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is as enthusiastic
as yourself; but his love for you had kept him from joining the army,
knowing that, at any moment, he might be ordered away from you. Now
the case is different. The foe is in our midst. We can see them from
our own door-steps, and we _must_ battle for the defence of our
firesides.”
At this moment, Catherine, who had been in the other room, entered.
With a pleasant “Good evening,” she shook hands, and, taking a seat,
she resumed the knitting which she had relinquished to prepare supper.
From a discussion of the state of the country, Nathaniel turned to
talk of other matters, spoke of what was going on about them, and
thus passed a pleasant half-hour. Finally, he rose from his seat,
remarking:
“To tell the truth, I _must_ leave now, although I should love well
enough to stay here a little while longer. If I was certain that John
would be home soon, I should wait for him: but, as it is, I think
I shall ride over to Squire Stoddart’s--where I take it he is--and
have a few words with him. It is important that I speak about the
organization now, as we will hold a meeting to-morrow night.”
Catherine accompanied the young man to the door, and remained talking
with him for some time. When she returned, the color had risen in her
face, but she quietly took her seat, while the clattering along the
road told that Nat was making all possible speed in the direction of
the squire’s.
CHAPTER II.
THE TORY SPY.
No man is so base as he who deliberately takes up arms against his
own country. Such a one is fit for any deed, however mean, cowardly,
or wicked. Unfortunately, traitors have been found in every country,
in all times; nor were they wanting during the American Revolution.
While there were a number of honorable men who, believing that the
colonies were wrong in revolting from the king, did not take up arms
against them, on the other hand there were numbers of base, sordid
wretches, who were willing to cling to any side so that it was the
strongest--to support any cause so that it was one which promised
them booty. Such a one was Timothy Turner, who followed the fortunes
of the British, who was devoted to their interests, who had, in
short, sold to them his very soul and body for paltry gold.
Although the character of this young man was not fully known, yet
suspicion rested upon him, and the Whigs had formed unfavorable
conclusions which were not long wanting a justification. He lived
in a small cabin, about half or three-quarters of a mile from Mr.
Stoddart’s; and, though ostensibly he supported himself by tilling a
small patch of ground, yet the dullest mind must have perceived that
a support from such a spot was simply an impossibility.
On this night, Timothy Turner was wending his way home from a tavern
which stood on the road about three-quarters of a mile from his
house. As he turned from the door, he thought he heard the sounds of
a rapidly approaching horseman. Pausing for a moment, to see whether
his ears did not deceive him, he discovered the dusky figure of the
rider. As he passed the tavern, and by the light which streamed from
the door, Turner caught sight of the man. It was Nathaniel Ernshaw.
“Ha! curse him, what is _he_ doing, riding about at this time of
night? It’s no good Wild Nat is after; blast him, if I could but lay
my hands on his carcass, I would show him a touch of my nature. If
ever I get the chance, he shall pay dear for what he has done.”
The ruffian kept on his journey down the road, straining his eyes to
follow the fast-flitting figure before him. When Ernshaw came to the
lane which led in to Mr. Stoddart’s dwelling, he reined in his horse,
and, dismounting, threw open the gate. Turner, who had followed
as closely as possible, on seeing the direction of Nat’s errand,
stealthily drew near to the spot.
Nathaniel drew up to the house, and knocked on the door. The knocking
brought a middle-aged man to the door. Holding a candle above his
head, he took a careful survey of the visitor.
“Why, Nat, is it you?” said the squire. “What brings you here at this
time of night? Come in.”
“No, I thank you, squire. For once in my life I have business to
attend to. I was over to see John Vale, but found that he was not
home. If he is here I wish you would ask him to step to the door for
a few minutes. I have something important to say to him.”
“Well, he’s here, sure enough; and if you won’t come in, why I will
have to send him out--that is, if he is willing.”
The old squire then entered the house again, to make Nat’s
requisition known to the son of his neighbor. Timothy Turner had,
in the mean time, approached to within hearing distance, and now
stood ready to note every word that was uttered. He scented gold and
revenge in the issue of that interview.
John Vale soon made his appearance. The two young men shook each
other cordially by the hand. The conversation which ensued it is
unnecessary to detail. Every word of it was overheard by the spy.
When, at length, John expressed his determination of joining the
company which his friend was raising, Turner rubbed his hands in high
glee, as he muttered to himself:
“You shall find out, Mr. John Vale, and you, Mr. Nathaniel
Ernshaw, that Timothy Turner is not the proper man to slight. This
intelligence is worth ten golden guineas to me, and the revenge
besides.”
“As my mother approves of it, I’m with you, Nat. When and where do we
meet? Let me know the rendezvous, and trust me but I’ll be there.”
“There was some talk,” replied Nat, “of meeting in the swamp, but
that is too far for the most of us. So that is out of the question;
but you know Clingman’s mills and the pine woods that run back from
the creek. If you enter the woods by the path immediately opposite
the mill, you will find a small clearing. That is the spot. Be on
hand by ten o’clock to-morrow night, and I promise you that your eyes
will be gladdened by the sight of thirty young men, all good, stout
patriots--ready, if need be, to die for their country.”
“And I can assure you,” said Turner, to himself, “that you’ll see the
greater part of them do so, unless something very unexpected prevents
it.”
“You can depend on me, Nat,” said John. Again shaking hands, Ernshaw
mounted his horse, and galloped away.
Turner waited until the clatter had died away, and then silently
hastened in the direction of his dwelling. Arriving there, he sought
the shed which covered his horse. Hurriedly saddling the beast, he
rode off toward the city of Charleston, twenty miles distant.
Gen. Clinton, the military commander in Charleston, had scarcely
arisen, on the following morning, when his servant announced a man
waiting to speak with him.
“Who is he?” was the general’s inquiry.
“He says that his name is Turner--that he rode twenty miles last
night to bring you an important piece of news.”
“Turner? Then I think I know the man. He is one of those tory hounds
we find it necessary to use. I’ll vouch for it, he is planning some
piece of rascality. Admit him.”
The servant retired and returned with Turner. Gen. Clinton surveyed
the fellow for a moment, then addressed him rather sharply:
“How now, sir? What have you to say? It should be something of
importance to cause you to journey so far and fast.”
“It is of importance,” rejoined Turner. “I heard at a late hour, last
night, of a meeting of rebels which is to take place this night.
There will be thirty or forty of them, and their purpose is to form a
brigade to act with Marion, Sumpter and others. I know the names of
but two; but, if the rest of the men are as good as they, the band
may do much injury to the king’s cause.”
“What are the names of these two of whom you speak?”
“Nathaniel Ernshaw and John Vale--two most desperate men, and fit to
do any thing against the followers of the king.”
“Ernshaw? I have heard that name before--where, I can not say. This
thing shall be attended to. I will see that measures are taken to cut
them off; but where is this meeting to be held?”
“About twenty miles from here there is a building called Clingman’s
mill. In a wood immediately behind this the rebels are to assemble. I
will lead any troops which you may send to the spot.”
“How many of them did you say that there would be?”
“Between thirty and forty. Whether they will be armed or not, I can
not say, but I do not think they will be. Some of them may have their
rifles, but I have no doubt fifty of your men could take the whole of
them alive.”
“Be in readiness, then, to act as guide. Or stay; I will see you
again this morning. Come an hour before noon. If your intelligence
proves correct you shall receive a suitable reward.”
Gen. Clinton rang the bell for his servant to show the tory out.
The man who performed this duty was a negro whom Gen. Clinton had
received into his service since his arrival in Charleston. He was an
intelligent-looking black, who had ingratiated himself into favor,
and now seemed to be almost a necessity with the general.
As Sampson opened the door for the exit of Turner, he shrugged his
shoulders in a manner which told that it was displeasing to him to
be compelled to do any service for such a man. Hardly had the body
of the tory crossed the threshold ere the door was violently closed
behind him. The black returned to his master, and busied himself
preparing for his master’s breakfast. Having partaken of this meal,
Gen. Clinton left the house, turning his footsteps in the direction
of a dwelling inhabited by a rich and influential tory.
Sampson passed quickly out by the back door, and, crossing the
garden, emerged from it into the street. Walking rapidly along for
some squares, he at length turned into a somewhat obscure alley. A
few steps brought him to the front of an humble-looking dwelling, at
whose door he gave a few taps. His summons was quickly answered, and
a middle-aged woman threw open the door.
“Is it you, Sampson?” said she. “What brings you here at this time of
day? Any thing important?”
“I guess mebbe it is. Whar is Simon? I got suthin’ to tell ’m.”
“Simon is here, if you would see him; so come in.”
The black entered the cabin, and found himself in the presence of
the person he was seeking, an honest-looking mechanic, whose eye and
bearing betokened the fearless man.
“Whatever brings you here must be of importance, Sampson; so tell us
at once,” said the mechanic, or Simon Hunt, as was his name.
“Thar’ ar’ no one here who oughtn’t to har a secret, is thar’.”
“Trust me for not harboring any such about my house.”
“Listen, then. This mornin’ that Timothy Turner came to see the
general, an’ tell him ’bout a meetin’ o’ whigs that was to be held
to-night, and so the general ’l send down a lot o’ his sodgers and
chop ’em all up. If you kin send ’em word you’ll be doin’ a good
thing for de blessed cause.”
“All right, where is this meeting to be held, and who is to hold it?
I must know who to send word to. Give me that, and they shall know
the game before night.”
“He on’y knows two--they be Masser John Vale and Nat Ernshaw.”
“What? Nat Ernshaw turning whig trooper? That’s unexpected, but I
always thought there was good in the fellow, if he only had a chance
and would show it. I’ll send my boy straight off. If he puts the
spurs to the old roan’s sides he ought to get to Ernshaw’s before
dinner. Then they have the whole afternoon in which to warn the boys
not to come to the meeting. The two that were mentioned, though, will
have to keep dark, or they will find the country too hot for them.”
“Well, Nat kin take care on himself. Take smarter men dan de
Britishers to ketch him asleep; and he take keer o’ Massa John, too;
but I think I better go. It might ’pear s’picious if any one see me
here. Good mornin!”
“Good morning,” answered Hunt. “There goes a noble fellow,” continued
he, speaking to his wife. “This is the third time he has brought
important intelligence of the movements of the British. Where is
Simon? He must start directly.”
CHAPTER III.
GOING OUT TO SHEAR, AND RETURNING SHORN.
It was about one o’clock in the afternoon, when fifty British
soldiers, under the guidance of Timothy Turner, set out for the
rendezvous of the Whig partisans, going with the avowed intention of
“driving them like sheep before them into Charleston, or else leave
their mangled carcasses to rot on the spot where they fell.”
Plenty of time was before them, for the troop was well-mounted and
could get over the distance in a few hours; but there was danger
of getting to the spot too soon. Well acquainted with the roads
thereabouts, the tory determined to lead the men by a circuitous and
rather unfrequented route, which, though it was some miles further,
afforded this advantage--none of the whigs would thus see the body
of horse, and consequently, could not give the alarm which should
prevent the patriot muster from taking place. By it, too, he could
penetrate through the pines and station the whole force so as to
surround his unsuspecting countrymen.
Having settled his mind on this point, Timothy took the lead, mounted
on a fine horse furnished him for the occasion,--his own being too
fatigued by his morning’s journey to permit him to take the field
with it.
John Vale was just sitting down to his dinner when the boy Simon
reached his house, bearing the important message with which he was
intrusted. John immediately recognized the lad, for he had often seen
him before. Judging that he had some very special news to tell, he
rose from his seat and followed the lad into the yard.
“If you have any thing to tell, speak out, Simon.”
“Father sent me here to tell you to warn every one not to go to the
meeting in the pines back of Clingman’s mill.”
“Indeed,” responded John, with an accent of astonishment. “Can you
tell me how your father learned a meeting was to be held there? I did
not know of it myself until late last night.”
“Timothy Turner found out about it, and rode over to Charleston last
night. He had a talk with General Clinton, and the general is going
to send forty or fifty soldiers to take you all. Sampson, the servant
of the general, heard Turner telling General Clinton about it; so
he told father, and father sent me down here to tell you and Nat
Ernshaw. You are to tell the rest, so the Britishers will have their
ride for their pains.”
“Your father has done well, and you’re a patriotic fellow to take so
long a ride to warn us of our danger. Come into the house and get
some dinner, then we’ll go over to Ernshaw’s together.”
Simon was tired, and a good hearty meal was most acceptable. When he
had done, the young man took down his rifle and powder-horn from the
hooks, and swung them over his shoulder, then, turning to his mother,
he remarked:--
“Perhaps you will not see me again to-day, perhaps not for weeks.
From what I hear, there is a good chance for us to begin the
campaign, and when we once take to the field, there is no telling how
long we shall be compelled to keep it. Remember, though, that I am
fighting, as is my duty, for my country, and if I die, that I die in
a good cause.”
“You know, John, that I love you and would do any thing to shield you
from harm or danger; but I rejoice to see you going. The nation has
need of such as you--those with strong arms and brave hearts. Go, and
may our Heavenly Father guard and bless you.”
John kissed her and his sister, then left the house, turning to the
stable. He soon led out his gallant steed. Mounting, he led the way
to Nat Ernshaw’s. Nat was at home, and catching sight of the two at a
distance, surmised that they had important business with him.
“What’s in the wind now, John?” inquired Nat. “Simon Filby, there,
looks as though he had been riding all morning, and, I guess, if the
truth be told, he was--”
“Matter enough. He has ridden from Charleston this morning for the
express purpose of saving us all from capture or slaughter. Relate to
Nathaniel the message which your father instructed you to deliver.”
The boy proceeded to repeat his story and message. Nathaniel was
astonished; it seemed to him incomprehensible how Turner had obtained
his intelligence concerning the contemplated meeting.
“There is something strange about this,” said he. “There can hardly
be a traitor among us, and how else the secret could have leaked out
I am unable to say. I particularly cautioned them not to speak of it
even among themselves. But stay! I think I have it now. You say that
Turner arrived this morning?”
“Yes, sir!” answered Simon.
“Now that I think of it, I have the impression that I caught a
glimpse of him coming out of the Royal Arms, last night, as I passed
on my way to Squire Stoddart’s. He _may_ have followed, and by
sneaking up, may have heard the conversation that look place between
you and I. We have no time to lose. There is much for us to do.”
“I agree with you,” responded Vale. “It would be well for us to hold
a consultation. I think that, if rightly managed, we can turn this
to advantage. Our troop can be, at the best, but poorly armed and
mounted. To be of any great service, both of these defects must be
remedied. Here is the opportunity!”
“By heavens! you are right. If we could capture or disperse this
force that is to be sent against us, we could secure what we most
need, horses and arms. Besides, it would give the men confidence.
Here is a list of names,” continued Ernshaw, drawing a paper from his
pocket; “do you hurry and see the fifteen whose names are first on
that paper. Tell them the particulars, let them know the force that
is coming, and then fix a rendezvous at the Black Rock, a mile this
side of the mill. They must be there at sundown, armed. Leave your
rifle here, for you will be back again before night. You are well
mounted, don’t spare your horse. As for Simon, here, he had better
stay until his nag is rested, then get back to Charleston as soon as
possible. He might be missed.”
It was by no means a light task to accomplish, this visiting thirty
persons at as many different houses; leaving it undone might prove
fatal. With their patriotic enthusiasm kindled, they bent themselves
to their duty. Every one with whom the young patriots spoke felt as
they did. An opportunity was now offered to strike for their country,
and they were willing to seize it.
Such was the expedition used, that John Vale had returned to Nat’s,
and was conversing with old Mr. Ernshaw by five o’clock; half an hour
later Nat himself returned.
In answer to Vale’s question--“how did you succeed?” he answered:--
“Oh, admirably. Not one has shown any signs of backing out. If your
success has been equal to mine, thirty as resolute fellows as ever
looked through the sights of a rifle, or wielded a broadsword, will
be assembled at Black Rock by sundown.”
* * * * *
Near the hour of sunset, an observer, had he been stationed near the
Black Rock--a spot so called from a huge black rock which lifted its
head from the waters of Cedar Creek--might have noted the approach
of a number of young men, all hurrying in one direction. Some were
mounted, and others were on foot; all bore weapons of one kind or
another--rifles, muskets, fowling-pieces, and a few swords.
They came, too, from every direction, by twos and threes, talking
together, and apparently discussing some important question. When
the sun had finally disappeared and the twilight had settled over
all like a friendly cloak, thirty-two men were gathered on the banks
of Cedar Creek: among the number were Nathaniel Ernshaw and John
Vale. The majority of the company were young men, none of them over
thirty,--all broad-shouldered, deep-chested, bronzed with exposure
to the weather, and as spirited as the winds which played over their
hills and valleys.
Ernshaw addressed his companions--stating that they were well
acquainted with the object which brought them there;--were they
willing to enter into a conflict with a body of men larger in number,
better armed, more used to such scenes of blood and carnage? If they
were willing let them say so. A low but distinct “We are!” passed
around. Nat continued:--
“The soldiers were to start from Charleston at an early hour this
afternoon, before this time they should have accomplished the
distance. There is another road which they must have taken. Timothy
Turner,”--at the mention of this name a shout of execration burst
from the lips of all--“I say, Turner knows the other road, and that
it leads near by the spot where we would have held our meeting.
I think I know the exact spot where the dragoons are this moment
stationed. By going three-quarters of a mile out of our way, we may,
by a third path, come upon them unawares. Shall we venture?”
No one raised a dissentient voice; all seemed anxious for the fray.
One, however, a hardy-looking six-footer, begged leave to say a word
before they started.
“You see we’re formin’ into a troop that’s goin’ to give thunder and
brimstone to every bloody, stealin’, cut-throat of a Britisher that
we come across. You know who started this here idea, and got it into
motion, an’ all that ’ar; but thar’s one thing that ain’t settled
yet, an’ that is, _who’s_ captain? It’s purty generally understood
that Nat Ernshaw is goin’ to lead us, but we hain’t actooally given
him the legal authority yit; so I move that he be constitooted our
captin’, an’ we all agree to be under and obey his orders, regular
soger fashion. Whoever’s in favor of this let him speak out and tell
it.”
A simultaneous and unanimous “ay!” announced that Nat Ernshaw was the
accepted and willing chosen commander of the patriotic brigade.
“Three cheers for Ernshaw’s brigade!” shouted one whose patriotism
had overcome his prudence, and the three cheers were accordingly
given with a will. Then the whole band took up its line of march, the
men handling their weapons with eager impatience.
Nat was busy in laying out his plans for attack. The principal
difficulty which presented itself seemed to be, how to open the
battle. He might, he felt assured, steal upon the dragoons and
shoot down a score or more of them before they could rightly tell
from whence their danger came; but there was almost an insuperable
objection to this plan--it seemed too much like murder. After due
deliberation he settled on the course which he intended to take, and
which seemed to be most safe as well as most honorable. What it was,
the reader will hereafter learn.
When the Americans reached the path which led through the woods, the
captain addressed a few last words to his men. Then they pressed
on with noiseless steps. When Ernshaw found they were within a few
rods of the spot designated, he left the troop and went forward to
reconnoiter. Carefully peering through an opening between the pines,
he looked out. It was a clear, moonlight night--so light that he
could easily distinguish the forms of some forty or fifty horsemen,
who occupied the area before him. Wishing to draw closer to them to
mark their disposal, a cracking stick betrayed his presence. Every
one of the waiting enemies were startled--the captain of the troop
calling out, “Here comes one of them at last. Into the woods after
him, half a dozen of you, but don’t use fire-arms unless it is
absolutely necessary. It will give the alarm.”
Instantly seven of the privates threw themselves from their steeds
for the pursuit; but they had scarcely touched the ground when a
command, given in a quick, clear-ringing voice, riveted them to their
places. “Hold! Not one step or you are dead men. Surrender to Nat
Ernshaw’s Carolina Brigade, or your lives shall be the forfeit!”
For a time a panic seemed to thrill the hearts of the Britons--this
command so unexpectedly, so sternly given.
“It’s but a ruse my men,” shouted the captain. “First rank fire a
volley, then charge into the woods.”
“Fire away. We will return volley for volley, and the man who stirs
from his tracks dies,” responded Nat. Then turning to his men,
who had ranged themselves in solid rank behind him, he gave the
command:--“Make ready, advance, take aim, and be ready.”
A murmur ran along the ranks. The clicking of thirty rifles sounded
out on the still air. The British troops had quickly formed, and, at
the word of command, they sent a volley from the carbines with which
the dragoons were armed, into the patriot ranks.
“Fire!” shouted Nat. The combined crack of the thirty rifles rang out
with a fearfully startling sound. The hail of lead was deadly in the
extreme, though its effect was not as severe as it might have been
had it gone hurtling forth in the daytime. Many a bullet proved a
messenger of death to the mercenaries of the foreigner.
Sixteen of the troopers dropped from their saddles, dead. The
captain received a ball through his shoulder. Eight others were
severely wounded. With that marvelous celerity gained by practice,
the Americans had reloaded their rifles. “First division, fire!”
commanded Ernshaw. Another volley sped on its mission of blood, and
half the remaining troopers tumbled from their saddles, while their
maddened and frightened horses flew wildly away into the woods.
“Fly,” screamed a Briton. “We cannot remain longer here and live!”
“Hold!” cried the leader of the Americans. “Throw down your arms and
surrender and your lives are safe; attempt to flee and we give you
another volley.”
Hardly had the summons to surrender been given, when the few of
the soldiers who still grasped their arms threw them down, and the
captain, faint from the loss of blood, answered:--“We agree. Come
forward and receive our surrender.”
The Americans stepped from the shade of the woods and stood in a
line, waiting for the commands of their captain. As Ernshaw appeared,
the crack of a pistol was heard, and a bullet whistled by close to
his head.
“Missed! by the infernal!” shouted a voice, easily recognized as
that of the tory Turner. He plunged into the gloom of the woods,
unappalled by the dozen bullets that followed.
“The tory, Turner!” remarked one of the men; “let us pursue him. His
capture is of more importance than all else we have done.”
“Not so,” replied Ernshaw; “let no man go in pursuit. It would
be impossible to come up with him, and our force would only be
separated, which must not be.”
A little murmuring followed, but all soon saw the wisdom of obeying
the captain, and, accordingly, quietly acquiesced.
* * * * *
General Clinton was sitting in his chamber, busily engaged in
examining a number of parchments which lay exposed on the table
before him. It was now well on toward noon. Though apparently intent
on his work, his mind evidently was not at ease. “It is strange,” he
muttered to himself, “that nothing has been heard concerning Captain
Morgan and his troop, whom I sent out to capture those rebels. I told
him to endeavor to take the young man, Vale, alive, if possible, and
send me word immediately. One of his men would have arrived, ere
this, had he chosen to obey my commands. I will see, though; perhaps
there is some news stirring without.”
He advanced to the door for the purpose of calling his servant, when
a loud knocking arrested him. He stood for a moment listening, and
then sank back in his chair, remarking, “There is some one at last.”
The door was flung open to admit the tory spy, Timothy Turner. With
a pale face spattered with blood, and his left arm supported in a
sling, he strode across the floor, and stood confronting the general.
For a moment Sir Henry looked at him with a countenance indicative of
surprise and apprehension; then he burst forth:
“How now, sir? What brings you before me in such plight? Speak, man!”
“It is easy to tell the whole story. We went out to shear, and come
home shorn--or, rather, _I_ do, for I am the only one who escaped.
All the rest are dead, or prisoners!”
“Then you deceived me, and I shall see that you receive your reward
for so doing. Without there, Sampson!”
“You needn’t put such a sorry face on the matter, general, for the
information I gave you was correct enough. The trouble was, that
the rebels got wind of our intended attack, hid themselves in the
woods, and, when the moon arose, came down on us as they would on a
covey of partridges. If I had wished to deceive you, I should have
taken better care of myself, and this left arm would not have had a
rifle-ball through it. I remained till every thing was lost, fired
the last shot, and then cleared out, with half-a-score of balls
flying around my head. If that looks like treachery, then call in
your men and do as you like with me.”
“Probably it is as you say, and I was overhasty. The king can not
afford to lose such friends as you. There is gold to heal your
wounds. Leave me, now, for I have important business to attend to.”
Turner pocketed the purse which Sir Henry threw upon the table, and,
making a low bow, left the apartment.
Ten minutes later, Sampson, the black servant, entered, bearing a
card, with the name, “Captain Reginald Preston,” written thereon.
Receiving the command to admit him, the gentleman soon made his
appearance. He was still a young man, not over thirty, and, by some,
would doubtless be called good-looking; but a close inspection would
tend to dissipate any favorable opinion which might be hastily
formed. Though well dressed, with all the appearance of being a
gentleman, his features wore the stamp of a life of profligacy, the
effects of which, the strength of a good constitution was unable to
ward off. Of good family, though a younger son, he had once been
possessed of quite a fortune, which he squandered away amidst the
splendid gayeties of London life, and was now recruiting his health
and fortune in the service of the king. Such in appearance was
Reginald Preston, the visitor of Sir Henry Clinton.
He approached the general in a careless manner. Shaking hands with
the superior officer, he took a seat.
“I received your note,” remarked Preston, after a silence of some
minutes, which he spent in curiously eyeing the papers on the table.
“I could not quite understand the drift of it, but here I am to
receive the explanation, which you promised when we should meet.
I send out my application for exchange by the next ship, and have
a fair prospect of leaving this miserable country; so don’t send
me where I will be killed off before I get a chance to enjoy this
fortune of mine.”
“Perhaps it may be as well to stay here. You never could live in
London without money, and your pockets are not particularly replete
with _that_ article.”
“I know they haven’t been; but this little fortune I was speaking
about is sufficient to keep me floating until I can carry off a rich
wife. Three thousand a year is not such an insignificant sum.”
“It is concerning that ‘small fortune’ that I wish to speak. If
you will take the trouble to recall the words of your letter from
Thompson & Smith, you will remember that they stated the fact in
nearly these words: ‘Although, at the present time we can scarce
speak with absolute certainty, yet, we have the pleasure of
announcing, in all probability you are heir to an estate of three
thousand a year. We would not advise you to announce this as a
_fact_, until we discover whether there be any nearer relatives to
the deceased than yourself. At present, we know of none.’ Are not
these the words?”
“I must confess that you are better posted in the matter of the
letter than I am. If you ask my opinion, I should say they are the
precise words.”
“Well, then, listen. By these papers which you see upon the table,
it is announced that a nearer relative to the gentleman who left
the property _has_ been discovered, and that your chances of again
shining in London life are decidedly slim--for the present, at least.”
The careless expression which had been resting on Preston’s face,
suddenly vanished under this, to him, remarkably unpleasing
intelligence.
“Good heavens, general! You do not mean to say that all my plans are
to be disarranged, and hopes blasted in this shockingly disagreeable
manner. Those Thompsons and Smiths must be a set of thorough-faced
rascals. As to my uncle’s leaving any relatives _outside_ of our
family, and nearer than myself, I am sure it’s a mistake, or else a
trumped-up claim. His wife died forty years ago, and his only son was
killed among the Indians, nearly as long since.”
“You have hit the right nail on the head, to use a vulgar expression.
That son is the person to whom I refer. It seems that he was _not_
killed by the Indians, and lived long enough to raise a family. He is
dead _now_, but there remains a son and daughter, not to speak of his
wife. Your uncle took it into his head to turn this only son out of
doors; that was what caused him to come to America; but, as he left
no will, the estate naturally enough reverts to his grand children.”
“And who are these grandchildren?”
“The grandson is John Vale, one of the rebels whom we endeavored to
capture yesterday night.”
CHAPTER IV.
THE WOLF AND THE LAMB.
“So, he is nothing but one of these cursed rebels, after all. If
_that_ is the case, my chances are not so desperate as you seem to
think. If Captain Morgan succeeded in doing his duty, he is doubtless
in custody now, if not dead. Of course I speak of the young man; I
have no fears of the old woman and her daughter.”
“Captain Morgan did his duty to the best of his ability; but I am
sorry to say that John Vale is not only _not_ in custody, but that,
on the contrary, it is Morgan and his command--that is, those of them
that are still alive--who are the prisoners.”
“You can not mean to say that a troop of dragoons has been defeated
by a squad of these half-mounted, half-armed rebels?”
“I mean to say just
|
furniture. “The question is how you’ll like
coming back to it.”
She seemed to accept the full consequences of his thought. “I only know
I don’t like leaving it.”
He flung back sombrely, “You don’t even put it conditionally then?”
Her gaze deepened. “On what?”
He stood up and walked across the room. Then he came back and paused
before her. “On the alternative of marrying me.”
The slow color--even her blushes seemed deliberate--rose to her lower
lids; her lips stirred, but the words resolved themselves into a smile
and she waited.
He took another turn, with the thwarted step of the man whose nervous
exasperation escapes through his muscles.
“And to think that in fifteen years I shall have a big practice!”
Her eyes triumphed for him. “In less!”
“The cursed irony of it! What do I care for the man I shall be then?
It’s slaving one’s life away for a stranger!” He took her hands
abruptly. “You’ll go to Cannes, I suppose, or Monte Carlo? I heard
Hollingsworth say to-day that he meant to take his yacht over to the
Mediterranean--”
She released herself. “If you think that--”
“I don’t. I almost wish I did. It would be easier, I mean.” He broke off
incoherently. “I believe your Aunt Virginia does, though. She somehow
connotes Hollingsworth and the Mediterranean.” He caught her hands
again. “Alexa--if we could manage a little hole somewhere out of town?”
“Could we?” she sighed, half yielding.
“In one of those places where they make jokes about the mosquitoes,” he
pressed her. “Could you get on with one servant?”
“Could you get on without varnished boots?”
“Promise me you won’t go, then!”
“What are you thinking of, Stephen?”
“I don’t know,” he stammered, the question giving unexpected form to his
intention. “It’s all in the air yet, of course; but I picked up a tip
the other day--”
“You’re not speculating?” she cried, with a kind of superstitious
terror.
“Lord, no. This is a sure thing--I almost wish it wasn’t; I mean if I
can work it--” He had a sudden vision of the comprehensiveness of the
temptation. If only he had been less sure of Dinslow! His assurance gave
the situation the base element of safety.
“I don’t understand you,” she faltered.
“Trust me, instead!” he adjured her, with sudden energy; and turning on
her abruptly, “If you go, you know, you go free,” he concluded.
She drew back, paling a little. “Why do you make it harder for me?”
“To make it easier for myself,” he retorted.
IV
Glennard, the next afternoon, leaving his office earlier than usual,
turned, on his way home, into one of the public libraries.
He had the place to himself at that closing hour, and the librarian
was able to give an undivided attention to his tentative request for
letters--collections of letters. The librarian suggested Walpole.
“I meant women--women’s letters.”
The librarian proffered Hannah More and Miss Martineau.
Glennard cursed his own inarticulateness. “I mean letters to--to some
one person--a man; their husband--or--”
“Ah,” said the inspired librarian, “Eloise and Abailard.”
“Well--something a little nearer, perhaps,” said Glennard, with
lightness. “Didn’t Merimee--”
“The lady’s letters, in that case, were not published.”
“Of course not,” said Glennard, vexed at his blunder.
“There are George Sand’s letters to Flaubert.”
“Ah!” Glennard hesitated. “Was she--were they--?” He chafed at his own
ignorance of the sentimental by-paths of literature.
“If you want love-letters, perhaps some of the French eighteenth
century correspondences might suit you better--Mlle. Aisse or Madame de
Sabran--”
But Glennard insisted. “I want something modern--English or American. I
want to look something up,” he lamely concluded.
The librarian could only suggest George Eliot.
“Well, give me some of the French things, then--and I’ll have Merimee’s
letters. It was the woman who published them, wasn’t it?”
He caught up his armful, transferring it, on the doorstep, to a cab
which carried him to his rooms. He dined alone, hurriedly, at a small
restaurant near by, and returned at once to his books.
Late that night, as he undressed, he wondered what contemptible impulse
had forced from him his last words to Alexa Trent. It was bad enough to
interfere with the girl’s chances by hanging about her to the obvious
exclusion of other men, but it was worse to seem to justify his weakness
by dressing up the future in delusive ambiguities. He saw himself
sinking from depth to depth of sentimental cowardice in his reluctance
to renounce his hold on her; and it filled him with self-disgust to
think that the highest feeling of which he supposed himself capable was
blent with such base elements.
His awakening was hardly cheered by the sight of her writing. He tore
her note open and took in the few lines--she seldom exceeded the first
page--with the lucidity of apprehension that is the forerunner of evil.
“My aunt sails on Saturday and I must give her my answer the day after
to-morrow. Please don’t come till then--I want to think the question
over by myself. I know I ought to go. Won’t you help me to be
reasonable?”
It was settled, then. Well, he would be reasonable; he wouldn’t stand
in her way; he would let her go. For two years he had been living some
other, luckier man’s life; the time had come when he must drop back into
his own. He no longer tried to look ahead, to grope his way through
the endless labyrinth of his material difficulties; a sense of dull
resignation closed in on him like a fog.
“Hullo, Glennard!” a voice said, as an electric-car, late that
afternoon, dropped him at an uptown corner.
He looked up and met the interrogative smile of Barton Flamel, who
stood on the curbstone watching the retreating car with the eye of a man
philosophic enough to remember that it will be followed by another.
Glennard felt his usual impulse of pleasure at meeting Flamel; but
it was not in this case curtailed by the reaction of contempt that
habitually succeeded it. Probably even the few men who had known Flamel
since his youth could have given no good reason for the vague mistrust
that he inspired. Some people are judged by their actions, others by
their ideas; and perhaps the shortest way of defining Flamel is to say
that his well-known leniency of view was vaguely divined to include
himself. Simple minds may have resented the discovery that his opinions
were based on his perceptions; but there was certainly no more definite
charge against him than that implied in the doubt as to how he would
behave in an emergency, and his company was looked upon as one of those
mildly unwholesome dissipations to which the prudent may occasionally
yield. It now offered itself to Glennard as an easy escape from the
obsession of moral problems, which somehow could no more be worn in
Flamel’s presence than a surplice in the street.
“Where are you going? To the club?” Flamel asked; adding, as the younger
man assented, “Why not come to my studio instead? You’ll see one bore
instead of twenty.”
The apartment which Flamel described as his studio showed, as its one
claim to the designation, a perennially empty easel; the rest of its
space being filled with the evidences of a comprehensive dilettanteism.
Against this background, which seemed the visible expression of its
owner’s intellectual tolerance, rows of fine books detached themselves
with a prominence, showing them to be Flamel’s chief care.
Glennard glanced with the eye of untrained curiosity at the lines of
warm-toned morocco, while his host busied himself with the uncorking of
Apollinaris.
“You’ve got a splendid lot of books,” he said.
“They’re fairly decent,” the other assented, in the curt tone of the
collector who will not talk of his passion for fear of talking of
nothing else; then, as Glennard, his hands in his pockets, began to
stroll perfunctorily down the long line of bookcases--“Some men,” Flamel
irresistibly added, “think of books merely as tools, others as tooling.
I’m between the two; there are days when I use them as scenery, other
days when I want them as society; so that, as you see, my library
represents a makeshift compromise between looks and brains, and the
collectors look down on me almost as much as the students.”
Glennard, without answering, was mechanically taking one book after
another from the shelves. His hands slipped curiously over the smooth
covers and the noiseless subsidence of opening pages. Suddenly he came
on a thin volume of faded manuscript.
“What’s this?” he asked, with a listless sense of wonder.
“Ah, you’re at my manuscript shelf. I’ve been going in for that sort of
thing lately.” Flamel came up and looked over his shoulders. “That’s a
bit of Stendhal--one of the Italian stories--and here are some letters
of Balzac to Madame Commanville.”
Glennard took the book with sudden eagerness. “Who was Madame
Commanville?”
“His sister.” He was conscious that Flamel was looking at him with the
smile that was like an interrogation point. “I didn’t know you cared for
this kind of thing.”
“I don’t--at least I’ve never had the chance. Have you many collections
of letters?”
“Lord, no--very few. I’m just beginning, and most of the interesting
ones are out of my reach. Here’s a queer little collection, though--the
rarest thing I’ve got--half a dozen of Shelley’s letters to Harriet
Westbrook. I had a devil of a time getting them--a lot of collectors
were after them.”
Glennard, taking the volume from his hand, glanced with a kind of
repugnance at the interleaving of yellow cris-crossed sheets. “She was
the one who drowned herself, wasn’t she?”
Flamel nodded. “I suppose that little episode adds about fifty per cent.
to their value,” he said, meditatively.
Glennard laid the book down. He wondered why he had joined Flamel.
He was in no humor to be amused by the older man’s talk, and a
recrudescence of personal misery rose about him like an icy tide.
“I believe I must take myself off,” he said. “I’d forgotten an
engagement.”
He turned to go; but almost at the same moment he was conscious of a
duality of intention wherein his apparent wish to leave revealed itself
as a last effort of the will against the overmastering desire to stay
and unbosom himself to Flamel.
The older man, as though divining the conflict, laid a detaining
pressure on his arm.
“Won’t the engagement keep? Sit down and try one of these cigars. I
don’t often have the luck of seeing you here.”
“I’m rather driven just now,” said Glennard, vaguely. He found himself
seated again, and Flamel had pushed to his side a low stand holding a
bottle of Apollinaris and a decanter of cognac.
Flamel, thrown back in his capacious arm-chair, surveyed him through
a cloud of smoke with the comfortable tolerance of the man to whom no
inconsistencies need be explained. Connivance was implicit in the air.
It was the kind of atmosphere in which the outrageous loses its edge.
Glennard felt a gradual relaxing of his nerves.
“I suppose one has to pay a lot for letters like that?” he heard himself
asking, with a glance in the direction of the volume he had laid aside.
“Oh, so-so--depends on circumstances.” Flamel viewed him thoughtfully.
“Are you thinking of collecting?”
Glennard laughed. “Lord, no. The other way round.”
“Selling?”
“Oh, I hardly know. I was thinking of a poor chap--”
Flamel filled the pause with a nod of interest.
“A poor chap I used to know--who died--he died last year--and who left
me a lot of letters, letters he thought a great deal of--he was fond
of me and left ‘em to me outright, with the idea, I suppose, that
they might benefit me somehow--I don’t know--I’m not much up on such
things--” he reached his hand to the tall glass his host had filled.
“A collection of autograph letters, eh? Any big names?”
“Oh, only one name. They’re all letters written to him--by one person,
you understand; a woman, in fact--”
“Oh, a woman,” said Flamel, negligently.
Glennard was nettled by his obvious loss of interest. “I rather think
they’d attract a good deal of notice if they were published.”
Flamel still looked uninterested. “Love-letters, I suppose?”
“Oh, just--the letters a woman would write to a man she knew well. They
were tremendous friends, he and she.”
“And she wrote a clever letter?”
“Clever? It was Margaret Aubyn.”
A great silence filled the room. It seemed to Glennard that the words
had burst from him as blood gushes from a wound.
“Great Scott!” said Flamel, sitting up. “A collection of Margaret
Aubyn’s letters? Did you say YOU had them?”
“They were left me--by my friend.”
“I see. Was he--well, no matter. You’re to be congratulated, at any
rate. What are you going to do with them?”
Glennard stood up with a sense of weariness in all his bones. “Oh, I
don’t know. I haven’t thought much about it. I just happened to see that
some fellow was writing her life--”
“Joslin; yes. You didn’t think of giving them to him?”
Glennard had lounged across the room and stood staring up at a bronze
Bacchus who drooped his garlanded head above the pediment of an Italian
cabinet. “What ought I to do? You’re just the fellow to advise me.” He
felt the blood in his cheek as he spoke.
Flamel sat with meditative eye. “What do you WANT to do with them?” he
asked.
“I want to publish them,” said Glennard, swinging round with sudden
energy--“If I can--”
“If you can? They’re yours, you say?”
“They’re mine fast enough. There’s no one to prevent--I mean there are
no restrictions--” he was arrested by the sense that these accumulated
proofs of impunity might precisely stand as the strongest check on his
action.
“And Mrs. Aubyn had no family, I believe?”
“No.”
“Then I don’t see who’s to interfere,” said Flamel, studying his
cigar-tip.
Glennard had turned his unseeing stare on an ecstatic Saint Catherine
framed in tarnished gilding.
“It’s just this way,” he began again, with an effort. “When letters are
as personal as--as these of my friend’s.... Well, I don’t mind telling
you that the cash would make a heap of difference to me; such a lot that
it rather obscures my judgment--the fact is if I could lay my hand on a
few thousands now I could get into a big thing, and without appreciable
risk; and I’d like to know whether you think I’d be justified--under the
circumstances....” He paused, with a dry throat. It seemed to him at the
moment that it would be impossible for him ever to sink lower in his own
estimation. He was in truth less ashamed of weighing the temptation than
of submitting his scruples to a man like Flamel, and affecting to appeal
to sentiments of delicacy on the absence of which he had consciously
reckoned. But he had reached a point where each word seemed to compel
another, as each wave in a stream is forced forward by the pressure
behind it; and before Flamel could speak he had faltered out--“You don’t
think people could say... could criticise the man....”
“But the man’s dead, isn’t he?”
“He’s dead--yes; but can I assume the responsibility without--”
Flamel hesitated; and almost immediately Glennard’s scruples gave way
to irritation. If at this hour Flamel were to affect an inopportune
reluctance--!
The older man’s answer reassured him. “Why need you assume any
responsibility? Your name won’t appear, of course; and as to your
friend’s, I don’t see why his should, either. He wasn’t a celebrity
himself, I suppose?”
“No, no.”
“Then the letters can be addressed to Mr. Blank. Doesn’t that make it
all right?”
Glennard’s hesitation revived. “For the public, yes. But I don’t see
that it alters the case for me. The question is, ought I to publish them
at all?”
“Of course you ought to.” Flamel spoke with invigorating emphasis. “I
doubt if you’d be justified in keeping them back. Anything of Margaret
Aubyn’s is more or less public property by this time. She’s too great
for any one of us. I was only wondering how you could use them to the
best advantage--to yourself, I mean. How many are there?”
“Oh, a lot; perhaps a hundred--I haven’t counted. There may be more....”
“Gad! What a haul! When were they written?”
“I don’t know--that is--they corresponded for years. What’s the odds?”
He moved toward his hat with a vague impulse of flight.
“It all counts,” said Flamel, imperturbably. “A long
correspondence--one, I mean, that covers a great deal of time--is
obviously worth more than if the same number of letters had been written
within a year. At any rate, you won’t give them to Joslin? They’d fill a
book, wouldn’t they?”
“I suppose so. I don’t know how much it takes to fill a book.”
“Not love-letters, you say?”
“Why?” flashed from Glennard.
“Oh, nothing--only the big public is sentimental, and if they WERE--why,
you could get any money for Margaret Aubyn’s love-letters.”
Glennard was silent.
“Are the letters interesting in themselves? I mean apart from the
association with her name?”
“I’m no judge.” Glennard took up his hat and thrust himself into his
overcoat. “I dare say I sha’n’t do anything about it. And, Flamel--you
won’t mention this to anyone?”
“Lord, no. Well, I congratulate you. You’ve got a big thing.” Flamel was
smiling at him from the hearth.
Glennard, on the threshold, forced a response to the smile, while he
questioned with loitering indifference--“Financially, eh?”
“Rather; I should say so.”
Glennard’s hand lingered on the knob. “How much--should you say? You
know about such things.”
“Oh, I should have to see the letters; but I should say--well, if you’ve
got enough to fill a book and they’re fairly readable, and the book is
brought out at the right time--say ten thousand down from the publisher,
and possibly one or two more in royalties. If you got the publishers
bidding against each other you might do even better; but of course I’m
talking in the dark.”
“Of course,” said Glennard, with sudden dizziness. His hand had slipped
from the knob and he stood staring down at the exotic spirals of the
Persian rug beneath his feet.
“I’d have to see the letters,” Flamel repeated.
“Of course--you’d have to see them....” Glennard stammered; and, without
turning, he flung over his shoulder an inarticulate “Good-by....”
V
The little house, as Glennard strolled up to it between the trees,
seemed no more than a gay tent pitched against the sunshine. It had the
crispness of a freshly starched summer gown, and the geraniums on the
veranda bloomed as simultaneously as the flowers in a bonnet. The garden
was prospering absurdly. Seed they had sown at random--amid laughing
counter-charges of incompetence--had shot up in fragrant defiance of
their blunders. He smiled to see the clematis unfolding its punctual
wings about the porch. The tiny lawn was smooth as a shaven cheek, and a
crimson rambler mounted to the nursery-window of a baby who never cried.
A breeze shook the awning above the tea-table, and his wife, as he drew
near, could be seen bending above a kettle that was just about to boil.
So vividly did the whole scene suggest the painted bliss of a stage
setting, that it would have been hardly surprising to see her step
forward among the flowers and trill out her virtuous happiness from the
veranda-rail.
The stale heat of the long day in town, the dusty promiscuity of the
suburban train were now but the requisite foil to an evening of scented
breezes and tranquil talk. They had been married more than a year,
and each home-coming still reflected the freshness of their first day
together. If, indeed, their happiness had a flaw, it was in resembling
too closely the bright impermanence of their surroundings. Their love as
yet was but the gay tent of holiday-makers.
His wife looked up with a smile. The country life suited her, and her
beauty had gained depth from a stillness in which certain faces might
have grown opaque.
“Are you very tired?” she asked, pouring his tea.
“Just enough to enjoy this.” He rose from the chair in which he had
thrown himself and bent over the tray for his cream. “You’ve had a
visitor?” he commented, noticing a half-empty cup beside her own.
“Only Mr. Flamel,” she said, indifferently.
“Flamel? Again?”
She answered without show of surprise. “He left just now. His yacht is
down at Laurel Bay and he borrowed a trap of the Dreshams to drive over
here.”
Glennard made no comment, and she went on, leaning her head back against
the cushions of her bamboo-seat, “He wants us to go for a sail with him
next Sunday.”
Glennard meditatively stirred his tea. He was trying to think of the
most natural and unartificial thing to say, and his voice seemed to come
from the outside, as though he were speaking behind a marionette. “Do
you want to?”
“Just as you please,” she said, compliantly. No affectation of
indifference could have been as baffling as her compliance. Glennard, of
late, was beginning to feel that the surface which, a year ago, he
had taken for a sheet of clear glass, might, after all, be a mirror
reflecting merely his own conception of what lay behind it.
“Do you like Flamel?” he suddenly asked; to which, still engaged with
her tea, she returned the feminine answer--“I thought you did.”
“I do, of course,” he agreed, vexed at his own incorrigible tendency to
magnify Flamel’s importance by hovering about the topic. “A sail would
be rather jolly; let’s go.”
She made no reply and he drew forth the rolled-up evening papers which
he had thrust into his pocket on leaving the train. As he smoothed them
out his own countenance seemed to undergo the same process. He ran his
eye down the list of stocks and Flamel’s importunate personality receded
behind the rows of figures pushing forward into notice like so many
bearers of good news. Glennard’s investments were flowering like his
garden: the dryest shares blossomed into dividends, and a golden harvest
awaited his sickle.
He glanced at his wife with the tranquil air of the man who digests
good luck as naturally as the dry ground absorbs a shower. “Things are
looking uncommonly well. I believe we shall be able to go to town for
two or three months next winter if we can find something cheap.”
She smiled luxuriously: it was pleasant to be able to say, with an air
of balancing relative advantages, “Really, on the baby’s account I shall
be almost sorry; but if we do go, there’s Kate Erskine’s house... she’ll
let us have it for almost nothing....”
“Well, write her about it,” he recommended, his eyes travelling on
in search of the weather report. He had turned to the wrong page; and
suddenly a line of black characters leapt out at him as from an ambush.
“‘Margaret Aubyn’s Letters.’ Two volumes. Out to-day. First edition of
five thousand sold out before leaving the press. Second edition ready
next week. THE BOOK OF THE YEAR....”
He looked up stupidly. His wife still sat with her head thrown back,
her pure profile detached against the cushions. She was smiling a little
over the prospect his last words had opened. Behind her head shivers
of sun and shade ran across the striped awning. A row of maples and
a privet hedge hid their neighbor’s gables, giving them undivided
possession of their leafy half-acre; and life, a moment before, had
been like their plot of ground, shut off, hedged in from importunities,
impenetrably his and hers. Now it seemed to him that every maple-leaf,
every privet-bud, was a relentless human gaze, pressing close upon their
privacy. It was as though they sat in a brightly lit room, uncurtained
from a darkness full of hostile watchers.... His wife still smiled; and
her unconsciousness of danger seemed, in some horrible way, to put her
beyond the reach of rescue....
He had not known that it would be like this. After the first odious
weeks, spent in preparing the letters for publication, in submitting
them to Flamel, and in negotiating with the publishers, the transaction
had dropped out of his consciousness into that unvisited limbo to which
we relegate the deeds we would rather not have done but have no notion
of undoing. From the moment he had obtained Miss Trent’s promise not
to sail with her aunt he had tried to imagine himself irrevocably
committed. After that, he argued, his first duty was to her--she had
become his conscience. The sum obtained from the publishers by Flamel’s
adroit manipulations and opportunely transferred to Dinslow’s successful
venture, already yielded a return which, combined with Glennard’s
professional earnings, took the edge of compulsion from their way of
living, making it appear the expression of a graceful preference for
simplicity. It was the mitigated poverty which can subscribe to a review
or two and have a few flowers on the dinner-table. And already in
a small way Glennard was beginning to feel the magnetic quality of
prosperity. Clients who had passed his door in the hungry days sought
it out now that it bore the name of a successful man. It was understood
that a small inheritance, cleverly invested, was the source of his
fortune; and there was a feeling that a man who could do so well for
himself was likely to know how to turn over other people’s money.
But it was in the more intimate reward of his wife’s happiness that
Glennard tasted the full flavor of success. Coming out of conditions so
narrow that those he offered her seemed spacious, she fitted into her
new life without any of those manifest efforts at adjustment that are
as sore to a husband’s pride as the critical rearrangement of the bridal
furniture. She had given him, instead, the delicate pleasure of watching
her expand like a sea-creature restored to its element, stretching out
the atrophied tentacles of girlish vanity and enjoyment to the rising
tide of opportunity. And somehow--in the windowless inner cell of his
consciousness where self-criticism cowered--Glennard’s course seemed
justified by its merely material success. How could such a crop of
innocent blessedness have sprung from tainted soil?
Now he had the injured sense of a man entrapped into a disadvantageous
bargain. He had not known it would be like this; and a dull anger
gathered at his heart. Anger against whom? Against his wife, for not
knowing what he suffered? Against Flamel, for being the unconscious
instrument of his wrong-doing? Or against that mute memory to which his
own act had suddenly given a voice of accusation? Yes, that was it;
and his punishment henceforth would be the presence, the unescapable
presence, of the woman he had so persistently evaded. She would always
be there now. It was as though he had married her instead of the other.
It was what she had always wanted--to be with him--and she had gained
her point at last....
He sprang up, as though in an impulse of flight.... The sudden movement
lifted his wife’s lids, and she asked, in the incurious voice of the
woman whose life is enclosed in a magic circle of prosperity--“Any
news?”
“No--none--” he said, roused to a sense of immediate peril. The papers
lay scattered at his feet--what if she were to see them? He stretched
his arm to gather them up, but his next thought showed him the futility
of such concealment. The same advertisement would appear every day, for
weeks to come, in every newspaper; how could he prevent her seeing it?
He could not always be hiding the papers from her.... Well, and what if
she did see it? It would signify nothing to her, the chances were that
she would never even read the book.... As she ceased to be an element of
fear in his calculations the distance between them seemed to lessen
and he took her again, as it were, into the circle of his conjugal
protection.... Yet a moment before he had almost hated her!... He
laughed aloud at his senseless terrors.... He was off his balance,
decidedly.
“What are you laughing at?” she asked.
He explained, elaborately, that he was laughing at the recollection
of an old woman in the train, an old woman with a lot of bundles, who
couldn’t find her ticket.... But somehow, in the telling, the humor of
the story seemed to evaporate, and he felt the conventionality of her
smile. He glanced at his watch, “Isn’t it time to dress?”
She rose with serene reluctance. “It’s a pity to go in. The garden looks
so lovely.”
They lingered side by side, surveying their domain. There was not space
in it, at this hour, for the shadow of the elm-tree in the angle of the
hedge; it crossed the lawn, cut the flower-border in two, and ran up the
side of the house to the nursery window. She bent to flick a caterpillar
from the honey-suckle; then, as they turned indoors, “If we mean to
go on the yacht next Sunday,” she suggested, “oughtn’t you to let Mr.
Flamel know?”
Glennard’s exasperation deflected suddenly. “Of course I shall let him
know. You always seem to imply that I’m going to do something rude to
Flamel.”
The words reverberated through her silence; she had a way of thus
leaving one space in which to contemplate one’s folly at arm’s length.
Glennard turned on his heel and went upstairs. As he dropped into a
chair before his dressing-table he said to himself that in the last hour
he had sounded the depths of his humiliation and that the lowest dregs
of it, the very bottom-slime, was the hateful necessity of having
always, as long as the two men lived, to be civil to Barton Flamel.
VI
THE week in town had been sultry, and the men, in the Sunday
emancipation of white flannel and duck, filled the deck-chairs of the
yacht with their outstretched apathy, following, through a mist of
cigarette-smoke, the flitting inconsequences of the women. The party
was a small one--Flamel had few intimate friends--but composed of more
heterogeneous atoms than the little pools into which society usually
runs. The reaction from the chief episode of his earlier life had
bred in Glennard an uneasy distaste for any kind of personal saliency.
Cleverness was useful in business; but in society it seemed to him as
futile as the sham cascades formed by a stream that might have been used
to drive a mill. He liked the collective point of view that goes with
the civilized uniformity of dress-clothes, and his wife’s attitude
implied the same preference; yet they found themselves slipping more
and more into Flamel’s intimacy. Alexa had once or twice said that she
enjoyed meeting clever people; but her enjoyment took the negative form
of a smiling receptivity; and Glennard felt a growing preference for the
kind of people who have their thinking done for them by the community.
Still, the deck of the yacht was a pleasant refuge from the heat on
shore, and his wife’s profile, serenely projected against the changing
blue, lay on his retina like a cool hand on the nerves. He had never
been more impressed by the kind of absoluteness that lifted her beauty
above the transient effects of other women, making the most harmonious
face seem an accidental collocation of features.
The ladies who directly suggested this comparison were of a kind
accustomed to take similar risks with more gratifying results. Mrs.
Armiger had in fact long been the triumphant alternative of those who
couldn’t “see” Alexa Glennard’s looks; and Mrs. Touchett’s claims to
consideration were founded on that distribution of effects which is the
wonder of those who admire a highly cultivated country. The third lady
of the trio which Glennard’s fancy had put to such unflattering uses,
was bound by circumstances to support the claims of the other two. This
was Mrs. Dresham, the wife of the editor of the RADIATOR. Mrs. Dresham
was a lady who had rescued herself from social obscurity by assuming the
role of her husband’s exponent and interpreter; and Dresham’s leisure
being devoted to the cultivation of remarkable women, his
wife’s attitude committed her to the public celebration of their
remarkableness. For the conceivable tedium of this duty, Mrs. Dresham
was repaid by the fact that there were people who took HER for a
remarkable woman; and who in turn probably purchased similar distinction
with the small change of her reflected importance. As to the other
ladies of the party, they were simply the wives of some of the men--the
kind of women who expect to be talked to collectively and to have their
questions left unanswered.
Mrs. Armiger, the latest embodiment of Dresham’s instinct for the
remarkable, was an innocent beauty who for years had distilled
dulness among a set of people now self-condemned by their inability
to appreciate her. Under Dresham’s tutelage she had developed into a
“thoughtful woman,” who read his leaders in the RADIATOR and bought the
books he recommended. When a new novel appeared, people wanted to know
what Mrs. Armiger thought of it; and a young gentleman who had made a
trip in Touraine had recently inscribed to her the wide-margined result
of his explorations.
Glennard, leaning back with his head against the rail and a slit of
fugitive blue between his half-closed lids, vaguely wished she wouldn’t
spoil the afternoon by making people talk; though he reduced his
annoyance to the minimum by not listening to what was said, there
remained a latent irritation against the general futility of words.
His wife’s gift of silence seemed to him the most vivid commentary on
the clumsiness of speech as a means of intercourse, and his eyes had
turned to her in renewed appreciation of this finer faculty when
Mrs. Armiger’s voice abruptly brought home to him the underrated
potentialities of language.
“You’ve read them, of course, Mrs. Glennard?” he heard her ask; and, in
reply to Alexa’s vague interrogation--“Why, the ‘Aubyn Letters’--it’s
the only book people are talking of this week.”
Mrs. Dresham immediately saw her advantage. “You HAVEN’T read them? How
very extraordinary! As Mrs. Armiger says, the book’s in the air; one
breathes it in like the influenza.”
Glennard sat motionless, watching his wife.
“Perhaps it hasn’t reached the suburbs yet,” she said, with her
unruffled smile.
“Oh, DO let me come to you, then!”
|
it all! Be careful
Garabato."
After many halts Gallardo reached the end with the entire piece of silk
wound around his waist. The skilful servant had sewed and put pins and
safety pins all over his master's body, converting his clothes into one
single piece. To get out of them the bull-fighter would have to resort
to scissors and to others' hands. He could not divest himself of a
single garment until his return to the hotel, unless the bull should
accomplish it for him in the open plaza and they should finish
undressing him in the hospital.
Gallardo seated himself again and Garabato went about the business of
arranging the queue, taking out the hairpins and adding the _moña_, the
black rosette with streamers which recalled the ancient head-dress of
early bull-fighting times.
The master, as if he wished to put off the moment of final encasement in
the costume, stretched himself, asked Garabato for the cigar that he had
left on the little night-table, and demanded the time, thinking that all
the clocks were fast.
"It's early yet. The boys haven't come. I don't like to go to the plaza
early. It makes a fellow tired to be there waiting!"
A servant of the hotel announced that the carriage with the _cuadrilla_
had arrived.
It was time to go. There was no excuse for delaying the moment of
setting forth. He put over his belt the gold-embroidered vest and
outside of this the jacket, a shining garment with enormous embossments,
heavy as armor and resplendent with light as a glowing coal. The silk,
color of tobacco, was only visible on the under side of the arms and in
two triangles on the back. Almost the entire garment disappeared under
the heavy layer of trimmings and gold-embroidered designs forming
flowers with colored stones in their corollas. The shoulder pieces were
heavy masses of gold embroidery from which fell a fringe of the same
metal. The garment was edged with a close fringe that moved at every
step. From the golden opening of the pockets the points of two
handkerchiefs peeped forth, red like the cravat and the tie.
The cap!
Garabato took out of an oval box with great care the fighting cap, black
and shining, with two pendent tassels, like ears of passementerie.
Gallardo put it on, taking care that the _coleta_ should remain
unhidden, hanging symmetrically down his back.
The cape!
Garabato caught up the cape from off a chair, the _capa de gala_, a
princely mantle of silk of the same shade as the dress and equally
burdened with gold embroidery. Gallardo hung it over one shoulder and
looked at himself in the glass, satisfied with his preparations. It was
not bad.
"To the plaza!"
His two friends took their farewells hastily and called a cab to follow
him. Garabato put under one arm a great bundle of red cloths, from the
ends of which peeped the hilts and guards of many swords.
CHAPTER II
THE MATADOR AND THE LADY
As Gallardo descended to the vestibule of the hotel he saw the street
filled with a dense and noisy crowd as though some great event had taken
place. The buzzing of the multitude outside the door reached his ears.
The proprietor and all his family appeared with extended hands as if
they would bid him farewell for a long journey.
"Good luck! May all go well with you!"
The servants, forgetting distance at the impulse of enthusiasm and
emotion, also held their right hands out to him.
"Good luck, Don Juan!"
And he turned in all directions smiling, regardless of the frightened
faces of the ladies of the hotel.
"Thanks, many thanks! See you later."
He was a different man. From the moment he had hung the glittering cape
over one shoulder a persistent smile illuminated his countenance. He was
pale, with a sweaty pallor like that of the sick; but he smiled,
satisfied to live and to show himself in public, adopting his new pose
with the instinctive freedom of one who but needs an incentive to parade
before the people.
He swaggered with arrogance, puffing occasionally at the cigar he
carried in his left hand. He moved his hips haughtily under his handsome
cape and strode with a firm step and with the flippancy of a gay youth.
"Come, gentlemen, make way! Many thanks; many thanks."
And he tried to preserve his dress from unclean contact as way was made
among an ill-clad, enthusiastic crowd which surged against the doors of
the hotel. They had no money with which to go to the bull-fight but they
took advantage of the opportunity of pressing the hand of the famous
Gallardo, or of at least touching his garments.
A coach drawn by four richly caparisoned mules with tassels and bells
stood waiting at the door. Garabato had already seated himself on the
box with his bundle of _muletas_ and swords. Three bull-fighters were
inside with their capes over their knees, dressed in gayly colored
clothes embroidered with as great profusion as the master's, but in
silver.
Pressed onward by the popular ovation, and having to defend himself with
his elbows from greedy hands, Gallardo reached the carriage-step.
"Good-afternoon, gentlemen," he said shortly to the men of his
_cuadrilla_.
He seated himself at the back so that all could see him, and smiled with
responsive nods to the shouts of some ragged women and to the short
applause begun by some newsboys.
The carriage started with all the impetus of the spirited mules, filling
the street with gay ringing. The mob parted to give passage but many
rushed at the carriage as though they would fall under its wheels. Hats
and canes were waved; an explosion of enthusiasm burst from the crowd,
one of those contagions that agitate and madden the masses at certain
times--making every one shout without knowing why.
"Hurrah for the brave! _Viva España!_"
Gallardo, ever pale and smiling, saluted, repeating "many thanks," moved
by the contagion of popular enthusiasm and proud of his standing which
united his name to that of his native land.
A troop of dishevelled youngsters ran after the coach at full speed, as
though convinced that, at the end of the mad race, something
extraordinary surely awaited them.
For at least an hour Alcalá Street had been like a river of carriages
that flowed toward the outskirts of the city between two banks of
close-packed foot passengers. All kinds of vehicles, ancient and modern,
figured in this tumultuous and noisy emigration, from the ancient
diligence, brought to light like an anachronism, to the automobile.
Crowded tramways passed with groups of people overflowing on their
steps. Omnibuses carried people to the corner of Seville Street, while
the conductor shouted "To the plaza! To the plaza!" Tasselled mules with
jingling bells trotted ahead of open carriages in which rode women in
white _mantillas_ with bright flowers in their hair; every instant
exclamations of alarm were heard at the escape, by apelike agility, of
some boy beneath the wheels of a carriage as he crossed by leaps from
one sidewalk to the other defying the current of vehicles. Automobile
horns tooted; coachmen yelled; newsboys shouted the page with the
picture and history of the bulls that were to be fought, or the likeness
and biography of the famous _matadores_, and from time to time an
explosion of curiosity swelled the deafening roar of the crowd.
Among the dark steeds of the mounted police rode gayly dressed
_caballeros_ with their legs rigidly encased in yellow leggings,
wearing gilded jackets and beaver hats with heavy tassels in lieu of a
cockade, mounted on thin and miserable hacks. They were the _picadores_.
Aft on the crupper, behind the high Moorish saddle, rode an impish
figure dressed in red, the _mono sabio_, or servant who had brought the
troop of horses to their hostelry.
The _cuadrillas_ passed in open coaches, and the embroidery of the
bull-fighters, reflecting the afternoon light, seemed to dazzle the
crowd and excite its enthusiasm. "That is Fuentes!" "That is Bomba!" And
the people, pleased with the identification, followed the retreating
carriages with greedy stare as if something startling were going to
happen and they feared to be too late.
From the top of the hill on Alcalá Street the broad straight road shone
white in the sun, with its rows of trees turning green at the breath of
spring, the balconies black with people, and the highway only visible at
intervals beneath the ant-like movement of the crowd and the rolling of
the coaches descending to the Fountain of Cibeles. Here the hill rose
again amid groves and tall buildings and the Puerta de Alcalá closed the
perspective like a triumphal arch, rearing its perforated white mass
against the blue space in which flecks of clouds floated like solitary
swans.
