emotion on seeing the East for the first time can never be felt
again.The surprise can never be repeated, and holds a type of pleasure
different from that which one feels on revisiting it, as I have so often
done since.One knows the "gorgeous East" at first only in pictures; one takes it on
trust from Delacroix, Decamps, Gerome, Mueller, Lewis, and a host of
others.You arrive, and their pictures suddenly become breathing
realities, and in time you learn, with exquisite pleasure, that their
most brilliant effects and groups are no flights of fancy but faithful
transcripts of every-day reality.[Illustration: IN A CAIRO BAZAAR]
But at first you ask, "Can those figures in robes and turbans be really
going about on ordinary business?Are they bringing on that string of
enormous camels to carry real hay down that crowded alley; are those
bundles in black and in white wrappers, astride of white asses
caparisoned in blue and silver, merely matter-of-fact ladies of the
harem taking their usual exercise?That Pasha's curvetting white Arab
horse's tail is dyed a tawny red |
bedroom | Where is Daniel? | That
water-seller by Gerome has moved; he is selling a cup of water to that
gigantic <DW64> in the white robe and yellow slippers, and is pocketing
the money quite in an ordinary way.And there is a praying man by
Mueller, not arrested in mid-prayer, but going through all the periods
with the prescribed gestures, his face to the East, and the declining
sun adding an ever-deepening flush to the back of his amber-
robe."It takes two or three days to rid oneself of the idea that the streets
are parading their colours and movement and their endless variety of
Oriental types and costumes for your diversion only, on an open-air
stage.Cairo in '85, '86, was only at the beginning of its mutilations by
occidentalism, and the Oriental _cachet_ was dominant still.To sit on
the low shady terrace of the old Shepheard's hotel under the acacias and
watch the pageant of the street below was to me an endless delight.The very incongruity of the drama unrolling itself before one's eyes had
a charm of its own.Look at that Khedivial officer in sky-blue, jerkily
riding his pretty circus Arab.There follows him a majestic and most
genuine Bedouin in camel's hair burnoos, deigning not the turn of an
eyelash as he passes our frivolous throng on the terrace; two Greek
priests, their long hair gathered up in knots under the tall black cap
and flowing veil, equal him in quiet dignity, and a mendicant friar
rattles his little money-box, like an echo of the water-seller's cups
over the way, as a hint to our charity.An Anglo-Indian officer of high
degree is driven up to our steps in a 'bus under a pile of baggage.He
has just arrived from India and is impressively escorted by various
Sikhs, whose immense _puggarees_ are conceived in a totally different
spirit from that of the native turbans.A British hussar, smart as only
a British soldier can be, trots by on a wiry Syrian horse; a cab full of
Highlanders out for a spree bumps along the unpaved roadway.I confess
I was disappointed with the effect of our honoured British red.What did
it look like where the red worn by the natives was always of the most
harmonious tones!See that string of little donkeys cheerily toddling along, all but
extinguished under their loads of sugar-canes that sweep the ground with
their long leaves; humble peasant donkeys, meeting a flashing brougham
with windows rigidly closed, through which the almond eyes of veiled
ladies of some high Pasha's harem glance up at us and take us all in in
that devouring sweep of vision.French bugles tell us an Egyptian regiment is coming, and, meeting it,
will go by with a dull rumble a string of English baggage-waggons drawn
by mules and driven by Nubians, escorted by British soldiers in dusty
khaki uniforms; stout fellows going to the front, a good many of them to
stay there--under the sand.weird music and flaring torches brings us out again on
the terrace, and we see a tumultuous crowd of pilgrims just arrived from
Mecca by the five o'clock Suez train.They gather the crowd by their
unearthly din and sweep it along with them.Beggars, flower-sellers,
snake-charmers, tourists, and touts are all rolling along in a
continuous buzz of various noises.Perhaps the full escort of cavalry
jingles past our point of observation and the native crowd salutes the
Khedive.Not so the British officers on the terrace, who keep their
seats.But what was all this to diving into the old city, and in a ten minutes'
donkey ride to find oneself in the Middle Ages; in the real, breathing,
moving, sounding life of the Arabian Nights?Then when inclined to come
back to our time and its comforts, which I am far from despising, ten
minutes' return ride and the glimpse into the old life of the East
became as a vision.For what I call the pageant of the street in front
of Shepheard's was much too much mixed with modernity to allow of so
complete a transformation of ideas.The bazaars of Cairo have been painted and written about more than those
of any other Oriental city.John went to the hallway.The idea of my having "a try" at them seems
to come a little late!But _if_ it is true that, as some croakers say,
Old Cairo is gradually dying, I feel impelled to lay one flower of
appreciation beside the grave which is ere long to close.What a treat, to put it in that way, it was to rove about in the reality
of the true East, to meet beauty of form and colour and light and shade
and movement wherever one's eyes turned, without being brought up with a
nasty jar by some modern hideosity or other.You
know what a bit of colour in sun or luminous shade does for me.Think of
my feelings when I walked through the narrow streets where the rays of
the sun slanted down through gaps in the masonry, or, as in some,
through chinks in the overhead matting--now on a white turban, now on a
rose- robe relieved against the rich dark background of some
cavernous open doorway, now on a bit of brass-work.The soft tones of
the famous Carpet Bazaar in noon-day twilight, with that richness of
colour that tells you the invisible sunshine is somewhere,
fulfilled--yea, over-filled--my expectations, and close by in real
working trim were the brass-workers tinkering and tapping musically, the
while smoking their hubble-bubbles in very truth.The goldsmiths, in
their own particular alley, were sitting in the rich chiaroscuro of
their little shops waiting for me.Daniel moved to the garden.The wife of the
---- minister asked the President for a _verre d'eau_ toward the end.He was very apologetic, pleasant, and modest, and said: "Oh, we don't
know how to do these things."He seemed full of good intentions and
hope for 1912--but alack!never has it been seen that nobility
alone is able to maintain its possessor!Elim is begging me to bring him a monkey when I come back.I hate to
disappoint him--but do you see me traveling with anything belonging to
that species?The trip is said to be magnificent--two nights and one
day.I wish it were two days and one night.Aunt L. is thinking of me and preparing for me; I know what it means
for some one of her own to penetrate to her fastness, or rather her
jungle.Cummings has put the telegraph at N.'s and my disposal
while I am away.I have not been outside the Federal district since I
arrived, so content with the treasures of this matchless valley; but of
course one easily gets the _Reisefieber_.John went back to the bedroom.I will write _en route_ to the "blazing tropics."_January 4th_, Cordoba, _10 a.m._
We have just descended into a dew-drenched world.It is supposed to
be the "dry season," _estacion de secas_.A warm, wet, glistening air
comes in at the window, and my furs are in the rack.I have been watching endless coffee-plantations with red berries
shining among the foliage, and great tobacco-fields of broad, shiny
leaves.Banana-trees grow close to the tracks, and everywhere are the
most perishable of homes, built of what looks like nothing more solid
than corn-stalks and dried leaves.Cordoba was founded early in the seventeenth century by a viceroy, who
modestly called it after himself.A series of the most gorgeous mountain vistas, tunnel after tunnel,
and in between each darkness a world of beauty.Lovely palms abound,
delicate yet definite in their flowery symmetry.The Pico de Orizaba
has made various farewell appearances, one more enchanting and
regretful than the other.Now a great plain is rolling away, of
seemingly incredible fertility, with shadows of clouds on its shining
stretches.The faithful banana, which was first brought to this continent
by a Dominican monk, _via_ Haiti, about the time of the Conquest
certainly came into its own in this hot, moist land.One of the early
ecclesiastical writers in Mexico was so impressed that he hazards
the statement that it was the forbidden fruit that tempted Eve.It
certainly continues to tempt both sexes and all ages to idleness._Later._
Presidio, in the canyon of the Rio Blanco.Mary journeyed to the garden.I have been absorbed in watching the tropical jungles, where form is
eliminated.Every tree is choked or cloaked by some sort of enveloping
_convolvuli_; every wall has its formless abundant covering.No
silhouettes anywhere, no "cut" to anything--which is why all this
richness could, I imagine, get monotonous.Tierra Blanca, _3.30_.A heavy, hot atmosphere comes in at the
window.All along there has been much sitting of a dark race under
banana-trees, where not even a change of position seems necessary in
order to be fed.We have had a long wait here at Tierra Blanca, which is the junction
of a branch line to Vera Cruz, and I have been watching station life.Here and there appears an unmistakably
American face--the "exploiters" some would call them; but it seems to
me they gather up all this vague splendor, this endless abundance, into
something definite, with benefits to the greater number, though some
get "left," of course.There is a decided note of _carpe diem_ transposed into orange,
scarlet, and black, which all the coming and going of men, women, and
children with baskets of coffee-beans doesn't do away with.In the
tropics the white man is king, be he Yankee, Spaniard, or Northman,
and it is part of the lure.The abundances of Mother Earth are for his
harvesting; a strange, native race seems there to do him honor, render
him service, asking only in return enough of the abundance to keep soul
in body for the allotted span.We have just passed the broad Rio Mariposa (Butterfly River), and are
at a place called "Obispo."Indian women are holding up baskets of
the most gorgeous fruits, babes on their backs, cigarettes in their
mouths.We are near the celebrated Valle Nacional.I remember some
terrible articles in one of the magazines about the human miseries in
the working of the tobacco-factories, herds of men, women, and children
locked together into great sheds at night during tropical storms,
enslavements, separations.It's easy to hope it is not so, but I dare
say it is.We are zigzagging through dense jungle with the gaudiest splashes of
color.Sandra went back to the kitchen.Sometimes one wonders if it is
bird or flower.All the green is studded with bright spots.There are
great, flat, meadow-like spaces, the soil looking rich enough to bear
food for all the hungry millions of the earth, and numberless cattle
are grazing over it.the inexpressible slipshodness of the
human abodes!Anything perishable, nearest at hand, sugar-cane stalks,
palm leaves, continue to compose the dwellings; and oh!the crowds of
children, of human beings, just as slipshod, just as perishable!Great pink brushes of cirrus are covering the sky,
against a blue that hates to give way, but in a moment I know it will
be dark._Later._
A wonderful day, but somehow I am glad I was born in the temperate
zone.I suppose it's the New England blood protesting against all this,
as something wasteful and unrelated.Since we passed the heavy-flowing
Rio Mariposa I have been having more than a touch of "world-pain."The
light is so poor in my state-room that I can't read, but I arrive at
San Geronimo at 5.30, which means a 4.30 rising, so good night._January 5th, 5.30 a.m._
Chivela Pass in the lemon- dawn!I don't know what I went
through in the night, but now I am descending to the Pacific.Sharp
outlines of treeless, pinkish hills are everywhere showing themselves,
with here and there patches of the classic and beautiful organos
cactus.My heart and I are ready for the meeting.The porter tells me there are only two more stations._San Geronimo, January 6th, evening._
As the train got in to San G. I saw a very pale, very blue-eyed, slim,
white-clad figure.Daniel went to the hallway.New England, though a thousand cycles had been
passed in the tropics.We met in silence, two full hearts, and in
silence we went over to the house....
_January 8th, evening._
We have been walking up and down the garden under the big fig-tree,
where a huge and very beautiful _huacamaia_, a sort of parrot, with a
yellow-and-red head and a long blue tail makes his home.We have been
thinking and talking in a way so foreign to the thick tropical darkness
enveloping us.The sun went down on a world of ashes of roses and then this soft,
very black night fell.At sunset we took a turn about the sandy,
desolate-looking town.Women, scriptural women, were washing and bathing in the broad,
high-banked stream.John went back to the bathroom.It reminded me of Tissot's pictures of the Holy
Land--the barren banks of the pebbly river, the fig-trees, the little
groups.The women wear most lovely garments as to outline.A wide skirt
with a deep flounce is tucked up in front, for more ease in moving, and
the falling flounce gives quite a Tanagra line.Little girls are always dressed, from their tenderest age, in skirts
too long; but little boys go naked till they are eleven or twelve, and
the clad and the unclad play about together.When Don Porfirio took things in hand the boys were made to dress to
go to school, and as a last touch of fashion made to tuck their shirts
inside their trousers.It appears, however, they only tuck them in as
they enter the school door, pulling them out when they are released.... But Aunt L. says she is tired of it all--the naked children, the
barren stretches, the _carpe diem_, the ultimate unrelatedness of her
life to its frame, though I kept thinking of Henley's line, "and in her
heart some late lark singing."Daniel went back to the kitchen....
... Each life, it seems to me, short or long, is wonderful when it
becomes a perfected story, if we could only get it in perspective,
against its own destined background; not blurred and mixed with other
unrelated lives, but by itself, in relief, as the great artists show
their masterpieces.I can't feel the ordinariness of any human life.Some are dreadful, some beautiful, some undeveloped; but each in its
way could be an infinitely perfect story were the artist there to
record it._January 10th, evening._
To-day we drove over to Juchitan, the "county-seat"--Aunt L. to get
some papers witnessed and signed at the _jefatura_, and to show me the
ravages of the revolution of November.The country, as we drove along, was scorching, dry, light-,
with only an occasional tree and the irrepressible mesquite growing
everywhere out of the sandy soil.Daniel went to the bedroom.John travelled to the hallway.We passed dreadful, screaming, wooden
carts, with their solid wooden wheels, drawn by thin oxen, trying to
nibble the withered grass; and there were herds of skeleton-like cattle
dotted over the thorny cactus-covered fields.There is a great hill, Istlaltepec, which separates San Geronimo |
kitchen | Where is Sandra? | It's a country with sandy, flat
stretches and blue hills bounding them, and the river of Juchitan
flowing to the near Pacific.The village of Istlaltepec was a blaze
of color, white-washed or pink- or blue-washed dwellings, fig- and
palm-trees, and over all the brilliant, blinding light.At Juchitan we stopped a moment at a hotel, but it was so dilapidated
and shot with bullet marks, and so desolate and mournful-looking
inside, that we went to a small, native place of refreshment, kept
by a one-time servant of Aunt L.'s.Her
daughter, a fine, tall woman of thirty or thereabouts, was coming down
the street, with one of the great, painted gourds on her head filled
with a variety of highly things, and with the walk of a queen,
a majestic, gentle, swaying movement.Daniel travelled to the bathroom.They spread a spotless cloth, in a dim, sandy, red-tiled room with
a glimpse of a palm in the old _patio_ behind, that would have been
a back yard, and a hideous one, if it had been "at home."The old
woman told her ailments, and the daughter, aided by the granddaughter,
served us a _sopa de frijoles_ (bean soup), a perfect omelet, with a
hard-crusted, pleasant-tasting bread, but no butter, and black coffee.Goat's milk was offered; the goat was in the _patio_--but "goat _me_ no
goats."The inhabitants of the street gathered around as we got into the
carriage, among them an Indian woman with a coal-black baby--a _salto
atras_, a "jump back," as they are cheerfully called, when the baby
is blacker than the mother.We proceeded to hunt the _jefe_ again,
but when we got to the _jefatura_ we were informed that he was still
taking his siesta, so in spite of the sun we decided to look about the
apparently deserted town.We stopped at another inn, where there were more signs of recent
"regeneration"--blood-stained walls, mirrors broken, a billiard-table
partly chopped up, and a piano of the "cottage" variety with its
strings pulled out.The _propietario_ showed us around sadly, but with
a note of pride.His house was, for the moment, the "show-place" of the
town.He pointed out a large, carefully preserved blood-spot on the
floor, and kept repeating _muy triste_--but all the same there was a
light in his eye.The barracks, with a large detachment of Federal troops, and the
near-by church have great pieces chipped off by guns, and are
embroidered by pepperings of rifle-fire.Don Porfirio nearly lost his life on his way to Don Alejandro de
Gyves' (Aunt L.'s French friend, when she first came down here; he was
consul, you remember, and they were the _civilises_ of the place).The
Juchitecos tried to kill Diaz and his priest-friend, Fray Mauricio,
near his house, and it was the village leader of that epoch who put
his brother Felix to death.They seem to be consistent and persistent
fighters, these Juchitecos, given over to libations, always fighting
with somebody, but best enjoying it in their own bailiwick.The damages caused by the ambitions of the late Che Gomez were amply
testified to.A French merchant, Senor Rome, whom Aunt L. saw about
some business, had had his home in the environs sacked, and his bride
had escaped with difficulty into the hills, her beloved trousseau and
household linen, brought from Paris, of course, being destroyed or
stolen._January 12th, 9 a.m._
We were up with the dawn, expecting to start for Tehuantepec and Salina
Cruz at six o'clock, taking the train that I had arrived on at 5.30.But this is one of the mornings when it won't get here till after nine
o'clock.A hot, fierce, sandy gale is blowing, and every door and window in the
house is rattling.We are just going to have a second breakfast, before
starting out.The Chinese cook does very well, but when he was talking
with his assistant this morning under my window, it sounded like the
chopping of hash, literally, a conversation of short sounds and shorter
stops.Sandra moved to the kitchen.Some fresh cocoanuts were brought in, and we have each had a glassful
of the milky beverage.I can imagine how delicious it would be, come
upon suddenly in the desert; but sitting at a table with a servant to
pour it out, I was a little disappointed.I innocently came down in a
hat for the journey, but it was impossible to keep it on, even sitting
on the veranda.These winds, it appears, blow whenever they feel like
it, from October till May.Now we are waiting, Aunt L. in white, with a long blue chiffon
veil, and I in blue, with a white veil.I fancy we would present a
picturesque sight to the proper eyes._January 13th, 7.30 a.m._
At last, yesterday, the train came, and, clutching at our veils, we
were blown into it, and after another unexplained delay started off in
an American-built car like our ordinary ones.In the old days, Aunt L. went everywhere on horseback.We passed
various little wind-swept villages.Jordan was the name of one of
them, seeming, in the sandy, New-Testament-looking spot, just the right
name.Two beautiful Tehuantepec women got into the train there, kindly
sitting near us.I was fascinated by their clothes, and much more
interested in them than they were in us.The unfamiliar cadence of the Zapoteca gave them a complete touch
of foreignness.One of them wore a beautiful, strange, complicated
head-dress of stiff pleated and ruffled lace, which, I later
discovered, does not at all interfere with the carrying on their heads
of the large, shallow, brightly painted gourds.Her skirts were long
and deeply flounced, but looped up at the waist, just a tucking in of
the lower hem of the flounce, with the rest of the stuff flowing away
in a most lovely line.The other woman had on a beautiful necklace
of irregular-shaped gold coins, and with her flashing teeth and dark
eyes, and a brilliant, low-cut, full jacket, with a yellow handkerchief
twisted turbanwise around her head, made a picture I could not take
my eyes from.I felt as colorless as a shadow, and I told Aunt L. she
looked like a blue-and-gray Copenhagen vase strayed into a Moorish
room.Just before getting into Tehuantepec we came upon a beautiful grove of
cocoanut-palms, high and graceful, above the rest of the vegetation,
and the little nestling huts and houses.All about are jungles
containing strange creeping things, and strange fevers and kindred
creeping ills.As the train passed slowly down the principal street, it seemed to me
I looked out on a race of queens, tall, stately, with their lovely
costumes.The men seemed undersized and sort of "incidental" in the
landscape, but those beautiful women walking up and down their sandy
streets were a revelation.Aunt L. says they possess not only the
beauty, but the brains of the race.Former generations of Tehuantepec
men, fitter mates for these queens than the specimens I saw, were
mostly killed off in the various wars of "independence," and I
understand the population is kept up by fortuitous but willing males
from other places.Everything was color; gorgeous splashes of yellow and black, and red
and orange and blue against the shifting, sandy streets.A picturesque,
creamy _Palacio Municipal_ faces the plaza, and there were many
churches--mostly showing earthquake vicissitudes.An old fortress, once
the headquarters of Diaz, gives a last suggestive note to the whole.Glorious memories of Don Porfirio hang all over this part of the
world, where he is adored and mourned.I must say Madero's face looked
positively childish in the _jefatura_ at Juchitan, as it confronted
the stern, clever visage of the great Indian.Even the cheap, highly
lithograph could not do away with his look of distinction and
power.He was, in his young days, military governor of Tehuantepec,
and at one time _jefe politico_.A French savant and traveler, l'Abbe
Brasseur de Bourbourg, remembering him then, said he was the most
perfect type he had ever seen, and what he imagined the kingly hero
Cuauhtemoc to have been.When we got out of the train at Salina Cruz, a whirl-wind caught us and
blew us down the platform.I saw very little of the town on the way to
the British Consulate, where we were to lunch, as I was bent double by
the wind and blinded by the sand.Buchanan and his wife were waiting to receive us.'s kind
but shrewd blue eyes, altruistic brow, and welcoming hand-clasp show
him at first sight to be what Aunt L. says he is, "pure gold."She has
found him through years the best of friends and wisest of advisers.The consulate is on one of the sandy ridges that the town seems largely
composed of, and Mrs.Buchanan has arranged it with taste and comfort
after our ideas, with books and flowers and easy-chairs.But one look
from the high bow window and you know at once where you are, with
irrepressible cacti and palm-trees peeking in at you.I tried sitting on the sheltered side of the veranda for a few minutes
while waiting for lunch, that my eyes might "receive" the Pacific, but
I was glad to go in-doors again.B. says the wind blows that way
six or seven months in the year.Haskell, and his wife came in later to tea.Their
house is on another sand-ridge.After a last pleasant chat about our
affairs, their affairs, and Mexican affairs we departed for our train
in a great darkness that the stars made no impression on, the wind
still tearing down the sandy streets.I was sorry not to visit the
breakwaters--_rompeolas_, they call them--but would probably have been
blown overboard.From the veranda I could see ships that had come from Morning Lands,
riding at anchor, and later the sun went down in quiet majesty over
the great, flat waters of the Pacific.I was so near the Atlantic that
I thought of Humboldt's expression of "tearing the Isthmus apart, as
the pillars of Hercules had been torn in some great act of nature,"
and Revillagigedo's[29] dream of a canal joining the Atlantic to the
Pacific.Buchanan said the first authentic mention of the Isthmus was in
a conversation between Montezuma and Cortes, as to the source of the
quantities of gold the Spaniards saw.Cortes, who was of an inquiring
turn of mind at any mention of the shining stuff, sent Pizarro, and
then Diego de Ordaz (he who tried to ascend Popocatepetl, and got a
volcano added to his crest), to investigate, coming here himself after
the rebuilding of Mexico City, _en route_ to Honduras.He received
a grant of the whole territory round about--"Las Marquesadas," as
they are still called, after his title, _Marques del Valle de Oaxaca_
(Marquis of the Valley of Oaxaca).This morning there is still a great rattling of the windows and the
doors, but not a sign of gnat or mosquito.I must arise and further
investigate isthmian life.The _huacamaia_ in the fig-tree has been
making himself heard since dawn.I knew that if I did not tell you of
Tehuantepec and Salina Cruz now, you would never hear, and I think what
those names have meant to you during the years.It's all a memory of
drifting sands, women as straight as their own palm-trees, slim, naked
boys, fierce wind, and, in the harbor, the great port works, built by
foreign energy and capital._January 14th._
Going up, up, with a ringing in my ears out of the "blazing tropics"
into the Tierra Templada.I am traveling with a parrot in a cage, and
a nondescript little animal called, I think, a _tajon_, in a box with
slats!After a very cursory survey last night, it seemed to belong to
the '<DW53> family.I (who wish all animals well, but not too near) dimly
apprehend the Merida family on the "Ward Line" traveling with their
parrot, when I consider that I was put onto the Pullman last night in a
thick, inky, tropical darkness, with a parrot in a cage, and a _tajon_
in a box with slats.The amiable porter is looking after them
in the baggage-car, and the back veranda with the oleanders, beyond
the dining-room, is their ultimate destination.I say nothing of the
parting; Aunt L. has promised to come soon.The glorious Pico de Orizaba has just shown its lovely white head
between two dissolving blue ridges.Last night I reread _Le Journal
d'Amiel_, which, with _Monsieur Le Coq_, I picked up as I was leaving
the house.As up-to-date in the jungle as anything would be.[29] Fifty-second viceroy.XVII
Gathering clouds--"Tajada" the common disease of
republics--Reception at Chapultepec--Madero in optimistic
mood--His views of Mexico's liabilities to America
_January 17th._
I have not written since my word in the train.Too busy taking up daily
threads, and there have been various dinings and lunchings out.On my
return I found yours saying that another yellow-stamped instalment of
the _Arabian Nights Entertainment_ had come in on your breakfast-tray.Just put Mexicans instead of Persians, or whatever they were, intrigues
for power in a Latin-American republic, instead of the intricacies of
Haroun-al-Raschid and his _califat_, change your longitude, and you are
"Orientee" as exactly as the pyramids!_January 19th._
(My brother's birthday).To-night I am thinking of Elliott,[30] and, as so often, _before_ his
days of physical and spiritual anguish, of the beautiful brow with its
lines of thought, and the straight limbs as he moved freely among the
other sons of men.But however dear in his activities, where pride
was a factor, he is infinitely dearer to me now, stretched, broken,
while others divide his garments.I ask myself to-night at this seventh
turning of the years of pain, what I have not asked him.Has he drunk
the chalice, or is he still putting it away?He as
naturally rejects the mystical; there is nothing "vicarious" to him.Life is only what rationally and definitely is to be discovered by each
one, no possible doing of another's work.I remember quoting to him
once, _a propos_ of destinies and the end of the ends: "_Ego sum alpha
et omega, principium et finis_," and he answered, "Each one is his own
alpha and omega."I know little, after all, of his spiritual life.His intellectual
life I can read like any fine book, the technicalities of a trained
mind superior to mine, inspiringly surmised, but not understood.He
is not _anima naturaliter christiana_, but all the same, he must hang
in his |
bathroom | Where is Daniel? | Results for him mean the
hunting out of definite, secret combinations, in definite, scientific
areas, and his mind is speculative only in an intellectual sense.I shall, perhaps, never know how far the "Crucified" has convinced
him, but to-night, in thinking of him, _sitio_ comes again and again
to me.He has been so thirsty for the employment of his gifts, whose
value he knows, in a clear, common-sense way, as he also knows what has
not been given him, and the suppression of that gift of industry seems
sometimes to me the most painful nail that holds him.Don't let what I
have written make you unhappy.Mother-wounds bleed and burn so easily.Daniel travelled to the bathroom.In this quiet, beauteous night, with the _patio_ holding a thick,
silver moonlight spilling over the square, dark roof, this gorgeous
Indian world in strange unrest about me, and I myself far enough
away to see, I can speak.Show him this some time when he is healed.I unite myself with the
millions who have had their loved ones hanging on the cross, who have
heard their _sitio_.But as the emotions of each are measured by their
personal experience, this, my brother's thirst, moves me more deeply
than even that of sacramental martyrs, who gave willingly, where he
gives resistingly."And everywhere I see a cross where sons of men give
up their lives."...
_January 20th._
Things are bubbling up, boiling, geyser-like, and the public in a
fair way to get scalded.Yesterday a bill was passed through Congress
suspending the constitutional guarantees in various of the near-by
states, Morelos, Tlaxcala, Puebla, Vera Cruz, and others.Madero's chickens are coming home to
roost, and demands for the cutting up of the Mexican cake sound from
all sides.But what was easy for Madero to promise in the first passion
for the regeneration of "his" people is proving not only impractical,
but impossible.What's the use, anyway, of giving waterless lands to
Indians without farming implements, whose only way of irrigating would
be prayers for moisture to pre- or post-Cortesian gods?Let those who
have been divested of their illusions by hard facts govern the state,
_I_ say.[Illustration: BOATS ON THE VIGA CANAL
Photograph by Ravell]
Outside of a few political agitators, who cares for politics here
except as a means of livelihood?Sandra moved to the kitchen.What each one is a-fevered for is
the disease commonly attacking republics.Above the Rio Grande they
call it graft._Tajada_ it is called here, but the name doesn't
matter.Republics are notoriously susceptible, and here it grows
with a lushness comparable only to the jungle.Now when the reins
of government are in many regions given over to those completely
unversed in statecraft or even in the rudiments of "mine and thine"--a
lower-class contingent, naturally destructive, unimaginative, and
completely ignorant--what can one expect?_January 23d._
Aldebert de Chambrun[31] called yesterday afternoon and came back for
dinner.He is just down from Washington, being _a cheval_ between the
two posts.Now he is in the full
tide of a brilliant career, and scintillating with the celebrated De
C. wit.They all have it--delightful, _fin_, glancing from subject
to subject, illuminating and refreshing, giving a "lift" to any
conversation they partake of, sometimes unsparing, but oftener kind.It's completely unlike the Spanish-American satire, which I am now
beginning to understand, and which has its own value, though it is
mostly cruel and demolishing, and seems to suffer with difficulty the
neighbor's good fortune._January 26th._
Yesterday was the first reception at Chapultepec since several weeks.We drove up during a chill dropping of the sun, to find quite a
grouping of foreign and domestic powers.The _Corps Diplomatique_ was
almost complete, De Chambrun going with the Lefaivres.I talked with
Calero, and Vasquez Tagle, Minister of Justice, a scholar of note, they
tell me, deeply versed in law and of the highest probity.Though he had
a serious face, there was a twinkle in his eyes.N. walked up and down the terrace with the President for a long time.He said he had a very interesting conversation, accidentally turning
on the claims of Americans who had been killed or wounded during the
revolution, in El Paso and Douglas.N., thinking it well to improve
the shining hour, pointed out to the President the special character
of these claims; that during a revolution by which he had established
himself as President of Mexico his soldiers, in taking positions held
by President Diaz's troops, had killed and wounded, on American soil,
several peaceful American citizens.This constituted a claim that
could not be denied by any international tribunal, to say nothing of
the violation of American territory.N., finding Madero in optimistic
mood (not that this is unusual), advised him strongly to settle these
claims, which were not large, and were leading to much criticism of his
government, when things might go so pleasantly.He even quoted to him,
"_Qui cito dat bis dat_."Madero replied: "All that will be settled in due time," but he did not
seem to feel that it was as important as N. thought it was, saying,
"They should have got out of harm's way."He also said the amounts
claimed were exorbitant (that "madonna of the wash-tub" wanted one
hundred thousand dollars) and he did not see how, without bringing
the matters before a court of arbitration, he could come to a decision
as to proper compensation.Mary moved to the bedroom.N. said that, as the question of Mexico's
liability was certain, he need not be afraid to admit the validity
of the claims in principle--to get a good railroad lawyer in Texas to
find out for him how much such injuries would be paid for by a railroad
company in event of such injuries occurring on a United States line,
and then quadruple the amount.This seemed to make an impression on
him, but in the shifting sands of Mexican liabilities will probably
lead nowhere.I found myself standing by ---- on the terrace, after we had taken
leave of Madame Madero, and as I said good-by, I added, "Perhaps some
day we will be paying our respects to _you_ here."Even in the sudden dusk that had fallen I saw flash across his
face in answer, as if written in words, the look that men of
ambitious temperament, gifted with will and intelligence necessary
to achievement, have had in all ages when the object of desire is
mentioned.I imagine he has little hope and no illusions about the
present situation.I am struck all the time by the exceeding cleverness
of the clever men here.What, then, _is_ the matter?In the evening a very pleasant dinner at the French Legation,
illuminated by several European stars, or rather comets, as they
quickly disappear from these heavens.He is small, with clever, unhappy eyes and
the world-manner, with a hint of introversion, most interesting.I
found, when I came to talk with him, that he was possessed of immense
knowledge, rendered living and _actuel_ by his personality, and his
mentality is of that crystal type equally lucid in the discussion of
facts or ideas.He has just returned from a trip through Oaxaca, where he has large
mining and railway interests, and is _en route_ for Paris, _via_ New
York.He walked home with us afterward, telling us about that southern
country, which he knows as only one knows a country gone through on
horseback, and, of course, he was turning the international flashlight
on it all.de Gheest sat on my other side.He has come on a brief business
visit with his handsome very _jeunesse doree_ son, Henri.[32] I had
never met them before, but his charming wife and I have listened to
Wagner cycles together in Munich.They were married strangely enough,
in Mexico, and lived here for a while afterward.M. de G. is trained and brilliant in discussion of international
affairs, witty, _risque_, and unsparing.I must say I was what one would call extremely well placed at table!_January 27th._
Most amusing lunch here to-day, the Gallic sparks flying in all
directions!The De Gheests, De Chambrun, the Lefaivres, Allart--and our
Anglo-Saxon selves as listeners.De G. was very amusing about some business rendezvous with Mexican
banking associates.One important meeting fell through because the
banker's little granddaughter was having a birthday.The second came
to grief because another luminary's wife's aunt's sister-in-law, or
some sort of remote relation, had died, and, of course, it's a rather
far journey from Paris to Mexico to find oneself tripping over family
occurrences....