Gallardo rode in silence, responding to the multitude with a fixed
smile. Since his greeting to the _banderilleros_ he had not spoken a
word. They were also silent and pale with anxiety over the unknown.
Being all bull-fighters together, they put aside as useless the
gallantries necessary before the public.
A mysterious influence seemed to tell the crowd of the passing of the
last _cuadrilla_ that wound its way to the plaza. The vagabonds that ran
behind the coach shouting after Gallardo had been outstripped and the
group scattered among the carriages, but in spite of this the people
turned their heads as if they divined the proximity of the celebrated
bull-fighter behind them and they stopped, lining up against the edge of
the sidewalk to see him better.
The women in the coaches in advance turned their heads, attracted by the
jingling bells of the trotting mules. An indescribable roar rose from
certain groups that barred the passage along the sidewalks. There were
enthusiastic exclamations. Some waved their hats; others lifted canes
and swung them in salutation.
Gallardo responded to all with grinning smile but in his preoccupation
he seemed to take small account of these greetings. At his side rode
Nacional, his confidential servant, a _banderillero_, older than himself
by ten years, a rugged, strong man with brows grown together and a grave
visage. He was famous among the men of the profession for his good
nature, his manliness, and his political enthusiasms.
"Juan--don't complain of Madri'," said Nacional; "thou art made with the
public."
But Gallardo, as if he did not hear him and as if he wished to get away
from the thoughts that occupied him, answered:
"I feel it in my heart that something's going to happen this afternoon."
When they arrived at Cibeles the coach stopped. A great funeral was
coming along the Prado from the Castellana, cutting through the
avalanche of carriages from Alcalá Street.
Gallardo turned paler, contemplating with angry eyes the passing of the
cross and the defile of the priests who broke into a grave chant as they
gazed, some with aversion, others with envy, at that God-forgotten
multitude running after amusement.
Gallardo made haste to take off his cap, in which he was imitated by all
his _banderilleros_ except Nacional.
"But damn it!" yelled Gallardo, "uncover, _condenao_!"
He looked furious, as though he would strike him, convinced by some
confused intuition that this rebellion would cause the most terrible
misfortune to befall him.
"Well, I take it off," said Nacional with the ill grace of a thwarted
child, as he saw the cross pass on, "I take it off, but it is to the
dead."
They were detained some time to let the long _cortège_ pass.
"Bad sign!" muttered Gallardo in a voice trembling with anger. "Whoever
would have thought of bringing a funeral along the road to the plaza?
Damn it! I say something's going to happen to-day!"
Nacional smiled, shrugging his shoulders.
"Superstitions and fanaticisms! Neither God nor Nature bothers over
these things."
These words, which irritated Gallardo still more, caused the grave
preoccupation of the other bull-fighters to vanish, and they began to
joke about their companion as they did on all occasions when he dragged
in his favorite expression of "God or Nature."
When the road was clear the carriage began to move at the full speed of
the mules, crowding along with the other vehicles that flowed to the
plaza. Arrived there it turned to the left toward the gate of the
stables that led to the enclosures and stalls, obliged to move now at
slower pace among the dense crowd. Another ovation to Gallardo when he
descended from the coach followed by his _banderilleros_; blows and
pushes to keep his dress from unclean contact; smiles of greeting;
concealment of the right hand which all wished to press.
"Make way, gentlemen! many thanks!"
The large enclosure between the body of the plaza and the walls of the
outbuildings was full of the curious who wished to see the bull-fighters
at close range before taking their seats. Above the heads of the crowd
emerged the _picadores_ and guards on horseback in their seventeenth
century dress. At one side of the enclosure rose one-story brick
buildings with vines over the doors and pots of flowers in the windows,
a small community of offices, shops, stables, and houses in which lived
the stable boys, the carpenters, and other employees of the bull-ring.
The _matador_ pressed forward laboriously among the assemblage. His name
passed from mouth to mouth with exclamations of enthusiasm.
"Gallardo! Here is Gallardo! Hurrah! _Viva España_!"
And he, wholly preoccupied by the adoration of the public, advanced
swaggering, serene as a god, happy and satisfied, as if he were
assisting at a feast in his honor.
Suddenly two arms encircled his neck, and a strong stench of wine
assailed his nostrils.
"You smasher of women's hearts! You glorious one! Hurrah for Gallardo!"
It was a man of decent appearance; he rested his head on the
swordsman's shoulder and thus remained as though falling asleep in spite
of his enthusiasm. Gallardo's pushing, and the pulling of his friends,
freed the bull-fighter from this interminable embrace. The drunken man,
finding himself separated from his idol, broke out in shouts of
enthusiasm. "Hurrah! Let all the nations of the world come to admire
bull-fighters like this one and die of envy! They may have ships, they
may have money, but that's trivial! They have neither bulls nor youths
like this--no one to outstrip him in bravery. Hurrah, my boy! _Viva mi
tierra_!"
Gallardo crossed a great white washed hall bare of furniture where his
professional companions stood surrounded by enthusiastic groups. Way was
immediately made among the crowd which obstructed a door, and he passed
through it into a narrow, dark room, at the end of which shone the
lights of the chapel. An ancient painting representing the Virgin of the
Dove hung over the back of the altar. Four candles were burning before
it and branches of moth-eaten cloth flowers in vases of common
earthenware were falling to dust.
The chapel was full of people. The devotees of the humbler classes
crowded in to see the great men close by. They remained in the dimness
with uncovered head; some crowded into the foremost ranks, others stood
on chairs and benches, the majority of them with their backs to the
Virgin and looking greedily toward the door, ready to shout a name the
instant they discerned the glitter of a spangled costume.
The _banderilleros_ and _picadores_, poor devils who were going to
expose their lives as much as were the _maestros_, scarcely raised the
slightest murmur by their presence. Only the most fervent enthusiasts
recognized their nicknames.
Suddenly a prolonged buzzing, a name repeated from mouth to mouth:
"Fuentes!--That is Fuentes!"
And this elegant bull-fighter with his air of gentility and his cape
over his shoulder advanced to the altar and bent one knee with
theatrical arrogance, his gypsy-like eyes reflecting the lights and his
graceful and agile body thrown back as he looked upward. As soon as his
prayer was said and he had made the sign of the cross he rose, walking
backwards toward the door without losing sight of the image, like a
singer who retires bowing to the audience.
Gallardo was more simple in his devotions. He entered swaggering with no
less arrogance, cap in hand and his cape folded, but on finding himself
in the presence of the image he fell on both knees and gave himself up
to prayer, unconscious of the hundreds of eyes fixed on him. His simple
Christian soul trembled with fear and remorse. He asked protection with
the fervor of ingenuous men who live in continual danger and believe in
all kinds of adverse influences and in supernatural protection.
For the first time during the whole exciting day he thought of his wife
and mother. Poor Carmen, there in Seville awaiting the telegram! Señora
Angustias, happy with her chickens at the farm of La Rinconada, without
knowing for a certainty in what place her son fought the bulls to-day!
And he with the terrible presentiment that this afternoon something was
going to happen! Virgin of the Dove! Some little protection! He would
be good, he would forget the _other one_, he would live as God commands.
And with his superstitious spirit strengthened with this vain
repentance, he left the chapel with troubled eyes, still deeply stirred
and heedless of the people who obstructed the way.
Outside in the room where the bull-fighters were waiting, a shaven-faced
man, dressed in a black habit which he seemed to wear with a certain
slovenliness, greeted him.
"Bad sign!" murmured the bull-fighter, continuing on his way. "When I
say that something is going to happen to-day--"
The black-robed man was the chaplain of the plaza, an enthusiast in the
art of bull-fighting, who had come with the Holy Oils beneath his habit.
He was accompanied by a neighbor who served him as sacristan in exchange
for a seat to see the bull-fight. On bull-fight days he hired a
carriage, which the management paid for, and he chose by turns among his
friends and _protégés_ one on whom to confer the favor of the seat
destined for the sacristan, beside his own in the front row near the
doors of the bull-pen.
The priest entered the chapel with a proprietary air, scandalized at the
behavior of the congregation; all had their hats off, but were talking
in a loud voice and some were even smoking.
"Gentlemen, this is not a _café_. Be so kind as to go out. The
bull-fight is going to begin."
This news caused a dispersion, while the priest took out the hidden Holy
Oils and placed them in a box of painted wood. Then he too, as soon as
he had secreted the sacred articles, ran out to take his place in the
plaza before the appearance of the _cuadrilla_.
The crowd had disappeared. No one was to be seen in the enclosure but
men dressed in silk and embroidery, yellow horsemen with great beaver
hats, guards on horseback, and the assistants in their suits of gold and
blue.
The bull-fighters formed with customary promptness before the horses'
gate beneath an arch that gave exit to the plaza, the _maestros_ at the
front, then the _banderilleros_ keeping far apart, and behind them, in
the enclosure itself, stamped the sturdy rough squadron of the
_picadores_, smelling of burnt hide and dung, mounted on skeleton-like
horses with one eye bandaged. As rearguard of this army the teams of
mules intended for dragging out the slaughtered bulls fretted behind
them; they were restless, vigorous animals with shining coats, covered
with trappings of tassels and bells, and wore on their collars the
waving national flag.
Beyond the arch, above the wooden gates which half obstructed it, opened
a narrow space, leaving visible a portion of the sky, the tiled roof of
the plaza, and a section of seats with the compact multitude swarming
like ants, amid which fans and papers seemed to flutter like gayly
colored mosquitoes. Through this gallery entered a strong breeze--the
respiration of an immense lung. An harmonious humming was borne on the
undulations of the air, making certain distant music felt, rather
divined than heard.
About the archway peeped heads, many heads; those of the spectators on
the nearby benches were thrust forward, curious to see the heroes
without delay.
Gallardo arranged himself in line with the other bull-fighters, who
exchanged among themselves grave inclinations of the head. They did not
speak; they did not smile. Each one thought of himself, letting his
imagination fly far away; or he thought of nothing, lost in that
intellectual void produced by emotion. They occupied themselves with a
ceaseless arranging of the cape, throwing it loosely over the shoulder,
rolling its ends about the waist, and trying to make their legs, encased
in silk and gold, show agile and brave under this gorgeous funnel. Every
face was pale, not with a deathly pallor, but brilliant and livid, with
the sweaty gloss of emotion. They thought of the arena, still unseen,
experiencing that irresistible terror of events that take place on the
other side of a wall, that fear of the hidden, the unknown danger that
makes itself felt though invisible. How would the afternoon end?
Behind the _cuadrillas_ sounded the trotting of the horses that entered
through the outer arcades of the plaza. They bore the constables with
their long black cloaks and bell-shaped hats decorated with red and
yellow feathers. They had just cleared the ring, emptying it of the
curious, and they came to put themselves at the head of the
_cuadrillas_, serving them as advance guards.
The doors of the archway and those of the barrier wall opposite opened
wide. The great ring appeared, the real plaza, the circular space of
sand where the tragedy of the afternoon was to be enacted for the
excitement and entertainment of fourteen thousand souls. The harmonious
and confused buzzing increased, developing into gay and bizarre music, a
triumphal march of sounding brass that caused arms to swing martially
and hips to swagger. Forward, ye brave!
And the bull-fighters, winking at the violent transition, passed from
the shadow to the light, from the silence of the quiet gallery to the
roar of the ring on whose surrounding seats surged the crowd in waves of
curiosity, rising to their feet to see to better advantage.
The _toreros_ advanced, seeming suddenly to diminish in size in
comparison to the length of the perspective as they trod the arena. They
resembled brilliant little puppets, whose embroideries caught rainbow
reflections from the sun. Their graceful movements fired the people with
an enthusiasm like to that of the child in the presence of a wonderful
toy. The mad gust that stirred the crowds, causing their nerves to
tingle and their flesh to creep, they knew not why, moved the whole
plaza.
The people applauded, the more enthusiastic and nervous yelled, the
music rumbled and, in the midst of this outburst which spread in every
direction, from the door of the exit to the president's box, the
_cuadrillas_ advanced with solemn pace, the graceful movements of arms
and bodies compensating for the shortness of step. In the ring of blue
ether overhanging above the plaza white doves were winging as if
frightened by the roar that escaped from this crater of brick.
The athletes felt themselves different men as they advanced across the
arena. They exposed their lives for something more than money. Their
uncertainty and terror in the presence of the unknown were left behind
those barriers; now they were before the public; they faced reality. And
the thirst for glory in their barbarous and simple souls, the desire to
outstrip their comrades, their pride of strength and skill, blinded
them, made them forget fear and filled them with a brutal courage.
Gallardo had become transfigured. He walked erect, aspiring to be
taller; he moved with the arrogance of a conqueror. He gazed in all
directions with a triumphant air, as though his two companions did not
exist. Everything was his; the plaza and the public. He felt himself
capable of killing every bull that roamed the pastures of Andalusia and
Castile. All the applause was for him, he was sure of it. The thousands
of feminine eyes shaded by white _mantillas_ in boxes and benches, dwelt
only on his person. He had no doubt of it. The public adored him and, as
he advanced, smiling flippantly, as though the entire ovation were
directed to his person, he looked along the rows of seats on the rising
tiers knowing where the greater number of his partisans were grouped and
seeming to ignore those sections where his rivals' friends were
assembled.
They saluted the president, cap in hand, and the brilliant defile broke
up, lackeys and horsemen scattering about the arena. Then, while a guard
caught in his hat the key thrown by the president, Gallardo turned
toward the rows of seats where sat his greatest admirers and handed them
his glittering cape to keep for him. The handsome garment, grasped by
many hands, was spread over the wall as though it were a banner, a
sacred symbol of loyalty.
The most enthusiastic partisans stood waving hands and canes, greeting
the _matador_ with shouts manifesting their expectations. "Let the boy
from Seville show what he can do!"
And he, leaning against the barrier, smiling, sure of his strength,
answered, "Many thanks. What can be done will be done."
Not only were his admirers hopeful of him, but all the people fixed
their attention upon him in a state of great excitement. He was a
bull-fighter who seemed likely to meet with a catastrophe some day, and
the sort of catastrophe which called for a bed in the hospital.
Every one believed he was destined to die in the plaza as the result of
a horn-stab, and this very belief caused them to applaud him with
homicidal enthusiasm, with barbaric interest like that of the
misanthrope who follows an animal tamer from place to place, expecting
every moment to see him devoured by his wild beasts.
Gallardo laughed at the old professors of tauromachy who consider a
mishap impossible as long as the bull-fighter sticks to the rules of the
art. Rules! He knew them not and did not trouble himself to learn them.
Valor and audacity were all that were necessary to win. And, almost
blindly, without other guide than his temerity, or other support than
that of his physical faculties, he had risen rapidly, astonishing the
public into paroxysms, stupefying it with wonder by his mad daring.
He had not climbed up, step by step, as had other _matadores_, serving
long years first as _peón_ and _banderillero_ at the side of the
_maestros_. He had never known fear of a bull's horns. "Hunger stabs
worse." He had risen suddenly and the public had seen him begin as
_espada_, achieving immense popularity in a few years.
They admired him for the reason that they held his misfortune a
certainty. He fired the public with devilish enthusiasm for the blind
way in which he defied Death. They gave him the same attention and care
that they would give a criminal preparing for eternity. This
bull-fighter was not one of those who held power in reserve; he gave
everything, his life included. It was worth the money it cost. And the
multitude, with the bestiality of those who witness danger from a point
of safety, admired and urged the hero on. The prudent made wry faces at
his deeds; they thought him a predestined suicide, shielded by luck, and
murmured, "While he lasts!"
Drums and trumpets sounded and the first bull entered. Gallardo, with
his plain working-cape over one arm, remained near the barrier close to
the ranks of his partisans, in disdainful immobility, believing that the
whole plaza had their eyes glued on him. That bull was for some one
else. He would show signs of existence when his arrived. But the
applause for the skilful cape-work of his companions brought him out of
his quiet, and in spite of his intention he went at the bull, achieving
several feats due more to audacity than to skill. The whole plaza
applauded him, moved by predisposition in his favor because of his
daring.
When Fuentes killed the first bull and walked toward the president's
box, bowing to the multitude, Gallardo turned paler, as though all show
of favor that was not for him was equivalent to ignominious oblivion.
Now his turn was coming; great things were going to be seen. He did not
know for a certainty what they might be but he was going to astound the
public.
Scarcely had the second bull appeared when Gallardo, by his activity and
his desire to shine, seemed to fill the whole plaza. His cape was ever
near the bull's nose. A picador of his cuadrilla, the one called Potaje,
was thrown from his horse and lay unprotected near the horns, but the
maestro, grabbing the beast's tail, pulled with herculean strength and
made him turn till the horseman was safe. The public applauded, wild
with enthusiasm.
When the time for placing the _banderillas_ arrived, Gallardo stood
between the inner and outer barrier awaiting the bugle signal to kill.
Nacional, with the _banderilla_ in his hand, attracted the bull to the
centre of the plaza. No grace nor audacity was in his bearing; it was
merely a question of earning bread. Away in Seville were four small
children who, if he were to die, would not find another father. To
fulfil his duty and nothing more; only to throw his _banderillas_ like a
journeyman of tauromachy, without desire for ovations and merely well
enough to avoid being hissed!
When he had placed the first pair, some of the spectators in the vast
circle applauded, and others bantered the _banderillero_ in a waggish
tone, alluding to his hobbies.
"Less politics, and get closer!"
And Nacional, deceived by the distance, on hearing these shouts answered
smiling, like his master:
"Many thanks; many thanks."
When Gallardo leaped anew into the arena at the sound of the trumpets
and drums which announced the last play, the multitude stirred with a
buzzing of emotion. This _matador_ was its own. Now they were going to
see something great.
He took the _muleta_ from the hands of Garabato, who offered it folded
as he came inside the walls; he grasped the sword which his servant also
presented to him, and with short steps walked over and stood in front of
the president's box carrying his cap in his hand. All craned their
necks, devouring the idol with their eyes, but no one heard his speech.
The arrogant, slender figure, the body thrown back to give greater force
to his words, produced on the multitude the same effect as the most
eloquent address. As he ended his peroration with a half turn, throwing
his cap on the ground, enthusiasm broke out long and loud. Hurrah for
the boy from Seville! Now they were to see the real thing! And the
spectators looked at each other mutely, anticipating stupendous events.
A tremor ran along the rows of seats as though they were in the presence
of something sublime.
The profound silence produced by great emotions fell suddenly upon the
multitude as though the plaza had been emptied. The life of so many
thousands of persons was condensed into their eyes. No one seemed to
breathe.
Gallardo advanced slowly toward the bull holding the _muleta_ across his
body like a banner, and waving his sword in his other hand with a
pendulum-like movement that kept time with his step.
Turning his head an instant he saw that Nacional with another member of
his _cuadrilla_ was following to assist him, his cape over his arm.
"Stand aside, everybody!"
A voice rang out in the silence of the plaza making itself heard even to
the farthest seats, and a burst of admiration answered it. "Stand aside,
everybody!" He had said, "Stand aside, everybody!" What a man!
He walked up to the beast absolutely alone, and instantly silence fell
again. He calmly readjusted the red flag on the stick, extended it, and
advanced thus a few steps until he almost touched the nose of the bull,
which stood stupefied and terrified by the audacity of the man.
The public dared not speak nor even breathe but admiration shone in
their eyes. What a youth! He walked in between the very horns! He
stamped the ground impatiently with one foot, inciting the beast to
attack, and that enormous mass of flesh, defended by sharp horns fell
bellowing upon him. The _muleta_ passed over his horns, which grazed the
tassels and fringes of the dress of the bull-fighter standing firm in
his place, with no other movement than a backward bending of his body. A
shout from the crowd answered this whirl of the _muleta_. Hurrah!
The infuriated beast returned; he re-attacked the man with the "rag,"
who repeated the pass, with the same roar from the public. The bull,
made more and more furious by the deception, attacked the athlete who
continued whirling the red flag within a short distance, fired by the
proximity of danger and the wondering exclamations of the crowd that
seemed to intoxicate him.
Gallardo felt the animal snort upon him; the moist vapor from its muzzle
wet his right hand and his face. Grown familiar by contact he looked
upon the brute as a good friend who was going to let himself be killed
to contribute to his glory.
The bull stood motionless for some seconds as if tired of this play,
gazing with hazy eyes at the man and at the red scarf, suspecting in his
obscure mind the existence of a trick which with attack after attack was
drawing him toward death.
Gallardo felt the presentiment of his happiest successes. Now! He rolled
the flag with a circular movement of his left hand around the staff and
he raised his right hand to the height of his eyes, standing with the
sword pointing towards the neck of the beast.
The crowd was stirred by a movement of protest and horror.
"Don't strike yet," shouted thousands of voices. "No, no!"
It was too soon. The bull was not in good position; he would make a
lunge and catch him. But Gallardo moved regardless of all rules of the
art. What did either rules or life matter to that desperate man?
Suddenly he threw himself forward with his sword held before him, at the
same time that the wild beast fell upon him. It was a brutal, savage
encounter. For an instant man and beast formed a single mass and thus
moved together several paces, no one knowing which was the conqueror,
the man with an arm and part of his body lying between the two horns, or
the beast lowering his head and trying to seize with his defences the
puppet of gold and colors which seemed to be slipping away from him.
At last the group parted, the _muleta_ lay on the ground like a rag, and
the bull-fighter, his hands free, went staggering back from the impulse
of the shock until he recovered his equilibrium a few steps away. His
clothing was in disorder; his cravat floated outside his vest, gored and
torn by one of the horns.
The bull raced on impelled by the momentum of his start. Above his broad
neck the red hilt of the sword embedded to the cross scarcely protruded.
Suddenly the animal paused, shuddering with a painful movement of
obeisance, doubled his fore legs, inclined his head till his bellowing
muzzle touched the sand, and finished by lying down with shudders of
agony.
It seemed as if the very building would fall, as if the bricks dashed
against one another, as
|
of the revision of those of Corcuera. They are much more clear-cut
than most of the remaining twenty-three ordinances, some of which
are vague and full of loopholes. As a whole, these first sixty-one
ordinances regulate the conduct of the alcaldes-mayor in their official
and private life in all lines--moral, religious, judicial, economic,
etc. From them one obtains almost a full glimpse of the life of the
times; he sees the canker of graft which was working in and through
everything; gains a knowledge of the Spanish treatment of their wards,
the natives, from the different standpoints of government paternalism,
and individual rapacity, half-contempt, and cruelty of subordinate
officials and others; notes the corrective measures that were taken,
often halting and inadequate; and above all, is conscious of that
peculiar method of Spanish legislation which, while apparently giving
subordinate officials a free hand, drew them back to the center by
threats of the residencia. The ordinances of Raón are ninety-four in
number, many of which are repetitions of the foregoing, while some
contain amendments and additions, and some again, are new. There
is, for instance, considerably more legislation relating to the
ecclesiastical estate in these later ordinances, which touch upon
certain abuses common among them in their treatment of the natives
and in their relations with the government. Less drastic, in many
ways, than those of Arandía (of which no known copy is extant), they
are more drastic than those of Corcuera and Cruzat, in the treatment
of both religious and natives. The scheme of government outlined in
both sets of ordinances is a simple and in some ways effective one,
but its effects were never fully seen, because of the almost total
disregard of the measures contained therein.
In 1771, Archbishop de Santa Justa issued instructions to the secular
clergy which forcibly indicate the need of many reforms among them,
in both their official and their private conduct.
One of the most important events in the history of Filipinas was the
expulsion of the Jesuit order therefrom in 1768, an account of which
is here presented, prefaced by a brief statement of the expulsion of
that order from Spain and its domains, and the causes of that measure;
it proves to be the final stroke in the long conflict between the
Spanish crown and the popes of Rome over the prerogatives of authority
claimed by the former in ecclesiastical matters. The Jesuits had
always upheld the principle of authority, as exercised by the Holy
See, and were therefore opposed to the claims of the Spanish monarchs;
moreover, the ideas of freedom brought from France in that period were
already fermenting in Spain, and had great influence in the minds of
Carlos III and his ministers; and they saw that the expulsion of the
Jesuits from the Spanish dominions would remove the chief obstacles
to their designs for governmental reforms and independence of papal
interference. In Filipinas this expulsion does not proceed as desired
by the Spanish court, with secrecy and promptness; the venal governor
(Raón) warns the Jesuits of their fate, enabling them to make all
preparations for their departure. Legal proceedings are therefore
brought against Raón and his associates in their residencias, but some
of them die before the suits are ended; and Anda, who instituted these
by royal order, is nevertheless impeded in every way, and afterward
sentenced to heavy fines, through the machinations of his enemies. A
decree by the archbishop (November 1, 1769) censures the officious
proceeding of an auditor, who seized and prohibited certain books
hostile to the Jesuits.
A letter (December 13, 1771) from a Franciscan friar at Manila,
relates various ecclesiastical disputes in connection with the diocesan
council of 1771.
The Editors
April, 1907.
DOCUMENT OF 1764-1800
Events in Filipinas, 1764-1800. Compiled from Montero y Vidal.
Source: Compiled from Montero y Vidal's Historia de Filipinas, ii,
pp. 66-70, 115-140, 229-382.
Translation: This is made by Emma Helen Blair.
EVENTS IN FILIPINAS, 1764-1800
Archbishop Rojo, ad interim governor of the islands at the time of
the English attack on Manila, died on January 30, 1764, a prisoner
in the hands of the conquerors. [1] A few days later, Anda received
despatches from Spain notifying him of the treaty of peace made
with England, and he immediately entered into negotiations with the
English for the surrender of Manila, which was accomplished on March 31
following. There was a dispute over the question of who should succeed
Rojo in the government of the islands, an honor which was certainly due
to the patriot Anda, who was, however, opposed by some of the citizens;
but this was settled by the arrival of Colonel Francisco de la Torre,
appointed governor ad interim of the islands, to whom Anda surrendered
his command on March 17. The revolts and other disturbances in the
provinces, consequent on the English occupancy, and their suppression,
are noted in VOL. XLIX; cf. Montero y Vidal, Hist. de Filipinas, ii,
chap. iii, and Ferrando, Hist. PP. dominicos, v, pp. 640-644, 651-740,
for fuller accounts of these, and of the Chinese insurrection which
then occurred. Ferrando makes (p. 739) the following interesting
citation from an unnamed but "reliable" writer: "There died in this
war some seventy Spaniards and two hundred and fifty natives, who,
as good subjects, fought even unto death for their king. Before
the insurrection there were in the province [of Pangasinan] 60,383
souls; and according to the computation which was made on May 13,
1766, there were in it only 33,456; consequently the loss for the
entire province was 26,927 souls. Many of these inhabitants emigrated,
others perished from their privations, and no small number were killed
by the barbarians." [2] During Torre's temporary command the most
important occurrence was a noisy controversy which was called forth
by the imprudent and meddlesome utterances of a Jesuit preacher in
Manila, Francisco Javier Puch, attacking government officials. [3]
The governor with the aid of the fiscal Viana, attempted to secure
the punishment or rebuke of Puch, but the Dominican theologians took
sides against them with the Jesuits; [4] the dispute was carried to
the court at Madrid, and produced long and bitter controversies and
dissensions, and probably was one of the motives which influenced
the king, some years later, to expel the Jesuits from his dominions.
On July 6, 1765, the new proprietary governor, José Raon, a military
officer of high rank, relieved Torre; he appears to have been able
but unscrupulous. [5] He is most conspicuous for his revision of
the "Ordinances of good government" drawn up by Arandía (see post,
pp. 191-264), the revision being dated February 26, 1768; and for
the expulsion of the Jesuits from the islands (1768), in pursuance of
the orders received from Madrid dated March 1, 1767--which matter is
related in detail in the last document of this volume. In 1769 he also
decreed the expulsion of the Chinese from Filipinas, although this was
not fully enforced. Early in October, 1766, the French astronomer Le
Gentil, whose Voyage (Paris, 1781) is a valuable contribution at once
to science and to the history of Filipinas at that time, arrived at
Manila, commissioned by the French government to make observations
on the approaching transit of Venus. "On account of the scarcity of
copper money in Manila, the senior regidor of the municipal council,
Domingo Gómez de la Sierra, in 1766 [6] requested authorization to make
the said coins, with the name of barrillas, because their shape was
that of a parallelogram. The government complied with this request,
ordaining that only [the amount of] 5,000 pesos should be coined,
to be used only in Tondo and Cavite. From that time, the Indians gave
the name barrilla to copper coins." "The municipal council again asked
for authority to make the barrillas, for use in various provinces;
and by royal decree of December 19, 1769, order was given to send
from Mexico 6,000 pesos in cuartillos (that is, fourths of silver
reals)--with the provision that the coin [previously] made should be
gathered in, and that what should be necessary should be made with the
royal arms, within the limits allowed to San Domingo, as appears in
ley 8, tit. xxiv, [book iv,] of the Recopilación de Indias." In 1766
there were two very fierce eruptions of the volcano Mayón, in Albay,
occurring on July 20 and October 23; in the second, vast quantities
of water were ejected, forming rivers and torrents, which destroyed
some villages and many lives, and ruined many homes and farms. [7]
On July 22, 1767, the new archbishop, Basilio Sancho de Santa Justa
y Rufina, [8] took possession of the see of Manila, and immediately
undertook to subject the regular curas to his diocesan visitation,
thus reviving the Camacho controversy of 1697-1700 (see VOL. XLII,
pp. 25-116) with the religious orders; but Santa Justa had the
support of the civil authority, which had orders to enforce the royal
rights of patronage. "The governor of the islands, on his side,
communicated to the provincials of the religious orders rigorous
commands that they must submit to the royal rights of patronage:
that within a short time-limit they should present their lists of
three names each [sus ternas] for appointments to all the curacies;
and that in future they might not remove any religious from his post
without informing the viceregal patron of the causes, whether public
or private, for such action." The Dominican province, in a provincial
council of August 5, 1767, yielded to the archbishop's claims, and
during the following year he visited all the parishes administered
by them; but some individuals refused to obey the council. The other
orders obstinately resisted the episcopal visitation, declaring that
they would abandon their curacies if it were enforced. Thereupon,
the archbishop appointed secular priests to the vacant curacies,
including those of the Parián, Binondo, and Bataan, which were
in charge of the Dominicans. [9] As the number of Spanish priests
was so small, the archbishop made up the deficiency by ordaining
natives from the seminaries; but this measure caused great resentment
among the regulars and their supporters, and Santa Justa himself was
disappointed in its effects, as the native clergy were generally so
unfit for the office of priest in both education and morals. [10]
Complaints to the king were made by both the religious orders and
the archbishop, filled with mutual accusations and recriminations;
and Raon withdrew his support from the latter, ceasing to press the
claims of the royal patronage--influenced thereto, according to Montero
y Vidal, by the intrigues of the Jesuits, who were enemies to Santa
Justa. The support given by the Dominicans to the Jesuits in the Puch
affair was censured by the Dominican general (Fray Tomás de Bojadors),
who punished the Philippine provincial, Fray Joaquín del Rosario,
and two of his brethren by depriving them of office and recalling
them to Madrid. They availed themselves of various technicalities to
delay their return for a long time; but finally two of them were sent
from Manila late in December, 1778. Fray Joaquín del Rosario (his
companion having died on the voyage) was captured by the English,
but afterward regained his liberty and proceeded to Madrid, where
the dispute was finally settled in an amicable manner.
After the capture of Manila by the English, the Moros renewed their
piratical incursions, the Spanish authorities being so burdened with
the insurrections of the natives and the Chinese, the lack of revenues,
and the general disturbance of the colony's affairs, that they could
do nothing to curb the insolence of the Moros. Those cruel pirates
therefore ravaged the entire archipelago, even capturing fishing-boats
in Manila Bay; and everywhere the coast villages were destroyed or
depopulated, and the native population kept in continual terror of this
inhuman foe. Bishop Ezpeleta, while temporary governor, had disbanded
the little fleet at Iligan commanded by the Jesuits Ducós, which had
been some check on the enemy, but Governor Rojo reëstablished the
Pintados fleet, with headquarters at Cebú; nevertheless, this could do
little to restrain them. There was a general attack by the Joloans and
Mindanaos, [11] well aided by the Tirones and Malanaos; and so insolent
did they become that they captured two richly-laden champans on the
Mariveles coast, and entrenched themselves at Mamburao, on Mindoro
Island, and sold their Filipino captives to the Macasar traders who
resorted thither. A small squadron was collected at Cavite, which
conveyed over 1,200 men to attack this Moro fort; [12] after several
days of skirmishing, the enemy fled, and the Spaniards seized their
stronghold, finding therein sufficient rice and other property to more
than pay the expenses of the expedition. Another Moro band, however,
made amends for this loss by gaining possession of the fort at Cateel,
with all its contents; but on going to besiege that at Tandag they
were repulsed and defeated, leaving behind all their arms and supplies.
In 1767 Anda went to Madrid, where he was praised and richly rewarded
for his brave conduct during the English invasion; and the king made
him a member of the Council of Castilla. Later, the post of governor of
Filipinas was offered to him; he several times refused the honor, but
finally yielded to the urgent request of the government, and in July,
1770 made his entry into Manila, where he was received with unbounded
enthusiasm. His instructions made it necessary for him to institute
legal proceedings against his predecessor Raon, who was accused of
having warned the Jesuits of their intended expulsion, and of having
secreted important official documents. Raon was held a prisoner in
his house, but died before the suit could be tried in court. In this
suit were also included two auditors and the royal fiscal, and they and
their friends attacked Anda bitterly, causing him numberless vexations
in his efforts to fix on them the responsibility for misconduct in
the affair of the Jesuit expulsion. It was reported in Spain that
the English intended to make another attack on Manila; Anda therefore
repaired the walls of the city [13] and constructed ships, and within
eight months had built and equipped twelve armed vessels of various
sizes, besides several smaller craft. Notwithstanding this enterprise,
the public revenues were greatly increased during the first year,
[14] and thus Anda was able to send several expeditions against the
Moro pirates. An earthquake [15] occurred on the night of February 1,
which fortunately did no great damage.
"The religious corporations, notwithstanding the support which they
generally lent to Anda during the war with the English, regarded with
displeasure his appointment as governor of Filipinas. That strict
magistrate, obeying the dictates of his conscience (which some
persons attribute, but without sufficient grounds, to feelings of
personal revenge), had addressed to the king on April 12, 1768, an
exposition which treated of 'the disorders which exist in Filipinas,
and which ought to be corrected.' In this document he points out most
serious abuses among the friars; in the university, which was in their
charge; among the Jesuits; among the Chinese, protected by the friars,
who preferred them before the Spaniards, driving away and expelling
the latter from their villages; and he censures certain frauds and
practices in the public administration in specified branches of the
civil service. The seventy with which Anda laid bare those abuses drew
upon him the hatred of the friars. [16] In this document he demanded a
remedy for the disorders which he denounced, pointing out the method
by which this might be effected, and declared that 'for the radical
correction of these evils it is indispensable to draw up and introduce
here a form of procedure which is clear, and capable of securing the
just system which corresponds thereto, conferring upon the governor
all the powers necessary for carrying it into execution, by those
measures which prudence and the actual condition of affairs shall
dictate to him.' He added: 'The choice of a zealous governor will
materially contribute to laying the foundations of that great work;
but it is necessary to reward him and give him authority, so that he
can work to advantage, and without the hindrances which have often,
by means of secret communications, cunning and disloyal maneuvers, and
other malicious proceedings, frustrated the best and most carefully
formed plans.' This exposition [17] by Anda was certainly taken into
account, for in the 'royal private instructions' which were given to
him when he was appointed governor of Filipinas we see that he was
ordered to put an end to specified abuses and disorders, the king using
the same terms which Anda had employed in describing those evils."
"The archbishop Santa Justa, a man of unparalleled firmness and
energetic character, from the first moment assailed the new governor
of Filipinas on the question of the diocesan visitation, to which
the friars continued their opposition, and demanded his support
in order to make it effectual. Anda, who regarded obedience to the
laws as a rule of conduct, and who brought orders from the court to
subject the regulars to the royal patronage, addressed an explicit
communication to the superiors of all the religious institutes,
requiring their obedience to the mandate of the sovereign, and
assigning a definite term, which could not be prolonged, for the
presentation of their lists of appointees, in order that the curacies
might be filled in this manner. All the orders of regulars openly
refused to yield obedience of this sort, excepting the Dominicans--who,
more circumspect, and endeavoring to avoid the dangers which they
foresaw in resistance, agreed to submit to this command--although
many of the parish priests of the order soon were disobedient to this
decision of their superiors."
The archbishop convened a provincial council at Manila, which held six
sessions during the period May 19-November 24, 1771; various matters
of ecclesiastical administration came before it, the chief of which
was the diocesan visit. In the fifth session, the subjection of the
parish priests to the diocesan visitation and the royal patronage
was ordained; and at the final one it was ordered that the decrees
of the council should immediately be promulgated, declaring that
those of the council of Mexico (which Urban VIII had ordered to be
observed in Filipinas) were not now binding. In the first session
the bishop of Nueva Cáceres, Fray Antonio de Luna (a Franciscan),
became involved in disputes over the appointment of secretaries,
and was expelled from the assembly; he then retired to his diocese,
and during the entire period of the council opposed its proceedings,
with protests, legal formalities, and official edicts. Bishop
Ezpeleta of Cebú died soon after the opening of the council, and
the government of that diocese devolved upon Luna, but, it seems,
not its representation in the council. A secretary of that body,
Father Joaquín Traggia, was sent to Madrid as its agent and bearer
of its despatches; but the king refused to accept his credentials,
and ordered him to go to his convent at Zaragoza, forbidding him to
return to Filipinas. (Toward the end of this council, the archbishop,
in concert with his suffragans, drew up a tariff for the parochial
fees to be collected by the curas.) The religious orders finally
secured, through influence at the court, the revocation of the order
given to Anda in regard to the regular curas, which had resulted in
many of them being removed from the Indian villages and replaced by
native priests; but no change was made in regard to the diocesan
visitation. The bishop of Nueva Segovia, Fray Miguel Garcia, [18]
claimed this right, and convened a diocesan council in 1773; the
only result was, to arouse a hot controversy between Garcia and the
Dominicans, to which order he belonged. That order also had a dispute
with the archbishop over his attempt to visit the beaterio of Santa
Catalina; but in 1779 the king decided that this institution should
continue to enjoy its exemption from visitation.
"By royal decree of November 9, 1774, it was ordered that the curacies
held by the regulars should be secularized as fast as they became
vacant. Anda suspended the execution of this command, and wrote to the
court, specifying the evils which would ensue from the secularization
of the curacies which the archbishop desired; and in consequence
of this and of the urgent appeals of the Franciscans, Augustinians,
and Recollects, the king ordered by a decree of December 11, 1776,
that what had been decided on this point in the decree of November 9,
1774, should not be put into execution, and that affairs should be
restored to their former status and condition, and their curacies to
the religious; that the regulations for his royal patronage and the
ecclesiastical visitation should be observed, but that the latter
might be made by the bishops in person, or by religious of the same
order as those who should serve in the curacies, and without collecting
visitation fees. The king also directed in the said decree that efforts
should be made, by all possible means and methods, to form a large body
of competent clerics, in order that, conformably to the royal decree
of June 23, 1757, these might be installed in the vacant curacies,
thus gradually establishing the secularization that had been decreed."
Anda took what precautions were available to restrain the Moro pirates,
but great difficulties arose in his way. Ali-Mudin, whom the English
had restored to his sway in Joló, and his son Israel (in whose favor
the father had abdicated) were friendly to the Spaniards, with many of
their dattos; but another faction, led by Zalicaya, the commander of
the Joloan armadas, favored the English, who had established themselves
(1762) on the islet of Balambangan [19] in the Joló archipelago,
which they had induced Bantilan to grant them; and the English were
accused of endeavoring to incite the Joloans against the Spaniards
by intrigue and bribery. Anda decided to send an expedition to make
protest to the English against their occupation of this island, as
being part of the Spanish territory, and entrusted this mission to an
Italian officer named Giovanni Cencelly, who was then in command of
one of the infantry regiments stationed at Manila; the latter sailed
from Zamboanga December 30, 1773, bearing careful instructions as to
his mode of procedure, and to avoid any hostilities with the English
and maintain friendship with the Joloans. But Cencelly seems to have
been quite destitute of tact or judgment, and even of loyalty to his
governor; for he disobeyed his instructions, angered the Joloans,
[20] who could hardly be restrained by Ali-Mudin from massacring the
Spaniards, and at the end of three weeks was obliged to return to
Zamboanga. He was on bad terms with the commandant there (Raimundo
Español), and refused to render him any account of his proceedings
at Joló; and he even tried to stir up a sedition among the Spanish
troops against Español. The English gladly availed themselves of this
unfortunate affair to strengthen their own position in Joló, stirring
up the islanders against Spain and erecting new forts. Later, however,
the English at Balambangan showed so much harshness and contempt for
the Moro dattos (even putting one in the pillory) that the latter
plotted to surprise and kill the intruders; and on March 5, 1775, this
was accomplished, the English being all slain except the commandant and
five others, who managed to escape to their ship in the harbor. The
fort was seized by the Moros, who thus acquired great quantities of
military supplies, arms, money, and food, with several vessels. [21]
Among this spoil were forty-five cannons and $24,000 in silver. Elated
by this success, Tenteng, the chief mover of the enterprise, tried to
secure Zamboanga by similar means; but the new commandant there, Juan
Bayot, was on his guard, and the Moros were baffled. Tenteng then went
to Cebú, where he committed horrible ravages; and other raids of this
sort were committed, the Spaniards being unable to check them for a
long time. A letter written to the king by Anda in 1773 had asked for
money to construct light armed vessels, and a royal order of January
27, 1776, commanded that 50,000 pesos be sent to Filipinas for this
purpose. This money was employed by Anda's temporary successor, Pedro
Sarrio, in the construction of a squadron of vintas, "vessels which,
on account of their swiftness and exceedingly light draft, were more
suitable for the pursuit of the pirates than the very heavy galleys;
they were, besides, to carry pilots of the royal fleet to reconnoiter
the coasts, draw plans of the ports, indicate the shoals and reefs,
take soundings in the sea, etc."
Notwithstanding the great services which Anda had rendered to his
king and country, his enemies succeeded in procuring from the Spanish
government the revocation of the sentences which had been pronounced
in the suits brought by Anda (at the instance of that very government,
and as its representative) against Raon and other corrupt officials;
and Anda was condemned (by decrees in 1775-76) to pay the costs
in these suits, and the further sums of four thousand pesos to the
heirs of Raon and two thousand to the former fiscal, Juan Antonio
Cosío. These unexpected and heavy blows, added to the strain of his
official responsibilities and the annoyances caused by the attacks
of his personal enemies, broke down Anda's health; and he died at
the hospital of San Felipe, Cavite, on October 30, 1776, at the,
age of sixty-six years. [22]
Sultan Israel of Joló was poisoned by the followers of his cousin
Ali-Mudin, son of Bantilan, who therefore assumed the government
(early in 1778); immediately the Moros renewed their raids on the
Spanish provinces nearest them, and the expeditions sent against them
by Sarrio could do little to punish them.
In July, 1778, the new proprietary governor arrived at Manila; this
was José de Basco y Vargas, an officer in the Spanish royal navy. The
officials of the Audiencia forthwith sent a remonstrance to the court,
against their being subordinated to a man whose rank "gave him only
the right to be addressed as 'you' while each one of the magistrates
[of the Audiencia] enjoyed the title of 'Lordship,'" and they asked
for the revocation of Basco's appointment: but of course this was
refused, and they were rebuked for their officiousness. As a result,
the auditors opposed all that Basco attempted, and even conspired to
seize his person and put Sarrio in his place. That officer, however,
refused to join them, and informed the governor of the scheme;
in consequence, Basco arrested the recalcitrant auditors and other
persons connected with their plans (including Cencelly), and sent
them all to Spain. [23] Now free from hindrances, he devoted himself
to the administration of the government, the welfare of the country,
and the development of its resources.
"In a document entitled 'A general economic plan,' he extolled the
advantages which are inherent in the promotion and development
of agriculture, commerce, and industries. He offered therein to
bestow rewards and distinctions on the persons who should excel in
agriculture, in making plantations of cotton, of mulberry trees,
and of the choicer spices, as cloves, cinnamon, pepper, and nutmeg;
to those who should establish manufactures of silk, porcelain, and
fabrics of hemp, flax, [24] and cotton like those that were received
from the Coromandel Coast, Malabar, and China; to those who would
undertake to work the mines of gold, iron, copper, and tin; to those
who should make discoveries useful to the State; and to those who
should excel in sciences, the liberal arts, and mechanics. He also
circulated instructions in regard to the method of cultivating and
preparing for use cotton, silk, sugar, etc. He also, in Camarines,
compelled the planting of more than four millions of mulberry
trees, which for several years yielded an excellent product; but
these important plantations were abandoned after his term of office
[expired]. [25] He improved the schools, and aided the diffusion of
knowledge by promoting the knowledge of the Castilian language. In
order to repress the boldness of the murderous highwaymen who infested
the roads in the provinces nearest to Manila, he appointed judges with
power of condemnation [jueces de acordada [26]]; these, accompanied
by a counsellor and an executioner, by summary process tried the
malefactors whom they arrested in their respective districts, and
applied the penalty--a measure so efficacious that in a short time
there was complete security everywhere. The Audiencia appealed
against this measure, and the king issued a decree notifying
the governor to abstain from meddling in the jurisdiction of that
court. In acknowledging the receipt of this sovereign command, Basco
remarked that 'unfortunately it had arrived too late.' As war had
been again declared between España and Inglaterra, Basco caused the
fortifications of Manila and Cavite, and the forts in the provinces,
to be repaired, changing a great part of the artillery therein for
new pieces. He also reorganized the army. In 1778 the order for the
expulsion of the Chinese was revoked, and a considerable number of
them returned to Manila.
A royal decree of November 15, 1777, recommended the establishment of
an institution in which vagrants and dissolute persons might be shut
up. Accordingly, Manuel del Castillo y Negrete, minister of justice
for the Philippines, drew up and printed (Sampaloc, 1779) a manual of
ordinances for the management of a general refuge for poor persons,
beggars, women of lewd life, abandoned children, and orphans. For this
project he had obtained the opinions of learned persons, all of whom
extolled it; and he sent this document to the king. Besides promoting
all interests of morality, and the development of agriculture,
industry, and commerce, Basco founded the noted "Economic Society of
Friends of the Country." [27] A royal decree dated August 27, 1780,
had ordered him to convene all the learned or competent persons in
the colony, "in order to form an association of selected persons,
capable of producing useful ideas;" but when this decree arrived,
Basco had already founded the above society. On February 7, 1781,
the active members of the general tribunal [junta] of commerce had
assembled, and agreed upon the constitution of the society, a number
of them signing their names as its members--among them the Marqués
de Villamediana, the prior of the consulate of commerce. "The body
of merchants endowed the society with a permanent fund of 960 pesos
a year, the value of two toneladas which were assigned to it in the
lading of the Acapulco galleon." The society was formally inaugurated
on May 6, 1781, under the presidency of Basco, who made an eloquent
address. Its first president was the quartermaster-general of the
islands, Ciríaco González Carvajal; according to its first regulations,
it contained the following sections: natural history, agriculture
and rural economy, factories and manufactures, internal and foreign
commerce, industries, and popular education. "Stimulated by Basco,
the society undertook with great ardor to promote the cultivation of
indigo, cotton, cinnamon, and pepper, and the silk industry, according
to the orders published by the superior authority. The parish priest
of Tambóbong, Fray Matías Octavio, taught his parishioners to prepare
the indigo, presenting to the society the first specimens, which were
adjudged to be of superior quality. In 1784, the first shipment of this
article to Europa was made in the royal fragata 'Asunción.' The society
also recommended that effort be made to attain perfection in weaving
and dyeing. (The society declined greatly after the departure of its
founder; and Aguilar roughly opposed it. In 1809 it was extinguished;
two years later, orders were received for its reëstablishment, but
this was not accomplished until 1819. In the following year, its
constitution was remodeled; and in 1821 it founded at its own cost a
professorship of agriculture and an academy of design, and established
special instruction in dyeing. In 1824 it resolved to bestow rewards
on the most successful farmers; and it introduced from China martins,
to fight the locusts that were desolating the fields. In 1828 its
constitution experienced another revision; but during more than half
a century it gave hardly any sign of its existence. It had a flash
of vitality in 1882, but soon fell again into a decline. To-day
[about 1893] there is hardly any indication that Manila remembers
a society of this sort; and, as it is not in the Guía de forasteros
["Guide for strangers"], it may be said that it has ceased to exist.)
"Filipinas had been, until the arrival of the illustrious Basco
y Vargas in the country, a heavy burden on the capital, since
every year the situado was sent in cash from México to meet the
obligations of the islands. In order to free España from this sort
of load, and to raise the country from its depressed condition, he
conceived the vast project of stimulating the cultivation of tobacco,
by establishing a government monopoly of it. [28] He communicated his
plan to the Spanish government; and by a royal order of February 9,
1780, the monopoly of tobacco, similar to that which was in force
in the other dominions of the nation, was decreed. He immediately
published two proclamations, on December 13 and 25 respectively,
in 1781, prohibiting the sale, traffic, and manufacture of tobacco;
and on February 16, 1782, he issued (signed and sealed by himself),
'Instructions which are given to all the commanders or heads of the
patrols, the provincial administrators, the market inspectors, and
other persons who are under obligation to prevent loss to the revenue
from tobacco.' These were directed to the prevention of smuggling,
showing the way in which investigations should be conducted--including
the houses of parish priests, the convents, colleges, and beaterios,
the quarters of the soldiers, etc. He created a board of direction
for this revenue, a general office of administration or agency,
and subordinate offices to this in the provinces. Basco's idea was
strongly opposed by various interests; but the governor's energy was
able to conquer this unjust opposition, and the monopoly was organized
on March 1, 1782; it constituted the basis of the prosperity of the
exchequer in that country, and its most important source of revenue.
"The zealous governor visited the provinces in person, in order to
inform himself of their needs and to remedy these, compelling their
governors and other functionaries to fulfil their trusts as they
should. He also organized various
|
they came in, shout: “Look!” and slide slowly down the banisters, head
foremost? Should he? The car turned in at the drive. It was too late!
And he only waited, jumping up and down in his excitement. The car came
quickly, whirred, and stopped. His father got out, exactly like life. He
bent down and little Jon bobbed up—they bumped. His father said,
“Bless us! Well, old man, you are brown!” Just as he would; and the
sense of expectation—of something wanted—bubbled unextinguished in
little Jon. Then, with a long, shy look he saw his mother, in a blue
dress, with a blue motor scarf over her cap and hair, smiling. He jumped
as high as ever he could, twined his legs behind her back, and hugged.
He heard her gasp, and felt her hugging back. His eyes, very dark blue
just then, looked into hers, very dark brown, till her lips closed on
his eyebrow, and, squeezing with all his might, he heard her creak and
laugh, and say:
“You are strong, Jon!”
He slid down at that, and rushed into the hall, dragging her by the
hand.
While he was eating his jam beneath the oak tree, he noticed things
about his mother that he had never seemed to see before, her cheeks for
instance were creamy, there were silver threads in her dark goldy hair,
her throat had no knob in it like Bella's, and she went in and out
softly. He noticed, too, some little lines running away from the corners
of her eyes, and a nice darkness under them. She was ever so beautiful,
more beautiful than “Da” or Mademoiselle, or “Auntie” June or even
“Auntie” Holly, to whom he had taken a fancy; even more beautiful than
Bella, who had pink cheeks and came out too suddenly in places. This new
beautifulness of his mother had a kind of particular importance, and he
ate less than he had expected to.
When tea was over his father wanted him to walk round the gardens.
He had a long conversation with his father about things in general,
avoiding his private life—Sir Lamorac, the Austrians, and the emptiness
he had felt these last three days, now so suddenly filled up. His father
told him of a place called Glensofantrim, where he and his mother had
been; and of the little people who came out of the ground there when it
was very quiet. Little Jon came to a halt, with his heels apart.
“Do you really believe they do, Daddy?” “No, Jon, but I thought you
might.”
“Why?”
“You're younger than I; and they're fairies.” Little Jon squared the
dimple in his chin.
“I don't believe in fairies. I never see any.” “Ha!” said his father.
“Does Mum?”
His father smiled his funny smile.
“No; she only sees Pan.”
“What's Pan?”
“The Goaty God who skips about in wild and beautiful places.”
“Was he in Glensofantrim?”
“Mum said so.”
Little Jon took his heels up, and led on.
“Did you see him?”
“No; I only saw Venus Anadyomene.”
Little Jon reflected; Venus was in his book about the Greeks and
Trojans. Then Anna was her Christian and Dyomene her surname?
But it appeared, on inquiry, that it was one word, which meant rising
from the foam.
“Did she rise from the foam in Glensofantrim?”
“Yes; every day.”
“What is she like, Daddy?”
“Like Mum.”
“Oh! Then she must be...” but he stopped at that, rushed at a wall,
scrambled up, and promptly scrambled down again. The discovery that his
mother was beautiful was one which he felt must absolutely be kept to
himself. His father's cigar, however, took so long to smoke, that at
last he was compelled to say:
“I want to see what Mum's brought home. Do you mind, Daddy?”
He pitched the motive low, to absolve him from unmanliness, and was a
little disconcerted when his father looked at him right through, heaved
an important sigh, and answered:
“All right, old man, you go and love her.”
He went, with a pretence of slowness, and then rushed, to make up. He
entered her bedroom from his own, the door being open. She was still
kneeling before a trunk, and he stood close to her, quite still.
She knelt up straight, and said:
“Well, Jon?”
“I thought I'd just come and see.”
Having given and received another hug, he mounted the window-seat, and
tucking his legs up under him watched her unpack. He derived a pleasure
from the operation such as he had not yet known, partly because she was
taking out things which looked suspicious, and partly because he liked
to look at her. She moved differently from anybody else, especially from
Bella; she was certainly the refinedest-looking person he had ever seen.
She finished the trunk at last, and knelt down in front of him.
“Have you missed us, Jon?”
Little Jon nodded, and having thus admitted his feelings, continued to
nod.
“But you had 'Auntie' June?”
“Oh! she had a man with a cough.”
His mother's face changed, and looked almost angry. He added hastily:
“He was a poor man, Mum; he coughed awfully; I—I liked him.”
His mother put her hands behind his waist.
“You like everybody, Jon?”
Little Jon considered.
“Up to a point,” he said: “Auntie June took me to church one Sunday.”
“To church? Oh!”
“She wanted to see how it would affect me.” “And did it?”
“Yes. I came over all funny, so she took me home again very quick. I
wasn't sick after all. I went to bed and had hot brandy and water, and
read The Boys of Beechwood. It was scrumptious.”
His mother bit her lip.
“When was that?”
“Oh! about—a long time ago—I wanted her to take me again, but she
wouldn't. You and Daddy never go to church, do you?”
“No, we don't.”
“Why don't you?”
His mother smiled.
“Well, dear, we both of us went when we were little. Perhaps we went
when we were too little.”
“I see,” said little Jon, “it's dangerous.”
“You shall judge for yourself about all those things as you grow up.”
Little Jon replied in a calculating manner:
“I don't want to grow up, much. I don't want to go to school.” A sudden
overwhelming desire to say something more, to say what he really felt,
turned him red. “I—I want to stay with you, and be your lover, Mum.”
Then with an instinct to improve the situation, he added quickly “I
don't want to go to bed to-night, either. I'm simply tired of going to
bed, every night.”
“Have you had any more nightmares?”
“Only about one. May I leave the door open into your room to-night,
Mum?”
“Yes, just a little.” Little Jon heaved a sigh of satisfaction.
“What did you see in Glensofantrim?”
“Nothing but beauty, darling.”
“What exactly is beauty?”
“What exactly is—Oh! Jon, that's a poser.”
“Can I see it, for instance?” His mother got up, and sat beside him.
“You do, every day. The sky is beautiful, the stars, and moonlit nights,
and then the birds, the flowers, the trees—they're all beautiful. Look
out of the window—there's beauty for you, Jon.”
“Oh! yes, that's the view. Is that all?”
“All? no. The sea is wonderfully beautiful, and the waves, with their
foam flying back.”
“Did you rise from it every day, Mum?”
His mother smiled. “Well, we bathed.”
Little Jon suddenly reached out and caught her neck in his hands.
“I know,” he said mysteriously, “you're it, really, and all the rest is
make-believe.”
She sighed, laughed, said: “Oh! Jon!”
Little Jon said critically:
“Do you think Bella beautiful, for instance? I hardly do.”
“Bella is young; that's something.”
“But you look younger, Mum. If you bump against Bella she hurts.”
“I don't believe 'Da' was beautiful, when I come to think of it; and
Mademoiselle's almost ugly.”
“Mademoiselle has a very nice face.” “Oh! yes; nice. I love your little
rays, Mum.”
“Rays?”
Little Jon put his finger to the outer corner of her eye.
“Oh! Those? But they're a sign of age.”
“They come when you smile.”
“But they usen't to.”
“Oh! well, I like them. Do you love me, Mum?”
“I do—I do love you, darling.”
“Ever so?”
“Ever so!”
“More than I thought you did?”
“Much—much more.”
“Well, so do I; so that makes it even.”
Conscious that he had never in his life so given himself away, he felt
a sudden reaction to the manliness of Sir Lamorac, Dick Needham, Huck
Finn, and other heroes.
“Shall I show you a thing or two?” he said; and slipping out of her
arms, he stood on his head. Then, fired by her obvious admiration, he
mounted the bed, and threw himself head foremost from his feet on to
his back, without touching anything with his hands. He did this several
times.
That evening, having inspected what they had brought, he stayed up to
dinner, sitting between them at the little round table they used when
they were alone. He was extremely excited. His mother wore a French-grey
dress, with creamy lace made out of little scriggly roses, round her
neck, which was browner than the lace. He kept looking at her, till at
last his father's funny smile made him suddenly attentive to his slice
of pineapple. It was later than he had ever stayed up, when he went to
bed. His mother went up with him, and he undressed very slowly so as to
keep her there. When at last he had nothing on but his pyjamas, he said:
“Promise you won't go while I say my prayers!”
“I promise.”
Kneeling down and plunging his face into the bed, little Jon hurried
up, under his breath, opening one eye now and then, to see her standing
perfectly still with a smile on her face. “Our Father”—so went his last
prayer, “which art in heaven, hallowed be thy Mum, thy Kingdom Mum—on
Earth as it is in heaven, give us this day our daily Mum and forgive us
our trespasses on earth as it is in heaven and trespass against us, for
thine is the evil the power and the glory for ever and ever. Amum! Look
out!” He sprang, and for a long minute remained in her arms. Once in
bed, he continued to hold her hand.
“You won't shut the door any more than that, will you? Are you going to
be long, Mum?”
“I must go down and play to Daddy.”
“Oh! well, I shall hear you.”
“I hope not; you must go to sleep.”
“I can sleep any night.”
“Well, this is just a night like any other.”
“Oh! no—it's extra special.”
“On extra special nights one always sleeps soundest.”
“But if I go to sleep, Mum, I shan't hear you come up.”
“Well, when I do, I'll come in and give you a kiss, then if you're awake
you'll know, and if you're not you'll still know you've had one.”
Little Jon sighed, “All right!” he said: “I suppose I must put up with
that. Mum?”
“Yes?”
“What was her name that Daddy believes in? Venus Anna Diomedes?”
“Oh! my angel! Anadyomene.”
“Yes! but I like my name for you much better.”
“What is yours, Jon?”
Little Jon answered shyly:
“Guinevere! it's out of the Round Table—I've only just thought of it,
only of course her hair was down.”
His mother's eyes, looking past him, seemed to float.
“You won't forget to come, Mum?”
“Not if you'll go to sleep.”
“That's a bargain, then.” And little Jon screwed up his eyes.
He felt her lips on his forehead, heard her footsteps; opened his eyes
to see her gliding through the doorway, and, sighing, screwed them up
again.
Then Time began.
For some ten minutes of it he tried loyally to sleep, counting a great
number of thistles in a row, “Da's” old recipe for bringing slumber. He
seemed to have been hours counting. It must, he thought, be nearly time
for her to come up now. He threw the bedclothes back. “I'm hot!” he
said, and his voice sounded funny in the darkness, like someone else's.
Why didn't she come? He sat up. He must look! He got out of bed, went to
the window and pulled the curtain a slice aside. It wasn't dark, but he
couldn't tell whether because of daylight or the moon, which was very
big. It had a funny, wicked face, as if laughing at him, and he did not
want to look at it. Then, remembering that his mother had said moonlit
nights were beautiful, he continued to stare out in a general way. The
trees threw thick shadows, the lawn looked like spilt milk, and a long,
long way he could see; oh! very far; right over the world, and it all
looked different and swimmy. There was a lovely smell, too, in his open
window.
'I wish I had a dove like Noah!' he thought.
“The moony moon was round and bright, It shone and shone and made it
light.”
After that rhyme, which came into his head all at once, he became
conscious of music, very soft-lovely! Mum playing! He bethought himself
of a macaroon he had, laid up in his chest of drawers, and, getting it,
came back to the window. He leaned out, now munching, now holding his
jaws to hear the music better. “Da” used to say that angels played on
harps in heaven; but it wasn't half so lovely as Mum playing in the
moony night, with him eating a macaroon. A cockchafer buzzed by, a moth
flew in his face, the music stopped, and little Jon drew his head in.
She must be coming! He didn't want to be found awake. He got back into
bed and pulled the clothes nearly over his head; but he had left a
streak of moonlight coming in. It fell across the floor, near the foot
of the bed, and he watched it moving ever so slowly towards him, as if
it were alive. The music began again, but he could only just hear it
now; sleepy music, pretty—sleepy—music—sleepy—slee.....
And time slipped by, the music rose, fell, ceased; the moonbeam crept
towards his face. Little Jon turned in his sleep till he lay on his
back, with one brown fist still grasping the bedclothes. The corners of
his eyes twitched—he had begun to dream. He dreamed he was drinking milk
out of a pan that was the moon, opposite a great black cat which watched
him with a funny smile like his father's. He heard it whisper: “Don't
drink too much!” It was the cat's milk, of course, and he put out his
hand amicably to stroke the creature; but it was no longer there; the
pan had become a bed, in which he was lying, and when he tried to get
out he couldn't find the edge; he couldn't find it—he—he—couldn't get
out! It was dreadful!
He whimpered in his sleep. The bed had begun to go round too; it was
outside him and inside him; going round and round, and getting fiery,
and Mother Lee out of Cast up by the Sea was stirring it! Oh! so
horrible she looked! Faster and faster!—till he and the bed and Mother
Lee and the moon and the cat were all one wheel going round and round
and up and up—awful—awful—awful!
He shrieked.
A voice saying: “Darling, darling!” got through the wheel, and he awoke,
standing on his bed, with his eyes wide open.
There was his mother, with her hair like Guinevere's, and, clutching
her, he buried his face in it.
“Oh! oh!”
“It's all right, treasure. You're awake now. There! There! It's
nothing!”
But little Jon continued to say: “Oh! oh!”
Her voice went on, velvety in his ear:
“It was the moonlight, sweetheart, coming on your face.”
Little Jon burbled into her nightgown
“You said it was beautiful. Oh!”
“Not to sleep in, Jon. Who let it in? Did you draw the curtains?”
“I wanted to see the time; I—I looked out, I—I heard you playing, Mum;
I—I ate my macaroon.” But he was growing slowly comforted; and the
instinct to excuse his fear revived within him.
“Mother Lee went round in me and got all fiery,” he mumbled.
“Well, Jon, what can you expect if you eat macaroons after you've gone
to bed?”
“Only one, Mum; it made the music ever so more beautiful. I was waiting
for you—I nearly thought it was to-morrow.”
“My ducky, it's only just eleven now.”
Little Jon was silent, rubbing his nose on her neck.
“Mum, is Daddy in your room?”
“Not to-night.”
“Can I come?”
“If you wish, my precious.”
Half himself again, little Jon drew back.
“You look different, Mum; ever so younger.”
“It's my hair, darling.”
Little Jon laid hold of it, thick, dark gold, with a few silver threads.
“I like it,” he said: “I like you best of all like this.”
Taking her hand, he had begun dragging her towards the door. He shut it
as they passed, with a sigh of relief.
“Which side of the bed do you like, Mum?”
“The left side.”
“All right.”
Wasting no time, giving her no chance to change her mind, little Jon got
into the bed, which seemed much softer than his own. He heaved another
sigh, screwed his head into the pillow and lay examining the battle of
chariots and swords and spears which always went on outside blankets,
where the little hairs stood up against the light.
“It wasn't anything, really, was it?” he said.
From before her glass his mother answered:
“Nothing but the moon and your imagination heated up. You mustn't get so
excited, Jon.”
But, still not quite in possession of his nerves, little Jon answered
boastfully:
“I wasn't afraid, really, of course!” And again he lay watching the
spears and chariots. It all seemed very long.
“Oh! Mum, do hurry up!”
“Darling, I have to plait my hair.”
“Oh! not to-night. You'll only have to unplait it again to-morrow. I'm
sleepy now; if you don't come, I shan't be sleepy soon.”
His mother stood up white and flowey before the winged mirror: he could
see three of her, with her neck turned and her hair bright under the
light, and her dark eyes smiling. It was unnecessary, and he said:
“Do come, Mum; I'm waiting.”
“Very well, my love, I'll come.”
Little Jon closed his eyes. Everything was turning out most
satisfactory, only she must hurry up! He felt the bed shake, she was
getting in. And, still with his eyes closed, he said sleepily: “It's
nice, isn't it?”
He heard her voice say something, felt her lips touching his nose, and,
snuggling up beside her who lay awake and loved him with her thoughts,
he fell into the dreamless sleep, which rounded off his past.
TO LET
“From out the fatal loins of those two foes A pair of star-crossed
lovers take their life.” —Romeo and Juliet.
TO CHARLES SCRIBNER
PART I
I.—ENCOUNTER
Soames Forsyte emerged from the Knightsbridge Hotel, where he was
staying, in the afternoon of the 12th of May, 1920, with the intention
of visiting a collection of pictures in a Gallery off Cork Street, and
looking into the Future. He walked. Since the War he never took a cab
if he could help it. Their drivers were, in his view, an uncivil lot,
though now that the War was over and supply beginning to exceed demand
again, getting more civil in accordance with the custom of human nature.
Still, he had not forgiven them, deeply identifying them with gloomy
memories, and now, dimly, like all members, of their class, with
revolution. The considerable anxiety he had passed through during the
War, and the more considerable anxiety he had since undergone in the
Peace, had produced psychological consequences in a tenacious nature.
He had, mentally, so frequently experienced ruin, that he had ceased to
believe in its material probability. Paying away four thousand a year in
income and super tax, one could not very well be worse off! A fortune of
a quarter of a million, encumbered only by a wife and one daughter, and
very diversely invested, afforded substantial guarantee even against
that “wildcat notion” a levy on capital. And as to confiscation of war
profits, he was entirely in favour of it, for he had none, and “serve
the beggars right!” The price of pictures, moreover, had, if anything,
gone up, and he had done better with his collection since the War began
than ever before. Air-raids, also, had acted beneficially on a spirit
congenitally cautious, and hardened a character already dogged. To be in
danger of being entirely dispersed inclined one to be less apprehensive
of the more partial dispersions involved in levies and taxation, while
the habit of condemning the impudence of the Germans had led naturally
to condemning that of Labour, if not openly at least in the sanctuary of
his soul.
He walked. There was, moreover, time to spare, for Fleur was to meet him
at the Gallery at four o'clock, and it was as yet but half-past two.
It was good for him to walk—his liver was a little constricted, and his
nerves rather on edge. His wife was always out when she was in Town, and
his daughter would flibberty-gibbet all over the place like most young
women since the War. Still, he must be thankful that she had been too
young to do anything in that War itself. Not, of course, that he had
not supported the War from its inception, with all his soul, but between
that and supporting it with the bodies of his wife and daughter,
there had been a gap fixed by something old-fashioned within him which
abhorred emotional extravagance. He had, for instance, strongly objected
to Annette, so attractive, and in 1914 only thirty-four, going to her
native France, her “chere patrie” as, under the stimulus of war, she had
begun to call it, to nurse her “braves poilus,” forsooth! Ruining
her health and her looks! As if she were really a nurse! He had put a
stopper on it. Let her do needlework for them at home, or knit! She had
not gone, therefore, and had never been quite the same woman since. A
bad tendency of hers to mock at him, not openly, but in continual little
ways, had grown. As for Fleur, the War had resolved the vexed problem
whether or not she should go to school. She was better away from her
mother in her war mood, from the chance of air-raids, and the impetus to
do extravagant things; so he had placed her in a seminary as far West
as had seemed to him compatible with excellence, and had missed her
horribly. Fleur! He had never regretted the somewhat outlandish name
by which at her birth he had decided so suddenly to call her—marked
concession though it had been to the French. Fleur! A pretty name—a
pretty child! But restless—too restless; and wilful! Knowing her power
too over her father! Soames often reflected on the mistake it was to
dote on his daughter. To get old and dote! Sixty-five! He was getting
on; but he didn't feel it, for, fortunately perhaps, considering
Annette's youth and good looks, his second marriage had turned out a
cool affair. He had known but one real passion in his life—for that
first wife of his—Irene. Yes, and that fellow, his cousin Jolyon, who
had gone off with her, was looking very shaky, they said. No wonder, at
seventy-two, after twenty years of a third marriage!
Soames paused a moment in his march to lean over the railings of the
Row. A suitable spot for reminiscence, half-way between that house in
Park Lane which had seen his birth and his parents' deaths, and the
little house in Montpellier Square where thirty-five years ago he had
enjoyed his first edition of matrimony. Now, after twenty years of
his second edition, that old tragedy seemed to him like a previous
existence—which had ended when Fleur was born in place of the son he had
hoped for. For many years he had ceased regretting, even vaguely, the
son who had not been born; Fleur filled the bill in his heart. After
all, she bore his name; and he was not looking forward at all to the
time when she would change it. Indeed, if he ever thought of such a
calamity, it was seasoned by the vague feeling that he could make her
rich enough to purchase perhaps and extinguish the name of the fellow
who married her—why not, since, as it seemed, women were equal to men
nowadays? And Soames, secretly convinced that they were not, passed his
curved hand over his face vigorously, till it reached the comfort of his
chin. Thanks to abstemious habits, he had not grown fat and gabby; his
nose was pale and thin, his grey moustache close-clipped, his eyesight
unimpaired. A slight stoop closened and corrected the expansion given to
his face by the heightening of his forehead in the recession of his
grey hair. Little change had Time wrought in the “warmest” of the young
Forsytes, as the last of the old Forsytes—Timothy-now in his hundred and
first year, would have phrased it.
The shade from the plane-trees fell on his neat Homburg hat; he had
given up top hats—it was no use attracting attention to wealth in days
like these. Plane-trees! His thoughts travelled sharply to Madrid—the
Easter before the War, when, having to make up his mind about that Goya
picture, he had taken a voyage of discovery to study the painter on his
spot. The fellow had impressed him—great range, real genius! Highly as
the chap ranked, he would rank even higher before they had finished with
him. The second Goya craze would be greater even than the first;
oh, yes! And he had bought. On that visit he had—as never
before—commissioned a copy of a fresco painting called “La Vendimia,”
wherein was the figure of a girl with an arm akimbo, who had reminded
him of his daughter. He had it now in the Gallery at Mapledurham, and
rather poor it was—you couldn't copy Goya. He would still look at it,
however, if his daughter were not there, for the sake of something
irresistibly reminiscent in the light, erect balance of the figure, the
width between the arching eyebrows, the eager dreaming of the dark eyes.
Curious that Fleur should have dark eyes, when his own were grey—no
pure Forsyte had brown eyes—and her mother's blue! But of course her
grandmother Lamotte's eyes were dark as treacle!
He began to walk on again toward Hyde Park Corner. No greater change
in all England than in the Row! Born almost within hail of it, he
could remember it from 1860 on. Brought there as a child between the
crinolines to stare at tight-trousered dandies in whiskers, riding with
a cavalry seat; to watch the doffing of curly-brimmed and white top
hats; the leisurely air of it all, and the little bow-legged man in
a long red waistcoat who used to come among the fashion with dogs
on several strings, and try to sell one to his mother: King Charles
spaniels, Italian greyhounds, affectionate to her crinoline—you never
saw them now. You saw no quality of any sort, indeed, just working
people sitting in dull rows with nothing to stare at but a few young
bouncing females in pot hats, riding astride, or desultory Colonials
charging up and down on dismal-looking hacks; with, here and there,
little girls on ponies, or old gentlemen jogging their livers, or an
orderly trying a great galumphing cavalry horse; no thoroughbreds, no
grooms, no bowing, no scraping, no gossip—nothing; only the trees
the same—the trees indifferent to the generations and declensions of
mankind. A democratic England—dishevelled, hurried, noisy, and seemingly
without an apex. And that something fastidious in the soul of Soames
turned over within him. Gone forever, the close borough of rank and
polish! Wealth there was—oh, yes! wealth—he himself was a richer man
than his father had ever been; but manners, flavour, quality, all gone,
engulfed in one vast, ugly, shoulder-rubbing, petrol-smelling Cheerio.
Little half-beaten pockets of gentility and caste lurking here and
there, dispersed and chetif, as Annette would say; but nothing ever
again firm and coherent to look up to. And into this new hurly-burly of
bad manners and loose morals his daughter—flower of his life—was flung!
And when those Labour chaps got power—if they ever did—the worst was yet
to come.
He passed out under the archway, at last no longer—thank
goodness!—disfigured by the gungrey of its search-light. 'They'd better
put a search-light on to where they're all going,' he thought, 'and
light up their precious democracy!' And he directed his steps along the
Club fronts of Piccadilly. George Forsyte, of course, would be sitting
in the bay window of the Iseeum. The chap was so big now that he was
there nearly all his time, like some immovable, sardonic, humorous
eye noting the decline of men and things. And Soames hurried, ever
constitutionally uneasy beneath his cousin's glance. George, who, as he
had heard, had written a letter signed “Patriot” in the middle of the
War, complaining of the Government's hysteria in docking the oats of
race-horses. Yes, there he was, tall, ponderous, neat, clean-shaven,
with his smooth hair, hardly thinned, smelling, no doubt, of the best
hair-wash, and a pink paper in his hand. Well, he didn't change! And
for perhaps the first time in his life Soames felt a kind of sympathy
tapping in his waistcoat for that sardonic kinsman. With his weight, his
perfectly parted hair, and bull-like gaze, he was a guarantee that the
old order would take some shifting yet. He saw George move the pink
paper as if inviting him to ascend—the chap must want to ask something
about his property. It was still under Soames' control; for in the
adoption of a sleeping partnership at that painful period twenty
years back when he had divorced Irene, Soames had found himself almost
insensibly retaining control of all purely Forsyte affairs.
Hesitating for just a moment, he nodded and went in. Since the death
of his brother-in-law Montague Dartie, in Paris, which no one had quite
known what to make of, except that it was certainly not suicide—the
Iseeum Club had seemed more respectable to Soames. George, too, he knew,
had sown the last of his wild oats, and was committed definitely to the
joys of the table, eating only of the very best so as to keep his weight
down, and owning, as he said, “just one or two old screws to give me an
interest in life.” He joined his cousin, therefore, in the bay window
without the embarrassing sense of indiscretion he had been used to feel
up there. George put out a well-kept hand.
“Haven't seen you since the War,” he said. “How's your wife?”
“Thanks,” said Soames coldly, “well enough.”
Some hidden jest curved, for a moment, George's fleshy face, and gloated
from his eye.
“That Belgian chap, Profond,” he said, “is a member here now. He's a rum
customer.”
“Quite!” muttered Soames. “What did you want to see me about?”
“Old Timothy; he might go off the hooks at any moment. I suppose he's
made his Will.”
“Yes.”
“Well, you or somebody ought to give him a look up—last of the old lot;
he's a hundred, you know. They say he's like a mummy. Where are you
goin' to put him? He ought to have a pyramid by rights.”
Soames shook his head. “Highgate, the family vault.”
“Well, I suppose the old girls would miss him, if he was anywhere else.
They say he still takes an interest in food. He might last on, you know.
Don't we get anything for the old Forsytes? Ten of them—average age
eighty-eight—I worked it out. That ought to be equal to triplets.”
“Is that all?” said Soames, “I must be getting on.”
'You unsociable devil,' George's eyes seemed to answer. “Yes, that's
all: Look him up in his mausoleum—the old chap might want to prophesy.”
The grin died on the rich curves of his face, and he added: “Haven't you
attorneys invented a way yet of dodging this damned income tax? It
hits the fixed inherited income like the very deuce. I used to have two
thousand five hundred a year; now I've got a beggarly fifteen hundred,
and the price of living doubled.”
“Ah!” murmured Soames, “the turf's in danger.”
Over George's face moved a gleam of sardonic self-defence.
“Well,” he said, “they brought me up to do nothing, and here I am in the
sear and yellow, getting poorer every day. These Labour chaps mean to
have the lot before they've done. What are you going to do for a living
when it comes? I shall work a six-hour day teaching politicians how to
see a joke. Take my tip, Soames; go into Parliament, make sure of your
four hundred—and employ me.”
And, as Soames retired, he resumed his seat in the bay window.
Soames moved along Piccadilly deep in reflections excited by his
cousin's words. He himself had always been a worker and a saver, George
always a drone and a spender; and yet, if confiscation once began,
it was he—the worker and the saver—who would be looted! That was the
negation of all virtue, the overturning of all Forsyte principles. Could
civilization be built on any other? He did not think so. Well, they
wouldn't confiscate his pictures, for they wouldn't know their worth.
But what would they be worth, if these maniacs once began to milk
capital? A drug on the market. 'I don't care about myself,' he thought;
'I could live on five hundred a year, and never know the difference, at
my age.' But Fleur! This fortune, so widely invested, these treasures
so carefully chosen and amassed, were all for—her. And if it should
turn out that he couldn't give or leave them to her—well, life had
no meaning, and what was the use of going in to look at this crazy,
futuristic stuff with the view of seeing whether it had any future?
Arriving at the Gallery off Cork Street, however, he paid his shilling,
picked up a catalogue, and entered. Some ten persons were prowling
round. Soames took steps and came on what looked to him like a lamp-post
bent by collision with a motor omnibus. It was advanced some three
paces from the wall, and was described in his catalogue as “Jupiter.” He
examined it with curiosity, having recently turned some
|
tering to himself, and fancying that he is again on board his
ship in the midst of fire and slaughter, and between you and I, sir,
they _do_ say--but hush! he's coming with his granddaughter. [_Music._
_Enter M. LAROQUE, leaning on MARGUERITE._
_Mar._ This way, dear grandfather. So, so. How well and strong you are
to-day. [_ALAIN places chairs and exits._
_Laroque._ Always better and stronger when you are near me, my darling,
[_sits down._] Thank ye, thank ye.
_Mar._ Let me present to you Mons. Manuel, our new steward.
_LAROQUE, on seeing MANUEL, is transfixed and gazes with a sort of
terror at him._
_Lar._ No--no--no--it cannot be!
_Mar._ What is this?
_Lar._ But I tell you he is dead--dead--
_Mar._ Dearest grandfather! [_To_ MANUEL.] For heaven's sake, sir, speak
to him.
_Man._ Really, Mademoiselle--I--I--
_Mar._ Speak, sir! Say something--anything--
_Man._ I am happy, sir, that I can devote my humble talents to your
service.
_Lar._ But he is dead--
_Man._ Who?
_Mar._ The last steward-- [_Signs to MANUEL to speak on._
_Man._ All the more happy, sir, as I have heard of your many brilliant
exploits, and had relatives who, like yourself, have often fought
against the English--
_Lar._ The English! Aye--aye--aye--they did it--they were the cause, but
they paid it all--paid dearly--dearly.
_Man._ [_Approaching._] Permit me, sir, to--
_Lar._ Ah! No--no--no. He has blood upon him! See--see--see--
_Mar._ Grandfather, dear grandfather! Do not regard him, [_To MANUEL._]
he is often thus--his great age--and--and--oh, sir, pray retire; join my
mother, I beg of you.
_Man._ Certainly, Mademoiselle. [_Aside._] A good beginning, truly.
[_Exit._
_Mar._ Grandfather, dearest, what terrible thoughts are troubling you?
See, it is I, Marguerite, your child.
_Lar._ Eh! my child! Ah, yes, true, my child, my own dear child; but
where is--are we alone? Who stood _there_ just now?
_Mar._ That was our new steward, Monsieur Manuel.
_Lar._ Manuel--Manuel--'tis very strange! I thought--
_Mar._ What, dear grandfather?
_Lar._ Thought that--that--
_Mar._ Oh, you thought you recognized him? He is like some one you have
seen before?
_Lar._ Yes--yes--yes--like some one I have seen before. But I am very
old, darling, and have seen so many faces in my time. Well, well, I
think I shall like him. Does he play picquet?
_Mar._ Indeed I do not know--
_Lar._ I hope so, I hope so--
_Enter MAD. AUBREY._
_Mad. H._ Ah, my dear cousin, how do you find yourself now? They told me
you were ill, and almost frightened me to death.
_Lar._ Thank ye, cousin, thank ye. It was only a passing weakness.
_Mad. A._ Indeed, I rejoice to hear it, for I was fearful of some
sudden--Oh, why did you not send for me? 'Tis very unkind of you
to forget those who love you so. [_Weeps._
_Mar._ Grandpapa, there's one for you. [_Aside to him._
_Lar._ [_To MAD. AUBREY._] Well, well it's very kind of you to be so
fearful of _something sudden_, but you needn't--I've made my _will_.
[_Aside to MARGUERITE._] There's one for _her_!
_Mad. A._ Come now, take my arm, a walk upon the terrace will do you so
much good. There, don't be afraid to lean on me.
_Lar._ You're very kind, cousin. Thank ye, thank ye. [_Going._]
Marguerite, my darling, ask him if he plays picquet.
_Mar._ I will.
_Lar._ Umph! do you think he does?
_Mar._ I have no doubt of it.
_Lar._ [_As he goes out with_ MAD. AUBREY.] I hope so--I hope so--I
hope so! [_Exeunt LAROQUE and MAD. AUBREY._
_Mar._ My poor grandfather; spite of his failing memory, he sees through
the disinterestedness of our good cousin Aubrey. But those wild words,
his terror at the appearance of this young man, what could that mean? Or
had it any meaning? [_Sees MAD. LAROQUE and MANUEL coming in at back._]
My mother--and leaning on the arm of that person!
_Mad. L._ Precisely my own opinion, sir, my impression exactly; this
is really charming; we agree upon every point.
_Man._ I am flattered, Madame, to think such should be the case.
_Bev._ [_Without._] 'Pon my honor, young ladies, I can't, I really
can't!
_Enter BEVANNES, surrounded by ladies, exclaiming_, "You must,
Indeed!"
_Bev._ Would you believe it, Madame? Those unconscionable ladies
insist on another waltz.
_Mar._ Oh, indeed I cannot play any more--I must finish this to-day--It
is a promise--
_Man._ Pray do not let that inconvenience the ladies--I will play a
waltz with much pleasure. [_Touches Piano._
_Bev._ Sir!
_Mar._ [_Haughtily._] Thank you, sir--it is not requisite.
_Man._ [_Aside._] Forgetting again. [_Goes up Terrace._
_Bev._ [_Aside._] Pretty cool!
_Mar._ Very presuming of that steward.
_Mad L._ Very polite of that _gentleman_.
_Bev._ Highly disgusting to _this_ gentleman.
_Mad. L._ Well, de Bevannes, you must find some other amusement for the
ladies.
_Bev._ 'Gad, I'll soon do that. It's positively fatiguing to be in such
general request with them. They can't do without me for one moment--they
absolutely--
_Turns and perceives MANUEL, who, during the preceding dialogue,
has entered into conversation with the ladies, and has, by this
time, offered his arm to two of them--They all accompany him off._
_Bev._ [_Aside._] Well, if I were given to strong sentiments, I should
wish that fellow at the deuce. As it is, I'll content myself with simply
damning his impudence.
_Mad. L._ Do you know, my dear, that I don't feel quite easy in my mind
about that young man.
_Bev._ [_Aside._] Nor I, either.
_Mar._ Why not, mamma?
_Mad. L._ He is much too charming to make a good steward.
_Mar._ Really; I do not perceive it. A person may be honest and
well-behaved, although he does happen to play on the piano.
_Bev._ I don't know that; I flatter myself I have seen something of the
world, and experience has specially taught me to beware of the man who
plays the piano.
_Mar._ Mamma, dear, will you hand me those scissors?
_Mad. L._ Yes, my child. [_Perceives MANUEL'S portfolio._] Whose
drawing-book is this?
_Mar._ That? oh! that is the steward's--I saw it in his hand when he
came in.
_Mad. L._ I positively must take a peep. Oh! De Bevannes, look!
beautiful! What a charming accomplishment it is to draw well.
_Mar._ Yes, for an engineer, or a builder--
_Bev._ Or an actor--
_Mar._ Why gracious! Monsieur de Bevannes, you have said a good thing.
_Bev._ Have I? Allow me to apologize.
_Mar._ Not at all; it's your _first_ offence.
_Mad. L._ How beautifully finished these groups are.
_Bev._ Positively, they're not so bad.
_Mad. L._ Bad! my dear sir; they're exquisite. Look, for instance at
that horse--is it not perfection?
_Bev._ It would be, doubtless--only it happens to be a cow.
_Mad.L._ A cow?
_Bev._ I think so; horses don't go about with two horns.
_Enter MANUEL._
_Man._ Your pardon, ladies; but I believe I left my drawing-book--
_Mad. L._ Allow me to return it, sir--and to thank you for an accident
which has afforded us much pleasure.
_Man._ Madame, you are too kind--so kind, indeed, that you have too long
refrained from permitting me to commence my duties. With your consent, I
will at once set about them. Your farm at Langeot, of which you spoke to
me, is not more, I think, than a mile or two from this. I will walk over
there this afternoon, and--
_Mad. L._ Walk! over such a miserable bad road as it is. Indeed, sir, I
could not allow it.
_Enter MADAME AUBREY._
_Mad. A._ Hush! Pray, _pray_, not so much noise. My dear cousin has
composed himself to sleep.
_Bev._ Noise! it appears to me we were pretty quiet.
_Mad. A._ Ah, sir, you might think so; but the least sound jars upon
his poor nerves. [_Weeps._
_Bev._ [_Aside._] I never saw such a devil of a woman as this is, to
cry.
_Man._ But I assure you, Madame, that I would rather walk. If I pretend
to be your steward--why steward I must be, and not fine gentleman.
_Mad. L._ [_To_ MARGUERITE.] My dear, would it be proper to allow M.
Manuel to walk?
_Mar._ I believe it is usual for the steward to do so. However, I see no
reason why he should not ride, if he chooses. There are plenty of horses
in the stable.
_Mad. A._ Ah! [_Weeps._
_Bev._ What's the matter, Madame?
_Mad. A._ Talking of riding always overcomes me.
_Bev._ Excuse my peculiar mode of expression--but you appear to me to
pass your life in being perpetually overcome.
_Mad. A._ Women are but fragile flowers. [_Weeps._
_Bev._ They seem to require a deal of water.
_Mad. A._ But horses, sir--talking of horses, puts me in mind of a pet
I had.
_Mad. L._ A pet horse, dear?
_Mad. A._ No, love, a donkey. Oh! [_Weeps._
_Bev._ [_Aside._] Now she's watering the donkey.
_Mad. A._ I had the dear little creature for two years. Just long enough
to--pray listen, sir. [_To MANUEL._
_Man._ I beg your pardon, Madame--I'm all attention--I heard. The
creature had two ears just long enough-- [_All laugh._
_Mad. A._ No, no; I said I had him for two years--just a sufficient time
to love him like a child--when he died--died, sir, of one of those
diseases peculiar to that class of quadruped.
_Man._ Children?
_Mad. A._ No, sir, Donkies! Dear me, it was, Umph! let me see, you must
know, sir, what I mean? [_To BEVANNES._
_Bev._ Measles?
_Mad. A._ No, no, but no matter; He died--
_Bev._ Peace to his ashes. But as you were saying, Madame Laroque, there
are plenty of horses in the stable, and, really, all but ruined for want
of exercise.
_Enter DR. DESMARETS._
_Des._ Yes, that's what you'll _all_ be, if you continue to lounge away
the days as you do.
_Mad. L._ Ah, Doctor, we've missed you dreadfully.
_Des._ What's the matter? anybody sick?
_Bev._ You ought to have been here just now, Doctor; Madame Aubrey has
told the most touching tale--
_Des._ Of a donkey? I know, I've heard it often.
_Bev._ But with regard to a horse for M. Manuel. There's Black Harry--
_Des._ Black Harry! Nobody can ride the brute! He's perfectly
untameable! Why, de Bevannes, you tried it yourself and couldn't.
_Bev._ Ahem! Oh--ah--yes, but I had no spurs.
_Des._ Spurs! Why, you couldn't even get upon his back!
_Bev._ Eh--why--no--not exactly--[_Aside_] Confound him!
_Man._ [_To BEVANNES_] And is Black Harry so very unmanageable?
_Bev._ 'Pon my word I don't see it. He has an insuperable objection to
being mounted, but if you can get upon his back, and _being_ on his
back, can _keep_ there, why, of course, it's a great point in your
favor.
_Man._ [_Smiling._] Certainly an important one.
_Des._ If you except a partiality for biting, and ditto for kicking,
occasionally shying, and always prone to running away, he's a pleasant
beast.
_Mar._ But such a beauty! I never saw a horse I should like so much to
ride, if he were but properly broken.
_Man._ [_To MAD. LAROQUE_] Madame, have I your permission?
_Mad. L._ Certainly. [_MANUEL rings._
_Bev._ [_Aside._] What's he at now?
_Enter ALAIN._
_Man._ Tell one of the grooms to saddle Black Harry.
_Alain._ Sir!
_Des._ What?
_Mad. L._ No--no--
_Man._ [_To_ ALAIN.] Did you hear my order?
_Alain._ Yes, sir. [_Aside._] There'll be work for the Doctor to-day.
[_Exit._
_Bev._ [_Aside._] Good.
_Man._ Pray do not fear, Madame, I have been used to restive horses.
I'll just make his acquaintance now, and if I can succeed in gaining a
small portion of his esteem, I will do myself the honor of riding him
daily until he is fit for your daughter's use.
_Des._ [_To BEVANNES._] What the devil made you mention that confounded
animal? You don't like the new steward, eh?
_Bev._ Not particularly.
_Des._ He's good looking.
_Bev._ Inconveniently.
_Des._ And you want his neck broken?
_Bev._ No. But I should like his nose put out of joint.
_Mad. L._ I do not think I ought to permit this.
[_Noise below the terrace._
_Enter ALAIN._
_Alain._ The horse is ready, sir.
_Bev._ I will lend you a pair of my spurs. Alain, get my spurs as you go
down.
_Alain._ Very well, sir. [_Exit._
_Mad. L._ Let me entreat you, sir.
_Man._ I do assure you, there is nothing to fear. With your good wishes
I am certain of success. [_Exit down steps._
_Des._ [_On a terrace._] Why, here are all the servants and grooms.
Quite an assemblage.
_Noise--Cries of_ "Hold him," "Quiet, sir," "Out of the way,"
"Stand clear," &c.--_Enter LADIES and MLLE HELOUIN._
_Des._ A nice, quiet animal. [_Leans over._] Manuel, my dear boy. Sir!
if you break your leg, you may mend it yourself--I won't.
_Bev._ [_On a sofa._] Doctor, report progress. [_Aside._] I'll bet a
thousand francs he doesn't even mount him.
_Mar._ [_Who has overheard him._] I'll take that bet, sir.
_Bev._ Eh? oh! as you please Mademoiselle.
_Des._ By the Lord, he's up! [_Noise as before--then shout._
_Bev._ In the air?
_Des._ No, in the saddle. [_Noise again._] Ah, he's off!
_Bev._ Off the horse?
_Des._ No; off on a gallop. [_Noise gets more distant._] Egad! they're
all scampering after him. What's he doing now? The ditch! take care!
_Mad. L._ He'll be killed.
_Mad. A._ Oh! oh! [_Weeps._
_Mar._ The horse can never do it. [_Shouts distant._
_Des._ Ah! he's--
_Bev._ In it?
_Des._ No, _over_ it! Back again! [_Shouts distant._] Here he comes.
Egad! Black Harry's had enough of it. [_Shouts approach nearer._
_Mar._ [_Aside._] There's some mystery about this man. He has hardly
arrived, when all eyes seem turned to him. There certainly _is_ a
mystery.
_Mlle H._ It will be cleared up, Mademoiselle.
_Enter ALAIN._
_Mar._ What do you mean?
_Mlle H._ Hush!
_Alain._ [_To BEVANNES._] Your spurs, sir.
_Bev._ Oh! I hope they assisted him.
_Alain._ Didn't want 'em sir.
_Great shouting below--The ladies, who have been witnessing the
ride, crowd upon the terrace, waving their handkerchiefs, and
appear surrounding and congratulating MANUEL as he comes on up
steps._
_Des._ [_To BEVANNES._] Somebody's nose is out of joint.
END TABLEAU II.
Lapse of Three Months.
TABLEAU III.
_The Park of the Chateau Laroque. ALAIN discovered arranging
Portfolio and Drawing materials._
_Alain._ Now really I do thank Madame for deputing me to wait more
especially on Monsieur Manuel. Steward or no steward, he's a perfect
gentleman; of that there can't be a doubt. What a pity it is that
Mademoiselle Marguerite and he don't like one another. When he says
white, she says black. When she goes one way, he goes another, yet
everybody else likes him. M'lle Helonin, our Governess, is absolutely in
love with him, and the wonderful influence he has obtained over old
Mons. Laroque, in this short time, is unaccountable. He has hardly been
here three months, and they say that all the money will be left
according to his advice--but that's going rather far, even for gossip.
Well, now, his drawing materials are all ready for him, and--here he is
to employ them.
_Enter MANUEL._
_Man._ Alain, did you, by chance, pick up a half finished letter
anywhere in my room?
_Alain._ No, sir.
_Man._ Strange! I commenced it yesterday, and left it on my table,
intending to finish it this morning. I have searched the room
thoroughly, and it is nowhere to be found.
_Alain._ Was it of much importance?
_Man._ Merely inasmuch as it related to family and business matters. It
was for the Doctor, in case he should call when I was from home.
However, let it go. I'll write another when I return. [_Sits down and
prepares drawing materials._] Did not Mademoiselle Marguerite go out on
horseback yesterday alone?
_Alain._ Yes, sir.
_Man._ How was it you did not follow her, as usual?
_Alain._ Oh, sir, she often goes without me. She's a capital rider, and
she says, to be alone sometimes, makes her feel more self-dependent, and
you know, sir, it won't do to contradict her, for though a charitable,
kind-hearted, young lady, she's rather wilful, and terribly proud.
_Man._ Somewhat, perhaps, but her general manner appears to me more the
result of a sad and gloomy thoughtfulness, than mere pride.
_Alain._ Ah, well, I suppose, sir, that, like most young ladies of her
age, she's a little bit in love.
_Man._ In love?
_Alain._ Yes, sir, Monsieur de Bevannes has been paying her great
attention for some time past, and it would be a grand match, for, after
Monsieur Laroque, he is the richest gentleman in the neighborhood, and
of excellent family. Ah, sir, what a pity it is _you_ are not rich.
_Man._ Why so, Alain?
_Alain._ Because--no matter. Have you any orders for me, sir?
_Man._ Merely to have a good look for that letter when you go to my
room.
_Alain._ I certainly will, sir. [_Exit._
_Man._ Married--married--and to _him_. Well, and why not? Fool that I
am! Despite of all that should preserve and fence my heart as with a
wall of steel, from every impulse which could induce forgetfulness of my
bitter lot, and the one sacred object of my life, still will that coward
heart indulge in dreams--wild dreams of one day laying its most precious
offerings at the feet which would but spurn them.
_Enter M'LLE HELOUIN, with basket._
But I will conquer yet, and if the struggle be hard, the victory will be
the more worthy.
_Mlle H._ [_Aside._] He is alone. Hitherto, I have kept his secret well;
whether I will continue silent, depends upon himself. Courage, and the
poor hireling may yet be a Marchioness. [_Comes down to him._] Oh!
Monsieur Manuel, how beautiful that is! You see, while you have been
painting the woods, I have been gathering flowers. You know we have a
ball to-night.
_Man._ Indeed? I was not aware of it.
_Mlle H._ You positively don't seem to know or care about anything that
goes on. You are worse than indifferent, you are unsociable--
_Man._ Pardon me, not unsociable. But I know my station, and think it
better not to risk being reminded of it.
_Mlle H._ [_After a pause._] Monsieur Manuel--
_Man._ Mademoiselle--
_Mlle H._ Have I ever offended you?
_Man._ No, indeed.
_Mlle H._ I have been vain enough to think, at times, that you had some
friendly feeling for me.
_Man._ And so I have. It is but natural. Our fortunes and positions are
the same, or nearly so. Both dependent on the caprices of those who
employ us, both alone, friendless. This should create sympathy at least,
if not friendship.
_Mlle H._ You would not fear, then, to tell me of my faults?
_Man._ Not if you desired it.
_Mlle H._ Indeed I do desire it.
_Mlle H._ But I only know of one.
_Mlle H._ Pray name it. Nay, I shall receive it as a kindness.
_Mlle H._ Well, then I think you admit and encourage somewhat too great
a familiarity with the family in whose employment we are. Your motives
may be, indeed, I'm sure they _are_, perfectly innocent; still they will
not be so considered, for in this world, the unfortunate are always
suspected.
_Mlle H._ True, true. Spoken with a delicacy and candor all you own--I
thank you sincerely--and you will always continue as now--my true
friend?
_Man._ I shall feel honored in the title.
_Mlle H._ A true--a _dear_ friend?
_Man._ [_Aside._] What is she driving at?
_Mlle H._ A friend that loves me?
_Man._ [_Aside._] Hallo! we're getting tender!
_Mlle H._ A friend that loves me, ardently--do you hear?
_Man._ Distinctly.
_Mlle H._ And do you comprehend?
_Man._ [_Half aside._] I'm afraid I do.
_Mlle H._ Do you remember the old nursery rhyme--
"Pluck from the flower its leafy store--
Love me little, love me more;
Hearts change owners, yet combine,
If mine is yours, and yours is mine."
Come, now, let us see if you know which line should be yours. Shall I
commence?
_Man._ If you please.
_Mlle H._
"Pluck from the flower it's leafy store--[_A pause._]
Love me little, love me more; [_A pause._]
Hearts change owners, yet combine,
If----
_Man._ I respectfully decline."
_Mlle H._ [_Throwing away the flower, which she has been picking to
pieces_] Then, sir--
_Sees BEVANNES, who enters._
Indeed, I could look at it all day, it is so beautiful--but I positively
must go. Monsieur, an revoir. [_Aside to MANUEL, as she goes._] You have
misunderstood me. [_Exit._
_Man._ Have I? Then I must be a greater fool than I thought.
_Bev._ [_Aside._] Pretty close quarters. What the deuce is that
governess after? And now for a little scientific pumping. [_Comes
down._] Ah, Monsieur Manuel, at your drawing, eh? Beautiful, beautiful,
indeed.
_Man._ You flatter.
_Bev._ Not at all--but to change the subject--by the by, do, I interrupt
your work?
_Man._ Not in the least.
_Bev._ Well, I was going to compliment you on the vast affection and
confidence you have inspired in poor old Laroque.
_Man._ I believe he really has a kindly regard for me.
_Bev._ Regard! my dear sir--you are absolutely wound around his heart.
His affection for his grand-daughter is very great, but no one has the
influence over him that you have. Now, in the strictest confidence, I'm
going to be very frank with you--and mark me well, you will not find it
to your disadvantage hereafter, if you are equally frank with _me_.
_Man._ Really, I don't quite--
_Bev._ No; but you will presently. Without flattery, I think you--
_Man._ [_Referring to his picture._] Too green.
_Bev._ Eh? Oh, exactly. I was about to say I think you, in every way, a
gentleman, therefore I don't hesitate to confide in you the fact that
yesterday, after dinner, I was just--
_Man._ [_To picture._] A little blue.
_Bev._ Eh? Oh precisely. I was just on the point of proposing to Madame
Laroque for her daughter's hand, when it suddenly struck me that I
should possess a double claim, if I could, in the first place, influence
you enough in the young lady's favor to make it certain that the bulk of
Monsieur Laroque's property would be left to her.
_Man._ Monsieur de Bevannes, you really very much over-rate--
_Bev._ Pray forgive me, but you hardly know yourself, the importance of
your good offices in this matter. I was going on to say that my marriage
with Marguerite is all but a settled affair, and, of course, it is my
duty to promote her interests in every possible way. I think you must
concede that?
_Man._ Surely, but--
_Bev._Permit me. Now I wish to call to your mind that Madame Laroque,
though a worthy excellent woman, is one of very simple tastes and
habits, and, should too large a portion of the property be left to her,
it would tax and embarrass her to an extent that would be painful to my
feelings. I hope you appreciate my disinterestedness in the matter.
_Man._ Oh, thoroughly! But I am still at a loss to imagine where my
interference would be either necessary or effectual.
_Bev._ My dear friend--
_Man._ [_Aside._] Now _he's_ getting tender!
_Bev._ One word from you as to the proper disposition of the money
would--
_Man._ Monsieur de Bevannes, let me end this at once, by telling you
that, in my opinion, any interference from me in the family affairs of
M. Laroque, would be a gross and unseemly abuse of his confidence.
_Bev._ And this is the return you make for mine?
_Man._ I did not solicit it, sir.
_Bev._ Sir, permit me to take your hand.
_Man._ Really--
_Bev._ You have stood the test, you are a noble fellow. You are--
_Enter MADAME AUBREY._
[_Aside._] There's Mrs. Waterspout, by jove! [_Aloud._] You seem puzzled
at my manner--I will take another opportunity of explaining. Suffice it
now to say you have _misunderstood_ me. [_Exit._
_Man._ My understanding seems to be terribly at fault to-day.
_Mad. A._ [_Aside._] De Bevannes has left him. A good opportunity for
me. [_Comes down._] Beautiful! Exquisite indeed!
_Man._ Madame--
_Mad. A._ Truly, each new picture you finish, is more lovely than the
last. Oh! [_Weeps._
_Man._ What is the matter?
_Mad. A._ The painting of that sheep's head--
_Man._ Yes, Madame--
_Mad. A._ Reminds me of my own portrait, taken in happier years, long
passed away.
_Man._ But there are as happy ones in store for you, I hope.
_Mad. A._ That will depend greatly upon you, Monsieur Manuel.
_Man._ On _me_?
_Mad. A._ Yes. Do you know, Monsieur Manuel, that I find my poor cousin
Laroque very much changed,--
_Man._ Indeed he is.
_Mad. A._ And for the worse. In fact, he appears to me to be sinking
fast.
_Man._ I'm afraid such is the case.
_Mad. A._ How fond he is of you--you, it is well known, possess his
entire confidence.
_Man._ I have been fortunate enough to make my poor services acceptable
to him.
_Mad. A._ Now, just between ourselves, in the strictest confidence; do
you happen to be aware how the property will be left?
_Man._ I do not, Madame.
_Mad. A._ I am in a state of painful apprehension, lest the dear old
gentleman should over-estimate the desires and requirements of Madame
Laroque, and should, therefore, curtail any little legacy coming to
_me_, to make _her_ portion larger, which would be absolutely throwing
money away. I hope you understand my entire want of selfishness in this
matter?
_Man._ I think I do.
_Mad. A._ I was sure you would. Now, if you will use your power and
settle this affair to my advantage, all I can say is, so noble an action
would not go unrewarded.
_Man._ I should hope not.
_Mad. A._ You will find me _substantially_ grateful; you understand me?
_Man._ Entirely.
_Mad. A._ And I you?
_Man._ Not quite; but in order that you may--I must tell you,
Madame--that when you offer me money to rob your benefactor, and mine,
you entirely and totally mistake the person you are addressing.
_Mad. A._ Oh! oh! [_Weeps._
_Man._ It grieves me to be so abrupt, but--
_Mad. A._ It is not that, it is not that--but, to be thought capable of
such--to be accused--oh, sir! you have cruelly _misunderstood_ me.
[_Exit, weeping._
_Man._ Another misunderstanding! That makes three friends I have secured
this morning. One or two more of the same sort, and my business here
will be soon finished.
_Enter MLLE HELOUIN._
_Man._ Here comes the first misunderstanding again.
_Mlle H._ M. Manuel, I thought you might like to know that the Doctor
has just arrived--
_Man._ Thank you--I'll go to him at once. [_Exit._
_Mlle H._ So eager to avoid me. Have a care, my lord Marquis--spite of
my insignificance, you may learn to rue the day you made me conscious of
it.
_Enter BEVANNES._
And here is one on whom, if I don't very much mistake, I may rely for
aid.
_Bev._ Upon my honor, Mademoiselle, you make quite a pretty picture--a
wood nymph's reverie; sweet subject, now, for the pencil of our friend,
the steward.
_Mlle H._ Our friend, the steward, as you term him, has loftier subjects
for his pictures, either aerial or substantial.
_Bev._ Really!
_Mlle H._ And in the former quality his aspirations are sublime.
_Bev._ Mademoiselle, you are an entertaining person, but I never guessed
a conundrum in my life.
_Mlle H._ In plain terms, then, this romantic gentleman aspires to
create an interest in the heart of Marguerite.
_Bev._ O come! I can stand a great deal, but that's rather _too_ good.
_Mlle H._ But if I can prove it?
_Bev._ The thing is too absurd.
_Mlle H._ I have just parted from Madame Aubrey.
_Bev._ I congratulate you.
_Mlle H._ You jest, M. de Bevannes, but you may one day wake to find the
steward rather a dangerous person. Madame Aubrey has picked up a letter
of his, which was blown out of the window of his room, into the park.
Would you like to see it?
_Bev._ Mademoiselle, I don't pretend to more virtue than my neighbors,
but if I can only get at facts by reading another man's letters, I'm
afraid I shall remain in ignorance.
_Mlle H._ Marguerite is coming. Would you like to hear the communication
I have to make?
_Bev._ The contents of the letter?
_Mlle H._ No, but still a somewhat startling discovery.
_Bev._ On the whole, I think I'll take my departure; for when there's
mischief to be concocted, and two women to brew it, it would be the
grossest vanity in any man to think he could improve the cookery.
[_Exit._
_Mlle H._ Now if I can instill but one small drop of the poison called
suspicion, her proud, impetuous spirit, will complete the work itself.
_Enter MARGUERITE._
_Mar._ Really, a very touching scene. The affection existing between the
good doctor and our steward is remarkable. If he had been M. Manuel's
father, he could hardly have been more cordially received.
_Mlle H._ And I assure you that M. Manuel's father could not serve him
at this moment as the doctor can.
_Mar._ My dear governess, you seem to know more of this young man than
you choose to reveal. I remember well your mysterious words to me the
day he first rode and conquered that horse.
_Mlle H._ Perhaps I have been to blame for having remained silent so
long. But right or wrong, I have, until now, looked upon it as a duty to
keep this person's secret inviolate.
_Mar._ His secret!
_Mlle H._ Nor would I reveal it now, but that his base intentions are no
longer doubtful, and silence would be criminal. However, I must exact
your promise that the knowledge of it shall remain, for the present,
between ourselves.
_Mar._ You have my word. Proceed.
_Mlle H._ Four years ago, when you were in Paris--you are aware that I
was in the habit of visiting some of my old friends at my former school?
_Mar._ I remember.
_Mlle H._ Well, I often saw there this very M. Manuel. He visited the
school to see his little sister. His father was the well known Marquis
de Champcey.
_Mar._ Ah!
_Mlle H._ It was the talk of the school that the family were even then
much reduced. Now, they are totally ruined. The father is dead, and the
son has, through the good offices of a friend, been placed in a position
to regain the fortune he has lost. By what means I leave to your
penetration to discover.
_Mar._ And is it so! [_A pause._] But, after all, the conduct of this
young man in
|
? And I throw back your curse in your
teeth!
A curse on your royal race, temporal King, on the office that you hold,
on the system that permits your impotent sway!
A curse on all my teachers, from the one who taught me to read to the
one who turned me loose with a box on the ear, dazzled and full of
words!
For they took me when I was only a child and they gave me dirt to eat.
A curse on my father and on my mother also!
A curse on the food they gave me, and on their ignorance, and on the
example they set me!
THE KING: Madman, be still!
THE FIFTH WATCHER: Why did you waken me, old man? Now you shall not
silence me!
Whom else shall I curse? I am full of malediction!
My bile pours forth in a flood and boils up even to my eyes!
And so great is the spasm that shakes me
That my ribs are cracking with it and my bones are riven apart!
I will curse myself!
Myself, because I am worthless, lost, dishonored,
Degraded below all beings and cowardly beyond all measure!
And I will bury my teeth in my arms and tear my face with my nails!
Come then, O Death! Come, O Death!
_(A scratching is heard at the door. The door creaks. Silence. The
scratching comes again._
THE KING: Who is there?
_(Silence._
Come in!
_(The PRINCESS enters, timidly._
THE KING (_shading his eyes with his hand_): Who are you?
THE PRINCESS: Father, may I come in?
THE KING: Is it you, my daughter? It is so dark here! I did not
recognise you. And besides I am so old!
What have you been doing, my child?
THE PRINCESS: Pardon me, father!
I was all alone, for the servants have run away
And I was frightened.
THE KING: We are left alone in this abandoned palace
Around this little light placed on the floor.
THE PRINCESS: Shall I wait here with you, father?
THE KING: Stay.
_(She seats herself at some distance from Cébès._
CÉBÈS (_half-aloud_): I am thirsty!
_(She pours some water into a glass and gives it to him._
CÉBÈS (_shaking his head, without looking at her_): I do not want to
drink. It is not worth the trouble any longer.
O God, how long the night is!
_(The nightingale sings again suddenly, close to the window._
THE PRINCESS (_listening, with the glass in her hand_): It is the first
nightingale. He is trying out his song again, after the terrible winter.
_(The nightingale sings again._
CÉBÈS: O bird! O voice strong and pure in the night!
But the measure of time will not be changed.
O mystery of the night! And you, O season of the nudity of love when
for leaves there are only blossoms on the trees!
What do you say, O bird? But you are only a voice and not a message.
THE PRINCESS: Do you think we shall have tidings soon?
CÉBÈS: With the first hour he will be here,
Bringing the news as a laborer brings his tools.
If only I do not die before he comes!
THE PRINCESS: Do not say such a thing!
CÉBÈS: Such a thing? Do you think I do not know what it means? Go and
listen to the rabble who rave in the shadows of the room.
I lie here, and I die before my time through the sin of my parents. The
sweat runs down my face.
And if you knew the terror that is in my soul
You would not treat me like a little child who says he cannot sleep.
Woman, you do not comfort me. I have nothing in common with you. I wait
until my older brother
Comes again.
THE PRINCESS: You speak to me brutally as everyone does nowadays.
You do not want me to console you and perhaps in this you are wrong.
_(She moves away for some distance._
THE FOURTH WATCHER: Well, after all....
That young man with the army he has raised, he may be able to....
THE FIRST WATCHER: What foolishness!
THE FOURTH WATCHER: Oh you, you are frozen like a well, and like a well
condemned!
But indeed there is a power in him. I could not stand against him when
he talked
And at the same time looked at me. For his voice is strong and piercing
And he looked at me in such a way that I felt it in the pit of my
stomach,
And the flame of confusion mounted to my cheeks.
Grant that he may return with a glorious victory.
THE FIFTH WATCHER: And then what will you do?
THE FOURTH WATCHER: O I shall live in joy!
Holding my face to the sun, holding my hands to the rain!
THE FIFTH WATCHER: Listen to him! You will live in joy, will you,
carrion?
Listen to what he says! And already he has forgotten what he said a
moment since and remembers it no more.
You will live in joy? But I tell you that you are already dead and life
has departed from you and that you weep because the man is at hand who
will drive you from your place!
Do not hope! For I say to you that the sword is loosed against you and
it will not rest till it has devoured you, sweeping you from before the
face of the sun.
Like the plague upon the poultry, like the pestilence upon the pigs,
the sword has come upon you!
This I see and exult. Let me perish beneath the sword!
I do not wish to live in joy. Where is the joy in life?
But I long to die, like a man that has been flayed.
Fools! 'Tis enough for you that cozening life anoints your lips with
its greasy thumb.
But nothing will keep me from dying of the malady of death
Unless I lay hold on joy, like a thing that one grasps with one hand
and tears with the other,
Making no scrutiny or examination,
And put it in my mouth like an everlasting food, and like a fruit that
one crushes between the teeth, so that the juice gushes down the throat!
Alas for me! There is a shadow upon me. And I know that there is
something here invisible to my eyes.
For we have come to the end of things.
Man has worked and has not rested from labor; he has worked the
livelong day from the morning until the evening, he has worked the
whole of the night,
And seven days a week, and his work has taken form.
He pants and perhaps he wishes to rest. But his work is alive under him
and it does not wish to stop. And he has become its slave, for he is
snared by the feet
And trapped by the hands and no longer can he turn his eyes away.
And at last they loosen him that he may die on the ground,
And, drowned in night and utter wretchedness, alone and stretched in
his dung, he gazes upward,
Like the drunkard sprawled in the gutter, staring with bleary eyes at
the star of February in the pallid western sky.
And his eyes are like those of a little child and there is surprise in
them.
So....
THE FIRST WATCHER: So what?
THE THIRD WATCHER: Let him alone, he is choking.
THE FIFTH WATCHER: I tell you that you are captives who cannot be
delivered.
And the stone is sealed above you; it is sealed and firmly cemented and
bound with iron bands.
We are shut in this secret place with a flickering lamp in our midst.
Shall I not be permitted to spit against the walls of my prison?
And after that I shall drop my head on my breast and my heart will
break of sorrow.
_(Silence. The KING makes a sign to the PRINCESS._
THE PRINCESS: Father, what is it you wish?
_(He speaks to her.--She listens, her head bent._
THE FOURTH WATCHER: O when will the sun come again!
CÉBÈS: O when will the sun come again!
O the golden Marne,
Where the boatman half believes that he rows over hills and vineyards
and houses whitewashed to the eaves, and gardens where the wash is hung
out to dry!
Yet a few hours,
A few hours and the sun will thrust his splendor from out the Gloom!
O there were years before I had finished growing
When I went for a swim before the break of day, and as I climbed the
muddy bank, pushing my way through the reeds,
I saw the Dawn brighten above the woods,
And like one who puts on his shirt, all naked as I was, I raised both
arms towards the burning poppies of gold!
O when will the sun come again! Could I but see you once more, sun that
makes bright the earth!
Yet I know that never again shall I watch you rise in the East.
THE PRINCESS (_to the KING_): Do not ask this thing of me! I could not
do it.
THE KING: It is my will!
THE PRINCESS: Then your will shall be obeyed!
_(She goes out. Pause._
_(The _princess_ re-enters. She wears a red robe and a golden mantle
that covers her from head to foot. On her head is a sort of mitre and
a thick black braid is thrown across her shoulders. She comes forward,
her eyes closed, moving rhythmically and very slowly, and stops at
the edge of the lamplight. All look at her in silence and with great
attention._
_Pause._
_One of the bystanders rises and, taking the lamp, he holds it close to
the face of the PRINCESS and examines it. Then he replaces the lamp on
the floor and returns to his place._
THE FIRST WATCHER (_breaking the silence_): Who is there?
THE SECOND WATCHER: Hush! Listen!
THE PRINCESS (_in a low voice, opening her eyes for an instant_): One
with closed eyes who is about to awaken from a long sleep.
_(She closes her eyes again.--Silence._
THE FOURTH WATCHER: What did I say of the sun?
Here in this room there is another sun who gazes upon us in his
splendor!
Who is this, clothed in such a garment, with hands hidden beneath a
tissue of gold?
Who is this, of the height of a human being,
Who stands in a flowing robe between the lamp and the dark?
Turn towards us and hold your face before us!
Ahhh!
Our unworthiness is bodily present among us! There is not one of us who
can escape it! Beautiful and blind,
Do not reopen your eyes! Let us feast on your loveliness
Now that you do not look at us.
THE PRINCESS (_sighing_): Nnn!
THE FIRST WATCHER (_half-aloud_): What does that mean?
THE SECOND WATCHER: Do you not understand?
_(Pantomime. The PRINCESS seems to be awakening from sleep, with slow
gestures and eyes always closed._
Look!
THE PRINCESS (_sighing again_): No! ah!
_(She slowly shakes her head. Then remains motionless._
THE FOURTH WATCHER: Will you awake?
THE PRINCESS (_very softly_): Ah!
THE FOURTH WATCHER: Come, make an end, if those eyelids still are
faithful to one another.
THE PRINCESS: Ah!
Must I leave you, lovely land?
THE FIRST WATCHER: What land?
THE PRINCESS: "I sleep" it is called.
I have fled from life, I am dancing in a dream,
My feet are set among strawberry blossoms and lilies of the valley.
I cannot move from my place.
A dull voice says, "Come!" A clear voice says, "Go!" But I cannot move
from my place.
_(She opens her eyes._
THE FOURTH WATCHER: Look and see! Alas, you have ceased to smile.
THE PRINCESS (_stretching out both arms and pointing to the
bystanders_): Who are these?
THE FOURTH WATCHER: Living men, and I am one also.
THE PRINCESS: And why do they stay here, seated on the floor?
THE FOURTH WATCHER: It is night, and there is no light while it endures.
THE PRINCESS: And what is that lamp?
THE FOURTH WATCHER: _Lampas est expectationis._
THE PRINCESS: And for what are they waiting?
THE FOURTH WATCHER: For Death, who is on the way, and the door is open
for him.
THE PRINCESS: And what dwelling is this?
THE FOURTH WATCHER: It is the house of the King.
THE PRINCESS: And why have they placed the lamp upon the floor?
THE FOURTH WATCHER: I will tell you that. It is so that they can see it.
_(Short pause._
THE FIRST WATCHER: And who are you that question us?
_(Short pause._
THE PRINCESS: I do not know. Indeed I do not know who I am!
And you, do you not know? Oh, who among you will tell me?
THE THIRD WATCHER: _Gaudium nostrum es et dilectio, et jussimus te
valere._
THE PRINCESS: Truly?
THE SECOND WATCHER: Have you come again, O woman?
Your absence has been long, but I have not forgotten, and often I
dreamed of you.
THE PRINCESS: Then you have known me before?
THE SECOND WATCHER: Ask me no questions, for I am a surly man.
_(Pause._
THE PRINCESS (_looks pensively from one to another. They lower their
eyes_): I see more clearly now. I see you all. Surely the darkness
shall not hide you nor the light of the lamp.
It is I. What do you want of me?
You dreamed of me, you say? Well, I am here.
--Why do you keep your eyes lowered? Are you afraid to look at me?
THE THIRD WATCHER: There is nothing that we want,
O woman, and we do not ask you for anything.
THE PRINCESS (_looking at him_): So it is you. I know you now. (_She
turns towards the_ FIRST WATCHER) And you! (_She turns towards the_
SECOND WATCHER) And you! (_She turns towards the_ THIRD WATCHER) And
you! (_She turns towards the_ FOURTH WATCHER)
THE FOURTH WATCHER (_rising hurriedly_): Make way! Let me go!
THE PRINCESS (_stretching her hand towards him_): Stay!
THE FOURTH WATCHER: I understand only your beauty! It is all a play but
why does she turn herself towards us
With the face of bygone things and of regret,
Alas! and things that were never to be? I remember the sweetness of
love! Do not shame me before these men!
THE PRINCESS: Shame? And I myself, can I not be ashamed before them,
Like a wise and modest man who stands erect amidst drunkards?
Ah! Ah! I see and I know! Alas! I see! I see and I understand!
THE FOURTH WATCHER: We salute you, O beauty! We salute you, reproach!
O Notary of the dying, now you are drawing near us bearing your book
and scroll.
THE PRINCESS: Truly, I pity you!
THE FOURTH WATCHER: Be sad, for we are sad.
_(The nightingale sings again._
THE PRINCESS: I am not sad! The nightingale sings and I will also sing!
Let him sing and I will sing also!
And my voice shall be uplifted like the piping of a flute,
Higher, louder, enfolding the city and the night.
I will sing and cast away all bounds and all restraint!
The bird sings in the summer and is silent in the winter, but I will
sing in the chill and bitter air, and when all is frozen I will rise,
drunk with ecstasy, towards the naked heavens!
For my voice is that of love and in my heart is the fire of youth.
_(She opens her mouth as if about to sing._
THE FOURTH WATCHER: Be silent!
THE PRINCESS: You do not wish me to sing?
THE FOURTH WATCHER: Be silent!
THE PRINCESS: Then I will talk to you and will not sing....
Did you think I had gone away? In truth I was always with you.
And I will not tell you who I am, for you know it and do not forget.
Every woman is only a mother. I am she who rears and nourishes,
And entreating you for yourselves in the sacred name of pity,
Receive from you for her portion
A boundless labor hard to undertake! But because I do not speak with
your speech you despise me.
And you did not think to see me; but at last I have shown myself!
THE THIRD WATCHER: Is it you?
THE PRINCESS (_after silently contemplating them_): O fools!
Fools! What shall I say? What shall I leave unsaid? Did you believe
that you could hide from me? I penetrate to the bottom of your souls.
Nothing is hidden in obscuring shadow.
And you will not always be able
To steal away from me like a thief of the night.
What have you done? How have you fled from me?
I could call to each of you
By his name and summon him to stand and face me, And one by one I could
recount his acts,
Showing his deeds of folly and how he had sinned
Through his own fault and not the fault of another,
So that before me he would be like a man who gives himself up for lost.
O presumptuous fool! O vile and brazen companion! O horrible and
ridiculous violence!
You have rebuffed me and have thrust me forth, but to-day I shall call
you to account and you shall answer me!
I shall call you to account with a sharp and piercing voice, and it
shall pass through your heart like a sword!
And I shall be harder and more bitter to you than a shrew to her
husband!
THE FOURTH WATCHER: What could we do?
THE THIRD WATCHER: Shall we shriek before you like mandrakes? Shall
we cause the moon to tremble with our cries, more dreadful than the
shrieks of the murderer caught in the clutches of the law?
THE FIRST WATCHER: With what does she reproach us?
She is a woman. Have we not known
Women like her? And have we not found them nothing and less than
nothing?
THE PRINCESS: And was I then so ugly,
So far from pleasing that no one of you would have looked with favor
upon me, and followed after me, and taken me for his mistress?
What have you done for me? And yet what is there that I could not give
you?
Sometimes the Muse descends to wander the ways of earth,
And profiting by the evening hour when the townspeople sit at supper,
Passes by, with laurel wreathing her brow; walks, barefoot, beside the
flowing stream, singing immortal verses
All alone like a solitary stag.
And I, though I love that calm retreat,
Cannot always remain in the fountains and caves and deserted hollows
among the oaks,
But I cry, at the cross-roads, and in the city streets,
In the bustling market-place and by the doors of the dance halls,
"Who will barter handfuls of blackberries for handfuls of heavy gold
and give the flesh of his heart in exchange for a lasting love?"
_(She goes to each of the bystanders and, forcing him to raise his head
and seizing it by the hair and the chin, she looks in his face, her
eyes close to his. Then she resumes her former position in silence._
THE FOURTH WATCHER: Save our souls for us if you have the power!
THE PRINCESS: From this time forth we are strangers!
Let the shadows and the lamp bear witness to our divorce!
Many a time in such dim shades, I have warned you earnestly. But you
would give no heed.
Here in this murky light,
Now that your souls are numbered with those that are marked for death,
I come to you once more
Not to repair the breach, but to proclaim it!
You invoke me at a moment when you are beyond all aid!
What have you made of me?
It is most fitting that you should taste of death!
But as for me, I suffer an iniquitous punishment and am a reproach to
you
Unavailingly!
Alas that I should have met so much stubbornness and ignorance!
Alas, I could cry aloud in my grief and if you could not endure
To hear the cries of your wife in the agony of her travail, how could
you bear to hear my grievances against you?
Oh! It is late! And I
Must go away alone like a widow harshly evicted from her home!
You will think of me with regret in the hour of your agony,
But I abandon you and leave this dwelling. And may the spiders weave
their webs here!
_(Pause. She moves backwards till she is near the bed of Cébès and,
bending her head towards him._
And you, sick man?
_(CÉBÈS raises his eyes, sees her, and begins to laugh._
THE PRINCESS: Why do you laugh?
CÉBÈS: That thing on your head is so queer!
I can't help laughing when I look at it!
THE PRINCESS: Look at me more closely.
Don't you think that I could cure you?
CÉBÈS: What shall I do to be cured, Most Beautiful?
THE PRINCESS: You must believe me and love me, Cébès.
CÉBÈS: I have given my troth to one and to one only, and I will die and
will have no other love.
_(Silence._
What more have you to say?
THE PRINCESS (_making a movement_): Farewell!
CÉBÈS: Do not go! Stay with me!
THE PRINCESS: Take my hand. (_He takes it._) Listen to my last word.
CÉBÈS: I am listening.
THE PRINCESS: Farewell!
CÉBÈS: Not that! Not that cruel word! Do not go!
THE PRINCESS: Farewell!
The song draws to an end!
And the face of the singer, The Gatherer-of-Flowers,
Fades in the dusk of evening
Till only the eyes remain and the violet ghost of the mouth.
He who loves goes forth to greet The Bride,
And the door is opened by invisible hands.
Farewell, for I am going.
_(CÉBÈS half rises and, stretching out his hand towards her, passes it
over her face. There is a tense silence._
THE PRINCESS (_rushing to the middle of the stage_): O my father,
You commanded me to show myself before you and I am here, a wretched
girl decked out in these fantastic robes!
I have spoken, adding what was needful to phrases learned by heart. I
suffer! I suffer! My soul is shaken in me!
And you, my father, is it thus I see you, gnawing your beard,
And fixing blood-shot eyes on the ground! Let me go, I beg of you!
The beautiful and illustrious lady who spoke just now is gone
And in her place there is only I myself, an every-day young girl,
careful of her nails and her complexion.
Good-bye, father! Good-bye to you all!
For the sadness rises also in me and I must go,
Groping my way through gloomy corridors.
O father! O mother that I never knew!
Soon I shall lie full length on the ground with outspread hands,
Or, with a hidden spring of blood welling up between my breasts, I
shall mock the maid who falls asleep in her chair.
--Off with you, heavy and importunate robes!
_(She goes out._
The King (_springing violently to his feet_): Go! It is well!
No imagined terror! Here is horror itself.
Look at me, me the old man!
By this hoary beard that I tear with both hands, I swear
That disaster incarnate
Stands before you and cries, _"Adsum!"_
You heard the sound of his rage like a battle beneath the horizon,
And now with nodding funereal plumes The Agony of Death strides
terribly towards you, like a colossus, with copper cheeks, shaking the
flimsy structures you have reared!
"I wandered in, the night with foam as thick as a camel's slaver,
dripping from my jaws! I was an outcast! The hounds of hell were
gnawing my heart!
Now in the day
I stride before the legions, mid blood and the crackle of fire, like
a flaming windmill, brandishing a flail, clenching between my teeth a
sword as big as an oar!"
THE FIFTH WATCHER: I defy you! I fear you not!
--Mangle me, cut me to bits and my severed head shall spring and bite!
Let the thunderbolt flay me and like Ajax voiding lightning and the
water of the sea from mouth and nose,
A blinding mass, I shall vomit
Against heaven my malediction like a dart.
THE KING: Ruin! Destruction!
The forest flames! The rivers are choked with wreckage! The belfries
full of clanging bells crash into chaos!
O my desolate fields!
O my strong men who strew the roads, like crushed beetles!
O the grocery and the bakery! O villages ill guarded by the Cock of the
Cross, O towns devoured by the ravening grave-yard!
Past is the time of ploughing and reaping and peaceful sharing of daily
bread!
And we ourselves like dead animals shall rot among weeds and nettles,
Or we shall be forced to take refuge in woods and caves and learn again
the language of nymphs and ravens.