Then we got on to the eternal land question.There's a lot said
about the 80 per cent.Mary journeyed to the garden.speaking out and asking for land, but _vox
populi_ here bears very little resemblance to _vox dei_, and it's only
confusing when a few (generally oppressors, not oppressed) do begin to
mutter.Madero walked to the presidency on the plank of the distribution of
land, which he promptly and inevitably kicked from under him--it
didn't, couldn't hold.It appears that he bought from one of the
computed two hundred and thirty-two members of the family a large tract
of land in Tamaulipas, but when it was parceled out it came so high
that no Indian could buy it, and wouldn't have known what to do with it
had he bought it.What he loves is his adobe hut running over with children and
surrounded by just enough land, planted with corn, beans, and peppers,
not to starve on, when worked intermittently, as fancy or the rainfall
indicate.The Indians certainly seem, under these conditions, a
thousand times happier than our submerged tenth, but it's never any
use comparing especially dissimilar matters.Anybody who has been to
Mexico, however, knows that the Indian of the adobe hut has little
or no qualification to permit of his being changed into a scientific
farmer by the touch of any wand.They're all right
to get into office with, but try tilling the soil with them!_January 31st, evening._
... And so the anniversaries come.I feel but a stitch between your
destiny and Elim's, holding the generations together in my turn.I am
distant from you, but I embrace you all--the dear ones of my blood.I realize the fortuitousness of mine and all other human experiences.I have never had the things I worked for, prayed for, hoped for, but
always something unexpected, which showed itself as inevitable only
after it had happened, though at the time it seemed to come as a blow
or a gift, accidentally, unrelatedly.The path has always lain where I
never had an intimation of the tiniest trail."Strange dooms past hope
or fear" of which we all partake....
[30] Elliott Baird Coues, + Zuerich, January 2, 1913.[31] (1917) Le Colonel de Chambrun, croix de guerre, grande
croix de la Legion d'Honneur, cite many times a l'ordre de
l'armee for deeds of bravery, and once, in the autumn of
1915, "pour sa gaite communicative dans les tranchees"--so
indicative of his special talents and great heart.(Lieutenant 4th Zouaves), wounded at Verdun,
June 9, 1916.Croix de guerre in Belgium, 1915, Legion
d'Honneur, Verdun, 1916.XVIII
Washington warns Madero--Mobilization orders--A visit to the
Escuela Preparatoria--A race of old and young--The watchword
of the early fathers
_February 1st._
To-day a military lunch--De Chambrun, Captain Sturtevant, just leaving,
and our new military attache, Burnside, just arrived.Speculations as
to the potentialities of the situation put a bit of powder into the
menu, and the appearance of small fat ducks awakened a few hunting
reminiscences, but mostly it was martial.In the afternoon I made some calls with De C. First to Mrs.'s, where we actually found an open fire in the big, book-lined
living-room.Some exotic-looking logs of a wood priceless in other
climes were making a sweet and long-unheard, comfortable, sputtering
sound.But as the weeks wore on, he found that the indictment was only true of
a certain minority, but it was terribly true of them; but down under
the half-dozen corruptible agents, under the roar of their voices,
there were many others speaking for truth and purity.The obscure mass
meant to be just and honest.They were good fathers and brothers, and
yet they were forced to bear the odium that fell on the whole
legislature whenever the miscreant minority rolled in the mire and
walked the public streets.There was one count, however, that remained good against nearly all of
the legislators: they seemed to lack conscience as regards public
money.Bradley remembered that this dishonesty extended down to the
matter of working on the roads in the country.He remembered that every
man esteemed it a virtue to be lazy, and to do as little for a day's
pay as possible, because it "came out of the town."He was forced to
admit that this was the most characteristic American crime.To rob the
commonwealth was a joke.He ended by philosophizing upon it with the Judge, who came down in
late February to attend the session during the great railway fight.The Judge put his heels on the window sill, and folded his arms over
the problem."Well, now, this thing must be looked at from another standpoint.The
power of redress is with the voter.If the voter is a boodler, he will
countenance boodling.Here is the mission of our party," he said, with
the zeal of an old-fashioned Democrat, "to come in here and educate the
common man to be an honest man.Now, we
mustn't talk of resigning or going out of politics.We've got to stay
right in the lump, and help leaven it.It will only make things worse
if we leave it."The Judge had grown into the habit of speaking of
Bradley as if he were a partner.Bradley, going about with him on the street, suddenly discovered that
the Judge's hat was just a shade too wide in the brim, and his coat a
little bit frayed around the button-holes.He had never noticed before
that the Judge was a little old-fashioned in his manners.No thought of
being ashamed of him came into his mind, but it gave him a curious
sensation when they entered a car together for the first time, and he
discovered that the Judge was a type.When Bradley made his great speech on the railroad question, arraigning
monopoly, the Judge had a special arrangement with a stenographer.He
was going to have that speech in pamphlet form to distribute, if it
took a leg.Ida sat in the balcony on the day he spoke for woman's suffrage, and he
could not resist the temptation of looking up there as he spoke.Everything combined to give great effect to his speech.It was late in
the afternoon and the western sun thrust bars of light across the dim
chamber which the fresh young voice of the speaker had hushed into
silence.Ida had sent a bunch of flowers to his desk and upon that
bouquet the intrusive sun-ray fell, like something wild that loved the
rose |
hallway | Where is Sandra? | The legislators saw nothing in the sun-ray
except a result of negligence on the part of the door-keeper.They all
cheered the speech, but a majority tabled the matter as usual.The
galleries cheered and the women swarmed about the young champion, Ida
among them.Her hand-shake and smile was his greatest reward."A great speech, Brad; if I
wasn't so old-fashioned and set--you'd have converted me.In private I
admit all you say, but it ain't policy for me to advocate it just now.""Let's try being right
awhile."He told the members at the
boarding-house that it wouldn't hurt Bradley's chances."People won't
down a man on that point any more."Daniel travelled to the bathroom."Perhaps not in your county, but I don't want to experiment down in my
county," said Major Root, of MacIntosh."I don't believe the people of Iowa will down any man for stating what
he believes is right.""Don't bet too high on that," said the Major in final reply.The Judge dined with Bradley at the dining-room in the little cottage,
and it gave Bradley great satisfaction to see that he used his fork
more gracefully than the Supreme judge, who sat beside him, and better
than the senator, who sat opposite.They had a most delightful time in
talking over old legal friends, and the Judge was beaming as he came to
pudding.He assured them all that the Honorable Talcott would be heard
on the floor of Congress."We're the winning party now," he said."We're the party of the
future.""You surprised us sleeping on our arms," the general said,
"but we're awake now, and we've got pickets out."The Judge enjoyed his visit very much, and only once did he present
himself to Bradley with a suspicious heaviness in his speech.He had
reformed entirely since he had adopted a son, he explained to his old
cronies.On the day when the Judge was to return, as they walked down to the
train together, he said, "Well, Brad, we'll go right into the
congressional campaign.""I don't believe we'd better do that, Judge.""Well, I could not be elected--that's one thing."Sandra moved to the kitchen.Mary moved to the bedroom.I tell you, young man, they're on the run."I don't believe I want to be put through.I don't
believe I'm a politician.I'm sick all through with the whole cursed
business.I never'd be here only for you, pulling wires.You talk, and that's what put
you here, and it'll put you in Congress.""What's the good of my going there?Mary journeyed to the garden.You've been right on the railroad question, on the oleo
question, and the bank question.That speech of
yours, yesterday, I'm going to send broadcast in Rock County.The
district convention will meet in June early.Foster will pave the way
for your nomination, by saying Rock County should have a congressman.We'll go into the convention with a clear two-thirds majority, and then
declare your nomination unanimous.You see, your youth will be in your
favor.The only fight will be in the
convention.""Looks like spring, to-day," Bradley said.It was his way of closing an
argument.You'll find the whole pot boiling when you come home,"
the Judge said, as the train started.As February drew on and the snow fled, the earth-longing got hold upon
Bradley.It was almost seed time, with its warm, mellow soil, its
sweeping flights of prairie pigeons, its innumerable swarms of tiny
clamorous sparrows, its whistling plovers, and its passing wild fowl.The thought came to him there, for the first time, that nature was not
malignant nor hard; that life on a farm might be the most beautiful and
joyous life in the world.The meaning of Ida's words at last took
definite and individual shape in his mind.* * * * *
Bradley gave himself up to the Judge's plans.He went home in April
with eagerness and with reluctance.He was eager to escape the smoke of
the city and reluctant to leave behind him all chance to see Ida.This
feeling of hungry disappointment dominated him during his day's ride.He had seen her but twice during his stay in Des Moines, and now--when
would he see her again?This terrible depression and sharp pain wore away a little by the time
he reached home, and the active campaign which followed helped him to
bear it.He still wrote to her, and she replied without either
encouragement and without explicit displeasure.The campaign was really
the Judge's fight.Victory in the
convention only foreshadowed the sweeping victory in October.He
resigned as legislator, to become a congressman.In the west (as in rural America anywhere), the three types of great
men in the peoples' eyes are the soldier, the politician and the
minister.The whole people appear to revere the great soldier, the men
admire the successful politician, and the women bow down before the
noted preacher.These classes of hero-worshipers melt into each other, of course, but
broadly they may be said to separately exist.In colonial days the
minister came first, the soldier second, the politician last.Since the
revolution the soldier has been the first figure in the triumvirate,
and in these later times the politician and his organ of voice the
newspaper have placed the preacher last.And there is something wholesome in such an atmosphere, the atmosphere
of the West, at least by contrast.The worship of political success,
low as it may seem, is less deplorable than the worship of wealth,
which is already weakening the hold of the middle-class Eastern man
upon the American idea.In the West mere wealth does not carry
assurance of respect, much less can it demand subservience.Bradley never dreamed of getting rich, but under Radbourn and the Judge
he had developed a growing love for the orator's dominion.Notwithstanding his fits of disgust and bitterness he
loved to be a part of the political life of his time.It had a powerful
fascination for him.The deference which his old friends and neighbors
paid him as things due a rising young man, pleased him.He looked now to Washington, and it fired his imagination to think of
sitting in the hall where the mighty legislators of generations now
dead had voiced their epoch-marking thoughts.It amazed the Judge to
see how the wings of his young eagle expanded.The transformation from
a farmer's hired man to a national representative appealed to him as
characteristically American, and he urged Bradley to do his best.The election which the young orator expected to be another moment of
great interest really came as a matter-of-fact ending to a long and
triumphant canvass.He had held victory in his hand until she was
tamed.He was
elected, and while the Democrats went wild with joy, Bradley slept
quietly in his bed at home--while the brass band played itself
quiescent under his window.Now he fixed his eyes on Washington as an actuality.It was a long time
before his term began, and at the advice of Judge Brown and others he
packed his trunk in January to go on and look around a little in the
usual way of new members.He went alone, the Judge couldn't spare the
time.The ride from Chicago to Washington was an epic to him.It was his next
great departure, his entrance into another widening circle of thinking.He had never seen a mountain before; and the wild, plunging ride among
the Alleghany Mountains was magnificent.He sat for hours at a time
looking out of the window, while the train, drawn by its two tremendous
engines, crawled toward the summit.He saw the river drop deeper and
deeper, and get whiter and wilder; and then came the wooded level of
the summit, and then began the descent.While the reeling train alternately flung him to the window and against
the seat, he gazed out at the wheeling peaks, the snow-laden pines, and
the mighty gorges, through which the icy river ran, green as grass in
its quiet eddies.On every side were wild hillsides meshed with fallen
trees, and each new vista contained its distant peak.It was the
realization of his imagination of the Alleghanies.As the train swooped round its curves, dropping lower and lower, the
valley broadened out, and the great mountains moved away into ampler
distances.The river ran in a wide and sinuous band to the east and the
south.He realized it to be the Potomac, whose very name is history.He
began to look ahead to seeing Harper's Ferry, and in the nearing
distance was Washington!He had the Western man's intensity of feeling for Washington.Mary moved to the hallway.To him it
was the centre of American life, because he supposed the laws were made
there.The Western man knows Boston as the centre of art, which he
affects to despise, and New York appeals to him as the home of the
millionaire, of the money-lender; but in Washington he recognizes the
great nerve centre of national life.It is the political ganglion of
the body politic.It appeals to the romantic in him as well.It is
historical; it is the city that makes history.After leaving Harper's Ferry the outside world
vanished, and when the brakeman called "Washington," it was nearly
eight o'clock of a damp, chilly night.He was so eager to see the
Capitol, which the kindly fat man behind him had assured him was but a
few steps away from the station, that he took his valise in his hand,
and started directly for the dome, which a darkey with a push-cart,
pointed out to him with oppressive courtesy.There was an all-pervasive, impalpable, blue-gray mist in the air, cold
and translucent; and when he came to the foot of the grounds, and faced
the western front of the Capitol building, he drew a deep breath of
delight.There it loomed in the misty, winter night,
the mightiest building on the continent, blue-white, sharply outlined,
massive as a mountain, yet seemingly as light as a winter cloud.Weighing myriads of tons, it seemed quite as insubstantial as the mist
which transfigured it.Against the cold-white of its marble, and out of
the gray-white enveloping mist, bloomed the warm light of lamps, like
vast lilies with hearts of fire and halos of faint light.He stood for a long time looking upon it, musing upon its historic
associations.Around him he heard the grinding wheels, the click of the
horses' hoofs upon the asphalt pavement, and heard the shouts of
drivers.Somewhere near him water was falling with a musical sound in a
subterranean sluiceway.At last he came to himself with a start, and
found his arm aching with the fatigue of his heavy valise.It seemed to swarm with <DW52> people.They were
selling papers, calling with musical, bell-like voices--
"Evenin' Sty-ah!"Horse cars tinkled along, and a peculiar form of elongated 'bus, with
the word "Carette" painted upon it, rolled along noiselessly over the
asphalt pavement.An old man in business dress, with rather
aristocratic side-whiskers, came toward him, walking briskly through
the crowd, an open hand-bag swung around his neck; and as he walked he
chanted a peculiar cry--
"Doc-tor Ferguson's, selly-brated, double X, Philadelphia cough-drops,
for coughs _and_ colds, sore throat or hoarseness; five _cents_ a
package."Innumerable signs invited him to "meals at 15 and 25 cts.""Rolls and
French drip coffee, 10 cts.""Oysters in every style," etc.The oyster saloons were, in general, very attractive to him, as a
Western man, but specifically he did not like the looks of the places
in which they were served.He came at last to a place which seemed
clean and free from a bar, and ventured to call for a twenty-five cent
stew.After eating this, he again took his way to the street, and walked
along, looking for a moderate-priced hotel.He did not think of going
to a hotel that charged more than seventy-five cents for a room.He
came at length to quite a decent-looking place, which advertised rooms
for fifty cents and upwards.He registered under the clerk's calm
misprision, and the brown and wonderfully freckled <DW52> boy showed
him to his room.It was all quite familiar to him--this hotel to which a man of moderate
means is forced to go in the city.The dingy walls and threadbare
carpet got geometrically shabbier at each succeeding flight of stairs,
until at length the boy ushered him into a little room at the head of
the stairway.It was unwarmed and had no lock on the door; but the bed
was clean, and, as he soon found, very comfortable.RADBOURN SHOWS BRADLEY ABOUT THE CAPITAL.He woke in the morning from his dreamless sleep with that peculiar
familiar sensation of not knowing where he had lain down the night
before.There was something boyish in the soundness of his sleep.He
heard the newsboys calling outside, although it was apparently the
early dawn.Their voices made him think of Des Moines, for the reason
that Des Moines was the only city in which he had ever heard the
newsboys cry.He sprang from his bed at the thought of Radbourn.He was surprised to find that it had snowed
during the night, and everywhere the <DW54>s were cleaning the walks.Walking thus a perfect stranger in what seemed to him a great city he
did not feel at all like a rising young man.In fact the farther he got
from Rock River the smaller his importance grew, for he had the
imagination that comprehends relative values.On the street he passed a window where a big <DW64> was cooking
griddle-cakes, dressed in a snowy apron and a paper cap.He looked so
clean and wholesome that Bradley decided upon getting his breakfast
there, and going in, took his seat at one of the little tables.A
<DW52> boy came up briskly."I'd like some of those cakes," said Bradley, to whom all this was very
new.yelled the boy, and added in a low voice,
"Buckwheat or batter?"the boy yelled, by the way of correction, and asked
again in a low voice, "Coffee?"While Bradley was eating his cakes, which were excellent, others came
in, and the waiters dashed to and fro, shouting their weird orders."Ham _and_, two up coff, a pair, boot-leg, white wings."Bradley had a curiosity to see what this order would bring forth, and,
watching carefully, found that it secured ham and eggs, two cups of
coffee, a beefsteak, and an omelet.He was deeply interested in the
discovery.He recognized the most of the men around him as Western or Southern
types.Many of them had chin whiskers and wore soft crush hats.The
<DW64>s interested and fascinated him: they were so grimly ugly of
face, and yet apparently so good natured and light hearted.On the street again he saw the same types of men.He wondered if they
were not his colleagues.As for them, they probably took him for a
Boston or New York man, with his full brown beard and clear complexion.Sandra went back to the hallway.The <DW64>s attracted his eyes constantly.They drifted along the
street apparently aimlessly, many of them.Their faces were mostly
smiling, but in a meaningless way, as if it were a habit.He soon found
that they were swift to struggle for a chance to work.They asked to
carry his valise, to black his boots; the newsboys ran by his side, in
their eagerness to sell.As he went along, he noticed the very large number of "Rooms to Let,"
and the equally large number of signs of "Meals, Fifteen and
Twenty-five Cents."Evidently there would be no trouble in finding a
place to board.As he entered Radbourn's office, he saw a young lady seated at a desk,
manipulating a typewriter.She had the ends of a forked rubber tube
hung in her ears, and did not see Bradley.He observed that the tube |
kitchen | Where is Mary? | At the window sat
Radbourn, talking in a measured, monotonous voice into the mouthpiece
of a large flexible tube, which connected with another phonograph.His
back was toward Bradley, and he stood for some time looking at the
curious scene and listening to Radbourn's talk."Congress brings to Washington a fulness of life which no one can
understand who has not spent the summer here," Radbourn went on, in a
slow, measured voice, his lips close to the bell-like opening of the
tube.It had a ludicrous effect upon Bradley--like a person talking to
himself."The city may be said to die, when Congress adjourns.Its life is
political, and when its political motor ceases to move the city lies
sprawled out like a dead thing.Its
street cars shuttle to and fro under the burning sun, and its teamsters
loaf about the corners drowsily.The store-keepers keep shop, of
course, but they open lazily of a morning and close early at night.The
whole city yawns and rests and longs for the coming of the autumn and
Congress."It is amusing and amazing to see it begin to wake up at the beginning
of the session.Then begins the scramble of the hotels and
boarding-houses to secure members of Congress.Then begins"--
The girl suddenly saw Bradley standing there, and called out, "Some one
to see you, Mr.Radbourn stopped the cylinder, and turned."Ah, how do you do," he said, as if greeting a stranger.Bradley smiled in reply, knowing that Radbourn did not recognize him.I don't suppose you remember me, but I'm Brad Talcott."Radbourn rose with great cordiality."Well, well, I'm glad to see you,"
he said, his sombre face relaxing in a smile, as he seized Bradley by
the hand.I'm glad to see an old class-mate."I was interested in hearing you talk
into that thing there.""Oh, yes, I was just getting off my syndicate letter for this week.Sit
down and talk; you don't interrupt me at all.Of course I have heard of your success, State Legislature and
Congress and all that, but I would like to have you tell me all about
it."I had very little to do with it," said
Bradley.They took seats near the window, looking out upon the square, and upon
the vast, squat, Egyptian, tomb-like structure, that rose out of the
centre of the smooth, snow-covered plat, across which the sun streamed
with vivid white radiance.There was a little pause after they sat down.Radbourn leaned his head
on his arm, and studied Bradley earnestly.He seemed older and more
bitter than Bradley expected to see him.He asked of the old friends in
a slow way, as if one name called up another in a slowly moving chain
of association.They talked on for an hour thus, sitting in the same
position.Daniel travelled to the bathroom.At last Radbourn said--
"How far I've got from all those scenes and people!and yet the memory
of that little old town and its people has a powerful fascination.I
never'll go back, of course.To tell the truth, I am afraid to go back;
it would drive me crazy.I
like to be in the centre of things.This
city is full of ruined young men and women, who came here from the
slow-moving life of inland towns and villages, and, after two or three
years of a richer life, find it impossible to go back; and here they
are, struggling along on forty-five cents a day at hash-houses, living
in hall bedrooms, preferring to pick up such a living, at all kinds of
jobs, than to go back home.I'd do it myself, if I were"--
He broke off suddenly, and looked at Bradley in a keen, steady way."And so you're a congressman, Talcott?Sandra moved to the kitchen.Well, I'm glad of your success,
because it shows a man _can_ succeed on the right lines--in a measure,
at least.""Well, I've tried to live up to most of your principles," smiled
Bradley."I've read all the things you've sent me.""Well, you're the wildest and most dangerous lunatic that ever got into
Congress," Radbourn said, gravely."Do you expect to talk any of that
stuff on the floor?""Well, I--I hoped to be able to say something before the session
closes.""If you do, it will be a miracle.The House is under the rule of a
Republican Czar, and men with your ideas or any ideas are to be shut
out remorselessly.Let me tell you something right here; it will save
time and worry: You want to know the Speaker, cultivate him.That's the reason the speakership becomes such a terrible
struggle.In his hand is the
appointing of committees, which should be chosen by the legislators
themselves.The power of these committees is unlimited, you'll find.They can smother bills of the utmost importance.Theoretically they are
the servants of the House."I don't suppose it is realized by the people.This appointing of the
committee is supposed to save time, and yet the speakership contest
consumes weeks, sometimes months.Mary moved to the bedroom."Well, suppose we got out and walk about
a little.I infer you're on to see the town.Bradley named the hotel with a little reluctance.He knew how cheap it
was; and since he had discovered that congressmen were at a premium in
boarding-houses, he saw that he must get more sumptuous quarters than
he had hitherto occupied.The
sky was gentle, beautiful, and spring-like.The fact that he was in
Washington came upon Bradley again, as he saw the soaring dome of the
capitol at the head of the avenue."What you want to do is to get on good social terms with the so-called
leaders," Radbourn was saying."Recognition goes by favor on the floor
of the House.We might go up to the capitol and look about," Radbourn
suggested.They walked up the steps leading to the west front of the building.Everywhere the untrodden snow lay white and level."This is the finest part of the whole thing," Radbourn remarked, as
they reached the level of esplanade."It has more beauty and simple
majesty than the main building itself, or any structure in the city."Bradley turned and looked at it right and left with
admiring eyes.It gleamed with snow, and all about was the sound of
dripping water, and in the distance the roll of wheels and click of
hoofs.The esplanade was a broad walk extending the entire width of the
building, and conforming to it.It was bottomed with marble squares,
and bordered with a splendid wall, breast-high on one side, and by the
final terrace running to the basement wall on the other.Here and there
along the wall gigantic brazen pots sat, filled with evergreens, whose
color seemed to have gradually dropped down and entered into the marble
beneath them.The bronze had stained with rich, dull green each
pedestal and irregular sections of the marble wall itself.Radbourn pointed out the Pension
Office, the White House, the Treasury, and other principal buildings
with a searching word upon their architecture.The monument, he
evidently considered, required no comment.As they entered the dome, they passed a group of men whose brisk, bluff
talk and peculiar swagger indicated their character--legislators from
small country towns."Some of your colleagues," Radbourn said, indicating them with his
thumb.As they paused a moment in the centre of the dome, one of the
group, a handsome fellow with a waxed mustache and hard, black eyes,
gave a stretching gesture, and said, "I'm in the world now."Des
Moines and its capitol were dwarfed and overshadowed by this great
national city, to which all roads ran like veins to a mighty heart.He
lifted his shoulders in a deep breath.Mary journeyed to the garden.It was glorious to be a
congressman, but still more glorious to be a citizen of the world.They passed through the corridors in upon the house floor, which
swarmed with legislators, lobbyists, pages, newspaper men and visitors.Radbourn led the way down to the open space before the speaker's desk,
and together they turned and swept the semi-circular rows of seats."Everywhere the visitor abounds," said Radbourn."Western and Southern
men predominate.It's surprising what deep interest the <DW64> takes in
legislation," he went on, lifting his eyes to the gallery, which was
black with their intent and solemn faces."See this old fellow with his
hat off as if he were in the midst of a temple," he said, nodding at a
group before the speaker's desk.Bradley looked at the poor, bent, meek, old man with a thrill of pity.He observed that many of the <DW64>s were splashed with orange-
clay.Members began to take their seats and to call pages by clapping their
hands.The cloak-rooms and barber-shop resounded with laughter.Newspaper men sauntered by, addressing Radbourn and asking for news.And here and there others, like Radbourn, were acting as guides to
groups of visitors.Mary moved to the hallway.In the midst of the growing tumult a one-armed man entered the
speaker's desk and called out in snappy tenor--
"Gentlemen, I am requested by the door-keeper to ask all persons not
entitled to the floor to please retire."Bradley started, but Radbourn said, "No hurry, you have fifteen minutes
yet.As a member-elect you have the courtesy of the floor anyway.I just want to look on for to-day.""Well, we'll go up in the gallery."Sandra went back to the hallway.Looking down upon the floor and its increasing swarm of individuals,
Bradley got a complete sense of its vastness and its complexity and
noise."It makes the Iowa legislature seem like a school-room," he said to
Radbourn.At precisely noon the gavel fell with a single sharp stroke, and the
speaker called persuasively, "The house will _please_ be in order."The
members rose and stood reluctantly, some of them sharpening their
pencils, others reading while the chaplin prayed sonorously with many
oratorical cadences, taking in all the departments of government in the
swing of his generous benediction.Instantly at the word "Amen," like the popping of a cork, the tumult
burst out again.Hands clapped, laughter flared out, desks were
slammed, papers were rattled, feet pounded, and the brazen monotonous
clanging voice of the clerk sounded above it all like some new steam
calliope whose sounds were words."You see how much prayer means here," said Radbourn.A good deal of the business which followed was similar in character to
the proceedings at Des Moines.Resolutions were passed with two or
three aye votes and no noes at all, while the rest of the members
looked over the Record, read the morning papers, or wrote on busily.The speaker declared each motion carried with glib voice.At last a special order brought up an unfinished debate upon some
matter, and the five minute rule was enforced."You're in luck," said Radbourn."The whole procession is going to pass
before you."As the debate went on he pointed out the great men whose names
suggested history to Bradley and whose actual presence amazed him.There was Amos B. Tripp, whom Radbourn said resembled "a Chinese
god"--immense, featureless, bald, with a pout on his face like an
enormous baby.The "watch dog of the house," Major Hendricks, was tall,
thin, with the voice and manner of an old woman.His eyes were
invisible, and his chin-beard wagged up and down as he shouted in high
tenor his inevitable objection.An old man with abundant hair, blue-white under the perpendicular
light, arose at the back part of the room, making a fine picture
outlined against the deep red screen.His manner was courtly, his ruddy
face pleasing, his voice musical and impassioned."He's the dress parade orator of the house," observed Radbourn.Mary went to the kitchen."I like him," said Bradley, leaning forward to absorb the speaker's
torrent of impassioned utterance.When he sat down the members
applauded.Most of the orators conformed to types familiar to Bradley.There was
the legal type, monotonously emphatic, with extended forefinger, which
pointed, threatened and delineated.His speaking wore on the ear like a
saw-filing.Then there was the political speaker, the stump orator, who
was full of well-worn phrases, who could not mention the price of wool
or the number of cotton bales without using the ferocious throaty-snarl
of a beast of prey.He was followed by the clerical type, a speaker who used the most
mournful cadences in correcting the gentleman on his left as to the
number of cotton bales.His voice and manner formed a distinct
reflection of the mournful preacher, and the tune of his high voice had
the power of calling up the exact phraseology of sermons--"Repent, my
lost brother, ere it be too late," "Prepare for the last great day, my
brother," while he actually asserted the number of cotton bales had
been grossly over-stated by the gentleman from Alabama.On going down the stairs, Radbourn called his attention to the
paintings, hanging here and there, which he called "hideous daubs" with
the reckless presumption of a born realist to whom allegory was a
personal affront.Radbourn showed him about the city as much as he
could spare time to do, and when he released him, Bradley went back to
the capitol, which exercised the profoundest fascination upon him.He had not the courage to go back to the private gallery into which
Radbourn had penetrated, but went into the common gallery, which was
full of <DW64>s, unweariedly listening to the dry and almost
unintelligible speeches below.He sat there the whole afternoon and went back to his hotel meek and
very tired.Radbourn introduced him to a few of the members the next day.It was
evident that nobody cared very much whether he had been elected or not.Each man had his own affairs to look after, and greeted him with a
flabby hand-shake and looked at him with cold and wandering eyes.He grew nervous over the expenses which he was incurring, although he
constantly referred himself back to the fact that he was a Congressman,
at a salary of six thousand dollars.His economy was too deeply
ingrained to be easily wiped out.John went to the garden.He seldom got into a street-car that
he did not hold a mental debate with himself to justify the
extravagance.He went about a good deal during the next two or three days, but he
continued at the cheap hotel, where he was obliged to keep his overcoat
on in order to write a letter or read a newspaper.He bought a dollar seat the first time, which worried him all
through the play, and he did penance the following evening by walking
the twenty blocks (both ways), and by taking a fifty-cent seat.He
figured it a clear saving of sixty cents.He really enjoyed the play
more than he would have done in a dollar seat and consoled himself with
the reflection that no one knew he was a Congressman, anyway.* * * * *
He told Radbourn at the station that he had enjoyed every moment of his
stay.As the train drew out he looked back upon the city, and the great
dome its centre, with a deep feeling of admiration, almost love.It had
seized upon him mightily.He had only to shut his eyes to see again
that majestic pile with its vast rotundas, its bewildering corridors
and its tumultuous representative hall.He began to calculate how long it would be before he should
return.After his return home he accepted every invitation to speak, because
that relieved the tedium of his life in Rock River.He took an active
part in the fall campaign in county politics, and he delivered the
Fourth of July address at the celebration at Rock River amid the usual
blare of bands and bray of fakirs and ice-cream vendors, while the
small boys fired off crackers in perfect oblivion of anybody but
themselves.It was magnificent to occupy a covered carriage in the parade and to
sit on the |
office | Where is John? | The strawberry festival that
secured his presence felicitated itself upon the fact and always
insisted on "just a few words, Mr.The summer passed rather better than he had anticipated.About a month
before his return to Washington he received a letter from Ida asking
him to be present at a suffrage meeting in Des Moines, and he accepted
the invitation with great pleasure.He had been wondering how he could
see her again without making the journey for that purpose, which he
could not bring himself to do.It was a soft, hazy October day and the ride to Des Moines was very
beautiful.The landscape seemed to be in drowse, half-sleeping and
half-waking.The jays flew from amber and orange- coverts of
maples and oaks across the blue haze of the open, and quails piped from
the hazel-thickets.Crows flapped lazily across the fields where the
ploughmen were at work.The threshing machines hummed and clattered
with a lower, quieter note, and as Bradley looked upon it all, the
wonder of his release from the toil of reaping and threshing and
ploughing came upon him again.She gave him her hand in a frank, strong
clasp."You'll stay to tea with us, of course," she said."There is no one
here but mother and I, and we can talk things all over.This is my
mother," she said, presenting an elderly lady with a broad, placid
face._Secondly._ We have fully paid the debt.The $37,389.79 of indebtedness
reported at the last annual meeting has absolutely disappeared.Daniel travelled to the bathroom.Every
cent of it has been paid, to the last of the seventy-nine.The great
work undertaken three years ago is finished, and we are free.We have
been for a long time like Lot’s wife, looking back and fearing lest
perchance the past might overwhelm us; but God has only rained down
riches out of Heaven and buried our burden beneath His gracious gifts;
and we are free now to look and to press forward.But such a statement brings a weight of grave responsibility.We say
of the treasury of the Association gladly and gratefully, No debt—no
deficit.But we must remember, in all humility, we do ever owe the debt
to love our fellow-men and show it by our works of Christian charity,
and our deficit is what we have been lacking in filling up the full
measure of our opportunity for serving Christ in the person of His poor.* * * * *
MISSIONARY MASS CONVENTIONS.At the late State Conference of Ohio, a Committee on Missions was
appointed, of which Prof.Judson Smith, D. D., is chairman, and Rev.C. C. Creegan, of Wakeman, secretary.It is proposed to hold a series
of mass conventions, at central points, and every member of every
Congregational church in the State will be invited to attend at least
one of these meetings.James Powell will represent the A. M. A.
The following schedule has been prepared:
Marietta, Oct.4th,
Mansfield, Nov.6th,
Wauseon, Nov.7th,
Sandusky, Nov.8th,
Norwalk, Nov.10th,
Wakeman, Nov.11th,
Elyria, Nov.18th,
Painesville, Nov.19th,
Ashtabula, Nov.21st,
N. Bloomfield, Nov.22d,
Youngstown (Welsh Conference), Nov.23d,
Windham, Nov.24th,
Ravenna, Nov.28th,
Newark (Welsh Conference), Nov.* * * * *
OUR NEW MEN.Scarcely ever in the history of the
Association have we had so large a number of recruits for important
places in our service, of such proved quality, and more and more we
find ourselves able to retain the services of our best men, who have
served the cause of education and religion with us in years past.It is
to us a gratifying indication of the growing sense among our Christian
ministers and teachers of the importance and dignity of the work, and
of their appreciation of it, as founded and established beyond all
question, and for all time (as we measure things), that such men are
willing to commit themselves to it, and to remain in it year after year.Sandra moved to the kitchen.We accept the congratulations of _The Congregationalist_ as expressed
in the following paragraph:
The Association is to be congratulated upon new accessories to its
working force.Henry S. DeForest of Iowa has accepted the
Presidency of Talladega College, and is already upon the ground.S. D. Gaylord, a highly commended schoolman of the West, has taken the
principalship of the Avery Institute at Charleston, S. C. The late
principal, Prof.A. W. Farnham, is proposed as an occupant of a chair
in one of the colleges of the A. M. A.; Rev.C. W. Hawley, pastor of
the Second Church at Amherst, Mass., is to enter upon the pastorate of
the First Congregational Church of Atlanta, which was resigned by Rev.S. S. Ashley, that he might take a season of respite after his fourteen
years of invaluable Southern service.O. W. Fay accepts the call
to the pastoral charge in Montgomery, Ala.O. D. Crawford of
West Bloomfield, N. Y., goes down to serve as pastor of the church
and superintendent of the Emerson Institute at Mobile; Prof.J. K.
Cole is transferred from New Orleans to the principalship of the Beach
Institute at Savannah, Ga.McPherron is promoted to be
Principal of the Normal Department of Straight University.* * * * *
THE MENDI MISSION.We call attention to the summary on another page of the Second Annual
Meeting of our Missionaries on the West Coast of Africa.There seems to
have been in it a careful review of the work of the year and a study of
the means at hand for carrying it in the future, and a reasonable view
of its needs and possibilities.It will be seen that the report of church and evangelizing work
indicates not only earnest effort but substantial results.The
missionaries are planning—and the plan has resulted from their own
experience and observation—a more free use of native helpers as it
shall become possible.All Missions have come or are coming to this.It
needs but a simple knowledge of the love of God and the redemption of
the world by the Lord Jesus Christ, to fit a man to go home and tell
his neighbors the good news which has come to him.And if these native Christians, carrying to their
own people only that portion of the Gospel which they have known and
certified by their experience, can come into frequent contact with the
missionaries educated and established in the faith, they will be kept
from wandering off into error, and grow in grace and knowledge by using
the grace and knowledge they have already received and acquired.The missionaries have, to some extent, upon the basis of the year’s
experience, re-arranged themselves so that they think (and we agree
with them) that they can work to better advantage than the past year.Mary moved to the bedroom.One of the schools, that at Good Hope, seems to have been very
successful and to have reached a large number of native children.The
other, at Avery, has been more confined to the training of children,
who are taken into the home to be under continuous influence, in the
hope that by industrial and religious, as well as mental training, they
may in time be fitted to be important helpers in the work.Anthony, who joined the Mission in March last, to take especial
charge of the mill and other industrial work at Avery, has already
proved to be a valuable addition to the band.And the Committee have
just commissioned and sent out another recruit to strengthen the hands,
we trust, of those already in the field.He was born in the island of Barbadoes, West Indies; immigrated to
Liberia, Africa, where he spent five years; came to the United States;
spent nearly two years in the cities of New York and Boston; was
converted to Christ in the latter city nine years ago.He returned to
Barbadoes, visiting also various other West Indian islands.In 1875 he
went to England, visiting Liverpool, and spending a year in London.While in the latter city he was engaged in missionary work.He was sent, about two years ago, by the Freedmen’s Missions Aid
Society, of London, assisted by Belmont Church, Aberdeen, Scotland,
and several individual Christians, to Fisk University, Nashville,
Tenn., where he has been studying with a view to devoting himself to
missionary work in Africa.These young men are in a very trying position, and need the prayers of
all good people that they may have wisdom and grace and patience from
the Giver of all good and perfect gifts.* * * * *
THE ARTHINGTON MISSION.Let it not be thought by any of the friends of the Association, because
we have not had more to say in the MISSIONARY, that we have given up
the hope of yet being able to accept the noble offer of Mr.Robert
Arthington, and of establishing and sustaining the Mission proposed by
him.We have already fully and formally recognized the importance of
the work, the accessibility of the field and its peculiar claims upon
our body.Mary journeyed to the garden.It is in that that we have
labored for over thirty years, and to that that we desire to confine
ourselves.Mary moved to the hallway.This Eastern Mission will be a proper balance and complement
to the Mendi Mission on the Western coast.But we have tried to make
haste slowly.Arthington, that the debt of the
Association should be extinguished, is now fully and fairly met.Sandra went back to the hallway.That
is an obstacle out of the way.The only other condition is one on our
part of prudent anticipation.It will take a large amount—though it
has been more often over than underestimated—to provide the men and
the outfit and to put them on the ground.It will require at least an
amount annually equal to that we are expending on the Western Mission
to sustain this in the East.And the Executive Committee have thought
it wise to assure themselves of $50,000, which they would have in hand
to devote to this work as it might be required, before they should take
the first step towards beginning it.There are several things within our horizon to-day which conspire to
give us hope of a speedy realization of this plan.Arthington’s
offer still holds good.There is $15,000 for the work to begin with.O. H. White, the indefatigable Secretary of the Freedmen’s Missions
Aid Society in Great Britain, is enthusiastic on the subject of this
Mission, and reports to us that the interest of the English and Scotch
people in it is deep and deepening.Already he has secured considerable
sums to be devoted to this work.Recently he has written us asking for
a definite agreement on the part of the Association as to what it will
do in the way of providing from this country a portion of the fund
deemed necessary to the inception of the Mission, if he shall raise
from the mother country a second $15,000.The Committee has answered
him that they will agree to provide the $20,000 to make the needed
$50,000 for the start, and will then, “with the blessing of God and
the assistance of the friends of the African race in Great Britain and
America, perpetually maintain the Mission.”
The Committee felt free to make this pledge, in the present financial
condition of the Association, and especially as final receipts
from the Avery estate have recently come to hand, amounting to a
considerable part of this sum, and which are devoted by the donor to
the evangelization of the African race in Africa.It is a great step for us to take; but we have felt that it would be
a great mistake, a great failure in duty, for us not to take it.God
bless Robert Arthington, of Leeds!White in his efforts
to raise this second fund!God bless every man and woman on either side
the sea who shall join hands and put together their resources to carry
the light of the gospel of love and liberty into the thick darkness of
Eastern Equatorial Africa!Who will help us on this side the water?* * * * *
SELF-PROTECTION.[We extract from the valuable address given at the Boston
anniversary, by the Rev.Mary went to the kitchen.Albert H. Heath, of New Bedford, Mass.,
his second division (all we can find room for), in which he
treats forcibly of one most important aspect of our home work.In other portions of the address he spoke at length of our
special obligations to these people and of the work in the light
of a genuine Christian philanthropy.We commend these strong
words to careful reading and thought.]Self-protection is to be taken into consideration in this work.What
effect, we may well inquire, is it going to have upon the beloved
institutions of our land if these races are not Christianly educated?It is possible that many will feel that the Indian, whatever our
treatment of him, can never offer any serious menace to our civil life;
we may safely let him go, as his fathers have gone before him, marching
before our fixed bayonets toward the setting sun.And if this military
policy is to prevail, we shall all be glad when he has made his last
trail across the plain and echoed his last shrill war-whoop amid the
mountains’ fastnesses.But, after all, friends, it may be there is a
God in Heaven who will remember and avenge the red man’s wrong.John went to the garden.John moved to the office.“They
that take the sword shall perish with the sword,” is not alone to
be found in Scripture.It is written in our constitutions; it is a
fundamental law of our being; and history bears abundant testimony that
it is no dead letter.We ought to remember this law as we press the
Indian from his God-given right.It may be that we, the children of the
Pilgrims, may yet find ourselves driven from our Eastern homes and the
institutions which the century has helped us to build, while the red
hand of Nihilism holds sway over the graves of our fathers, and crowds
us, as we are to-day crowding the Indian, into the track of the setting
sun.But whatever may be the result of our treatment of the Indian, there
can be no doubt what will be the effect if the <DW64> and the Chinaman
are left uneducated and unchristianized.Already do we feel the hand
of the black man in our politics; our ears have distinctly heard the
low rumbling, and we have felt the shudder beneath our feet which
betokens an eruption.Before we know it Vesuvius may be belching forth
its fiery flood, darkening the sky and spreading far and wide its river
of death.The demagogue
and the office-seeker are a genus that thrives in all climes.They
may be more poisonous at the South, as most reptiles are that breed
under a tropical sun; but the frosts of the North do not kill them any
more than they kill the larvæ of the insects which every April sun
hatches into life.It only needs the warmth of an election to quicken
them and bring them in buzzing swarms around your ears.Daniel went back to the bedroom.There will be
corrupt politicians in Kansas who will rob them of their political
rights as readily as those in the South.It matters little where they
dwell; even in New York or Boston they would find themselves still
in the reign of demoniacal possession.While they remain an ignorant
class they will be a dangerous class.To be shot and intimidated may
not be, after all, their worst political fate; to be corrupted with
bribery would be equally bad.The electioneering purse, in the hand of
the Northern office-seeker, might prove as potent in robbing them of
their rights as the pistol which Southern chivalry may point at their
devoted heads.Let us not, therefore, cheer ourselves, |
garden | Where is John? | Wherever they
may be, ignorance is their greatest curse; nothing but education and
Christianization will dispel this shadow that is darkening their lives,
and lift this yoke of bondage that is now galling their necks, and in
no other way can they be converted into useful citizens.They are an
element of danger to the Republic, until, like our Northern children,
they grow up under the shadow of the school-house.It is possible that
all are not aware how great is the weight of this ignorance, which is
like loose ballast in the ship of State, ready at any sudden lurch to
change sides and carry us to the bottom.We and our legislators have
been most thoughtless in our treatment of this question.In a single
day, by legislative enactment, we put the ballot into the hand of a
million men, not one of whom knew a letter of the alphabet.A more
suicidal blow has seldom been aimed at the heart of this Republic.We
have given, almost indiscriminately, the right of suffrage to these
Southern States, and yet in sixteen of them seventy-five out of every
hundred of the population, according to the census of 1870, are growing
up entirely without school advantages.At the present moment a majority
of the voters in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Mississippi and South
Carolina are without the ability either to read or write.In either
of these States, or in all of them, any election can be carried by
sheer weight of ignorance.Seventeen hundred thousand men, according
to a statistical report which has been put into my hands, at the last
national election cast the ballot which they could neither read nor
write.Had not a kindly
Providence been on our side we should have been plunged into anarchy.Sandra moved to the office.And this scene waits to repeat itself in 1880.The next President of
these States will be elected to his high position by sheer force of
ignorance—ignorance manipulated and controlled by men whose hearts are
as black with treason to-day as they were in ’61.No thoughtful man can
look upon these facts and not tremble for the safety of his country.John went back to the garden.So, also, is the ignorant and unchristianized Chinaman making himself
felt in our politics.He casts no ballot, he holds no office.He
does not come to the polls to drink and smoke and sell himself to
the highest bidder on election day; and yet his political influence
already is as wide as the continent; his unwelcome ghost stalks through
the halls of Congress, and broods over every political or religious
convention that is holden between the two oceans.Already have we
seen one sovereign State changing the terms of its constitution and
revolutionizing its laws out of pure regard for the Chinaman.And,
still more significant, we have seen our great National Congress
voting to change the very genius of the Government, and to shut the
doors that have for a hundred years stood open, and which we mean
shall not be closed for a hundred years to come; and we will write
over these open doors in letters of fire, so that the most distant
islands of the sea may read: “This is the world’s asylum, free to the
oppressed of all nations.” Now, I doubt not there are evils connected
with the coming of the heathen Chinaman.There is oppression and
sorrow brought home to many hearts.I feel that there must be more
or less of pollution in his touch.I pity the State into which this
old world sewerage empties itself.But the remedy is not in building
walls, though they be heaven-high, on our Chinaward side.This evil
can be handled and neutralized only by the Christian virtue that is in
us.Can we convert this heathen material—permeate it with Christian
thought?Can we assimilate it and weave it into the civil fabric we are
making?If so, it will do us no harm; otherwise it will rankle like
poison in our blood, and possibly work our destruction in the end.This
question should not be settled in the political arena.It is a moral, a
religious question.The forces that are needed now are those that lie
in the hand of the Christian church.We must permeate this festering
mass with the leaven of Christ, and we must do it speedily.Politicians are beginning to treat it, and therefore it is
rapidly growing worse.Legislation knows of no instrumentality, save that the civil statute
ultimately seeks support in the bayonet.Before we know it, this
question may be baptized in blood.The Rocky Mountain wall lifts up a tremendous barrier to separate us
and make us twain; only one little thread of iron binds us together
and makes us one.Let us not wait until the whole Pacific <DW72>
bristles with rebellion as the South did in ’61; but let us pour the
strains of our Christian influence over the mountains.If we can
Christianize this heathen mass, then the trouble is over, the danger
passed.Self-protection, then, affords a most powerful motive in the
prosecution of this work.* * * * *
SUNDAY-SCHOOL LETTERS.The interest of the Sunday-schools in our Southern work has been
increasing during the past year.The concert exercise has taken well,
and many schools have sent us their first contributions.How many of the schools connected with our churches understand clearly
our offer in regard to correspondence from the field, we do not know.It is this: any Sunday-school which contributes ten dollars or more
annually to the work of the A. M. A., if they request it, is entitled
to a quarterly letter from one of our missionaries.The “Children’s Page” of this number of the MISSIONARY contains such a
letter.It is bright and interesting to both teachers and scholars.The
following letter from a superintendent tells of the interest excited by
such letters in his school.Besides the good done by the money given, is it not well worth while to
train up our children to give, and to educate them in the missionary
spirit?This letter is in response to a Sunday-school letter from Miss
Barr:
MISS L. E. B.
DEAR SISTER IN CHRIST: Your kind letter of the 11th inst.came to
hand by due course of mail, and your very valuable epistle to our
Sabbath-school, of the 2d, came last Saturday.Accept my sincere thanks
for the same, in behalf of the Sunday-school and myself.I think if
you could have seen the eager faces and deep interest manifested by
all while I read it to the school last Sabbath, you would be satisfied
that at least one missionary of the A. M. A. would be mentioned by our
praying ones in their petitions at the Throne of Grace for some time,
and that all of us have so much of a missionary spirit kindled in our
hearts, and so much interest awakened in you personally, that your next
letter will be looked for so eagerly that it will seem a good while to
wait.I think you must have a very earnest-working church in Atlanta,
and that the Master will bless them and you is my prayer.I have no
doubt but “Aunt Lucy” will have many prayers offered for a blessing
upon her.I am glad to know that your present field of labor in the vineyard is
so pleasant; and that the Master will give you health and strength to
labor for Him in it, and that you may be the means in His hands of
gathering in many precious sheaves from it to the heavenly garners, is
the sincere prayer of
Your humble fellow-servant,
R. H.,
_Superintendent Congregational Sabbath-school_.* * * * *
ITEMS FROM THE FIELD.P. J. McEntosh writes: “My field is increasing
in interest greatly.I have just closed a series of meetings in our
church.The Lord hath once more visited this part of His vineyard.There have been twenty-two conversions in our meetings.Seventeen of
these have cast their lot among us—seven strong, settled men, four
settled wives, six promising young ladies.Others are still asking
what they must do to be saved, and if I can induce them to take Jesus
at His word and believe on Him, they too shall be saved.Pray for us,
that I may lead them on in the paths of peace, and that they may learn
from experience that ‘The path of the just is as a shining light, which
shineth more and more unto the perfect day.’”
TALLADEGA, ALA.—Our first word from the new President of the College,
Rev.H. S. DeForest: I came sound and dusty this p. m., having seen
many things of interest to me at Hampton and Atlanta.The first look
here more than meets my expectations.The buildings, grounds and
scenery are very pleasant, and the possibilities certainly are grand.ATLANTA, GA.—The Fall term of the University opened October 1st.The
first week gives promise of a very full school.There are already
thirty girl boarders, and the indications are that their Hall will be
as badly crowded as last year.The reports of the Summer work of the
students, in all parts of the State, are very cheering.The white people are taking a deeper
and more kindly interest in the education of the <DW52> children and
in the University.Orr, State School Commissioner of Georgia, has, with the approval
of Dr.Sears, established fourteen Peabody scholarships, each paying
$72, in the Normal department of Atlanta University.The award is to be
determined by competitive examinations.The Storrs School is running over full.CYPRESS SLASH, GA.—Brother Snelson writes: Last Sunday, 14th, I spent
with Brother Headen at Cypress Slash.Gave the communion there, and
received three new members.They have made a pretty good pole-house,
about 28×20 feet, in which they hold school and meeting.FLATONIA, TEXAS.—We are holding a protracted meeting, and last Sunday
was our communion.There seems to be more interest in the church, and
the prospect is fair for doing good.Brother Church has been here since last Thursday, and will
remain a few days longer.AUSTIN, TEXAS.—Mr.A. J. Turner writes: I was in Austin last week and
visited Mrs.She had just returned from the North and
started her school.I visited with her
the site of the new building, the walls of which are rising.I rejoice that Northern people are doing so much for
our people.GOLIAD, TEXAS.—“There is an increasing desire among our people to carry
the Gospel beyond the bounds of our churches, and so far as it has
been done, our polity and purity have attracted favorable attention.There is a growing dissatisfaction with the worship and moralities of
the older churches on the part of some of their members and others who
would join but for these.The young people, in their plays, imitate the
‘shouting’ to perfection.It is fine sport to them to see the church
members perform.They laugh at the claim of Divine help to do what they
can so easily do without that help.The young men, on this account,
are increasingly more difficult to reach with the Gospel.Education,
property and morality are cast aside as of little worth; stealing and
shooting among themselves are not uncommon.Only a pure Gospel can save
these young men from dissipation and crime; yet they see the grossest
immoralities in church members, and the wildest fanaticism in their
modes of worship.A wide door is open here for Christian workers, and
as promising as any other to those of great patience and self-denial.”
* * * * *
GENERAL NOTES.—THE PEABODY EDUCATIONAL FUND—REPORTS OF THE GENERAL AGENT AND
THE TREASURER.—The annual meeting of the trustees of the Peabody
Educational Fund was held October 1st, at the Fifth Avenue Hotel.The chairman addressed the meeting, and in the course of his remarks
mentioned with regret the shrinkage in the income from the investments,
and expressed the hope that from other sources the funds would be
rendered adequate to the work laid out.The thirteenth annual report was presented by Dr.He said that the work had made satisfactory progress during the
past year.The difficulties arising from the poverty of the South, he
continued, are now increased by the pressure of the State debts.The
necessity of aid from the Federal Government is now greater than ever
before.The evils that are certain to grow out of popular ignorance,
if the public schools are suffered to languish, or if they reach only
a part of the population, will not be limited to the States where they
first appear, but will cast their blight over the whole country.It might be thought best to limit the assistance to the <DW52>
population, if any should be granted.By an act of the General
Government the right of suffrage has been extended to them.A large
proportion of them are confessedly unqualified for a judicious exercise
of this power.If the <DW52> people are the “wards of the nation,” in
what way can the nation so well perform the duties of its trust as by
qualifying them for citizenship?Of the two grand objects of this fund, the first, the promotion of
common school education, has been thoroughly established, and the chief
attention should be henceforth given to the second, the professional
training of teachers.In some of the States that stand most in need of
efficient normal schools, it would be impossible to provide at once the
requisite funds for their establishment.Though there are very few normal schools of a high character besides
our own in the States with which we are concerned, there are several
of different grades of excellence, either maintained or aided by
public authority.Some of the former, and all of the latter, are for
teachers.Much good has been accomplished for the
schools by the universities and other endowed institutions with normal
departments, maintained by different Christian denominations.One
association has already sent out from its numerous institutions 5,267
teachers, by whom about 100,000 pupils have been instructed.A large
proportion of the graduates of all these institutions become teachers.The report by States shows the following facts: In Virginia less than
half the children of the State attended the public schools last year.In the schools there was a loss of 3,271, compared with the
year before.Over $250,000 of the school money has been diverted to
other purposes; but in the future three-fourths of the appropriation
are secure.In North Carolina the attendance is less than one-half.Difficulty has
been found in this State to induce young men of character and talent to
prepare for the business of teaching, as the pay is uncertain and but
little more than the wages of a common laborer.The school attendance in South Carolina has increased 13,843 during
the year.For several years the system of public instruction was in
a disordered condition; but, during the last year, a better state of
things has been manifest.But the want of normal schools and of more
funds is painfully felt.Such, at least, are the views of the State
Superintendent.In regard to scholarships he says: “The agent of the
Peabody Fund has placed at my disposal ten fifty-dollar scholarships
in the Normal and Agricultural Institute at Hampton, Va.A visit to
the Institute and observation of the manner in which it is conducted
convince me that it is doing exactly what it professes to do.” He
adds: “There are dangers before us which it will require the highest
patriotism and the wisest statesmanship to avoid.of the voting population of the State are unable to read the ballots
which they cast.”
In Georgia, notwithstanding the increase of nearly 40,000 in the school
population, the number of the illiterate is diminished 20,614.Great
encouragement is felt regarding the educational prospects in the State.Two-fifths of the children
attend school, and there are applicants promised for all the Normal
College scholarships that can be allowed to that State.Opposition to the public free school system is disappearing in
Mississippi, and a healthy condition is reported. |
bathroom | Where is Sandra? | One-third of the school population attend
in Louisiana.In the Normal School we have had twenty
scholarships of $50 each.This arrangement is the result of an extended
correspondence with the State Superintendent.In Tennessee, never since the first year of the present school system
has so much money been raised for its support; never has the school tax
been paid more cheerfully.Peabody’s
gift, the Superintendent says: “The encouragement given by the wise
disposition of this fund has always proved an invaluable accessory in
the arduous work of organizing and sustaining the cause of popular
education in this State and in the South.”
The State Superintendent of West Virginia says of the aid received from
the Peabody Fund for the Normal Institutes: “It is of the highest value
to the cause of education, and contributes more, perhaps, in general
advantage than an equal expenditure in any other direction could do.”