O race! O dynasty! Long have I lived! Long has the King been governor
of this country.
Solitary, searching for Wisdom, fixing on Duty his arid eyes,
A helmsman made wise by steering in the uncharted sea, practised in
deciphering the slow changes of the stars!
That I should cease to see and feel!
Oh, this life
Looks with two faces upon us:
Dawn, her cheeks anointed with honey and honeycomb,
And Care, with swarthy face like an old fisherman, taciturn, shedding
tears of pitch!
That I should fall,
Striking the echoing pavement with the head
Of an anointed King!
THE SECOND WATCHER: Peace, peace, O King, and do not speak so loudly!
Be still! If you cannot sleep, keep silence!
For this is the dreadful part of the night that was not meant for the
eye of man,
And this is a task that was not intended for him. Nevertheless let him
sleep his sleep;
For in its splendor the army of the heavens passes above the earth,
And is reflected in the puddles and the open wells in the
market-gardens.
Wait patiently and listen to the cock crowing in the night,
And soon it will be the hour when the baker throws the dough on the
kneading board with a dull thud, a sign that the dawn is near.
I think that the sun will rise and will strike with a ruddy light the
wall overgrown with the ancient royal vine,
And the light and the breeze will enter through the windows vast and
high!
I shall think only this and shall keep my eyes upraised. For they are
made to see and if they close it is only to open again.
_(Prolonged silence.--The sound of cannon._
THE FIRST WATCHER: It is he! There is news!
_(The MESSENGER enters, out of breath._
THE FIRST WATCHER: Speak! Why do you open your mouth so wide? Why do
you nod your head? If
It should be not haste but joy that makes you speechless, if
You only bring us tidings that are not of disaster,
Laugh only; do not keep that ominous air
Cassius!
THE MESSENGER: O
Triumph!
What glory! What human heart will be strong enough to bear
This!
And you, my brothers that I now behold again,
Listen to this resplendent news!
THE THIRD WATCHER: Speak! What? You say....
THE MESSENGER:... That we have gained the victory? Yes.
THE THIRD WATCHER: That this Kingdom is saved? That we live once more?
That this land
Is still intact with its people in its length and in its breadth?
I listen trembling! How,
How is it possible?
You do not say that we are victorious, we?
THE MESSENGER: Yes. That is what I said!
THE FOURTH WATCHER: My hair stands on end and my tears pour forth like
the melting snow!
And I will utter such a cry
That one would think that a dead man had risen from his tomb, sending
the stone flying!
What!
That armed horde that fell upon us terribly arrayed, those successive
lines, those strong columns that, marching like one man, advanced
across the valleys and the plains, that interminable line of cannon....
THE MESSENGER: I said that we had conquered.
Did you not understand? I said that we had won the battle.
THE FOURTH WATCHER: What is a single battle? The menace is always there.
THE MESSENGER: The enemy is retreating, struck with terror. Halted as
though he had seen The Angel of Death!
THE THIRD WATCHER: Of course! He was here! He has shown himself in
their path.
THE SECOND WATCHER: You say that the enemy is retreating?
THE MESSENGER: Retreating! Routed! Fleeing!
THE FOURTH WATCHER: You bring warmth into a frozen place and into a
pitch black night a dazzling brightness.
Be patient with me! Repeat it yet again! Nourish my heart with that
sustaining word!
THE MESSENGER: We have conquered! We have driven them before us! Our
strength has prevailed!
THE FOURTH WATCHER: Triumph!
THE FIRST WATCHER: Do you say nothing, Sire?
THE KING: O my children!
I cannot speak,
For an hour better than I have deserved
Has come upon me,
On me, the incapable, useless governor of this country!
O Messenger, you have restored their taste to bread and wine.
Let the bells ring out till all the air resounds,
Let the round brazen throats beneath the bell-ringer's feet fill with
our jubilation,
The circle of the earth and the height of heaven!
Let the singers of our triumph stand forth together,
And let their mouths exhaling
A song of benediction, eat of the sun till evening!
Wine! Wine! I wish to drink with you, O Messenger,
Even as two carters do who meet in a roadside inn!
_(Wine is brought._
O fortune, I drink to you with this trembling hand! Accept this toast!
O fortune, since you have given us this hour, conduct us where you
will! (_He drinks._) Excellent glass of wine!
THE MESSENGER: I cannot
Put wine between my teeth till that excessive joy
Which buoyed me upon my horse as I galloped towards you
Has spoken.
I say that the kingdom has been saved by handfuls of gold and jewels!
He was not ashamed to beg, on the bridges, at the cross-roads,
Stretching out his princely hands,
Burying in the mud his armored knees....
THE THIRD WATCHER: We have seen him!
THE MESSENGER:... Fixing before him his sparkling eyes, like an
Andromeda with horse's mane, more proud than the god of the wind when
at the water's edge
He kneels, stretching out his hands to the chains on the rocks of
Occismor,
Till he was buried up to the thighs in alms!
For each man looked at him with astonishment, and struck with a vague
shame, he gave in silence all that he had and placed it on the ground
before him.
He had come, our king, unique in his beauty, adorned with marvellous
deeds!
And, full of a secret sadness, we recalled his face, shy and terrible.
THE FIRST WATCHER: It is thus that....
THE MESSENGER: If anyone dared to speak to him, unaddressed, saying,
"Who are you?"
He looked at him a moment, and answered, "I am what I seem to be. You
are not mistaken."
"Oh!" one said to him, "Oh, war!
When shall we have peace?"
"You wish to live in peace?"
"Surely," he answered, "Yes, indeed."
"Coward, you cannot! Even now they come to rob you of your goods
And the man is at hand who will take you, caught by the scruff of the
neck, and geld you like a domestic animal."
And the questioner said, "What can I do?"
"Fight!" he answered, "Resist!"
"And conquer also, perhaps?" "You can do it," he replied and he looked
at him fixedly.
"O man insulted and outraged,
To-day you can wash away your shame and rise from your baseness and
give the lie to the name they have bestowed upon you!"
These words were repeated and often he who heard them
Did not forget them, but, leaving his wife alone in her bed to weep,
He paced all night the floor of his room, pondering this question,
"If I try, why cannot I?"
Until a little phrase, full of a sense of strength,
Impinged upon his consciousness: "I can!"
THE FIRST WATCHER: It is astonishing! It is utterly astonishing! I did
not believe what they told me.
THE MESSENGER: Then it was
That in the unhappy soul was born the fury of the captive!
Renouncing life and crying "Forward!", they flocked to where the bugle
sounded the assembly.
Still not sure of themselves,
When, like a superintendent among his workmen, he walked among them,
looking at them all, assuring himself
That everything was according to his command.
They turned to him their ranks of eyes of every kind and hue, and they
were comforted again.
To a man they gladly left their families and their work.
There was on the slope a mighty growth of broom, tree of yellow
flowers, dear to the bees.
He had it cut down and, having kissed it, he bade them bear it before
him. Then he mounted his horse.
And the soldiers waiting their turn to set out,
Heard behind them the rustling of the flag, cock of the war, song of
sails!
ALL: Come! Speak! Speak!
THE MESSENGER: But when they came to the field where they had to die or
conquer,
They knew another flag.
THE FIRST WATCHER: What flag?
THE MESSENGER: What flag? Not a tatter of silk, not a woman's shirt
that a child waves about on the end of a bean-pole!
But like some old gibbet that creaks beneath its burden of corpses,
like a mast with its sinister yardarms,
The monstrous standard of our wretchedness, enormous, charged with
chains!
They saw it while they set their feet on a soil enriched by the flesh
Of their fathers and mothers, like fallen leaves!
At first they kept their ranks, fighting shoulder to shoulder, and thus
it was for some time.
But finally full of a rage like the lust for gold,
They rushed forward all together, raising discordant cries.
And then a sudden panic
Arose as if all at once, though it was day, the Night
Rearing up her giant head with its diadem of stars,
Confounded the sense with the blast of her prodigious horn.
They were astounded, those others, and they trembled, and suddenly the
serried ranks of our foes,
Like colts stampeded by a clanking chain,
Turned tail and fled!
Thus did we raise that army, having gotten under it,
Thus did we tilt it backward like a cask,
Spilling a great tumult of men
On the earth and in the reedy beds of streams.
Think of it! That innumerable horde turned their backs, and ran before
us! Zounds!
Oh who has seen such a massacre, the piles of wounded and dying
Gasping like a catch of fish in the bottom of a boat!
ALL: Triumph!
THE MESSENGER: Sharp cries resounded on the bleeding air, and the mad
galloping of horsemen, and cannon whose flashes glared through the pall
of smoke!
God!
We chased them with a shoe like rats!
Doddering gray beards with a gesture
Put to flight battalions, and children whose voices broke,
Catching him by the bridle, led away the horse and his rider.
This I saw.
I saw the captured flags brought in like fagots!
I remember soldiers, black-bearded, or with chins
Bristling with white hairs,
Who in the evening, while the soup was cooking,
Stood, their feet in the heather, like smiths worn out with toil,
Red like the arbute-berry in the ruddy gloaming,
Contemplating through the branches the scarlet sky from which comes
life.
--As for him,
Those who stood by his stirrups, taking his orders,
Listening with parted lips to what he said, for the first time saw on
his face,
Like that of
|
before.”
The savage features of the old hunter from the mountains of Kiölen
assumed an expression of extreme amazement and childlike credulity.
“What!” he exclaimed.
“Yes,” added Hacket, in whose face a more skilful observer might have
read grim triumph; “I knew it all, except that you were the hero of this
unfortunate adventure. Hans of Iceland told me the whole story on our
way here.”
“Really!” said Kennybol; and he gazed at Hacket with respect and awe.
Hacket continued with the same perfect composure: “To be sure. But now
calm yourself; I will present you to this dreadful Hans of Iceland.”
Kennybol uttered an exclamation of fright.
“Be calm, I say,” repeated Hacket. “Consider him as your friend and
leader; but be careful not to remind him in any way of what occurred
this morning. Do you understand?”
Resistance was useless; but it was not without a severe mental struggle
that he agreed to be presented to the demon. They advanced to the group
where Ordener stood with Jonas and Norbith.
“May God guard you, good Jonas, dear Norbith!” said Kennybol.
“We need his protection, Kennybol,” said Jonas.
At this instant Kennybol’s eye met that of Ordener, who was trying to
attract his attention.
“Ah! there you are, young man,” said he, going up to him eagerly and
offering him his hard, wrinkled hand; “welcome! It seems that your
courage met with its reward.”
Ordener, who could not imagine how this mountaineer happened to
understand him so well, was about to ask an explanation, when Norbith
exclaimed: “Then you know this stranger, Kennybol?”
“By my patron saint, I do! I love and esteem him. He is devoted, like
ourselves, to the good cause which we all serve.”
And he cast another meaning look at Ordener, which the latter was on the
point of answering, when Hacket, who had gone in search of his giant,
whose company all the insurgents seemed to avoid, came up to our four
friends, saying: “Kennybol, my valiant hunter, here is your leader, the
famous Hans of Klipstadur!”
Kennybol glanced at the huge brigand with more surprise than terror, and
whispered in Hacket’s ear: “Mr. Hacket, the Hans of Iceland whom I met
this morning was a short man.”
Hacket answered in low tones: “You forget, Kennybol; he is a demon!”
“True,” said the credulous hunter; “I suppose he has changed his shape.”
And he turned aside with a shudder to cross himself secretly.
XXXIV.
The mask approaches; it is Angelo himself. The rascal knows his
business well; he must be sure of his facts.--LESSING.
In a dark grove of old oaks, whose dense leaves the pale light of dawn
can scarcely penetrate, a short man approaches another man who is alone,
and seems to waiting for him. The following conversation begins in low
tones:--
“Your worship must excuse me for keeping you waiting; several things
detained me.”
“Such as what?”
“The leader of the mountain men, Kennybol, did not reach the appointed
place until midnight; and we were also disturbed by an unlooked-for
witness.”
“Who?”
“A fellow who thrust himself like a fool into the mine in the midst of
our secret meeting. At first I took him for a spy, and would have put
him to death; but he turned out to be the bearer of a safe-conduct from
some gallows-bird held in great respect by our miners, and they
instantly took him under their protection. When I came to consider the
matter, I made up my mind that he was probably a curious traveller or a
learned fool. At any rate, I have taken all necessary precautions in
regard to him.”
“Is everything else going well?”
“Very well. The miners from Guldsbrandsdal and the Färöe Islands, led by
young Norbith and old Jonas, with the mountain men from Kiölen, under
Kennybol, are probably on the march at this moment. Four miles from Blue
Star, their comrades from Hubfallo and Sund-Moer will join them; those
from Kongsberg and the iron-workers from Lake Miösen, who have already
compelled the Wahlstrom garrison to retreat, as your lordship knows,
will await them a few miles farther on; and finally, my dear and honored
master, these combined forces will halt for the night some two miles
away from Skongen, in the gorges of Black Pillar.”
“But how did they receive your Hans of Iceland?”
“With perfect confidence.”
“Would that I could avenge my son’s death on that monster! What a pity
that he should escape us!”
“My noble lord, first use Hans of Iceland’s name to wreak your revenge
upon Schumacker; then it will be time enough to think of vengeance
against Hans himself. The insurgents will march all day, and halt
to-night in Black Pillar Pass, two miles from Skongen.”
“What! can you venture to let so large a force advance so close to
Skongen? Musdœmon, take care!”
“You are suspicious, noble Count. Your worship may send a messenger at
once to Colonel Vœthaün, whose regiment is probably at Skongen now;
inform him that the rebel forces will encamp to-night in Black Pillar
Pass, and have no misgivings. The place seems made purposely for
ambuscades.”
“I understand you; but why, my dear fellow, did you muster the rebels in
such numbers?”
“The greater the insurrection, sir, the greater will be Schumacker’s
crime and your merit. Besides, it is important that it should be crushed
at a single blow.”
“Very good; but why did you order them to halt so near Skongen?”
“Because it is the only spot in the mountains where all resistance is
impossible. None will ever leave it alive but those whom we select to
appear before the court.”
“Capital! Something tells me, Musdœmon, to finish this business quickly.
If all looks well in this quarter, it looks stormy in another. You know
that we have been making secret search at Copenhagen for the papers
which we feared had fallen into the possession of Dispolsen?”
“Well, sir?”
“Well, I have just discovered that the scheming fellow had mysterious
relations with that accursed astrologer, Cumbysulsum.”
“Who died recently?”
“Yes; and that the old sorcerer delivered certain papers to Schumacker’s
agent before he died.”
“Damnation! He had letters of mine,--a statement of our plot!”
“_Your_ plot, Musdœmon!”
“A thousand pardons, noble Count! But why did your worship put yourself
in the power of such a humbug as Cumbysulsum?--the old traitor!”
“You see, Musdœmon, I am not a sceptic and unbeliever, like you. It is
not without good reason, my dear fellow, that I have always put my trust
in old Cumbysulsum’s magic skill.”
“I wish your worship had had as much doubt of his loyalty as you had
trust in his skill. However, let us not take fright too soon, noble
master. Dispolsen is dead, his papers are lost; in a few days we shall
be safely rid of those whom they might benefit.”
“In any event, what charge could be brought against me?”
“Or me, protected as I am by your Grace?”
“Oh, yes, my dear fellow, of course you can count upon me; but let us
bring this business to a head. I will send the messenger to the colonel.
Come, my people are waiting for me behind those bushes, and we must
return to Throndhjem, which the Mecklenburger must have left ere now.
Continue to serve me faithfully, and in spite of all the Cumbysulsums
and Dispolsens upon earth, you can count on me in life and death!”
“I beg your Grace to believe--The Devil!”
Here they plunged into the thicket, among whose branches their voices
gradually died away; and soon after, no sound was heard save the tread
of their departing steeds.
XXXV.
Beat the drums! They come, they come! They have all sworn, and all
the same oath, never to return to Castile without the captive
count, their lord.
They have his marble statue in a chariot, and are resolved never to
turn back until they see the statue itself turn back.
And in token that the first man who retraces his steps will be
regarded as a traitor, they have all raised their right hand and
taken an oath.
* * * * *
And they marched toward Arlançon as swiftly as the oxen which drag
the chariot could go; they tarry no more than does the sun.
Burgos is deserted; only the women and children remain behind; and
so too in the suburbs. They talk, as they go, of horses and
falcons, and question whether they should free Castile from the
tribute she pays Leon.
And before they enter Navarre, they meet upon the frontier....
_Old Spanish Romance._
While the preceding conversation was going on in one of the forests on
the outskirts of Lake Miösen, the rebels, divided into three columns,
left Apsyl-Corh lead-mine by the chief entrance, which opens, on a level
with the ground, in a deep ravine.
Ordener, who, in spite of his desire for a closer acquaintance with
Kennybol, had been placed under Norbith’s command, at first saw nothing
but a long line of torches, whose beams, vying with the early light of
dawn, were reflected back from hatchets, pitchforks, mattocks, clubs
with iron heads, huge hammers, pickaxes, crowbars, and all the rude
implements which could be borrowed from their daily toil, mingled with
genuine weapons of warfare, such as muskets, pikes, swords, carbines,
and guns, which showed that this revolt was a conspiracy. When the sun
rose, and the glow of the torches was no more than smoke, he could
better observe the aspect of this strange army, which advanced in
disorder, with hoarse songs and fierce shouts, like a band of hungry
wolves in pursuit of a dead body. It was divided into three parts. First
came the mountaineers from Kiölen, under command of Kennybol, whom they
all resembled in their dress of wild beasts’ skins, and in their bold,
savage mien. Then followed the young miners led by Norbith, and the
older ones under Jonas, with their broad-brimmed hats, loose trousers,
bare arms, and blackened faces, gazing at the sun in mute surprise.
Above this noisy band floated a confused sea of scarlet banners, bearing
various mottoes, such as, “Long live Schumacker!” “Let us free our
Deliverer!” “Freedom for Miners!” “Liberty for Count Griffenfeld!”
“Death to Guldenlew!” “Death to all Oppressors!” “Death to d’Ahlefeld!”
The rebels seemed to regard these standards rather in the light of a
burden than an ornament, and they were passed frequently from hand to
hand when the color-bearers were tired, or desired to mingle the
discordant notes of their horns with the psalm-singing and shouts of
their comrades.
The rear-guard of this strange army consisted of ten or a dozen carts
drawn by reindeer and strong mules, doubtless meant to carry ammunition;
and the vanguard, of the giant, escorted by Hacket, who marched alone,
armed with a mace and an axe, followed at a considerable distance, with
no small terror, by the men under command of Kennybol, who never took
his eyes from him, as if anxious not to lose sight of his diabolical
leader during the various transformations which he might be pleased to
undergo.
This stream of insurgents poured down the mountainside with many
confused noises, filling the pine woods with the sound of their horns.
Their numbers were soon swelled by various reinforcements from
Sund-Moer, Hubfallo, Kongsberg, and a troop of iron-workers from Lake
Miösen, who presented a singular contrast to the rest of the rebels.
They were tall, powerful men, armed with hammers and tongs, their broad
leather aprons being their only shield, a huge wooden cross their only
standard, as they marched soberly and rhythmically, with a regular tread
more religious than military, their only war-song being Biblical psalms
and canticles. They had no leader but their cross-bearer, who walked
before them unarmed.
The rebel troop met not a single human being on their road. As they
approached, the goat-herd drove his flocks into a cave, and the peasant
forsook his village; for the inhabitant of the valley and plain is
everywhere alike,--he fears the bandit’s horn as much as the bowman’s
blast.
Thus they traversed hills and forests, with here and there a small
settlement, followed winding roads where traces of wild beasts were more
frequent than the footprint of man, skirted lakes, crossed torrents,
ravines, and marshes. Ordener recognized none of these places. Once only
his eye, as he looked up, caught upon the horizon the dim, blue outline
of a great sloping rock. He turned to one of his rude companions, and
asked, “My friend, what is that rock to the south, on our right?”
“That is the Vulture’s Neck, Oëlmœ Cliff,” was the reply.
Ordener sighed heavily.
XXXVI.
God keep and bless you, my daughter.--RÉGNIER.
Monkey, paroquets, combs, and ribbons, all were ready to receive
Lieutenant Frederic. His mother had sent, at great expense, for the
famous Scudéry’s latest novel. By her order it had been richly bound,
with silvergilt clasps, and placed, with the bottles of perfume and
boxes of patches, upon the elegant toilet-table, with gilded feet, and
richly inlaid, with which she had furnished her dear son Frederic’s
future sitting-room. When she had thus fulfilled the careful round of
petty maternal cares which had for a moment caused her to forget her
hate, she remembered that she had now nothing else to do but to injure
Schumacker and Ethel. General Levin’s departure left them at her mercy.
So many things had happened recently at Munkholm of which she could
learn but little! Who was the serf, vassal, or peasant, who, if she was
to credit Frederic’s very ambiguous and embarrassed phrases, had won the
love of the ex-chancellor’s daughter? What were Baron Ordener’s
relations with the prisoners of Munkholm? What were the incomprehensible
motives for Ordener’s most peculiar absence at a time when both kingdoms
were given over to preparations for his marriage to that Ulrica
d’Ahlefeld whom he seemed to disdain? And lastly, what had occurred
between Levin de Knud and Schumacker? The countess was lost in
conjectures. She finally resolved, in order to clear up all these
mysteries, to risk a descent upon Munkholm,--a step to which she was
counselled both by her curiosity as a woman and her interests as an
enemy.
One evening, as Ethel, alone in the donjon garden, had just written, for
the sixth time, with a diamond ring, some mysterious monogram upon the
dusty window in the postern gate through which her Ordener had
disappeared, it opened. The young girl started. It was the first time
that this gate had been opened since it closed upon him.
A tall, pale woman, dressed in white, stood before her. She gave Ethel a
smile as sweet as poisoned honey, and behind her mask of quiet
friendliness there lurked an expression of hatred, spite, and
involuntary admiration.
Ethel looked at her in astonishment, almost fear. Except her old nurse,
who had died in her arms, this was the first woman she had seen within
the gloomy walls of Munkholm.
“My child,” gently asked the stranger, “are you the daughter of the
prisoner of Munkholm?”
Ethel could not help turning away her head; she instinctively shrank
from the stranger, and she felt as if there were venom in the breath
which uttered such sweet tones. She answered: “I am Ethel Schumacker. My
father tells me that in my cradle I was called Countess of Tönsberg and
Princess of Wollin.”
“Your father tells you so!” exclaimed the tall woman, with a sneer which
she at once repressed. Then she added: “You have had many misfortunes!”
“Misfortune received me, at my birth, in its cruel arms,” replied the
youthful captive; “my noble father says that it will never leave me
while I live.”
A smile flitted across the lips of the stranger, as she rejoined in a
pitying tone: “And do you never murmur against those who flung you into
this cell? Do you not curse the authors of your misery?”
“No, for fear that our curse might draw down upon their heads evils like
those which they make us endure.”
“And,” continued the pale woman, with unmoved face, “do you know the
authors of these evils of which you complain?”
Ethel considered a moment, and said: “All that has happened to us is by
the will of Heaven.”
“Does your father never speak to you of the king?”
“The king? I pray for him every morning and evening, although I do not
know him.”
Ethel did not understand why the stranger bit her lip at this reply.
“Does your unhappy father never, in his anger, mention his relentless
foes, General Arensdorf, Bishop Spolleyson, and Chancellor d’Ahlefeld?”
“I don’t know whom you mean.”
“And do you know the name of Levin de Knud?”
The recollection of the scene which had occurred but two days before,
between Schumacker and the governor of Throndhjem, was so fresh in
Ethel’s mind that she could not but be struck by the name of Levin de
Knud.
“Levin de Knud?” said she; “I think that he is the man for whom my
father feels so much esteem, almost affection.”
“What!” cried the tall woman.
“Yes,” resumed the girl; “it was Levin de Knud whom my father defended
so warmly, day before yesterday, against the governor of Throndhjem.”
These words increased her hearer’s surprise.
“Against the governor of Throndhjem! Do not trifle with me, girl. I am
here in your interests. Your father took General Levin de Knud’s part
against the governor of Throndhjem, you say?”
“General! I thought he was a captain. But no; you are right. My father,”
added Ethel, “seemed to feel as much attachment for this General Levin
de Knud as dislike for the governor of Throndhjem.”
“Here is a strange mystery indeed!” thought the tall, pale woman, whose
curiosity increased momentarily. “My dear child, what happened between
your father and the governor?”
All these questions wearied poor Ethel, who looked fixedly at the tall
woman, saying: “Am I a criminal, that you should cross-examine me thus?”
At these simple words the stranger seemed thunderstruck, as if she saw
the reward of her skill slipping through her fingers. She replied,
nevertheless, in a tremulous voice: “You would not speak to me so if you
knew why and for whom I come.”
“What!” said Ethel; “do you come from him? Do you bring me a message
from him?” And all the blood in her body rushed to her fair face; her
heart throbbed in her bosom with impatience and alarm.
“From whom?” asked the stranger.
The young girl hesitated as she was about to utter the adored name. She
saw a flash of wicked joy gleam in the stranger’s eye like a ray from
hell. She said sadly:--
“You do not know the person whom I mean.”
An expression of disappointment again appeared upon the stranger’s
apparently friendly face.
“Poor young girl!” she cried; “what can I do to help you?”
Ethel did not hear her. Her thoughts were beyond the mountains of the
North, in quest of the daring traveller. Her head sank upon her breast,
and her hands were unconsciously clasped.
“Does your father hope to escape from this prison?”
This question, twice repeated by the stranger, brought Ethel to herself.
“Yes,” said she, and tears sparkled on her cheek.
The stranger’s eyes flashed.
“He does! Tell me how; by what means; when!”
“He hopes to escape from this prison because he hopes ere long to die.”
There is sometimes a power in the very simplicity of a gentle young
spirit which outwits the artifices of a heart grown old in wickedness.
This thought seemed to occur to the great lady, for her expression
suddenly changed, and laying her cold hand on Ethel’s arm, she said in a
tone which was almost sincere: “Tell me, have you heard that your
father’s life is again threatened by a fresh judicial inquiry? That he
is suspected of having stirred up a revolt among the miners of the
North?”
The words “revolt” and “inquiry” conveyed no clear idea to Ethel’s mind.
She raised her great dark eyes to the stranger’s face as she asked:
“What do you mean?”
“That your father is conspiring against the State; that his crime is all
but discovered; that this crime will be punished with death.”
“Death! crime!” cried the poor girl.
“Crime and death,” said the strange lady, seriously.
“My father! my noble father!” continued Ethel. “Alas! he spends his days
in hearing me read the Edda and the Gospel! He conspire! What has he
done to you?”
“Do not look at me so fiercely. I tell you again I am not your enemy.
Your father is suspected of a grave crime; I am here to warn you of it.
Perhaps, instead of such a show of dislike, I might lay claim to your
gratitude.”
This reproach touched Ethel.
“Oh, forgive me, noble lady, forgive me! What human being have I ever
seen who was not an enemy? I have doubted you. You will forgive me, will
you not?”
The stranger smiled.
“What, my girl! have you never met a friend until to-day?”
A hot blush mantled Ethel’s brow. She hesitated an instant.
“Yes. God knows the truth, we have found a friend, noble lady,--one
only!”
“One only!” said the great lady, hastily. “His name, I implore. You do
not know how important it is; it is for your father’s safety. Who is
this friend?”
“I do not know,” said Ethel.
The stranger turned pale.
“Is it because I wish to serve you that you trifle with me? Consider
that your father’s life is at stake. Tell me, who is this friend of whom
you speak?”
“Heaven knows, noble lady, that I know nothing of him but his name,
which is Ordener.”
Ethel uttered these words with that difficulty which we all feel in
pronouncing before an indifferent person the sacred name which wakes
within us every emotion of love.
“Ordener! Ordener!” repeated the stranger, with singular agitation,
while her hands crumpled the white embroideries of her veil. “And what
is his father’s name?” she asked in a troubled voice.
“I do not know,” replied the girl. “What are his family and his father
to me? This Ordener, noble lady, is the most generous of men.”
Alas! the accent with which these words were spoken revealed Ethel’s
secret to the sharp-sighted stranger.
She assumed an air of calm composure, and asked, without taking her eyes
from the girl’s face: “Have you heard of the approaching marriage of the
viceroy’s son to the daughter of the present lord chancellor,
d’Ahlefeld?”
She was obliged to repeat her question before Ethel’s mind could grasp
an idea which did not interest her.
“I believe I have,” was her answer.
Her calmness, and her indifferent manner, seemed to surprise the
stranger.
“Well, what do you think of this marriage?”
It was impossible to note the slightest change in Ethel’s large eyes as
she replied: “Nothing, truly. May their union be a happy one!”
“Counts Guldenlew and d’Ahlefeld, the fathers of the young couple, are
both bitter enemies of your father.”
“May their marriage be blessed!” gently repeated Ethel.
“I have an idea,” continued the crafty stranger. “If your father’s life
be really threatened, you might obtain his pardon through the viceroy’s
son upon the occasion of this great marriage.”
“May the saints reward you for your kind thought for us, noble lady; but
how should my petition reach the viceroy’s son?”
These words were spoken in such good faith that they drew a gesture of
surprise from the stranger.
“What! do you not know him?”
“That powerful lord!” cried Ethel. “You forget that I have never been
outside the walls of this fortress.”
“Truly,” muttered the tall woman between her teeth. “What did that old
fool of a Levin tell me? She does not know him. Still, that is
impossible,” said she; then, raising her voice: “You must have seen the
viceroy’s son; he has been here.”
“That may be, noble lady; of all the men who have been here, I have
never seen but one,--my Ordener.”
“Your Ordener!” interrupted the stranger. She added, without seeming to
notice Ethel’s blushes: “Do you know a young man with noble face,
elegant figure, grave and dignified bearing? His expression is gentle,
yet firm; his complexion fresh as that of a maiden; his hair chestnut.”
“Oh!” cried poor Ethel, “that is he; it is my betrothed, my adored
Ordener! Where did you meet him? He told you that he loved me, did he
not? He told you that he has my whole heart. Alas! a poor prisoner has
nothing but her love to give. My noble friend! It was but a week ago,--I
can see him still on this very spot, with his green mantle, beneath
which beats so generous a heart, and that black plume, which waved so
gracefully above his broad brow.”
She did not finish her sentence. The tall stranger tottered, turned
pale, then red, and cried in her ears in tones of thunder: “Wretched
girl, you love Ordener Guldenlew, the betrothed of Ulrica d’Ahlefeld,
the son of your father’s deadly foe, the viceroy of Norway!”
Ethel fell fainting on the ground.
XXXVII.
_Caupolican._ Walk so cautiously that the earth itself may not
catch your footfall. Redouble your precautions, friends. If we
arrive unheard, I will answer for the victory.
_Tucapel._ Night veils all; fearful darkness covers the earth. We
hear no sentinel; we have seen no spies.
_Ringo._ Let us advance!
* * * * *
_Tucapel._ What do I hear? Are we discovered?
LOPE DA VEGA: _The Conquest of Arauco_.
“I say, Guldon Stayper, old fellow, the evening breeze is beginning to
blow my hairy cap about my head rather vigorously.”
These words were spoken by Kennybol, as his eyes wandered for a moment
from the giant who marched at the head of the insurgents, and half
turned toward a mountaineer whom the accident of a disorderly progress
had placed beside him.
His friend shook his head and shifted his banner from one shoulder to
the other, with a deep sigh of fatigue, as he answered:--
“Hum! I fancy, Captain, that in these confounded Black Pillar gorges,
through which the wind rushes like a torrent let loose, we shall not be
as warm to-night as if we were flames dancing on the hearth.”
“We must make such rousing fires that the old owls will be scared from
their nests among the rocks in their ruined palace. I can’t endure owls.
On that horrid night when I saw the fairy Ubfem she took the shape of an
owl.”
“By Saint Sylvester!” interrupted Guldon Stayper, turning his head, “the
angel of the storm beats his wings most furiously! Take my advice,
Captain Kennybol, and set fire to all the pine-trees on the mountain. It
would be a fine sight to see an army warm itself with a whole forest.”
“Heaven forbid, my dear Guldon! Think of the deer, and the gerfalcons,
and the pheasants! Roast the game, if you will, but do not burn it
alive.”
Old Guidon laughed: “Oh, Captain, you are the same devil of a
Kennybol,--the wolf of deer, the bear of wolves, and the buffalo of
bears!”
“Are we far from Black Pillar?” asked a voice from the huntsmen.
“Comrade,” replied Kennybol, “we shall enter the gorge at nightfall; we
shall reach the Four Crosses directly.”
There was a brief silence, during which nothing was heard but the tramp
of many feet, the moaning of the wind, and the distant song of the
regiment of iron-workers from Lake Miösen.
“Friend Guldon Stayper,” resumed Kennybol, when he had whistled an old
hunting-song, “you have just passed a few days at Throndhjem, have you
not?”
“Yes, Captain; my brother George, the fisherman, was ill, and I took his
place in the boat for a short time, so that his poor family might not
starve while he was ill.”
“Well, as you come from Throndhjem, did you happen to see this count,
the prisoner--Schumacker--Gleffenhem--what is his name, now? I mean that
man in whose behalf we have rebelled against the royal protectorate, and
whose arms I suppose you have on that big red flag.”
“It is heavy enough, I can tell you!” said Guldon. “Do you mean the
prisoner in Munkholm fortress,--the count, if you choose to call him so;
and how do you suppose, Captain, that I should see him? I should have
needed,” he added, lowering his voice, “the eyes of that demon marching
in front of us, though he does not leave a smell of brimstone behind
him; of that Hans of Iceland, who can see through stone walls; or the
ring of Queen Mab, who passes through keyholes. There is but one man
among us now, I am sure, who ever saw the count,--the prisoner to whom
you refer.”
“But one? Ah! Mr. Hacket? But this Hacket is no longer with us; he left
us to-day to return to--”
“I do not mean Mr. Hacket, Captain.”
“And who then?”
“That young man in the green mantle, with the black plume, who burst
into our midst last night.”
“Well?”
“Well!” said Guldon, drawing closer to Kennybol; “he knows the
count,--this famous count, as well as I know you, Captain Kennybol.”
Kennybol looked at Guldon, winked his left eye, smacked his lips, and
clapped his friend on the shoulder with that triumphant exclamation
which so often escapes us when we are satisfied with our own
penetration,--“I thought as much!”
“Yes, Captain,” continued Guldon Stayper, changing his flame-colored
banner to the other shoulder; “I assure you that the young man in green
has seen Count--I don’t know what you call him, the one for whom we are
fighting--in Munkholm keep; and he seemed to think no more of walking
into that prison than you or I would of shooting in a royal park.”
“And how happen you to know this, brother Guldon?”
The old mountaineer seized Kennybol by the arm, and half opening his
otter-skin waistcoat with a caution which was almost suspicious, he
said, “Look there!”
“By my most holy patron saint!” exclaimed Kennybol; “it glitters like
diamonds!”
It was indeed a superb diamond buckle, which fastened Guldon Stayper’s
rough belt.
“And they are real diamonds,” he replied, closing his waistcoat. “I am
just as sure of it as I am that the moon is two days’ journey from the
earth, and that my belt is made of buffalo leather.”
Kennybol’s face clouded, and his expression changed from surprise to
distress. He cast down his eyes, and said with savage sternness: “Guldon
Stayper, of Chol-Sœ village, in the Kiölen mountains, your father,
Medprath Stayper, died at the age of one hundred and two, without
reproach; for it was no crime to kill one of the king’s deer or elk by
mistake. Guldon Stayper, fifty-seven good years have passed over your
gray head, which cannot be called youth except for an owl. Guldon
Stayper, old friend, I would rather for your sake that the diamonds in
that buckle were grains of millet, if you did not come by them
honestly,--as honestly as a royal pheasant comes by a leaden bullet.”
As he pronounced this strange sermon, the mountaineer’s tone was both
impressive and menacing.
“As truly as Captain Kennybol is the boldest hunter in Kiölen,” replied
Guldon, unmoved, “and as truly as these diamonds are diamonds, they are
my lawful property.”
“Indeed!” said Kennybol, in accents which wavered between confidence and
doubt.
“God and my patron saint know,” replied Guldon, “that one evening, just
as I was pointing out the Throndhjem Spladgest to some sons of our good
mother Norway, who were carrying thither the body of an officer found
dead on Urchtal Sands,--this was about a week ago,--a young man stepped
up to my boat. ‘To Munkholm!’ says he to me. I was not at all anxious to
obey, Captain; a free bird never likes to fly into the neighborhood of a
cage. But the young gentleman had a haughty, lordly manner; he was
followed by a servant leading two horses; he leaped into my boat with an
air of authority; I took up my oars, that is to say, my brother’s oars.
It was my good angel that willed me to do so. When we reached the
fortress, my young passenger, after exchanging a few words with the
officer on guard, flung me in payment--as God hears me, he did,
Captain--this diamond buckle which I showed you, and which would have
belonged to my brother George, and not to me, if at the time that the
traveller--Heaven help him!--engaged me, the day’s work which I was
doing for George had not been done. This is the truth, Captain
Kennybol.”
“Very good.”
Little by little the captain’s features had cleared as much as their
naturally hard and gloomy expression would permit, and he asked Guidon
in a softened voice: “And are you sure, old fellow, that this young man
is the same who is now behind us with Norbith’s followers?”
“Sure! I could not mistake among a thousand faces the face of him who
made my fortune; besides, it is the same cloak, the same black plume.”
“I believe you, Guldon!”
“And it is clear that he went there to see the famous prisoner; for if
he were not bound on some very mysterious errand, he would never have
rewarded so handsomely the boatman who rowed him over and besides, now
that he has joined us--”
“You are right.”
“And I imagine, Captain, that this young stranger may have far greater
influence with the count whom we are about to set free than Mr. Hacket,
who strikes me, by my soul! as only fit to mew like a wildcat.”
Kennybol nodded his head expressively.
“Comrade, you have said just what I meant to say. I should be much more
inclined in this whole matter to obey that young gentleman than the
envoy Hacket. Saint Sylvester and Saint Olaf help me! but if the Iceland
demon be our commander, I believe, friend Guldon, that we owe it far
less to that magpie Hacket than to this stranger.”
“Really, Captain?” inquired Guldon.
Kennybol opened his mouth to answer, when he felt
|
our Riviera blossoms.
"You will do nothing of the kind," retorted her relative peremptorily.
"You'll just stay here with Beechy and me, till we've done our
business."
"But I haven't anything to do with--"
"You're going with us on the trip, anyhow, if we go. Now, come along and
don't make a fuss."
For a moment "Maida" hesitated, then she did come along, and as
obediently as the brown child, though not so willingly, sat down in the
_chaise longue_, carefully arranged for her reception by Terry.
"Evidently a poor relation, or she wouldn't submit to being ordered
about like that," I thought. "Of course, any one might see that she's
too pretty to be an heiress. They don't make them like that. Such
beauties never have a penny to bless themselves with. Just Terry's luck
if he falls in love with her, after all I've done for him, too! But if
this tour does come off, I must try to block _that_ game."
"I expect I'd better introduce myself and my little thirteen-year-old
daughter, and my niece," said the auburn lady, putting down her parasol,
and opening a microscopic fan. "I'm Mrs. Kathryn Stanley Kidder, of
Denver, Colorado. My little girl, here--she's all I've got in the world
since Mr. Kidder died--is Beatrice, but we call her Beechy for short. We
used to spell it B-i-c-e, which Mr. Kidder said was Italian; but people
_would_ pronounce it to rhyme with mice, so now we make it just like the
tree, and then there can't be any mistake. Miss Madeleine Destrey is the
daughter of my dead sister, who was _ever_ so much older than I am of
course; and the way she happened to come over with Beechy and me is
quite a romance; but I guess you'll think I've told you enough about
ourselves."
"It's like the people in old comic pictures who have kind of balloon
things coming out of their mouths, with a verse thoroughly explaining
who they are, isn't it?" remarked Miss Beechy in a little soft, childish
voice, and at least a dozen imps looking out of her eyes all at once.
"Mamma's balloon never collapses."
To break the awkward silence following upon this frank comparison, I
bustled away with hospitable murmurs concerning tea. But, my back once
turned upon the visitors, the pink, white, and green glamour of their
presence floated away from before my eyes like a radiant mist, and I saw
plain fact instead.
By plain fact I mean to denote Félicité, my French cook-housekeeper, my
all of domesticity in the Châlet des Pins.
Félicité might be considered plain by strangers, and thank heaven she is
a fact, or life at my little villa on the Riviera would be a hundred
times less pleasant than it is; but she is nevertheless as near to being
an angel as a fat, elderly, golden-hearted, sweet-natured,
profane-speaking, hot-tempered peasant woman of Provence can possibly
be. Whatever the greatest geniuses of the kitchen can do, Félicité can
and will do, and she has a loyal affection for her undeserving master,
which leads her to attempt miracles and almost invariably to accomplish
them.
There are, however, things which even Félicité cannot do; and it had
suddenly struck me coldly in the sunshine that to produce proper cakes
and rich cream at ten minutes' notice in a creamless and cakeless
bachelor villa, miles from anywhere in particular, might be beyond even
her genius.
I found her in the back garden, forcibly separating the family pet, a
somewhat moth-eaten duck, from the yellow cat whose mouse he had just
annexed by violence.
With language which told me that a considerable quantity of pepper had
got into her disposition (as it does with most cooks, according to my
theory) she was admonishing the delinquent, whom she mercilessly
threatened to behead and cook for dinner that evening. "You have been
spared too long; the best place for you is on the table," I heard her
lecturing the evil cannibal, "though the saints know that you are as
tough as you are wicked, and all the sauce in the Alpes Maritimes would
not make of you a pleasant morsel, especially since you have taken to
eating the cat's mice."
"Félicité," I broke in upon her flood of eloquence, in my most winning
tones. "Something has happened. Three ladies have come unexpectedly to
tea."
The round body straightened itself and stood erect. "Monsieur well knows
that there is no tea; neither he nor the other milord ever take anything
but coffee and whisk--"
"Never mind," said I hastily. "There must be tea, because I asked the
ladies to have some, and they have said yes. There must also be lettuce
sandwiches, and cakes, and cream--plenty, lots, heaps, for five people."
"As well ask that serpent of wickedness, your duck, to lay you five eggs
in as many minutes."
"He isn't my duck; he's yours. You won him in a raffle and adopted him.
I suspect it's a physical impossibility for him to lay eggs; but look
here, Félicité, dear, kind, good Félicité, don't go back on me. Man and
boy I've known you these eighteen months, and you've never failed me
yet. Don't fail me now. I depend on you, you know, and you _must_ do
something--anything--for the honour of the house."
"Does Monsieur think I can command tea, cakes, and cream from the tiles
of the kitchen floor?"
"No; but I firmly believe you can evolve them out of your inner
consciousness. You wouldn't have me lose faith in you?"
"No," said Félicité, whose eyes suddenly brightened with the rapt look
of one inspired. "No; I would not have Monsieur lose faith. I will do
what I can, as Monsieur says, for the honour of the house. Let him go
now to his friends, and make his mind easy. In a quarter of an hour, or
twenty minutes at most, he shall have a feef o'clocky for which he need
not blush."
"Angel!" I ejaculated fervently, patting the substantial shoulder, so
much to be depended upon. Then with a buoyant step I hastened round the
house to rejoin the party in the front garden, where, I anxiously
realized, the tables might have been completely turned during my
absence.
Ready to hurl myself into the breach, if there were one, I came round
the corner of the villa, to meet the unexpected. I had left Terry with
three ladies; I found him with seven.
Evidently he had gone into the drawing-room and fetched chairs, for they
were all sitting down, but they were not being sociable. Mrs. Kidder's
round chin was in the air, and she wore an "I'm as good as you are, if
not better" expression. The imps in Beechy's eyes were critically
cataloguing each detail of the strangers' costumes, and Miss Destrey was
interested in the yellow cat, who had come to tell her the tragic tale
of the stolen mouse.
The new arrivals were English. I can't explain exactly how I knew that,
the moment I clapped eyes on them, but I did; and I felt sure their
nearest male relative must have made money in beer, pickles, or it might
have been corsets or soap. They were that kind; and they had a great
many teeth, especially the daughters, who all three looked exactly
thirty, no more and no less, and were apparently pleasantly conscious of
superlative virtue.
I could see the house they lived in, in England. It would be in
Surbiton, of course, with "extensive grounds." There would be a
Debrett's "Peerage," and a Burke's "Landed Gentry," and a volume of
"Etiquette of Smart Society" on the library shelves, if there was
nothing else; and in the basket on the hall table the visiting cards of
any titled beings of the family's acquaintance would invariably rise to
the top like cream.
"I understand from your friend that it is your advertisement which
appears in _The Riviera Sun_ to-day," began the Mother, whose aspect
demanded a capital M. "You are Sir Ralph Moray, I believe?"
I acknowledged my identity, and the lady continued: "I am Mrs.
Fox-Porston. You will have heard of my husband, no doubt, and I daresay
we know a great many of the same People at Home." (This with a
dust-brush glance which swept the Americans out of the field.) "I think
it is a very excellent idea of yours, Sir Ralph, to travel about the
Continent on your motor-car with a few congenial companions, and I have
brought my daughters with me to-day in the hope that we may arrange a
delightful little tour which--"
"Ting-a-ling" at the gate bell robbed us of Mrs. Fox-Porston's remaining
hope, and gave us two more visitors.
Little had I known what the consequences of one small, pink
advertisement would be! Apparently it bade fair to let loose upon us,
not the dogs of war, but the whole floating feminine population of the
French Riviera. Something must be done, and done promptly, to stem the
rising tide of ladies, or the Châlet des Pins and Terry and I with it,
would be swamped.
I looked at Terry, he looked at me, as we rose like mechanical figures
to indicate our hosthood to the new arrivals.
They were Americans; I could tell by their chins. They had no
complexions and no particular age; they wore blue tissue veils, and
little jingling bags on their belts, which showed that they were not
married, because if they had been, their husbands would have ordered the
little jingling bags into limbo, wherever that may be.
"Good-afternoon," said the leading Blue Veil. "I am Miss Carrie Hood
Woodall, the lady lawyer from Hoboken, who had such a nice little
paragraph in _The Riviera Sun_, close to your advertisement; and this is
my chaperone, Mrs. Elizabeth Boat Cully. We're touring Europe, and we
want to take a trip with you in your automobile, if--"
"Unfortunately, ladies," said I, "the services of--er--my car are
already engaged to Mrs. Kidder, of Colorado, and her party. Isn't it so,
Barrymore?"
"Yes," replied Terry stoutly. And that "yes" even if inadvertent, was
equivalent I considered, to sign and seal.
Mrs. Kidder beamed like an understudy for _The Riviera Sun_. Beechy
twinkled demurely, and tossed her plaits over her shoulder. Even Miss
Destrey, the white goddess, deigned to smile, straight at Terry and no
other.
At this moment Félicité appeared with a tray. Whipped cream frothed over
the brow of a brown jug like a white wig on the forehead of a judge;
lettuce showed pale green through filmy sandwiches; small round cakes
were piled, crisp and appetizing, on a cracked Sèvres dish; early
strawberries glowed red among their own leaves. Talk of the marengo
trick! It was nothing to this. The miracle had been duly performed;
but--there were only five cups.
Mrs. Fox-Porston and her daughters, Miss Carrie Hood Woodall and her
chaperone, took the hint and their leave; and the companions of the
future were left alone together to talk over their plans.
"Lock the gate, Félicité," said I. "Do make haste!" And she did. Dear
Félicité!
II
A CHAPTER OF PLANS
So it is that Fate calmly arranges our lives in spite of us. Although no
details of the coming trip were settled during what remained of our new
employers' visit, that was their fault and the fault of a singularly
premature sunset, rather than mine, or even Terry's; and we both felt
that it came to the same thing. We were in honour bound to "personally
conduct" Mrs. Kidder, Miss Beechy Kidder, and Miss Destrey towards
whatever point of the compass a guiding finger of theirs should signify.
It has always been my motto to take Father Time by the fore-lock, for
fear he should cut it off, or get away, or play some other trick upon
me, which the cantankerous old chap (no parent of mine!) is fond
of doing. Therefore, if I could, I would have had terms, destination,
day and hour of starting definitely arranged before that
miraculously-produced tea of Félicité's had turned to tannin. But man
may not walk through a solid wall, or strive against such conversational
gifts as those of Mrs. Kidder.
She could and would keep to anything except the point. That, whatever
its nature, she avoided as she would an indelicacy.
"Well, now, Mrs. Kidder," I began, "if you really want us to organize
this tour, don't you think we'd better discuss--"
"Of _course_ we want you to!" she broke in. "We all think it's just
awfully good of you to bother with us when you must have so many friends
who want you to take them--English people in your own set. By the way,
do you know the Duchess of Carborough?"
"I know very few duchesses or other Americans," I replied. Whereupon
Miss Kidder's imp laughed, though her mother remained grave, and even
looked mildly disappointed.
"That's a funny way of putting it," said Beechy. "One would think it was
quite an American habit, being a Duchess."
"So it is, isn't it?" I asked. "The only reason we needn't fear its
growing like the Yellow Peril is because there aren't enough dukes. I've
always thought the American nation the most favoured in the world.
Aren't all your girls brought up to expect to be duchesses, and your men
presidents?"
"_I_ wasn't," snapped Beechy. "If there was a duke anywhere around,
Mamma would take him, if she had to snatch him out of my mouth. What are
English girls brought up to expect?"
"Hope for, not expect," I corrected her. "Any leavings there are in the
way of marquesses or earls; or if none, a mere bishop or a C. B."
"What's a C. B.?" asked Mrs. Kidder anxiously.
"A Companion of the Bath."
"My goodness! Whose bath?"
"The Bath of Royalty. We say it with a capital B."
"My! How awkward for your King. And what was done about it when you had
only a Queen on the throne?"
"You must inquire of the chamberlains," I replied. "But about that trip
of ours. The--er--my car is in a garage not far away, and it can be
ready when--"
"Oh, I hope it's a _red_ car, with your coat of arms on it. I do so
admire red for an automobile. We could all fix ourselves up in red
cloaks and hats to match, and make ourselves look awfully swell--"
"Everybody'd call us 'The Crimson Ramblers,' or 'The Scarlet Runners,'
or something else horrid," tittered that precocious child Beechy.
"It isn't red, it's grey," Terry managed hastily to interpolate; which
settled one burning question, the first which had been settled or seemed
likely to be settled at our present rate of progress.
"If you are keen on starting--" I essayed again, hope triumphing over
experience.
"Yes, I'm just looking forward to that start," Mrs. Kidder caught me up.
"We _shall_ make a sensation. We're neighbours of yours, you know. We're
at the Cap Martin Hotel. Isn't it perfectly lovely there, with that big
garden, the woods and all? When we were coming to the Riviera, I told
the man at Cook's that we wanted to go to the grandest hotel there was,
where we could feel we were getting our money's worth; and he said all
the kings and princes, and queens and princesses went to the Cap Martin,
so--"
"We thought it might be good enough for us," capped Beechy.
"It's as full of royalties, as--as--"
"As a pack of cards," I suggested.
"And some of them have splendid automobiles. I've been envying them; and
only this morning I was saying to my little girl, what a lot of nice
things there are that women and children can't do, travelling
alone--automobiling for one. Then, when I came on that advertisement of
yours, I just _screamed_. It did seem as if the Hand of Providence must
have been pointing it out. And it was so funny your home being on the
Cap, too, within ten minutes' walk of our hotel. I'm sure it was
_meant_, aren't you?"
"Absolutely certain," I responded, with a glance at Terry, who was not
showing himself off to any advantage in this scene although he ought to
have been the leading actor. He did nothing but raise his eyebrows when
he thought that no one was looking, or tug at his moustache most
imprudently when somebody was. Or else he handed the cakes to Miss
Destrey, and forgot to offer them to her far more important relatives.
"I'm so sure of it," I went on, "that I think we had better arrange--"
"Yes, indeed. Of course your ch--Mr. Barrymore (or did I hear you say
Terrymore?) is a very experienced driver? We've never been in an
automobile yet, any of us, and I'm afraid, though it will be perfectly
lovely as soon as we're used to it, that we may be a little scary at
first. So it would be nice to know for sure that the driver understood
how to act in any emergency. I should _hate_ to be killed in an
automobile. It would be such--such an _untidy_ death to die, judging
from what you read in the papers sometimes."
"I should prefer it, myself," I said, "but that's a matter of taste, and
you may trust Terry--Mr. Barrymore. What he doesn't know about a
motor-car and its inner and outer workings isn't worth knowing. So when
we go--"
"Aunt K--I mean Kittie, don't you think we ought to go home to the
hotel?" asked Miss Destrey, who had scarcely spoken until now, except to
answer a question or two of Terry's, whom she apparently chose to
consider in the Martyr's Boat, with herself. "We've been here for
_hours_, and it's getting dark."
"Why, so it is!" exclaimed Mrs. Kidder, rising hurriedly. "I'm quite
ashamed of myself for staying so long. What will you think of us? But we
had such a lot of things to arrange, hadn't we?"
We had had; and we had them still. But that was a detail.
"We _must_ go," she went on. "Well, we've decided nearly everything"
(this was news to me). "But there are one or two things yet we'll have
to talk over, I suppose."
"Quite so," said I.
"Could you and Mr. Terrymore come and dine with us to-night? Then we can
fix _everything_ up."
"Speaking for myself, I'm afraid I can't, thanks very much," Terry said,
hastily.
"What about you, Sir Ralph? I may call you Sir Ralph, may I not?"
"Please. It's my name."
"Yes, I know it. But it sounds so familiar, from a stranger. I was
wondering if one ought to say 'Sir Ralph Moray,' till one had been
acquainted a little longer. Well, anyway, if you could dine with us,
without your friend--"
I also thanked her and said that matters would arrange themselves more
easily if Barrymore and I were together.
"Then can you both lunch with us to-morrow at one o'clock?"
Quickly, before Terry could find time to object if he meditated doing
so, I accepted with enthusiasm.
Farewells were exchanged, and we had walked to the gate with the
ladies--I heading the procession with Mrs. Kidder, Terry bringing up the
rear with the two girls--when my companion stopped suddenly. "Oh,
there's just one thing I ought to mention before you come to see us at
the hotel," she said, with a little catch of the breath. Evidently she
was embarrassed. "I introduced myself to you as Mrs. Kidder, because I'm
used to that name, and it comes more natural. I keep forgetting always,
but--but perhaps you'd better ask at the hotel for the Countess Dalmar.
I guess you're rather surprised, though you're too polite to say so, my
being an American and having that title."
"Not at all," I assured her. "So many charming Americans marry titled
foreigners, that one is almost more surprised--"
"But I haven't married a foreigner. Didn't I tell you that I'm a widow?
No, the only husband I ever had was Simon P. Kidder. But--but I've
bought an estate, and the title goes with it, so it would seem like a
kind of waste of money not to use it, you see."
"It's the estate that goes with the title, for you, Mamma," said Beechy
(she invariably pronounces her parent "Momma"). "You know you just love
being a Countess. You're happier than I ever was with a new doll that
opened and shut its eyes."
"Don't be silly, Beechy. Little girls should be seen and not heard. As I
was saying, I thought it better to use the title. That was the advice of
Prince Dalmar-Kalm, of whom I've bought this estate in some part of
Austria, or I think, Dalmatia--I'm not quite sure about the exact
situation yet, as it's all so recent. But to get used to bearing the
title, it seemed best to begin right away, so I registered as the
Countess Dalmar when we came to the Cap Martin Hotel a week ago."
"Quite sensible, Countess," I said without looking at
Beechy-of-the-Attendant-Imps. "I know Prince Dalmar-Kalm well by
reputation, though I've never happened to meet him. He's a very familiar
figure on the Riviera." (I might have added, "especially in the Casino
at Monte Carlo," but I refrained, as I had not yet learned the
Countess's opinion of gambling as an occupation.) "Did you meet him here
for the first time?"
"No; I met him in Paris, where we stopped for a while after we crossed,
before we came here. I was so surprised when I saw him at our hotel the
very day after we arrived! It seemed such a coincidence, that our only
acquaintance over on this side should arrive at the same place when we
did."
"When is a coincidence not a coincidence?" pertly inquired Miss Beechy.
"Can you guess that conundrum, Cousin Maida?"
"You naughty girl!" exclaimed her mother.
"Well, you like me to be childish, don't you? And it's childish to be
naughty."
"Come, we'll go home at once," said the Countess, uneasily; and followed
by the tall girl and the little one, she tottered away, sweeping yards
of chiffon.
"I do hope she won't wear things like that when she's in--ahem!--_our_
motor-car," I remarked _sotto voce_, as Terry and I stood at the gate,
watching, if not speeding, our parting guests.
"I doubt very much if she'll ever be there," prophesied Terry, looking
handsome and thoroughly Celtic, wrapped in his panoply of gloom.
"Come away in, while I see if I can find you 'The harp that once through
Tara's halls,' to play your own funeral dirge on," said I. "You look as
if it would be the only thing to do you any good."
"It would certainly relieve my feelings," replied Terry, "but I could do
that just as well by punching your head, which would be simpler. Of all
the infernal--"
"Now don't be brutal!" I implored. "You were quite pleasant before the
ladies. Don't be a whited sepulchre the minute their backs are turned.
Think what I've gone through since I was alone with you last, you great
hulking animal."
"Animal yourself!" Terry had the ingratitude to retort. "What have _I_
gone through, I should like to ask?"
"I don't know what you've gone through, but I know how you behaved," I
returned, as we walked back to the magnolia tree. "Like a sulky barber's
block--I mean a barber's sulky block. No, I--but it doesn't signify.
Hullo, there's the universal provider, carrying off the tray. Félicité,
_mon ange_, say how you summoned that tea and those cakes and cream from
the vasty deep?"
"What Monsieur is pleased to mean, I know not," my fourteen-stone angel
replied. "I visited with haste a friend of mine at the hotel, and I came
back with the things--that is all. It was an inspiration," and she
sailed away, her head in the air.
Terry and I went into the house, for the sun had left the high-walled
garden, and besides, the talk we were going to have was more suitable to
that practical region, my smoking-room-study-den, than to the romantic
shade of a magnolia tree.
We unpocketed our pipes, and smoked for several minutes before we spoke.
I vowed that Terry should begin; but as he went on puffing until I had
counted sixty-nine slowly, I thought it simpler to unvow the vow before
it had had time to harden.
"A penny for your thoughts, Paddy," was the sum I offered with engaging
lightness. "Which is generous of me, as I know them already. You are
thinking of Her."
Teddy forgot to misunderstand, which was a bad sign.
"If it weren't for Her, I'd have got out of the scrape at any price,"
said he, bold as brass. "But I'm sorry for that beautiful creature. She
must lead a beastly life, between a silly, overdressed woman and a pert
minx. Poor child, she's evidently as hard up as I am, or she wouldn't
stand it. She's miserable with them, I could see."
"So you consented to fall into my web, rather than leave her to their
mercy."
"Not exactly that, but--well, I can't explain it. The die's
cast, anyhow. I'm pledged to join the menagerie. But look here, Ralph,
do you understand what you've let me in for?"
"For the society of three charming Americans, two of whom are no doubt
worth their weight in gold."
"It's precisely their weight that's on my mind at this moment. You may
know one or two little things, my dear boy, but among them motoring is
not, otherwise when you were putting that mad advertisement into your
pink rag, you would have stopped to reflect that a twelve-horse power
car is not expected to carry five grown persons up airy mountains and
down rushy glens. Europe isn't perfectly flat, remember."
"Only four of us are grown up. Beechy's an Infant Phenomenon."
"Infant be hanged. She's sixteen if she's a day."
"Her mother ought to know."
"She doesn't want any one else to know. Anyway, I'm big enough to make
up the difference. And besides, my car's not a new one. I paid a
thumping price for her, but that was two years ago. There have been
improvements in the make since."
"Do you mean to tell me that car of yours can't carry five people half
across the world if necessary?"
"She can, but not at an exciting speed; and Americans want excitement.
Not only that, but you saw for yourself that they expect a handsome car
of the latest make, shining with brass and varnish. Amateurs always do.
What will they say when my world-worn old veteran bursts, or rather
bumbles, into view?"
I felt slightly crestfallen, for the first time. When one is an editor,
one doesn't like to think one has been caught napping. "You said you
ought to get two hundred pounds for your Panhard, if you sold it," I
reminded him. "That's a good deal of money. Naturally I thought the
motor must be a fairly decent one, to command that price after several
seasons' wear and tear."
Terry fired up instantly, as I had hoped he would; for his car is the
immediate jewel of his soul. "Decent!" he echoed. "I should rather
think she is. But just as there's a limit to your intelligence, so is
there a limit to her power, and I don't want it to come to that.
However, the thing's gone too far for me to draw back. It must depend
upon the ladies. If they don't back out when they see my car, I won't."
"To all intents and purposes it's my car now," said I. "You made her
over to me before witnesses, and I think I shall have her smartened up
with a bit of red paint and a crest."
"If you try on anything like that, you can drive her yourself, for I
won't. I like her old grey dress. I wouldn't feel at home with her in
any other. And she sha'n't be trimmed with crests to make an American
holiday. She goes as she is, or not at all, my boy."
"You are the hardest chap to do anything for I ever saw," I groaned,
with the justifiable annoyance of a martyr who has failed to convert a
pagan hero. "As if you hadn't made things difficult enough already by
'Mistering' yourself. At any moment you may be found out--though, on
second thoughts, it won't matter a rap if you are. If you're a mere
Mister, you are often obliged to appear before an unsympathetic police
magistrate for pretending to be a Lord. But I never heard of a Lord's
falling foul of the law for pretending to be a Mister."
"If you behave yourself, there isn't much danger of my being found out
by any of the people most concerned, during a few weeks' motoring on the
Continent; but it's to be hoped they won't select England, Scotland, or
Ireland for their tour."
"We can tell them that conditions are less favourable for motoring at
home--which is quite true, judging from the complaints I hear from
motor-men."
"But look here; you let me in for this. What I did was on the spur of
the moment, and in self-defence. I didn't dream then that I should be,
first cornered by you, then led on by circumstances into engaging as
chauffeur, to drive my own car on such a wild-goose chase."
"It's a wild goose that will lay golden eggs. Fifteen guineas a day, my
son; that's the size of the egg which that beneficent bird will drop
into your palm every twenty-four hours. Deduct the ladies' hotel
expenses--say three guineas a day; expenses for yourself and car we'll
call two guineas more (of course I pay my own way), that leaves you as
profit ten guineas daily; seventy guineas a week, or at the rate of
three thousand five hundred guineas per annum. Before you'd spent your
little patrimony, and been refused an--er--fratrimony, you weren't half
as well off as that. You might do worse than pass your whole life as a
Personal Conductor on those terms. And instead of thanking the wise
friend who has caught this goose for you, and is willing to leave his
own peaceful duck for your sake, with no remuneration, you abuse him."
"My dear fellow, I'm not exactly abusing you, for I know you meant well.
But you've swept me off my feet, and I'm not at home yet in mid air."
"You can lie on your back and roll in gold in the intervals of driving
the car. I promise not to give you away. Still, it's a pity you wouldn't
consent to trading a little on your title, which Heaven must have given
you for some good purpose. As it is, you've made my tuppenny-ha'penny
baronetcy the only bait, and that's no catch at all for an American
millionairess, fishing for something big in Aristocracy Pond. Why, when
that Prince of hers discovers what is doing, he will persuade the fair
Countess Dalmar that she's paying a high price for a Nobody--a
Nobody-at-All."
"What makes you think he doesn't know already, as he evidently followed
the party here, and must be constantly dangling about?"
"My detective instinct, which two seasons of pink journalism has
developed. Mrs. Kidder saw the advertisement this morning, and was
caught by it. May Sherlock Holmes cut me in the street if Prince
Dalmar-Kalm hasn't been away for the day, doubtless at Monte Carlo where
he has lost most of his own money, and will send the Countess's to find
it, if she gives him the chance."
"I never saw the fellow, or heard of him, so far as I can remember,"
said Terry thoughtfully. "What's he like? Middle-aged, stout?"
"He looks thirty, so he is probably forty; for if you look your age, you
are probably ten years past it--though that sounds a bit more Irish than
Scotch, eh? And he's far from being stout. From a woman's point of view,
I should say he might be very attractive. Tall; thin; melancholy;
enormous eyes; moustache waxed; scar on forehead; successful effect of
dashing soldier, but not much under the effect, I should say, except
inordinate self-esteem, and a masterly selfishness which would take what
it wanted at almost any cost to others. There's a portrait of Prince
Dalmar-Kalm for you."
"Evidently not the sort of man who ought to be allowed to hang about
young girls."
"Young girls with money. Don't worry about the vestal virgin. He won't
have time in this game to bother with poor relations, no matter how
pretty they may happen to be."
Terry still looked thoughtful. "Well, if we are going in for this queer
business, we'd better get off as soon as possible," said he.
I smiled in my sleeve. "St. George in a stew to get the Princess out of
the dragon's claws," I thought; but I refrained from speaking the
thought aloud. Whatever the motive, the wish was to be encouraged. The
sooner the wild goose laid the first golden egg the better. Fortunately
for my private interests, the season was waning and the coming week
would see the setting of my _Riviera Sun_ until next November. I could
therefore get away, leaving what remained of the work to be done by my
"sub"; and I determined that, Prince or no Prince, luncheon to-morrow
should not pass without a business arrangement being completed between
the parties.
III
A CHAPTER OF REVENGES
Mrs. Kidder, alias the Countess Dalmar, either had a fondness for lavish
hospitality or else she considered us exceptionally distinguished
guests. Our feast was not laid in a private dining-room (what is the
good of having distinguished guests if nobody is to know you've got
them?); nevertheless, it was a feast. The small round table, close to
one of the huge windows of the restaurant, was a condensed flower-show.
Our plates and glasses (there were many of the latter) peeped at us from
a bower of roses, and bosky dells of greenery. The Countess and the
Infant were dressed as for a royal garden party, and Terry and I would
have felt like moulting sparrows had not Miss Destrey's plain white
cotton kept us in countenance.
Mrs. Kidder had evidently not been comfortably certain whether we ought
not to march into the restaurant arm in arm, but the penniless goddess
(who had perhaps been brought to Europe as a subtle combination of
etiquette-mistress and ladies'-maid) cut the Gordian knot with a quick
glance, to our intense relief; and we filed in anyhow, places being
indicated to Terry and me on either hand
|
because Cneius Pompey, whom he
hated, was at the head of a large army, and he was willing that the
power of any one whomsoever should raise itself against Pompey's
influence; trusting, at the same time, that if the plot should
succeed, he would easily place himself at the head of the
conspirators.
XVIII. But previously[108] to this period, a small number of persons,
among whom was Catiline, had formed a design against the state: of
which affair I shall here give as accurate account as I am able. Under
the consulship of Lucius Tullus and Marcus Lepidus, Publius Autronius
and Publius Sylla,[109] having been tried for bribery under the laws
against it,[110] had paid the penalty of the offense. Shortly after
Catiline, being brought to trial for extortion,[111] had been
prevented from standing for the consulship, because he had been unable
to declare himself a candidate within the legitimate number of
days.[112] There was at that time, too, a young patrician of the most
daring spirit, needy and discontented, named Cneius Piso,[113] whom
poverty and vicious principles instigated to disturb the government.
Catiline and Autronius,[114] having concerted measures with this Piso,
prepared to assassinate the consuls, Lucius Cotta and Lucius Torquatus,
in the Capitol, on the first of January,[115] when they, having seized
on the fasces, were to send Piso with an army to take possession of the
two Spains.[116] But their design being discovered, they postponed the
assassination to the fifth of February; when they meditated the
destruction, not of the consuls only, but of most of the senate. And had
not Catiline, who was in front of the senate-house, been too hasty to
give the signal to his associates, there would that day have been
perpetrated the most atrocious outrage since the city of Rome was
founded. But as the armed conspirators had not yet assembled in
sufficient numbers, the want of force frustrated the design.
XIX. Some time afterward, Piso was sent as quaestor, with Praetorian
authority, into Hither Spain; Crassus promoting the appointment,
because he knew him to be a bitter enemy to Cneius Pompey. Nor were
the senate, indeed, unwilling[117] to grant him the province; for they
wished so infamous a character to be removed from the seat of
government; and many worthy men, at the same time, thought that there
was some security in him against the power of Pompey, which was then
becoming formidable. But this Piso, on his march toward his province,
was murdered by some Spanish cavalry whom he had in his army. These
barbarians, as some say, had been unable to endure his unjust,
haughty, and cruel orders; but others assert that this body of
cavalry, being old and trusty adherents of Pompey, attacked Piso at
his instigation; since the Spaniards, they observed, had never before
committed such an outrage, but had patiently submitted to many severe
commands. This question we shall leave undecided. Of the first
conspiracy enough has been said.
XX. When Catiline saw those, whom I have just above mentioned,[118]
assembled, though he had often discussed many points with them singly,
yet thinking it would be to his purpose to address and exhort them in
a body, retired with them into a private apartment of his house,
where, when all witnesses were withdrawn, he harangued them to the
following effect:
"If your courage and fidelity had not been sufficiently proved by me,
this favorable opportunity[119] would have occurred to no purpose;
mighty hopes, absolute power, would in vain be within our grasp; nor
should I, depending on irresolution or ficklemindedness, pursue
contingencies instead of certainties. But as I have, on many remarkable
occasions, experienced your bravery and attachment to me, I have
ventured to engage in a most important and glorious enterprise. I am
aware, too, that whatever advantages or evils affect you, the same
affect me; and to have the same desires and the same aversions, is
assuredly a firm bond of friendship.
"What I have been meditating you have already heard separately. But my
ardor for action is daily more and more excited, when I consider what
our future condition of life must be, unless we ourselves assert our
claims to liberty.[120] For since the government has fallen under the
power and jurisdiction of a few, kings and princes[121] have constantly
been their tributaries; nations and states have paid them taxes; but all
the rest of us, however brave and worthy, whether noble or plebeian,
have been regarded as a mere mob, without interest or authority, and
subject to those, to whom, if the state were in a sound condition, we
should be a terror. Hence, all influence, power, honor, and wealth, are
in their hands, or where they dispose of them: to us they have left only
insults,[122] dangers, persecutions, and poverty. To such indignities,
O bravest of men, how long will you submit? Is it not better to die in
a glorious attempt, than, after having been the sport of other men's
insolence, to resign a wretched and degraded existence with ignominy?
"But success (I call gods and men to witness!) is in our own hands.
Our years are fresh, our spirit is unbroken; among our oppressors, on
the contrary, through age and wealth a general debility has been
produced. We have therefore only to make a beginning; the course of
events[123] will accomplish the rest.
"Who in the world, indeed, that has the feelings of a man, can endure
that they should have a superfluity of riches, to squander in building
over seas[124] and leveling mountains, and that means should be wanting
to us even for the necessaries of life; that they should join together
two houses or more, and that we should not have a hearth to call our
own? They, though they purchase pictures, statues, and embossed plate;
[125] though they pull down now buildings and erect others, and lavish
and abuse their wealth in every possible method; yet can not, with the
utmost efforts of caprice, exhaust it. But for us there is poverty at
home, debts abroad; our present circumstances are bad, our prospects
much worse; and what, in a word, have we left, but a miserable existence?
"Will you not, then, awake to action? Behold that liberty, that
liberty for which you have so often wished, with wealth, honor, and
glory, are set before your eyes. All these prizes fortune offers to
the victorious. Let the enterprise itself, then, let the opportunity,
let your poverty, your dangers, and the glorious spoils of war,
animate you far more than my words. Use me either as your leader or
your fellow-soldier; neither my heart nor my hand shall be wanting to
you. These objects I hope to effect, in concert with you, in the
character of consul; unless, indeed, my expectation deceives me, and
you prefer to be slaves rather than masters."
XXI. When these men, surrounded with numberless evils, but without any
resources or hopes of good, had heard this address, though they
thought it much for their advantage to disturb the public tranquillity,
yet most of them called on Catiline to state on what terms they were to
engage in the contest; what benefits they were to expect from taking up
arms; and what support and encouragement they had, and in what quarters.
[126] Catiline then promised them the abolition of their debts;[127] a
proscription of the wealthy citizens;[128] offices, sacerdotal dignities,
plunder, and all other gratifications which war, and the license of
conquerors, can afford. He added that Piso was in Hither Spain, and
Publius Sittius Nucerinus with an army in Mauritania, both of whom were
privy to his plans; that Caius Antonius, whom he hoped to have for a
colleague, was canvassing for the consulship, a man with whom he was
intimate, and who was involved in all manner of embarrassments; and that,
in conjunction with him, he himself, when consul, would commence
operations. He, moreover, assailed all the respectable citizens with
reproaches, commended each of his associates by name, reminded one of
his poverty, another of his ruling passion,[129] several others of their
danger or disgrace, and many of the spoils which they had obtained by
the victory of Sylla. When he saw their spirits sufficiently elevated,
he charged them to attend to his interest at the election of consuls,
and dismissed the assembly.
XXII. There were some, at the time, who said that Catiline, having
ended his speech, and wishing to bind his accomplices in guilt by an
oath, handed round among them, in goblets, the blood of a human body
mixed with wine; and that when all, after an imprecation, had tasted
of it, as is usual in sacred rites, he disclosed his design; and they
asserted[130] that he did this, in order that they might be the more
closely attached to one another, by being mutually conscious of such
an atrocity. But some thought that this report, and many others, were
invented by persons who supposed that the odium against Cicero, which
afterward arose, might be lessened by imputing an enormity of guilt to
the conspirators who had suffered death. The evidence which I have
obtained, in support of this charge, is not at all in proportion to
its magnitude.
XXIII. Among those present at this meeting was Quintus Curius,[131] a
man of no mean family, but immersed in vices and crimes, and whom the
censors had ignominiously expelled from the senate. In this person
there was not less levity than impudence; he could neither keep secret
what he heard, not conceal his own crimes; he was altogether heedless
what he said or what he did. He had long had a criminal intercourse
with Fulvia, a woman of high birth; but growing less acceptable to her,
because, in his reduced circumstances, he had less means of being
liberal, he began, on a sudden, to boast, and to promise her seas and
mountains;[132] threatening her, at times, with the sword, if she were
not submissive to his will; and acting, in his general conduct, with
greater arrogance than ever.[133] Fulvia, having learned the cause of
his extravagant behavior, did not keep such danger to the state a
secret; but, without naming her informant, communicated to several
persons what she had heard and under what circumstances, concerning
Catiline's conspiracy. This intelligence it was that incited the
feelings of the citizens to give the consulship to Marcus Tullius
Cicero.[134] For before this period, most of the nobility were moved
with jealousy, and thought the consulship in some degree sullied, if a
man of no family,[135] however meritorious, obtained it. But when
danger showed itself, envy and pride were laid aside. XXIV.
Accordingly, when the comitia were held, Marcus Tullius and Caius
Antonius were declared consuls; an event which gave the first shock to
the conspirators. The ardor of Catiline, however, was not at all
diminished; he formed every day new schemes; he deposited arms, in
convenient places, throughout Italy; he sent sums of money borrowed on
his own credit, or that of his friends, to a certain Manlius,[136] at
Faesulae,[137] who was subsequently the first to engage in hostilities.
At this period, too, he is said to have attached to his cause great
numbers of men of all classes, and some women, who had, in their earlier
days, supported an expensive life by the price of their beauty, but who,
when age had lessened their gains but not their extravagance, had
contracted heavy debts. By the influence of these females, Catiline
hoped to gain over the slaves in Rome, to get the city set on fire, and
either to secure the support of their husbands or take away their lives.
XXV. In the number of those ladies was Sempronia,[138] a woman who had
committed many crimes with the spirit of a man. In birth and beauty,
in her husband and her children, she was extremely fortunate; she was
skilled in Greek and Roman literature; she could sing, play, and
dance,[139] with greater elegance than became a woman of virtue, and
possessed many other accomplishments that tend to excite the passions.
But nothing was ever less valued by her than honor or chastity.
Whether she was more prodigal of her money or her reputation, it would
have been difficult to decide. Her desires were so ardent that she
oftener made advances to the other sex than waited for solicitation.
She had frequently, before this period, forfeited her word, forsworn
debts, been privy to murder, and hurried into the utmost excesses by
her extravagance and poverty. But her abilities were by no means
despicable;[140] she could compose verses, jest, and join in
conversation either modest, tender, or licentious. In a word, she was
distinguished[141] by much refinement of wit, and much grace of
expression.
XXVI. Catiline, having made these arrangements, still canvassed for
the consulship for the following year; hoping that, if he should be
elected, he would easily manage Antonius according to his pleasure.
Nor did he, in the mean time remain inactive, but devised schemes, in
every possible way, against Cicero, who, however, did not want skill
or policy to guard, against them. For, at the very beginning of his
consulship, he had, by making many promises through Fulvia, prevailed
on Quintus Curius, whom I have already mentioned, to give him secret
information of Catiline's proceedings. He had also persuaded his
colleague, Antonius, by an arrangement respecting their provinces,[142]
to entertain no sentiment of disaffection toward the state; and he kept
around him, though without ostentation, a guard of his friends and
dependents.
When the day of the comitia came, and neither Catiline's efforts for
the consulship, nor the plots which he had laid for the consuls in the
Campus Martius,[143] were attended with success, he determined to
proceed to war, and resort to the utmost extremities, since what he
had attempted secretly had ended in confusion and disgrace.[144]
XXVII. He accordingly dispatched Caius Manlius to Faesulae, and the
adjacent parts of Etruria; one Septimius, of Carinum,[145] into the
Picenian territory; Caius Julius into Apulia; and others to various
places, wherever he thought each would be most serviceable.[146] He
himself, in the mean time, was making many simultaneous efforts at
Rome; he laid plots for the consul; he arranged schemes for burning
the city; he occupied suitable posts with armed men; he went constantly
armed himself, and ordered his followers to do the same; he exhorted
them to be always on their guard and prepared for action; he was active
and vigilant by day and by night, and was exhausted neither by
sleeplessness nor by toil. At last, however, when none of his
numerous projects succeeded,[147] he again, with the aid of Marcus
Porcius Laeca, convoked the leaders of the conspiracy in the dead of
night, when, after many complaints of their apathy, he informed them
that he had sent forward Manlius to that body of men whom he had
prepared to take up arms; and others of the confederates into other
eligible places, to make a commencement of hostilities; and that he
himself was eager to set out to the army, if he could but first cut
off Cicero, who was the chief obstruction to his measures.
XXVIII. While, therefore, the rest were in alarm and hesitation, Caius
Cornelius, a Roman knight, who offered his services, and Lucius
Vargunteius, a senator, in company with him, agreed to go with an
armed force, on that very night, and with but little delay,[148] to
the house of Cicero, under pretense of paying their respects to him,
and to kill him unawares, and unprepared for defense, in his own
residence. But Curius, when he heard of the imminent danger that
threatened the consul, immediately gave him notice, by the agency of
Fulvia, of the treachery which was contemplated. The assassins, in
consequence, were refused admission, and found that they had
undertaken such an attempt only to be disappointed.
In the mean time, Manlius was in Etruria, stirring up the populace,
who, both from poverty, and from resentment for their injuries (for,
under the tyranny of Sylla, they had lost their lands and other
property) were eager for a revolution. He also attached to himself all
sorts of marauders, who were numerous in those parts, and some of
Sylla's colonists, whose dissipation and extravagance had exhausted
their enormous plunder.
XXIX. When these proceedings were reported to Cicero, he, being
alarmed at the twofold danger, since he could no longer secure the
city against treachery by his private efforts, nor could gain
satisfactory intelligence of the magnitude or intentions of the army
of Manlius, laid the matter, which was already a subject of discussion
among the people, before the senate. The senate, accordingly, as is
usual in any perilous emergency, decreed that THE CONSULS SHOULD MAKE
IT THEIR CARE THAT THE COMMONWEALTH SHOULD RECEIVE NO INJURY. This is
the greatest power which, according to the practice at Rome, is
granted[149] by the senate to the magistrate, and which authorizes him
to raise troops; to make war; to assume unlimited control over the
allies and the citizens; to take the chief command and jurisdiction at
home and in the field; rights which, without an order of the people,
the consul is not permitted to exercise.
XXX. A few days afterward, Lucius Saenius, a senator, read to the
senate a letter, which, he said, he had received from Faesulae, and in
which, it was stated that Caius Manlius, with a large force, had taken
the field by the 27th of October.[150] Others at the same time, as is
not uncommon in such a crisis, spread reports of omens and prodigies;
others of meetings being held, of arms being transported, and of
insurrections of the slaves at Capua and in Apulia. In consequence of
these rumors, Quintus Marcius Rex[151] was dispatched, by a decree of
the senate, to Faesulae, and Quintus Metellus Creticus[152] into
Apulia and the parts adjacent; both which officers, with the title of
commanders,[153] were waiting near the city, having been prevented
from entering in triumph, by the malice of a cabal, whose custom it
was to ask a price for every thing, whether honorable or infamous. The
praetors, too, Quintus Pompeius Rufus, and Quintus Metellus Celer, were
sent off, the one to Capua, the other to Picenum, and power was given
them to levy a force proportioned to the exigency and the danger. The
senate also decreed, that if any one should give information of the
conspiracy which had been formed against the state, his reward should
be, if a slave, his freedom and a hundred sestertia; if a freeman, a
complete pardon and two hundred sestertia[154]. They further appointed
that the schools of gladiators[155] should be distributed in Capua and
other municipal towns, according to the capacity of each; and that, at
Rome, watches should be posted throughout the city, of which the
inferior magistrates[156] should have the charge.
XXXI. By such proceedings as these the citizens were struck with
alarm, and the appearance of the city was changed. In place of that
extreme gayety and dissipation,[157] to which long tranquillity[158]
had given rise, a sudden gloom spread over all classes; they became
anxious and agitated; they felt secure neither in any place, nor with
any person; they were not at war, yet enjoyed no peace; each measured
the public danger by his own fear. The women, also, to whom, from the
extent of the empire, the dread of war was new, gave way to lamentation,
raised supplicating hands to heaven, mourned over their infants, made
constant inquiries, trembled at every thing, and, forgetting their pride
and their pleasures, felt nothing but alarm for themselves and their
country.
Yet the unrelenting spirit of Catiline persisted in the same purposes,
notwithstanding the precautions that were adopted against him, and
though he himself was accused by Lucius Paullus under the Plautian
law.[159] At last, with a view to dissemble, and under pretense of
clearing his character, as if he had been provoked by some attack, he
went into the senate-house. It was then that Marcus Tullius, the
consul, whether alarmed at his presence, or fired with indignation
against him, delivered that splendid speech, so beneficial to the
republic, which he afterward wrote and published.[160]
When Cicero sat down, Catiline, being prepared to pretend ignorance of
the whole matter, entreated, with downcast looks and suppliant voice,
that "the Conscript Fathers would not too hastily believe any thing
against him;" saying "that he was sprung from such a family, and had
so ordered his life from his youth, as to have every happiness in
prospect; and that they were not to suppose that he, a patrician,
whose services to the Roman people, as well as those of his ancestors,
had been so numerous, should want to ruin the state, when Marcus
Tullius, a mere adopted citizen of Rome,[161] was eager to preserve
it." When he was proceeding to add other invectives, they all raised
an outcry against him, and called him an enemy and a traitor.[162]
Being thus exasperated, "Since I am encompassed by enemies," he
exclaimed,[163] "and driven to desperation, I will extinguish the
flame kindled around me in a general ruin."
XXXII He then hurried from the senate to his own house; and then,
after much reflection with himself, thinking that, as his plots
against the consul had been unsuccessful, and as he knew the city to
be secured from fire by the watch, his best course would be to augment
his army, and make provision for the war before the legions could be
raised, he set out in the dead of night, and with a few attendants, to
the camp of Manlius. But he left in charge to Lentulus and Cethegus,
and others of whose prompt determination he was assured, to strengthen
the interests of their party in every possible way, to forward the
plots against the consul, and to make arrangements for a massacre, for
firing the city, and for other destructive operations of war;
promising that he himself would shortly advance on the city with a
large army.
During the course of these proceedings at Rome, Caius Manlius
dispatched some of his followers as deputies to Quintus Marcius Rex,
with directions to address him[164] to the following effect:
XXXIII. "We call gods and men to witness, general, that we have taken
up arms neither to injure our country, nor to occasion peril to any
one, but to defend our own persons from harm; who, wretched and in
want, have been deprived most of us, of our homes, and all of us of
our character and property, by the oppression and cruelty of usurers;
nor has any one of us been allowed, according to the usage of our
ancestors, to have the benefit of the law,[165] or, when our property
was lost to keep our persons free. Such has been the inhumanity of the
usurers and of the praetor.[166]
Often have your forefathers, taking compassion on the commonalty at
Rome, relieved their distress by decrees;[167] and very lately, within
our own memory, silver, by reason of the pressure of debt, and with
the consent of all respectable citizens, was paid with brass.[168]
Often too, we must own, have the commonalty themselves, driven by
desire of power, or by the arrogance of their rulers, seceded[169]
under arms from the patricians. But at power or wealth, for the sake
of which wars, and all kinds of strife, arise among mankind, we do not
aim; we desire only our liberty, which no honorable man relinquishes
but with life. We therefore conjure you and the senate to befriend
your unhappy fellow-citizens; to restore us the protection of the law,
which the injustice of the praetor has taken from us; and not to lay
on us the necessity of considering how we may perish, so as best to
avenge our blood."
XXXIV. To this address Quintus Marcius replied, that, "if they wished
to make any petition to the senate, they must lay down their arms, and
proceed as suppliants to Rome;" adding, that "such had always been the
kindness[170] and humanity of the Roman senate and people, that none
had ever asked help of them in vain."
Catiline, on his march, sent letters to most men of consular dignity,
and to all the most respectable citizens, stating that "as he was
beset by false accusations, and unable to resist the combination of
his enemies, he was submitting to the will of fortune, and going into
exile at Marseilles; not that he was guilty of the great wickedness
laid to his charge, but that the state might be undisturbed, and that
no insurrection might arise from his defense of himself."
Quintus Catulus, however, read in the senate a letter of a very
different character, which, he said, was delivered to him in the
name of Catiline, and of which the following is a copy.
[171]XXXV. "Lucius Catiline to Quintus Catulus, wishing health. Your
eminent integrity, known to me by experience,[172] gives a pleasing
confidence, in the midst of great perils, to my present recommendation.
[173] I have determined, therefore, to make no formal defense[174] with
regard to my new course of conduct; yet I was resolved, though conscious
of no guilt,[175] to offer you some explanation,[176] which, on my word
of honor,[177] you may receive as true.[178] Provoked by injuries and
indignities, since, being robbed of the fruit of my labor and exertion,
[179] I did not obtain the post of honor due to me,[180] I have
undertaken, according to my custom, the public cause of the distressed.
Not but that I could have paid, out of my own property, the debts
contracted on my own security;[181] while the generosity of Orestilla,
out of her own fortune and her daughter's, would discharge those
incurred on the security of others. But because I saw unworthy men
ennobled with honors, and myself proscribed[182] on groundless suspicion,
I have for this very reason, adopted a course,[183] amply justifiable
in my present circumstances, for preserving what honor is left to me.
When I was proceeding to write more, intelligence was brought that
violence is preparing against me. I now commend and intrust Orestilla
to your protection;[184] intreating you, by your love for your own
children, to defend her from injury.[185] Farewell."
XXXVI. Catiline himself, having stayed a few days with Caius Flaminius
Flamma in the neighborhood of Arretium,[186] while he was supplying
the adjacent parts, already excited to insurrection, with arms,
marched with his fasces, and other ensigns of authority, to join
Manlius in his camp.
When this was known at Rome, the senate declared Catiline and Manlius
enemies to the state, and fixed a day as to the rest of their force,
before which they might lay down their arms with impunity, except such
as had been convicted of capital offenses. They also decreed that the
consuls should hold a levy; that Antonius, with an army, should hasten
in pursuit of Catiline; and that Cicero should protect the city.
At this period the empire of Rome appears to me to have been in an
extremely deplorable condition;[187] for though every nation, from the
rising to the setting of the sun, lay in subjection to her arms, and
though peace and prosperity, which mankind think the greatest
blessings, were hers in abundance, there yet were found, among her
citizens, men who were bent with obstinate determination, to plunge
themselves and their country into ruin; for, notwithstanding the two
decrees of the senate,[188] not one individual, out of so vast a
number, was induced by the offer of reward to give information of the
conspiracy; nor was there a single deserter from the camp of Catiline.
So strong a spirit of disaffection had, like a pestilence, pervaded
the minds of most of the citizens.
XXXVII. Nor was this disaffected spirit confined to those who were
actually concerned in the conspiracy; for the whole of the common
people, from a desire of change, favored the projects of Catiline.
This they seemed to do in accordance with their general character;
for, in every state, they that are poor envy those of a better class,
and endeavor to exalt the factious;[189] they dislike the established
condition of things, and long for something new; they are discontented
with their own circumstances, and desire a general alteration; they
can support themselves amid tumult and sedition, without anxiety,
since poverty does not easily suffer loss.[190]
As for the populace of the city, they had become disaffected[191] from
various causes. In the first place,[192] such as every where took the
lead in crime and profligacy, with others who had squandered their
fortunes in dissipation, and, in a word, all whom vice and villainy
had driven from their homes, had flocked to Rome as a general
receptacle of impurity. In the next place, many, who thought of the
success of Sylla, when they had seen some raised from common soldiers
into senators, and others so enriched as to live in regal luxury and
pomp, hoped, each for himself, similar results from victory, if they
should once take up arms. In addition to this, the youth, who, in the
country, had earned a scanty livelihood by manual labor, tempted by
public and private largesses, had preferred idleness in the city to
unwelcome toil in the field. To these, and all others of similar
character, public disorders would furnish subsistence. It is not at
all surprising, therefore, that men in distress, of dissolute
principles and extravagant expectations, should have consulted the
interest of the state no further than as it was subservient to their
own. Besides, those whose parents, by the victory of Sylla, had been
proscribed, whose property had been confiscated, and whose civil
rights had been curtailed,[193] looked forward to the event of a war
with precisely the same feelings.
All those, too, who were of any party opposed to that of the senate,
were desirous rather that the state should be embroiled, than that
they themselves should be out of power. This was an evil, which, after
many years, had returned upon the community to the extent to which it
now prevailed.[194]
XXXVIII. For after the powers of the tribunes, in the consulate of
Cneius Pompey and Marcus Crassus, had been fully restored,[195]
certain young men, of an ardent age and temper, having obtained that
high office,[196] began to stir up the populace by inveighing against
the senate, and proceeded, in course of time, by means of largesses
and promises, to inflame them more and more; by which methods they
became popular and powerful. On the other hand, the most of the
nobility opposed their proceedings to the utmost; under pretense,
indeed, of supporting the senate, but in reality for their own
aggrandizement. For, to state the truth in few words, whatever
parties, during that period, disturbed the republic under plausible
pretexts, some, as if to defend the rights of the people, others, to
make the authority of the senate as great as possible, all, though
affecting concern for the public good, contended every one for his own
interest. In such contests there was neither moderation nor limit;
each party made a merciless use of its successes.
XXXIX. After Pompey, however, was sent to the maritime and Mithridatic
wars, the power of the people was diminished, and the influence of the
few increased. These few kept all public offices, the administration
of the provinces, and every thing else, in their own hands; they
themselves lived free from harm,[197] in flourishing circumstances,
and without apprehension; overawing others, at the same time, with
threats of impeachment,[198] so that when in office, they might be
less inclined to inflame the people. But as soon as a prospect of
change, in this dubious state of affairs, had presented itself, the
old spirit of contention awakened their passions; and had Catiline, in
his first battle, come off victorious, or left the struggle undecided,
great distress and calamity must certainly have fallen upon the state,
nor would those, who might at last have gained the ascendency, have
been allowed to enjoy it long, for some superior power would have
wrested dominion and liberty from them when weary and exhausted.
There were some, however, unconnected with the conspiracy, who set out
to join Catiline at an early period of his proceedings. Among these
was Aulus Fulvius, the son of a senator, whom, being arrested on his
journey, his father ordered to be put to death.[199] In Rome, at the
same time, Lentulus, in pursuance of Catiline's directions, was
endeavoring to gain over, by his own agency or that of others, all
whom he thought adapted, either by principles or circumstances, to
promote an insurrection; and not citizens only, but every description
of men who could be of any service in war.
XL. He accordingly commissioned one Publius Umbrenus to apply to
certain deputies of the Allobroges,[200] and to lead them, if he
could, to a participation in the war; supposing that as they were
nationally and individually involved in debt, and as the Gauls were
naturally warlike, they might easily be drawn into such an enterprise.
Umbrenus, as he had traded in Gaul, was known to most of the chief men
there, and personally acquainted with them; and consequently, without
loss of time, as soon as he noticed the deputies in the Forum, he
asked them, after making a few inquiries about the state of their
country, and affecting to commiserate its fallen condition, "what
termination they expected to such calamities?" When he found that they
complained of the rapacity of the magistrates, inveighed against the
senate for not affording them relief, and looked to death as the only
remedy for their sufferings, "Yet I," said he, "if you will but act as
men, will show you a method by which you may escape these pressing
difficulties." When he had said this, the Allobroges, animated with
the highest hopes, besought Umbrenus to take compassion on them;
saying that there was nothing so disagreeable or difficult, which they
would not most gladly perform, if it would but free their country from
debt. He then conducted them to the house of Decimus Brutus, which was
close to the Forum, and, on account of Sempronia, not unsuitable to
his purpose, as Brutus was then absent from Rome.[201] In order, too,
to give greater weight to his representations, he sent for Gabinius,
and
|
right now," you are conscious of the
friendliness of intention in the hall porter, which the English phrase
"at once" wholly fails to convey. Even if you have to wait several hours
before you actually get the luggage you know that every effort is being
made to meet your wishes. You may perhaps have got into a bath and find
yourself, for the want of clean clothes, forced to decide between
staying there, going straight to bed, and getting back into the dirty
garments in which you have traveled. But you have no business to
complain. The "right now" ought to comfort you. Especially when it is
repeated cheerily, while you stand dripping and embarrassed at the
receiver to make a final appeal. The word "right" in these phrases does
not intensify, it modifies, the immediateness of the now. This is one of
the things to which you must get accustomed in America. But it is a
friendly phrase, offering and inviting brotherliness of the most
desirable kind. That it means no more than the "Anon, sir, anon," of
Shakespeare's tapster is not the fault of anybody. Some sacrifices must
be made for the sake of friendliness.
But taken as a whole the American language is very little different from
English. I imagine the tendency to diverge has been checked by the
growing frequency of intercourse between the two countries. So many
Americans come to England and so many English go to America that the
languages are being reduced to one dead level. What used to be called
"Americanisms" are current in common talk on this side of the Atlantic
and on the other there is a regrettable tendency to drop even the fine
old forms which the English themselves lost long ago. "Gotten" still
survives in America instead of the degraded "got," but I am afraid it is
losing its hold. "Wheel" is in all ways preferable to bicycle, and may
perhaps become naturalized here. I cannot imagine that the Americans
will be so foolish as to give it up. Whether "an automobile ride" is
preferable to "a drive in a motor" I do not know. They both strike me as
vile phrases, and it is difficult to choose between them.
America, as a country to travel in, had for us another attraction
besides its language. Some people have relations in Spain to whom they
can go and in whose houses they can stay as guests. Others have
relatives of the same convenient kind in Austria and even in Russia.
Many people have friends in France and Germany. We are not so fortunate.
When we go to those countries we spend our time in hotels, or at best in
pensions. We do not discover intimate things about the people there. It
is impossible for us to learn, except through books, and they seldom
tell us the things we want to know, whether the Austrians are morose or
cheerful at breakfast time, and whether the Germans when at home hate
fresh air as bitterly as they hate it when traveling. And these are just
the sort of things which it is most interesting to know about any
people. The politics of a foreign country are more easily studied in the
pages of periodicals like "The Nineteenth Century" than in the daily
press of the country itself. Statistics about trade and population can
be read up in books devoted to the purpose. All sorts of other
information are supplied by the invaluable Baedeker, so that it is in no
way necessary to go to Venice in order to find out things about St.
Mark's. But very intimate details about the insides of houses, domestic
manners and so forth can only be obtained by staying in private homes.
This we thought we might accomplish in America because we had some
friends there before we started. In reality ready made friends are
unnecessary for the traveler in America. He makes them as he goes along,
for the Americans are an amazingly sociable people and hospitable beyond
all other nations. To us Irish—and we are supposed to be
hospitable—the stranger is a stranger until he is shown in some way to
be a friend. In America he is regarded as a friend unless he makes
himself objectionable, unless he makes himself very objectionable
indeed. We heard of American hospitality before we started. We feel now,
as the Queen of Sheba felt after her visit to King Solomon, that the
half was not told us. To be treated hospitably is always delightful. It
is doubly so when the hospitality enables the fortunate guest to learn
something of a kind of life which is not his own.
For all these reasons—I have enumerated four, I think—we desired
greatly to go to America; and there was still another thing which
attracted us. You cannot go to America except by sea. Even if you are
seasick—and I occasionally am, a little—traveling in a steamer is
greatly to be preferred to traveling in a train. A good steamer is
clean. The best train covers you with smuts. The noise of the train is
nerve-shattering. The noise which a steamer makes, even in a gale, is
soothing. When a train stops and when it starts again it jerks and
bumps. It also runs over things called points and then it bumps more. A
steamer stops far seldomer than a train, and does so very gently and
smoothly. It never actually bumps, and though it very often rolls or
pitches, it does these things in a dignified way with due deliberation.
We chose a slow steamer for our voyage out and if we are fortunate
enough to go to America again we shall choose another slow steamer.
Having made up our minds to go—or rather since these things are really
decided for us and we are never the masters of our movements—having
been shepherded by Destiny into a trip to America we naturally sought
for information about that country. We got a great deal more than we
actually sought. Everyone we met gave us advice and told us what to
expect. Advice is always contradictory, and the only wise thing to do is
to take none of what is offered. But it puzzled us to find that the
accounts we got of the country were equally contradictory. English
people, using a curious phrase of which they seem to be very fond,
prophesied for us "the time of our lives." They said that we should
enjoy ourselves from the day we landed in New York until the day when we
sank exhausted by too much joy, a day which some of them placed a
fortnight off, some three weeks, all of them underestimating, as it
turned out, our capacity for enduring delight. Americans on the other
hand decried the country, and told us that the lot of the traveler in it
was very far from being pleasant. This puzzled us. A very modest and
retiring people might be expected to underestimate the attractions of
their own land. We Irish, for instance, always assert that it rains
three days out of every four in Ireland. But the Americans are not
popularly supposed to be, and in fact are not, particularly modest. I
can only suppose that the Americans we met before we started were in bad
tempers because they were for one reason or another obliged to stay in
England, and that they belittled their country in the spirit of the fox
who said the grapes were sour.
One piece of advice which we got gave us, incidentally and accidentally,
our first glimpse at one of the peculiarities of the American people,
their hatred of letter writing as a means of communication. The advice
was this:
"Do not attempt to take a sealskin coat into America, because there is a
law there against sealskin coats and the Custom House officers will hold
up the garment."
This seemed to us very improbable. I remembered the song I have already
quoted about the "Land of the Free" and could not bring myself to
believe that a great nation, a nation that had fought an expensive war
in order to set its slaves at liberty, could possibly want to interfere
with the wearing apparel of a casual stranger. The Law, which is very
great and majestic everywhere, is, according to the proverb, indifferent
to very small matters. America, which is as great and majestic as any
law, could not possibly be supposed to concern itself with the material
of a woman's coat. So we reasoned. But the warning was given with
authority by one who knew a lady who had tried to bring a sealskin coat
into America and failed. We thought it well to make sure. An inquiry at
the steamboat office was useless. The clerk there declined to say
anything either good or bad about the American Custom House regulations.
I have noticed this same kind of cautious reticence among all Americans
when the subject of customs comes up. I imagine that the people of
ancient Crete avoided speaking about that god of theirs who ate young
girls, and for the same reason. There is no use running risks, and the
American Custom House officer is a person whom it is not well to offend.
This is the way with all democracies. In Russia and Germany a man has to
be careful in speaking about the Czar or the Kaiser. In republics we
shut our mouths when a minor official is mentioned, unless we are among
tried and trusted friends. I myself dislike respecting any one; but if
respect is exacted of me I should rather yield it to a king with a
proper crown on his head than to an ordinary man done up with brass
buttons. However, Anglo-Saxons on both sides of the Atlantic seem to
like doing obeisance to officials, and their tastes are no affairs of
mine.
Having failed in the steamboat office, I wrote a letter to a high
American official in England—not the Ambassador. I did not like to
trouble him about a sealskin coat. An English official, high, or of
middling station, would have answered me by return of post, because he
is glad of an opportunity of writing a letter. In fact, he likes writing
letters so much that he would have sent me two answers, the first a
brief but courteous acknowledgment of my letter and an assurance that it
was receiving attention; the second an extract from the Act of
Parliament which dealt with my particular problem. The American official
does not like writing letters. No American does. Rather than write a
letter, an American will pursue you, _viva voce_, over hundreds of miles
of telephone wire, or spend an hour of valuable time in having an
interview with you in some more or less inaccessible place. Not even
promotion to a high official position will cause an American to feel
kindly toward a pen. The official to whom I wrote would, I am sure, have
told me all there is to know about the American dislike of sealskin
coats, if he could have got me on a telephone. He could not do that,
because my name is not in the London telephone directory. He would,
although he is a most important person and I am less than the least,
have come to me and talked face to face if he had known where to find
me; but I wrote from a club, and the chances were five to one at least
against his finding me there. There was nothing for it but to write a
letter; but it took him several days to make up his mind to the effort.
His answer, when he did write it, followed me to New York, and the
sealskin coat problem had solved itself then.
I noticed, when in New York, that it takes a posted letter much longer
to get from one street in that city to another quite near at hand than
it does in London for a letter posted in the same way to get from
Denmark Hill to Hampstead. I connect this fact with the dislike of
letter-writing which is prevalent among Americans. But I do not know
which is cause and which is effect. It may be that the American avoids
letters because he knows that they will go to their destination very
slowly. It may be, on the other hand, that the American post-office has
dropped into leisurely ways because it knows that it is seldom used for
business purposes. Love letters it carries, no doubt, for it is
difficult to express tender feelings on a telephone, and impossible to
telegraph them; but love letters are hardly ever urgent. The "Collins"
or "Hospitable Roof" communication must be a letter and must go through
the post, but the writer and the recipient would both be better pleased
if it never arrived at all. Business letters are different things, and I
am sure the American post-office carries comparatively few of them.
I wish that some one with a taste for statistics would make out a table
of the weights of the mail bags carried on Cunard steamers. I am
convinced, and nothing but statistics will make me think differently,
that the westward bound ships carry far more letters than those which
travel eastward. All Englishmen, except for obvious reasons English
journalists, write letters whenever they have a decent excuse. Americans
only write letters when they must. It was, I think, the late Charles
Stewart Parnell who observed that most letters answered themselves if
you leave them alone long enough. This is profoundly true, although
Englishmen do not believe it. I have tried and I know. Americans have
either come across Parnell's remark or worked out the same truth for
themselves. I applaud their wisdom, but I was once sorry that they
practice this form of economy. If we had got an answer to our letter
before we sailed, we should have left the coat behind us. As it was, we
took the coat with us and carried it about America, giving ourselves
indeed a good deal of trouble and reaping very little in the way of
comfort or credit by having it. When we did get the letter it showed us
that the Americans really do object strongly to these coats and have
made a law against them. If we had known that before starting, we should
have left the coat behind us at any cost to our feelings.
We are not aggressive people, either of us, and we always try to conform
to the customs of the country in which we are, and to respect the
feelings of the inhabitants. We cannot, indeed, afford to do anything
else. Members of powerful, conquering nations go about the world
insisting on having their own way wherever they are. The English, for
instance, have spread the practice of drinking tea in the afternoon all
over Europe. They make it understood that wherever they go afternoon tea
must be obtainable. Other peoples shrug their shoulders and give in. The
Americans have insisted that hotels shall be centrally heated and all
rooms and passages kept up to a very high temperature. No one else wants
this kind of heat, and until the Americans took to traveling in large
numbers we were all content with fireplaces in rooms and chilly
corridors. But the Americans are a great people, and there is hardly a
first-rate hotel left in Europe now which has not got a system of
central heating installed. The French have secured the use of their
language, or a colorable imitation of their language, on all menu cards
and bills of fare. No self-respecting _maître d'hotel_, even if 90% of
his patrons are Americans, English and Germans, would dare to call soup
anything except _potage_ or _consommé_. I think we owe it to the
Russians that ladies can now smoke cigarettes without reproach in all
European restaurants, though they cannot do this yet in America because
very few Russians of the tourist classes go to America. It must be very
gratifying to belong to one of these great nations and to be able to
import a favorite custom or a valued comfort wherever you go. We are
mere Irish. We have never conquered any one ourselves, although we are
rather good at winning other people's battles for them. We have not
money enough to make it worth anybody's while to consider our tastes;
nor, indeed, are we sure enough of ourselves to insist on having our own
way. There is always at the backs of our minds the paralyzing thought
that perhaps the other people may be right and we may be wrong. We
submit rather than struggle.
We like, for instance, good tea at breakfast, strong dark brown tea,
which leaves a distinct stain on the inside of the cup out of which we
drink it. Nobody else in the world likes this kind of tea. If we were a
conquering, domineering people, we should go about Europe and America
saying: "This which we drink is tea. Your miserable concoction is slop
or worse." If we were rich enough and if large numbers of us traveled,
we should establish our kind of tea as an institution. It would be
obtainable everywhere. At first it would be called "_Thé à
l'Irlandaise_" and we should get it by asking for it. Afterwards it
would be "thé" simply, and if a traveler wanted anything else he would
have to ask for that by some special name. But we are not that kind of
people. There are not enough of us, and the few there are have not
sufficient money to make them worth considering. Besides, we are never
self-confident enough to assert that our kind of tea is the true and
superior kind. We are uneasily conscious that it is rude to describe
other people's favorite beverages as "slop" even when they call ours
"poison." And there is always the doubt whether we may not be wrong,
after all. Great peoples do not suffer from this doubt. The American is
perfectly certain that houses ought to be centrally heated. To him there
does not seem to be any possibility of arguing about that. He has
discovered a universal truth, and the rest of the world must learn it
from him.
The German is equally sure that fresh air in a railway carriage brings
death to the person who breathes it. He is as certain about that as he
is that water wets him when it is poured over him. There is no room for
discussion. But we Irish are differently constituted. When any one tells
us that our type of tea reduces those who drink it to the condition of
nervous wrecks and ultimately drives them into lunatic asylums, we
wonder whether perhaps he may not be right. It is true that we have
drunk the stuff for years and felt no bad effects; but there is always
"the plaguy hundredth chance" that the bad effects may have been there
all the time without our noticing them, and that, though we seem sane,
we may be jibbering imbeciles. Thus it is that we never have the heart
to make any real struggle for strong tea.
This same infirmity would have prevented our dragging that coat into
America if we had found out in time that sealskin coats strike Americans
as wicked things. To us it seems plain that seals exist mainly for the
purpose of supplying men, and especially women, with skins; just as
fathers have their place among created things in order to supply money
for the use of their children, or steam in order that it may make
engines work. Left to ourselves, we should accept all these as final
truths and live in the light of them. But the moment any one assails
them with a flat contradiction we begin to doubt. The American says that
the seal, at all events the seal that has the luck to live in Hudson
Bay, ought not to be deprived of his skin, and that men and women must
be content with their own skins, supplemented when necessary by the
fleeces of sheep.
The Englishman or the German would stand up to the American.
"I will," one of them would say, "kill a Hudson Bay seal if I like or
have him killed for me by some one else. I will wear his skin unless you
prevent me by actual force, and I will resist your force as long as I
can."
We do not adopt that attitude. We cannot, for the spirit of defiance is
not in us. When we were assured, as we were in the end, that the
American really has strong feelings about seals, we began to think that
he might be right.
"America," so we argued, "is a much larger country than Ireland. It is
much richer. The buildings in its cities are far higher. Who are we that
we should set up our opinions about tea or skins or anything else
against the settled convictions of so great a people?"
Therefore, though we brought our coat into America, we did so in no
spirit of defiance. Once we found out the truth, we concealed the coat
as much as possible, carrying it about folded up so that only the lining
showed. It was hardly ever worn, only twice, I think, the whole time we
were there. The weather, indeed, was as a rule particularly warm for
that season of the year.
CHAPTER II
PRESSMEN AND POLITICIANS
Our ship, after a prosperous and pleasant voyage, steamed up the Hudson
River in a blinding downpour of rain which drove steadily across the
decks. Our clothes had been packed up since very early in the morning,
and we declined to get soaked to the skin when there was no chance of
our being able to get dry again for several hours. Therefore, we missed
seeing the Statue of Liberty and the Woolworth Building. We were
cowards, and we suffered for our cowardice by losing what little respect
our American fellow travelers may have had for us. They went out in the
rain to gaze at the Statue of Liberty and the Woolworth Building. We saw
nothing through the cabin windows except an advertisement of Colgate's
tooth paste. The Woolworth Building we did indeed see later on. The
Statue of Liberty we never saw at all. I could of course write
eloquently about it without having seen it. Many people do things of
this kind, but I desire to be perfectly honest. I leave out the Statue
of Liberty. I am perfectly sure it is there; but beyond that fact I know
nothing whatever about it.
We actually landed, set foot at last on the soil of the new world, a
little before 8 A.M., which is a detestable hour of the day under any
circumstances, and particularly abominable in a downpour of rain. If a
stranger with whom I was very slightly acquainted were to land at that
hour in Dublin, and if it were raining as hard there as it did that
morning in New York—it never does, but it is conceivable that it
might—I should no more think of going to meet him at the quay than I
should think of swimming out a mile or two to wave my hand at his ship
as she passed. A year ago I should have made this confession without the
smallest shame. It would not have occurred to me as possible that I
should make such an expedition. If a very honored guest arrived at a
reasonable hour and at an accessible place—steamboat quays are never
accessible anywhere in the world—if the day were fine and I had nothing
particular to do, I might perhaps go to meet that guest, and I should
expect him to be surprised and gratified. I now confess this with shame,
and I intend to reform my habits. I blush hotly when I think of the
feelings of Americans who come to visit us. They behave very much better
than we do to strangers. There were three people to meet us that morning
when we landed and two others arrived at the quay almost immediately
afterwards. Of the five there was only one whom I had ever seen before,
and him no oftener than twice. Yet they were there to shake our hands in
warm welcome, to help us in every conceivable way, to whisper advice
when advice seemed necessary.
There were also newspaper reporters, interviewers, and we had our first
experience of that business as the Americans do it, in the shed where
our baggage was examined by Custom House officers.
"Don't," said one of my friends, "say more than you can help about
religion."
The warning seemed to me unnecessary. I value my religion, not as much
as I ought to, but highly. Still it is not a subject which I should
voluntarily discuss at eight o'clock in the morning in a shed with rain
splashing on the roof. The very last thing I should dream of offering a
newspaper reporter is a formal proof of any of the articles of the
Apostle's Creed. Nor would any interviewer whom I ever met care to
listen to a sermon. I was on the point of resenting the advice; but I
reflected in time that it was certainly meant for my good and that the
ways of the American interviewer were strange to me. He might want to
find out whether I could say my catechism. I thanked my friend and
promised to mention religion as little as possible. I confess that the
warning made me nervous.
"What," I whispered, "are they likely to ask me?"
"Well, what you think of America, for one thing. They always begin with
that."
I had been told that before I left home. I had even been advised by an
experienced traveler to jot down, during the voyage out, all the things
I thought about America, and have them ready on slips of paper to hand
to the interviewers when I arrived. This plan, I was assured, would save
me trouble and would give the Americans a high opinion of my business
ability. I took the advice. I had quite a number of excellent remarks
about America ready in my pocket when I landed. They were no use to me.
Not one single interviewer asked me that question. Not even the one who
chatted with me in the evening of the day on which I left for home. I do
not know why I was not asked this question. Every other stranger who
goes to America is asked it, or at all events says he is asked it.
Perhaps the Americans have ceased to care what any stranger thinks about
them. Perhaps they were uninterested only in my opinion. I can
understand that.
Nor was I tempted or goaded to talk about religion. The warning which I
got to avoid that subject was wasted. No one seemed to care what I
believed. I do not think I should have startled the very youngest
interviewer if I had confided to him that I believed nothing at all. The
nearest I ever got to religion in an interview was when I was asked what
I thought about Ulster and Home Rule. That I was asked frequently,
almost as frequently as I was asked what I thought of Synge's "Playboy
of the Western World"; and both these seemed to me just the sort of
questions I ought to be asked, if, indeed, I ought to be asked any
questions at all. I do not, indeed cannot, think about Ulster and Home
Rule. Nobody can. It is one of those things, like the fourth dimension,
which baffle human thought. Just as you hope that you have got it into a
thinkable shape it eludes you and you see it sneering at your
discomfiture from the far side of the last ditch. But it was quite right
and proper to expect that an Irishman, especially an Irishman who came
originally from Belfast, would have something to say about it, some
thought to express which would illuminate the morass of that
controversy. I could not complain about being asked that question. I
ought to have had something to say about Synge's play, too, but I had
not. I think it is a wonderful play, by far the greatest piece of
dramatic literature that Ireland has produced; but I cannot give any
reasons for the faith that is in me. Therefore, I am afraid I must have
been a most unsatisfactory subject for the interviewers. They cannot
possibly have liked me.
I, on the other hand, liked them very much indeed. I found them
delightful to talk to, and look back on the hours I spent with them as
some of the most interesting of my whole American trip. They all,
without exception, seemed to want to be pleasant. They were the least
conceited set of people I ever came across and generally apologized for
coming to see me. The apologies were entirely unnecessary. Their visits
were favors conferred on me. They were strictly honorable. When, as very
often happened, I said something particularly foolish and became
conscious of the fact, I used to ask the interviewer to whom I had said
it not to put it in print. He always promised to suppress it and he
always kept his promise, though my sillinesses must often have offered
attractive copy. Nor did any interviewer ever misrepresent me, except
when he failed to understand what I said, and that must always have been
more my fault than his. At first I used to be very cautious with
interviewers and made no statements of any kind without hedging. I used
to shy at topics which seemed dangerous, and trot away as quickly as I
could to something which offered opportunity for platitudes. I gradually
came to realize that this caution was unnecessary. I would talk
confidently now to an American interviewer on any subject, even
religion, for I know he would not print anything which I thought likely
to get me into trouble.
I cannot understand how it is that American interviewers have such a bad
reputation on this side of the Atlantic. They are a highly intelligent,
well-educated body of men and women engaged in the particularly
difficult job of trying to get stupid people, like me, or conceited
people to say something interesting. They never made any attempt to pry
into my private affairs. They never asked obviously silly questions. I
have heard of people who resorted to desperate expedients to avoid
interviewers in America. I should as soon think of trying to avoid a
good play or any other agreeable form of entertainment. After all, there
is no entertainment so pleasant as conversation with a clever man or
woman. I have heard of people who were deliberately rude to interviewers
and gloried in their rudeness afterwards. That seems to me just as grave
a breach of manners as to say insolent things to a host or hostess at a
dinner party.
Every now and then an interviewer, using a very slender foundation of
fact, produces something which is brilliantly amusing. There was one,
with whom I never came into personal contact at all, who published a
version of a conversation between Miss Maire O'Neill and me. What we
actually said to each other was dull enough. The interviewer, by the
simple expedient of making us talk after the fashion which "Mr. Dooley"
has made popular, represented us as exceedingly interesting and amusing
people. No one but a fool would resent being flattered after this
fashion.
The one thing which puzzles me about the business is why the public
wants it done. It is pleasant enough for the hero of the occasion, and
it is only affectation to call him a victim. The man who does the work,
the interviewer, is, I suppose, paid. He ought to be paid very highly.
But where does the public come in? It reads the interview—we must, I
think, take it for granted that somebody reads interviews, but it is
very difficult to imagine why. The American public, judging from the
number of interviews published, seems particularly fond of this kind of
reading. Yet, however clever the interviewer, the thing must be dull in
nine cases out of ten.
My first interviewer, my very first, photographed me. I told him that he
was wasting a plate, but he went on and wasted three. Why did he do it?
If I were a very beautiful woman I could understand it, though I think
it would be a mistake to photograph Venus herself on the gangway of a
steamer at eight o'clock in the morning in a downpour of rain. If I had
been a Christian missionary who had been tortured by Chinese, I could
understand it. Tortures might have left surprising marks on my face or
twisted my spine in an interesting way. If I had been an apostle of
physical culture, dressed in a pair of bathing drawers and part of a
tiger skin, the photographing would have been intelligible. But I am
none of these things. What pleasure could the public be expected to find
in the reproduction of a picture of a common place middle-aged man? Yet
the thing was done. I can only suppose that reading interviews and
looking at the attendant photographs has become a habit with the
American public, just as carrying a walking stick has with the English
gentleman. A walking stick is no real use except to a lame man. The
walker does not push himself along with it. He does not, when he sets
out from home, expect to meet any one whom he wants to hit. It cannot be
contended that the stick is ornamental or adds in any way to the beauty
of his appearance. He carries it because he always does carry it and
would feel strange if he did not. The Americans put up with interviews
in their papers for the same sort of reason. After all, no one, least of
all the subject, has any right to complain.
Those were our two first impressions of America, that it was a country
of boundless hospitality and a country pervaded by agreeable newspaper
men. I am told by those who make a study of such things that the first
glance you get at a face tells you something true and reliable about the
man or woman it belongs to, but that you get no further information by
looking at the face day after day for months. When you come to know the
man or woman really well, and have studied his actions and watched his
private life closely for years, you find, if you still recollect what it
was, that your first impression was right. I knew an Englishman once who
lived for ten years in Ireland and was deeply interested in our affairs.
He told me that when he had been a week in the country he understood it,
understood us and all belonging to us thoroughly. At the end of three
months he began to doubt whether he understood us quite as well as he
thought. After five years he was sure he did not understand us at all.
After ten years—he was a persevering man—he began to understand us a
little, and was inclined to think he was getting back to the exact
position he held at the end of the first week. Ten years hence, if he
and I live so long, I intend to ask him again what he thinks about
Ireland. Then, I expect, he will tell me that he is quite convinced that
his earliest impressions were correct. This is my justification for
recording my first impressions of America. I hope to get to know the
country much better as years go on. I shall probably pass through the
stage of laughing at my earliest ideas, but in the end I confidently
expect to get back to my joyous admiration for American hospitality and
my warm affection for American journalists.
Almost immediately—certainly before the end of our second day—we
arrived at the conclusion that New York was a singularly clean city. We
are, both of us, by inclination dwellers in country places. The noise of
great towns worries us. The sense of being closely surrounded by large
numbers of other people annoys us. But we should no doubt get used to
these things if we were forced to dwell long in any city. I am, however,
certain that I should always loathe the dirt of cities. The dirt of the
country, good red mud, or the slime of wet stems of trees, does not
trouble me, even if I am covered with it. I enjoy the dirt of quiet
harbors, fish scales, dabs of tar and rust off old anchor chains. I am
happier when these things are clinging to me than when I am free of
them. I am no fanatical worshipper of cleanliness. I do not rank it, as
the English proverb does, among the minor divinities of the world. But I
do not like, I thoroughly detest, the dirt of cities, that impalpable
grime which settles down visibly on face, hands, collar, cuffs, and
invisibly but sensibly on coats, hats and trousers. New York, of all the
cities I have ever been in, is freest of this grime. You can open your
bedroom window at night in New York, and the pocket handkerchief you
leave on your dressing table will still be white in the morning, fairly
white. You can walk about New York all day and your nose will not be
covered with smuts in the evening. I am told that the cleanness of New
York is partly due to the fact that trains running in and out of the
city are forced by the municipal authorities to use electricity as a
motive power and are forbidden to burn coal till they get into the
country. I am told that only a hard, comparatively smokeless coal may be
burned by any one in the city. If these things are true, then the City
Fathers of New York ought to be held up as a pattern to Town Councillors
and corporations all over the world.
As a matter of fact—such is the injustice of man—the municipal
government of New York is not very greatly admired by the rest of the
world. It is supposed to be singularly corrupt, and my fellow countrymen
are blamed for its corruptness. When an European city feels in a
pharisaical mood it says: "Thank God I am not as other cities are, even
as this New York." European cities may be morally cleaner. I do not know
whether they are or not. They are certainly physically much dirtier. And
from the point of view of the ordinary citizen physical dirt is more
continuously annoying than the
|
," said Ian. "I'm fond of Aunt
Alison--you'll like her, too--but she'll keep. Let's go see my mare
Fatima, and then my room."
Fatima was a most beautiful young, snowy Arabian. Alexander sighed
with delight when they led her out from her stable and she walked
about with Ian beside her, and when presently Ian mounted she curveted
and caracoled. Ian and she suited each other. Indefinably, there was
about him, too, something Eastern. The two went to and fro, the mare's
hoofs striking music from the flags. Behind them ran a gray range of
buildings overtopped by bushy willows. Alexander sat on a stone bench,
hugged his knees, and felt true love for the sight. Ian had come to
him like a gift from the blue.
Ian dismounted, and they watched Fatima disappear into her stall.
"Come now and see the house."
The house was large and cumbered with furniture too much and too rich
for the Scotch countryside. Ian's room had a great, rich bed and a
dressing-table that drew from Alexander a whistle, contemplative and
scornful. But there were other matters besides luxury of couch and
toilet. Slung against the wall appeared a fine carbine, the pistols
and sword of Ian's father, and a wonderful long, twisted, and
damascened knife or dirk--creese, Ian called it--that had come in some
trading-ship of his uncle's. And he had books in a small closet room,
and a picture that the two stood before.
"Where did you get it?"
"There was an Italian who owed my uncle a debt. He had no money, so he
gave him this. He said that it was painted a long time ago and that it
was very fine."
"What is it?"
"It is a Bible piece. This is a city of refuge. This is a sinner
fleeing to it, and here behind him is the avenger of blood. You can't
see, it is so dark. There!" He drew the window-curtain quite aside. A
flood of light came in and washed the picture.
"I see. What is it doing here?"
"I don't know. I liked it. I suppose Aunt Alison thought it might hang
here."
"I like to see pictures in my mind. But things like that poison me!
Let's see the rest of the house."
They went again through Ian's room. Coming to a fine carved ambry, he
hesitated, then stood still. "I'm going to show you something else! I
show it to you because I trust you. It's like your telling me about
your making gold out of lead." He opened a door of the ambry, pulled
out a drawer, and, pressing some spring, revealed a narrow, secret
shelf. His hand went into the dimness and came out bearing a silver
goblet. This he set carefully upon a neighboring table, and looked at
Alexander somewhat aslant out of long, golden-brown eyes.
"It's a bonny goblet," said Alexander. "Why do you keep it like that?"
Ian looked around him. "Years and years ago my father, who is dead
now, was in France. There was a banquet at Saint-Germain. _A very
great person_ gave it and was in presence himself. All the gentlemen
his guests drank a toast for which the finest wine was poured in
especial goblets. Afterward each was given for a token the cup from
which he drank.... Before he died my father gave me this. But of
course I have to keep it secret. My uncle and all the world around
here are Whigs!"
"James Stewart!" quoth Alexander. "Humph!"
"Remember that you have not seen it," said Ian, "and that I never said
aught to you but _King George, King George!_" With that he restored
the goblet to the secret shelf, put back the drawer, and shut the
ambry door. "Friends trust one another in little and big.--Now let's
go see Aunt Alison."
They went in silence along a corridor where every footfall was subdued
in India matting. Alexander spoke once:
"I feel all through me that we're friends. But you're a terrible fool
there!"
"I am not," said Ian. His voice carried the truth of his own feeling.
"I am like my father and mother and the chieftains my kin, and I have
been with certain kings ever since there were kings. Others think
otherwise, but I've got my rights!"
With that they came to the open door of a room. A voice spoke from
within:
"Ian!"
Ian crossed the threshold. "May we come in, Aunt Alison? It's
Alexander Jardine of Glenfernie."
A tall, three-leaved screen pictured with pagodas, palms, and macaws
stood between the door and the rest of the room. "Come, of course!"
said the voice behind this.
Passing the last pagoda edge, the two entered a white-paneled parlor
where a lady in dove-gray muslin overlooked the unpacking of fine
china. She turned in the great chair where she sat. "I am truly glad
to see Alexander Jardine!" When he went up to her she took his two
hands in hers. "I remember your mother and how fine a lassie she was!
Good mind and good heart--"
"We've heard of you, too," answered Alexander. He looked at her in
frank admiration, _Eh, but you're bonny!_ written in his gaze.
Mrs. Alison, as they called her, was something more than bonny. She
had loveliness. More than that, she breathed a cleanliness of spirit,
a lucid peace, a fibered self-mastery passing into light. Alexander
did not analyze his feeling for her, but it was presently one of great
liking. Now she sat in her great chair while the maids went on with
the unpacking, and questioned him about Glenfernie and all the family
and life there. She was slight, not tall, with hair prematurely
white, needing no powder. She sat and talked with her hand upon Ian.
While she talked she glanced from the one youth to the other. At last
she said:
"Alexander Jardine, I love Ian dearly. He needs and will need
love--great love. If you are going to be friends, remember that love
is bottomless.--And now go, the two of you, for the day is getting
on."
They passed again the macaw-and-pagoda screen and left the paneled
room. The August light struck slant and gold. The two quitted the
house and crossed the terrace into the avenue without again
encountering the master of the place.
"I will go with you to the top of the hill," said Ian. They climbed
the ridge that was like a purple cloud. "I'll come to Glenfernie
to-morrow or the next day."
"Yes, come! I'm fond of Jamie, but he's three years younger than I."
"You've got a sister?"
"Alice? She's only twelve. You come. I've been wanting somebody."
"So have I. I'm lonelier than you."
They came to the level top of the heath. The sun rode low; the shadow
of the hill stretched at their feet, out over path and harvest-field.
"Good-by, then!"
"Good-by!"
Ian stood still. Alexander, homeward bound, dropped over the crest.
The earth wave hid from him Black Hill, house and all. But, looking
back, he could still see Ian against the sky. Then Ian sank, too.
Alexander strode on toward Glenfernie. He went whistling, in expanded,
golden spirits. Ian--and Ian--and Ian! Going through a grove of oaks,
blackbirds flew overhead, among and above the branches. _The cranes of
Ibycus!_ The phrase flashed into mind. "I wonder why things like that
disturb me so!... I wonder if there's any bottom or top to living
anyhow!... I wonder--!" He looked at the birds and at the violet
evening light at play in the old wood. The phrase went out of his
mind. He left the remnant of the forest and was presently upon open
moor. He whistled again, loud and clear, and strode on happily.
Ian--and Ian--and Ian!
CHAPTER V
The House of Glenfernie and the House of Touris became friends. A
round of country festivities, capped by a great party at Black Hill,
wrought bonds of acquaintanceship for and with the Scots family
returned after long abode in England. Archibald Touris spent money
with a cautious freedom. He set a table and poured a wine better by
half than might be found elsewhere. He kept good horses and good dogs.
Laborers who worked for him praised him; he proved a not ungenerous
landlord. Where he recognized obligations he met them punctually. He
had large merchant virtues, no less than the accompanying limitations.
He returned to the Church of Scotland.
The laird of Glenfernie and the laird of Black Hill found
constitutional impediments to their being more friendly than need be.
Each was polite to the other to a certain point, then the one glowered
and the other scoffed. It ended in a painstaking keeping of distance
between them, a task which, when they were in company, fell often to
Mrs. Jardine. She did it with tact, with a twist of her large,
humorous mouth toward Strickland if he were by. Admirable as she was,
it was curious to see the difference between her method, if method
there were, and that of Mrs. Alison. The latter showed no effort, but
where she was there fell harmony. William Jardine liked her, liked to
be in the room with her. His great frame and her slight one, his
rough, massive, somewhat unshaped personality and her exquisite
clearness contrasted finely enough. Her brother, who understood her
very little, yet had for her an odd, appealing affection, strange in
one who had so positively settled what was life and the needs of life.