The appropriations from the fund for the last year were: Virginia,
$9,850; North Carolina, $6,700; South Carolina, $4,250; Georgia,
$6,500; Florida, $3,000; Alabama, $3,600; Mississippi, $4,000;
Louisiana, $7,650; Texas, $7,700; Arkansas, $5,600; Tennessee, $12,000;
West Virginia, $4,000; total, $74,850.The Treasurer’s report showed a balance of about $83,000 available
for expenditure during the coming year.In former years the income
has amounted at times to as much as $110,000, but there has been some
shrinkage since the 6 per cent.bonds, in which much of the fund was
invested, have been called in, the new investments being in 4 per cent.The officers of the Board, who have been continued from year to year,
are Robert Winthrop, Chairman; G. Peabody Russell, Secretary; Samuel
Wetmore, Treasurer; the Rev.* * * * *
The Indians.—In the coming fall, twenty more girls will be added to the number
of Indian students at Hampton.Their due proportion is regarded as
essential to the success and value of the effort.Augustine returned to the Territory, and their wives
and families turned out to welcome them home with rejoicing, the long
dreamed of meeting proved such a shock to the reconstructed braves that
some of them broke from the company and ran away to the woods, refusing
to have anything more to do with their affectionate but very dirty
squaws.The situation was humorous but tragic, and withal very natural.How could they walk “the white man’s road” in such companionship?The co-education of the Indian boys
and girls, with its lessons of mutual respect and helpfulness in
the class-rooms and work-rooms, is the hope, and the only hope, of
permanent Indian civilization.—The Secretary of War has turned over to the Department of the Interior
the U. S. Army barracks at Carlisle, Penn., to be used for the purpose
of Indian education, under charge of Capt.R. H. Pratt, who has been
sent West to collect 100 Indian youths for his school, as well as
the girls for Hampton.Captain Pratt’s wise, Christian philanthropy
toward the Indian prisoners at St.Augustine was the origin of the
present movement for Indian education, and has demonstrated his eminent
qualifications for the work.Sandra moved to the office.* * * * *
Africa.Mackay gives most interesting accounts of his intercourse with
Mtesa and his chiefs.Every Sunday, after Wilson left, he conducted
service at the palace for the king and chiefs, speaking in Suahili
without an interpreter, and Mtesa interpreting into the Uganda language
for the benefit of those who did not understand Suahili.On Christmas
day a special service was held, all the chiefs being in “extra dress,”
when Mackay explained the great event of the day.He regards Mtesa as
most intelligent, and quite inclined to listen to the word of God.Gratifying instances are mentioned of the influence already exerted
upon him.Some Arab traders arrived to buy slaves, offering cloth in
exchange, and saying they had come from the Sultan of Zanzibar.Mackay
vigorously opposed them, informed the king of the Sultan’s decrees
against the slave traffic, and of the cruelties perpetrated upon its
victims.Then he gave a lecture on physiology, and asked why such an
organism as a human body, which no man could make, should be sold for a
rag of cloth which any man could make in a day.The result was not only
the rejection of the Arabs’ demand, but a decree forbidding any person
in Uganda to sell a slave on pain of death!By another decree Mtesa has
forbidden all Sunday labor, and the question of the evils of polygamy
has been seriously discussed by him and the chiefs.He was on capital
terms with the chiefs, and was teaching numbers of people to read,
having made large alphabet sheets for the purpose.He describes the
Arab traders as most bitter against the Mission.They are distilling
ardent spirits from the plantain, and drunkenness is spreading in
consequence.* * * * *
THE FREEDMEN.E. ROY, D. D.,
FIELD SUPERINTENDENT, ATLANTA, GA.* * * * *
PART OF A TOUR THROUGH THE CAROLINAS.John went back to the garden.A new administration was to be inaugurated in the Avery Institute.The
way was found open, and the new Principal, Rev.S. D. Gaylord, one of
the foremost educational managers of the interior, was greeted on the
first day, the 29th of September, with an attendance of 258, which
was an advance of 40 or 50 upon former opening days.Daniel travelled to the office.The prospect was
for a continued accession through the month.The _News and Courier_
gave a handsome notice.I found that the Avery was an occasion of city
pride, not only on the part of but of white citizens.Sandra journeyed to the bathroom.The
authorities of Claflin University, at Orangeburg, S. C., have visited
and complimented the institute, seeking to pattern after some of the
methods.A. W. Farnham, who has been at the head of the Avery for
four years, bringing it up to its high standard, will do a like work on
a more general scale in the Normal department of Atlanta University.The Plymouth church, during the Summer, under the care of the pastor’s
assistant, Rev.Birney, a former fellow-servant with the members,
had been prospering.Temple Cutler, the church
will enter upon a career of enlargement.Water, which is so much wanted, and which is seldom found
in requisite abundance in tropical regions, here flows in the greatest
plenty.The cultivator who has prepared his _sáwah_, or rice field,
within its reach, diverts part of it from its channel, spreads it out
into numerous canals of irrigation, and thus procures from it, under
a scorching sun, the verdure of the rainy season, and in due time a
plentiful harvest.Nothing can be conceived more beautiful to the
eye, or more gratifying to the imagination, than the prospect of the
rich variety of hill and dale, of rich plantations and fruit trees or
forests, of natural streams and artificial currents, which presents
itself to the eye in several of the eastern and middle provinces, at
some distance from the coast.In some parts of _Kedú_, _Banyumás_,
_Semárang_, _Pasúruan_, and _Málang_, it is difficult to say whether
the admirer of landscape, or the cultivator of the ground, will be most
gratified by the view.The whole country, as seen from mountains of
considerable elevation, appears a rich, diversified, and well watered
garden, animated with villages, interspersed with the most luxuriant
fields, and covered with the freshest verdure.Over far the greater part, seven-eighths of the island, the soil is
either entirely neglected or badly cultivated, and the population
scanty.It is by the produce of the remaining eighth that the whole
of the nation is supported; and it is probable that, if it were all
under cultivation, no area of land of the same extent, in any other
quarter of the globe, could exceed it, either in quantity, variety, or
value of its vegetable productions.The kind of husbandry in different
districts (as shall be mentioned afterwards more particularly) depends
upon the nature and elevation of the ground, and the facilities for
natural or artificial irrigation.The best lands are those situated in
the vallies of the higher districts, or on the <DW72>s of mountains,
and on the plains stretching from them, as such lands are continually
enriched with accessions of new earth washed down from the hills by
the periodical rains.The poorest soil is that found on the ranges
of low hills, termed _kéndang_, extending along many districts, and
particularly in the southern division of the island; but in no part is
it so sterile or ungrateful, as not to afford a liberal return for the
labour bestowed upon its cultivation, especially if a supply of water
can be by any means directed upon it.But when nature does much for a country, its inhabitants are sometimes
contented to do little, and, satisfied with its common gifts, neglect
to improve them into the means of dignity or comfort.The peasantry
of Java, easily procuring the necessaries of life, seldom aim at
improvement of their condition.Rice is the principal food of all
classes of the people, and the great staple of their agriculture.Of this necessary article, it is calculated that a labourer can, in
ordinary circumstances, earn from four to five _kátis_ a day; and a
_káti_ being equivalent to one pound and a quarter avoirdupois, is
reckoned a sufficient allowance for the daily subsistence of an adult
in these regions.The labour of the women on Java is estimated almost
as highly as that of the men, and thus a married couple can maintain
eight or ten persons; and as a family seldom exceeds half that number,
they have commonly half of their earnings applicable for the purchase
of little comforts, for implements of agriculture, for clothing and
lodging.The two last articles cannot be expensive in a country where
the children generally go naked, and where the simplest structure
possible is sufficient to afford the requisite protection against the
elements.The price of rice, which thus becomes of importance to the labourer,
varies in different parts of the island, according to the fertility
of the district where it is produced, its situation with regard to a
market, or its distance from one of the numerous provincial capitals.As the means of transport, by which the abundance of one district
might be conveyed to supply the deficiencies of another, and to
equalize the distribution of the general stock, are few and laborious,
this variation of price is sometimes very considerable: even in the
same district there are great variations, according to the nature
of the crop.In the Native Provinces, a _píkul_ (weighing 133⅓ lbs.English) sometimes sells below the fourth part of a Spanish dollar, and
at other times for more than two Spanish dollars; but in common years,
and at an average over the whole island, including the capital, the
estimate may be taken at thirty Spanish dollars the _kóyan_ of thirty
_píkuls_, or three thousand _kútis_.A _kúti_ of rice, according to
this estimate, may be sold to the consumer, after allowing a sufficient
profit to the retail merchant, for much less than a penny.But though the price of this common article of subsistence may be of
some consequence to the Javan labourer, when he wants to make any
purchase with his surplus portion, he is rendered independent of the
fluctuations of the market for his necessary food, by the mode in
which he procures it.He is generally the cultivator of the soil; and
while he admits that law of custom, which assigns to the superior a
certain share of the produce, he claims an equal right himself to the
remainder, which is generally sufficient to support himself and his
family: and he sometimes finds in this law of custom, sanctioned by the
interest of both parties, a security in the possession of his lands,
and a barrier against the arbitrary exactions of his chief, which could
scarcely be expected under the capricious despotism of a Mahomedan
government.In addition to this reserved share, he raises on his own
account, if he is industrious, within what may be termed the cottage
farm, all the vegetables, fruit, and poultry requisite for his own
consumption.His wife invariably manufactures the slight articles of
clothing, which, in such a climate, the common people are in the habit
of wearing.What can be spared of the fruits of their joint industry
from the supply of their immediate wants, is carried to market, and
exchanged for a little salt fish, dried meat, or for other trifling
comforts, hoarded as a store for the purchase of an ox or a buffalo, or
expended in procuring materials for repairing the hut and mending the
implements of husbandry.The farming stock of the cultivator is as limited as his wants are
few and his cottage inartificial: it usually consists of a pair of
buffaloes or oxen, and a few rude implements of husbandry.There is
a small proportion of sheep and goats on the island; but, with the
exception of poultry, no kind of live stock is reared exclusively
either for the butcher or the dairy.By the returns made in 1813 of
the stock and cattle of the provinces under the British government,
containing a population of nearly two millions and a half, it was found
that there were only about five thousand sheep and twenty-four thousand
goats.The number of buffaloes, by the same return, and in the same
space, was stated at 402,054, and of oxen at 122,691.Horses abound in
the island, but are principally employed about the capitals, and not in
husbandry, further than in the transport of produce from one district
to another.The buffalo and ox are used for ploughing.The former is of a smaller
size than the buffalo of Sumatra and the Peninsula, though larger than
that of Bengal and of the islands lying eastward of Java.It is a
strong tractable animal, capable of long and continued exertion, but it
cannot bear the heat of the mid-day sun.It is shy of Europeans, but
submits to be managed by the smallest child of the family in which it
is domesticated.The buffalo is either black or white: the former is
larger and generally considered superior.In the _Súnda_, or western
and mountainous districts, nine out of ten are white, which is not at
all the case in the low countries; no essential difference in the breed
has been discovered to be connected with this remarkable distinction of
colour.The usual price of a buffalo in the western districts is about
twenty-four rupees for the black, and twenty rupees for the white; in
the eastern districts the price varies from twelve to sixteen rupees.The _Súnda_ term for a buffalo is _múnding_; the Javan, _máisa_ and
_kébo_: and in compliment to _Laléan_, the prince who is supposed to
have introduced cultivation into the _Súnda_ districts, that prince
and his successors on the _Súnda_ throne are distinguished by the
appellation _Múnding_ or _Máisa_.The name of the individual sovereigns
enters into a compound with these general terms for the dynasty, and
they are called _Máisa-laléan_, _Múnding-sári_, and so of others.The ox of Java derives its origin from the Indian breed.Two varieties
are common: that which is called the Javan ox has considerably
degenerated; the other, which is termed the Bengal or Surat ox, is
distinguished by a lump on the shoulder, and retains in his superior
strength other traces of his origin.The bull after castration is used
as a beast |
bathroom | Where is Sandra? | Cows are chiefly employed in husbandry, and are particularly useful
to the poorer class; but in the _sáwah_ and the extensive inundated
plantations of the low districts of the island, the superior bulk and
strength of the buffalo is indispensable.Eastward of _Pasúruan_,
however, the lands are ploughed by oxen and cows exclusively.The
wild breed, termed _bánténg_, is found principally in the forests of
that quarter and in _Báli_, although it occurs also in other parts; a
remarkable change takes place in the appearance of this animal after
castration, the colour in a few months invariably becoming red.The cows on Java, as well as throughout the Archipelago, remarkably
degenerate from those properties, for which, in a state of
domestication, they are chiefly prized in other quarters of the world,
and afford little or no milk beyond what is barely sufficient for the
nourishment of the calf: but the draught ox does not partake of a
similar change, and in the central and eastern districts, particularly
where the pasture is good, becomes a strong active animal.The
degenerate domestic cows are sometimes driven into the forests, to
couple with the wild _bánténg_, for the sake of improving the breed.A single pair of oxen, or buffaloes, is found sufficient for the yoke
both of the plough and harrow; and these form by far the most expensive
part of the cultivator's stock.The price of a draught ox, in the
central and eastern districts, in which they are more generally used
in agriculture, varies from eight to sixteen rupees, or from twenty to
forty shillings English, and a cow may be purchased for about the same
price.Either from the luxuriance of the pasture, the greater care of
the husbandmen, or a more equal climate, both the buffalo and the ox
are usually in better condition on Java than in many parts of India:
indeed, those miserable half-starved looking animals, with which some
of the provinces of Bengal abound, are never seen in this island,
except, perhaps, occasionally, in some of the few herds belonging to
Europeans, in the vicinity of Batavia.Buffaloes, however, more than other domestic animals, are subject to
an epidemic disease, the symptoms and nature of which have not been
hitherto carefully noted, or satisfactorily explained.It prevails
throughout the whole island, and generally re-appears after an interval
of three, four, or five years: it makes great ravages in the stock of
the peasantry, and is checked in its progress by no remedies which have
hitherto been discovered or applied: it is of an infectious nature,
and excites great alarm when it appears: it bears different names in
different parts of the island.As the bull and cow are not liable to
this disease; and as, in addition to this advantage, they are less
expensive in their original purchase, they are preferred by many of the
natives.For draught, the buffalo and cow are employed; and for burden, the
horse (particularly mares) and the ox.In level districts, and in good
roads, the use of the latter is preferred.The usual burden of a horse
is rather less than three hundred weight, and that of an ox rather
more than four; but in mountainous districts, and where the roads are
neglected, one half of this weight is considered as a sufficient, if
not an excessive load.The comparatively higher price of cattle on Java than in Bengal has
been accounted for from the demand for them as food, and the absence of
extensive commons on which to feed them.When implements of husbandry are mentioned in British agriculture, many
expensive instruments, and complicated machinery suggest themselves
to those acquainted with its practical details.From the preparation
of the ground for receiving the seed, till the grain comes into the
hands of the miller, labour is economized and produce increased, by
many ingenious processes and artful contrivances, of which a Javan
could form no conception.He could form no idea of the fabrication or
advantages of our different kinds of ploughs; of our swing ploughs,
our wheel ploughs, and our two-furrow ploughs; of our grubbers,
cultivators, and other instruments for pulverizing the soil; of our
threshing and winnowing machines, and other inventions.A plough of
the simplest construction, a harrow, or rather rake, and sometimes a
roller, with a _páchul_, or hoe, which answers the purpose of a spade;
an _árit_, which serves as a knife or small hatchet; and the _áni áni_,
a peculiar instrument used by the reapers, are all the implements
employed by him in husbandry; and the total cost of the whole does not
exceed three or four rupees, or from seven to ten shillings.The plough (_walúku_), in general use for the irrigated land, consists
of three parts, the body, beam, and handle.It is generally made of
teak wood, where that material can be provided, or otherwise of the
most durable that can be found: the yoke only is of _bámbu_.Simple as
it is, it appears, both in its construction and durability, superior
to the plough of Bengal, as described by Mr.Colebrooke, from which it
differs, in having a board cut out of the piece which forms the body,
for throwing the earth aside.The point of the body, or sock, is tipped
with iron, which in some districts is cast for the purpose.Sandra moved to the office.There is
another kind, of more simple construction, in use for dry and mountain
cultivation: this is termed _brújul_, and consists of but two parts.Both kinds are so light, that when the ploughman has performed his
morning's work, he throws the plough over his shoulder, and without
feeling any inconvenience or fatigue, returns with it to his cottage.For gardens, and for small fields adjoining the villages, the small
_lúku chína_, or Chinese plough, is used with one buffalo: the cost for
a good plough seldom exceeds a rupee and a half.The harrow (_gáru_),
which is rather a large rake having only a single rough row of teeth,
costs about the same sum, and is in like manner made of teak where
procurable; except the handle, beam, and yoke, which are of _bámbu_.John went back to the garden.When used, the person who guides it generally sits upon it, to give it
the necessary pressure for levelling or pulverizing the soil.The _páchul_ is a large hoe, which in Java serves every purpose of the
spade in Europe, and is consequently, next to the plough, the most
important implement in Javan husbandry.The head is of wood tipped
with iron; and the handle, which is about two feet and a half long,
frequently has a slight curve, which renders it more convenient for
use: its price is about half a rupee.The _árit_, or weeding knife,
costs about eight pence; and the _áni áni_, with which the grain
is reaped, about three pence.The latter is a small instrument of
peculiar shape.The reaper holds it in a particular manner, and crops
off with it each separate ear, along with a few inches of the straw.This mode of reaping has been immemorially practised and is universally
followed.Some of the most intelligent people being questioned
respecting the origin of this operose process, answered, that it was
reported to have been established in ancient times as a _s'lámat_, or
grateful acknowledgment for an abundant harvest; that when his field
was covered with the bounty of Ceres, no reaper could refuse her this
acknowledgment; and that the religious discharge of this obligation was
guarded by the belief, that if he ceased to offer this tribute of his
labour at the season of harvest, the field would not continue to yield
him the same abundant return.The lands are ploughed, harrowed, and weeded by the men, who
also conduct the whole process of irrigation; but the labour of
transplanting, reaping, and (where cattle are not used for the purpose)
of transporting the different crops from the field to the village, or
from the village to the market, devolves upon the women.Besides the two general divisions of the year, marked out by nature
in the great changes of the earth and the atmosphere, there are other
periodical distinctions, depending on less obvious or more irregular
phenomena.These variations have been ascertained by a reference
to the course of the heavenly bodies, or the calculations of the
_wúku_, which are described in another part of this work.It is the
office of the village priest to keep this reckoning, and to apprize
the cultivators when the term approaches for the commencement of the
different operations of husbandry.Of these minor seasons of the
year, the first, commencing after the rice harvest which falls in
August or September, lasts forty-one days.During this season the
leaves fall from the trees, vegetation is interrupted, and the only
field labour performed is the burning of grass and vegetables, as a
preparation of the _tégal_ or _gágas_.In the second season, which
lasts twenty-five days, vegetation again resumes its vigour.The
third, which lasts twenty-four days, is considered the most proper for
planting sweet potatoes, yams, and such other vegetables as usually
form the second crop; the wild flowers of the forest are now in
blossom; and the period of what is termed dry cultivation commences.The fourth, which lasts also twenty-four days, is the natural season
for the pairing of wild animals: high winds now prevail, the rains
descend, and the rivers begin to rise.During the fifth, which lasts
twenty-six days, the implements of husbandry are prepared, and the
water-courses examined and renewed: this is the commencement of the
wet cultivation.Daniel travelled to the office.In the sixth season the ploughing of the _sáwahs_
and sowing of the _bíbít_ for the great rice crop takes place: this
season lasts forty-one days.In the seventh, which also lasts forty-one
days, _pári_ is transplanted into fields, and the courses of the water
properly directed.In the eighth, which lasts twenty-six days, the
plants shoot above the water and begin to blossom.In the ninth season,
which consists of twenty-five days, the ears of the grain form.In the
tenth, also consisting of twenty-five days, they ripen and turn yellow.The eleventh, which lasts twenty-six days, is the period for reaping;
and in the twelfth, which consists of forty-one days, the harvest
is completed, the produce gathered in, and that dry clear weather
prevails, in which the days are the hottest and the nights the coldest
of the whole year.The accurate assignment of the number of days by the
natives themselves to the different operations of husbandry, affords
such complete information on this interesting subject, that any further
account would be superfluous.It may, however, be proper to observe,
that the periods above described chiefly refer to the progress of the
principal rice crop, as influenced by the annual rains; but there are
many lands rendered quite independent of these rains, by the vicinity
of streams which afford a plentiful supply of water at all times of the
year.In many favoured situations, it is even common to observe at one
view the rice fields in almost every stage of their cultivation; in
one, women engaged in planting the newly prepared soil, and in another,
the reapers employed in collecting the fruits of the harvest.Lands in Java are classed under two general divisions; lands which are
capable of being inundated directly from streams or rivers, and lands
which are not so.The former are termed _sáwah_, the latter _tégal_
or _gága_.Sandra journeyed to the bathroom.It is on the _sáwahs_ that the great rice cultivation
is carried on; and these admit of a subdivision, according to the
manner in which the land is irrigated.Those which can be irrigated
at pleasure from adjacent springs or rivers, are considered as the
proper _sáwah_; those which depend on the periodical rains for the
whole or principal part of the water by which they are fertilized,
are termed _sáwah tádahan_.The former are by far the most valuable,
and lands of this description admit of two heavy crops annually,
without regard to any particular time of the year: the fields seldom
exceed forty or sixty feet in breadth, and the water is retained in
them by means of a small embankment of about a foot in height.On the
<DW72>s of the mountains, where this mode of cultivation is chiefly
found, these fields are carried gradually above each other in so many
terraces, for the purpose of irrigation, the water admitted in the
upper terrace inundating each of them in its descent.The _tégal_ lands
are appropriated to the culture of less important crops, such as the
mountain rice, Indian corn, &c.
The vast superiority of the _sáwah_, or wet cultivation, over that
of _tégal_, or dry, is shewn in their relative produce, and may be
still further illustrated by a comparison of the rents which the two
descriptions of land are calculated to afford.The quantity of _tégal_
land, or land fit for maize, as compared with that of _sáwah_ land,
varies in different districts.John moved to the kitchen.In _Chéribon_, the _tégal_ land, by
the late survey, amounted only to 2,511, while the _sáwan_ exceeded
16,000.In _Tégal_ the proportions were even more widely varied, the
number of _jungs_ of the former to the latter being as 891 to 11,445.In _Surabáya_ they were as 1,356 to 17,397; in _Kedú_ and _Besúki_ they
were nearly equal, being respectively as 8,295 to 10,757, and as 6,369
to 7,862.The succession of crops, next to the facility of irrigation, depends
upon the quality of the soil, which in the native provinces is divided
by the cultivators into three principal kinds, _tána ládu_, _tána
línchad_, and _tána pásir_.The first is the best, consisting of
rich vegetable mould, and a certain proportion of sand, and exists
chiefly near the banks of large rivers; the second is almost pure
clay, and is found in the central plains; and the third is alluvial,
and covers the maritime districts.The term _pádas péréng_ is applied
to the oblique tracts enriched with a fertile mould, which form the
acclivities of hills, and from which the water readily disappears._Tána ládu_ will bear a constant succession of crops.John moved to the bathroom._Tána línchad_
yields only a single annual crop of rice: during the rainy season the
soil constitutes a stiff mud, in which the plants find the requisite
moisture and display all their luxuriance; when it is afterwards
exposed to the rays of the sun, it bursts into extensive fissures,
which admitting the scorching heat by which they were produced, become
detrimental to every species of vegetation.Besides the annual crop of rice which is raised on the _sáwah_ lands,
a variety of plants are raised upon them as a second or light crop
within the same year.Among these are several species of _káchang_ or
bean, the cotton plant, the indigo, and a variety of cucumbers, &c.
But the more generally useful and profitable vegetables require nearly
the same period as the rice, and only yield their increase once in a
season: they mostly grow in situations, on which the supply of water
can be regulated, and a continued inundation prevented.Among the
most important are the _gúdé_, _káchang pénden_, or _káchang chína_,
_káchang íju_, _kédéle_, _jágung_ or Indian corn, _jágung chántel_,
_jáwa-wút_, |
bathroom | Where is Daniel? | In _tégal_ lands of high situations a particular method of planting is
sometimes practiced, which produces a result similar to a succession
of crops.Together with the rice are deposited the seeds of other
vegetables, which arrive at maturity at different periods, chiefly
after the rice harvest.The most common and useful among these is
cotton; and, in some tracts, great quantities of this valuable product
is thus obtained, without any exclusive allotment of the soil.Next to
this are various leguminous and other plants, which do not interfere
with the rice.No less than six or eight kinds of vegetables are
sometimes in this manner seen to shoot up promiscuously in a single
field.Rice, however, as has been repeatedly observed, is the grand staple
of Javan, as well as Indian cultivation, and to this every other
species of husbandry is subordinate.The adjacent islands and states
of Sumatra, Malacca, Borneo, Celebes, and the Moluccas, have always in
a great measure depended on the Javan cultivator for their supply,
and the Dutch were in the habit of transporting an annual quantity of
between six and eight thousand tons to Ceylon, to Coromandel, to the
Cape, and their other settlements.Even at the low rate at which it
generally sells, a revenue of near four million of rupees, or about
half a million sterling, has been estimated as the government portion
of its annual produce.According to the modes of cultivation by which it has been reared, this
grain is called _pári sáwah_, or _pári gága_; corresponding, with some
exceptions, to the _pádi sáwah_, and _pádi ládang_ of Sumatra.In the
western, and particularly the _Súnda_ districts, the term _gága_ is
changed for _típar_, the term _gága_, in these districts, being only
occasionally applied to the grain which is cultivated on newly cleared
mountainous spots.The lowland and the mountain rice, or more correctly speaking, the
rice raised in dry lands and the rice raised in lands subjected to
inundation, are varieties of the same species (the oriza sativa of
Linnæus) although both of them are permanent: but the rice planted
on the mountainous or dry ground does not thrive on irrigated lands;
nor, on the contrary, does the _sáwah_ rice succeed on lands beyond
the reach of irrigation.Sandra moved to the office.The mountain rice is supposed to contain in
the same bulk more nourishment than the other, and is more palatable;
but its use is limited to the less populous districts of the island,
the greater proportion of the inhabitants depending exclusively on the
produce of the _sáwahs_, or wet cultivation, for their support.Stavorinus asserts, that the mountain rice is not so good as that
of the low lands.Marsden informs us, on the contrary, that the
former brings the higher price, and is considered of superior quality,
being whiter, heartier, and better flavoured grain, keeping better,
and increasing more in boiling."The rice of the low lands," he says,
"is more prolific from the seed, and subject to less risk in the
culture; and on these accounts, rather than from its superior quality,
is in more common use than the former."In general, the weightiest
and whitest grain is preferred; a preference mentioned by Bontius,
who includes in the character of the best rice its whiteness, its
clearness of colour, and its preponderating weight, bulk for bulk.John went back to the garden.Daniel travelled to the office.Horsfield conceives that Stavorinus formed his opinion in the
low northern maritime districts of Java, and Mr.Marsden from a more
extensive observation.Many intelligent natives state, that they
prefer the mountain rice when they can procure it, on account of its
whiteness, strength, and flavour; and that they are only limited in
its use, by the impossibility of raising as much of it as can satisfy
the general demand, all the mountain or dry rice not being sufficient
to feed one-tenth of the population.In less populous countries, as in
many parts of Sumatra, the inhabitants can easily subsist the whole
of their numbers exclusively on mountain rice, or that produced on
_ládangs_, which are fields reclaimed from ancient forests for the
first time, and from which only one crop is demanded.The grain here,
as in the mountain rice of Java, is highly flavoured and nutritious;
but in countries where the population is crowded, where a scanty crop
will not suffice, and where a continued supply of new land cannot be
obtained, the peasantry must apply their labour to such grounds as
admit of uninterrupted cultivation, and renew their annual fertility
by periodical inundations, even although the produce is not so highly
prized.In the _sáwahs_ of Java the fields are previously ploughed, inundated,
and laboured by animals and hoeing, until the mould is converted into
a semifluid mire: they then are considered fit to receive the young
plants.Oil-cakes (_búngkil_), which are by
some writers supposed to be used for this purpose generally, are only
employed in the gardens about Batavia.One of the chief characteristics
of the soil on Java, is an exemption from the necessity of requiring
manure: on the _sáwah_ lands, the annual inundation of the land is
sufficient to renovate its vigour, and to permit constant cropping for
a succession of years, without any observable impoverishment.In the cultivation of the _sáwahs_, the plants are uniformly
transplanted or removed from their first situation.In those of _tégal_
or _gága_, they grow to maturity on the same spot where the seed was
originally deposited, whether this be on high mountainous districts,
or on low lands, the distinction of _sáwah_ and _gága_ depending
exclusively not upon the situation of the field, but in the mode of
culture, whether wet or dry.In raising rice in the _sáwahs_, inundation is indispensable till it is
nearly ripe.The seed is first sown on a bed prepared for the purpose,
about one month before the season for transplanting it, and the plant
is during that time termed _bíbit_.Sandra journeyed to the bathroom.According
to the first, called _úrit_, the ears of _pári_ are carefully disposed
on the soft mud of the seed bed; in the second, called _ng'éber_, the
separated seeds are thrown after the manner of broadcast in Europe.In
by far the greatest portions of the island, the ground is prepared,
the seed sown, and the plant removed, during the course of the rainy
season, or between the months of November and March.In situations
where a constant supply of water can be obtained from springs,
rivulets, or rivers, two crops are produced in the course of twelve or
fourteen months; but the advantage of double cropping, which exhausts
the soil without allowing it time to recover, has been considered as
very questionable.If in some situations commanding a supply of water,
the earth is allowed to rest after the preceding harvest, during the
latter end of the rainy season, and the transplantation made in the
months of June and July, it generally yields more profitable crops than
the common method of working the _sáwah_.This, which is termed _gádu_
by the natives, has been recommended by the experience of European
planters.Irrigation is exclusively effected by conducting the water of rivers
and rivulets from the more or less elevated spots in the vicinity,
and in this respect, differs materially in its process from that of
Bengal, for although considerable labour and ingenuity are exercised in
detaining, regulating, and distributing the supply, by means of dams,
called _bandáng'ans_, no machinery whatever is employed in raising
water for agricultural purposes in any part of the island.The rice grown on _sáwahs_, is of two kinds, _pári génja_ and _pári
dálam_.In the former, the harvest takes place four months after the
transplantation; in the latter, six months._Pári génja_ having the
advantage of a quicker growth, is therefore often planted when the
rainy season is far advanced.John moved to the kitchen._Pári dálam_ is more prolific, and
yields a grain of superior quality, comprising those varieties in which
the ears are longer and more compound.The varieties of each kind are
distinct and permanent.The subvarieties are very numerous, amounting, with those of _kétan_,
to more than a hundred._Kétan_ is a distinct variety, with very
glutinous seeds, seldom employed as an article of food, except in
confections, cakes, and the like.Of the varieties of the _pári
génsha_, _mentik_ and _anchar bántap_ are preferred.Of the _pári
dálam_, those of _krentúlan_ and _súka nándi_ are most esteemed, being
remarkably well flavoured and fit for keeping._S'lámat jáwa_ yields
also rice of good quality.The bearded kinds of _pári_ are always
preferred for keeping, as the grains do not readily fall off.Near
_Súra-kérta_, the principal native capital, close to the site of the
former capital _Kérta-súra_, there is a peculiar tract inundated by
water from a fountain at _Píng'gíng_, which is said to produce a grain
of very superior flavour, from which the table of the _Susuhúnan_
is supplied._Súka nándi_ is the kind uniformly preferred for these
plantations.For _pári gága_, whether in high or low situations, the ground is
prepared by ploughing and harrowing, and the seed is planted after the
manner called setting in some parts of England.John moved to the bathroom.The holes are made
by pointed sticks, called _pónchos_, and into each hole two seeds
are thrown.Only careless husbandmen, or those who cannot procure
the requisite assistance in their labour, sow by broadcast.In high
situations the earth is prepared before the rains commence: the seed
is sown in the months of September or October, and the harvest takes
place in January and February following._Gágas_ of low situations are
planted about a month after the harvest of the _sáwah_ is got in, and
frequently receive temporary supplies of water from a neighbouring
rivulet.In high situations, to which water cannot be carried, they are
sufficiently moistened by the first rains of the season.During their
growth, they receive several hoeings from the careful husbandman.Sandra journeyed to the hallway.As the grain ripens, an elevated shed is frequently erected in the
centre of a plantation, within which a child on the watch touches,
from time to time, a series of cords extending from the shed to the
extremities of the field, like the radii of a circle, and by this cheap
contrivance, and an occasional shout, prevents the ravages of birds,