It was his habit to speak of her as though she were more helplessly
dependent even than other women. But at times there might be seen who
was more truly the dependent.
August passed into September, September into brown October. Alexander
and Ian were almost continually in company. The attraction between
them was so great that it appeared as though it must stretch backward
into some unknown seam of time. If they had differences, these
apparently only served in themselves to keep them revolving the one
about the other. They might almost quarrel, but never enough to drag
their two orbs apart, breaking and rending from the common center. The
sun might go down upon a kind of wrath, but it rose on hearts with the
difference forgotten. Their very unlikenesses pricked each on to seek
himself in the other.
They were going to Edinburgh after Christmas, to be students there, to
grow to be men. Here at home, upon the eve of their going, rein upon
them was slackened. They would so soon be independent of home
discipline that that independence was to a degree already allowed.
Black Hill did not often question Ian's comings and goings, nor
Glenfernie Alexander's. The school-room saw the latter some part of
each morning. For the rest of the day he might be almost anywhere with
Ian, at Glenfernie, or at Black Hill, or on the road between, or in
the country roundabout.
William Jardine, chancing to be one day at Black Hill, watched from
Mrs. Alison's parlor the two going down the avenue, the dogs at their
heels. "It's a fair David and Jonathan business!"
"David needed Jonathan, and Jonathan David."
"Had Jonathan lived, ma'am, and the two come to conflict about the
kingdom, what then, and where would have flown the friendship?"
"It would have flown on high, I suppose, and waited for them until
they had grown wings to mount to it."
"Oh," said the laird, "you're one I can follow only a little way!"
Ian and Alexander felt only that the earth about them was bright and
warm.
On a brown-and-gold day the two found themselves in the village of
Glenfernie. Ian had spent the night with Alexander--for some reason
there was school holiday--the two were now abroad early in the day.
The village sent its one street, its few poor lanes, up a bare
hillside to the church atop. Poor and rude enough, it had yet to-day
its cheerful air. High voices called, flaxen-haired children pottered
about, a mill-wheel creaked at the foot of the hill, iron clanged in
the smithy a little higher, the drovers' rough laughter burst from the
tavern midway, and at the height the kirk was seeing a wedding. The
air had a tang of cooled wine, the sky was blue.
Ian and Alexander, coming over the hill, reached the kirk in time to
see emerge the married pair with their kin and friends. The two stood
with a rabble of children and boys beneath the yew-trees by the gate.
The yellow-haired bride in her finery, the yellow-haired groom in his,
the dressed and festive following, stepped from the kirkyard to some
waiting carts and horses. The most mounted and took place, the
procession put itself into motion with clatter and laughter. The
children and boys ran after to where the road dipped over the hill. A
cluster of village folk turned the long, descending street. In passing
they spoke to Alexander and Ian.
"Who was married?--Jock Wilson and Janet Macraw, o' Langmuir."
The two lounged against the kirkyard wall, beneath the yews.
"_Marry!_ That's a strange, terrible, useless word to me!"
"I don't know...."
"Yes, it is!... Ian, do you ever think that you've lived before?"
"I don't know. I'm living now!"
"Well, I think that we all lived before. I think that the same things
happen again--"
"Well, let them--some of them!" said Ian. "Come along, if we're going
through the glen."
They left the kirkyard for the village street. Here they sauntered,
friends with the whole. They looked in at the tavern upon the drovers,
they watched the blacksmith and his helper. The red iron rang, the
sparks flew. At the foot of the hill flowed the stream and stood the
mill. The wheel turned, the water diamonds dropped in sheets. Their
busy, idle day took them on; they were now in bare, heathy country
with the breathing, winey air. Presently White Farm could be seen
among aspens, and beyond it the wooded mouth of the glen. Some one,
whistling, turned an elbow of the hill and caught up with the two. It
proved to be one several years their senior, a young man in the
holiday dress of a prosperous farmer. He whistled clearly an old
border air and walked without dragging or clumsiness. Coming up, he
ceased his whistling.
"Good day, the both of ye!"
"It's Robin Greenlaw," said Alexander, "from Littlefarm.--You've been
to the wedding, Robin?"
"Aye. Janet's some kind of a cousin. It's a braw day for a wedding!
You've got with you the new laird's nephew?--And how are you liking
Black Hill?"
"I like it."
"I suppose you miss grandeurs abune what ye've got there. I have a
liking myself," said Greenlaw, "for grandeurs, though we've none at
all at Littlefarm! That is to say, none that's just obvious. Are you
going to White Farm?"
Alexander answered: "I've a message from my father for Mr. Barrow. But
after that we're going through the glen. Will you come along?"
"I would," said Greenlaw, seriously, "if I had not on my best. But I
know how you, Alexander Jardine, take the devil's counsel about
setting foot in places bad for good clothes! So I'll give myself the
pleasure some other time. And so good day!" He turned into a path that
took him presently out of sight and sound.
"He's a fine one!" said Alexander. "I like him."
"Who is he?"
"White Farm's great-nephew. Littlefarm was parted from White Farm.
It's over yonder where you see the water shining."
"He's free-mannered enough!"
"That's you and England! He's got as good a pedigree as any, and a
notion of what's a man, besides. He's been to Glasgow to school, too.
I like folk like that."
"I like them as well as you!" said Ian. "That is, with reservations of
them I cannot like. I'm Scots, too."
Alexander laughed. They came down to the water and the stepping-stones
before White Farm. The house faced them, long and low, white among
trees from which the leaves were falling. Alexander and Ian crossed
upon the stones, and beyond the fringing hazels the dogs came to meet
them.
Jarvis Barrow had all the appearance of a figure from that Old
Testament in which he was learned. He might have been a prophet's
right-hand man, he might have been the prophet himself. He stood, at
sixty-five, lean and strong, gray-haired, but with decrepitude far
away. Elder of the kirk, sternly religious, able at his own affairs,
he read his Bible and prospered in his earthly living. Now he listened
to the laird's message, nodding his head, but saying little. His staff
was in his hand; he was on his way to kirk session; tell the laird
that the account was correct. He stood without his door as though he
waited for the youths to give good day and depart. Alexander had made
a movement in this direction when from beyond Jarvis Barrow came a
woman's voice. It belonged to Jenny Barrow, the farmer's unmarried
daughter, who kept house for him.
"Father, do you gae on, and let the young gentlemen bide a wee and
rest their banes and tell a puir woman wha never gaes onywhere the
news!"
"Then do ye sit awhile, laddies, with the womenfolk," said Jarvis
Barrow. "But give me pardon if I go, for I canna keep the kirk
waiting."
He was gone, staff and gray plaid and a collie with him. Jenny, his
daughter, appeared in the door.
"Come in, Mr. Alexander, and you, too, sir, and have a crack with us!
We're in the dairy-room, Elspeth and Gilian and me."
She was a woman of forty, raw-boned but not unhandsome, good-natured,
capable, too, but with more heart than head. It was a saying with her
that she had brains enough for kirk on the Sabbath and a warm house
the week round. Everybody knew Jenny Barrow and liked well enough
bread of her baking.
The room to which she led Ian and Alexander had its floor level with
the turf without the open door. The sun flooded it. There came from
within the sound, up and down, of a churn, and a voice singing:
"O laddie, will ye gie to me
A ribbon for my fairing?"
CHAPTER VI
It grew that Ian was telling stories of cities--of London and of
Paris, for he had been there, and of Rome, for he had been there. He
had seen kings and queens, he had seen the Pope--
"Lord save us!" ejaculated Jenny Barrow.
He leaned against the dairy wall and the sun fell over him, and he
looked something finer and more golden than often came that way. Young
Gilian at the churn stood with parted lips, the long dasher still in
her hands. This was as good as stories of elves, pixies, fays, men of
peace and all! Elspeth let the milk-pans be and sat beside them on the
long bench, and, with hands folded in her lap, looked with brown eyes
many a league away. Neither Elspeth nor Gilian was without book
learning. Behind them and before them were long visits to scholar
kindred in a city in the north and fit schooling there. London and
Paris and Rome.... Foreign lands and the great world. And this was a
glittering young eagle that had sailed and seen!
Alexander gazed with delight upon Ian spreading triumphant wings. This
was his friend. There was nothing finer than continuously to come upon
praiseworthiness in your friend!
"And a beautiful lady came by who was the king's favorite--"
"Gude guide us! The limmer!"
"And she was walking on rose-colored velvet and her slippers had
diamonds worked in them. Snow was on the ground outside and poor folk
were freezing, but she carried over each arm a garland of roses as
though it were June--"
Jenny Barrow raised her hands. "She'll sit yet in the cauld blast, in
the sinner's shift!"
"And after a time there walked in the king, and the courtiers behind
him like the tail of a peacock--"
They had a happy hour in the White Farm dairy. At last Jenny and the
girls set for the two cold meat and bannocks and ale. And still at
table Ian was the shining one. The sun was at noon and so was his
mood.
"You're fey!" said Alexander, at last.
"Na, na!" spoke Jenny. "But, oh, he's the bonny lad!"
The dinner was eaten. It was time to be going.
"Shut your book of stories!" said Alexander. "We're for the Kelpie's
Pool, and that's not just a step from here!"
Elspeth raised her brown eyes. "Why will you go to the Kelpie's Pool?
That's a drear water!"
"I want to show it to him. He's never seen it."
"It's drear!" said Elspeth. "A drear, wanrestfu' place!"
But Ian and Alexander must go. The aunt and nieces accompanied them to
the door, stood and watched them forth, down the bank and into the
path that ran to the glen. Looking back, the youths saw them
there--Elspeth and Gilian and their aunt Jenny. Then the aspens came
between and hid them and the white house and all.
"They're bonny lasses!" said Ian.
"Aye. They're so."
"But, oh, man! you should see Miss Delafield of Tower Place in
Surrey!"
"Is she so bonny?"
"She's more than bonny. She's beautiful and high-born and an heiress.
When I'm a colonel of dragoons--"
"Are you going to be a colonel of dragoons?"
"Something like that. You talk of thinking that you were this and that
in the past. Well, I was a fighting-man!"
"We're all fighting-men. It's only what we fight and how."
"Well, say that I had been a chief, and they lifted me on their
shields and called me king, the very next day I should have made her
queen!"
"You think like a ballad. And, oh, man, you talk mickle of the
lasses!"
Ian looked at him with long, narrow, dark-gold eyes. "They're found in
ballads," he said.
Alexander just paused in his stride. "Humph! that's true!..."
They entered the glen. The stream began to brawl; on either hand the
hills closed in, towering high. Some of the trees were bare, but to
most yet clung the red-brown or the gold-brown dress. The pines showed
hard, green, and dead in the shadow; in the sunlight, fine,
green-gold, and alive. The fallen leaves, moved by foot or by breeze,
made a light, dry, talking sound. The white birch stems clustered and
leaned; patches of bright-green moss ran between the drifts of leaves.
The sides of the hills came close together, grew fearfully steep.
Crags appeared, and fern-crowded fissures and roots of trees like
knots of frozen serpents. The glen narrowed and deepened; the water
sang with a loud, rough voice.
Alexander loved this place. He had known it in childhood, often
straying this way with the laird, or with Sandy the shepherd, or Davie
from the house. When he was older he began to come alone. Soon he came
often alone, learned every stick and stone and contour, effect of
light and streak of gloom. As idle or as purposeful as the wind, he
knew the glen from top to bottom. He knew the voice of the stream and
the straining clutch of the roots over the broken crag. He had lain on
all the beds of leaf and moss, and talked with every creeping or
flying or running thing. Sometimes he read a book here, sometimes he
pictured the world, or built fantastic stages, and among fantastic
others acted himself a fantastic part. Sometimes with a blind turning
within he looked for himself. He had his own thoughts of God here, of
God and the Kirk and the devil. Often, too, he neither read, dreamed,
nor thought. He might lie an hour, still, passive, receptive. The
trees and the clouds, crag life, bird life, and flower life, life of
water, earth, and air, came inside. He was so used to his own silence
in the glen that when he walked through it with others he kept it
still. Slightly taciturn everywhere, he was actively so here. The path
narrowing, he and Ian must go in single file. Leading, Alexander
traveled in silence, and Ian, behind, not familiar with the place,
must mind his steps, and so fell silent, too. Here and there, now and
then, Alexander halted. These were recesses, or it might be projecting
platforms of rock, that he liked. Below, the stream made still pools,
or moved in eddies, or leaped with an innumerable hurrying noise from
level to level. Or again there held a reach of quiet water, and the
glen-sides were soft with weeping birch, and there showed a wider arch
of still blue sky. Alexander stood and looked. Ian, behind him, was
glad of the pause. The place dizzied him who for years had been away
from hill and mountain, pass and torrent. Yet he would by no means
tell Alexander so. He would keep up with him.
There was a mile of this glen, and now the going was worse and now it
was better. Three-fourths of the way through they came to an opening
in the rock, over which, from a shelf above, fell a curtain of brier.
"See!" said Alexander, and, parting the stems, showed a veritable
cavern. "Come in--sit down! The Kelpie's Pool is out of the glen, but
they say that there's a bogle wons here, too."
They sat down upon the rocky floor strewn with dead leaves. Through
the dropped curtain they saw the world brokenly; the light in the cave
was sunken and dim, the air cold. Ian drew his shoulders together.
"Here's a grand place for robbers, wraiths, or dragons!"
"Robbers, wraiths, or dragons, or just quiet dead leaves and
ourselves. Look here--!" He showed a heap of short fagots in a corner.
"I put these here the last time I came." Dragging them into the middle
of the rock chamber, he swept up with them the dead leaves, then took
from a great pouch that he carried on his rambles a box with flint and
steel. He struck a spark upon dry moss and in a moment had a fire. "Is
not that beautiful?"
The smoke mounted to the top of the cavern, curled there or passed out
into the glen through the briers that dropped like a portcullis. The
fagots crackled in the flame, the light danced, the warmth was
pleasant. So was the sense of adventure and of _solitude à deux_. They
stretched themselves beside the flame. Alexander produced from his
pouch four small red-cheeked apples. They ate and talked, with between
their words silences of deep content. They were two comrade hunters of
long ago, cavemen who had dispossessed bear or wolf, who might
presently with a sharpened bone and some red pigment draw bison and
deer in procession upon the cave wall.--They were skin-clad hillmen,
shag-haired, with strange, rude weapons, in hiding here after hard
fighting with a disciplined, conquering foe who had swords and shining
breastplates and crested helmets.--They were fellow-soldiers of that
conquering tide, Romans of a band that kept the Wall, proud, with talk
of camps and Cæsars.--They were knights of Arthur's table sent by
Merlin on some magic quest.--They were Crusaders, and this cavern an
Eastern, desert cave.--They were men who rose with Wallace, must hide
in caves from Edward Longshanks.--They were outlaws.--They were
wizards--good wizards who caused flowers to bloom in winter for the
unhappy, and made gold here for those who must be ransomed, and fed
themselves with secret bread. The fire roared--they were happy, Ian
and Alexander.
At last the fagots were burned out. The half-murk that at first was
mystery and enchantment began to put on somberness and melancholy.
They rose from the rocky floor and extinguished the brands with their
feet. But now they had this cavern in common and must arrange it for
their next coming. Going outside, they gathered dead and fallen wood,
broke it into right lengths, and, carrying it within, heaped it in the
corner. With a bough of pine they swept the floor, then, leaving the
treasure hold, dropped the curtain of brier in place. They were not so
old but that there was yet the young boy in them; he hugged himself
over this cave of Robin Hood and swart magician. But now they left it
and went on whistling through the glen:
Gie ye give ane, then I'll give twa,
For sae the store increases!
The sides of the glen fell back, grew lower. The leap of the water was
not so marked; there were long pools of quiet. Their path had been a
mounting one; they were now on higher earth, near the plateau or
watershed that marked the top of the glen. The bright sky arched
overhead, the sun shone strongly, the air moved in currents without
violence.
"You see where that smoke comes up between trees? That's Mother
Binning's cot."
"Who's she?"
"She's a wise auld wife. She's a scryer. That's her ash-tree."
Their path brought them by the hut and its bit of garden. Jock
Binning, that was Mother Binning's crippled son, sat fishing in the
stream. Mother Binning had been working in the garden, but when she
saw the figures on the path below she took her distaff and sat on the
bench in the sun. When they came by she raised her voice.
"Mr. Alexander, how are the laird and the leddy?"
"They're very well, Mother."
"Ye'll be gaeing sune to Edinburgh? Wha may be this laddie?"
"It is Ian Rullock, of Black Hill."
"Sae the baith o' ye are gaeing to Edinburgh? Will ye be friends
there?"
"That we will!"
"Hech, sirs!" Mother Binning drew a thread from her distaff. The two
were about to travel on when she stopped them again with a gesture.
"Dinna mak sic haste! There's time enough behind us, and time enough
before us. And it's a strange warld, and a large, and an auld! Sit ye
and crack a bit with an auld wife by the road."
But they had dallied at White Farm and in the cave, and Alexander was
in haste.
"We cannot stop now, Mother. We're bound for the Kelpie's Pool."
"And why do ye gae there? That's a drear, wanrestfu' place!" said
Mother Binning.
"Ian has not seen it yet. I want to show it to him."
Mother Binning turned her distaff slowly. "Eh, then, if ye maun gae,
gae!... We're a' ane! There's the kelpie pool for a'."
"We'll stop a bit on the way back," said Alexander. He spoke in a
wheedling, kindly voice, for he and Mother Binning were good friends.
"Do that then," she said. "I hae a hansel o' coffee by me. I'll mak
twa cups, for I'll warrant that ye'll baith need it!"
The air was indeed growing colder when the two came at last upon the
moor that ran down to the Kelpie's Pool. Furze and moss and ling, a
wild country stretched around without trees or house or moving form.
The bare sunshine took on a remote, a cool and foreign, aspect. The
small singing of the wind in whin and heather came from a thin, eery
world. Down below them they saw the dark little tarn, the Kelpie's
Pool. It was very clear, but dark, with a bottom of peat. Around it
grew rushes and a few low willows. The two sat upon an outcropping of
stone and gazed down upon it.
"It's a gey lonely place," said Alexander. "Now I like it as well or
better than I do the cave, and now I would leave it far behind me!"
"I like the cave best. This is a creepy place."
"Once I let myself out at Glenfernie without any knowing and came here
by night."
Ian felt emulation. "Oh, I would do that, too, if there was any need!
Did you see anything?"
"Do you mean the kelpie?"
"Yes."
"No. I saw something--once. But that time I wanted to see how the
stars looked in the water."
Ian looked at the water, that lay like a round mirror, and then to the
vast shell of the sky above. He, too, had love of beauty--a more
sensuous love than Alexander's, but love. This shared perception made
one of the bonds between them.
"It was as still--much stiller than it is to-day! The air was clear
and the night dark and grand. I looked down, and there was the
Northern Crown, clasp and all."
Ian in imagination saw it, too. They sat, chin on knees, upon the
moorside above the Kelpie's Pool. The water was faintly crisped, the
reeds and willow boughs just stirred.
"But the kelpie--did you ever see that?"
"Sometimes it is seen as a water-horse, sometimes as a demon. I never
saw anything like that but once. I never told any one about it. It may
have been just one of those willows, after all. But I thought I saw a
woman."
"Go on!"
"There was a great mist that day and it was hard to see. Sometimes you
could not see--it was just rolling waves of gray. So I stumbled down,
and I was in the rushes before I knew that I had come to them. It was
spring and the pool was full, and the water plashed and came over my
foot. It was like something holding my ankles.... And then I saw
her--if it was not the willow. She was like a fair woman with dark
hair unsnooded. She looked at me as though she would mock me, and I
thought she laughed--and then the mist rolled down and over, and I
could not see the hills nor the water nor scarce the reeds I was in.
So I lifted my feet from the sucking water and got away.... I do not
know if it was the kelpie's daughter or the willow--but if it was the
willow it could look like a human--or an unhuman--body!"
Ian gazed at the pool. He had many advantages over Alexander, he knew,
but the latter had this curious daring. He did more things with
himself and of himself than did he, Ian. There was that in Ian that
did not like this, that was jealous of being surpassed. And there was
that in Ian that would not directly display this feeling, that would
provide it, indeed, with all kinds of masks, but would, with
certainty, act from that spurring, though intricate enough might be
the path between the stimulus and the act.
"It is deep?"
"Aye. Almost bottomless, you would think, and cold as winter."
"Let us go swimming."
"The day's getting late and it's growing cold. However, if you want
to--"
Ian did not
|
They withered "Translucence" and "Passion,"
They vulgarised leisure by haste.
Self to realise--that was the question,
Inscrutable still while the cooks
Of our Colleges preached indigestion,
Their Dons indigestible books.
Two volumes alone were not bathos,
The one by an early Chinese,
The other, that infinite pathos,
Our Nursery Rhymes, if you please.
He was lost, he avowed, in this era;
His spirit was seared by the West,
But he deemed to be Monk in Madeira
Would probably suit him the best.
"Impressions of Babehood" in plenty
Succeeded, "Hot youth" and its tears,
Till I wondered if ninety or twenty
Summed up his unbearable years.
Great Heavens! I turned to my neighbour,
A SQUARSON by culture unblest;
And welcomed at length in field-labour
And foxes refreshment and rest.
* * * * *
QUESTION OF THE KNIGHT.--If it be true, as was mentioned in the
_World_ last week, that Mr. Justice WRIGHT has "climbed down," only to
be placed upon a higher perch, will any change of name follow on the
Knighthood? Will he be known as Sir ROBERT RONG, late Mr. JUSTICE
WRIGHT?
* * * * *
OUR ADVERTISERS.
THE JERRYBAND PIANO is a thundering instrument.
* * * * *
THE JERRYBAND PIANO should be in every Lunatic Asylum.
* * * * *
THE JERRYBAND PIANO.--This wonderful and unique instrument, horizontal
and perpendicular Grand, five octaves, hammerless action, including
keyboard, pedals, gong, peal of bells, ophicleide stop, and all
the newest improvements, can be seen at Messrs. SPLITTE AND SON's
Establishment, High Holborn, and purchased ON THE FIFTY YEARS' HIRE
SYSTEM, by which, at a payment of 1s. 1-1/2d. a week, the piano, or
what is left of it, becomes the property of the purchaser, or his
heirs and executors, at the expiration of that period.
* * * * *
PECADILLA is a new after-dinner, home-grown Sherry, of quite
extraordinary value and startling excellence.
* * * * *
PECADILLA is a full, fruity, gout-giving, generous, heady wine, smooth
on the palate, round in the mouth, full of body, wing, character, and
crust.
* * * * *
PECADILLA may be safely offered at funerals.
* * * * *
PECADILLA is a beverage for Dukes in distressed circumstances.
* * * * *
PECADILLA _is the wine, par excellence_, for the retrenching.
* * * * *
PECADILLA, mixed with citrate of soda, treacle, and soda-water, and
drunk in the dark immediately after a glass of hot ginger brandy, will
be found to possess all the quality of a low-priced Champagne.
* * * * *
PECADILLA is the making of an economical wedding breakfast.
* * * * *
PECADILLA. A few parcels of this unique and delicious Wine are still
to be had of the grower, a Sicilian Count, for the moment resident in
Houndsditch, at the nominal price, inclusive of the bottles, of five
shillings and ninepence the dozen.
* * * * *
TO MR. RUDYARD KIPLING.
(_AN EXPLANATION._)
["Every minute of my time during 1891 is already mortgaged. In
1892 you may count upon me."--Mr. JEROME K. JEROME, _not_ Mr.
RUDYARD KIPLING. _See "Punch," Feb. 14_.]
Oh, Mr. KIPLING!--you whose pungent pen
Of pirate publishers has been the terror,
Try hard, I beg you, to forgive me, when
I openly confess I wrote in error.
It was not you by whom the deed was done.
But Mr. JEROME 'twas who wrote and said he
Could not contribute, since his Ninety-One
Was mortgaged to the Editors already.
'Twas rough on you, indeed, in such a way,
By thinking you were he, to dim your glory.
Yet pray believe I really grieve to say
I mixed you up with quite "another story"!
* * * * *
DRAMATIC ILLUSTRATION OF AN ADVERTISEMENT.--In one of the advertising
columns of the _Times_ the paragraph appeared one day last week. The
newspaper containing it lay on the table of a drawing-room. Elderly
beau was making up (he was accustomed to making-up in another sense,
as his wig and whiskers could testify) to charming young lady. Such
was the scene. He asked her to accept him. Her reply was to show him
the heading of this advertisement in the _Times_:--"YOUTH WANTED."
_Tableau! Exit_ Beau. Curtain.
* * * * *
[Illustration: MISS PARLIAMENT'S DREAM OF A FANCY BALL.
_A Suggestion for Druriolanus at Covent Garden._]
* * * * *
MR. PUNCH TO MISS CANADA.
Oh, Canada, dear Canada, we shall not discombobulate
Ourselves concerning JONATHAN. 'Tis true he tried to rob you late
(That is if Tariff-diddling may be qualified as robbery),
But BULL has learned the wisdom of not kicking up a bobbery.
No, Canada, we love you dear, and shall be greatly gratified
If by your March Elections our relations are--say ratified.
We don't expect self-sacrifice, we do not beg for gratitude,
But keep an interested eye, my dear, upon your attitude.
Railings and ravings rantipole we hold are reprehensible,
But of our kindly kinship we're affectionately sensible.
A mother's proud to see her child learning to "run alone," you know;
But does not wish to see her "run away" from home, she'll own you know.
MACDONALD is magniloquent, perhaps a bit thrasonical;
His dark denunciations--at a distance--sound ironical.
And when we read the rows between him and Sir RICHARD CARTWRIGHT; dear,
We have our doubts if either chief quite plays the patriot part right, dear!
But there, we know that party speeches are not _merum nectar_, all,
And we can take the measure of magniloquence electoral;
The tipple Party Spirit men will stir and whiskey-toddy-fy,
But when they have to drink it--cold--its strength they greatly modify.
Beware the Ides of March? Oh, no! All auguries we defy, my dear!
The spectre of disloyalty don't scare us; all my eye, my dear.
So vote away, dear Canada! our faith's in friendly freedom, dear;
And croakers, Yank, or Canuck, or home-born, we shall not heed 'em, dear!
* * * * *
[Illustration: A SENSITIVE EAR.
_Intelligent Briton_. "BUT WE HAVE NO THEATRE, NO ACTORS WORTHY OF THE
NAME, MADEMOISELLE! WHY, THE ENGLISH DELIVERY OF BLANK VERSE IS SIMPLY
TORTURE TO AN EAR ACCUSTOMED TO HEAR IT GIVEN ITS FULL BEAUTY AND
SIGNIFICANCE BY A BERNHARDT OR A COQUELIN!"
_Mademoiselle_. "INDEED? I HAVE NEVER HEARD BERNHARDT OR COQUELIN
RECITE ENGLISH BLANK VERSE!"
_Intelligent Briton_. "OF COURSE NOT. I MEAN _FRENCH_ BLANK VERSE--THE
BLANK VERSE OF CORNEILLE, RACINE, MOLIÈRE!"
_Mademoiselle_. "OH, MONSIEUR, THERE IS NO SUCH THING!"
[_Briton still tries to look intelligent._]
* * * * *
ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT.
EXTRACTED FROM THE DIARY OF TOBY, M.P.
_House of Commons, Monday Night, February 16_.--After long tarrying,
House once more justified its old character. Been dolefully dull
these weeks and months past. Thought it was dead; only been sleeping.
To-night woke up, and audience that filled every Bench, blocked the
Gangways, and thronged the Bar, had rare treat. Occasion was the
indictment of Prince ARTHUR; long pending; was to have come off at
beginning of Session; put off on account of counter attractions in
Committee-Room No. 15; postponement no longer possible; and here we
are, House throbbing with excitement, OLD MORALITY nervously clacking
about Treasury Bench, bringing his chicks together under his wing.
RANDOLPH brought his young beard down to witness performance.
[Illustration: A Buffer Q.C.]
Initial difficulty in Irish Camp; Brer FOX sitting in old place, two
steps down third bench below Gangway. Brer RABBIT, sunk in profound
meditation, oblivious to the rival Leader's presence, occupies corner
seat; room for one between them. Who shall take it? Anxious time for
TIM HEALY. Nothing he dreads so much as possibility of outbreak. In
Committee-Room No. 15, Brer FOX snatched out of Brer RABBIT's hand
a sheet of paper. Suppose now, in sudden paroxysm, he were to reach
forth and taking Brer RABBIT by the beard bang his head against the
back of the Bench? TIM's gentle nature shivered with apprehension;
thing to do was to get a good plump gentleman set between the two, so
that in case hostilities broke out his body might be used as buffer.
Thought of ELTON first. Besides a professional desire to find
occupation for Members of the Bar, ELTON's figure seemed made on
purpose for the peaceful errand TIM had in mind. Broached subject.
ELTON said, always happy to oblige; but was, in fact, just now
retiring from Parliamentary life; didn't care to be brought into undue
prominence. Besides, he belonged to other side of House; Why not try
T.B. POTTER?
"The very man!" cried TIM, "I believe you and he scale the same to a
pound, and though your waist is more shapely, he has the advantage in
shoulders."
POTTER most obliging of men; offered no objection. So TIM conducted
him to the seat; he dropped gently, but firmly in it; Brer RABBIT
putting on his spectacles, and looking across the expanse of T.B.'s
shoulders, thought he recognised Brer FOX at the other side. Anyhow,
he was beyond speaking distance, and so embarrassment was obviated.
TIM, his mind thus at rest, able to devote his attention to debate, to
progress of which, he contributed a few interjections. Finally, when
Division taken on JOHN MORLEY's Motion, and everybody ready to go
home, he moved and carried Adjournment of Debate.
_Business done_.--Prince ARTHUR indicted for breach of Constitutional
Law in Ireland. Jury retired to consider their verdict. Agreed upon
acquittal by 320 Votes against 245.
_Tuesday_.--A once familiar presence pervades House to-night. Everyone
more, or less vaguely, conscious of it. Even without chancing to look
up to Peers' Gallery, Members are inspired with sudden mysterious
access of Moral Influence. OLD MORALITY himself, that overflowing
reservoir of moral axioms, takes on an aggravated air of
responsibility and respectability. Has had a great triumph which would
inflate a man of less modest character. Last night, or rather early
this morning, Irish Members appeared to force Government hand; just
when it seemed that RUSSELL's Amendment was about to be substituted
for MORLEY's Resolution, TIM HEALY interposed, moved Adjournment of
Debate; OLD MORALITY protested; SEXTON slily threatened all-night
sitting; after an hour's struggle, Government capitulated; Adjournment
agreed to; Irish Members went off jubilant.
To-night SEXTON asks OLD MORALITY when they shall resume debate?
"Ah," says OLD MORALITY, with look of friendly interest, as if the
idea had struck him for the first time, "yes; just so. The Hon. Member
wants to know when we shall resume the debate, the adjournment of
which he and his friends were instrumental in carrying at an early
hour this morning. Well, I must say, on the part of Her Majesty's
Government, that we are perfectly satisfied with matters as they were
left. We had a lively debate, a majority much larger than we had dared
to hope for, and, as far as we are concerned, I think we'll leave
matters alone. As one of our great prose-writers observed, it is, on
the whole, more conducive to comfort to endure any inconveniences that
may press upon one at the current moment, than to hasten to encounter
others with the precise nature of which we do not happen to be
acquainted."
[Illustration: Under-Secretary.]
GRAND CROSS missed this delightful little episode, not coming in till
questions were over. Now he sat in Peers' Gallery and gazed through
spectacles on scene of earlier triumphs. Looks hardly a day older than
when he left us; the same perky manner, the same wooden visage, with
its pervading air of supreme self-satisfaction and inscrutable wisdom.
It is a night given up to Indian topics. PLOWDEN, in his quiet,
effective way, has just carried Motion which will have substantial
effect in the direction of securing fuller debate of Indian questions.
GORST, standing at table replying to BUCHANAN on another Indian topic,
alludes with deferential tone to "the SECRETARY OF STATE." GRAND CROSS
almost audibly purrs from his perch in the Gallery.
"An odd world, my masters," says the Member for SARK, striding out
impatiently, "when you have a man like GORST Under-Secretary, with
a man like GRAND CROSS at the Head of the Department."
_Business done_.--An hour or two given to India.
_Thursday_.--Army Estimates on to-night. HANBURY comes to the front,
as usual. STANHOPE tossing about on Treasury Bench, in considerable
irritation.
"What's the use, my ST. JOHN," he asked BRODRICK, the only man
standing by him, "of a family arrangement like ours, if one is
subjected to annoyance like this? With one brother in the Peers, a
pillar of staid Conservatism; with myself on the Treasury Bench,
a Cabinet Minister, a right-hand man of the Government: and then,
final touch, old PHILIP EGALITÉ below the Gangway opposite, with
his Radicalism, and his tendency to out-JACOBY LABOUCHERE. This is
a broad-based family combination, that ought to make us, each in his
way, irresistible. And yet there seems nothing to prevent a fellow
like HANBURY looking down from his six feet two scornfully on a
British soldier not more than five feet four in his stocking-feet,
whilst he inflates his chest, and asks, in profound bass notes, how
are the ancient glories of the British Army to be maintained with men
who cannot stretch the tape at thirty-six inches?"
[Illustration: "Amazed at his own Moderation."]
When HANBURY sat down, after pounding away in ponderous style for
nearly an hour, STANHOPE got up and prodded him reproachfully.
Wonderful how much vinegar and vitriol he managed to distil into his
oft-repeated phrase, "My honourable friend!" As for HANBURY, he sat
with hands in pocket, staring at empty benches opposite, amazed at his
own moderation.
Hours of the usual kind of talk on Army Estimates; the Colonels,
Volunteer and otherwise, showing that the Army is as GILL (who
has recently spent some time in Boulogne) says, _en route pour les
chiens_; the SECRETARY of State for WAR demonstrating that everything
is in apple-pie order, and his right honourable predecessor on the
Front Opposition Bench bearing testimony to the general state of
efficiency.
WOLMER flashed through the haze a word that has long wanted saying
in the House. Why, he asked, place sentries surrounding St. James's
Palace, the War Office, and the Horse Guards? Why, if presence of
armed men at these particular gateways is essential to proper conduct
of affairs of Department--why should Charity Commissioners and
Education Office be left unguarded? WOLMER should keep pegging away at
this question till he gets common-sense answer.
_Business done_.--Army Estimates moved.
_Friday_.--Gallant little Wales took the floor to-night. Wants the
Church Disestablished; PRITCHARD MORGAN, in speech of prodigious
length, asked House to sanction the proposal. The Government,
determined to oppose Motion, cast about for Member of their body who
could best lead opposition. Hadn't a Welshman on the Treasury Bench.
"There's RAIKES, you know," AKERS-DOUGLAS said, discussing the matter
with OLD MORALITY. "He's not exactly a Welshman, but, when he's at
home, he lives in Denbighshire, which is as near being Wales as you
can get. Besides, his postal address is Llwynegrin."
"Ah!" said OLD MORALITY, "that looks well. He's not the rose, but he
lives in convenient contiguity to the flower."
So RAIKES was put up, and a nice, peaceful, soothing, insinuating,
conciliatory speech he made. In fact, as the Member for SARK says, "He
got gallant little Wales down on its back, tied its horns and heels
together, partially flayed it, and then rubbed in cunningly contrived
combination of Cayenne pepper and vinegar."
_Business done_.--Welsh Disestablishment Motion negatived by 235 Votes
to 203.
* * * * *
CELT AGAIN.
GRANT-ALLEN,--his manner moves cynics to mirth!--
Makes out that the Celt is the Salt of the Earth.
That accounts, it may be, for his dominant fault;
A "salt of the earth" _has_ a taste for assault!
* * * * *
OUT OF SCHOOL!
DEAR MR. PUNCH,--You are so awfully good to chaps at school that I
am sure you will insert this letter. SMITH MINOR, who takes in the
_Times_, says, that a "PARENT" has been writing to say, that there
should be a meeting of Fathers to swagger over the meeting of Head
Masters. Well, this wouldn't be half a bad idea if it were properly
conducted; but the "PARENT" seems to be a beast of a governor, who
wants to cut down the holidays, and such like rot. And this brings me
to what I want to propose myself. If there are to be meetings of Head
Masters and Parents, why not a meeting of Boys? We have a heap of
grievances. For instance, lots of chaps would like to know why "the
water" was stopped at Westminster, and something about the domestic
economy of Harrow. Then the great and burning question of grub is
always ready to hand. The "PARENT" wants to have a hand in the payment
for school-books, seeing his way to getting the discount (stingy
chap!) then why shouldn't we fellows have a voice choosing them? Then
about taking up Greek, why shouldn't we have our say in _that_ matter?
After all, it interests us more than anyone else, as we are the
fellows that will have to learn it, if it is to be retained. Then
about corporal punishment. Not that we mind it much, still _we_ are
the fellows who get swished at Eton, and feel the tolly at Beaumont.
Surely the Boys know more about a licking than Head Masters and
Parents? You, as a practical man, will say, "Who should attend the
Congress?" I reply, every public school might send a delegate; and by
public school, I do not limit the term to the old legitimate "E. and
the two W.'s," Eton, Winchester and Westminster. No; I would throw
it open to such respectable educational establishments as Harrow,
Rugby, Charterhouse, St. Paul's, Marlborough, Felsted, Cheltenham,
Stonyhurst, and the rest of them. The more the merrier, say I; and
if there was a decided division of opinion on any subject, we could
settle the matter off-hand at once, by taking off our jackets and
turning up our shirt-sleeves. The more I think of it, the more I like
it! It _would_ be a game!
Always your affectionate friend, (_Signed_) JONES MINIMUS.
* * * * *
THE SAME OLD GAME.
[Russia is said to be threatening the old Finnish laws and
liberties.]
Russia snubs him who, as a candid friend,
Horrors Siberian, Hebrew would diminish.
_Must_ Muscovites prove tyrants to the end?
At least they aim to prove so to the _Finnish_!
* * * * *
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100. Feb. 28, 1891, by Various
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species present on the forested slopes include
_Tabebuia Donnell-Smithi_, _Zanthoxylum melanostictum_, _Pithecolobium
arboreum_, and a species of _Pterocarpus_. The structure of this forest
differs from that on the Gulf Coastal Plain in that there is no
continuous upper canopy and there is a dense undergrowth (Pl. 3, fig.
1). This type of forest extends from Mogoñe southward to about Matías
Romero.
In the vicinity of Matías Romero open pine-oak forest (_Pinus caribaea_
and _Quercus_ sp.) is found on some ridges as low as 250 meters above
sea level.
On the Plains of Chivela in the southern part of the central region
the vegetation takes on a semi-arid appearance, especially in a savanna
on the plains. Clumps of small trees and bushes, consisting of _Croton
nivea_, _Cordia cana_, _Jacquinia aurantiaca_, _Calycophyllum
candidissimum_, and _Cassia emarginata_, are scattered on a grassy
plain, from which rise widely-spaced palms of an unknown species (Pl.
3, fig. 2).
Pacific Coastal Plain
The vegetation of the Pacific lowlands definitely is semi-arid in
character. Most of the trees are deciduous, thorny, and short. During
the dry season the landscape presents a barren appearance, but shortly
after the first summer rains dense green foliage appears (Pl. 4, figs.
1 and 2). Between Juchitán and La Ventosa few trees are more than two
meters high (Pl. 5, fig. 1). In many areas the trees and bushes form an
almost impenetrable tangle, whereas on especially rocky soils or on
slopes those plants are more widely spaced. Abundant and widespread
species of trees on the Plains of Tehuantepec include _Acacia
cymbispina_, _Prosopis chilensis_, _Caesalpinia coriaria_, _Caesalpinia
eriostachys_, _Celtis iguanaea_, _Cordia brevispicata_, _Jatropha
aconitifolia_, and _Crescentia alata_.
Montane Vegetation
In order to illustrate the interruption of subtropical and temperate
types of vegetation by the lowlands of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, it
is necessary to digress for a moment from the isthmus and consider the
types of vegetation present on the adjacent highlands. On the higher
peaks, such as Cerro de Zempoaltepetl, above about 2500 meters is fir
forest (_Abies religiosa_); lower on the slopes are extensive pine
forests, which on some slopes are mixed with oak or replaced entirely
by oaks. Subtropical cloud forest, characterized by relatively cool
temperatures and high humidity, is found at elevations usually between
1000 and 1800 meters on the windward slopes of the Sierra Madre
Oriental in Veracruz and northern Oaxaca and on the northern and
southern slopes of the Chiapan-Guatemalan Highlands. None of these
forest types is continuous across the Isthmus of Tehuantepec.
_The Sierra de los Tuxtlas_
Although actually located in the region of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec,
the Sierra de los Tuxtlas, because of its isolated position, need not
be considered in great detail in analyzing the distribution of animals
inhabiting the lowlands of the isthmus. Nevertheless because some
species living in the highlands adjacent to the isthmus also live in
the Tuxtlas, this range is briefly described here. The Sierra de los
Tuxtlas is a range of volcanos lying near the Gulf Coast in southern
Veracruz between the mouths of the Río Papaloapan and the Río
Coatzacoalcos. Volcán San Martín, the highest peak, rises above 1800
meters. This range of volcanos is surrounded by lowlands, which
immediately to the south and west are covered with savanna and in
places by scrub forest. The luxuriant nature of the vegetation on these
volcanos indicates that this range receives much more rainfall than the
surrounding lowlands. Especially on the northern slopes, tropical
rainforest is well developed; this is replaced at about 1200 meters by
cloud forest. The southern and western slopes are drier, for the lower
slopes are covered with a scrubby, but evergreen, forest.
Detailed comments on the herpetofauna of the Tuxtlas have been omitted
purposefully, for the reptiles and amphibians of the region currently
are being studied by Douglas Robinson.
GAZETTEER
The following localities are those referred to in the text. The name of
the locality (listed alphabetically by states) is followed by latitude,
longitude, elevation, general description (town, ranch, etc.), and
general type of habitat. Unless otherwise noted, distances are
straight-line (airline) distances in kilometers. The localities have
been plotted from the American Geographical Society's "Map of Hispanic
America on the Scale of 1:1,000,000" (Millionth Map). Numbers in
brackets identify the position of a locality on the accompanying map
(Fig. 1).
_Oaxaca_
Agua Caliente.--Lat. 16° 38'; long. 94° 48'; elev. 140 m. A
hot spring, 6.9 km. north of La Ventosa on the
Trans-isthmian Highway; arid scrub forest [43].
Arenal, Cerro de.--Lat. 16° 18'; long. 95° 32'; elev. 925 m.
(crest). A ridge northeast of Tenango; scrub forest on
slopes and pine-oak forest on top [64].
Barrio, El.--Lat. 16° 38'; long. 95° 07'; elev. 314 m. A
village about 10 kilometers southwest of Matías Romero;
transition between scrub forest and broadleaf hardwood
forest [38].
Bisilana.--Lat. 16° 20'; long. 95° 13'; elev. 35 m. A place
name for a former ranch at the edge of Tehuantepec; open
arid scrub forest [62].
Chivela.--Lat. 16° 20'; long. 95° 01'; elev. 195 m. A
village on the Trans-isthmian Railroad, 26 kilometers by
rail south of Matías Romero and on the western edge of the
semi-arid Plains of Chivela [40].
Concepción.--Lat. 16° 17'; long. 95° 29'; elev. 1200 m. A
ranch on the slopes of Cerro Arenal, east-northeast of
Tenango; dry pine-oak forest [66].
Coyol.--Exact position unknown; according to Smith and
Taylor (1950: 10), Coyol is "between San Antonio and Las
Cruces."
Donají.--Lat. 17° 13'; long. 95° 02'; elev. 90 m. A village
at Km. 155 on the Trans-isthmian Highway; rainforest [29].
Escurano.--Lat. 16° 25'; long. 95° 27'; elev. 500 m. A ranch
about 25 kilometers west-northwest of Tehuantepec; arid
scrub forest [51].
Guichicovi, San Juan.--Lat. 16° 58'; long. 95° 06'; elev.
250 m. A village on the north slopes of the isthmus, 12
kilometers north-northwest of Matías Romero; cleared
hardwood forest and coffee plantations [33].
Huilotepec.--Lat. 16° 14'; long. 95° 09'; elev. 30 m. A
small village on the Río Tehuantepec, 13 kilometers
south-southeast of Tehuantepec; open arid scrub forest [69].
Ixtepec.--Lat. 16° 34'; long. 95° 06'; elev. 60 m. A town
and railroad junction on the northwestern edge of the Plains
of Tehuantepec; arid scrub forest [45].
Juchitán.--Lat. 16° 26'; long. 95° 02'; elev. 15 m. A town
on the Plains of Tehuantepec, 22 kilometers by road
east-northeast of Tehuantepec; arid scrub forest [50].
Limón.--Lat. 16° 20'; long. 95° 29'; elev. 600 m. A former
agrarian colony and now a small ranch about 27 kilometers
west of Tehuantepec; arid scrub forest [60].
Matías Romero.--Lat. 16° 53'; long. 95° 02'; elev. 200 m. A
town on the Trans-isthmian Highway and railroad in the hills
near the crest of the isthmus; broadleaf hardwood forest and
open pine-oak forest [36].
Mixtequilla.--Lat. 16° 24'; long. 95° 18'; elev. 40 m. A
village on the Río Tehuantepec, northwest of Tehuantepec;
dense scrub forest [57].
Modelo, El.--Lat. 17° 07'; long. 94° 43'; elev. 200 m. An
old rubber plantation on the Río Chalchijapa, a tributary to
the Río Coatzacoalcos; rainforest [31].
Nanches, Portillo Los.--Lat. 16° 35'; long. 95° 37'; elev.
500 m. A place name, about 4 kilometers southeast of
Totolapilla; scrub forest [44].
Nizanda.--Lat. 16° 42'; long. 95° 02'; elev. 150 m. A
village on the Trans-isthmian Railroad between Chivela and
Ixtepec; dense scrub forest [42].
Nueva Raza.--Exact location unknown; according to Thomas
MacDougall, this locality is in the lowlands of northern
Oaxaca; rainforest.
Palmar.--Lat. 16° 43'; long. 94° 40'; elev. 300 m. A small
ranch on the west base of Cerro Atravesado; scrub forest
[39].
Papaloapan.--Lat. 18° 11'; long. 96° 06'; elev. 25 m. A
small village on the Río Papaloapan in northern Oaxaca; low
evergreen forest and savanna [11].
Princesa, La.--Lat. 16° 56'; long. 95° 02'; elev. 150 m. A
ranch on the northern slopes of the isthmus, 6 kilometers by
road north of Matías Romero; poorly developed rainforest
[34].
Quiengola, Cerro de.--Lat. 16° 24'; long. 95° 22'; elev. 900
m. (crest). A hill 15 kilometers west-northwest of
Tehuantepec; dense scrub forest on slopes and scattered
pines on top [55].
Salazar.--Lat. 16° 25'; long. 95° 20'; elev. 45 m. A ranch
on the Río Tehuantepec, northwest of Tehuantepec; dense
scrub forest [52].
Salina Cruz.--Lat. 16° 10'; long. 95° 12'; sea level. A port
on the Golfo de Tehuantepec; open arid scrub forest [70].
Collections were made in the vicinity of the town and in the
open scrub forest 2.4 kilometers north at an elevation of 20
meters.
San Antonio.--Lat. 16° 15'; long. 95° 22'; elev. 40 m. A
ranch about 25 kilometers west-southwest of Tehuantepec;
arid scrub forest [68].
San Pablo.--Lat. 16° 24'; long. 95° 18'; elev. 40 m. A ranch
on the Río Tehuantepec, northwest of Tehuantepec; dense
scrub forest [56]. Cerro San Pablo probably is the hill
north of this ranch; this is shown on some maps as Cerro de
los Amates.
San Pedro, Cerro de.--Lat. 16° 18'; long. 95° 28'; elev.
about 1100 m. (crest). A ridge about 24 kilometers west of
Tehuantepec and east of Cerro Arenal; scrub forest on slopes
and pine-oak forest on top [65].
Santa Efigenia.--Lat. 16° 25'; long. 94° 13'; elev. 500 m. A
ranch on the southern slopes of the Sierra Madre de Chiapas,
8 kilometers north-northwest of Tapanatepec; scrub forest.
Former home of Francis Sumichrast [53].
Santa Lucía.--Lat. 16° 18'; long. 95° 28'; elev. 800 m. A
place name for a former ranch on the east slopes of Cerro
Arenal; scrub forest [63].
Santa María Chimalapa.--Lat. 16° 55'; long. 94° 42'; elev.
296 m. A village on the Río de los Milagros, a tributary to
the Río Coatzacoalcos; rainforest [35].
Santiago Chivela.--Lat. 16° 42'; long. 94° 53'; elev. 200 m.
A village on the Trans-isthmian Highway, 13.4 kilometers by
road south of Matías Romero; dry, grassy plains and
scattered clumps of scrubby trees and palms [41].
Collections were made in the vicinity of the village and at
a rocky stream, 11 kilometers south on the Trans-isthmian
Highway at an elevation of 230 m.
Santo Domingo (Petapa).--Lat. 16° 50'; long. 95° 08'; elev.
225 m. A village about 13 kilometers west-southwest of
Matías Romero; semi-arid scrub forest [37].
Sarabia.--Lat. 17° 04'; long. 95° 02'; elev. 100 m. A
village 25 kilometers north of Matías Romero on the
Trans-isthmian Highway; rainforest [32]. Collections were
made in the vicinity of the village and in the rainforest
along the Río Sarabia, 5 kilometers north of the village at
an elevation of 80 meters.
Tapanatepec.--Lat. 16° 32'; long. 94° 12'; elev. 90 m. A
town on the Pan-American Highway on the lower slopes of the
Sierra Madre de Chiapas; dense scrub forest [58].
Tehuantepec.--Lat. 16° 20'; long. 95° 14'; elev. 35 m. A
large town on the Plains of Tehuantepec; scrub forest [61].
Collections were made in the vicinity of the town and in the
dense scrub forest 8.6 kilometers west at an elevation of 85
meters and 14 kilometers west at an elevation of 120 meters.
Tenango.--Lat. 16° 16'; long. 95° 30'; elev. 1100 m. A town
in the mountains about 40 kilometers west-southwest of
Tehuantepec; scrub forest [67].
Tequisistlán.--Lat. 16° 24'; long. 95° 37'; elev. 190 m. A
village in the valley of the Río Tequisistlán, a tributary
to the Río Tehuantepec; dense scrub forest [54]. Most
collections were made about one kilometer north of the
village where the Pan-American Highway crosses the Río
Tequisistlán.
Tolosita.--Lat. 17° 12'; long. 95° 03'; elev. 80 m. A
village on the Río Tortuguero near the Trans-isthmian
Highway; rainforest [30].
Tres Cruces.--Lat. 16° 26'; long. 95° 51'; elev. 750 m. A
ranch near the Pan-American Highway, 70 kilometers by road
west-northwest of Tehuantepec; dense scrub forest [49].
Tuxtepec--Lat. 18° 06'; long. 96° 05'; elev. 80 m. A town on
the Río Papaloapan in northern Oaxaca; low evergreen forest
[12].
Ubero.--Lat. 17° 18'; long. 95° 00'; elev. 80 m. A lumber
camp and railroad station, 8.5 kilometers south of the Río
Jaltepec on the Trans-isthmian Highway; rainforest [28].
Unión Hidalgo.--Lat. 16° 27'; long. 94° 48'; elev. 7 m. A
village on the railroad, 20 kilometers east-northeast of
Juchitán; open scrub forest [48].
Ventosa, La.--Lat. 16° 30'; long. 94° 51'; elev. 25 m. A
village at the junction of the Pan-American and
Trans-isthmian highways; open scrub forest [46].
Zanatepec.--Lat. 16° 28'; long. 94° 22'; elev. 80 m. A
village on the Pan-American Highway at the eastern edge of
the Plains of Tehuantepec; dense scrub forest [47]. Most
collections were made in the scrub forest 5 to 8 kilometers
west-northwest of the village.
Zarzamora.--Lat. 16° 21'; long. 95° 48'; elev. 800 m. A
ranch between La Reforma (16 kilometers west of
Tequisistlán) and Santa María Ecatepec; scrub forest with
oaks on higher ridges [59].
_Veracruz_
Acayucan.--Lat. 17° 57'; long. 94° 55'; elev. 160 m. A large
town on the Trans-isthmian Highway; rainforest [21].
Collections were made in the vicinity of the town, but
principally at Rancho Las Hojitas, 7 kilometers northwest of
town at an elevation of 150 meters.
Alvarado.--Lat. 18° 47'; long. 95° 47'; sea level. A fishing
village at the mouth of the Río Papaloapan; coastal dunes
and marshes [1]. Most collections were made 1-3 kilometers
southeast of the village in marshes on the leeward side of
the coastal dunes.
Amatitlán.--Lat. 18° 26'; long. 95° 45'; elev. 4 m. A
village on the bank of the Río Papaloapan; savanna and sugar
plantations [6].
Aquilera.--Lat. 17° 48'; long. 95° 01'; elev. 150 m. A
village 21 kilometers southwest of Acayucan on the
Trans-isthmian Highway; rainforest [22].
Ayentes.--Lat. 18° 10'; long. 94° 26'; elev. 2 m. A railroad
station on the east bank of the Río Coatzacoalcos, across
the river from the city of Coatzacoalcos; scrub forest and
marshes [17].
Berta.--Lat. 18° 07'; long. 94° 27'; elev. 5 m. A ranch just
south of Coatzacoalcos; scrub and low evergreen forest [15].
Chacaltianguis.--Lat. 18° 18'; long. 95° 52'; elev. 5 m. A
village on the Río Papaloapan; savanna [8].
Ciudad Alemán.--Lat. 18° 13'; long. 96° 07'; elev. 30 m. A
new government town, headquarters of the Comisión del
Papaloapan; scrub and low evergreen forest [10].
Coatzacoalcos (formerly Puerto México).--Lat. 18° 10'; long.
94° 27'; elev. 2 m. A seaport at the mouth of the Río
Coatzacoalcos; scrub on coastal dunes; marshes and low
evergreen forest inland [16]. Most collections are from the
forest-savanna ecotone, 8 kilometers southwest of town.
Cosamaloapan.--Lat. 18° 22'; long. 95° 50'; elev. 4 m. An
agricultural town on the Río Papaloapan; savanna and sugar
plantations [7].
Cosoleacaque.--Lat. 17° 59'; long. 94° 38'; elev. 55 m. A
village 8 kilometers by road west of Minatitlán; savanna
[19].
Cuatotolapam.--Lat. 18° 08'; long. 95° 16'; elev. 13 m. A
village on the Trans-isthmian Railroad; savanna and low
evergreen forest along streams [13].
Hueyapan.--Lat. 18° 08'; long. 19° 09'; elev. 85 m. A town
32 kilometers by road northwest of Acayucan; savanna and low
evergreen forest [14]. Collections were made in the vicinity
of the town and from forest 10 kilometers southeast of town
at an elevation of 135 meters.
Jesús Carranza (formerly Santa Lucrecia).--Lat. 17° 27';
long. 95° 02'; elev. 80 m. A town and railroad junction in
the middle of the isthmus; rainforest [26]. Most of
Dalquest's specimens came from varying distances from Jesús
Carranza along the Río Coatzacoalcos and its tributaries.
Minatitlán.--Lat. 17° 58'; long. 94° 32'; elev. 15 m. An oil
refinery center on the Río Coatzacoalcos; savanna [20].
Naranjo.--Lat. 17° 35'; long. 95° 07'; elev. 100 m. A
village on the Trans-isthmian Highway, 45 kilometers south
of Acayucan; rainforest and palm forest [24].
Novillero.--Lat. 18° 16'; long. 95° 59'; elev. 10 m. A
village on the Río Papaloapan; scrub forest and grassland
[9].
Oaxaqueña, La.--Lat. 17° 26'; long. 94° 53'; elev. 80 m. A
hacienda on the Río Coatzacoalcos about 12 kilometers east
of Jesús Carranza; rainforest [27].
Playas, Río de las.--Lat. 18° 08'; long. 94° 07'; elev. 3 m.
The river (sometimes known as the Río Tonolá) forming the
boundary between the states of Veracruz and Tabasco;
rainforest [18].
San Lorenzo.--Lat. 17° 44'; long. 94° 42'; elev. 25 m. A
village on the Río Chiquito, about 30 kilometers southeast
of Acayucan; rainforest [23].
Suchil.--Lat. 17° 31'; long. 95° 03'; elev. 40 m. A village
on the Trans-isthmian Railroad, about 10 kilometers north of
Jesús Carranza; rainforest [25].
Tecolapan.--Lat. 18° 24'; long. 95° 18'; elev. 275 m. A
village on a small river of the same name in the western
foothills of Los Tuxtlas; rainforest [5].
Tejada, Lerdo de.--Lat. 18° 37'; long. 95° 31'; elev. 60 m.
An agricultural village, 35 kilometers by road
east-southeast of Alvarado; scrub forest, marshes, and sugar
plantations [2]. Collections were made in a marsh, 5
kilometers west-northwest of the village.
Tlacotalpan.--Lat. 18° 37'; long. 95° 42'; elev. 3 m. A town
at the confluence of the Río San Juan and Río Papaloapan;
marshes and sugar plantations [3].
Tula.--Lat. 18° 36'; long. 95° 22'; elev. 150 m. A village
near the western base of Los Tuxtlas; low evergreen forest
and marshes [4]. Collections were made in a marsh 3
kilometers northwest of the village.
THE AMPHIBIAN FAUNA OF THE LOWLANDS
In presenting an account of the amphibian fauna of the lowlands of the
Isthmus of Tehuantepec three items must be considered:
1. The composition of the fauna.
2. The ecology of the fauna.
3. The distribution of the fauna.
These items, together with similar data concerning the amphibians of
the adjacent highlands, will form the basis for the subsequent
discussion of the establishment of present patterns of distribution in
the isthmian region.
_Composition of the Fauna_
The amphibian fauna of the lowlands of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec
consists of 36 species definitely recorded from the area. These include
one genus and species of caecilian, one genus, including three species
of salamanders, and 14 genera and 32 species of anurans.
In comparison with the known amphibian fauna of the forested and
savanna portions of El Petén, Guatemala (Stuart, 1935 and 1958), we
find that there are more species recorded from the isthmus than from El
Petén. Stuart found only 20 species of amphibians in both forest and
savanna habitats in El Petén. Of the 36 species of amphibians known
from the isthmus, 28 occur on the Gulf lowlands and live in forest or
savanna habitats.
The geographic position of the isthmus with regard to major faunal
areas in Middle America, and the diversity of the environment are
important factors in understanding the presence of a large number of
species of amphibians in the isthmus. The large number of species
probably is a reflection of the diversity of the environment; this
diversity is the result of fluctuation of climate, and thus
environments, in the not too distant past. In no individual habitat,
such as rainforest, savanna, or scrub forest, does the number of
species approach the total for the region.
_Ecology of the Fauna_
In the preceding section on the description of the Isthmus of
Tehuantepec I have outlined the major environments in the region. With
respect to the distribution of amphibians we may recognize three major
environments in the isthmus--rainforest, semi-arid scrub forest, and
savanna. Each of these has varying combinations of physical and biotic
factors that are important in the ecology of amphibians. Because of the
importance of moisture, not only for the maintenance of life in these
animals, but in most species their dependence on water for breeding
purposes, this environmental factor is considered the most significant
in the ecological distribution of amphibians. A second factor is the
availability of necessary shelter, especially aestivation sites. These
factors will be compared in the three major environments in the region.
Moisture is present in the environment in the form of free water or
atmospheric moisture. With respect to the latter, it is well known that
dense shaded forests have a considerably higher relative humidity than
do open plains or areas with only scattered trees. Thus, the
rainforests of the isthmus are characterized by a much higher relative
humidity than are the savannas or semi-arid scrub forests. Although
with regard to rainfall there is a pronounced dry season in the regions
supporting rainforest, there still remains considerable atmospheric
moisture in this environment throughout the year. The dense foliage
provides shade and protection from desiccating effects of wind and
sunlight; furthermore the foliage contributes moisture by
transpiration. The deep alluvial soils mixed with large quantities of
organic matter (decaying leaves and rotting logs) maintain considerable
quantities of moisture.
Conversely, the savannas and scrub forests have little atmospheric
moisture during the dry season. In the former habitat there are few
trees to provide shade or moisture through transpiration; in the latter
most of the trees lose their leaves during the dry season. Thus, these
environments are desiccated by the dry winds and direct sunlight.
Furthermore, the soils in these environments become dry and caked.
There is little or no terrestrial matter to hold moisture.
Free water in these environments is present in a variety of forms at
different times of the year. During the dry season the more extensive
marshes in the savannas persist; many ponds and most of the streams in
the rainforest are permanent throughout the year. In the scrub forest
all except the largest streams become dry during the dry season, and no
ponds exist through the dry season. With the advent of the first heavy
summer rains the stream beds fill with water, marshes expand, and many
depressions become ponds (Pl. 5, fig. 2). At this time the amount of
free water in the scrub forests and savannas greatly increases, much
more so than that in the rainforests.
Environments are vertically stratified in the rainforests. There is the
deep alluvial soil, the ground litter of leaves and decaying logs, the
low bushes and small trees, and finally the tall trees of the forest.
Each of these provides certain types of shelter for amphibians. The
moist soil and litter on the forest floor is an important microhabitat
for fossorial and strictly terrestrial species. The dense foliage of
the trees, tree holes, and bromeliads growing on the trees provide
shelter for arboreal species. Arboreal and terrestrial bromeliads and
the terrestrial elephant-ear plants (_Xanthosoma_) contain water in the
axils of their leaves throughout the year and thus provide an important
habitat for amphibians. The low, spiny, deciduous trees of the scrub
forest and the grasses and scattered trees in the savannas provide
little shelter. In the savannas there are depressions, some of which
contain water throughout the year; these are often surrounded by trees
providing refugia for amphibians during the dry season. In the scrub
forest many species congregate along streams and in moist stream beds
during the dry season.
Now that the important ecological factors of the major environments
have been outlined, we may examine the local distribution of amphibians
in each of these. Beginning with the rainforest, we find only one
fossorial species, _Gymnopis mexicanus_. A large number of species are
found on the forest floor; characteristic inhabitants of the leaf
litter are: _Bufo valliceps_, _Eleutherodactylus rhodopis_,
_Microbatrachylus pygmaeus_, and _Syrrhophus leprus_. Other terrestrial
amphibians usually are not scattered throughout the rainforest, as are
those named immediately above, but instead inhabit areas of forest
adjacent to ponds or streams; these species include: _Bufo marinus_,
_Eleutherodactylus natator_, _Eleutherodactylus rugulosus_,
_Leptodactylus labialis_, _Leptodactylus melanonotus_, _Rana palmipes_
and _Rana pipiens_. The most striking ecological assemblage of
amphibians in the rainforest is the arboreal group of species,
including:
_Bolitoglossa occidentalis_
_Bolitoglossa platydactyla_
_Eleutherodactylus alfredi_
_Hyla baudini_
_Hyla ebraccata_
_Hyla loquax_
_Hyla microcephala martini_
_Hyla picta_
_Phrynohyas modesta_
_Phrynohyas spilomma_
_Phyllomedusa callidryas taylori_
In the savannas _Rhinophrynus dorsalis_, _Engystomops pustulosus_, and
_Gastrophryne usta_ are fossorial species. _Bufo marinus_,
_Leptodactylus melanonotus_, _Leptodactylus labialis_, _Rana palmipes_,
and _Rana pipiens_ are found in the vicinity of permanent water in the
savannas. Although the savanna habitat does not provide the ecological
conditions for the existence of an arboreal fauna, many arboreal
species from the surrounding rainforest utilize the extensive marshes
and ponds in the savannas for breeding purposes. Thus, _Hyla baudini_,
_Hyla microcephala martini_, _Hyla picta_, and _Phrynohyas spilomma_
have been found breeding in savannas. In parts of savannas where clumps
of trees surround depressions containing water throughout the year,
individuals of the species named above, together with _Hyla loquax_ and
_Phyllomedusa callidryas taylori_, may not only breed, but remain
throughout the year.