which would otherwise prove highly injurious to the crops.These little
elevated sheds in the interior, and particularly in the district of
_Bányumás_, are very neatly constructed of matting.The reapers are uniformly paid, by receiving a portion of the crop
which they have reaped: this varies in different parts of the island,
from the sixth to the eighth part, depending on the abundance or
scarcity of hands; when the harvest is general through a district,
one-fifth or one-fourth is demanded by the reaper.In opposition to so
exorbitant a claim, the influence of the great is sometimes exerted,
and the labourer is obliged to be content with a tenth or a twelfth.Daniel went to the bathroom.The grain is separated from the husk by pounding several times
repeated.The first operation is generally performed in wooden troughs,
in the villages near which it grows, and before it is brought to
market.The _pári_ being thus converted into _bras_ or rice, afterwards
receives repeated poundings, according to the condition or taste of the
consumer.With the exception of the rice raised in _sáwahs_, all other produce
is cultivated on dry grounds, either on the _sáwah_ fields during the
dry season, or on _tégal_ land, at all times exclusively appropriated
to dry cultivation.The principal article next to rice, as affording
food to man, is maize or Indian corn, termed _jágung_.It is general in
every district of Java, but is more particularly an object of attention
on _Madúra_, where, for want of mountain streams, the lands do not
in general admit of irrigation.In the more populous parts of Java,
likewise, where the _sáwahs_ do not afford a sufficient supply of rice,
the inhabitants have lately had recourse to the cultivation of maize.It is now rapidly increasing in those low ranges of hills, which, on
account of the poverty of the soil, had hitherto been neglected, and is
becoming more and more a favourite article of food.In the more eastern
districts, it is procured from the inhabitants of _Madúra_ in exchange
for rice.It is generally roasted in the ear, and in that state is
exposed while hot for public sale; but it is never reduced to flour, or
stored for any considerable time.The _zea maize_, or common _jágung_, is a hardy plant, and grows on
any soil.In common with every other production of Java it thrives
there most luxuriantly; nor is there any reason to believe, that
the Javan soil is less adapted to it than that of Spanish America,
where Humboldt estimates its produce at a hundred and fifty fold.It
is planted in fertile low lands in rotation with rice, and in high
situations without intermission, often forming in the latter the chief,
if not the only, support of the inhabitants.There are three different
kinds, distinguished from each other by their respective periods of
ripening.A collateral advantage of playing as advised, is that a good partner
will often know how many of his suit you still have in hand.Thus, he
leads knave, which you pass; he continues with queen, which you win.It
ought to be a certainty that you remain with one small card of his suit
and no more.If you pass again, it should be equally certain, when your
ace comes down in the third round, that you have one small card of the
suit in hand.Again: your partner leads ace and knave; knave is won by
the adversary with the king.You, holding ten, nine, eight, deuce, have
played eight and nine of the suit.If the winner of the trick does not
lead a trump, your partner would infer, with tolerable certainty, that
you remain with the deuce and ten of his suit, as no one is asking for
trumps (_see_ p.125) and no one has played the deuce in two rounds.In trumps, the case is somewhat different, as you cannot block your
partner's trump suit.It is then only advisable to get out of his way,
if you see from the fall of the cards that it is essential he should
proceed with trumps.Thus: with ace and one small trump you would not
put ace on his knave led, unless very desirous of three rounds of
trumps immediately.Moreover, in trumps, your partner can count your
hand in another way; for with four trumps you would echo, as will be
fully explained under Management of Trumps (p.You help your partner to get rid of the command of your suit by leading
the lowest of a sequence, notwithstanding that it heads your suit,
when you want him to win your card if he can.For this reason you lead
ten from king, queen, knave, ten; ace, knave from ace, queen, knave,
and at least two small cards; and so on.In this last case, if your
partner has king, whether he should put it on your knave, or not,
depends on how many small cards of the suit he holds.If, when you lead
knave, he remains with king and one small one, he should win the knave
with the king; but if he has king and two small ones remaining, he
should pass the knave, for precisely the same reasons as those |
hallway | Where is Sandra? | Again, suppose you are left with knave, ten, and
others of a suit, of which your partner can only have king and another
(ace and queen being out), though it is uncertain whether he does hold
the king.You would cause him to get rid of the king by leading the
ten; whereas, if you led the knave, he probably would not part with the
king.Experienced players frequently endeavour to steal a trick, or to
obtain the entire command of a suit (_i.e._, to keep a sufficient
number of winning or commanding cards in it to make every trick), by
_underplaying_.Underplay is keeping up the winning card, generally in
the second round of a suit, by leading a low card, though holding the
best.Thus, suppose a small trump is led, and you (fourth player) hold ace,
knave, and two small ones, and you win with one of the small ones.If,
at a later period of the hand, you return a small trump, you will very
likely cause your left-hand adversary to believe that your partner has
the ace; consequently, if your left-hand adversary has the king, he may
not put it on; your partner will win the second round with the queen,
and you will retain the command of the trump suit.Underplay is an extempore stratagem depending on observation of the
previous fall of the cards, and, therefore, best capable of explanation
by examples.Thus: A, finding his partner strong in trumps, leads the
seven.The king is put on by Y (second hand), which B (third hand)
wins, holding ace, queen, ten, nine, eight.It is evident to B that A's
seven was his highest trump, as the only higher one in is the knave,
and A would never lead the seven from knave, seven.The king having
been put on second hand, B concludes that Y, in all probability, holds
at most one small trump more.The knave is, to a moral certainty, in
Z's hand.B, by leading the eight in the second round, will probably
win the trick, and unless Z had four trumps originally, will catch the
knave with the queen in the third round.(Further examples of underplay
occur in the hands.)Players should be on their guard against this manœuvre, particularly
when second hand, in the second round of a suit, they hold the second
best card guarded, and the adversary has been playing a strong game (as
by leading trumps), and is left with the long trump, or is certain to
be able to obtain the lead again.Then it is often right for the second
hand to stick on a singly-guarded second best card, especially if that
is the only chance of making it.In the case stated in the previous
paragraph, Z's only chance of making the knave, if singly guarded, is
to put it on second hand.Sandra moved to the office.For, if the queen with small ones is in A's
hand, A is sure to finesse on the return of the suit by his partner.John went back to the garden.Again, take this case: A leads the six of diamonds; Y, with knave, ten,
and a small one, puts on the ten; B plays the king, and Z wins it with
the ace.Daniel travelled to the office.Presently, A obtains the lead again, and leads the eight of
diamonds.A, having led the lowest of his suit in the first round, it
may be inferred that he has led from a strong suit--headed in this case
by the queen--and that he is underplaying with, probably, queen and
nine in his hand.Y should observe this, and in the second round should
win the eight with the knave.Refusing to play the winning card in the first and second rounds
of a suit--commonly called _holding up_--is, in fact, a species of
underplay.Trumps are led by the player to your left;
the third player wins with the ace, and returns the suit through your
hand.If you are left with king and one or more small ones, you should
play a small one, unless the circumstances of the hand are such that
you deem it advantageous to stop the trump lead.Sandra journeyed to the bathroom.The original trump
leader, not knowing but that the king is in your partner's hand, will
probably finesse, and your partner thus has a chance of making the
third best trump, even though unguarded.If your partner has neither
second nor third best trump, no harm is done, as you will then probably
make but one trick in the suit, however you play.Again, ten tricks
are played, and each player is left with three cards of a suit not
opened.If the second player puts on the queen (from which it may
be inferred that he holds the king also), the third hand should not
cover with the ace.For, by winning the trick, he must lead up to king
guarded; but, by passing it, he leaves the lead with the second player,
and takes the best chance of making two tricks.One more example
will suffice: A has the last trump, and ace, ten, and three small cards
of a suit not led.The adversary now leads the king, and follows with
the queen of that suit.A should pass them both; by so doing he will
probably make three tricks in the suit if the cards are equally divided.When you cannot follow suit, you should
11.DISCARD FROM YOUR WEAKEST SUIT.You weaken a suit by discarding from it, and lessen the number of long
cards you might otherwise establish and bring in (_i.e._, make tricks
with if trumps are out, and you obtain the lead after the establishment
of your suit).On the other hand, you do but little harm by throwing
from a suit in which you are already weak.Your partner should
understand that your first or _original discard_ is from your _weakest
suit_, just as he understands that your original lead is from your
strongest suit.But, as in the case of leads, you are sometimes obliged to lead from
a weak suit, or to make a forced lead, so sometimes you have to
make a _forced discard_.Forced discards require much more careful
consideration than they generally receive.It is clear that if the opponents declare great strength in trumps
(by leading trumps or asking for them, as will be fully explained in
Section 13), that your chance of bringing in a suit is practically
_nil_.You should therefore, in such cases, abandon the tactics
you would otherwise adopt, and play to guard your weaker suits, by
discarding from your best protected suit, which is generally your
longest suit.You must, in fact, play a defensive game.If this system of discarding is comprehended by the two players who
are partners, it follows, as a matter of course, that _when trumps are
not declared against you, your partner will assume you are weak in the
suit you first discard_; but, _when trumps are declared against you, he
will give you credit for strength in the suit from which you originally
throw away_.This is most important, as it affects his subsequent
leads.In the first case, he will refrain from leading the suit from
which you have discarded; in the second, he will, unless he has a very
strong suit of his own, select for his lead the suit in which you have
shown strength by your discard.It is commonly said, "Discard from your strong suit when the adversary
leads or calls for trumps."But this is a very imperfect and
misleading aphorism.John moved to the kitchen.If you have no indications from the play, and
are obliged to discard to an adverse trump lead or call, you should
discard from your best protected suit.But, if you have, or if the
fall of the cards shows that your partner has, sufficient strength in
trumps to outlast the adversary, the discard should be from the weak
suit.Thus: Y, second player, calls for trumps (_see_ p.125), and B,
third player, also calls.The discards of A and Z should be from their
weak suits.For though, on the one hand, great strength in trumps
is declared against them, on the other hand great strength is also
declared with them.Again: Z deals and turns up nine of clubs.A (the
original leader) leads a small club; Y follows suit; B puts on ace;
Z plays king.This shows that Z has a sequence of queen, knave, ten,
nine of trumps; and therefore that, though A has led a trump, he has
anything but the command of the suit.B returns the trump; Z wins; Y
has no more trumps.The
following case is less easy:--The adversary (A) leads a tierce major in
trumps, eleven trumps come out, and your partner (Y) must have knave of
trumps to save the game.You now credit your partner with the command
of trumps, though the adversary has led them; and if either you (Y) or
your partner (Z) has to discard, the discard should be from the weakest
suit (_see_ Hand XII.)Similar remarks apply if a strengthening trump
is led by an adversary from weak trumps and good cards in plain suits.It must be borne in mind that it is only your original discard which
is directive.Having once discarded, you cannot undo your work by any
number of discards from another suit.Also, having once led a suit, you
have declared strength in it; and subsequent discards from that suit do
not alter the fact that it was originally your strongest suit.It is dangerous to unguard an honour, or to blank an ace; and, also,
to discard a single card when the game is in an undeveloped stage,
as it exposes your weakness almost as soon as the suit is led.But,
when you see that there is a probability of strength in trumps on your
side, direct your partner to your strong suit by all the means in your
power, and unhesitatingly unguard an honour, or throw a single card.Of
course, if strength in trumps is against you, these are the very last
cards you should think of throwing away.When your left-hand adversary will have the lead next round, if you
discard from a suit in which you hold a tenace, you may possibly induce
him to lead that suit up to you.You must be on your guard against this
ruse, and not necessarily lead up to the discard of your right-hand
opponent.The same principle applies to trumping as to discarding.The weaker
you are in trumps, the better it is for you to make a little one by
trumping, as will be further explained in Section 14.It has several times been assumed in the preceding pages that you
should convey information by your play.The question naturally arises,
_How is it that a player gains any advantage by publishing information
to the table?_ It is often argued, and with much show of reason, that
as almost every revelation concerning your hand must be given to the
whole table, and that as you have two adversaries and only one partner,
you publish information at a disadvantage.No doubt this argument would
have considerable force if you were compelled to expose the whole of
your hand.John moved to the bathroom.But you possess the power, to a great extent, of selecting
what facts shall be announced and what concealed.Experienced players are unanimous in admitting that it is an advantage
to inform your partner of strength in your own suits, though some
advise concealment of strength in suits in which the adversaries have
shown strength.Thus, with ace, king, second hand, the usual play is
to put on the king.The third hand does not win the king, and hence
the leader is able to infer that the ace of his strong suit is against
him.But, if you put on the ace second hand, you prevent the leader
from discovering where the king of his suit lies.It is, however, found
that two honours in the adversary's suit constitute sufficient strength
to make it advantageous in the long run to proclaim your force;
while, with less strength, it is not easy to mystify the opponents
prejudicially; so that, on the whole, it seldom happens that a balance
of gain results from the adoption of deceptive play.Sandra journeyed to the hallway.Occasionally, however, a false card may be played with a special
object.For instance: ace is turned up to your right, and, when the
dealer gets in, he leads a small trump.If you, second hand, have king,
queen only, you would be justified in playing the king, in hopes of
inducing the trump leader to finesse on the return of the suit.Or,
take this case: your left-hand adversary leads originally the five of
his strong suit, from king, ten, seven, five.Your partner plays the
six; third hand plays ace.Daniel went to the bathroom.You, holding queen, knave, nine, eight,
four, three, play the three.Your right-hand opponent now leads trumps;
all the trumps come out.The player to your right next returns the
deuce of his partner's suit.The original lead being from a four-card
suit, king, ten, seven, remain in the leader's hand.Sandra went to the bathroom.If you play knave,
the original leader will place queen in your hand, and will hesitate
to go on with the suit.But, if you play queen, he will put knave and
at least one small one in his partner's hand.Then if, under this
impression, he continues the suit, you bring it in.It is in most cases unquestionably disadvantageous to you that the
whole table should be aware of your being very weak in a particular
suit, and, consequently, information of weakness should be withheld as
long as possible.If you are led up to fourth hand in such a suit,
or if your partner opens the suit with a small card, of course the
disclosure is inevitable; but until one of these events happens your
poverty can generally be kept out of sight.It may happen that you are
occasionally forced to lead a weak suit yourself; and in this event
the least disadvantage, on the whole, is to tell the truth at once, by
first leading the highest of it.Your partner apprised of the state of
your hand, by the fall of your smaller card in the subsequent round,
will probably deem it prudent to strive by defensive tactics to avert
total defeat in that suit, rather than to contend single-handed against
the combined strength of the opponents.But, at critical points of the
game, it is often right to conceal weakness.Thus, towards the end of a
hand, it is necessary that your partner should make a couple of tricks
in an unopened suit, of which you hold two or three little cards.If you lead the highest, the adversaries will
suspect your weakness at once, and will be sure of it on the second
round.Their efforts will then be directed to preventing your partner
from making the required tricks in that suit.Sandra journeyed to the hallway.Your left-hand adversary
will not finesse; and if your partner is led through, your right-hand
adversary merely covers, or plays the lowest card he has, higher than
the one you first led.When your partner has exhibited weakness in one or more suits, you
would frequently be justified in playing a false card.You are driven
to rely solely on yourself, and are entitled to adopt every artifice
your ingenuity can suggest in order to perplex the other side.The consideration that you may mislead your partner will no longer
influence you, as you know him to be powerless for good or for evil.You inform your partner by following the recognised practice of the
game, as by leading from your strong suit originally, by leading the
highest of a sequence, by following suit with the lowest of a sequence,
and so forth.If you adhere to this you will soon acquire a reputation
for playing a straightforward intelligible game; and this character
alone will counterbalance the disadvantage which will sometimes attach
to the fact that you have enabled the adversaries to read your hand.If
your partner knows that you play at random and without method, he will
be in a state of constant uncertainty; and you almost preclude him from
executing any of the finer strokes of play, the opportunities for which
generally arise from being able to infer with confidence the position
of particular cards.The extreme case of two skilled players against
two unskilled ones amounts almost to this, that towards the close of a
hand the former have the same advantage as though they had seen each
other's cards, while the latter have not.It follows that when you are unfortunately tied to an untaught partner,
especially if at the same time you are pitted against observant
adversaries, you should expose your hand as little as possible,
particularly in respect of minor details.It will become apparent, on consideration, that the question of the
advisability of affording information is more or less |
bathroom | Where is John? | It is, therefore, of extreme
importance to ascertain whether the practice is advantageous or the
reverse.The arguments just adduced are doubtless in favour of the
practice of affording information by the play; but it must be admitted
that by far the strongest authority for it is that experienced players,
by their settled opinions, reject the opposite course.The instructed player frequently selects one card in preference to
another with the _sole_ object of affording information.When the
principle is carried thus far, the play becomes purely conventional.For example: you naturally win a trick as cheaply as possible; if,
fourth hand, you could win with a ten, you would not waste an ace.But suppose you hold knave and ten, which card should then be played?The knave and ten in one hand are of equal value, and therefore to
win with the knave would be no unnecessary sacrifice of strength.Nevertheless, you extend to such cases the rule of winning as cheaply
as possible, and you play the ten for the mere purpose of conveying
information.Again: the
system of returning the higher of two losing cards (_see_ p.80) when
they are both small cards, is purely conventional.To take another
case: after two rounds of your four-card suit, you are left with two
losing cards, say the six and the seven, and you, having the lead, are
about to continue the suit; you should lead the six, not the seven,
in accordance with the rule that you lead the lowest card of a suit,
except with commanding strength.This being the convention, if you lead
the seven, your partner will infer that you cannot hold the six, and
will suppose that you led from a three-card suit, in consequence of
exceptional circumstances; if he is a good player he will miscount all
the hands, probably to your mutual discomfiture.Whist conventions, it will be observed, are in accordance with, and are
suggested by, principle.Indeed, all the established conventions of the
game are so chosen as to harmonise with play that would naturally be
adopted independently of convention.The aggregation of the recognised
rules of play, including the established conventions, constitute what
in practice is called the Conversation of the Game of Whist.It must not be overlooked that unsound players often deceive
unintentionally, and all players sometimes with intention.It is,
therefore, necessary to be on your guard against drawing inferences too
rigidly.There are some ways of conveying information which have not been
explained.For example: if you have the complete command of a suit, you
can publish the fact by discarding the highest of it; the presumption
being that you would never throw away a winning card with a losing one
in your hand.If you discard a second-best card of a suit of which
your partner does not know you to hold a long sequence, you ought to
have no more of the suit, for with the best also you would discard
that, and with a smaller one you would discard that.By winning with
the highest, and returning the lowest of a sequence (more especially
fourth hand), you show that you have the intermediate cards.Thus, with
ace, king, queen, fourth hand, if you desire to continue the suit,
and at the same time to show that you still remain with the winning
card, you would win with the ace and return the queen.Again, as long
as you keep the turn-up card in hand, your partner knows where it is;
so, having turned up a nine and holding the ten, trump with the ten
in preference.This rule, however, is liable to exceptions.With very
small trumps, of equal value, trumping with the higher card may be
mistaken for an exhibition of four or five trumps; also, if you are
weak in trumps, and the adversaries have shown strength in them, it is
not advisable to keep the turn-up card; for, if the adversaries know
you have it in your hand, they will draw it, whereas, if you play it,
they may be uncertain as to your holding another.If you open a suit
of ace, king only, it must be a forced lead.You then adopt the rule
of leading the highest of a numerically weak suit, and first lead the
ace.This shows your partner (unless you have already been forced, when
you lead the ace before king for other reasons), that you have no more
of the suit.Also, by leading the lowest of a head sequence of winning
trumps (subject, if an American Leader, to a selection of card in order
to show number), you convey information.Thus, you lead a small trump,
partner plays queen, won with king.You remain with ace, knave, ten.On
obtaining the lead, you continue with the ten, and, when it wins, you
have shown two by honours (unless ace is held up, which is unlikely).If you continue with ace, as in plain suits, your partner can tell
nothing about the knave and ten.You may pursue the same method in
plain suits when your partner has no more trumps, and with any head
sequence when you want him to win the trick, or are sure he cannot, and
also when the fourth hand has already renounced in the suit led.A most valuable mode of conveying very precise information of strength
is within the reach of players who think fit to adopt _American Leads_
(_see_ Appendix A).As the propriety of these leads is questioned by
some players, it may be stated that they form a beautiful system which
is in full harmony with the established principles of whist play.With regard to the American system when leading a high card of your
strong suit after a high card, no one disputes the propriety of leading
ace, then queen, from ace, queen, knave, and one small card; and of
leading ace, then knave, from ace, queen, knave, and more than one
small card.In the case of the four-card suit, you select the higher
card to tell your partner not to play the king, as you have not
sufficient numerical power to defend the suit single-handed.In the
case of a suit of more than four cards, you select the lower card that
your partner may not retain the command of your suit, and may play the
king, should he happen to have held king and two small ones originally.For a similar reason, it is obvious that with queen, knave, ten, and
one small card, you should follow queen with knave; with queen, knave,
ten, and more than one small card, you should follow queen with ten.Now, here is a germ of a principle of play.Holding two high
indifferent cards, and only four of your suit, your second lead is the
higher card; holding more than four, your second lead is the lower card.For the sake of uniformity, you should pursue the same plan in
all cases where, after your first lead, you remain with two high
indifferent cards.Thus, your original lead is a ten, from king, knave,
ten, and one or more small cards.You have the lead again, and it is immaterial, so far as establishing
the suit is concerned, whether you proceed with the king or with the
knave.But, if your practice is uniform, and in accordance with the
practice which obtains in the case of ace, queen, knave, and of queen,
knave, ten, you can inform your partner whether you led from a suit of
four cards or of more than four cards.If you continue with the king,
the higher of two indifferent cards, you led from king, knave, ten,
and one small card; if you continue with the knave, the lower of two
indifferent cards, you led from king, knave, ten, and more than one
small card.With regard to the American system, when opening your strong suit with
a low card, those who have already adopted the _penultimate lead_ from
suits of five cards, will have no difficulty in again discovering the
germ of a principle of play.The fourth-best card of your suit is led
from suits of four cards, and from suits of five cards.You have only to apply the same rule to suits of more than five cards,
and to lead your fourth-best card.You then pursue a uniform practice,
and at the same time convey valuable information.As an illustration, take this suit--queen, ten, nine, eight.Now suppose your suit to be queen, ten, nine, eight, three.Your suit is queen,
ten, nine, eight, three, two.No
doubt, a careful player would lead the eight, as a card of protection,
even if American leads had never been thought of.With lower cards,
such as queen, nine, eight, seven, three, two, it is possible a careful
player might lead the seven; and with still lower cards, where is he to
stop?The knot is cut by the very simple and uniform rule of leading
the fourth-best, without reference to the possibility of its being a
card of protection.With regard to the lead of a high card followed by a low card, when
the American system is followed, the low card selected should be the
original fourth-best.The more the American system is examined, the more thorough and perfect
it will be found.Care, however, must be taken, with leads late in
a hand, not to confuse a fourth-best lead with a forced lead of the
highest card of a weak suit.The American rule only applies, in its
integrity to the original lead,--or after one or more tricks have
been played, to the original lead of the player's own choice, (_See_
Appendix A).Also, it may be, that the leader, with very strong cards
in all plain suits, starts by leading a strengthening trump.The
uncertainty of the real character of the lead, in this case, is no
doubt unfavourable; but, the advantage of frequently being able to give
information of great numerical strength far outweighs this occasional
danger.Information as to the number of trumps you hold can be similarly
communicated when you have more than four trumps, by trumping with
the fourth-best and then leading the fourth-best of those remaining.This rule, however, is subject to rather a large exception.When your
fourth-best trump is a medium card, such as an eight, trumping with the
eight may imperil a trick later on.For instance: with such cards as
king, knave, nine, eight, three, a careful player would rightly trump
with the three and lead the eight.For the time, you do not inform
your partner as to number, because the eight is too valuable a card to
get rid of, and the information might be purchased too dearly.Also,
when about to lead high trumps after a force, there is no occasion to
run any risk by trumping with any but the lowest, as the high cards
led will of themselves indicate how many trumps you now hold (not how
many you held originally).If you take a force with any trump but the
lowest, and do not lead a trump, when your lowest is afterwards played
it only signifies that you had at least five trumps originally, and
your play does not constitute a call for trumps.The Management of Trumps is, perhaps, the most difficult of the
problems presented to the Whist-player.Before discussing the special
uses of trumps, it may be observed that in some few hands trumps are
led like plain suits, because they are your strongest suit, and you
prefer leading them to opening a weak suit.The principles already
discussed, which guide us to the most favourable chances for making
tricks in a suit, apply to trumps equally with other suits.The
privilege, however, enjoyed by the trump suit of winning every other,
causes some modifications of detail (noticed at pp.85-88); for, since the winning trumps _must_ make tricks, you play a
more backward game in the trump suit.Thus, with ace, king, and small
trumps, you lead a small one, by which you obtain an increased chance
of making tricks in the suit, and you keep the command of it, and must
have the lead after the third round, the advantage of which will be
presently explained.John travelled to the kitchen.Even if your partner is so weak in trumps that the
opponent wins the first trick very cheaply, but little (if any) harm
accrues; for the opponent then has to open a suit up to you or your
partner.In the great majority of hands, trumps are applied to their special
uses, viz.To disarm the opponents, and to prevent their trumping
your winning-cards; and 2.To trump the winning cards of the
adversaries.In order to comprehend when trumps may be most profitably
applied to the first, and when to the second, of these uses, we must
first clearly perceive the objects aimed at throughout the hand, viz.:
to establish a suit, to exhaust the adversaries' trumps, and to retain
the long trump, or a certain winning card with which to get the lead
again, for the purpose of bringing in the suit; also to endeavour to
obstruct similar designs of the opponents.It follows that you should
13.LEAD TRUMPS WHEN VERY STRONG IN THEM.It cannot be too strongly impressed that _the primary use of strength
in trumps is to draw the adversaries' trumps for the bringing in of
your own or your partner's long suit_.With great strength in trumps
(five or more), you may proceed at once to disarm the opponents, and
lead trumps without waiting to establish a suit.For, with five trumps
or more, the chance of your succeeding in drawing the other trumps,
and of being left with the long trumps is so considerable, that you
may then almost always lead trumps, whatever your other cards.The
exceptional hands are principally those which contain five trumps
without an honour, and five small cards of a plain suit; or five trumps
without an honour, and four middling cards of one plain suit together
with four bad cards of another plain suit.But if the adversaries are
at the score of three, you should lead a trump with these hands, as
your partner must have two honours, or very good cards out of trumps,
for you to save the game.If you are at the score of three, the adversaries being love, one, or
two, you should not lead a trump merely because you have five trumps
with two honours, if they are unaccompanied by a very strong suit, or
by good cards in each suit.For here, if your partner has an honour,
you probably win the game in any case; and if he has no honour you open
the trump suit to a disadvantage.Some good players, however, do not
allow this to be an exceptional case.The turn-up card may sometimes
cause you to refrain from leading trumps from five.Thus: you have
king, ten, nine, six, and four of spades (trumps); ace, queen, and
three small diamonds; and three small hearts.You are four, and the
ace of spades is turned up.In the opinion of most players, the ace of
diamonds is the best original lead; but, if an ace were not turned up,
you should lead a trump.It is often said, even by pretty good players, "Strength in trumps is
no reason for leading them, unless you have a good suit as well."If
both you and your partner are devoid of good cards you cannot make
tricks; but should your partner hold one good suit out of the three,
you will very likely bring it in for him by leading from strength in
trumps.For, even if you have a poor hand out of trumps, you will
discover in the course of play (_i.e._, by the suits led or discarded
by the other players), what your partner's suit is, and will be able
to lead it to him each time you get the lead with your long trumps.Besides, if your hand is weak out of trumps, you are placed in the
disadvantageous position of leading from a weak suit unless you lead
trumps.John went to the bathroom.You should not be deterred from leading trumps because an honour is
turned up to your right, nor necessarily lead them because the same
happens to your left; either is proper if the circumstances of the hand
require it, but neither otherwise.To illustrate this proposition, take
this hand: ace, queen, and three small spades (trumps), three small
hearts, three small clubs, and two small diamonds.The king of spades
is turned up fourth hand.The best lead is disputed; but the author has
no hesitation in advising the lead of a small trump, notwithstanding
that there is a certain finesse over the king.By leading the trump suit originally, you
obtain the advantages just enumerated, and make the dealer open a suit
up to your partner.Your partner, as soon as he gets the lead, will
return the trump, and you thus obtain the command of trumps whether the
king |
bathroom | Where is John? | Bearing in mind the severe consequences of leaving the adversary with
the long trump, you must be cautious in leading trumps from less than
five; four trumps and a moderate hand not justifying an original trump
lead.You should, instead, lead your strong plain suit, and if you
establish it, and the adversaries do not meantime show any great
strength, as by leading or calling for trumps (pp.125-127), you may
then, with four trumps, mostly venture a trump lead.With strength
in trumps you may generally finesse more freely in the second and
third rounds of trumps than you would in plain suits.In plain suits
an unsuccessful finesse may result in the best card being afterwards
trumped, which cannot happen in trumps.Moreover, by finessing, you
keep the winning trump, and so obtain the lead after the third round.This is especially important when you have a suit established and but
four trumps.Here you should, generally, not merely finesse in the
second round, but hold up the winning trump, and sometimes at this
juncture refuse to part with it even if the trump lead comes from the
adversary.The leader (A) has ace, and
three small trumps, a strong suit, headed by ace, king, queen, and a
probable trick, say king and another, in a third suit.A should, in
the writer's judgment, lead a trump.If B (A's partner) wins the first
trick in trumps, and returns a strengthening trump, A, as a rule,
should not part with his ace.John travelled to the kitchen.When A or B obtain the lead again they
play a third round of trumps, which, being won by the ace, enables A,
by leading his tierce major, to get a force (_i.e._, to compel one of
his adversaries to trump in order to win the trick), in which case
nothing short of five trumps in one hand against him can prevent A's
bringing in his suit.You must be prepared for similar tactics on the
part of the adversaries, and not conclude that they have not the best
trump because they suffer you to win the first or second round.With a well protected hand containing four trumps, two being honours,
a trump may be led originally.For here the chance of gaining by the
trump lead may be taken as greater than the chance of losing.Thus with
queen, knave, and two small trumps, a four suit with an honour, say
for example, knave, ten, nine, and a small one, king guarded in the
third suit, and queen guarded in the fourth, a small trump if it finds
partner with an honour is by no means unlikely to win the game.If
partner turns out very weak in trumps the leader must alter his plan,
and, instead of continuing the trump lead, play to make three, five or
seven tricks according to the fall of the cards in plain suits.Now, in order that the current should circulate around it and make a
magnet of it by induction, what was required?Nothing but a metallic
lode, whose innumerable windings through the bowels of the soil
should be connected subterraneously at the base of the block.It seemed to me also that the place of this block ought to be in the
magnetic axis, as a sort of gigantic calamite, from whence the
imponderable fluid whose currents made an inexhaustible accumulator
set up at the confines of the world should issue.John went to the bathroom.Our compass could
not have enabled us to determine whether the marvel before our eyes
really was at the magnetic pole of the southern regions.All I can
say is, that its needle staggered about, helpless and useless.And
in fact the exact location of the Antarctic Sphinx mattered little
in respect of the constitution of that artificial loadstone, and the
manner in which the clouds and metallic lode supplied its attractive
power.In this very plausible fashion I was led to explain the phenomenon
by instinct.It could not be doubted that we were in the vicinity of
a magnet which produced these terrible but strictly natural effects
by its attraction.I communicated my idea to my companions, and they regarded this
explanation as conclusive, in presence of the physical facts of
which we were the actual witnesses."We shall incur no risk by going to the foot of the mound, I
suppose," said Captain Len Guy.I could not describe the impression those three words made upon us.Edgar Poe would have said that they were three cries from the depths
of the under world.It was Dirk Peters who had spoken, and his body was stretched out in
the direction of the sphinx, as though it had been turned to iron
and was attracted by the magnet.Then he sped swiftly towards the sphinx-like mound, and his
companions followed him over rough ground strewn with volcanic
remains of all sorts.The monster grew larger as we neared it, but lost none of its
mythological shape.Alone on that vast plain it produced a sense of
awe.And--but this could only have been a delusion--we seemed to
be drawn towards it by the force of its magnetic attraction.On arriving at the base of the mound, we found there the various
articles on which the magnet had exerted its power; arms, utensils,
the grapnel of the _Paracuta_, all adhering to the sides of the
monster.There also were the iron relics of the _Halbrane's_ boat,
all her utensils, arms, and fittings, even to the nails and the iron
portions of the rudder.There was no possibility of regaining possession of any of these
things.Even had they not adhered to the loadstone rock at too great
a height to be reached, they adhered to it too closely to be
detached.Hurliguerly was infuriated by the impossibility of
recovering his knife, which he recognized at fifty feet above his
head, and cried as he shook his clenched fist at the imperturbable
monster,--
"Thief of a sphinx!"Of course the things which had belonged to the _Halbrane's_ boat
and the _Paracuta's_ were the only articles that adorned the mighty
sides of the lonely mystic form.Never had any ship reached such a
latitude of the Antarctic Sea.Hearne and his accomplices, Captain
Len Guy and his companions, were the first who had trodden this
point of the southern continent.And any vessel that might have
approached this colossal magnet must have incurred certain
destruction.Our schooner must have perished, even as its boat had
been dashed into a shapeless wreck.West now reminded us that it was imprudent to prolong our stay upon
this Land of the Sphinx--a name to be retained.Time pressed, and a
few days' delay would have entailed our wintering at the foot of
the ice-barrier.The order to return to the beach had just been given, when the voice
of the half-breed was again heard, as he cried out:
"There!We followed the sounds to the back of the monster's right paw, and
we found Dirk Peters on his knees, with his hands stretched out
before an almost naked corpse, which had been preserved intact by
the cold of these regions, and was as rigid as iron.The head was
bent, a white beard hung down to the waist, the nails of the feet
and hands were like claws.How had this corpse been fixed to the side of the mound at six feet
above the ground?Across the body, held in place by its cross-belt, we saw the twisted
barrel of a musket, half-eaten by rust.He tried to rise, that he might approach and kiss the ossified
corpse.But his knees bent under him, a strangled sob seemed to rend
his throat, with a terrible spasm his faithful heart broke, and the
half-breed fell back--dead!After their separation, the boat had
carried Arthur Pym through these Antarctic regions!Like us, once he
had passed beyond the south pole, he came into the zone of the
monster!And there, while his boat was swept along on the northern
current, he was seized by the magnetic fluid before he could get rid
of the gun which was slung over his shoulder, and hurled against the
fatal loadstone Sphinx of the Ice-realm.Now the faithful half-breed rests under the clay of the Land of the
Antarctic Mystery, by the side of his "poor Pym," that hero
whose strange adventures found a chronicler no less strange in the
great American poet!That same day, in the afternoon, the _Paracuta_ departed from the
coast of the Land of the Sphinx, which had lain to the west of us
since the 21st of February.By the death of Dirk Peters the number of the passengers was reduced
to twelve.These were all who remained of the double crew of the two
schooners, the first comprising thirty-eight men, the second,
thirty-two; in all seventy souls.But let it not be forgotten that
the voyage of the _Halbrane_ had been undertaken in fulfillment of a
duty to humanity, and four of the survivors of the _Jane_ owed their
rescue to it.And now there remains but little to tell, and that must be related
as succinctly as possible.It is unnecessary to dwell upon our
return voyage, which was favoured by the constancy of the currents
and the wind to the northern course.The last part of the voyage was
accomplished amid great fatigue, suffering, and but it ended in our
safe deliverance from all these.Firstly, a few days after our departure from the Land of the Sphinx,
the sun set behind the western horizon to reappear no more for the
whole winter.It was then in the midst of the semi-darkness of the
austral night that the _Paracuta_ pursued her monotonous course.True,
the southern polar lights were frequently visible; but they were not
the sun, that single orb of day which had illumined our horizons
during the months of the Antarctic summer, and their capricious
splendour could not replace his unchanging light.That long darkness
of the poles sheds a moral and physical influence on mortals which no
one can elude, a gloomy and overwhelming impression almost impossible
to resist.Of all the _Paracuta's_ passengers, the boatswain and Endicott only
preserved their habitual good-humour; those two were equally
insensible to the weariness and the peril of our voyage.I also
except West, who was ever ready to face every eventuality, like a
man who is always on the defensive.As for the two brothers Guy,
their happiness in being restored to each other made them frequently
oblivious of the anxieties and risks of the future.Of Hurliguerly I cannot speak too highly.He proved himself a
thoroughly good fellow, and it raised our drooping spirits to hear
him repeat in his jolly voice,--
"We shall get to port all right, my friends, be sure of that.And,
if you only reckon things up, you will see that we have had more
good luck than bad.Oh, yes, I know, there was the loss of our
schooner!Poor _Halbrane_, carried up into the air like a balloon,
then flung into the deep like an avalanche!But, on the other hand,
there was the iceberg which brought us to the coast, and the Tsalal
boat which brought us and Captain William Guy and his three
companions together.And don't forget the current and the breeze
that have pushed us on up to now, and will keep pushing us on, I'm
sure of that.With so many trumps in our hand we cannot possibly
lose the game.The only thing to be regretted is that we shall have
to get ashore again in Australia or New Zealand, instead of casting
anchor at the Kerguelens, near the quay of Christmas Harbour, in
front of the Green Cormorant."For a week we pursued our course without deviation to east or west,
and it was not until the 21st of March that the __Paracuta__ lost
sight of Halbrane Land, being carried towards the north by the
current, while the coast-line of the continent, for such we are
convinced it is, trended in a round curve to the north-east.Although the waters of this portion of sea were still open, they
carried a flotilla of icebergs or ice-fields.Hence arose serious
difficulties and also dangers to navigation in the midst of the
gloomy mists, when we had to manoeuvre between these moving masses,
either to find passage or to prevent our little craft from being
crushed like grain between the millstones.Sandra travelled to the bedroom.Besides, Captain Len Guy could no longer ascertain his position
either in latitude or longitude.The sun being absent, calculations
by the position of the stars was too complicated, it was impossible
to take altitudes, and the _Paracuta_ abandoned herself to the action
of the current, which invariably bore us northward, as the compass
indicated.By keeping the reckoning of its medium speed, however, we
concluded that on the 27th of March our boat was between the
sixty-ninth and the sixty-eighth parallels, that is to say, some
seventy miles only from the Antarctic Circle.if no obstacle to the course of our perilous navigation had
existed, if passage between this inner sea of the southern zone and
the waters of the Pacific Ocean had been certain, the _Paracuta_ might
have reached the extreme limit of the austral seas in a few days.But a few hundred miles more to sail, and the iceberg-barrier would
confront us with its immovable rampart, and unless a passage could
be found, we should be obliged to go round it either by the east or
by the west.once cleared, we should be in a frail craft upon the terrible
Pacific Ocean, at the period of the year when its tempests rage with
redoubled fury and strong ships dread the might of its waves.Sandra journeyed to the garden.This the boatswain
asserted confidently, and we were bound to believe the boatswain.* * * * *
For six entire days, until the 2nd of April, the _Paracuta_ held her
course among the ice-barrier, whose crest was profiled at an
altitude of between seven and eight hundred feet above the level of
the sea.The extremities were not visible either on the east or the
west, and if our boat did not find an open passage, we could not
clear it.By a most fortunate chance a passage was found on the
above-mentioned date, and attempted, amid a thousand risks.Yes, we
required all the zeal, skill, and courage of our men and their
chiefs to accomplish such a task.At last we were in the South Pacific waters, but our boat had
suffered severely in getting through, and it had sprung more than
one leak.We were kept busy in baling out the water, which also came
in from above.The breeze was gentle, the sea more calm than we could have hoped,
and the real danger did not lie in the risks of navigation.No, it
arose from the fact that not a ship was visible in these waters, not
a whaler was to be seen on the fishing-grounds.At the beginning of
April these places are forsaken, and we arrived some weeks too late.We learned afterwards that had we arrived a little sooner, we should
have met the vessels of the American expedition.In fact, on the 1st of February, by 95° 50' longitude and 64°
17' latitude, Lieutenant Wilkes was still exploring these seas in
one of his ships, the _Vincennes_, after having discovered a long
extent of coast stretching from east to west.On the approach of the
bad season, he returned to Hobart Town, in Tasmania.The same year,
the expedition of the French captain Dumont d'Urville, which
started in 1838, discovered Adélie Land in 66° 30' latitude and
38° 21' east longitude, and Clarie Coast in 64° 30' and 129°
54'.Their campaign having ended with these important discoveries,
the _Astrolabe_ and the _Zélée_ left the Antarctic Ocean and returned
to Hobart Town.None of these ships, then, were in those waters; so that, when our
nutshell _Paracuta_ was "alone on a lone, lone sea" beyond the
ice-barrier, we were bound to believe that it was no longer possible
we could be saved.We were fifteen hundred miles away from the nearest land, and winter
was a month old!Hurliguerly himself was obliged to acknowledge the last fortunate
chance upon which he had counted failed us.On the 6th of April we were at the end of |
bathroom | Where is John? | cried the boatswain, and on the instant we made out a
vessel about four miles to the north-east, beneath the mist which
had suddenly risen.Signals were made, signals were perceived; the ship lowered her
largest boat and sent it to our rescue.This ship was the _Tasman_, an American three-master, from
Charlestown, where we were received with eager welcome and
cordiality.The captain treated my companions as though they had
been his own countrymen.The _Tasman_ had come from the Falkland Islands where the captain had
learned that seven months previously the American schooner _Halbrane_
had gone to the southern seas in search of the shipwrecked people of
the _Jane_.John travelled to the kitchen.But as the season advanced, the schooner not having
reappeared, she was given up for lost in the Antarctic regions.Fifteen days after our rescue the _Tasman_ disembarked the survivors
of the crew of the two schooners at Melbourne, and it was there that
our men were paid the sums they had so hardly earned, and so well
deserved.We then learned from maps that the _Paracuta_ had debouched into the
Pacific from the land called Clarie by Dumont d'Urville, and the
land called Fabricia, which was discovered in 1838 by Bellenny.Thus terminated this adventurous and extraordinary expedition, which
cost, alas, too many victims.Our final word is that although the
chances and the necessities of our voyage carried us farther towards
the south pole than those who preceded us, although we actually did
pass beyond the axial point of the terrestrial globe, discoveries of
great value still remain to be made in those waters!Arthur Pym, the hero whom Edgar Poe has made so famous, has shown
the way.It is for others to follow him, and to wrest the last
Antarctic Mystery from the Sphinx of the Ice-realm."You'll
see that if it'll all come right now."She neither avoided James
nor sought him, but when chance brought them together, was perfectly
natural.Her affection had never been demonstrative, and now there was
in her manner but little change.She talked frankly, as though nothing
had passed between them, with no suspicion of reproach in her tone.She
was, indeed, far more at ease than James.He could not hide the effort
it was to make conversation, nor the nervous discomfort which in her
presence he felt.He watched her furtively, asking himself whether she
still suffered.But Mary's face betrayed few of her emotions; tanned by
exposure to all weathers, her robust colour remained unaltered; and it
was only in her eyes that James fancied he saw a difference.They had
just that perplexed, sorrowful expression which a dog has, unjustly
beaten.James, imaginative and conscience-stricken, tortured himself by
reading in their brown softness all manner of dreadful anguish.He
watched them, unlit by the smile which played upon the lips, looking at
him against their will, with a pitiful longing.He exaggerated the pain
he saw till it became an obsession, intolerable and ruthless; if Mary
desired revenge, she need not have been dissatisfied.But that
apparently was the last thing she thought of.He was grateful to hear
of her anger with Mrs.Jackson, whose sympathy had expressed itself in
round abuse of him."I will never listen to a word against Captain Parsons, Mrs.Whatever he did, he had a perfect right to do.He's incapable of acting
otherwise than as an honourable gentleman."But if Mary's conduct aroused the admiration of all that knew her, it
rendered James still more blameworthy.The hero-worship was conveniently forgotten, and none strove to conceal
the dislike, even the contempt, which he felt for the fallen idol.James
had outraged the moral sense of the community; his name could not be
mentioned without indignation; everything he did was wrong, even his
very real modesty was explained as overweening conceit.And curiously enough, James was profoundly distressed by the general
disapproval.A silent, shy man, he was unreasonably sensitive to the
opinion of his fellows; and though he told himself that they were
stupid, ignorant, and narrow, their hostility nevertheless made him
miserable.Even though he contemned them, he was anxious that they
should like him.He refused to pander to their prejudices, and was too
proud to be conciliatory; yet felt bitterly wounded when he had excited
their aversion.Now he set to tormenting himself because he had despised
the adulation of Little Primpton, and could not equally despise its
censure.* * *
Sunday came, and the good people of Little Primpton trooped to church.Mrs Clibborn turned round and smiled at James when he took his seat, but
the Colonel sat rigid, showing by the stiffness of his backbone that his
indignation was supreme.The service proceeded, and in due course Mr.He delivered his text: "_The fear of the Lord is to hate evil:
pride, and arrogancy, and the evil way, and the froward mouth, do I
hate._"
The Vicar of Little Primpton was an earnest man, and he devoted much
care to the composition of his sermons.He was used to expound twice a
Sunday the more obvious parts of Holy Scripture, making in twenty
minutes or half an hour, for the benefit of the vulgar, a number of
trite reflections; and it must be confessed that he had great facility
for explaining at decorous length texts which were plain to the meanest
intelligence.But having a fair acquaintance with the thought of others, Mr.Jackson
flattered himself that he was a thinker; and on suitable occasions
attacked from his village pulpit the scarlet weed of heresy, expounding
to an intelligent congregation of yokels and small boys the manifold
difficulties of the Athanasian Creed.He was at his best in pouring
vials of contempt upon the false creed of atheists, Romanists,
Dissenters, and men of science.The theory of Evolution excited his
bitterest scorn, and he would set up, like a row of nine-pins, the
hypotheses of the greatest philosophers of the century, triumphantly to
knock them down by the force of his own fearless intellect.His
congregation were inattentive, and convinced beyond the need of
argument, so they remained pious members of the Church of England.But this particular sermon, after mature consideration, the Vicar had
made up his mind to devote to a matter of more pressing interest.Jackson, who knew what was coming, caught the
curate's eye, and looked significantly at James.The homily, in fact,
was directed against him; his were the pride, the arrogancy, and the
evil way.He was blissfully unconscious of these faults, and for a
minute or two the application missed him; but the Vicar of Little
Primpton, intent upon what he honestly thought his duty, meant that
there should be no mistake.He crossed his t's and dotted his i's, with
the scrupulous accuracy of the scandal-monger telling a malicious story
about some person whom charitably he does not name, yet wishes everyone
to identify.Colonel Parsons started when suddenly the drift of the sermon dawned
upon him, and then bowed his head with shame.His wife looked straight
in front of her, two flaming spots upon her pale cheeks.Mary, in the
next pew, dared not move, hardly dared breathe; her heart sank with
dismay, and she feared she would faint.They all felt for James intensely; the form of Mr.Jackson, hooded and
surpliced, had acquired a new authority, and his solemn invective was
sulphurous with the fires of Hell."He hasn't deserved this," thought Mrs.But the Colonel bent his head still lower, accepting for his son the
reproof, taking part of it himself.The humiliation seemed merited, and
the only thing to do was to bear it meekly.James alone appeared
unconcerned; the rapid glances at him saw no change in his calm,
indifferent face.His eyes were closed, and one might have thought him
asleep.Jackson noted the attitude, and attributed it to a wicked
obstinacy.For the repentant sinner, acknowledging his fault, he would
have had entire forgiveness; but James showed no contrition.Stiff-necked and sin-hardened, he required a further chastisement."There is nothing more
easy than to do a brave deed when the blood is hot.But to conduct one's
life simply, modestly, with a meek spirit and a Christ-like submission,
that is ten times more difficult Courage, unaccompanied by moral worth,
is the quality of a brute-beast."He showed how much more creditable were the artless virtues of honesty
and truthfulness; how better it was to keep one's word, to be
kind-hearted and dutiful.Becoming more pointed, he mentioned the case
which had caused them so much sorrow, warning the delinquent against
conceit and self-assurance."Pride goeth before a fall," he said."And he that is mighty shall be
abased."* * *
They walked home silently, Colonel Parsons and his wife with downcast
eyes, feeling that everyone was looking at them.Their hearts were too
full for them to speak to one another, and they dared say nothing to
James.But Major Forsyth had no scruples of delicacy; he attacked his
nephew the moment they sat down to dinner."Well, James, what did you think of the sermon?"I fancy it was addressed pretty directly to you.""So I imagine," replied James, good-humouredly smiling."I thought it
singularly impertinent, but otherwise uninteresting."Jackson doesn't think much of you," said Uncle William, with a
laugh, ignoring his sister's look, which implored him to be silent."I can bear that with equanimity.John went to the bathroom.I never set up for a very wonderful
person."Sandra travelled to the bedroom."He was wrong to make little of your attempt to save young Larcher,"
said Mrs.One soon gets used to
shells flying about; they're not so dangerous as they look, and after a
while one forgets all about them.Sandra journeyed to the garden.Now and then one gets hit, and then
it's too late to be nervous.""But you went back--into the very jaws of death--to save that boy."John journeyed to the bedroom."I've never been able to understand why.It didn't occur to me that I
might get killed; it seemed the natural thing to do.It wasn't really
brave, because I never realised that there was danger."* * *
In the afternoon James received a note from Mrs.Clibborn, asking him
to call upon her.Mary and her father were out walking, she said, so
there would be no one to disturb them, and they could have a pleasant
little chat.The invitation was a climax to Jamie's many vexations, and
he laughed grimly at the prospect of that very foolish lady's
indignation.It was, after a fashion, a
point of honour with him to avoid none of the annoyances which his act
had brought upon him.It was partly in order to face every infliction
that he insisted on remaining at Little Primpton.John journeyed to the bathroom."Why haven't you been to see me, James?"Clibborn murmured, with a
surprisingly tender smile."I thought you wouldn't wish me to."She sighed and cast up her eyes to heaven."It's very kind of you to say so," replied James, somewhat relieved."I'm afraid you and Colonel Clibborn must be very angry with me?""I could never be angry with you, James.... Poor Reginald, he doesn't
understand!Clibborn put her hand
on Jamie's arm and gazed into his eyes."I want you to tell me
something."If you had asked me the other day, I should have denied it with all my
might.She was convinced that James adored her, but wanted to hear him say so.It is notorious that to a handsome woman even the admiration of a
crossing-sweeper is welcome."Oh, it's no good any longer trying to conceal it from myself!"cried
James, forgetting almost to whom he was speaking."I'm sorry about Mary;
no one knows how much.But I do love someone else, and I love her with
all my heart and soul; and I shall never get over it now."Clibborn, complacently, "I knew it!"Then
looking coyly at him: "Tell me about her."I know my love is idiotic and impossible; but I can't help it."You're in love with a married woman, James.""My poor boy, d'you think you can deceive me!And is it not the wife of
an officer?""It's just that which makes it so terrible."Clibborn, I swear you're the only woman here who's got two
ounces of gumption.If they'd only listened to you five years ago, we
might all have been saved this awful wretchedness."Clibborn, whose affectations were
manifest, whose folly was notorious, should alone have guessed his
secret.He was tired of perpetually concealing his thoughts."You can't think how hard I've struggled.When I found I loved her, I
nearly killed myself trying to kill my love."And nothing can ever come of it, you know," said Mrs.The only thing is to live
on and suffer."Clibborn thought that even poor Algy Turner, who had killed
himself for love of her, had not been so desperately hit."It's very kind of you to listen to me," said James."I have nobody to
speak to, and sometimes I feel I shall go mad.""You're such a nice boy, James.What a pity it is you didn't go into the
cavalry!"James scarcely heard; he stared at the floor, brooding sorrowfully."Fate is against me," he muttered."If things had only happened a little differently.Clibborn was thinking that if she were a widow, she could never
have resisted the unhappy young man's pleading."It's no good," he said; "talking makes it no better.I must go on
trying to crush it.And the worst of it is, I don't want to crush it; I
love my love.Though it embitters my whole life, I would rather die than
lose it.You can't
imagine what good it does me to receive a little sympathy."You're not the first who has told me that he is miserable.James looked at her, perplexed, not understanding what she meant.With
her sharp, feminine intuition, Mrs.Clibborn read in his eyes the
hopeless yearning of his heart, and for a moment her rigid virtue
faltered."I can't be hard on you, Jamie," she said, with that effective, sad
smile of hers."I don't want you to go away from here quite wretched.""What can you do to ease the bitter aching of my heart?"Clibborn, quickly looking at the window, noticed that she could not
possibly be seen by anyone outside."Jamie, if you like you may kiss me."She offered her powdered cheek, and James, rather astonished, pressed it
with his lips."I will always be a mother to you.You can depend on me whatever
happens.... Now go away, there's a good boy."She watched him as he walked down the garden, and then sighed deeply,
wiping away a tear from the corner of her eyes.Mary was surprised, when she came home, to find her mother quite
affectionate and tender.Clibborn, indeed, intoxicated with her
triumph, could afford to be gracious to a fallen rival.XV
A Few days later Mary was surprised to receive a little note from Mr.Dryland:
"MY DEAR MISS CLIBBORN,--With some trepidation I take up my pen to
address you on a matter which, to me at least, is of the very
greatest importance.We have so many sympathies in common that my
meaning will hardly escape you.I daresay you will find my
diffidence ridiculous, but, under the circumstances, I think it is
not unpardonable.It will be no news to you when I confess that I
am an exceptionally shy man, and that must be my excuse in sending
you this letter.In short, I wish to ask you to grant me a brief
interview; we have so few opportunities of seeing one another in
private that I can find no occasion of saying to you what I wish.Indeed, for a long period my duty has made it necessary |
bathroom | Where is John? | Now, however, that things have taken a
different turn, I venture, as I said, to ask you to give me a few
minutes' conversation.--I am, my dear Miss Clibborn, your very
sincere,
"THOMAS DRYLAND."P.S.--I open this letter to say that I have just met your father
on the Green, who tells me that he and Mrs.Clibborn are going into
Tunbridge Wells this afternoon.Unless, therefore, I hear from you
to the contrary, I shall (D.V.)present myself at your house at 3
P.M.""What can he want to see me about?"exclaimed Mary, the truth occurring
to her only to be chased away as a piece of egregious vanity.It was
more reasonable to suppose that Mr.Dryland had on hand some charitable
scheme in which he desired her to take part."Anyhow," she thought philosophically, "I suppose I shall know when he
comes."At one and the same moment the church clock struck three, and Mr.Dryland rang the Clibborns' bell.He came into the dining-room in his best coat, his honest red face
shining with soap, and with a consciousness that he was about to perform
an heroic deed."This is kind of you, Miss Clibborn!Do you know, I feared the servant
was going to say you were 'not at home.'""Oh, I never let her say that when I'm in.Mamma doesn't think it wrong,
but one can't deny that it's an untruth."John travelled to the kitchen.cried the curate, with
enthusiasm."I'm afraid I haven't really; but I like to be truthful.""I'm afraid I didn't understand it.""I was under the impression that I expressed myself with considerable
perspicacity," remarked the curate, with a genial smile."Oh, but you are, Miss Clibborn.I have always thought that your mental powers were
very considerable indeed.I can assure you it has been a great blessing
to me to find someone here who was capable of taking an intelligent
interest in Art and Literature.In these little country places one
misses intellectual society so much.""I'm not ashamed to say that I've learnt a lot from you, Mr.All I lay claim to is that I was fortunate
enough to be able to lend you the works of Ruskin and Marie Corelli.""That reminds me that I must return you the 'Master Christian.'"I think it's a book worth pondering over;
quite unlike the average trashy novel.""I haven't had much time for reading lately.""Ah, Miss Clibborn, I understand!I'm afraid you've been very much
upset.I wanted to tell you how sorry I was; but I felt it would be
perhaps indelicate.""It is very kind of you to think of me.""Besides, I must confess that I cannot bring myself to be very sorry.It's an ill wind that blows nobody good.""I'm afraid I don't understand what you mean, Mr."Miss Clibborn, I have come here to-day to converse with you on a matter
which I venture to think of some importance.In these matters it is always best, I
believe, to come straight to the point."The curate cleared his throat,
and assumed his best clerical manner."Miss Clibborn, I have the honour
to solemnly ask you for your hand."Mary blushed scarlet, and her heart went pit-a-pat in the most alarming
fashion."I think I should tell you that I am thirty-three years of age.I have
some private means, small, but sufficient, with my income and economy,
to support a wife.My father was for over a quarter of a century vicar
of Easterham.""I feel very much honoured by your proposal, Mr.And no one can
be more convinced than I of my unworthiness.But I'm afraid I must
refuse."John went to the bathroom."I don't press for an immediate answer, Miss Clibborn.I know at first
blush it must surprise you that I should come forward with an offer so
soon after the rupture of your engagement with Captain Parsons.But if
you examine the matter closely, you will see that it is less surprising
than it seems.While you were engaged to Captain Parsons it was my duty
to stifle my feelings; but now I cannot.Indeed, I have not the right to
conceal from you that for a long time they have been of the tenderest
description.""Not at all," reassuringly answered Mr."I can honestly say
that you are deserving of the very highest--er--admiration and esteem.Miss Clibborn, I have loved you in secret almost ever since I came to
the parish.The moment I saw you I felt an affinity between us.Our
tastes are so similar; we both understand Art and Literature.When you
played to me the divine melodies of Mendelssohn, when I read to you the
melodious verses of Lord Tennyson, I felt that my happiness in life
would be a union with you.""I'm afraid I can never be unfaithful to my old love.""No; time can make no possible difference.I have always tried to do my duty, and while
you were engaged to another, I allowed not even a sigh to escape my
lips.But now I venture to think that the circumstances are altered.I
know I am not a gallant officer, I have done no doughty deeds, and the
Victoria Cross does not adorn my bosom.I am comparatively poor; but I
can offer an honest heart and a very sincere and respectful love.Oh,
Miss Clibborn, cannot you give me hope that as time wears on you will be
able to look upon my suit with favour?""I'm afraid my answer must be final.""I hope to be soon appointed to a living, and I looked forward ardently
to the life of usefulness and of Christian fellowship which we might
have lived together.You are an angel of mercy, Miss Clibborn.I cannot
help thinking that you are eminently suitable for the position which I
make so bold as to offer you.""I won't deny that nothing could attract me more than to be the wife of
a clergyman.One has such influence for good, such power of improving
one's fellow-men.Even if he has ceased to
care for me, I could never look upon him with other feelings.""Even though it touches me to the quick, Miss.Clibborn," said the
curate, earnestly, "I respect and admire you for your sentiments.I wonder if you'd allow me to make a little confession?"Sandra travelled to the bedroom."The fact is, I have written a few
verses comparing you to Penelope, which, if you will allow me, I should
very much like to send you.""I should like to see them very much," said Mary, blushing a little and
smiling."Of course, I'm not a poet, I'm too busy for that; but they are the
outpouring of an honest, loving heart.""I'm sure," said Mary, encouragingly, "that it's better to be sincere
and upright than to be the greatest poet in the world.""It's very kind of you to say so.I should like to ask one question,
Miss Clibborn.I have the
highest respect and esteem for you, Mr.Sandra journeyed to the garden.I can never forget the
great compliment you have paid me.I shall always think of you as the
best friend I have."John journeyed to the bedroom."Can you say nothing more to me than that?"asked the curate,
despondently."Oh, Miss Clibborn, how sad it is to think that your affections should
be unrequited.Miss Clibborn, can you give
me no hope?"John journeyed to the bathroom."I should not be acting rightly towards you if I did not tell you at
once that so long as Captain Parsons lives, my love for him can never
alter."I think there's nothing so noble as a clergyman.If
it is any consolation to you, I may confess that if I had never known
Captain Parsons, things might have gone differently.""Well, I suppose I had better go away now.I must try to bear my
disappointment."Mary gave him her hand, and, bending down with the utmost gallantry, the
curate kissed it; then, taking up his low, clerical hat, hurriedly left
her.Jackson was a woman of singular penetration, so that it was not
strange if she quickly discovered what had happened.Dryland was
taking tea at the Vicarage, whither, with characteristic manliness, he
had gone to face his disappointment.Not for him was the solitary
moping, nor the privacy of a bedchamber; his robust courage sent him
rather into the field of battle, or what was under the circumstances the
only equivalent, Mrs.But even he could not conceal the torments of unsuccessful love.He
stirred his tea moodily, and his usual appetite for plum-cake had quite
deserted him."What's the matter with you, Mr.asked the Vicar's wife, with
those sharp eyes which could see into the best hidden family secret.Jackson, in a tone which half-a-dozen marks of
interrogation could inadequately express.Life is not all beer and skittles."Did you say you'd been calling on Mary Clibborn this afternoon?"Dryland blushed, and to cover his confusion filled his mouth with a
large piece of cake."Yes," he said, as soon as he could.Dryland, you can't deceive me.Dryland, it was a noble thing to do.We can't let you hide your light under a bushel.Fancy
you proposing to that poor, dear girl!But it's just what I should have
expected of you.The clergy are constantly
doing the most beautiful actions that no one hears anything about.You
ought to receive a moral Victoria Cross.I'm sure you deserve it far
more than that wicked and misguided young man.""I don't think I ought to take any credit for what I've done," modestly
remonstrated the curate.You don't know how much it means to that
poor, jilted girl.""It's true my indignation was aroused at the heartless conduct of
Captain Parsons; but I have long loved her, Mrs.When I saw you together I said to Archibald:
'What a good pair they'd make!'I'm sure you deserve her far more than
that worthless creature.""I'll go and speak to her myself.You've behaved like a knight-errant, Mr.The news spread like wild-fire, and with it the opinion that the curate
had vastly distinguished himself.Neither pagan hero nor Christian
martyr could have acted more becomingly.The consideration which had
once been Jamie's was bodily transferred to Mr.He was the man
of the hour, and the contemplation of his gallant deed made everyone
feel nobler, purer.The curate accepted with quiet satisfaction the
homage that was laid at his feet, modestly denying that he had done
anything out of the way.With James, all unconscious of what had
happened, he was mildly patronising; with Mary, tender, respectful,
subdued.If he had been an archbishop, he could not have behaved with
greater delicacy, manliness, and decorum."I don't care what anyone says," cried Mrs.Jackson, "I think he's worth
ten Captain Parsons!Why, Captain
Parsons simply used to look bored when one told him he was brave."But in Primpton House the proposal was met with consternation.Major Forsyth suggested that James should be told, in the belief that
his jealousy would be excited.She waited till she was alone with her son, and then, without stopping
her needlework, said suddenly:
"James, have you heard that Mr.cried his mother, indignantly, "how can you ask such a
question?You must know that for nothing in
the world would she be faithless to you.""I should like her to marry the curate.I think it would be a very
suitable match."XVI
The tension between James and his parents became not less, but greater.That barrier which, almost from the beginning, they had watched with
pain rise up between them now seemed indestructible, and all their
efforts only made it more obvious and more stable.It was like some
tropical plant which, for being cut down, grew ever with greater
luxuriance.And there was a mischievous devil present at all their
conversations that made them misunderstand one another as completely as
though they spoke in different tongues.Notwithstanding their love, they
were like strangers together; they could look at nothing from the same
point of view.The Parsons had lived their whole lives in an artificial state.Ill-educated as most of their contemporaries in that particular class,
they had just enough knowledge to render them dogmatic and intolerant.It requires a good deal of information to discover one's own ignorance,
but to the consciousness of this the good people had never arrived.They
felt they knew as much as necessary, and naturally on the most
debatable questions were most assured.Their standpoint was
inconceivably narrow.They had the best intentions in the world of doing
their duty, but what their duty was they accepted on trust, frivolously.They walked round and round in a narrow circle, hemmed in by false
ideals and by ugly prejudices, putting for the love of God unnecessary
obstacles in their path and convinced that theirs was the only possible
way, while all others led to damnation.They had never worked out an
idea for themselves, never done a single deed on their own account, but
invariably acted and thought according to the rule of their caste.They
were not living creatures, but dogmatic machines.James, going into the world, quickly realised that he had been brought