In the semi-arid scrub forest the same fossorial species as exist in
the savannas are found. Likewise, _Bufo marinus_, _Leptodactylus
labialis_, _Leptodactylus melanonotus_, and _Rana pipiens_ are found
near permanent water. Terrestrial species in this semi-arid environment
include _Bufo canaliferus_, _Bufo coccifer_, _Bufo marmoreus_,
_Syrrhophus pipilans_, and _Diaglena reticulata_. Of these, _Syrrhophus
pipilans_ sometimes inhabits low trees and bushes; the others may be
fossorial. The arboreal species in the scrub forest include _Hyla
baudini_, _Hyla robertmertensi_, _Hyla staufferi_, and _Phyllomedusa
dacnicolor_.
_Eleutherodactylus rugulosus_ and _Hylella sumichrasti_ live along
streams in the scrub forest. _Hylella sumichrasti_ lays its eggs in
these streams.
In comparing the ecological differences in the amphibian assemblages in
the three major habitats, the most obvious difference is the great
percentage of arboreal species in the rainforest as compared with
savanna and scrub forest. Only four arboreal species are found in the
scrub forest, none in the savannas, but eleven in the rainforest.
Likewise, there is an absence of ground-dwelling forms in the arid
habitats; in the latter the only terrestrial species are those that
are found near water. A possible exception is _Syrrhophus pipilans_.
From the above analysis of ecological distribution we may see that the
rainforest provides a variety of habitats for amphibians and that these
habitats are suitable for amphibian life throughout the year. On the
other hand, the savannas and scrub forests are characterized by extreme
conditions of desiccation, a factor of considerable importance in
limiting the ecological distribution of amphibians. However, there
still is a diversity of amphibians in these semi-arid environments.
Obviously, these species
|
the furnishings of an office, and by degrees, as his mind cleared, he
recalled with a start his arrest.
He was at the police station.
But why in this particular room? The walls were hung with sporting
prints. Bookshelves, a comfortable sofa, upon which he had spent the
night, all these indicated nothing less than the private office of the
chief.
And then he recalled with what consideration he had been conducted
hither. Evidently they took him for an intimate friend of the King.
Nevertheless, he was under arrest for murder, or at least as an
accomplice to a murder.
"After all," he thought, "the truth will come to light, they'll capture
the murderer and my innocence will be established.
"Besides, didn't the King promise to see me through. Probably before
this he has already taken steps for my release."
He then decided to call out:
"Is there anyone here?"
Scarcely had Fandor spoken when a man entered, who, after a profound bow
to the journalist, drew the curtains apart.
"You are awake, Monsieur?"
Fandor was amazed. What charming manners the police had!
"Oh, yes, I'm awake, but I feel stiff all over."
"That is easily understood, and I hope you will pardon... You see, I
didn't happen to be at the station... and when I got here... why, I
didn't like to wake you."
"They take me for a friend of the King of Hesse-Weimar," thought Fandor.
"You did perfectly right, Monsieur..."
"M. Perrajas, District Commissioner of Police... and the circumstances
being such... the unfortunate circumstances... I imagine it was better
that you did not return immediately to your apartment... in fact, I
have given the necessary orders and in a few moments... the time to get
a carriage... I can, of course, rely upon the discretion of my men who,
besides, are ignorant of..."
"Oh, that's all right."
Fandor replied in a non-committal tone. It would be wiser to avoid any
compromising admission. A carriage!--what carriage, doubtless the Black
Maria to take him to prison. And what did he mean by 'the discretion of
his men?'
"Well," thought Fandor, "he can count upon me. I shan't publish anything
yet. And after all, it's going to be very hard for me to prove my
innocence. Since I must rely on the King getting me out of this hole, it
would be very foolish of me to give him away."
"Besides," continued the officer, "I have had the concièrge warned; she
has received the most positive orders... and no reporter will be
allowed to get hold of..."
The officer became confused in his explanation.
"The incidents of last night," added Fandor.
A knock at the door and Sergeant Masson entered.
"The coupé is ready."
"Very well, Sergeant."
Fandor rose and was about to put on his overcoat, but the man darted
forward and helped him on with it.
"Do you wish me to come with you, Monsieur, or would you prefer to
return alone?"
"Oh, alone, thanks, don't trouble yourself."
The door was opened wide by the polite officer and Fandor passed through
the main hall of the Station, where everyone rose and bowed. Getting
into his carriage, he was disagreeably surprised to see an individual
who appeared to be a plain clothes man sitting on the seat. In addition
a police cyclist fell in behind the carriage as escort.
"Where the devil are they going to take me?" he wondered.
To his intense surprise, they stopped ten minutes later at the Royal
Palace, the most luxurious hotel in Paris.
With infinite deference he was then conducted to the elevator and taken
to the first floor.
"Well, this lets me out," thought Fandor. "Evidently the King has sent
for me... in a few minutes I shall be free... what a piece of luck!"
He was shown into a sumptuous apartment and there left to his own
devices.
"Wonder what's become of Frederick-Christian," he muttered, after a wait
of twenty minutes. "It's worse than being at the dentist's."
As the room was very warm, Fandor removed his overcoat and began an
investigation of his surroundings. Upon a table lay several illustrated
papers and picking one up he seated himself comfortably in an armchair
and began to read.
Some minutes later a Major-domo entered the room with much ceremony and
silently presented him with a card. This turned out to be a menu.
"Well, they're not going to let me starve anyway," he thought, "and as
long as the King has asked me to breakfast, I'll accept his invitation."
Choosing several dishes at random, he returned the menu, and the man,
bowing deeply, inquired:
"Where shall we serve breakfast? In the boudoir?"
"Yes, in the boudoir."
The bow ended the interview and Fandor was once more left alone. But not
for long. Close upon the heels of the first, a second man entered and
handed the journalist a telegram and withdrew.
"Ah, now I shall get some explanation of all this mystery! This should
come from the King.... Has he got my name?... No!... the Duke of
Haworth... evidently the name of the individual I am supposed to
represent."
Fandor tore open the telegram and then stared in surprise. Not one word
of it could he make out. It was in cipher!
"Why the deuce was this given to me!... what does the whole thing mean?
Is it possible they take me for...."
CHAPTER V
BY THE SINGING FOUNTAINS
Paris rises very late indeed on New Year's Day. The night before is
given up to family reunions, supper parties and every kind of
jollification. So the year begins with a much needed rest. The glitter
and racket of the streets gives place to a death-like stillness. Shops
are shut and the cafés are empty. Paris sleeps. There is an exception to
this rule: Certain unfortunate individuals are obliged to rise at
day-break, don their best clothes, their uniforms and make their way to
the four corners of the town to pay ceremonial calls.
These are the Government officials representing the army, the
magistracy, the parliament, the municipality--all must pay their
respects to their chiefs. For this hardship they receive little
sympathy, as it is generally understood that while they have to work
hard on New Year's Day, they do nothing for the rest of the year.
The somnolence of Paris, however, only extends until noon. At that hour
life begins again. It is luncheon time.
This New Year's Day differed in no wise from others, and during the
afternoon the streets were thronged with people.
A pale sun showed in the gray winter sky and the crowd seemed to be
converging toward the Place de la Concorde. Suddenly the blare of a
brass band on the Rue Royale brought curious heads to the windows.
A procession headed by a vari-colored banner was marching toward the
banks of the Seine. The participants wore a mauve uniform with gold
trimmings and upon the banner was inscribed in huge letters:
LA CAPITALE
THE GREAT EVENING PAPER
With some difficulty the musicians reached the Obelisk and at the foot
of the monument they formed a circle, while at a distance the crowd
awaited developments.
In the front rank two young women were standing.
One of them seemed to be greatly amused at the gratuitous entertainment,
the other appeared preoccupied and depressed.
"Come, Marie Pascal, don't be so absent-minded. You look as if you were
at a funeral."
The other, a workgirl, tried to smile and gave a deep sigh.
"I'm sorry, Mademoiselle Rose, to be out of sorts, but I feel very
upset."
Two police officers tried to force their way to the musicians and after
some difficulty they succeeded in arresting the flute and the trombone
players.
This act of brutality occasioned some commotion and the crowd began to
murmur.
The employés of _La Capitale_ now brought up several handcarts and
improvised a sort of platform. Gentlemen in frock coats then appeared on
the scene and gathered round it. One or two were recognized and pointed
out by the crowd.
"There's M. Dupont, the deputy and director of _La Capitale_."
A red-faced young man with turned up moustaches was pronounced to be M.
de Panteloup, the general manager of the paper.
As a matter of fact, those who read _La Capitale_ had been advised
through its columns that an attempt would be made to solve the mystery
of the Singing Fountains, which had intrigued Paris for so many weeks. A
small army of newsboys offered the paper for sale during the ceremony.
Marie Pascal bought a copy and read it eagerly.
"They haven't a word about the affair yet," she cried.
At that moment the powerful voice of M. de Panteloup was heard:
"You are now going to hear an interesting speech by the celebrated
archivist and paleographer, M. Anastasius Baringouin, who, better than
anyone else, can explain to you the strange enigma of the Singing
Fountains."
An immense shout of laughter greeted the orator as he mounted the steps
to the stage. He was an old man, very wrinkled and shaky, wearing a high
hat much too large for his head. He was vainly trying to settle his
glasses upon a very red nose. In a thin, sharp voice, he began:
"The phenomenon of the Singing Fountains is not, as might be supposed,
wholly unexpected. Similar occurrences have already been noted and date
back to remote antiquity. Formerly a stone statue was erected in the
outskirts of the town of Thebes to the memory of Memnon. When the beams
of the rising sun struck it, harmonious sounds were heard to issue from
it. At first this peculiarity was attributed to some form of trickery, a
secret spring or a hidden keyboard. But upon further research, it was
demonstrated that the sounds arose from purely physical and natural
causes."
The crowd which hitherto had listened in silence to the orator now began
to show signs of impatience.
"What the dickens is he gassing about?" shouted some one in the street.
As the savant paid no attention to these signs the band struck up a
military march. Finally when order was re-established M. Panteloup
himself mounted the platform.
"This fountain, ladies and gentlemen," he began in a powerful voice,
"was built in 1836 at a cost of a million and a half francs. In the
twenty-four hours its output is 6,716 cubic yards of water. It is
composed, as you can see, of a basin of polished stone, decorated by six
tritons and nereids, each holding a fish in its mouth from which the
water flows out. Thus far there is nothing unusual and it is therefore
with justifiable surprise that we discover the fact that at certain
moments these fountains actually sing. Are we in the presence of a
phenomenon similar to that recalled just now by M. Anastasius
Baringouin? Are we, at the beginning of the twentieth century--the
century of Science and Precision--victims of hallucination or sorcery?
This, ladies and gentlemen, is what we are about to investigate, and we
will begin by consulting the celebrated clairvoyant, Madame Gabrielle de
Smyrne."
A murmur of approbation greeted the pretty prophetess as she appeared,
but at the same moment a police officer followed by fifteen men pushed
his way to the foot of the platform and ordered M. Panteloup to cease
attracting a crowd. The latter, however, was equal to the occasion.
After lifting his hand for silence he shouted the famous cry:
"We are here by the will of the people, we shall not go away except by
force."
The crowd cheered, and with the voices mingled the barking of dogs.
"Ladies and gentlemen," continued M. Panteloup, "you hear the wonderful
police dogs of Neuilly, Turk and Bellone. They are coming to help us to
scent out the mystery."
This was to be the termination of the ceremony, but an unlooked for
addition to the program appeared in the person of one of those Parisian
"Natural Men" or "Primitive Men."
He was a very old, long-bearded man and wore a white robe. He went by
the name of Ouaouaoua, and his portrait had been published in all city
papers. A hush came over the crowd and then in the silence a vague
metallic murmur was heard above the splash of the water.
This time there was no mistake. The Fountains were singing.
Thousands of witnesses were present and could testify to that fact.
The crowd at once associated the arrival of Ouaouaoua with the music
from the Fountains, and he was acclaimed the hero of the occasion.
M. de Panteloup, seized with a happy inspiration, shook hands with
Ouaouaoua and pinned on his white robe the gold medal of _La Capitale_.
Proceedings were, however, summarily brought to a stop at this point.
The prefect of the police drove up and his men scattered the crowd in
all directions.
Ten minutes after the Place de la Concorde had assumed its usual aspect
and the tritons and nereids continued to pour out their 6,716 cubic
yards of water every twenty-four hours.
CHAPTER VI
THE INVESTIGATION BEGINS
M. Vicart, sub-director of the Police Department, was in an execrable
humor.
In all his long career such a thing had never happened before. In spite
of the established rule, he had been deprived of his New Year holiday,
which he usually spent in visits to governmental officials capable of
influencing his advancement.
He had been ordered to his office. His morning had been spent in endless
discussions with M. Annion, his director. Numerous telegrams,
interviews, work of all kinds instead of his customary rest. Besides, he
had received from his friends only 318 visiting cards instead of 384,
last year's number. It was most annoying. He was engaged in recounting
his cards when a clerk announced the visit of detective Juve.
"Send him in at once."
In a few moments Juve entered.
* * * * *
Juve had not changed. In spite of his forty-odd years, he was still
young looking, active, persevering and daring.
For some time past he had been left very much to his own devices in his
tracking of the elusive Fantômas, and he was rarely called in to assist
in the pursuit of other criminals. Therefore he realized that it was an
affair of the very first importance which called for his presence in M.
Vicart's office.
The detective found M. Vicart seated at his desk in the badly lighted
room.
"My dear Juve, you are probably surprised at being sent for to-day."
"A little... yes."
"Well, you probably know that the King of Hesse-Weimar,
Frederick-Christian II, has been staying incognito in Paris?"
Juve nodded. He did not think it necessary to mention the incident that
had occasioned this visit.[1]
[Footnote 1: See "A Nest of Spies."]
"Now, Christian II has, or rather had, a mistress, Susy d'Orsel, a
demi-mondaine. Were you aware of that?"
"No, what of it?"
"This woman has been murdered... or rather... has not been
murdered... you understand, Juve, has not been murdered."
"Has not been murdered, very well!"
"Now, this woman who has not been murdered threw herself out of the
window last night at three o'clock; in a word, she committed suicide, at
the precise moment when Frederick-Christian was taking supper with
her... you grasp my meaning?"
"No, I don't. What are you trying to get at?"
"Why, it's as clear as day, Juve... the scandal! especially as the
local magistrate had the stupidity to arrest the King."
"The King has been arrested... I don't understand! Then it wasn't
suicide?"
"That is what must be established."
"And I am to take charge of the investigation?"
"I put it in your hands."
When M. Vicart had explained the circumstances of the case, Juve summed
up:
"In a word, Frederick-Christian II went to see his mistress last night,
she threw herself out of the window, the King was arrested for murder;
he put in a denial, claiming that a third person was present, this third
person escaped, an inadmissible hypothesis, since nobody saw him and the
door to the servant's staircase was locked... this morning the King was
set at liberty, and we have now to find out whether a crime was really
committed or whether it was a case of suicide.... Is that it?"
"That is it! But you're going ahead pretty fast. You don't realize,
Juve, the seriousness of the supposition you formulate so freely.... You
must know whether it's murder or suicide! Of course! Of course!... but
you are too precise.... A King a murderer... that isn't possible. There
would be terrible diplomatic complications.... It's a case of
suicide.... Susy d'Orsel committed suicide beyond a doubt."
Juve smiled slightly.
"That has to be proved, hasn't it?"
"Certainly it must be proved. The accident happened at number 247 Rue de
Monceau. Go there, question the concièrge... the only witness.... In a
word, bring us the proof of suicide in written form. We can then send a
report to the press and stifle the threatened scandal."
Juve rose.
"I will begin an immediate investigation," he replied, smiling, "and M.
Vicart, you may depend upon me to use all means in my power to clear up
the affair... entirely and impartially."
When Juve had gone, M. Vicart realized a sense of extreme uneasiness.
"Impartially!... the deuce!"
Hurriedly he left his office and made his way through the halls to his
chief, M. Annion. His first care must be to cover his own
responsibility in the matter.
M. Annion, cold and impassive, listened to his recital in silence and
then broke out:
"You have committed a blunder, M. Vicart. I told you this morning to put
a detective on the case who would bring us a report along the lines that
we desire. I pointed out to you the gravity of the situation."
"But..." protested M. Vicart.
"Let me finish.... I thought I had made myself quite clear on that point
and now, you actually give the commission to Juve!"
"Exactly, Monsieur! I gave Juve the commission because he is our most
expert detective."
"That I don't deny, and therefore Juve is certain to discover the truth!
It is an unpardonable blunder."
At this moment a clerk entered with a telegram. M. Annion opened it
quickly and read it.
"Ah! this is enough to bring about the fall of the Ministry. Listen!"
"The Minister of Hesse-Weimar to the Secretary of the Interior, Place
Beauvau, Paris--Numerous telegrams addressed to his Majesty the King of
Hesse-Weimar, at present staying incognito at the Royal Palace Hotel,
Avenue des Champs Elysées, remain unanswered, in spite of their extreme
urgence. The Minister of Hesse-Weimar begs the Secretary of the Interior
of France to kindly make inquiries and to send him the assurance that
his Majesty the King of Hesse-Weimar is in possession of these
diplomatic telegrams."
M. Annion burst out.
"There now! Pretty soon they'll be accusing us of intercepting the
telegrams... Frederick-Christian doesn't answer! How can I help that! I
suppose he's weeping over the death of his mistress. And now that fellow
Juve has taken a hand in it! I tell you. Monsieur Vicart, we're in a
nice fix!"
While M. Annion was unburdening his mind to M. Vicart, Juve left the
Ministry whistling a march, and hailed a cab to take him to the Rue
Monceau.
He quite understood what was required of him, but his professional
pride, his independence and his innate honesty of purpose determined him
to ferret out the truth regardless of consequences.
As a matter of fact, the presence of the King in Paris was, in part, to
render a service to Juve himself.[2]
[Footnote 2: See "Fantômas," Vols. I, II, III, IV.]
If, therefore, the hypothesis of suicide could be verified, Juve would
be able to be of use to the King; if, on the other hand, it had to be
rejected, his report would prove that fact.
On arriving at the Rue de Monceau, Juve went straight to the concièrge's
office and having shown his badge, began to question her:
"Tell me, Madame Ceiron, did you see the King when he came to pay his
visit to his mistress?"
"No, Monsieur. I saw nothing at all. I was in bed... the bell rang, I
opened the door... the King called out as usual, 'the Duke of
Haworth'--it's the name he goes by--and then he went upstairs, but I
didn't see him."
"Was he alone?"
"Ah, that's what everyone asks me! Of course he was alone... the proof
being that when they went up and found poor Mlle. Susy, nobody else was
there, so..."
Juve interrupted:
"All right. Now, tell me, did Mlle. Susy d'Orsel expect any other
visitor? Any friend?"
"Nobody that I knew of... at least that's what she said to her
lace-maker--one of my tenants... a very good young girl, Mlle. Marie
Pascal--She said like this--'I'm expecting my lover,' but she mentioned
nobody else."
"And this Marie Pascal is the last person who saw Susy d'Orsel alive,
excepting, of course, the King? The servants had gone to bed?"
"Oh, Monsieur, the maid wasn't there. Justine came down about eleven,
she said good-night to me as she went by... while Marie Pascal didn't
go up before eleven-thirty or a quarter to twelve."
"Very well, I'll see Mlle. Pascal later. Another question, Mme. Ceiron:
did any of your tenants leave the house after the crime... I mean after
the death?"
"No, Monsieur."
"Mlle. Susy d'Orsel's apartment is reached by two staircases. Do you
know if the door to the one used by the servants was locked?"
"That I can't tell you, Monsieur, all I know is that Justine generally
locked it when she went out."
"And while you were away hunting the doctor and the police, did you
leave the door of the house open?"
"Ah, no, Monsieur, to begin with, I didn't go out. I have a telephone in
my room, besides I never leave the door open."
"Is Justine in her room now?"
"No, I have the key, which means that she's out... she's probably
looking after funeral arrangements of the poor young girl."
"Mlle. d'Orsel had no relations?"
"I don't think so, Monsieur."
"Is Marie Pascal in?"
"Yes... sixth floor to the right at the end of the hall."
"Then I will go up and see her. Thanks very much for your information,
Madame."
"You're very welcome, Monsieur. Ah, this wretched business isn't going
to help the house. I still have two apartments unrented."
Juve did not wait to hear the good woman's lamentations but hurriedly
climbed the flights of stairs and knocked on the door indicated.
It was opened by a young girl.
"Mademoiselle Marie Pascal?"
"Yes, Monsieur."
"Can I see you for a couple of minutes? I am a detective and have charge
of investigating the death of Mlle. d'Orsel."
Mlle. Pascal led the way into her modest room, which was bright and
sunny with a flowered paper on the walls, potted plants and a bird-cage.
She then began a recital of the interview she had had with Susy. This
threw no fresh light upon the case and at the end, Juve replied:
"To sum it up, Mademoiselle, you know only one thing, that Mlle.
d'Orsel was waiting for her lover, that she told you she was not very
happy, but did not appear especially sad or cast down... in fact,
neither her words nor her attitude showed any thought of attempted
suicide. Am I not right?"
Marie Pascal hesitated; she seemed worried over something; at length she
spoke up:
"I do know more."
"What?"
Juve, to cover the young girl's confusion, had turned his head away
while putting the last question.
"Why," he remarked, "you can see Mlle. d'Orsel's apartment from your
windows!"
"Yes, Monsieur, and that..."
"Were you in bed when the suicide took place?"
"No... I was not in bed, I saw..."
"Ah! You saw! What did you see?"
"Monsieur, I haven't spoken to a soul about it; in fact, I'm not sure I
wasn't mistaken, it all happened so quickly.... I was getting a breath
of fresh air at the window, I noticed her apartment was lighted up, I
could see that through the curtains, and I said to myself, her lover
must have arrived."
"Well, what then?"
"Then suddenly some one pulled back the hall-window curtains, then the
window was flung open and I thought I saw a man holding Mlle. d'Orsel
by the shoulders... she was struggling but without crying out...
finally he threw her out of the window, then the light was extinguished
and I saw nothing more."
"But you called for help?"
"Ah, Monsieur, I'm afraid I didn't act as I should have. I lost my head,
you understand... I left my room and was on my way downstairs to help
the poor woman... and then I heard voices, doors slamming... I was
afraid the murderer might kill me, too, so I hurried back to my room."
"According to you, then, it was not a suicide?"
"Oh, no, Monsieur... I am quite sure she was thrown out of the window
by some man."
"Some man? But, Mademoiselle, you know Susy d'Orsel was alone with the
King, so that man must be the King."
Marie Pascal gave a dubious shrug.
"You know the King?" Juve asked.
"Yes, I sold him laces. I saw him through an open door."
"And you are not sure that he is or is not the murderer?"
"No, I don't know, that's why I've said nothing about it. I'm not sure
of anything."
"Pardon, Mademoiselle, but it seems to me you don't quite grasp the
situation... what is it you are not sure of?"
"Whether it was the King who killed poor Mlle. Susy."
"But you are sure it was a man who killed Mlle. d'Orsel?"
"Yes, Monsieur... and I am also sure it was a thin, tall man... in
fact, some one of the same build as the King."
"Well, Mademoiselle, I cannot see why you have kept this knowledge to
yourself, it is most important, for it does away with the theory of
suicide, it proves that a crime has been committed."
"Yes, but if it wasn't the King, it would be terrible to suspect him
unjustly... that is what stopped me..."
"It must no longer stop you. If the King is a murderer, he must be
punished like any other man; if he is innocent, the guilty man must be
caught. You haven't spoken of this to the concièrge?"
Marie Pascal smiled.
"No, Monsieur, Mme. Ceiron is rather a gossip."
"I understand, but now you need keep silence no longer; in fact, I
should be glad if you would spread your news... talk of it freely and
I, on my side, will notify my chief.... I may add that we shall not be
long in clearing up this mystery."
Juve had a reason for giving this advice. The more gossip, the less
chance would the police department have to stifle the investigation.
* * * * *
Marie Pascal slept badly that night. She was too intelligent not to
realize that her deposition had convinced Juve of the guilt of the King,
and this troubled her greatly. She, herself, was persuaded that she had
seen the King throw Susy out of the window, although she had had no time
to identify him positively and the young girl was alarmed at the
importance of her testimony.
However, she determined to follow Juve's advice and spread the gossip.
With that purpose she went down to see Mother Ceiron. As the concièrge
was not in her room she called through the hallway:
"Madame Ceiron!... Madame Ceiron!"
A man's voice answered and a laundryman came downstairs carrying a
basket.
"The concièrge is on the sixth floor, Mademoiselle. I passed her as I
was going up to get M. de Sérac's laundry."
"Ah, thank you, then I will wait for her."
Marie Pascal took a seat in the office, but at the end of ten minutes
she became bored and decided to go out and get a breath of the fresh
morning air.
As she reached the entrance she noticed an article of clothing lying on
the ground.
"A woman's chemise," she exclaimed, picking it up. "The laundryman must
have dropped it."
Then suddenly she grew pale and retraced her steps to the office.
"Good God!" she cried, leaning for support upon the back of a chair.
CHAPTER VII
THE KING RECEIVES
The elegant attaché of the Secretary for Foreign Affairs bowed, saying:
"I am extremely sorry to bring your Majesty this bad news."
A voice from the depth of the cushions inquired:
"What bad news?"
"I am telling your Majesty that it would be difficult--even impossible
for you to go to the Longchamps races as you had the intention of
doing."
"And why not?"
"The President of the Republic opens to-day the exposition at the
Bagatelle Museum. If your Majesty went to the Bois de Boulogne you would
run the risk of meeting him. You would then be obliged to stop and talk
a few moments, but as this interview has not been foreseen and arranged
for it would be very awkward."
"That is true."
"That is all I had to convey to your Majesty."
"Let me see, what is your name, Monsieur?"
"I am Count Adhemar de Candières, your Majesty."
"Well, Count, many thanks! You may retire."
The Count gracefully bowed himself out and with a convulsive movement of
the cushions Jerome Fandor sprang up and burst out laughing.
"Ah!" he cried, "I thought that chap would never go! Your Majesty!...
Sire... the King... pleasant names to be called when you're not
accustomed to them. I've already had twenty-four hours of it, and if it
goes on much longer I shall begin to think it's not a joke.
"And the King himself, what's become of him... what is
Frederick-Christian II doing now... that's something I'd like to find
out."
The journalist had indeed sufficient food for thought. From the dawn of
New Year's Day he had gone from surprise to surprise. At first he
thought he had been brought to the Royal Palace Hotel at the instigation
of the King. That would have been the simple solution of the affair. The
King must have realized the awkward predicament in which his companion
was placed and in spite of his drunken stupor he would come to his
assistance as soon as possible. As a matter of fact, Fandor had been set
at liberty. The journalist therefore had waited patiently for the
arrival of the King, who was unaccountably late.
Then little by little it began to dawn on him that the hotel people
were considering him not as a friend of the King but as the King
himself! Under ordinary circumstances, he would at once have made his
identity known, but against that there were now a multitude of
objections. His presence in the apartment of the murdered Susy d'Orsel
had created an ambiguous and disagreeable situation. Again, was the
personnel of the hotel really duped by the substitution?
The situation was becoming more and more difficult for Fandor. He
realized that he was being watched. The evening before one of the clerks
of the Royal Palace Hotel had informed him that his Majesty's automobile
was ready. For a moment Fandor did not know what to do, but finally
decided to take a chance for an outing. As soon as he had come
downstairs he regretted his decision. Among the persons lounging in the
lobby he recognized five or six detectives whom he had known and he
realized that the police would have accurate information as to where he
might go. On reaching the door he saw three or four automobiles lined up
outside. Which one belonged to the King? Faced by this situation he
acted without hesitation, he turned quickly and went back to the Royal
apartment, where during the rest of the evening he had been left in
peace. The following morning he awoke with a violent headache, and
applied the usual remedy for the neuralgia to which he was subject. He
bound up his head with a large silk scarf which he found in the Royal
wardrobe. During the course of the morning his hotel bill was brought to
him, which amounted to four thousand francs.
"Pretty stiff," he muttered, "for three days' stay. It may be all right
for Frederick-Christian II, but for a poor devil of a journalist it is
rather awkward."
Fandor was wondering what he should do about it when the telephone rang
to announce a visitor. After listening at the receiver, his face
suddenly lighted with a broad smile.
"Show him up," he answered.
Several moments afterwards a man entered the apartment He was about
forty and wore the conventional frock coat and light gloves.
"I am," he said, "the private secretary of the Comptoir National de
Crédit and am at your Majesty's disposition for the settlement of
accounts. Your Majesty will excuse our sub-director for not having come
himself to take your orders as it is his pleasure and honor generally to
do, but he has been ill for several days and that is why I have begged
permission for this audience with your Majesty."
Fandor with difficulty repressed his desire to laugh and congratulated
himself that he had escaped the danger of being shown up by the
sub-director who knew the real King. The Secretary brought with him a
large sum of money which he placed at the disposal of the sovereign. For
a moment Fandor was tempted to accept the money but his scruples held
him back. If things should turn out badly it would not do to lay himself
open to the charge of usurping the Royal funds as well as the
personality of the King. So he limited himself to handing over the hotel
bill, saying:
"Kindly settle this without delay and don't stint yourself with the
tips."
A little later a porter entered with newspapers. Fandor seized them
eagerly, but after a single glance he could not repress a movement of
impatience.
"These idiots," he growled to himself, "always bring me the Hesse-Weimar
papers, and I don't know a confounded word of German. What I would like
to get hold of is a copy of _La Capitale_."
He rang the bell intending to give the order for a copy to be sent up,
but at that moment a servant announced:
"Mlle. Marie Pascal is here, your Majesty."
"What does she want?"
The servant handed Fandor a letter.
"Your Majesty has granted an interview to her."
Without thinking the journalist asked: "Is she pretty?"
The employé of the Royal Palace kept a straight face. He was too much in
the habit of dealing with royal patrons. The King might joke as much as
he pleased, but the same liberty was not granted to others. He therefore
made a deep bow and said with a tone of profound deference:
"I will send Marie Pascal to your Majesty."
CHAPTER VIII
MARIE PASCAL
Now that he had become a King and was obliged to receive unexpected
visits in that capacity, Fandor had adopted the wise precaution of
making his visitors wait in the main Salon, while he retired to the
adjoining study. From there, thanks to a large mirror, he could see them
without being seen himself. Following this precaution he waited for the
appearance of his visitor and scarcely had she set foot in the Salon
when he experienced an agreeable surprise.
"Ah, there's a pretty girl."
He was right. She was charming, with her large clear blue eyes, her fair
hair
|
and without other ornament than
the fresco upon the front, which recalls a scene from the Nibelungen.
A straight flight of steps leads to the door; that opens upon a small
anteroom, which again communicates with a large vestibule, very high,
and lighted from the top. It is surrounded, on a level with the first
story, by a gallery, decorated with paintings, representing Eastern
scenes. The floor is paved with flagstones, divans are placed in the
angles, together with marble statues of Wagner's heroes, the work of
enthusiastic sculptors, and a large American organ with brass stops.
At the right is the dining-room; on the left a little salon filled
with objects of art. Facing this is the great hall of reunion, vast
and sumptuous, at once library and working-room. It is terminated by
a glass rotunda opening into the garden, where a fountain is babbling
joyously.
The theatre, which stands outside of the city on a hill, is a
construction of simple aspect, somewhat resembling the palace of the
Trocadéro. When I saw it for the first time rising majestically on the
height, illumined by the rays of the setting sun; when I saw that
contemplative crowd slowly ascending on every side toward this temple
of art, I could not restrain tears of joy. The dream of this man's
entire life was thus at last realized. The world that had persecuted
him hastened finally to greet him with a rapture beyond precedent. He,
once so persecuted, enjoyed even in life his apotheosis. This new phase
of his life had changed nothing in his manner of being; this immense
triumph failed to intoxicate him; he did not even appear to be greatly
impressed. It seemed to me that the Nibelungen were far from his mind,
which already meditated new creations. He made me visit the theatre in
all its details, from the hidden orchestra, sunk beneath the stage, to
the mechanism which held suspended the Undines of the Rhine. We had to
climb everything that was practicable, descend to the floor under the
stage; and I perceived that the master had lost none of his agility of
Tribscheu.
Those who were present at the admirable representations of 1876,
where everything had been prepared and directed by Wagner, will never
forget them. A like solemnity has not been reproduced since the great
theatrical celebrations of ancient Greece, and will remain a great
event in the future history of art. I shall close these few pages,
written from memory, by the relation of my last visit to the master,
copied from my travelling note book.
BAYREUTH, 29th of September, 1881.
It is with quickly beating hearts that we cross once more the threshold
of this dwelling, which, in spite of the cordial reception always
awaiting us, we feel to be consecrated ground, the holy of holies,
which should not be penetrated without a sort of sacred awe. The whole
family is assembled in the drawing-room, which is brightened by a ray
of sunlight. Liszt, who has come to pass a few weeks with his dear
grandchildren, is superb, with his long white hair, his bushy eyebrows,
beneath which shine a lion's eyes. My godson is already growing large;
he has a broad forehead, and blue eyes of exquisite sweetness. The
master comes up from the garden, always the same, even younger. Truly
the immortals defy time. He receives us with that tender effusion with
which those of his followers, by whom he knows himself perfectly loved,
inspire him, for he has nothing of the impassable egotism which so
often attacks great men when they arrive at a certain height of glory.
He is rather, as we have already said, too impressionable, allows
himself to be governed by the momentary violence of his impressions;
and the only uneasiness he causes to those who surround him, who live
only for him, proceeds from this intensity in his sadness or joy, or
from his anger, which a nature less tempered than his would not be
able to resist. He can sometimes forget, even completely change, his
opinion, love that which he once detested, and always with the same
sincerity.
We pass to the dining-room. The master is now rapturously gay; he
expresses himself with some difficulty in French, which does not,
however, prevent his playing upon the words as no one else can. He
tells us of his journey to Naples and Venice, of the pleasure he has
derived from Italy, and we quickly divine in him a longing for the sun
and new horizons; he is thinking of Greece, the Bosporus, India. Oh
Wahnfried, Wahnfried! One thing evidently wearies him greatly; it is
the instrumentation of Parsifal. He complains of not being able to form
young artists capable of aiding him in his work; but this is simply
make-believe, he well knows that it is impossible. "When one is young,"
he said, "when the nerves are not yet fatigued, and one writes scores
with a certain ease, even that of Lohengrin, without knowing all
the resources of coloring and combination, the work is not comparable
to that which the new works demand, and which must be written at a
maturer age. Auber, however, wrote until his eighty-fourth year without
fatigue; but he had not changed his manner." Liszt relates a speech of
Auber's, to whom a young musician of great promise had been presented.
"Are we not enough already?" cried the master. He afterwards spoke of a
counterbass with five chords, the object of which is to descend still
further in the lower notes than the ordinary counterbass does. Wagner
said of a gentleman who came to submit a similar process to him, that
he sent him about his business. Mendelssohn, however, has already tried
something of the kind and produced a fine effect.
We were reproached for not having come a month sooner, when the house
was full of singers, to whom the parts of Parsifal were assigned, and
who began their first studies. To console us, Wagner promised to let
us hear certain passages. But he pretends to play badly, so that it
will not be the same thing. There is a project to go to-morrow to the
theatre to see the models of the scenes, provided the machinist who is
expected has arrived to show them:
30th September.
We are early to-day at Wahnfried. The gate is never shut except by a
bolt, and we can take a solitary walk in the garden without disturbing
any one. Long trellises of virgin vines, already bloodstained by the
precocious autumn, creep the length of each side of the way leading to
the house; it is almost dark under their shelter; in places, however,
the green roof becomes lighter, and the dead leaves rustle under our
feet. The space intervening between these trellises and the centre
walk is reserved for the kitchen garden; but the soil does not appear
to be fertile. We come out at the conservatory, where there is already
a fire; all the delicate flowers have been brought in-doors. A few
exotic plants destined to ornament the drawing-room, but which are
withering, are there as in an infirmary. In front of the hot-house, on
the other side of the house, cries and a flapping of wings indicate the
hen-house; it is large and gay, and might be taken for a sample from
the garden of acclimation in Paris. Peacocks, silver pheasants, rare
hens, and a scattering of pigeons fill it, defying the cook's knife,
for the place is as sacred to them as if they were taking their sports
within the enclosure of a Brahmin temple.
In front of the drawing-room, and surrounding the fountain, is the
pleasure-garden; with fine lawns, beds of Bengal roses, and flowers of
all kinds, but many of them are already frostbitten. This free space
is enclosed by a bushy wood forming a sort of wall. One must penetrate
its shadows to approach the tomb, which has been already so much talked
of, and which by a sufficiently exuberant fancy the master caused to
be built at the same time with his house. It is completely enveloped
by the thick coppice, and is without egress; it is only when autumn
strips the trees that a large, gray marble slab can be seen through
the confusion of branches, over which the briars twine themselves.
A graceful pavilion of two stories, a gymnasium for the children,
hemicycles of grass, with stone benches, are scattered in this wood,
which leads to a little gate, looking out upon the royal residence. The
stroke of the clock recalls us to the house. The master has finished
his morning task, and shows us his well-filled page lying upon the
table. His life is one of the greatest regularity, above all when, as
at this time, he is pursuing a hurried and fatiguing work. He rises at
six, but after his bath retires again and reads until ten. At eleven
he sets himself to work until two o'clock. After dinner he rests for
a short time, always in company with a book. From four until six he
drives, then goes back to his work until supper, at eight; the evening
is passed gayly with his family, and before eleven all the household is
in bed.
At table Liszt announces that Darwin declares himself a partisan of
vivisection, but that this frightful practice has just been interdicted
in England. It is well known that Richard Wagner is one of the warmest
defenders of those innocent victims of the physiologist's cruel
curiosity. Some time ago he wrote a long article full of sadness and
anger, in which he repeats the words of Faust, "The dogs themselves
will no longer wish to live in such a world." "Our campaign has already
had good results in Germany," he said; "the joiners who manufacture
the instruments of torture destined for the unfortunate dogs complain
of the diminution of their sales." He asks us if this humane cause
has defenders in France; to which we reply that there are very ardent
ones; in the first instance, all honest people: and then we cite among
the journalists Victor Meunier, who, in the Rappel, rises vehemently
against these cruelties, and very justly compares the actual position
of animals to that of the former slaves, over whom their masters were
supposed to have every right.
A visit to the theatre is again spoken of; the machinist whom we
expected, evidently cannot come; but we shall go to see the models and
scenery in M. Ioukouski's studio. "My theatre will, I think," said the
master, "become a sort of conservatory where singers will be found, and
where the method in which my works will be executed and put upon the
stage will serve as a model to directors and managers who will mount
them elsewhere." The Paris Conservatory still holds to the tradition
of the movements of Gluck's Iphigenia.... "You have there," he added,
"an orchestra of the first order--Beethoven's Symphonies were played to
perfection." Liszt tells of a very singular appreciation on Boieldieu's
part of the Beethoven Symphonies, at the time of their first hearing
in Paris. "It certainly produces an effect," he said, "but it bears a
resemblance to people chewing tobacco and swearing in a guard-house."
We start upon a visit to M. Paul Ioukouski's studio. This young
painter, who, meeting Richard Wagner at Naples, solicited and obtained
the honor of being chosen for the work of the scenery in Parsifal, and
left all to follow the master, is the son of one of Russia's most
illustrious poets, who was the preceptor of Alexander II. The artist
is installed in a house in the immediate neighborhood of Wahnfried,
and lives there like a hermit, putting his whole heart into his work.
The sketches, which are real pictures, are displayed upon the various
easels. On the first is the forest, with the rising sun, for the first
tableau, which, to make place for the second, will slide gently from
left to right, sinking down little by little, while the characters
are supposed to be advancing as they ascend a hill. These characters
will disappear behind masses of rocks, then will be seen again in
grottoes near Cyclopean substructures, then in galleries. They finally
pass through a door, and the temple of the Grail will appear. Here
it is seen, upon the neighboring easel, with its porphyry columns,
its capital of precious stones, its vaults, its double cupolas, its
mysterious depths. The tables destined for the sacred repast, which
bring to mind the sacrament, are arranged on either side of the altar.
The smooth marble-paved floor reflects like a lake. Mr. Brandt,
machinist of the theatre at Darmstadt, a man of genius, it appears,
for whom the word impossible does not exist, says that he can produce
this glittering effect, and that the only difficulty lies in the rapid
shifting of the scenery.
The fantastic garden, created by the magician, Klingsor, in order
to reduce and ruin the Knights of the Grail, was a thing difficult
to conceive. Wagner wished for something absolutely improbable; the
conception of a dream, a wild efflorescence brought to life by the
stroke of a wand, not by plodding earthly labor; he was dissatisfied
with every attempt. He has, however, obtained his desire, and it
appears that on the stage this scene is one of the most successful
of all. What is most singular is that these giant flowers, sheaves,
clusters, and thickets, which leave only a corner on the horizon
visible, fade away and die in the twinkling of an eye, leaving in
sight only an arid moor, shut in by snowy mountains, while a shower of
withered leaves and dried petals falls upon the ground. The flowering
meadow near the spring wood, which shelters the hermit's hut, with its
clear spring murmuring beneath the thick moss, is truly enchanting.
From this we return by a shifting of scenes analogous to that in the
first act, to the temple of the Grail, where the piece ends. The
costumes are not more easy of invention, for the master will not be
satisfied with anything like the costumers' indignation. Even should
they all become wretched they must yield. The enchantresses evoked by
the magician,--women who are flowers, as the syrens are fishes,--are
those who give the most trouble. Wagner will not have attractive young
girls, but real animated flowers. There is also the tunic of the
terrible and marvellous Kundry.
1st October.
The master has kept his promise this evening, and has let us hear
fragments from Parsifal. "Liszt's presence makes me lose my powers in
a measure," he said, laughing, "he intimidates me, for I know that my
false notes irritate him." Unfortunately, Liszt, who only yesterday
improvised upon the piano in a delightful manner, blending with his
own inventions motions from Tristan and Isolde, has slightly wounded
his finger, and cannot play. It must certainly be acknowledged that
Wagner is an imperfect pianist, and he is the first to laugh at his
own imperfection. We notice, however, in a wonderful manner, certain
passages which the author knows how to render with the true expression,
better than any other. A few months ago, Liszt wrote to us: "Wagner
has worked a new miracle, Parsifal. Those who already have the good
fortune to understand this new work share this opinion; the singers
are enraptured. Judging from the general impression, this ought to be
a new transformation in the master's method,--one of those giant steps
to which he is accustomed. In this instance the height and refinement
of art combine to produce an effect of apparent simplicity and perfect
serenity." This evening we take leave of our illustrious hosts,
promising to meet them again next year at the first representation of
Parsifal.
POETIC WORK.
WAGNER'S POETIC WORK.
FROM RIENZI TO TRISTAN AND ISOLDE.
The spectacle, which represents a series of lofty and still loftier
peaks of a chain of mountains, at the moment when the morning mists
envelop them, furnishes a just comparison to that given us by these
works, which rise successively, one above the other, from the lovely
green hill to the dazzling and, for many, inaccessible summits. From
Rienzi to the Gloom of the Gods there is the same difference of
attitude as between the Capitoline Hill and the Himalaya. And what
gigantic strides from one work to the other. A powerful, enthusiastic
genius already reveals itself in Rienzi; but it has done little more
than assimilate, with the greatest facility, the beauties that had
most charmed one in the works of its predecessors. Wagner likes show,
pompous processions, the tumult of battle; the brilliant orchestra
resounds, is carried away, enthusiastic; the power which moves it,
not yet under control, expends itself in vociferations, heroic cries
of extreme vehemence; but as yet nothing presages the innovator, if
it be not the almost prophetic sense of the subject, so ardently
revolutionary.
Between Rienzi and The Flying Dutchman lies an abyss. The young master,
disdaining the success of his first work, judges it with severity
and casts it aside; he considers it an essay. From the first he has
equalled his models, but he feels that he is still far from his ideal;
a new world palpitates in his mind; he must break the old moulds and
fetters of routine that he may soar untrammelled toward unexplored
regions. The artist, now sure of himself, definitely abandons
historical subjects, whose too hard reality is not in keeping with the
idealism of music. The natural poetry of legend and myth suits him far
better. Henceforward the path is found, he will no longer turn aside
from it, but continually enlarge upon its thought. From the popular
song, hummed by the Norwegian spinners while turning their wheels, he
will rise to the savage grandeurs of the northern theogonies. It was
upon a sea-voyage, during a storm, which cast him upon the coast of
Norway, that Richard Wagner induced the sailors themselves to repeat to
him the frightful story of the Flying Dutchman--Ahasverus of the Sea,
who, blaspheming, defied the storm with Satan's aid, and was condemned
to wander eternally, he and his fantastic ship. But the mystical young
girl, grown pale from the snow's reflections, who languishes with
love for the damned one, carried incessantly through shipwrecks and
lightning, will save him by her faithful devotion, even unto death, if
he but reaches her.
This work seems to have come at a single stroke, under the inspiration
of a violent emotion. The ocean, with its rage, its awe, its mystery
and sweetness--all is in this music, which is like the sea's own
soul. If a few traces of the old formulæ remain, it is only in the
subordinate parts of the work. The orchestra is no longer a great
guitar, accompanying a song; it already assumes a capital importance;
the designs, dividing and blending, have a precise meaning; the whole,
less noisy, acquires a power until then unknown. The orchestral
tissue becomes the woof upon which the characters are embroidered;
it becomes the ocean which bears the ship, the atmosphere which
envelops the action, where the thoughts, the sentiments of the heroes,
reverberating, amplifying, become visible, so to speak, and make the
mind experience all that is inexpressible in the sensations of the
soul.
The legend of Tanhäuser still exists in Germany, above all in leafy
Thuringia, where the famous castle of Wartburg stands, which, under
the hospitable landgraves of the thirteenth century, was the theatre
of pacific contests, fought by the illustrious troubadours. In front
of the castle rises a bare, dreary mountain, burned as it were,
which makes a strange blot in the midst of the fresh vegetation of
the neighboring valleys. This is the terrible Venusberg, inhabited,
according to popular tradition, by a dangerous goddess. This divinity
was formerly Hulda the beneficent, who came each year to awaken the
spring, and wandered over the country scattering flowers under her
feet. But being cursed by Christianity, she was obliged to take refuge
in the unknown caverns of the mountain; she was soon confounded with
Venus, the sovereign of the senses. The graces, syrens, bacchantes,
and fauns constituted her court, and enchanting voices seduced those
whose impure desires guided them toward the mountain; unknown roads
enticed them, and they were borne away to the mysterious palace which
it encloses, in the abode of eternal perdition, from which none return.
The Knight Tanhäuser, curious and intrepid, found the path of the
grottoes in the Venusberg, and was the spouse of the goddess during
seven years, after which, his desires satiated and himself devoured
with remorse, aspiring to human suffering, he succeeded in tearing
himself from the arms of his love by invoking the Virgin Mary. He
went and confessed to the pope, imploring his pardon, but the pontiff
replied, "that having tasted the pleasures of hell he was forever
damned." Then raising his crosier, he added, "Even as this wood cannot
become green again, so is there no pardon for thee." The legend adds,
that at the expiration of three days the crosier began to blossom,
signifying that celestial grace is greater than that of a pontiff.
It is from this recital, enlarged by a powerful spirit, that Wagner
has taken his drama, inter-weaving with his own tissue the tradition
about the famous contests of the poet-singers, and also the chaste
and melancholy face of Elisabeth, whom he voluntarily confounds with
the sainted princess whose virtuous life shed a lustre over the the
castle. But what Richard Wagner has above all wished to bring out in
this marvellous work is the eternal struggle between the flesh and the
spirit, the brute and the angel, which, being in man, dispute his soul.
And this he has rendered with incomparable clearness and grandeur. The
discussions formerly raised by the representation of Tanhäuser have
made this debated work better known than many others illustrious from
success. It is useless, therefore, to speak of it further.
Lohengrin, which has never been represented in Paris, and which can
scarcely be appreciated from partial executions of the most inferior
order, is, strange to say, almost popular. Whoever has heard the
orchestral prelude typifying the vision of King Titurel, when the
angels bring to him the Holy Grail, can never forget this admirable
passage, and the extraordinary impression which it produces. At first
an almost imperceptible vibration takes possession of the highest
notes of the flutes and violins. The air becomes agitated, the light
approaches and grows larger, soon with an irradiation of trumpets the
luminous vision shines resplendent in all its glory. The incomparable
cup, cut from a stone, it is said, which fell from Lucifer's crown when
he was precipitated from heaven, and which is now filled with the blood
of the Saviour, is confided to the pure hands of a holy knight. Then
the angels again take their flight, the glimmering becomes obliterated,
and the atmospheric vibrations, which can no longer be heard, little
by little diminish and die away. The curtain rises upon a site near
the environs of Anvers, on the borders of Scheldt. We find ourselves
in the tenth century. Henry the Fowler, King of Germany, has come to
Brabant to convoke the noble lords according to the feudal custom.
Frederick of Telramund, the most valiant of all the lords of Brabant,
has just accused, before all the people, Elsa, Duchess of Brabant, of
the murder of her young brother, who has disappeared, leaving no trace.
The young girl possesses no method of proving her innocence; her cause
then is to be submitted to the judgment of God. But when the herald has
resounded the trumpet toward the four quarters of the world, no knight
has entered the lists in her defence. Elsa, however, has confidence in
a singular vision: a charming warrior has appeared to her in a dream;
he will fight for her. However, the herald's second summons remains
without response. It is then that, with an impulse of sublime faith,
she throws herself upon her knees, and beseeches Heaven to send her the
defender who has visited her in a vision.
Soon, in fact, the people, grouped upon the banks of the river, see
in the distance, with increasing agitation, a strange bark drawn
by a dazzling swan; it approaches, it draws nearer; a knight of
wondrous beauty stands erect in the bark; his light helmet, his silver
breastplate are resplendent, he rests one hand upon his shield. "A
miracle! a miracle!" cries the crowd. "Can it be an angel sent by God?"
The mysterious knight steps upon the shore. With a calm and modest
voice he bids farewell to the beautiful swan which has conducted him
and now returns to the unknown regions from which it came. Then the
knight advances in the midst of the surprised and rejoicing multitude.
"I am come," he says, "to defend the innocent girl unjustly accused.
Who will do combat with me?" Telramund, notwithstanding the sacred
character of his adversary, and preferring death to dishonor, raises
the gauntlet and upholds the accusation. The knight draws near the
enraptured Elsa, and in a sweet, grave voice, says to her: "If I bear
off the victory, wilt thou that I should become thy husband? Then must
thou promise never to seek to discover from what countries I come, nor
what is my name or nature." "My shield, my angel, my savior!" cried
Elsa, "thou who defendest me in my distress, how could I do other than
faithfully keep to the law thou imposest upon me?" "Elsa, I love thee,"
murmurs the unknown knight with deepest tenderness. The king blesses
the arms, and the combat begins. The knight gains an easy victory over
his adversary, whose life he spares. Elsa's innocence is proclaimed by
the entire people in a triumphal hymn of joy.
But Ortrud, Telramund's wife, daughter of the King of Friesia, who
aspires to the throne of Brabant, succeeds in exciting feminine
curiosity in Elsa, and in pouring the poison of doubt into her heart
in order to blight her joy. She torments her until at last Elsa,
distracted, violates her oath, exacting from her spouse the avowal
of his origin. Doubt has killed faith, which carries with it all
happiness; the night of love ends in despair. It is upon a meadow
near the border of the Scheldt, amid flying, banners and flourishing
trumpets, in the presence of Brabant counts, followed by their vassals
called by King Henry for an expedition against the Hungarians, that the
mysterious knight will unveil his origin. "In a distant country," he
says, "upon a high mountain, called Mont Salvat, stands a magnificent
temple, in which knights of absolute purity guard a miraculous cup; it
is the Holy Grail, the cup in which Christ consecrated the bread and
wine at the time of the Lord's Supper, and in which, later, Joseph of
Arimathea received his blood. This cup had been carried to heaven by
the angels, but they brought it back again to the holy king, Titurel,
who founded the temple of the Grail, and the order of its knights.
Those who serve the Grail are endowed with wonderful virtue, but an
inflexible law forces them to remain unknown among men. If their name
be discovered, they must immediately depart, and once more regain the
sacred mountain. For this reason I must leave you, informing you that
Parsifal, my father, is King of the Grail, and I, his knight, am named
Lohengrin." The swan reappears upon the shore to bear the warrior away
to his miraculous country; Elsa has destroyed her happiness; she sees
her guardian angel depart forever.
Lohengrin is, perhaps, the most perfect of the three lyric dramas
which form the second period in the master's work. From Lohengrin to
Tristan and Isolde as great a distance is marked as between Rienzi and
the Flying Dutchman. It is a new revelation, a new art,--something
perfect and definite, a prodigious flight toward the future. There is
no longer, so to speak, any question of music in the sense formerly
attached to this word; it is poetry in superb and precise form, with a
sonorous resonant soul,--Apollo and Orpheus melted in a single lyre.
The works following may, perhaps, be grander, but Tristan and Isolde
is and will remain the masterpiece of masterpieces, by reason of the
poetical subject which, in art as in the human soul, takes by right the
first place. In Tristan and Isolde love itself, in its most complete
and perfect form, finds utterance. The most pointed phases of the
passion are pushed to their extreme. In the first act it is unavailing
love, heroically conquered, which consumes the heart while not a cry
escapes the lips,--Tristan, conducting toward another the royal
betrothed, whose hand he himself, in his blind love, has solicited for
the King of Cornwall. Tristan's love believes itself despised. Isolde,
consumed with anger and tenderness, powerless to master the tumult in
her soul, wishes shipwreck to the vessel which bears her away, with the
hero who disdains her, toward the shore which she hopes never to reach.
"Death rather, death for us both!" she cries. And when the tempest
betrays her, when already the hated land is signaled, she offers poison.
Tristan cannot refuse to empty a cup in Isolde's honor, to drink to
their reconciliation, for a debt of blood lies between them, long
since effaced by their unavowed love, but which she begins to remember.
Tristan well knows that eternal forgetfulness is poured out for him
by the hand which he secretly adores; he accepts with gratitude this
mitigation of evils which have no remedy. On the threshold of death,
however, both drop their mask, the fire then breaks out triumphant,
love casts them into one another's arms in the intoxication of a
supreme joy which should repay them for their past sufferings. Heart
against heart, eyes looking into eyes, thus will their hearts cease
to beat, and their mutual gaze be extinguished. But alas! they are
betrayed; the two devoted followers have substituted for the mortal
draught a love-drink, and instead of the kindly shade which reunited
them, behold the detested shore, and the deceitful day which separates
them.
Such a love once free can no longer be stifled or conquered. It
is a formidable conflagration, a flame which death itself cannot
extinguish. It has devoured everything,--loyalty, honor, virtue.
The earth itself becomes effaced in the ravishing rapture of mutual
possession. Infinite and sublime ecstasy follows, which no heart can
have either experienced or foreseen. Their happiness even crushes
and stifles them; the heart cannot contain such love, the human
voice has no words to express it; the most burning embraces leave
them disunited. Tristan and Isolde are two, and they would become
one soul, a single thought, a scintillation of love in an unlimited
night. Desperate and unsatisfied, they aspire to the infinity of
death. They dream of a flight beyond all worlds in that mysterious
shade which protects them upon earth, but over which the day and the
empty phantoms of life triumph, ceaselessly inflicting the tortures of
impending separation. The eternal and great night of love without the
terrors of the morning! A long enchanting dream in unlimited space;
no names to separate; a single flame; a single thought; a sweet swoon
in each other's arms; the ardent rapture of death without end, without
awakening! Such is their thought. But suddenly, behold the cruel day,
and with it shame. This sublime love is dragged before the world,
which calls it an indiscretion, and censures. Then follows the combat,
in which Tristan, overcome with a divine ecstasy, is no longer the
victorious hero, but falls mortally wounded.
When we see him again, in the agonies of death, it is in the ancient
dungeon of his ancestors in Brittany. The faithful shield-bearer has
taken him across the seas in a bark. Now he is sheltered from all
surprise. But Isolde? When his eyes, which seem to be forever closed,
will awake to life, if they are not gladdened by his soul's sweet
sovereign, they will close again forever. Isolde knows her loved
one's retreat; she is coming to him, but the minutes are centuries,
and the sea is deserted and void, even to the silent horizon. See, the
hero now comes to himself with the dear name upon his lips. Tristan
cannot die while Isolde is still in the empire of the sun. The gates
of death, which had already closed upon him with a clang, reopen wide
before this invincible desire to see once more her with whom alone he
can lose himself in eternal night. Void and deserted is the sea! Thus
it is that the fury of despair tears Tristan's soul. Love and fever
mingling their delirium, he writhes upon his bed of pain with cries
of superhuman suffering. Nothing can render the impression of this
frightful agony, in which the flame of love cannot be extinguished by
death, of this distracted and expectant soul, retarding the supreme
departure. At intervals the hero falls to the ground, seemingly dead;
but when the weeping shield-bearer stoops to hear a last sigh, a last
palpitation, Tristan in a low voice murmurs the name of Isolde! Yet once
again hope springs to life in the breast of this martyr to love; he
perceives the ship, although common eyes cannot distinguish it, and
on the ship Isolde, who makes a sign to him. "Dost thou not see it
yet? Tender and majestic she crosses the breadth of the sea like a
sovereign; she comes carried toward land as by waves of intoxicating
flowers; her smile will pour out supreme consolation. Oh, Isolde!
Isolde! how beautiful, how welcome art thou!" The ship is, in truth,
signalled. The soul's eyes are not deceived. All sails spread, it flies
over the waters. She approaches--she, the enchanting one, she comes.
What delirious impatience, what joyous transports!
"Intoxication of the soul, rapture without measure, impetuous and
overheated, blood, how shall I support you chained to this couch? Up
then, up, on the march toward the beating heart!" Already Isolde's
voice is heard, and the hero throws himself, staggering, from his bed.
She comes, she calls him, holds her arms toward him; but he can only
die at her feet, uttering for the last time the infinitely-beloved
name. "Ah, live with me yet one hour, only an hour," cries the
distracted Isolde in her despair. "I have only lived through so many
days of anguish and desire to watch one hour with thee. Do not die of
thy wound, let me heal thee, that safe and strong we may share the
sainted delights of night." The flame is extinguished, the soul has
fled. Isolde, always faithful, will follow Tristan in death. Already
the loved one draws her toward the mysterious land; mighty waves seem
to overpower her. Her ears resound with murmurs of the infinite. Night,
consoling night, gently envelops her, overwhelms her. She is drowned,
lost, to unite herself forever to the twin flame, and loses herself
in the divine breath of the universal soul. It is almost impossible to
imagine the intensity of expression which this poem, so passionate,
so intense
|
and, secondly, the bluntness of the "jaws" which hold the wheel,
and which must be ground down (and are in universal practice ground
down), before the tool can be sharpened.
His reply called attention to a number of different patterns of handle,
the existence of which, I think, is not generally known, in England at
any rate, and some of which seem to more or less meet the difficulties
we experience, most of them also being made with malleable iron handles,
so that fresh cutting-wheels can be inserted in the same handle. His
letter also entered into the question of the actual dynamics of
"cutting," maintaining, I think rightly, that a "cut" is made by the
edge of the wheel (this not being very sharp) forcing the particles of
the glass down into the mass of it by pressure.
With regard to the old-fashioned pattern of tool which we chiefly use in
this country, the very sufficient explanation is that they continue to
make it because we continue to demand it, a circumstance which, as he
declares, is a mystery to the inventor himself! Nevertheless, as we do
so, and, in spite of the variety of newer tools on the market, still go
on grinding down the jaws of our favourite, and wrapping round the
handle with cotton-wool, let us try and put this matter straight, and
compare our requirements with the advantages offered us.
There are three chief points to be cleared up. (1) The actual nature of
a "cut" in glass; (2) the question of sharpening the tool and grinding
down of the jaws to do so; and (3) the "mystery" of our preference for a
particular tool, although we all confess its awkwardness by the means we
take to modify it.
(1) With regard, then, to the nature of a "cut" in glass I am disposed
entirely to agree with the theory put forward by the inventor of the
wheel, which an examination of the cuts under the microscope, or even a
6 diameter lens, certainly also tends to confirm.
What happens appears to my non-scientific eyes to be this.
Glass is one of the most fissile or "splittable" of all materials; but
it is so just in the same way that ice is, and just in the opposite way
to that in which slate or talc is.
Slate or talc splits easily into thin layers or laminæ, _because it
already lies in such layers_, and these will come apart when the force
is applied between them: but _it will only split into the laminæ of
which it already is composed, and along the line of the fissures which
already exist between them_.
Glass, on the contrary (and the same is true of ice, or for that matter
of currant-jelly and such like things), appears to be a substance which
is the same in all directions, or nearly so, and therefore as liable to
split in one direction as in another, and is so loosely held together
that, once a splitting force is applied, the crack spreads very rapidly
and easily, and therefore smoothly and in straight lines and in even
planes.
The diamond, or the wheel-cutter, is such a force. Being pressed on to
the surface, it forces down the particles, and these start a series of
small vertical splits, sometimes nearly through the whole thickness of
the glass, though invisibly so until the glass is separated. And mark,
that it is the _starting_ of the splits that is the important thing;
there is no object in making them _deep_, it is only wasted force; they
will continue to split of themselves if encouraged in the proper way
(see Plates IX. and X.). Try this as follows.
Take a bit of glass, say 3 inches by 2, and make the very smallest dint
you can in it, in the middle of the narrowest dimension. You cannot make
one so small that the glass will hold together if you try to break it
across. It will break across in a straight line, springing from each end
of the tiny cut. The cut may be only 1/8 of an inch long; less--it may
be only 1/16, 1/32--as small as you will, the glass will break across
just the same.
Why?
Because the cut has _started_ it splitting at each end; and the material
being the same all through, the split will go straight on in the
direction in which it has started; there is nothing to turn it aside.
So also the pressure of the wheel starts a continuous split, or series
of splits, _downwards_, into the thickness of the glass. No matter how
small a distance these go in, the glass will come asunder directly
pressure is applied.
Now, if you press too hard in cutting, another thing takes place.
Imagine a quantity of roofing-slates piled flat one on top of another,
all the piles being of equal height and arranged in two rows, side by
side, so close that the edges of the slates in one row touch the edges
of those in the other row, along a central line.
Wheel a wheelbarrow along that line over the edges of both.
What would happen?
The top layer of slates would all come cocking their outer edges up as
the barrow passed over their inner ones, would they not?
Now, just so, if you press hard on your glass-cutting wheel, it will
press down the edges of the groove, and though there are no layers
_already made_ in the glass, the pressure will _split off_ a thin layer
from the top surface of the glass on each side in flakes as it goes
along (Plate X., D, E).
This is what gives the _noise_ of the cut, c-r-r-r-r-r-; and as the
thing is no use the noise is no use; like a good many other things in
life, the less noise the better work, much cry generally meaning little
wool, as the man found out who shaved the pig.
But the wheel or the diamond is not quite the same as the wheel of the
wheelbarrow, for it has a _wedge-shaped_ edge. Imagine a barrow with
such a wheel; what _then_ would happen to your slates? besides being
cocked up by the wheel, they would also be _pushed out_, surely?
This happens in glass. You must not imagine that glass is a rigid thing;
it is very elastic, and the wedge-like pressure of the wheel pushes it
out just as the keel of a boat pushes the water aside in ripples (Plate
X., D, E).
All these observations seem to me to bear out the theory of the
inventor, and perhaps to some extent to explain it. I am much tempted to
carry them further, and ask the questions, why a penknife as well as a
wheel will not make a cut in glass, but will make a perfectly definite
scratch on it if the glass is placed under water? and why this line so
made will yet not serve for separating the glass? and why a piece of
glass can be cut in two (roughly, to be sure, but still cut in two) with
a pair of scissors under water, a thing otherwise quite impossible?