up to a state of things which did not exist.He was like a sailor who
has put out to sea in an ornamental boat, and finds that his sail is
useless, the ropes not made to work, and the rudder immovable.The long,
buoyant wind of the world blew away like thistle-down the conventions
which had seemed so secure a foundation.But he discovered in himself a
wonderful curiosity, an eagerness for adventure which led him boldly to
affront every peril; and the unknown lands of the intellect are every
bit as dangerously fascinating as are those of sober fact.He read
omnivorously, saw many and varied things; the universe was spread out
before him like an enthralling play.Knowledge is like the root of a
tree, attaching man by its tendrils to the life about him.James found
in existence new beauties, new interests, new complexities; and he
gained a lighter heart and, above all, an exquisite sense of freedom.At
length he looked back with something like horror at that old life in
which the fetters of ignorance had weighed so terribly upon him.On his return to Little Primpton, he found his people as he had left
them, doing the same things, repeating at every well-known juncture the
same trite observations.Their ingenuousness affected him as a <DW64>,
civilised and educated, on visiting after many years his native tribe,
might be affected by their nose-rings and yellow ochre.Mary travelled to the kitchen.James was
astounded that they should ignore matters which he fancied common
knowledge, and at the same time accept beliefs that he had thought
completely dead.He was willing enough to shrug his shoulders and humour
their prejudices, but they had made of them a rule of life which
governed every action with an iron tyranny.It was in accordance with
all these outworn conventions that they conducted the daily round.And
presently James found that his father and mother were striving to draw
him back into the prison.Unconsciously, even with the greatest
tenderness, they sought to place upon his neck again that irksome yoke
which he had so difficultly thrown off.If James had learnt anything, it was at all hazards to think for
himself, accepting nothing on authority, questioning, doubting; it was
to look upon life with a critical eye, trying to understand it, and to
receive no ready-made explanations.Above all, he had learnt that every
question has two sides.Now this was precisely what Colonel Parsons and
his wife could never acknowledge; for them one view was certainly right,
and the other as certainly wrong.To doubt what
they believed could only be ascribed to arrant folly or to wickedness.Sometimes James was thrown into a blind rage by the complacency with
which from the depths of his nescience his father dogmatised.No man
could have been more unMary journeyed to the garden. |
bathroom | Where is Daniel? | And James was horrified at the pettiness and the prejudice which he
found in his home.Reading no books, for they thought it waste of time
to read, the minds of his father and mother had sunk into such a narrow
sluggishness that they could interest themselves only in trivialities.Their thoughts were occupied by their neighbours and the humdrum
details of the life about them.Flattering themselves on their ideals
and their high principles, they vegetated in stupid sloth and in a less
than animal vacuity.Every topic of conversation above the most
commonplace they found dull or incomprehensible.James learned that he
had to talk to them almost as if they were children, and the tedium of
those endless days was intolerable.John travelled to the kitchen.Occasionally he was exasperated that he could not avoid the discussions
which his father, with a weak man's obstinacy, forced upon him.Some
unhappy, baneful power seemed to drive Colonel Parsons to widen the
rift, the existence of which caused him such exquisite pain; his natural
kindliness was obscured by an uncontrollable irritation."I see we've had another unfortunate reverse," he said, looking up."You always stick up for the enemies of your country."Turning to his
brother-in-law, he explained: "James says that if he'd been a Cape
Dutchman he'd have fought against us.""Well, he deserves to be court-martialled for saying so!"I don't think he means to be taken seriously," said his mother.It constantly annoyed James that when he said anything
that was not quite an obvious truism, they should think he was speaking
merely for effect."Why, my dear mother, if you'd been a Boer woman
you'd have potted at us from behind a haystack with the best of them.""The Boers are robbers and brigands.""That's just what they say we are.""And they're equally convinced that they are.""God can't be on both sides, James.""The odd thing is the certainty with which both sides claim His
exclusive protection.""I should think it wicked to doubt that God is with us in a righteous
war," said Mrs.John went to the bathroom."If the Boers weren't deceived by that old villain Kruger, they'd never
have fought us.""The Boers are strange people," replied James.Sandra travelled to the bedroom."They actually prefer
their independence to all the privileges and advantages of
subjection.... The wonderful thing to me is that people should really
think Mr.A ruler who didn't honestly believe in
himself and in his mission would never have had such influence.If a man
wants power he must have self-faith; but then he may be narrow,
intolerant, and vicious.His fellows will be like wax in his hands.""If Kruger had been honest, he wouldn't have put up with bribery and
corruption.""The last thing I expect is consistency in an animal of such contrary
instincts as man.""Every true Englishman, I'm thankful to say, thinks him a scoundrel and
a blackguard.""In a hundred years he will probably think him a patriot and a hero.In
that time the sentimental view will be the only one of interest; and the
sentimental view will put the Transvaal in the same category as Poland.""You're nothing better than a pro-Boer, James.""I'm nothing of the kind; but seeing how conflicting was current
opinion, I took some trouble to find for myself a justification of the
war.I couldn't help wondering why I went and killed people to whom I
was personally quite indifferent.""I hope because it was your duty as an officer of Her Majesty the
Queen."I came to the conclusion that I killed people because I
liked it.The fighting instinct is in my blood, and I'm never so happy
as when I'm shooting things.Killing tigers is very good sport, but it's
not in it with killing men.That is my justification, so far as I
personally am concerned.Sandra journeyed to the garden.As a member of society, I wage war for a
different reason.War is the natural instinct of all creatures; not only
do progress and civilisation arise from it, but it is the very condition
of existence.Men, beasts, and plants are all in the same position:
unless they fight incessantly they're wiped out; there's no sitting on
one side and looking on.... When a state wants a neighbour's land, it
has a perfect right to take it--if it can.We English wanted the Transvaal for our greater numbers, for our trade,
for the continuance of our power; that was our right to take it.The
only thing that seems to me undignified is the rather pitiful set of
excuses we made up.""If those are your ideas, I think they are utterly ignoble.""D'you think men go to war for scientific reasons?""No, of course not; they don't realise them.The great majority are
incapable of abstract ideas, but fortunately they're emotional and
sentimental; and the pill can be gilded with high falutin._Rumbelow_ was the chorus or burden of many ancient songs, both English
and Scotch.After the Battle of Bannockburn, says Fabyan, a citizen of
London, who wrote the "Chronicles of England," "the Scottes inflamed
with pride, made this rhyme as followeth in derision of the English:--
"Maydens of Englande, sore may ye mourne
For your lemans ye've lost at Bannockisburne,
With _heve a lowe!_
What weeneth the Kyng of Englande,
So soone to have won Scotlande,
With _rumbylowe!_"
In "Peebles to the Play" the word occurs--
With heigh and howe, and _rumbelowe_,
The young folks were full bauld.There is an old English sea song of which the burden is "with a
rumbelowe."In one more modern, in Deuteromelia 1609, the word dance the
rumbelow is translated--
Shall we go dance to round, around,
Shall we go dance the round.Greek--_Rhombos_, _Rhembo_, to spin or turn round.The word is apparently another remnant of the old Druidical chants
sung by the priests when they walked in procession round their sacred
circles of Stonehenge and others, and clearly traceable to the
Gaelic--_Riomball_, a circle; _riomballach_, circuitous; _riomballachd_,
circularity.The perversion of so many of these once sacred chants to the service of
the street ballad, suggests the trite remark of Hamlet to Horatio:--
To what base uses we may come at last!John journeyed to the bedroom.Imperial Caesar, dead and turned to clay,
May stop a hole to keep the winds away.The hymns once sung by thousands of deep-voiced priests marching in
solemn procession from their mystic shrines to salute with music and
song, and reverential homage, the rising of the glorious orb which
cheers and fertilises the world, the gift as well as the emblem of
Almighty Power and Almighty Love, have wholly departed from the
recollection of man, and their poor and dishonoured relics are spoken of
by scholars and philosophers, as trash, gibberish, nonsense, and an idle
farrago of sounds, of no more philological value than the lowing of
cattle or the bleating of sheep.But I trust that all attentive readers
of the foregoing pages will look upon the old choruses--so sadly
perverted in the destructive progress of time, that demolishes languages
as well as empires and systems of religious belief--with something of
the respect due to their immense antiquity, and their once sacred
functions in a form of worship, which, whatever were its demerits as
compared with the purer religion that has taken its place, had at least
the merit of inculcating the most exalted ideas of the Power, the Love,
and the Wisdom of the Great Creator.ON VISITING _DRUIM-A LIATH_, THE BIRTH-PLACE OF DUNCAN _BAN_ MACINTYRE.The homes long are gone, but enchantment still lingers,
These green knolls around, where thy young life began,
Sweetest and last of the old Celtic singers,
Bard of the _Monadh-dhu'_, blithe _Donach Ban_!John journeyed to the bathroom.Never mid scenes of earth, fairer and grander,
Poet first lifted his eyelids on light;
Free mid these glens, o'er these mountains to wander,
And make them his own by the true minstrel right.Thy home at the meeting and green interlacing
Of clear-flowing waters and far-winding glens,
Lovely inlaid in the mighty embracing
Of sombre pine forests and storm-riven Bens.Behind thee these crowding Peaks, region of mystery,
Fed thy young spirit with broodings sublime;
Each cairn and green knoll lingered round by some history,
Of the weird under-world, or the wild battle-time.Thine were Ben-Starrav, Stop-gyre, Meal-na-ruadh,
Mantled in storm-gloom, or bathed in sunshine;
Streams from Corr-oran, Glash-gower, and Glen-fuadh
Made music for thee, where their waters combine.But over all others thy darling Bendorain
Held thee entranced with his beautiful form,
With looks ever-changing thy young fancy storing,
Gladness of sunshine and terror of storm--
Opened to thee his heart's deepest recesses,
Taught thee the lore of the red-deer and roe,
Showed thee them feed on the green mountain cresses,
Drink the cold wells above lone Doire-chro.How did'st thou watch them go up the high passes
At sunrise rejoicing, a proud jaunty throng?Learn the herbs that they love, the small flow'rs, and hill grasses,
And made them for ever bloom green in thy song.Yet, bard of the wilderness, nursling of nature,
Would the hills e'er have taught thee true minstrel art,
Had not a visage more lovely of feature
The fountain unsealed of thy tenderer heart?Mary travelled to the kitchen.The maiden that dwelt by the side of Maam-haarie,
Seen from thy home-door, a vision of joy,
Morning and even the young fair-haired Mary
Moving about at her household employ.Mary journeyed to the garden.High on Bendoa and stately Ben-challader,
Leaving the dun deer in safety to bide,
Fondly thy doating eye dwelt on her, followed her,
Tenderly wooed her, and won her thy bride.well for the maiden that found such a lover,
And well for the poet, to whom Mary gave
Her fulness of love until, life's journey over,
She lay down beside him to rest in the grave.From the bards of to-day, and their sad songs that dark'n
The day-spring with doubt, wring the bosom with pain,
How gladly we fly to the shealings and harken
The clear mountain gladness that sounds in thy strain.On the hill-side with thee is no doubt or misgiving,
But there joy and freedom, Atlantic winds blow,
And kind thoughts are there, and the pure simple living
Of the warm-hearted folk in the glens long ago.The muse of old Maro hath pathos and splendour,
The long lines of Homer majestic'lly roll;
But to me Donach Ban breathes a language more tender,
More kin to the child-heart that sleeps in my soul.+--------------------------------------------------------------+
| Transcriber's Note: In the original text, the word 'tra' in |
| "_Ai, tra, la, la, la_" is spelt with a breve over the a.|
+--------------------------------------------------------------+
End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Celtic Magazine, Vol.They are placed in the same
relative position, but work from the opposite direction.There being two cylinders on this type of machine, one passes in as
the other is going out.Both cylinders turn toward the machine as
indicated by the arrows, and a glance at the two cards A and B with
holes marked 1 and 2, and needles marked the same will show the two
hooks F and D control the same harness threads.Showing Levers, Supports and Studs.]It will be noticed that one hook has the top bend bent backward, while
the other bends forward in the same direction as the lower bend of the
hook.The reason for this latter is that it would require more space
in the grate and the needles would have to be longer, which would make
a broader machine if the same shape of hook were used; so that by the
use of these hooks, considerable space is gained.When cutting cards for a double action machine, each card is cut from
the design singly, just the same as if cutting cards for a single
action machine.After the cards are cut, they are divided, the odd
numbers from the even numbers, so that when laced they form, as it
were, two sets of cards, one set being placed at one side of the
machine and the other set at the other side of the machine.A double action machine is composed of double the number of working
parts that are on a single action machine, but they are placed so as
to work in different directions, with the exception that with an
independent cylinder motion only one eccentric rod is used, and the
eccentric is placed on the pick cam shaft.But if the cylinders are
operated by a spindle motion, a slotted crank arm is attached to the
lifting rod of each griffe and the cylinder is moved out as the griffe
to which it is attached is raised, one cylinder moving out from
contact with the needle board as the griffe, that comes in contact
with the hook controlled by the needles of that board, is raised, at
the same time the other cylinder is passing in towards the needle
board while the second griffe is descending.When using the cradle lever on a double action machine, it is
necessary to have two different sizes of lifting cranks to allow extra
lift for the difference in length of the levers, owing to one of the
levers working on the inside of the other.John journeyed to the office.The length of levers used
is about 30 inches for the longer end, from fulcrum to connection of
lifting rod, and 13 inches for the shortest end on the longer lever.Fulcrum to connection of lifting arm on the shorter lever is 25
inches, and 10 inches on the shorter end.The double crank is made so
that the one with the 12-inch stroke is attached to the shorter lever,
and the 10-inch stroke operates the longer lever.Pulley and Belt for Lifting Griffe.]The cradle lever lift is used only on machines that have the harnesses
attached to them by the cross tie system, because by the straight tie
system the machine is turned in the opposite direction; that is, one
set of cards would be over the cloth in the loom, and the other set
over the warp; and in the cross tie system the cards are over the
sides of the loom or over shuttle boxes.Daniel journeyed to the bathroom.The top lever lift is considered by many to be the best method of
operating the griffes, and this method can be used whether the
harnesses are attached by the straight tie or the cross tie system.All that is required to be changed is that where as in the straight
tie both the levers are on the same stud, and fixed to one support, |
bedroom | Where is Mary? | The reason for using separate supports and studs is
to meet the different positions of the griffe bar.Other lifting methods have been successfully tried on double action
machines; one being a rack movement shown in Fig.29 and another a
pulley and belt lift shown in Fig.The rack movement is as follows: A 1½-inch iron shaft is supported in
bearings fixed to the top of the machine.Mary moved to the bedroom.This shaft extends over the
end of the machine.The supports are bolted to the cross rail of the
griffe, and on these supports the racks are fixed.The shaft passes
between the two racks, and the gear is fixed on the shaft in contact
with the rack.An arm is set-screwed on the outer end of the shaft,
and to this arm a long lifting rod is attached.The bottom of the rod
is placed on a stud attached to the face of a round iron plate that is
set-screwed on the pick cam shaft.30 the pulley A is supported on a shaft in the same position
as the gear for the rack motion, and to the pulley a strip of belting
B is attached, each end being fixed to the cross rail of the griffe at
C. The belt motion is a simple arrangement, but the griffe must act
freely and perfectly straight or the griffe will not descend low
enough to allow the hooks to be pressed off by the cylinder.THE RISE AND FALL OR CLOSE SHED MACHINE
The illustration, Fig.Its purpose
is to have all the harnesses level at the center movement.The same
working parts are used on this machine as are used on the single
action, the distinctive difference being that cranked levers are
attached to the usual lifting levers so that the grate through which
the hooks pass can be raised and lowered, and so that the griffe is
raised only half the usual distance.After the cylinder has pressed off the hooks that are not to be
lifted, the grate descends with these hooks, and at the same time the
griffe raises the hooks that are to be lifted.On some rise and fall machines, a batten cylinder motion is used, but
is fixed in the opposite position from the usual batten motion; that
is, the batten swings from the bottom instead of from the top of the
machine, the set screws that hold it in position being placed in
brackets fixed near the feet of the machine.These machines cannot be run at a high speed, 130 being considered
average, but faster speed is obtained when the pattern is equally
balanced so that about the same number of ends are raised, as are
falling.This style of machine is now extensively used for weaving
table cloths, silk goods, etc.EXAMINATION PAPER
JACQUARD MACHINES
~Read carefully:~ Place your name and full address at the head of the
paper.Any cheap, light paper like the sample previously sent you may
be used.Do not crowd your work, but arrange it neatly and legibly._Do not copy the answers from the Instruction Paper; use your own
words, so that we may be sure that you understand the subject._
1.To what may the term "Jacquard Weaving" be applied?What are the classifications of Jacquard machines?What are the chief features of the single action machine?In what industry is the single action machine most extensively
used?What is the use of the extra row of needles in the single
action machine?How many methods are there for operating the movable parts of
a machine, and what are they?What are the reasons for using "double-lift" and "single
cylinder" machines?Why do the needles of double-lift and single cylinder machines
have two eyes?Why does the hook on a double-lift and single cylinder machine
require a deep band at the top?Why is the bottom of the hook made like the capital letter V?Why are two different sizes of lifting cranks necessary in
using a cradle lever on a double action machine?Describe fully the working of the Jacquard machine.How are the cords handled in a Jacquard machine?~After completing the work, add and sign the following statement:~
I hereby certify that the above work is entirely my own.(Signed)
Transcriber's Note
Minor punctuation errors have been corrected.The following amendment has been made:
Page 20--extention amended to extension--... is a small
extention on which an iron roller is placed.VINCENT MILLAY
THE GOLDEN-ROD
O Rod of gold!O swaying sceptre of the year--
Now frost and cold
Show Winter near,
And shivering leaves grow brown and sere.The bleak hillside,
And marshy waste of yellow reeds,
And meadows wide
Where frosted weeds
Shake on the damp wind light-winged seeds,
Are decked with thee,--
The lingering Summer's latest grace,
And sovereignty.Each wind-swept space
Waves thy red gold in Winter's face--
He strives each star,
In stormy pride to lay full low;
But when thy bar
Resists his blow,
Will crown thee with a puff of snow!MARGARET DELAND
THE PATH THAT LEADS TO NOWHERE
There's a path that leads to nowhere
In a meadow that I know,
Where an inland island rises
And the stream is still and slow;
There it wanders under willows
And beneath the silver green
Of the birches' silent shadows
Where the early violets lean.Other pathways lead to Somewhere,
But the one I love so well
Had no end and no beginning--
Just the beauty of the dell,
Just the windflowers and the lilies,
Yellow striped as adder's tongue
Seem to satisfy my pathway
As it winds their sweets among.There I go to meet the Spring-time,
When the meadow is aglow,
Marigolds amid the marshes,--
And the stream is still and slow.--
There I find my fair oasis,
And with care-free feet I tread
For the pathway leads to nowhere,
And the blue is overhead!All the ways that lead to Somewhere
Echo with the hurrying feet
Of the Struggling and the Striving,
But the way I find so sweet
Bids me dream and bids me linger,
Joy and Beauty are its goal,--
On the path that leads to nowhere
I have sometimes found my soul!CORINNE ROOSEVELT ROBINSON
LOVERS AND ROSES
THE MESSAGE
_So fair the world about me lies,
So pure is heaven above,
Ere so much beauty dies
I would give a gift to my love;
Now, ere the long day close,
That has been so full of bliss,
I will send to my love the rose,
In its leaves I will shut a kiss;
A rose in the night to perish,
A kiss through life to cherish;
Now, ere the night-wind blows,
I will send unto her the rose._
GEORGE EDWARD WOODBERRY
"WHERE LOVE IS LIFE"
Where love is life
The roses blow,
Though winds be rude
And cold the snow,
The roses climb
Serenely slow,
They nod in rhyme
We know--we know
Where love is life
The roses blow.Where life is love
The roses blow,
Though care be quick
And sorrows grow,
Their roots are twined
With rose-roots so
That rosebuds find
A way to show
Where life is love
The roses blow.DUNCAN CAMPBELL SCOTT
THE TIME OF ROSES
Love, it is the time of roses!In bright fields and garden-closes
How they burgeon and unfold!How they sweep o'er tombs and towers
In voluptuous crimson showers
And untrammelled tides of gold!How they lure wild bees to capture
All the rich mellifluous rapture
Of their magical perfume,
And to passing winds surrender
And their frail and dazzling splendor
Rivalling your turban-plume!How they cleave the air adorning
The high rivers of the morning
In a blithe, bejewelled fleet!How they deck the moonlit grasses
In thick rainbow tinted masses
Like a fair queen's bridal sheet!Hide me in a shrine of roses,
Drown me in a wine of roses
Drawn from every fragrant grove!Sandra travelled to the garden.Bind me on a pyre of roses,
Burn me in a fire of roses,
Crown me with the rose of Love!SAROJINI NAIDU
LOVE PLANTED A ROSE
Love planted a rose,
And the world turned sweet.Where the wheat-field blows
Love planted a rose.Up the mill-wheel's prose
Ran a music-beat.Love planted a rose,
And the world turned sweet.KATHARINE LEE BATES
THE GARDEN
My heart shall be thy garden.Come, my own,
Into thy garden; thine be happy hours
Among my fairest thoughts, my tallest flowers,
From root to crowning petal thine alone.Thine is the place from where the seeds are sown
Up to the sky enclosed, with all its showers.Who shall build bowers
To keep these thine?For as these come and go, and quit our pine
To follow the sweet season, or, new-comers,
Sing one song only from our alder-trees,
My heart has thoughts, which, though thine eyes hold mine,
Fit to the silent world and other summers,
With wings that dip beyond the silver seas.ALICE MEYNELL
CLOUD AND FLOWER
I saw the giant stalking to the sky,
The giant cloud above the wilderness,
Bearing a mystery too far, too high,
For my poor guess.Away I turned me, sighing: "I must seek
In lowlier places for the wonder-word.And long I looked into its face, to see
At last some hidden import of the hour.And I had thought to turn from mystery--
But O, flower!AGNES LEE
PROGRESS
There seems no difference between
To-day and yesterday--
The forest glimmers just as green,
The garden's just as gay.Yet, something came and something went
Within the night's chill gloom:
An old rose fell, her fragrance spent,
A new rose burst in bloom.CHARLOTTE BECKER
"BUT WE DID WALK IN EDEN"
But we did walk in Eden,
Eden, the garden of God;--
There, where no beckoning wonder
Of all the paths we trod,
No choiring sun-filled vineyard,
No voice of stream or bird,
But was some radiant oracle
And flaming with the Word!Mine ears are dim with voices;
Mine eyes yet strive to see
The black things here to wonder at,
The mirth,--the misery.Beloved, who wert with me there,
How came these shames to be?--
On what lost star are we?Men say: The paths of gladness
By men were never trod!--
But we have walked in Eden,
Eden, the garden of God.JOSEPHINE PRESTON PEABODY
A GARDEN-PIECE
Among the flowers of summer-time she stood,
And underneath the films and blossoms shone
Her face, like some pomegranate strangely grown
To ripe magnificence in solitude;
The wanton winds, deft whisperers, had strewed
Her shoulders with her shining hair out blown,
And dyed her breast with many a changing tone
Of silvery green, and all the hues that brood
Among the flowers;
She raised her arm up for her dove to know
That he might preen him on her lovely head;
Then I, unseen, and rising on tiptoe,
Bowed over the rose-barriers, and lo!Touched not her arm, but kissed her lips instead,
Among the flowers!EDMUND GOSSE
"HOW MANY FLOWERS ARE GENTLY MET"
How many flowers are gently met
Within my garden fair!The daffodil, the violet,
And lilies dear are there.They fade and pass, the fleeting flowers,
And brief their little light;
They hold not Love's diviner hours,
Nor Sower's human night.Tho' one by one their bloom depart,
No change thy lover knows,
For mine the fragrance of thy heart,
O thou my perfect rose!GEORGE STERLING
WITH A ROSE, TO BRUNHILDE
Brunhilde, with the young Norn soul
That has no peace, and grim as those
That spun the thread of life, give heed:
Peace is concealed in every rose.And in these petals peace I bring:
A jewel clearer than the dew:
A perfume subtler than the breath
Of Spring with which it circles you.Peace I have found, asleep, awake,
By many paths, on many a strand.And when at night I clasp it there
I wonder how you never know
The strength you shed from finger-tips:
The treasure that consoles me so.Begin the art of finding peace,
Beloved:--it is art, no less.Sometimes we find it hid beneath
The orchards in their springtime dress:
Sometimes one finds it in oak woods,
Sometimes in dazzling mountain-snows;
In books, sometimes.But pray begin
By finding it within a rose.VACHEL LINDSAY
"MY SOUL IS LIKE A GARDEN-CLOSE"
My soul is like a garden-close
Where marjoram and lilac grow,
Where soft |
garden | Where is Sandra? | Where sometimes homing winds at play
Bear the faint fragrance of a rose--
My soul is like a garden-close
Because you chanced to pass my way.Mary moved to the bedroom.THOMAS S. JONES, JR.A DREAM
I dreamed a dream of roses somewhere breathing
Their sweet souls out upon the summer night:
The flowers I saw not, but their fragrance wreathing
Like clouds of incense filled me with delight.And then as if for my still further pleasure
There came a flood of sweetest melody,--
But whence I knew not flowed the wondrous measure,
For neither flute nor viol could I see.Then in the vision love sublime, immortal,
Encircled all my soul with its pure stream;
And though I saw thee not through dreamland's portal,
I knew thou only hadst inspired the dream.'Tis thus thine influence itself discloses,
In dreams of love, of music, and of roses!ANTOINETTE DE COURSEY PATTERSON
THE ROSE
The rose-tree wears a diadem,
Both bud and bloom of gold and fire,
Too high upon the slender stem
For baby hands that reach for them:
And _Roses!_ my brown Elsa cries:
Her chubby arms in vain aspire.But rose-leaf Hilda smiles and sighs
And worships them with patient eyes.I gathered them a rose or two,
But not the shy one hanging higher
That brushed my lips with honey-dew!_That_ is the rose I send to you.GRACE HAZARD CONKLING
PRAYER
Would that I might become you,
Losing myself, my sweet!--
So longs the dust that lies
About the rose's feet.So longs the last, dim star
Hung on the verge of night;--
She moves--she melts--she slips--
She trembles into the light.JOHN HALL WHEELOCK
IN A GARDEN
I sat one day within a garden fair
Pining for thee and sad because alone,
Wishing some fate could send thee to me there.All things appeared to share my saddened mood,
Each flower drooped, the sun was hid from view,
The very birds in silence seemed to brood.Then, as I day-dreamed with my eyes half closed,
Sudden the birds began to sing again,
The flow'rs, uplifting heads, no longer dozed.Thinking the sun had come once more for me
And for all nature, to effect such change,
I turned and lo!LIVINGSTON L. BIDDLE
A SONG OF FAIRIES
Oh, the beauty of the world is in this garden,
I hear it stir on every hand.See how the flowers keep still because of it!hear how it trembles in the blackbird's song!There is a secret in it, a blessed mystery.I fain would weep to feel it near me, my eyes
grow dim before these unseen wings.And the secret is in other places, it is in songs
and music and all lovers' hearts.Hush now, and walk on tiptoe, for these are fairy things.ELIZABETH KIRBY
A SONG TO BELINDA
Belinda in her dimity,
Whereon are wrought pink roses,
Trips through the boxwood paths to me,
A-down the garden-closes,
As though a hundred roses came,
('Twas so I thought) to meet me,
As though one rosebud said my name
And bent its head to greet me.Belinda, in your rose-wrought dress
You seemed the garden's growing;
The tilt and toss o' you, no less
Than wind-swayed posy blowing.'Twas so I watched in sweet dismay,
Lest in that happy hour,
Sudden you'd stop and thrill and sway
And turn into a flower.THEODOSIA GARRISON
SWEETHEART-LADY
De roses lean ter love her an' des won't leave de place;
De climbin' mawnin'-glories sweet-smilin' in her face;
De twinklin' pathway know her an' seem ter pass de word,
An' de South Win' singin' ter her ter match de mockin'-bird.She sweetheart ter de Springtime,
W'en de dreamy roses stir,
An' Winter shine lak' Summer
An' wear a rose fer her.sing de Medder, w'en lak' de light she pass;
De River take de tune up: "Make me yo' lookin'-glass!"But des who her true lover she never let 'em know;
De Win' is sich a tell-tale, an' de River run on so!But Springtime come a-courtin'
An' let de blossoms fall,
An' Summer say: "I loves you!"FRANK L. STANTON
HEART'S GARDEN
I have a garden filled with many flowers:
The mignonette, the sweet-pea, and the rose,
Daisies, and daffodils, whose color glows
The fairer for the verdure which embowers
Their beauty, and sets forth their hidden powers
To charm my heart, whenever at the close
Of day's dull hurry I would seek repose
In my still garden through the darkening hours.Thus, Lady, do I keep a place apart,
Wherein my love for you cloistered shall be,
Far from the rattle of the city cart,
Even as my garden, where daily I may see
The flowers of your love, and none from me
May win the hidden secret of my heart.NORREYS JEPHSON O'CONOR
A ROSE LOVER
Do thou, my rose, incline
Thy heart to mine.If love be real
Ah, whisper, whisper low
That I at last may know.A sigh,--a tear,--a vow:
Oh, any lightest thing
Its cadences to sing
That loved am I, and not,
Ah, not forgot!Sandra travelled to the garden.FREDERIC A. WHITING
SONNET
The sweet caresses that I gave to you
Are but the perfume of the Rose of Love,
The color and the witchery thereof,
And not the Rose itself.Each is a clue
Merely, whereby to seek the hidden, true,
Substantial blossom.Like the Jordan dove
A kiss is but a symbol from above--
An emblem the Reality shines through.The Rose of Love is ever unrevealed
In all its beauty, for the sight of it
Were perilous with purpose of the world.The hand of Life has cautiously concealed
The pollen-chamber of the infinite
Flower, and its petals only half uncurled.ELSA BARKER
A SONG IN A GARDEN
Will the garden never forget
That it whispers over and over,
"Where is your lover, Nanette?Oh, roses I helped to grow,
Oh, lily and mignonette,
Must you always question me so,
"Where is your lover, Nanette?"Since you looked on my joy one day,
Is my grief then a lesser thing?Have you only this to say
When I pray you for comforting?Now that I walk alone
Here where our hands were met,
Must you whisper me everyone,
"Where is your lover, Nanette?"Sandra journeyed to the kitchen.I have mourned with you year and year,
When the Autumn has left you bare,
And now that my heart is sere
Does not one of your roses care?Oh, help me forget--forget,
Nor question over and over,
"Where is your lover, Nanette?THEODOSIA GARRISON
"IT WAS JUNE IN THE GARDEN"
It was June in the garden,
It was our time, our day;
And our gaze with love on everything
Did fall;
They seemed then softly opening,
And they saw and loved us both,
The roses all.The sky was purer than all limpid thought;
Insect and bird
Swept through the golden texture of the air,
Unheard;
Our kisses were so fair they brought
Exaltation to both light and bird.It seemed as though a happiness at once
Had skied itself and wished the heavens entire
For its resplendent fire;
And life, all pulsing life, had entered in,
Into the fissures of our beings to the core,
To fling them higher.And there was nothing but invocatory cries,
Mad impulses, prayers and vows that cleave
The arched skies,
And sudden yearning to create new gods,
In order to believe.EMILE VERHAEREN
TWO ROSES
A fair white rose sedately grows
Within the garden wall.There blows
No wind to ruff her petals white,
No stain of earth, no touch of blight
The pure face of my ladye shows.The queen of all the walls enclose
Might be mine own, an' if I chose;
But yet, but yet I cannot slight
My wild red rose.Outside the garden wall she throws
Her clinging tendrils, and she knows
How strong the winds of passion smite;
She's fragrant, though not faultless quite;
Just as she is, none shall depose
My wild red rose.WILLIAM LINDSEY
ROSES
Red roses floating in a crystal bowl
You bring, O love; and in your eyes I see,
Blossom on blossom, your warm love of me
Burning within the crystal of your soul--
Red roses floating in a crystal bowl.WILFRID WILSON GIBSON
HER GARDEN
This friendly garden, with its fragrant roses,--
It was not ours, when she was here below;
And so, in that low bed where she reposes,
The beauty of it all she cannot know.But in the evening when the birds are calling
The fragrance rises like a breath of myrrh,
And in my empty heart, benignly falling,
Becomes a little prayer to send to her.So, in that silent, lonely bed that holds her,
Where nevermore the shadows rise or flee,
I think a dream of radiant spring enfolds her--
Of bloom and bird and bending bough... and me.LOUIS DODGE
AERE PERENNIUS
As long as the stars of God
Hang steadfast in the sky,
And the blossoms 'neath the sod
Awake when Spring is nigh;
As long as the nightingale
Sings love-songs to the rose,
And the Winter wind in the vale
Makes moan o'er the virgin snows--
As long as these things be
I would tell my love for thee!As long as the rose of June
Bursts forth in crimson fire,
And the mellow harvest-moon
Shines over hill and spire;
As long as heaven's dew
At morning kisses the sod;
As long as you are you,
And I know that God is God--
As long as these things be
I would tell my love for thee!CHARLES HANSON TOWNE
EVER THE SAME
King Solomon walked a thousand times
Forth of his garden-close;
And saw there spring no goodlier thing,
Be sure, than the same little rose.Under the sun was nothing new,
Or now, I well suppose.But what new thing could you find to sing
More rare than the same little rose?Nothing is new; save I, save you,
And every new heart that grows,
On the same Earth met, that nurtures yet
Breath of the same little rose.JOSEPHINE PRESTON PEABODY
THE MESSAGE
When one has heard the message of the Rose,
For what faint other calling shall he care?Dark broodings turn to find their lonely lair;
The vain world keeps her posturing and pose.He, with his crimson secret, which bestows
Heaven in his heart, to Heaven lifts his prayer,
And knows all glory trembling through the air
As on triumphal journeying he goes.So through green woodlands in the twilight dim,
Led by the faint, pale argent of a star,
What though to others it is weary night,
Nature holds out her wide, sweet heart to him;
And, leaning o'er the world's mysterious bar,
His soul is great with everlasting light.HELEN HAY WHITNEY
TELL-TALE
The Lily whispered to the Rose:
"The Tulip's fearfully stuck up.You'd think to see the creature's pose,
She was a golden altar-cup.There's method in her boldness, too;
She catches twice her share of Dew."The Rose into the Tulip's ear
Murmured: "The Lily is a sight;
Don't you believe she _powders_, dear,
To make herself so saintly white?She takes some trouble, it is plain,
Her reputation to sustain."Sandra moved to the garden.Said Tulip to the Lily white: |
garden | Where is Daniel? | Should you say it's quite--
Well, quite a natural shade of pink?"Why, _everybody_ knows she paints!"OLIVER HERFORD
DA THIEF
Eef poor man goes
An' steals a rose
Een Juna-time--
Wan leetla rose--
You gon' su'pose
Dat dat's a crime?Den taka look at me,
For here bayfore your eyes you see
Wan thief dat ees so glad an' proud
He gona brag of eet out loud!Mary moved to the bedroom.So moocha good I do, an' feel
From dat wan leetla rose I steal,
Dat eef I gon' to jail to-day
Dey could no tak' my joy away.here ees how eet com':
Las' night w'en I am walkin' home
From work een hotta ceety street,
Ees sudden com' a smal so sweet
Eet maka heaven een my nose--
I look an' dere I see da rose!Not wan, but manny, fine an' tall,
Dat peep at me above da wall.So, too, I close my eyes an' find
Anudder peecture een my mind;
I see a house dat's small an' hot
Where manny pretta theengs is not,
Where leetla woman, good an' true,
Ees work so hard da whole day through,
She's too wore out, w'en com's da night,
For smile an' mak' da housa bright.now I'm home an' she
Ees settin' on da step weeth me.Bambino, sleepin' on her breast,
Ees nevva know more sweeta rest,
An' nevva was sooch glad su'prise
Like now ees shina from her eyes;
An' all baycause to-night she wear
Wan leetla rose stuck een her hair.Eet mak' me feel
I shoulda sooner learned to steal.Eef "thief's" my name
I feel no shame;
Eet ees no crime--
Dat rose I got.not
Een Juna-time!T. A. DALY
RESULTS AND ROSES
The man who wants a garden fair,
Or small or very big,
With flowers growing here and there,
Must bend his back and dig.The things are mighty few on earth
That wishes can attain.Whate'er we want of any worth
We've got to work to gain.It matters not what goal you seek,
Its secret here reposes:
You've got to dig from week to week
To get Results or Roses.EDGAR A. GUEST
UNDERNEATH THE BOUGH
MIRACLE
_Yesterday the twig was brown and bare;
To-day the glint of green is there
To-morrow will be leaflets spare;
I know no thing so wondrous fair
No miracle so strangely rare._
_I wonder what will next be there!_
L. H. BAILEY
THE AWAKENING
You little, eager, peeping thing--
You embryonic point of light
Pushing from out your winter night,
How you do make my pulses sing!A tiny eye amid the gloom--
The merest speck I scarce had seen--
So doth God's rapture rend the tomb
In this wee burst of April green!And lo, 'tis here--and lo!'Tis there--
Spurting its jets of sweet desire
In upward curling threads of fire
Like tapers kindling all the air.Why, scarce it seems an hour ago
These branches clashed in bitter cold;
What Power hath set their veins aglow?Sandra travelled to the garden.O soul of mine, be bold, be bold!If from this tree, this blackened thing,
Hard as the floor my feet have prest,
This flame of joy comes clamoring
In hues as red as robin's breast
Waking to life this little twig--
O faith of mine, be big!ANGELA MORGAN
SHADE
The kindliest thing God ever made,
His hand of very healing laid
Upon a fevered world, is shade.His glorious company of trees
Throw out their mantles, and on these
The dust-stained wanderer finds ease.Green temples, closed against the beat
Of noontime's blinding glare and heat,
Open to any pilgrim's feet.The white road blisters in the sun;
Now, half the weary journey done,
Enter and rest, Oh, weary one!And feel the dew of dawn still wet
Beneath thy feet, and so forget
The burning highway's ache and fret.This is God's hospitality,
And whoso rests beneath a tree
Hath cause to thank Him gratefully.THEODOSIA GARRISON
SELECTION FROM "UNDER THE TREES"
The wonderful, strong, angelic trees,
With their blowing locks and their bared great knees
And nourishing bosoms, shout all together,
And rush and rock through the glad wild weather.They are so old they teach me,
With their strong hands they reach me,
Into their breast my soul they take,
And keep me there for wisdom's sake.They teach me little prayers;
To-day I am their child;
The sweet breath of their innocent airs
Blows through me strange and wild.* * * * *
I never feel afraid
Among the trees;
Of trees are houses made;
And even with these,
Unhewn, untouched, unseen,
Is something homelike in the safe sweet green,
Intimate in the shade.* * * * *
We are all brothers!Come, let's rest awhile
In the great kinship.Underneath the trees
Let's be at home once more, with birds and bees
And gnats and soil and stone.Sandra journeyed to the kitchen.With these I must
Acknowledge family ties.Sandra moved to the garden.Our mother, the dust,
With wistful and investigating eyes
Searches my soul for the old sturdiness,
Valor, simplicity!Stout virtues these,
We learned at her dear knees.Friend, you and I
Once played together in the good old days.Why, brother, down what wild ways
We traveled, when--
That's right!Come now, let's tell the tale beneath the old roof-tree.ANNA HEMPSTEAD BRANCH
A GARDEN FRIEND
O comrade tree, perhaps alive as I--
One process lacking of this mortal clay--
Give me your constant outlook to the sky,
The courtesy and cheer that fill your day.Your noble gift of perfect service teach;
Your wisdom in the wild storm softly bent
Aware 'twill end; your patience that can reach
Across the years from clod to firmament.EDWIN MARKHAM)
A LADY OF THE SNOWS
The mountain hemlock droops her lacy branches
Oh, so tenderly
In the summer sun!Yet she has power to baffle avalanches--
She, rising slenderly
Where the rivers run.Oh, see her
Spread alluringly
Her thin sea-green dress!Now from white winter's thrall the sun would free her
To bloom unenduringly
In his glad caress.HARRIET MONROE
THE TREE
Spread, delicate roots of my tree,
Feeling, clasping, thrusting, growing;
Sensitive pilgrim root tips roaming everywhere.Into resistant earth your filaments forcing,
Down in the dark, unknown, desirous:
The strange ceaseless life of you, eating and drinking of earth,
The corrosive secretions of you, breaking the stuff of the world to
your will.Tips of my tree in the springtime bursting to terrible beauty,
Folded green life, exquisite, holy exultant;
I feel in you the splendour, the autumn of ripe fulfilment,
Love and labour and death, the sacred pageant of life.In the sweet curled buds of you,
In the opening glory of leaves, tissues moulded of green light;
Veined, cut, perfect to type,
Each one like a child of high lineage bearing the sigil of race.The open hands of my tree held out to the touch of the air
As love that opens its arms and waits on the lover's will;
The curtsey, the sway, and the toss of the spray as it sports with the
breeze;
Rhythmical whisper of leaves that murmur and move in the light;
Crying of wind in the boughs, the beautiful music of pain:
Thus do you sing and say
The sorrow, the effort, the sweet surrender, the joy.tented leaves of my tree;
High summer is here, the moment of passionate life,
The hushed, the maternal hour.Sandra travelled to the kitchen.Deep in the shaded green your mystery shielding,
Heir of the ancient woods and parent of forests to be,
Lo!to your keeping is given the Father's life-giving thought;
The thing that is dream and deed and carries the gift of the past.For this, for this, great tree,
The glory of maiden leaves, the solemn stretch of the bough,
The wise persistent roots
Into the stuff of the world their filaments forcing,
Breaking the earth to their need.* * * * *
Tall tree, your name is peace.You are the channel of God:
His mystical sap,
Elixir of infinite love, syrup of infinite power,
Swelling and shaping, brooding and hiding,
With out-thrust of delicate joy, with pitiless pageant of death,
Sings in your cells;
Its rhythmical cycle of life
In you is fulfilled.EVELYN UNDERHILL
"LOVELIEST OF TREES"
Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
Is hung with bloom along the bough,
And stands about the woodland ride
Wearing white for Eastertide.Now, of my threescore years and ten,
Twenty will not come again,
And take from seventy springs a score,
It only leaves me fifty more.And since to look at things in bloom
Fifty springs are little room,
About the woodlands I will go
To see the cherry hung with snow.A. E. HOUSMAN
THE SPIRIT OF THE BIRCH
I am the dancer of the wood
I shimmer in the solitude
Men call me Birch Tree, yet I know
In other days it was not so.I am a Dryad slim and white
Who danced too long one summer night,
And the Dawn found and prisoned me!But let the wood wind flutes begin
Their elfin music, faint and thin,
I sway, I bend, retreat, advance,
And evermore--I dance!ARTHUR KETCHUM
FAMILY TREES
You boast about your ancient line,
But listen, stranger, unto mine:
You trace your lineage afar,
Back to the heroes of a war
Fought that a country might be free;
Yea, farther--to a stormy sea
Where winter's angry billows tossed,
O'er which your Pilgrim Fathers crossed.Nay, more--through yellow, dusty tomes
You trace your name to English homes
Before the distant, unknown West
Lay open to a world's behest;
Yea, back to days of those Crusades
When Turk and Christian crossed their blades,
You point with pride to ancient names,
To powdered sires and painted dames;
You boast of this--your family tree;
Now listen, stranger, unto me:
When armored knights and gallant squires,
Your own beloved, honored sires,
Were in their infants' blankets rolled,
My fathers' youngest sons were old;
When they broke forth in infant tears
My fathers' heads were crowned with years,
Yea, ere the mighty Saxon host
Of which you sing had touched the coast,
Looked back as far as you look now.Yea, when the Druids trod the wood,
My venerable fathers stood
And gazed through misty centuries
As far as even Memory sees.Daniel went to the garden.When Britain's eldest first beheld
The light, my fathers then were eld.You of the splendid ancestry,
Who boast about your family tree,
Consider, stranger, this of mine--
Bethink the lineage of a Pine.DOUGLAS MALLOCH
IDEALISTS
Brother Tree:
Why do you reach and reach?Do you dream some day to touch the sky?Brother Stream:
Why do you run and run?Do you dream some day to fill the sea?Brother Bird:
Why do you sing and sing?Do you dream--
_Young Man:
Why do you talk and talk and talk?_
ALFRED KREYMBORG
"DRAW CLOSER, O YE TREES" |
hallway | Where is John? | Leaning within my chair,
Through the curtain I can see the stir--
The gentle undulations of the air--
Sway the dark-layered fir;
And, in the beechen green,
Mark many a squirrel romp and chirrup loud;
While far beyond, the chestnut-boughs between,
Floats the white summer cloud.Through the loopholes in the leaves,
Upon the yellow <DW72>s of far-off farms,
I see the rhythmic cradlers and the sheaves
Gleam in the binders' arms.At times I note, nearby,
The flicker tapping on some hollow bole;
And watch the sun, against the sky,
The fluting oriole;
Or, when the day is done,
And the warm splendors make the oak-top flush,
Hear him, full-throated in the setting sun,--
The darling wildwood thrush.O sanctuary shade
Enfold one round!I would no longer roam:
Let not the thought of wandering e'er invade
This still, reclusive home!Veil from my sight e'en the loved mountain's blue;
The world may be more fair beyond all these,
Yet I would know but you!LLOYD MIFFLIN
TREES
In the Garden of Eden, planted by God,
There were goodly trees in the springing sod,--
Trees of beauty and height and grace,
To stand in splendor before His face.Apple and hickory, ash and pear,
Oak and beech and the tulip rare,
The trembling aspen, the noble pine,
The sweeping elm by the river line;
Trees for the birds to build and sing,
And the lilac tree for a joy in spring;
Trees to turn at the frosty call
And carpet the ground for their Lord's footfall;
Trees for fruitage and fire and shade,
Trees for the cunning builder's trade;
Wood for the bow, the spear, and the flail,
The keel and the mast of the daring sail;
He made them of every grain and girth,
For the use of man in the Garden of Earth.Then lest the soul should not lift her eyes
From the gift to the Giver of Paradise,
On the crown of a hill, for all to see,
God planted a scarlet maple tree.BLISS CARMAN
THE TREES
There's something in a noble tree--
What shall I say?For 'tis not form, or aught we see
In leaf or branch or bole.Some presence, though not understood,
Dwells there alway, and seems
To be acquainted with our mood,
And mingles in our dreams.I would not say that trees at all
Were of our blood and race,
Yet, lingering where their shadows fall,
I sometimes think I trace
A kinship, whose far-reaching root
Grew when the world began,
And made them best of all things mute
To be the friends of man.But if I _must_ answer, I cannot but say
that, if I were a Spanish sentinel, pacing back and forth in such a
presence and compelled at every turn to look up at that Lion frowning
over me, it would be with a very bitter feeling.I might even ask my
English friends who are masters of Gibraltar, how they would like to see
the flag of another country floating over a part of _their_ country?Of course, the retention of Gibraltar is to England a matter of pride.It is a great thing to see the red cross flying on the top of the Rock
in the sight of two continents, and of all who go sailing up and down
in these waters.But this pride has to be paid for by a good many
entanglements of one kind and another.For example: It is a constant source of complaint on the part of Spain
that Gibraltar is the headquarters for smuggling across the frontier.This is not at all surprising, since (like Singapore and perhaps
other distant places in the British Empire) it is a "free port."Its
deliverance from commercial restrictions dates back to the reign of
Queen Anne, in the beginning of the last century--an immunity which
it has enjoyed for nearly two hundred years.A few years since a light
restriction was placed upon wines and spirits, probably for a moral
rather than a commercial purpose, lest their too great abundance might
lead to drunkenness among the soldiers.But with respect to everything
else used by man, trade is absolutely free; whatever is brought here
for sale is not burdened with the added tax of an import duty.Though
Gibraltar is so near Tarifa, there is no _tariff_ levied on merchandise
any more than on voyagers that go up and down the seas.Not only English
goods, but French and Italian goods, all are free; even those which, if
imported into England, would pay duty, here pay none, so that they
are cheaper than in England itself.Thus Gibraltar is the paradise
of free-traders, since in it there is no such "accursed thing" as a
custom-house, and no such hated official as a custom-house officer!This
puts it at an advantage as compared with any port or city or country
which is not free, and they have to suffer from the difference.Especially does Spain, which is not yet converted to free trade, suffer
from its close contact with its more liberal neighbor.The extraordinary
cheapness on one side of the Neutral Ground, as compared with the
dearness on the other, is a temptation to smuggling which it requires
more virtue than the Spaniards possess to resist.The temptation takes them on their weakest side when it presents itself
in the form of tobacco, for the Spaniards are a nation of smokers.The
manufacture and sale of tobacco is a monopoly of the Government, and
yields a large revenue, amounting, I believe, to fifteen millions of
dollars.It might amount to twice as much if every smoker in Spain
bought only Spanish tobacco.But who will pay the price for the
Government cigars and cigarettes when they can be obtained without
paying duty?Smuggling is going on every day, and every hour of the day;
and the Spaniards say that it is winked at and encouraged by the English
in Gibraltar; to which the latter reply that whatever smuggling is done,
is done by the Spaniards themselves, for which they are not responsible.A shopkeeper in Gibraltar has as good a right to sell a pound of tobacco
to a Spanish peasant as to an English sailor.What becomes of it after
it leaves his shop is no concern of his.Of course the Spanish police
are numerous, and are, or are supposed to be, vigilant.The Carabineros
are stationed at the lines, whose duty it is to keep a sharp look-out on
every passing vehicle; whether it be a lordly carriage rolling swiftly
by, or a market wagon; to poke their noses into every little cart; to
lift up the panniers of every donkey; and even to thrust their hands
into every basket, and to give a pinch to every suspicious-looking
parcel.And yet, with this great display of watchfulness, which indeed
is a little overdone, somehow an immense quantity slips through their
fingers.Many amusing stories are told of contrabandists.One
honest Spaniard had a wonderful dog that went through miraculous
transformations: he was sometimes fat and sometimes lean, nature (or
man) having provided him with a double skin, between which was packed
a handsome allowance of tobacco.Mary moved to the bedroom.This dog was a model of docility, and
would play with other dogs, like the poor innocent that he was, and then
dart off to his master to "unload" and be sent back again!It was said
that he would make several trips a day.In another case a poor man tried
to make an honest living by raising turkeys for market; but even then
fate had a spite against him, for after he had brought them into town,
he had no luck in selling them!The same ill-fortune attended him
every day.But one evening, as he came out of the gates looking sad and
sorrowful, the Carabineros took a closer inspection of his cart, and
found that every turkey had been prepared for another market than that
of Gibraltar, by a well-spiced "stuffing" under her motherly wings!Of course the Spanish officers are indignant at the duplicity which
permits this smuggling to take place, and utter great oaths in sonorous
Castilian against their treacherous neighbors.But even the guardians of
the law may fall from virtue.The Governor, who took office here but
a few weeks since, tells me that when the Governor of Algeciras, the
Spanish town across the bay, came to pay his respects to him, the
officers of his suite, while their horses were standing in the court of
the Convent [the Government House], filled their pockets with tobacco!Fit agents indeed to collect the revenue of Spain!But smuggling is not the worst of the complications that arise out
of having a fortress in a foreign country.Another is that Gibraltar
becomes the resort of all the characters that find Spain too hot to hold
them.Men who have committed offences against Spanish law, flee across
the lines and claim protection.Some of them are political refugees, who
have escaped from a Government that would persecute and perhaps imprison
them for their opinions, and find safety under the English flag.The
necessity for this protection is not so great now as in former years,
when the Government of Spain was a despotism as absolute and intolerant
as any in Europe.Even so late as thirty years ago, Castelar would have
been shot if he had not escaped across the frontier into Switzerland; as
his father, twenty years before, had been sentenced to death, and would
have been executed if he had not made haste to get inside of Gibraltar,
and remained here seven years.In his case, as in many others, the old
fortress was a bulwark against tyranny.Within these walls the laws of
national hospitality were sacred.No Spanish patriot could be taken from
under this flag, to be sent to the dungeon or the scaffold.All honor to
England, that she has a City of Refuge for the free and the brave of all
lands, and that she has so often sheltered and saved those who were the
champions, and but for her would have been the martyrs, of liberty!But the greater number of those who seek a refuge here have no claim
to protection, since they are not political refugees, but ordinary
criminals--thieves, and sometimes murderers--who have fled here to
escape the punishment of their crimes.In such cases it is easy to say
what should be done with them: they should be given up at once to the
Spanish authorities, to be tried by Spanish law and receive the just
reward of their deeds.If all cases were like these, the disposition of them would be a very
simple matter.Sandra travelled to the garden.But they are not all so clear; some of them, indeed, are
very complex, involving questions of international law, which an army
officer, or even a civil officer, might not understand.A man may be
accused of crime by the Spanish authorities, and yet, in the eye of
impartial judges of another country, be guilty of no greater crime than
loving his country too well.But the Spanish Government demands his
surrender.The case is referred to the Colonial Secretary, as the
highest authority in Gibraltar next to the Governor.It is a grave
responsibility, which requires not only a disposition to do what is
right and just, but a knowledge of law which a military or a civil
officer may not possess.The present Secretary is Lord Gifford, and a
more honorable English gentleman it would be impossible to find.But
though a gallant soldier, brave and accomplished as he is, he may not
be familiar with all the points which he may have to decide.Sandra journeyed to the kitchen.He tells me
that this matter of extradition is the most difficult duty that is laid
upon him.He said, "I have two cases before me to-day," in the decision
of which he seemed a good deal perplexed.With the most earnest desire
to decide right, he might decide wrong.Sandra moved to the garden.His predecessor had been removed
for extraditing a man without proper authority.He told me the incident
to illustrate the responsibility of his position, and the extreme
difficulty of adjudicating cases which are of a doubtful character.It was this: The island of Cuba, as Americans know too well, is in a
chronic state of insurrection.Sandra travelled to the kitchen.In one of the numerous outbreaks, a man
who was implicated made his escape, and took refuge in Tangier, and
while there asked of some visitors from Gibraltar if he would be safe
here, to which they promptly replied, "Certainly; that he could not
be given up," and on the strength of that assurance he came; but the
Spanish agents were watching, and somehow managed to influence the
officers here to surrender him.The English Government promptly
disavowed the act, and claimed that the man was still under their
protection, and should be brought back.Daniel went to the garden.This Spanish pride did not
permit them to do.However, he was sent to Port Mahon, in the Balearic
Islands, and there (perhaps by the connivance of the authorities,
who may have thought it the easiest way to get rid of a troublesome
question) he was not so closely guarded but that he was able to make
his escape, and so the matter ended.John went to the hallway.But the Colonial Secretary who had
permitted his extradition was promptly recalled, in disapprobation of
his conduct.With such a warning before him, as well as from his own
desire to do justice, the present Secretary wished to act with
due prudence and caution, that he might not share the fate of his
predecessor.I could but admire his patience and care, and yet a
stranger can but reflect that all this complication and embarrassment
comes from holding a fortress in a foreign country!But while this is true, yet what are such petty vexations as smuggling
and extradition; what is the million of dollars a year which it costs to
keep Gibraltar; in a matter which concerns the majesty and the colossal
pride of England--the sense of power to hold her own against the world?A hundred years ago Burke spoke of Gibraltar with exultation as "a post
of power, a post of superiority, of connection, of commerce--one which
makes us invaluable to our friends and dreadful to our enemies;" and the
feeling has survived to this day.Not an Englishman passes through the
Straits whose heart does not swell within him to see the flag of his
country floating from the top of the Rock, from which, as he believes,
the whole world cannot tear it down.Every true Briton would look upon
the lowering of that flag as the abdication of Imperial power.But is not this an over-estimate of the value of Gibraltar to England?Mary travelled to the hallway.Would it weigh much in the balance in a great
contest of nations for the mastery of the world?The object of this
Rock-fortress is to command the passage into the Mediterranean.The arms
of Gibraltar are a Castle and a Key, to signify that it holds the key of
the Straits, and that no ship flying any other flag than that of England
can enter or depart except by her permission.England may hold the key of the Straits, but the door is too wide
to be bolted.The hundred-ton guns of Gibraltar, even if aimed directly
seaward, could not destroy or stop a passing fleet.I know this is not
the limit of construction in modern ordnance.Guns have been wrought
weighing a hundred and twenty tons, which throw a ball weighing a ton
over ten miles!Such a gun mounted at Tarifa might indeed hurl its
tremendous bolt across the Mediterranean into Africa.But Tarifa is in
Spain, while opposite Gibraltar it is fourteen miles to Ceuta, a point
not to be reached by any ordnance in existence, even if the last product
of modern warfare were mounted on the height of O'Hara |
hallway | Where is Mary? | The reliance must be therefore on the fleet, not on the fortress.Of
course the latter would be a refuge in case of disaster, where the
English ships could find protection under the guns of the fort.But the
fortress _alone_ could not bar the passage into the Mediterranean.As to the fleet, England has been mistress of the seas for more than
a century; and yet it does not follow that she will always retain this
supremacy.Her fleet is still the largest and most powerful in the
world, and her seamen as skilful and as brave as in the days of Nelson;
but the conditions of naval warfare are greatly changed.The use of
steam for ships of war as well as for commerce, and the building of
ironclads mounted with enormous guns, tend to equalize the conditions
of war.Battles may be decided by the weight of guns or the thickness of
defensive armor, and in these particulars other nations have advanced as
well as England.France, Germany, and Russia have vied with each other
as to which should build the most tremendous ships of war.Even Italy
has within a few years risen to the rank of a first-class naval power,
as she has some of the largest ships in the world.The Italia, which
I saw lying in the harbor of Naples, could probably have destroyed the
whole fleet with which Nelson won the battle of Trafalgar; and hence the
Italian fleet must be counted as a factor of no second importance in any
future struggle for the control of the Mediterranean.And yet some military authorities think too much importance is attached
to these modern inventions.Farragut did not believe in iron ships.He judged from his own experience in naval warfare, and no man had
had greater.He had found wooden ships good enough to win his splendid
victories.In his famous attack upon Mobile he ran his fleet close under
the guns of the fort, himself standing in the round-top of his flag-ship
to overlook the whole scene of battle, and then boldly attacked
ironclads, and sunk them in the open bay.His motto was: "Wooden ships
and iron hearts!"Ships and guns are good, but men are better.And so
I do not give up my faith in English prowess and skill, but hold that,
whatever the improvements in ships or guns, to the last hour that men
meet each other face to face in battle, the issue will depend largely
on a genius in war; on the daring to seize unexpected opportunities; to
take advantage of sudden changes; and thus by some master-stroke to turn
what seemed inevitable defeat into victory.Mary moved to the bedroom.In the year 1867 I crossed the Atlantic in the Great Eastern, then in
command of Sir James Anderson.Among the passengers was the Austrian
Admiral Tegetthoff, who had the year before gained the battle of Lissa,
with whom I formed a pleasant acquaintance; and as we walked the deck
together, drew from him some particulars of that great victory.He was
as modest as he was brave, and did not like to talk of himself; but in
answer to my inquiries, said that before the battle he knew the immense
superiority of the Italian fleet; and that his only hope of victory was
in disregarding all the ordinary rules of naval warfare: that, instead
of drawing up his ships in the usual line of battle, he must rush into
the centre of the enemy, and confuse them by the suddenness of his
attack where they did not expect him.The manoeuvre was successful
even beyond his own expectation.The _Re d'Italia_, the flagship of the
Italian Admiral, which had been built in New York as the masterpiece
of naval architecture, was sunk, and the fleet utterly defeated!What
Tegetthoff did at Lissa, the English may do in future battles.Of this
I am sure, that whatever _can_ be done by courage and skill will be done
by the sons of the Vikings to retain their mastery of the sea.But it
would be too much to expect of any power that it could stand against the
combined navies of the world.If Gibraltar be thus powerless for offence, is it altogether secure for
defence?That is a question often asked, and
on which only military men are competent to give an opinion, and even
they are divided.Englishmen, who are most familiar with its defences,
say, Yes!Sandra travelled to the garden.Those defences have been enormously increased even in our day.In the Great Siege we saw its powers of resistance a hundred years ago.Yet Eliott defeated the French and Spanish fleets and armies with less
than a hundred guns.Ninety years later--in 1870--there were _seven
hundred_ guns in position on the Rock, the smallest of which were larger
than the heaviest used in the siege.And yet since 1870 the increase
in the size of guns and their weight of metal, is greater than in the
hundred years before.Sandra journeyed to the kitchen.In the siege it was counted a wonderful shot that
carried a ball two miles and a half.Now the hundred-ton guns carry over
eight miles.Putting these things together, English officers maintain
that Gibraltar cannot be taken by all the powers of Europe combined.On the other hand, French and German engineers--familiar with the
new inventions in war, and knowing that they can use dynamite and
nitro-glycerine, instead of gunpowder, to give tremendous force to the
new projectiles--would probably say that there is no fortress which
cannot be battered down.To me, who am but a layman in such matters,
as I walk about Gibraltar, it seems that, if all the armies of Europe
should come up against it, they could make no impression on its
rock-ribbed sides; that only some convulsion of nature could shake
its "everlasting foundations."And yet such is the power of modern
explosives to rend the rocks and hills, with a new invention every year
of something still more terrible, that we know not but they may at last
almost tear the solid globe asunder.What wreck and ruin of the works of
man may be wrought by such engines of destruction, it is not given us to
foresee.Meanwhile to the Spaniards the English possession of Gibraltar is a
constant irritation.Sandra moved to the garden.It is of no use to remind them that they had it
once, and might have kept it; that is no comfort; it only makes the
matter worse; for they are like spoiled children, who grieve the most
for that which they have thrown away.Again it was offered to them by
England, with only the condition that they should not sell Florida to
Napoleon; but as he was then in the height of his career, they thought
it safer to trust to his protection; albeit a few years later they
found out his treachery, and had to depend on an English army, led by
Wellington, to drive the French out of Spain.Sandra travelled to the kitchen.And still these spoiled
children of the South will not recognize the English sovereignty.To
this day the King of Spain claims Gibraltar as a part of his dominions,
though he recognizes it as "temporarily in the possession of the
English," and all who are born on the Rock are entitled to the rights of
Spanish subjects!But whether Gibraltar can be "taken" or not by siege or storm, in the
course of human events there may be a turn of fortune which shall compel
England to surrender it.If there should come a general European war, in
which there should be (what the first Napoleon endeavored to effect) a
combination of all the Continental powers against England, she might,
standing alone, be reduced to such extremity as to be obliged to sue
for peace, and one of the hard conditions forced upon her might be the
surrender of Gibraltar!But while we may speculate on such a possibility of the future, it is
not a change which I desire to see in my day.The transfer of Gibraltar
to Spain might satisfy Spanish pride, but I fear that it would be no
longer what it is if it had not the treasury of England to supply its
numerous wants.The Spaniards are not good managers, and Gibraltar
would ere long sink into the condition of an old, decayed Spanish town.Further than this, I confess that, as a matter of sentiment, it would be
no pleasure to me to visit it if the charm of its present society were
gone.I should miss greatly the English faces, so manly and yet so
kindly, and the dear old mother tongue.So while I live I hope Gibraltar
will be held by English soldiers.No: not the deluge, but universal peace!Let the old Rock remain as it
is.Lover of peace as I am, I should be sorry to see it dismantled.It
would not be the same thing if it were to become another Capri--a mere
resort for artists, who should sit upon Europa Point, and make their
sketches; or if lovers only should saunter in the Alameda gardens,
whispering softly as they look out upon the moonlit sea.The mighty crag
that bears the name of Hercules should bear on its front something which
speaks of power.Let the Great Fortress remain as the grim monument of
War, even when men learn war no more; as the castles on the Rhine are
kept as the monuments of mediaeval barbarism.If its guns are all silent,
or unshotted, it will stand for something more than a symbol of brute
force: it will be a monumental proof that the blessed age of peace has
come.Daniel went to the garden.Then, if there be any change in the flag that waves over it; if
the Red Cross of England, which has never been lowered in war, should
give place to an emblem of universal peace; it may be a Red Cross
still--red in sign of blood, but only of that blood which was shed alike
for all nations, and which is yet to unite in One Brotherhood the whole
Family of Mankind.John went to the hallway.FAREWELL TO GIBRALTAR--LEAVING FOR AFRICA.All too swiftly the days flew by, and the time of my visit to Gibraltar
was coming to an end.Mary travelled to the hallway.But in travel I have often found that the last
taste was the sweetest.It is only when you have come to know a place
well that you can fully enjoy it; when emancipated from guides, with
no self-appointed cicerone to dog your footsteps and intrude his
stereotyped observations; when, in short, you have obtained "the freedom
of the place" by right of familiar acquaintance, and can wander about
alone, sauntering slowly in favorite walks, or sitting under the shade
of the trees, and looking off upon the purple mountains or the rippling
sea, that you are fully master of the situation."Days of idleness," as
they are called, are sometimes, of all days, at once the busiest and
the happiest, when, having finished up all regular and routine work,
and thus done his duty as a traveller, one devotes himself to "odds and
ends," and gathers up his varied impressions into one delightful whole.These are delicious moments, when the pleasure of a foreign clime--
"Blest be the time, the clime, the spot!"--
becomes so intense that we are reluctant to let it go, and linger still,
clinging to that which is nearly exhausted, as if we would drain the cup
to the very last drop.Such is the feeling that comes in these last days, as I go wandering
about, full of moods and fancies born of the place and the hour.There
is a strange spell and fascination in the Rock itself.If it be proper
ever to speak of respect for inanimate things, next to a great mountain,
I have a profound respect for a great rock.It is the emblem of strength
and power, which by its very height shelters and protects the feebleness
of man.How often on the desert, under the burning sun, have I espied
afar off a huge cliff rising above the plain, and urging on my wearied
camel, thrown myself from it, and found the inexpressible relief of "the
shadow of a great rock in a weary land!"So here this mountain wall that
rises above me, does not awe and overwhelm so much as it shelters and
protects; the higher it lifts its head, the more it carries me upward,
and gives me an outlook over a wider horizon.Daniel went back to the hallway.If I were a dweller in
Gibraltar, I would seek out every sequestered nook upon its side, where
I could be away from the haunts of men, and could "dream dreams and see
visions."Often would I climb to the Signal Station, or O'Hara's Tower,
to see the glory of the sunrisings and sunsettings; and, as the evening
comes on, to see the African mountains casting their shadows over the
broad line of coast and the broader sea.Next to the Rock itself, the oldest thing in Gibraltar--the very oldest
that man has made--is the Moorish Castle, on which the Moslem invader
planted the standard of the Crescent near twelve centuries ago, making
this his first stronghold in the land which he was to conquer.And now
I must look upon its face again, because of its very age.American as
I am, coming from a country where everything is supposed to be "brand
new," I feel a strange delight in these old castles and towers, and even
in ruins, gray with the moss of centuries.I know it is a "far cry"
to the time of the Moors, but we must not think of it as a time of
barbarism.The period in which the Moors held Gibraltar was that of the
Moorish rule in Spain, when they were the most highly civilized people
in Europe, and the Goths were the barbarians.In that day the old
Moorish town must have been a very picturesque place, with the domes of
its mosques, and the slender minarets rising above them, from which
at the sunset hour voices called the faithful to prayer; and very
picturesque figures were those of the turbaned Moors, as they reverently
turned toward Mecca, and bowed themselves and worshipped.Daniel moved to the bathroom.Nor did the romance die when the Spaniards followed in the procession of
races, for they were only less picturesque than the Moors.A life which would seem tame and dull to the modern
Englishman had its charms for the children of the sun, whether they were
children of Europe or of Africa.When the church took the place of the
mosque, mollahs and ulemas were replaced by priests and monks; and
the old Franciscan friars, whose Convent is now the residence of the
Governor, marched in sombre procession through the streets, and instead
of the call from the minaret, the evening was made holy by the sound
of the Ave Maria or the Angelus bell.And these Spaniards had their
gayeties as well as their solemnities.When their prayers were ended, the same dark-eyed senoritas who had
knelt in the churches sat on balconies in the moonlight, while gallant
cavaliers sang their songs and tinkled their guitars--diversions which
filled the intervals of stern and savage war.Out of all this strange
old history, with many a heroic episode that still lives in Spanish song
and story, might be wrought, if there were another Irving to tell the
tale, an historical romance as fascinating as that of the Conquest of
Granada.The materials are abundant; all that is wanting is that they be
touched by the wand of the enchanter.But as I have just now more freshly in mind the English history of
Gibraltar, I leave the Spaniards and the Moors, and betake me to the
King's Bastion, on which "Old Eliott" stood on the greatest day that
Gibraltar ever saw.And here we must not forget the second in command,
his brave companion-in-arms, General Boyd, who built the Bastion in
1773, and who, on laying the first stone, prayed "that he might live to
see it resist the united fleets of France and Spain"--a wish that was
gloriously fulfilled nine years later, when he took part in the immortal
defence; and it is fitting that his body should sleep under his own
work, at once the instrument and the monument of that great victory.Even the trees have a historic air, as they are old--at least many of
them have a look of age.One would think that the constant firing of
guns, the shock and "sulphurous canopy," would kill vegetation or stunt
it in its growth.But there are many fine old trees in Gibraltar.Near
the Alameda stands a magnificent _bella sombra_ (so named because
its wide-spreading branches are dark and sombre, and yet strangely
beautiful), which must be very old.Perhaps it was standing a century
ago, and heard all the guns fired in the Great Siege, as possibly a few
years later it may have heard, across the bay and away over the Spanish
hills |
Subsets and Splits