But I do not think that the knowledge of these questions will help the
reader to do better stained-glass windows, and therefore I will not
pursue them.
(2) The question of sharpening the tool is soon disposed of.
If the tool is to be sharpened, the jaws must be ground down, whether
the maker grinds them down originally or whether we do it. Is sharpening
worth while, since the tool only costs a few pence?
Well, it's a question each must decide for himself; but I will just
answer two small difficulties which affect the matter.
If grinding the jaws loosens the pivot, it can be hammered tight again
with a punch. If sharpening wears out the oil-stone (as it undoubtedly
does, and oil-stones are expensive things), a piece of fine polished
Westmoreland slate will do as well, and there is no need to be chary of
it. Even a piece of ground-glass with oil will do.
(3) But now as to the handle. I am first to explain the amusing
"mystery" why the old pattern shown in fig. 1 still sells.
It is because the British working-man _is convinced that the wheels in
this handle are better quality than any others_.
Is he right, or is it only an instance of his love for and faith in the
thing he has got used to?
Or can it be that all workmen do not know of the existence of the other
types of handle? In case this is so, I figure some (fig. 17). Or is it
that the wheel for some reason runs less truly in the malleable iron
than in the cast iron?
[Illustration: FIG. 17.]
Certain it is that the whole trade here prefers these wheels, and I am
bound to say that as far as my experience goes they seem to me to work
better than those in other handles.
But as to all the handles themselves, I must now voice our general
complaint.
(1) They are too light.
For tapping our heavy antique and slab-glasses we wish we had a heavier
tool.
(2) They are too thin in the handle for comfort, at least it seems so to
me.
(3) The three gashes cut out of the head of the tool decrease the
weight, and if these were omitted the tool would gain. Their only use
that I can conceive of is that of a very poor substitute for pliers as a
"groseing" tool, if one has forgotten one's pliers. But (as Serjeant
Buzfuz might say) "who _does_ forget his pliers?"
The whole question of the handle is complicated by the fact that some
cutters rest the tool on the forefinger and some on the middle finger in
tapping, and that a handle the sections of which are calculated for the
one will not do equally well for the other.
But the whole thing resolves itself into this, that if we could get a
tool, the handle of which corresponded in all its curves, dimensions,
and sections with the old-established diamond, I think we should all be
glad; and if the head, wheel, and pivot were all made of the quality and
material of which fig. 1 is now made, but with the handle as I describe,
many of us, I think, would be still more glad; and if these remarks lead
in any degree to such results, they at least of all the book will have
been worth the writing, and will probably be its best claim to a white
stone in Israel, as removing one more solecism from "this so-called
twentieth century."
I shall now leave this subject of cutting for the present, and describe,
up to about the same point, the processes of painting, taking both on to
a higher stage later--as if, in fact, I were teaching a pupil; for as
soon as you can cut glass well enough to cut a piece to paint on, you
should learn to paint on it, and carry the two things on step by step,
side by side.
CHAPTER III
Painting (elementary)--Pigments--Mixing--How to Fill the
Brush--Outline--Examples--Industry--The Needle and
Stick--Completing the Outline.
The pigments for painting on glass are powders, being the oxides of
various minerals, chiefly iron. There are others; but take it thus--that
the iron oxide is a red pigment, and the others are introduced, mainly,
to modify this. The red pigment is the best to use, and goes off less in
the firing; but, alas! it is a detestably ugly _colour_, like red lead;
and, do what you will, you cannot use it on white glass. Against clear
sky it looks pretty well in some lights, but get it in a sidelight, or
at an angle, and the whole window looks like red brick; while, seen
against any background except clear sky, it always looks so from all
points of view. There are various makers of these pigments. Some
glass-painters make their own, and a beginner with any knowledge of
chemistry would be wise to work in that direction.
I need not discuss the various kinds of pigment; what follows is a
description of my own practice in the matter.
_To Mix the Pigment for Painting._--Take a teaspoonful of red
tracing-colour, and a rather smaller spoonful of intense black, put them
on a slab of thick ground-glass about 9 inches square, and drop clean
water upon them till you can work them up into a paste with the
palette-knife (fig. 18); work them up for a minute or so, till the paste
is smooth and the lumps broken up, and then add about three drops of
strong gum made from the purest white gum-arabic dissolved in cold
water. Any good chemist will sell this, but its purity is a matter of
great importance, for you want the maximum of adhesiveness with the
minimum of the material.
Mix the colour well up with the knife; then take one of those
long-haired sable brushes, which are called "riggers" (fig. 19), and
which all artists'-colourmen sell, and fill it with the colour, diluting
it with enough water to make it quite thin. Do not dilute all the
pigment; keep most of it in a tidy lump, merely moist, as you ground it
and not further wetted, at the corner of your slab; but always keep a
portion diluted in a small "pond" in the middle of your palette.
[Illustration: Fig. 18.]
_How to Fill the Brush with Pigment._--Now you must note that this is a
heavy powder floating free in water, therefore it quickly sinks to the
bottom of your little "pond." _Each time you fill your_ _brush you must
"stir up the mud_," for the "mud" is what you want to get in your brush,
and not only so, but you want to get your brush _evenly full_ of it from
tip to base, therefore you must splay out the hairs flat against the
glass, till all are wet, and then in taking it off the palette,
"twiddle" it to a point quickly. This takes long to describe, but it
does not take a couple of seconds to do. You must have the patience to
spend so much pains on it, and even to fill the brush very often, nearly
for each touch; then you will get a clear, smooth, manageable stroke for
your outline, and save time in the end.
[Illustration: FIG. 19.]
_How to Paint in Outline._--Make some strokes (fig. 20) on a piece of
glass and let them dry; some people like them to stick very tight to the
glass, some so that a touch of the finger removes them; you must find
which suits you by-and-by, and vary the amount of gum accordingly; but
to begin, I would advise that they should be just removable by a
moderately hard rub with the finger, rather less hard a rub than you
close a gummed envelope with.
Practise now for a time the making of strokes, large and small, dark and
light, broad and fine; and when you have got command of your tools, set
yourself the task of doing the same thing, _copying an example placed
underneath your bit of glass_. You will find a hand-rest (fig. 21) an
assistance in this.
[Illustration: FIG. 20.]
It is difficult to give any list of examples suitable for this stage of
glass, but the kind of line employed on the best _heraldry_ is always
good for the purpose. The splendid illustrations of this in Mr. St.
John-Hope's book of the stall-plates of the Knights of the Garter at
Windsor, examples of which by the author's courtesy I am allowed to
reproduce (figs. 22-22A), are ideal for bold outline-work, and
fascinatingly interesting for their own sake. In most of these there is
not only excellent practice in _outline_, and a great deal of it, but,
mixed with it, practice also in flat washes, which it is a good thing to
be learning side by side with the other.
[Illustration: FIG. 21.]
And here let me note that there are throughout the practice of
glass-painting _many_ methods in use at every stage. Each person, each
firm of glass-stainers, has his own methods and traditions. I shall not
trouble to notice all these as we come to them, but describe what seems
to me to be the best practice in each case; but I shall here and there
give a word about others.
For instance: if you use sugar or treacle instead of gum, you get a
rather smoother-working pigment, and after it is dry you can moisten it
as often as you will for further work by merely breathing on the
surface; and perhaps if your aim is _outline only_, it may be well to
try it; but if you wish to pass shading-colour over it you must use gum,
for you cannot do so over treacle colour; nor do I think treacle serves
so well for the next process I am to describe, which here follows.
[Illustration: FIG. 22.]
[Illustration: FIG. 22A.]
_How to complete the Outline better than you possibly can by One
Tracing._--When you take up a bit of glass from the table, after having
done all you can to make a correct tracing, you will be disappointed
with the result. It will have looked pretty well on the table with the
copy showing behind it and hiding its defects, but it is a different
thing when held up to the searching daylight. This must not, however,
discourage you. No one, not the most skilful, could expect to make a
perfect copy of an original (if that original had any fineness of line
or sensitiveness of touch about it) by merely tracing it downwards on
the bench. You must put it upright against the daylight, and mend your
drawing, freehand, faithfully by the copy.
These remarks do not, in a great degree, apply to the case of hard
outlines specially prepared for literal translation. I am speaking of
those where the outline is, in the artistic sense, sensitive and
refined, as in a Botticelli painting or a Holbein drawing, and to copy
these well you want an easel.
For this small work any kind of frame with a sheet of glass in it, and a
ledge to rest your bit of glass on and a leg to stand out behind, will
do, and by all means get it made (fig. 23); but do not spend too much on
it, for later on you will want a bigger and more complicated thing,
which will be described in its proper place--that is to say, when we
come to it; and we shall come to it when we come to deal with work made
up of a number of pieces of glass, as all windows must be.
[Illustration: FIG. 23.]
This that you have now, not being a window but a bit of glass to
practise on, what I have described above will do for it.
_A note to be always industrious and to work with all your might._--I
advise you to put this work on an easel; but this is not the way such
work is usually done;--where the work is done as a task (alas, that it
could ever be so!) it is held listlessly in the left hand while touched
with the right; but no artist can afford to be at this disadvantage, or
at any disadvantage.
Fancy a surgeon having to hold the limb with one hand while he uses the
lancet with the other, or an astronomer, while he makes his measurement,
bunglingly moving his telescope by hand while he pursues his star,
instead of having it driven by the clock!
You cannot afford to be less keen or less in earnest, and you want both
hands free--ay! more than this--your whole body free: you must not be
lazy and sit glued to your stool; you must get up and walk backwards and
forwards to look at your work. Do you think art is so easy that you can
afford to saunter over it?
Do, I beg you, dear reader, pay attention to these words; for it is true
(though strange) that the hardest thing I have found in teaching has
been to get the pupil to take the most reasonable care not to hamper and
handicap himself by omitting to have his work comfortably and
conveniently placed and his tools and materials in good order. You shall
find a man going on painting all day, working in a messing, muddling
way--wasting time and money--because his pigment has not been covered up
when he left off work yesterday, and has got dusty and full of "hairs";
another will waste hour after hour, cricking his neck and squinting at
his work from a corner, when thirty seconds and a little wit would move
his work where he would get a good light and be comfortable; or he will
work with bad tools and grumble, when five minutes would mend his tools
and make him happy.
An artist's work--any artist's, but especially a glass-painter's--should
be just as finished, precise, clean, and alert as a surgeon's or a
dentist's. Have you not in the case of these (when the affair has not
been too serious) admired the way in which the cool, white hands move
about, the precision with which the finger-tips take up this or that,
and when taken up use it "just _so_," neither more nor less: the
spotlessness and order and perfect finish of every tool and material,
from those fearsome things which (though you prefer not to dwell on
their uses) you cannot help admiring, down to the snowy cotton-wool
daintily poked ready through the holes in a little silver beehive? Just
such skill, handling, and precision, and just such perfection of
instruments, I urge as proper to painting.
_What Tools are wanted to complete the Outline._--I will now describe
those tools which you want at this stage, that is, _to mend your outline
with_.
[Illustration: FIG. 24.]
You want the brush which you used in the first instance to paint it
with, and that has already been described; but you also want points of
various fineness to etch it away with where it is too thick; these are
the needle and the stick (fig. 24); any needle set in a handle will do,
but if you want it for fine work, take care that it be sharp. "How
foolish," you say; "as if you need tell us that." On the contrary,--nine
people out of ten need telling, because they go upon the assumption that
a needle _must_ be sharp, "as sharp as a needle," and cannot need
sharpening,--and they will go on for 365 days in a year wondering why a
needle (which _must_ be sharp) should take out so much coarser a light
than they want.
Now as to "sticks"; if you make a point of soft wood it lasts for three
or four touches and then gets "furred" at the point, and if of very hard
wood it slips on the glass. Bamboo is good; but the best of all--that is
to say for broad stick-lights--is an old, sable oil-colour brush,
clogged with oil and varnish till it is as hard as horn and then cut to
a point; this "clings" a little as it goes over the glass, and is most
comfortable to use.
I have no doubt that other materials may be equally good, celluloid or
horn, for example; the student must use his own ingenuity on such a
simple matter.
_How to Complete the Outline._--With the tools above described complete
the outline--by adding colour with the brush where the lines are too
fine, and by taking it away with needle or stick where they are too
coarse; make it by these means exactly like the copy, and this is all
you need do. But as an example of the degree of correctness attainable
(and therefore to be demanded) are here inserted two illustrations
(figs. 25 and 26), one of the example used, and the other of a copy made
from it by a young apprentice.
[Illustration: FIG. 25.]
[Illustration: FIG. 26.]
CHAPTER IV
Matting--Badgering--How to preserve Correctness of
Outline--Difficulty of Large Work--Ill-ground Pigment--The
Muller--Overground Pigment--Taking out Lights--"Scrubs"--The Need
of a Master.
Take your camel hair matting-brush (fig. 27 or 28); fill it with the
pigment, try it on the slab of the easel till it seems just so full that
the wash you put on will not run down till you have plenty of time to
brush it flat with the badger (fig. 29).
Have your badger ready at hand and _very clean_, for if there is any
pigment on it from former using, that will spoil the very delicate
operation you are now to perform.
Now rapidly, but with a very light hand, lay an even wash over the whole
piece of glass on which the outline is painted; use vertical strokes,
and try to get the touches to just meet each other without overlapping;
but there is a very important thing to observe in holding the brush. If
you hold it so (fig. 30) you cannot properly regulate the pressure, and
also the pigment runs away downwards, and the brush gets dry at the
point; you must hold it so (fig. 31), then the curve of the hair makes
the brush go lightly over the surface, while also, the body of the brush
being pointed downwards, the point you are using is always being
refilled.
[Illustration: FIG. 27.]
[Illustration: FIG. 28.]
[Illustration: FIG. 29.]
It takes a very skilful workman indeed to put the strokes so evenly side
by side that the result looks flat and not stripy; indeed you can hardly
hope to do so, but you can get rid of what "stripes" there are by taking
your badger and "stabbing" the surface of the painting with it very
rapidly, moving it from side to side so as never to stab twice in the
same spot; this by degrees makes the colour even, by taking a little off
the dark part and putting it on the light; but the result will look
mottled, not flat and smooth. Sometimes this may be agreeable, it
depends on what you are painting; but if you wish it to be smooth, just
give a last stroke or two over the whole glass sideways, that is to say,
holding the badger so that it stands quite perpendicular to the glass,
move it, _always still perpendicular_, across the whole surface. You
must not sway it from side to side, or kick it up at the end of each
stroke like a man white-washing; it must move along so that the points
of the hairs are all just lightly touching the glass all the time.
[Illustration: FIG. 30.]
_How to Ensure the Drawing of a Face being kept Correct while
Painting._--If you adopt the plan of doing the first painting over an
unfired outline, you must be very careful that the outline is not
brushed out of drawing in the process. If you have sufficient skill it
need not be so, for it is quite possible--if all the conditions as to
adhesiveness are right--and if you are light-handed enough--to so lay
and badger the "matt" that the outline beneath shall only be gently
softened, and not blurred or moved from its place. But in any case the
best plan is at the same time that you trace the outline of a head on to
the glass to trace it also with equal care on to a piece of tracing
paper, and arrange three or four well-marked points, such as the corner
of the mouth, the pupil of the eye, and some point on the back of the
head or neck, so that these cannot possibly shift, and that you may be
able at any time to get the tracing back into its proper place, both on
the cartoon and on the piece of glass on which you are to paint the
head. On which piece of glass also your first care should be that these
three or four points should be clearly marked and unmovable; then during
the whole progress of the painting you will always be able to verify the
correctness of the drawing by placing your piece of tracing paper over
the glass, and so seeing that nothing has shifted its place.
[Illustration: FIG. 31.]
It requires a good deal of patience and practice to lay matt
successfully over unfired outline. It is a question of the amount and
quality of the gum, the condition of your brush, even the dryness or
dampness of the air. You must try what degree of gum suits you best,
both in the outline and in the matt which you are to pass over it. Try
it a good many times on a slab of plain glass or on the plate of your
easel first, before you try on your painting. Of course it's a much
easier thing to matt successfully over a small piece than over a large.
A head as big as the palm of your hand is not a very severe test of your
powers; but in one as large as the _whole_ of your hand, say a head
seven inches from crown to chin, the problem is increased quite
immeasurably in difficulty. The real test is being able to produce in
glass a real facsimile of a head by Botticelli or Holbein, and when you
can do that satisfactorily you can do anything in glass-painting.
Do not aim to get _too much_ in the first painting, at any rate not till
you have had long practice. Be content if you get enough modelling on a
head to turn the outline into a more sensitive and artistic drawing than
it could be if planted down, raw and hard, upon the bare, cold glass.
After all it is a common practice to fire the outline separately, and
anything beyond this that you get upon the glass for first fire is so
much to the good.
But besides the quality of the _gum_ you will find sometimes differences
in the quality or condition of the _pigment_. It may be insufficiently
ground; in which case the matt, in passing over, will rasp away every
vestige of the outline, so delicate a matter it is.
You can tell when colour is not ground sufficiently by the way it acts
when laid as a vertical wash. Lay a wash, moist enough to "run," on a
bit of your easel-slab; it will run down, making a sort of
seaweed-looking pattern--clear lanes of light on the glass with a black
grain at the lower end. Those are the bits of unground material: under a
100-diameter microscope they look like chunks of ironstone or road
metal, or of rusty iron, and you'll soon understand why they have
scratched away your tender outline.
You must grind such colour till it is smooth, and an old-fashioned
_granite_ muller is the thing, not a glass one.
Now, after all this, how am I to excuse the paradox that it is possible
to have the colour ground _too_ fine! All one can say is that you "find
it so." It can be so fine that it seems to slip about in a thin, oily
kind of way.
It's all as you find it; the differences of a craft are endless; there
is no forecasting of everything, and you must buy your experience, like
everybody else, and find what suits you, learning your skill and your
materials side by side.
Now these are the chief processes of painting, as far as laying on
colour goes; but you still have much of your work before you, for the
way in which light and shade is got on glass is almost more in "taking
off" than in "putting on." You have laid your dark "matt" all over the
glass evenly; now the next thing is to remove it wherever you want light
or half-tone.
[Illustration: FIG. 32.]
_How to Finish a Shaded Painting out of the Even Matt._--This is done in
many ways, but chiefly with those tools which painters call "scrubs,"
which are oil-colour hog-hair brushes, either worn down by use, or
rubbed down on fine sandpaper till they are as stiff as you like them
to be. You want them different in this: some harder, some softer; some
round, some square, and of various sizes (figs. 32 and 33), and with
these you brush the matt away gently and by degrees, and so make a light
and shade drawing of it. It is exactly like the process of mezzotint,
where, after a surface like that of a file has been laboriously produced
over the whole copper-plate, the engraver removes it in various degrees,
leaving the original to stand entirely only for the darkest of all
shadows, and removing it all entirely only in the highest lights.
[Illustration: FIG. 33.]
There is nothing for this but practice; there is nothing more to _tell_
about it; as the conjurers say, "That's how it's done." You will find
difficulties, and as these occur you will think this a most defective
book. "Why on earth," you will say, "didn't he tell us about this, about
that, about the other?"
Ah, yes! it is a most defective book; if it were not, I would have taken
good care not to write it. For the worst thing that could happen to you
would be to suppose that any book can possibly teach you any craft, and
take the place of a master on the one hand, and of years of practice on
the other.
This book is not intended to do so; it is written to give as much
information and to arouse as much interest as a book can; with the hope
that if any are in a position to wish to learn this craft, and have not
been brought up to it, they may learn, in general, what its conditions
are, and then be able to decide whether to carry it further by seeking
good teaching, and by laying themselves out for a patient course of
study and practice and many failures and experiments. While, with regard
to those already engaged in glass-painting, it is of course intended to
arouse their interest in, and to give them information upon, those other
branches of their craft which are not generally taught to those brought
up as glass-painters.
CHAPTER V
Cutting (advanced)--The Ideal Cartoon--The Cut-line--Setting the
Cartoon--Transferring the Cut-line to the Glass--Another Way--Some
Principles of Taste--Countercharging.
We have only as yet spoken of the processes of cutting and painting in
themselves, and as they can be practised on a single bit of glass; but
now we must consider them as applied to a subject in glass where many
pieces must be used. This is a different matter indeed, and brings in
all the questions of taste and judgment which make the difference
between a good window and an inferior one. Now, first, you must know
that every differently coloured piece must be cut out by itself, and
therefore must have a strip of lead round it to join it to the others.
Draw a cartoon of a figure, _bearing this well in mind_: you must draw
it in such a simple and severe way that you do not set impossible or
needlessly difficult tasks to the cutter. Look now, for example, at the
picture in Plate V. by Mr. Selwyn Image--how simple the cutting!
You think it, perhaps, too "severe"? You do not like to see the leads so
plainly. You would like better something more after the "Munich" school,
where the lead line is disguised or circumvented. If so, my lesson has
gone wrong; but we must try and get it right.
You would like it better because it is "more of a picture"; exactly, but
you ought to like the other better because it is "more of a window."
Yes, even if all else were equal, you ought to like it better, _because_
the lead lines cut it up. Keep your pictures for the walls and your
windows for the holes in them.
But all else is _not_ equal: and, supposing you now standing before a
window of the kind I speak of, I will tell you what has been sacrificed
to get this "picture-window" "like a picture." _Stained-glass_ has been
sacrificed; for this is _not_ stained-glass, it is painted glass--that
is to say, it is coloured glass ground up into powders and painted on to
white sheets of glass: a poor, miserable substitute for the glorious
colour of the deep amethyst and ruby-col
|
roused by our worthy host. He was
going out to catch twenty or thirty oxen, wanted for the market at New
Orleans. As the kind of chase which takes place after these animals
is very interesting, and rarely dangerous, we willingly accepted the
invitation to accompany him; and having dressed and breakfasted in all
haste, got upon our mustangs and rode off into the prairie.
The party was half-a-dozen strong, consisting of Mr Neal, my friend and
myself, and three negroes. What we had to do was to drive the cattle,
which were grazing on the prairie in herds of from thirty to fifty head,
to the house, and then those selected for the market were to be taken
with the lasso and sent off to Brazoria.
After riding four or five miles, we came in sight of a drove; splendid
animals, standing very high, and of most symmetrical form. The horns of
these cattle are of unusual length, and, in the distance, have more the
appearance of stags' antlers than of bulls' horns. We approached the
herd to within a quarter of a mile. They remained quite quiet. We rode
round them, and in like manner got in rear of a second and third drove,
and then spread out, so as to form a half circle and drive the cattle
towards the house.
Hitherto my mustang had behaved exceedingly well, cantering freely
along, and not attempting to play any tricks. I had scarcely, however,
left the remainder of the party a couple of hundred yards, when the
devil by which he was possessed began to wake up. The mustangs belonging
to the plantation were grazing some three quarters of a mile off; and no
sooner did my beast catch sight of them, than he commenced practising
every species of jump and leap that it is possible for a horse to
execute, and many of a nature so extraordinary, that I should have
thought no brute that ever went on four legs would have been able to
accomplish them. He shied, reared, pranced, leaped forwards, backwards,
and sideways; in short, played such infernal pranks, that, although a
practised rider, I found it no easy matter to keep my seat. I heartily
regretted that I had brought no lasso with me, which would have tamed
him at once, and that, contrary to Mr Neal's advice, I had put on my
American bit instead of a Mexican one. Without these auxiliaries, all my
horsemanship was useless. The brute galloped like a mad creature some
five hundred yards, caring nothing for my efforts to stop him; and then,
finding himself close to the troop of mustangs, he stopped suddenly
short, threw his head between his fore-legs, and his hind feet into the
air, with such vicious violence, that I was pitched clean out of the
saddle. Before I well knew where I was, I had the satisfaction of seeing
him put his fore feet on the bridle, pull bit and bridoon out of his
mouth, and then, with a neigh of exultation, spring into the midst of
the herd of mustangs.
I got up out of the long grass in a towering passion. One of the negroes
who was nearest to me came galloping to my assistance, and begged me to
let the beast run for a while, and that when Anthony, the huntsman,
came, he would soon catch him. I was too angry to listen to reason, and
I ordered him to get off his horse, and let me mount. The black begged
and prayed of me not to ride after the brute; and Mr Neal, who was some
distance off, shouted to me, as loud as he could, for Heaven's sake, to
stop; that I did not know what it was to chase a wild horse in a Texan
prairie, and that I must not fancy myself in the meadows of Louisiana or
Florida. I paid no attention to all this--I was in too great a rage at
the trick the beast had played me; and, jumping on the negro's horse, I
galloped away like mad.
My rebellious steed was grazing quietly with his companions, and he
allowed me to come within a couple of hundred paces of him; but just as
I had prepared the lasso, which was fastened to the negro's saddle-bow,
he gave a start, and galloped off some distance further, I after him.
Again he made a pause, and munched a mouthful of grass--then off again
for another half mile. This time I had great hopes of catching him, for
he let me come within a hundred yards; but just as I was creeping up to
him, away he went with one of his shrill neighs. When I galloped fast,
he went faster; when I rode slowly, he slackened his pace. At least ten
times did he let me approach him within a couple of hundred yards,
without for that being a bit nearer getting hold of him. It was
certainly high time to desist from such a mad chase, but I never dreamed
of doing so; and indeed the longer it lasted, the more obstinate I got.
I rode on after the beast, who let me come nearer and nearer, and then
darted off again with his loud, laughing neigh. It was this infernal
neigh that made me so savage--there was something spiteful and
triumphant in it, as though the animal knew he was making a fool of me,
and exulted in so doing. At last, however, I got so sick of my
horse-hunt that I determined to make a last trial, and, if that failed,
to turn back. The runaway had stopped near one of the islands of trees,
and was grazing quite close to its edge. I thought that, if I were to
creep round to the other side of the island, and then steal across it,
through the trees, I should be able to throw the lasso over his head,
or, at any rate, to drive him back to the house. This plan I put in
execution: rode round the island, then through it, lasso in hand, and as
softly as if I had been riding over eggs. To my consternation, however,
on arriving at the edge of the trees, and at the exact spot where, only
a few minutes before, I had seen the mustang grazing, no signs of him
were to be perceived. I made the circuit of the island, but in vain--the
animal had disappeared. With a hearty curse, I put spurs to my horse,
and started off to ride back to the plantation.
Neither the plantation, the cattle, nor my companions, were visible, it
is true; but this gave me no uneasiness. I felt sure that I knew the
direction in which I had come, and that the island I had just left was
one which was visible from the house, whilst all around me were such
numerous tracks of horses, that the possibility of my having lost my
way never occurred to me, and I rode on quite unconcernedly.
After riding for about an hour, I began to find the time rather long. I
looked at my watch: it was past one o'clock. We had started at nine,
and, allowing an hour and a half to have been spent in finding the
cattle, I had passed nearly three hours in my wild and unsuccessful
hunt. I began to think I must have got further from the plantation than
I had as yet supposed.
It was towards the end of March, the day clear and warm, just like a
May-day in the Southern States. The sun now shone brightly out, but the
early part of the morning had been somewhat foggy; and as I had only
arrived at the plantation the day before, and had passed the whole
afternoon and evening indoors, I had had no opportunity of getting
acquainted with the bearings of the house. This reflection made me
rather uneasy, particularly when I remembered the entreaties of the
negro, and the loud exhortations Mr Neal addressed to me as I rode away.
I said to myself, however, that I could not be more than ten or fifteen
miles from the plantation, that I should soon come in sight of the herds
of cattle, and that then there would be no difficulty in finding my way.
But when I had ridden another hour without seeing the smallest sign
either of man or beast, I got seriously uneasy. In my impatience, I
abused poor Neal for not sending somebody to find me. His huntsman, I
had heard, was gone to Anahuac, and would not be back for two or three
days; but he might have sent a couple of his lazy negroes: or, if he had
only fired a shot or two as a signal. I stopped and listened, in hopes
of hearing the crack of a rifle. But the deepest stillness reigned
around, scarcely the chirp of a bird was heard--all nature seemed to be
taking the siesta. As far as the eye could reach was a waving sea of
grass, here and there an island of trees, but not a trace of a human
being. At last I thought I had made a discovery. The nearest clump of
trees was undoubtedly the same which I had admired and pointed out to
my companions soon after we left the house. It bore a fantastical
resemblance to a snake coiled up and about to dart upon its prey. About
six or seven miles from the plantation we had passed it on our right
hand, and if I now kept it upon my left, I could not fail to be going in
a proper direction. So said, so done. I trotted on most perseveringly
towards the point of the horizon where I felt certain the house must
lie. One hour passed, then a second, then a third: every now and then I
stopped and listened, but nothing was audible--not a shot nor a shout.
But although I heard nothing, I saw something which gave me no great
pleasure. In the direction in which we had ridden out, the grass was
very abundant and the flowers scarce; whereas the part of the prairie
in which I now found myself presented the appearance of a perfect
flower-garden, with scarcely a square foot of green to be seen. The most
variegated carpet of flowers I ever beheld lay unrolled before me; red,
yellow, violet, blue--every colour, every tint was there; millions of
magnificent prairie roses, tuberoses, asters, dahlias, and fifty other
kinds of flowers. The finest artificial garden in the world sinks
into insignificance when compared with this parterre of nature's own
planting. My horse could hardly make his way through the wilderness of
flowers, and I for a time remained lost in admiration of this scene of
extraordinary beauty. The prairie in the distance looked as if clothed
with rainbows, that waved to and fro over its surface.
But the difficulties and anxieties of my situation soon banished all
other thoughts, and I rode on with complete indifference through
scenes which, under other circumstances, would have captivated my
entire attention. All the stories I had heard of mishaps in these
endless prairies, recurred in vivid colouring to my memory--not mere
backwoodsmen's legends, but facts well authenticated by persons of
undoubted veracity, who had warned me, before I came to Texas, against
venturing without guide or compass into these dangerous wilds. Even men
who had been long in the country were often known to lose themselves,
and to wander for days and weeks over these oceans of grass, where no
hill or variety of surface offers a landmark to the traveller. In summer
and autumn, such a position would have one danger the less--that is to
say, there would be no risk of dying of hunger; for at those seasons the
most delicious fruits--grapes, plums, peaches, and others--are to be
found in abundance. But we were now in early spring, and although I saw
numbers of peach and plum-trees, they were only in blossom. Of game also
there was plenty, both fur and feather; but I had no gun, and nothing
appeared more probable than that I should be starved, although
surrounded by food, and in one of the most fruitful countries in the
world. This thought flashed suddenly across me, and for a moment my
heart sank within me as I first perceived the real danger of my
position.
After a time, however, other ideas came to console me. I had been
already four weeks in the country, and had ridden over a large slice of
it in every direction, always through prairies, and I had never had any
difficulty in finding my way. True, but then I had always had a compass,
and been in company. It was this sort of over-confidence and feeling
of security that had made me adventure so rashly, and in spite of all
warning, in pursuit of the mustang. I had not waited to reflect, that a
little more than four weeks' experience was necessary to make one
acquainted with the bearings of a district three times as big as New
York State. Still I thought it impossible that I should have got so
far out of the right track as not to be able to find the house before
nightfall, although that was now rapidly approaching. Indeed, the
first shades of evening, strange as it may seem, gave this persuasion
increased strength. Home-bred and gently nurtured as I was, my life,
before coming to Texas, had been by no means one of adventure, and I was
so used to sleep with a roof over my head, that when I saw it getting
dusk I felt certain I could not be far from the house. The idea fixed
itself so strongly in my mind, that I involuntarily spurred my mustang,
and trotted on, peering out through the now fast-gathering gloom, in
expectation of seeing a light. Several times I fancied I heard the
barking of the dogs, the cattle lowing, or the merry laugh of the
children.
"Hurrah! there is the house at last--I see the lights in the parlour
windows."
I urged my horse on, but when I came near the house, it proved to be an
island of trees. What I had taken for candles were fire-flies, that now
issued in swarms from out of the darkness of the islands, and spread
themselves over the prairie, darting about in every direction, their
small blue flames literally lighting up the plain, and making it appear
as if I were surrounded by a sea of Bengal fire. Nothing could be more
bewildering than such a ride as mine, on a warm March night, through
the interminable, never-varying prairie; overhead the deep blue
firmament, with its hosts of bright stars; at my feet, and all around,
an ocean of magical light, myriads of fire-flies floating upon the soft
still air. It was like a scene of enchantment. I could distinguish every
blade of grass, every flower, every leaf on the trees--but all in a
strange unnatural sort of light, and in altered colours. Tuberoses and
asters, prairie roses and geraniums, dahlias and vine branches, began
to wave and move, to range themselves in ranks and rows. The whole
vegetable world around me appeared to dance, as the swarms of living
lights passed over it.
Suddenly, from out of the sea of fire, sounded a loud and long-drawn
note. I stopped, listened, and gazed around me. It was not repeated, and
I rode on. Again the same sound, but this time the cadence was sad and
plaintive. Again I made a halt, and listened. It was repeated a third
time in a yet more melancholy tone, and I recognised it as the cry of a
whip-poor-will. Presently it was answered from a neighbouring island by
a katydid. My heart leaped for joy at hearing the note of this bird, the
native minstrel of my own dear Maryland. In an instant the house where I
was born stood before the eyesight of my imagination. There were the
negro huts, the garden, the plantation, everything exactly as I had
left it. So powerful was the illusion, that I gave my horse the spur,
persuaded that my father's house lay before me. The island, too, I took
for the grove that surrounded our house. On reaching its border, I
literally dismounted, and shouted out for Charon Tommy. There was a
stream running through our plantation, which, for nine months out of the
twelve, was passable only by means of a ferry, and the old negro who
officiated as ferryman was indebted to me for the above classical
cognomen. I believe I called twice, nay, three times--but no Charon
Tommy answered; and I awoke as from a pleasant dream, somewhat ashamed
of the lengths to which my excited imagination had hurried me.
I now felt so weary and exhausted, so hungry and thirsty, and, withal,
my mind was so anxious and harassed by my dangerous position, and by the
uncertainty how I should get out of it, that I was really incapable of
going any further. I felt quite bewildered, and stood for some time
gazing before me, and scarcely even troubling myself to think. At length
I mechanically drew my clasp-knife from my pocket, and set to work to
dig a hole in the rich black soil of the prairie. Into this hole I put
the knotted end of my lasso, and then, filling in the earth and stamping
it down with my foot, as I had seen others do since I had been in Texas,
I passed the noose over my mustang's neck, and left him to graze,
whilst I myself lay down outside the circle which the lasso would allow
him to describe. An odd manner, it may seem, of tying up a horse; but
the most convenient and natural one in a country where one may often
find oneself fifty miles from any house, and five-and-twenty from a tree
or bush.
I found it no easy matter to sleep, for on all sides I heard the howling
of wolves and jaguars--an unpleasant serenade at any time, but most of
all so in the prairie, unarmed and defenceless as I was. My nerves, too,
were all in commotion; and I felt so feverish that I do not know what I
should have done, had I not fortunately remembered that I had my
cigar-case and a roll of tobacco, real Virginia _dulcissimus_, in my
pocket--invaluable treasures in my present situation, and which on this,
as on many other occasions, did not fail to soothe and calm my agitated
thoughts.
Luckily, too, being a tolerably confirmed smoker, I carried a flint and
steel with me; for otherwise, although surrounded by lights, I should
have been sadly at a loss for fire. A couple of havannahs did me an
infinite deal of good, and after a while I sank into the slumber of
which I stood so much in need.
The day was hardly well broken when I awoke. The refreshing sleep I had
enjoyed had given me new energy and courage. I felt hungry enough, to
be sure, but light and cheerful, and I hastened to dig up the end of
the lasso, and to saddle my horse. I trusted that, although I had been
condemned to wander over the prairie the whole of the preceding day, as
a sort of punishment for my rashness, I should now have better luck,
and, having expiated my fault, be at length allowed to find my way. With
this hope I mounted my mustang and resumed my ride.
I passed several beautiful islands of pecan, plum, and peach trees. It
is a peculiarity worthy of remark, that these islands are nearly always
of one sort of tree. It is very rare to meet with one where there are
two sorts. Like the beasts of the forest, that herd together according
to their kind, so does this wild vegetation preserve itself distinct in
its different species. One island will be entirely composed of live
oaks, another of plum, and a third of pecan trees; the vine only, common
to them all, embraces them all alike with its slender but tenacious
branches. I rode through several of these islands. They were perfectly
free from bushes and brushwood, and carpeted with the most beautiful
verdure possible to behold. I gazed at them in astonishment. It seemed
incredible that nature, abandoned to herself, should preserve herself so
beautifully clean and pure, and I involuntarily looked around me for
some trace of the hand of man. But none was there. I saw nothing but
herds of deer, that gazed wonderingly at me with their large clear
eyes, and when I approached too near, galloped off in alarm. What would
I not have given for an ounce of lead, a charge of powder, and a
Kentucky rifle! Nevertheless, the mere sight of the beasts gladdened me,
and raised my spirits. They were a sort of society. Something of the
same feeling seemed imparted to my horse, who bounded under me, and
neighed merrily, as he cantered along in the fresh spring morning.
I was now skirting the side of an island of trees of greater extent than
most of those I had hitherto seen. On reaching the end of it, I suddenly
came in sight of an object whose extraordinary appearance far surpassed
any of the natural wonders I had as yet beheld, either in Texas or the
United States.
At the distance of about two miles rose a colossal mass, in shape
somewhat like a monumental mound or tumulus, and apparently of the
brightest silver. As I came in view of it, the sun was just covered by a
passing cloud, from the lower edge of which the bright rays shot down
obliquely upon this extraordinary phenomenon, lighting it up in the most
brilliant manner. At one moment it looked like a huge silver cone; then
took the appearance of an illuminated castle with pinnacles and towers,
or the dome of some great cathedral; then of a gigantic elephant,
covered with trappings, but always of solid silver, and indescribably
magnificent. Had all the treasures of the earth been offered me to say
what it was, I should have been unable to answer. Bewildered by my
interminable wanderings in the prairie, and weakened by fatigue and
hunger, a superstitious feeling for a moment came over me, and I half
asked myself whether I had not reached some enchanted region, into which
the evil spirit of the prairie was luring me to destruction by
appearances of supernatural strangeness and beauty.
Banishing these wild imaginings, I rode on in the direction of this
strange object; but it was only when I came within a very short distance
that I was able to distinguish its nature. It was a live oak of most
stupendous dimensions, the very patriarch of the prairie, grown grey in
the lapse of ages. Its lower limbs had shot out in a horizontal, or
rather a downward-slanting direction, and, reaching nearly to the
ground, completed the base of a vast dome, several hundred feet in
diameter, and full a hundred and thirty feet high. It had no appearance
of a tree, for neither trunk nor branches were visible. It seemed a
mountain of whitish-green scales, fringed with long silvery moss, that
hung like innumerable beards from every bough and twig. Nothing could
better convey the idea of immense and incalculable age than the hoary
beard and venerable appearance of this monarch of the woods. Spanish
moss of a silvery grey draped the whole mass of wood and foliage, from
the topmost bough down to the very ground; short near the top of the
tree, but gradually increasing in length as it descended, until it hung
like a deep fringe from the lower branches. I separated the vegetable
curtain with my hands, and entered this august temple with feelings of
involuntary awe. The change from the bright sunlight to the comparative
darkness beneath the leafy vault was so great, that I at first could
distinguish scarcely anything. But when my eyes got accustomed to the
gloom, nothing could be more beautiful than the effect of the sun's
rays, which, in forcing their way through the silvered leaves and
mosses, took as many varieties of colour as if they had passed through a
window of painted glass, and gave the rich, subdued, and solemn light
observable in old cathedrals.
The trunk of the tree rose, free from all branches, full forty feet from
the ground, rough and knotted, and of such enormous size that it might
have been taken for a mass of rock covered with moss and lichens, whilst
many of its boughs were nearly as thick as the trunk of any tree I had
ever previously seen.
I was so absorbed in the contemplation of the vegetable giant, that for
a short space I almost forgot my troubles; but as I rode away from the
tree they returned to me in full force, and my reflections were
certainly of no very cheering or consolatory nature. I rode on, however,
most perseveringly. The morning slipped away; it was noon, the sun stood
high in the cloudless heavens. My hunger had now increased to an
insupportable degree, and I felt as if something were gnawing within
me--something like a crab tugging and riving at my stomach with his
sharp claws. This feeling left me after a time, and was replaced by a
sort of squeamishness, a faint sickly sensation. But if hunger was bad,
thirst was worse. For some hours I suffered martyrdom. At length, like
the hunger, it died away, and was succeeded by a feeling of sickness.
The thirty hours' fatigue and fasting I had endured were beginning to
tell upon my naturally strong nerves: I felt my reasoning powers growing
weaker, and my presence of mind leaving me. A feeling of despondency
came over me--a thousand wild fancies passed through my bewildered
brain; whilst at times my head grew dizzy, and I reeled in my saddle
like a drunken man. These weak fits, as I may call them, did not last
long; and each time that I recovered I spurred my mustang onwards. But
all was in vain--ride as far and as fast as I would, nothing was visible
but a boundless sea of grass.
At length I gave up hope, except in that God whose almighty hand was so
manifest in the beauteous works around me. I let the bridle fall on my
horse's neck, clasped my hands together, and prayed as I had never
before prayed, so heartily and earnestly. When I had finished my prayer
I felt greatly comforted. It seemed to me, that here in the wilderness,
which man had not as yet polluted, I was nearer to God, and that my
petition would assuredly be heard. I gazed cheerfully around, persuaded
that I should yet escape the peril in which I stood. Just then, with
what astonishment and inexpressible delight did I perceive, not ten
paces off, the track of a horse!
The effect of this discovery was like an electric shock, and drew a cry
of joy from my lips that made my mustang start and prick his ears. Tears
of delight and gratitude to Heaven came into my eyes, and I could
scarcely refrain from leaping off my horse and kissing the welcome signs
that gave me assurance of succour. With renewed strength I galloped
onwards; and had I been a lover flying to rescue his mistress from an
Indian war-party, I could not have displayed more eagerness than I did
in following up the trail of an unknown traveller.
Never had I felt so thankful to Providence as at that moment. I uttered
thanksgivings as I rode on, and contemplated the wonderful evidences of
His skill and might that offered themselves to me on all sides. The
aspect of everything seemed changed, and I gazed with renewed admiration
at the scenes through which I passed, and which I had previously been
too preoccupied by the danger of my position to notice. The beautiful
appearance of the islands struck me particularly, as they loomed in the
distance, swimming in the bright golden beams of the noonday sun, dark
spots of foliage in the midst of the waving grasses and many-hued
flowers of the prairie. Before me lay the eternal flower-carpet, with
its innumerable asters, tuberoses, and mimosas--that delicate plant
which, when approached, lifts its head, seems to look at you, and then
droops and shrinks back in alarm. This I saw it do when I was two or
three paces from it, and without my horse's foot having touched it. Its
long roots stretch out horizontally in the ground, and the approaching
tread of a horse or man is communicated through them to the plant, and
produces this singular phenomenon. When the danger is gone by, and the
earth ceases to vibrate, the mimosa may be seen again to raise its head,
quivering and trembling, as though not yet fully recovered from its
fears.
I had ridden on for three or four hours, following the track I had so
fortunately discovered, when I came upon the trace of a second horseman,
who appeared to have here joined the first traveller. It ran in a
parallel direction to the one I was following.
Had it been possible to increase my joy, this discovery would have done
so. I could now entertain no doubt that I had hit upon the way out of
this terrible prairie. It struck me as rather singular that two
travellers should have met in this immense plain, which so few persons
traversed; but that they had done so was certain, for there were the
tracks of the two horses, as distinct as possible. The trail was fresh,
too, and it was evidently not long since the horsemen had passed. It
might still be possible to overtake them; and in this hope I rode on
faster than ever--as fast, at least, as my mustang could carry me
through the thick grass and flowers, which in some places were four or
five feet high.
During the next three hours I passed over ten or twelve miles of ground;
but although the trail still lay plainly and broadly marked before me, I
saw nothing of those who had left it. Still I persevered. I must
overtake them sooner or later, provided I did not lose the track; and
that I was most careful not to do, keeping my eyes fixed upon the ground
as I rode along, and never deviating from the line which the travellers
had followed.
Thus the day passed away, and evening approached. I still retained hope
and courage; but my physical strength was giving way. The gnawing
sensation of hunger increased. I felt sick and faint; my limbs were
heavy, my blood seemed chill in my veins, and all my senses grew duller
under the influence of exhaustion, thirst, and hunger. My eyesight was
misty, my hearing less acute, the bridle felt cold and heavy in my
fingers.
Still I rode on. Sooner or later I must find an outlet; the prairie must
have an end somewhere. True, that the whole of Southern Texas is one
vast prairie; but then there are rivers flowing through it, and if I
could reach one of those, I should not be far from the abodes of men. By
following the streams five or six miles up or down, I should be sure to
find a plantation.
Whilst thus reasoning with and encouraging myself, I perceived the
traces of a third horse, running parallel to the two which I had so long
followed. This was indeed encouragement. It was certain that three
travellers, arriving from different points of the prairie, and all going
in the same direction, must have some object, must be repairing to some
village or clearing; and where or what this was had now become
indifferent to me, so long as I once more found myself in the
habitations of men. I spurred on my mustang, who began to flag a little
in his pace with the fatigue of our long ride.
The sun set behind the high trees of an island that bounded my view
westward, and there being little or no twilight in those southerly
latitudes, the broad day was almost instantaneously replaced by the
darkness of night. I could proceed no further without losing the track
of the three horsemen; and as I happened to be close to an island, I
fastened my mustang to a branch with the lasso, and threw myself on the
grass under the trees.
This night, however, I had no fancy for tobacco. Neither the cigars nor
the _dulcissimus_ tempted me. I tried to sleep, but in vain. Once or
twice I began to doze, but was roused again by violent cramps and
twitchings in all my limbs. I know of nothing more horrible than a night
passed as I passed that one--faint and weak, enduring torture from
hunger and thirst, striving after sleep, and never finding it. The
sensation of hunger I experienced can only be compared to that of twenty
pairs of pincers tearing at the stomach.
With the first grey light of morning I got up and prepared for
departure. It was a long business, however, to get my horse ready. The
saddle, which at other times I could throw upon his back with two
fingers, now seemed of lead, and it was as much as I could do to lift
it. I had still more difficulty in drawing the girths tight; but at last
I accomplished this, and, scrambling upon my beast, rode off. Luckily my
mustang's spirit was pretty well taken out of him by the last two days'
work; for if he had been fresh, the smallest spring on one side would
have sufficed to throw me out of the saddle. As it was, I sat upon him
like an automaton, hanging forward over his neck, sometimes grasping the
mane, and almost unable to use either rein or spur.
I had ridden on for some hours in this helpless plight, when I came
to a place where the three horsemen whose track I was following had
apparently made a halt--perhaps had passed the previous night. The grass
was trampled and beaten down in a circumference of some fifty or sixty
feet, and there was a confusion in the horse-tracks as if they had
ridden backwards and forwards. Fearful of losing the right trail, I was
looking carefully about me to see in what direction they had recommenced
their journey, when I noticed something white amongst the long grass.
I got off my horse to pick it up. It was a piece of paper with my own
name written upon it; and I recognised it as the back of a letter in
which my tobacco had been wrapped, and which I had thrown away at my
halting-place of the preceding night. I looked around, and recognised
the island and the very tree under which I had slept or endeavoured to
sleep. The horrible truth instantly flashed across me--the horse-tracks
I had followed were my own: since the preceding morning, I had been
riding _in a circle_!
I stood for a few seconds thunderstruck by this discovery, and then sank
upon the ground in utter despair. At that moment I should have been
thankful to any one who would have knocked me on the head as I lay. All
I wished for was to die as speedily as possible.
I remained I know not how long in a desponding, half-insensible state
upon the grass. Several hours must have elapsed; for when I got up, the
sun was low in the western heavens. My head was so weak and wandering
that I could not well explain to myself how it was that I had been thus
riding after my own shadow. Yet the thing was clear enough. Without
landmarks, and in the monotonous scenery of the prairie, I might have
gone on for ever following my horse's track, and going back when I
thought I was going forwards, had it not been for the discovery of the
tobacco-paper. I was, as I subsequently learned, in the Jacinto prairie,
one of the most beautiful in Texas, full sixty miles long and broad,
but in which the most experienced hunters never risked themselves
without a compass. It was little wonder, then, that I, a mere boy of
two-and-twenty, just escaped from college, should have gone astray in
it.
I now gave myself up for lost, and with the bridle twisted round my
hand, and holding on as well as I could by the saddle and mane, I let my
horse choose his own road. It would perhaps have been better had I done
this sooner: the beast's instinct would probably have led him to some
plantation. When he found himself left to his own guidance, he threw up
his head, snuffed the air three or four times, and then, turning round,
set off in a contrary direction to that he was before following, and at
such a brisk pace that
|
A mavis is singing on a rose-bough.
The babble of a stream hidden under adjacent trees is pleasant on the
morning silence. He doesn't notice any of it; he thinks it odiously hot,
and what fools they were who clipped a yew-tree into the shape of a
periwig, and what a beast of a row that trout-stream makes. Why don't
they turn it, and send it farther from the house? He's got no money to
do anything, or he would have it done to-morrow.
A peacock begins to scream. The noise of a peacock cannot be said to be
melodious or soothing at any time.
"Why don't you wring that bird's neck?" he says savagely to a gardener's
boy who is gathering up fallen rose-leaves.
The boy gapes and touches his hair, his hat being already on the ground
in sign of respect. The peacocks have been at Surrenden ever since
Warren Hastings sent the first pair as a present to the Lady Usk of that
generation, and they are regarded with a superstitious admiration by all
the good Hampshire people who walk in the gardens of Surrenden or visit
them on the public day. The Surrenden peacocks are as sacred to the
neighborhood and the workpeople as ever was the green ibis in old Egypt.
"How long will they touch their caps or pull their forelocks to us?"
thinks Lord Usk; "though I don't see why they can reasonably object to
do it as long as we take off our hats to Wales and say 'Sir' to him."
This political problem suggests the coming elections to his mind: the
coming elections are a disagreeable subject for meditation: why wasn't
he born in his grandfather's time, when there were pocket boroughs as
handy and portable as snuff-boxes, and the county returned Lord Usk's
nominee as a matter of course without question?
"Well, and what good men they got in those days," he thinks, "Fox, and
Hervey, and Walpole, and Burke, and all the rest of 'em; fine orators,
clever ministers, members that did the nation honor; every great noble
sent up some fine fellow with breeding and brains; bunkum and bad logic
and dropped aspirates had no kind of chance to get into the House in
those days. Now, even when Boom's old enough to put up himself, I dare
say there'll be some biscuit-baker or some pin-maker sent down by the
Radical Caucus or the English Land League who'll make the poor devils
believe that the millennium's coming in with them, and leave Boom
nowhere!"
The prospect is so shocking that he throws his cigar-end at the peacocks
and gets up out of the evergreen periwig.
As he does so he comes, to his absolute amazement, face to face with his
friend Lord Brandolin.
Lord Brandolin is supposed by all the world, or at least that large
portion of it which is interested in his movements, to be at that moment
in the forest-recesses of Lahore.
"My dear George," says Lord Brandolin, in a very sweet voice, wholly
unlike the peacocks', "I venture to take you by surprise. I have left my
tub at Weymouth and come on foot across-country to you. It is most
unpardonable conduct, but I have always abused your friendship."
The master of Surrenden cannot find words of welcome warm enough to
satisfy himself. He is honestly delighted. Failing Dulcia Waverley,
nobody could have been so agreeable to him as Brandolin. For once a
proverb is justified, "a self-invited guest is thrice welcome." He is
for dragging his visitor in at once to breakfast, but Brandolin resists.
He has breakfasted on board his yacht; he could not eat again before
luncheon; he likes the open air, he wishes to sit in the periwig and
smoke.
"Do not let us disturb Lady Usk," he said. "I know châtelaines in the
country have a thousand and one things to do before luncheon, and I know
your house is full from gable to cellar."
"It will be by night," says the master of Surrenden, with disgust, "and
not a decent soul among 'em all."
"That is very sad for you," says Brandolin, with a twinkle in his
handsome eyes. He is not a handsome man, but he has beautiful eyes, a
patrician profile, and a look of extreme distinction; his expression is
a little cynical, but more amused; he is about forty years old, but
looks younger. He is not married, having by some miracle of good
fortune, or of personal dexterity, contrived to elude all the efforts
made for his capture. His barony is one of the oldest in England, and he
would not exchange it, were it possible, for a dukedom.
"Since when have you been so in love with decency, George?" he asks,
gravely.
Lord Usk laughs. "Well, you know I think one's own house should be
proper."
"No doubt," says Lord Brandolin, still more gravely. "To do one's
morality vicariously is always so agreeable. Is Lady Waverley not here?
She would save a hundred Sodoms, with a dozen Gomorrahs thrown in
gratis."
"I thought you were in India," says his host, who does not care to
pursue the subject of Lady Waverley's saintly qualifications for the
salvation of cities or men.
"I went to India, but it bored me. I liked it when I was twenty-four;
one likes so many things when one is twenty-four,--even champagne and a
cotillion. How's Boom?"
"Very well; gone to his cousins' in Suffolk. Sure you won't have
something to eat? They can bring it here in a minute if you like
out-of-doors best."
"Quite sure, thanks. What a lovely place this is! I haven't seen it for
years. I don't think there's another garden so beautiful in all England.
After the great dust-plains and the sweltering humid heats of India, all
this coolness and greenness are like Paradise."
Brandolin laughs languidly.
"Hot! you ungrateful, untravelled country squire! I should like to
fasten you to a life-buoy in the middle of the Red Sea. Why do
Englishmen perspire in every pore the moment the thermometer's above
zero in their own land, and yet stand the tropics better than any other
Europeans?"
"You know I've sold Achnalorrie?" says his host, _à propos de rien_, but
to him Achnalorrie seems _à propos_ of everything in creation.
Brandolin is surprised, but he does not show any surprise. "Ah! Quite
right, too. If we wished to please the Radicals we couldn't find any way
to please them and injure ourselves equal to our insane fashion of
keeping hundreds of square acres at an enormous cost, only that for a
few weeks in the summer we may do to death some of the most innocent and
graceful of God's creatures."
"That's just the bosh Dolly talks."
"Lady Usk is a wise politician, then. Let her train Boom for
his political life. I don't know which is the more utterly
indefensible,--our enormous Highland deer-slaughter or our imbecile
butchery of birds. They ought to have recorded the introduction of
battue-shooting into the British Isles by the Great and Good on the
Albert Memorial."
"One must shoot something."
"I never saw why. But'something' honestly found by a setter in stubble,
and three thousand head of game between five guns in a morning, are very
different things. What did they give you for Achnalorrie?"
Usk discourses of Achnalorrie with breathless eloquence, as of a lover
eulogizing the charms of a mistress forever lost to him.
Brandolin listens with admirable patience, and affects to agree that the
vision of the American crawling on his stomach over soaking heather in a
thick fog for eight hours after a "stag of ten" is a vision of such
unspeakably enviable bliss that it must harrow the innermost soul of the
dispossessed lord of the soil.
"And yet, do you know," he says, in conclusion, "I am such a degenerate
mortal, such an unworthy'son of a gun,' that I would actually sooner be
sitting in these lovely, sunny, shady gardens, where one expects to see
all Spenser's knights coming through the green shadows towards one, than
I would be the buyer of Achnalorrie, even in the third week of August?"
"You say so, but you don't mean it," says the seller of Achnalorrie.
"I never say what I don't mean," says Brandolin. "And I never cared
about Scotland."
The other smokes dejectedly, and refuses to be comforted.
"Lady Waverley isn't here?" asks Brandolin, with a certain significance.
Lady Waverley alone would have the power of making the torturing vision
of the American among the heather fade into the background of her host's
reflections.
CHAPTER II.
"Dolly is nasty about Achnalorrie," says Lord Usk, as they at last rise
and approach the house.
"Not logical if she objects to moors on political principles. But ladies
are seldom logical when they are as charming as Lady Usk."
"She never likes me to enjoy anything."
"I don't think you are quite just to her: you know I always tell you
so." (Brandolin remembers the sweetness with which Dorothy Usk invites
Lady Waverley season after season.) "You are a great grumbler, George. I
know grumbling is a Briton's privilege, provided for and secured to him
in Magna Charta; but still too great abuse of the privilege spoils
life."
"Nobody was ever so bothered as I am." Lord Usk regards himself
invariably with compassion as an ill-used man. "You always take
everything lightly; but then you aren't married, and I suppose you get
_some_ of your rents?"
"I have always been rather poor, but I don't mind it. So long as I
needn't shut up or let the old place, and can keep my boat afloat, I
don't much care about anything more. I've enough for myself."
"Ah, that's just it; but when one has no end of family expenses and four
great houses to keep up, and the counties looking to one for everything,
and the farmers, poor devils, ruined themselves, it's another matter. I
assure you if I hadn't made that sacrifice of Achnalorrie----"
Lady Usk coming out of the garden-room down the steps of one of the low
windows spares Brandolin the continuation of the lament. She looks
pretty; mindful of her years, she holds a rose-lined sun-umbrella over
her head; the lace and muslin of her breakfast-gown sweep the lawn
softly; she has her two daughters with her, the Ladies Alexandra and
Hermione, known as Dodo and Lilie. She welcomes Brandolin with mixed
feelings, though with unmixed suavity. She is glad to see him because he
amuses Usk, and is a person of wit and distinction whom everybody tries
to draw to their houses; but then he upsets all her nicely-balanced
combinations; there is nobody for him; he will be the "one out" when all
her people so nicely arranged and paired; and, as she is aware that he
is not a person to be reconciled to such isolation, he will dispossess
somebody else and cause probably those very dissensions and
complications from which it is always her effort to keep all her
house-parties free. However, there he is; and he is accustomed to be
welcomed and made much of wherever he goes. She can do no less.
Brandolin makes himself charming in return, and turns pretty compliments
to her and the children, which he can do honestly, for he has always
liked Dorothy Usk, and the two young girls are as agreeable objects of
contemplation as youth, good looks, fair skins, pretty frocks, open air,
much exercise, and an indescribable air of "breeding" can make them. An
English patrician child is one of the prettiest and most wholesome
things on the face of the earth.
He goes to play lawn tennis with them and their youngest brother Cecil,
called the Babe; and Lady Usk, under her rose-lined umbrella, sits as
umpire, while her lord saunters off disconsolately to an interview with
his steward. In these times those interviews are of an unbroken
melancholy, and always result in producing the conviction in his mind
that Great Britain cannot possibly last out another year. Without the
nobility and gentry what will she be? and they will all go to the lands
they've bought in America, if they're in luck, and if they aren't will
have to turn shoeblacks.
"But the new electorate won't have its shoes blacked,--won't even have
any shoes to black," suggests Mr. Lanyon, the land-steward, who began
life as an oppidan at Eton and captain of an Eight, but has been glad to
take refuge from the storm on the estates of his old Eton comrade, a
trust which he discharges with as much zeal as discretion, dwelling
contentedly in a rose-covered grange on the edge of the home-woods of
Surrenden. If Boom finds things at all in order when he comes into
possession, it will be wholly due to John Lanyon.
In one of the pauses of their game the tennis-players hear the brake and
the omnibus returning. None of those whom they bring will be visible
until luncheon at two o'clock.
"Have you anybody very nice, Lady Usk?" asks Brandolin of his hostess.
She hesitates; there are some women that he would call nice, but then
they each have their man. "I hardly know," she answers, vaguely. "You
don't like many people, if I remember----"
"All ladies, surely," says Brandolin, with due gravity.
"I'm sure you don't like Grandma Sophy," says the saucy Babe, sitting
cross-legged in front of him. He means the Dowager Duchess of Derry, a
very unpleasant person of strong principles, called by the profane
"Sophia, by the grace of God," because she ruled Ireland in a
viceroyalty of short duration and long-enduring mischief. She and
Brandolin do not agree, a fact which the Babe has seen and noted with
the all-seeing eyes of a petted boy who is too much in his mother's
drawing-rooms.
"I plead guilty to having offended her Grace Sophia," says Brandolin,
"but I conclude that Lady Usk's guests are not all like that most
admirable lady."
The Babe and his sisters laugh with much irreverent enjoyment; her Grace
is not more appreciated by her grandchildren than she was by Ireland.
"If I had known you were going to be so kind as to remember us, I would
have invited some of your friends," says his hostess, without coming to
the rescue of her august mother's name. "I am so sorry; but there is
nobody I think who will be very sympathetic to you. Besides, you know
them all already."
"And is that fatal to sympathy? What a cruel suggestion, dear Lady Usk!"
"Sympathy is best new, like a glove. It fits best; you don't see any
wrinkles in it for the first hour."
"What cynicism! Do you know that I am very fond of old gloves? But,
then, I never was a dandy----"
"Lord Brandolin will like Madame Sabaroff," says Dodo, a very _éveillé_
young lady of thirteen.
"Fair prophetess, why? And who is Madame Sabaroff? A second O. K., a
female Stepniak?"
"What are those?" says Dodo. "She is very handsome, and a princess in
her own right."
"She gave me two Ukraine ponies and a real droschky," says the Babe.
"And Boom a Circassian mare, all white, and each of us a set of Siberian
turquoises," says Lilie.
"Her virtues must be as many as her charms," says Brandolin.
"She is a lovely creature," adds Lady Usk, "but I don't think she is
your style at all; you like fast women who make you laugh."
"My tastes are catholic where your adorable sex is in question," says
Brandolin. "I am not sure that I do like fast women; they are painful to
one's vanity; they flirt with everybody."
Lady Usk smiles. "The season before last, I recollect----"
"Dearest lady, don't revert to pre-historic times. Nothing is so
disagreeable as to think this year of what we liked last year."
"It was Lady Leamington last year!" cries the terrible Babe.
Brandolin topples him over on the grass and hoists him up on his own
shoulders. "You precocious rascal! What will you be when you are
twenty?"
"Babe's future is a thing of horror to contemplate," says his mother,
smiling placidly.
"Who is Madame Sabaroff?" asks Brandolin, again, with a vague curiosity.
"A princess in her own right; a god-daughter of the Emperor's," says
Dodo. "She is so handsome, and her jewels--you never saw such jewels."
"Her father was Chancellor," adds her mother, "and her husband held some
very high place at court, I forget what."
"Held? Is he disgraced, then, or dead?"
"Oh, dead: that is what is so nice for her," says Dodo.
"Heartless Dodo!" says Brandolin. "Then if I marry you four years hence
I must kill myself to become endeared to you?"
"I should pity you indeed if you were to marry Dodo," says Dodo's
mother. "She has not a grain of any human feeling, except for her dog."
Dodo laughs. She likes to be called heartless; she thinks it is _chic_
and grown-up; she will weep over a lame puppy, a beaten horse, a dead
bird, but she is "hard as nails to humans," as her brother Boom phrases
it.
"Somebody will reign some day where the Skye reigns now over Dodo's
soul. Happy somebody!" says Brandolin. "I shall be too old to be that
somebody. Besides, Dodo will demand from fate an Adonis and a Cr[oe]sus
in one!"
Dodo smiles, showing her pretty white teeth; she likes the banter and
the flirtation with some of her father's friends. She feels quite old;
in four years' time her mother will present her, and she means to marry
directly after that.
"When does this Russian goddess who drops ponies and turquoises out of
the clouds arrive here?" asks Brandolin, as he picks up his racquet to
resume the game.
"She won't be here for three days," says Lady Usk.
"Then I fear I shall not see her."
"Oh, nonsense! You must stay all the month, at least."
"You are too good, but I have so many engagements."
"Engagements are made to be broken. I am sure George will not let you
go."
"We won't let you go," cries the Babe, dragging him off to the nets,
"and I'll drive you this afternoon, behind my ponies."
"I have gone through most perils that can confront a man, Babe, and I
shall be equal even to that," says Brandolin.
He is a great favorite with the children at Surrenden, where he has
always passed some weeks of most years ever since they can remember, or
he either, for he was a godson and ward of the late Lord Usk, and always
welcome there. His parents died in his infancy: even a long minority
failed to make him a rich man. He has, however, as he had said, enough
for his not extravagant desires, and is able to keep his old estate of
St. Hubert's Lea, in Warwickshire, unembarrassed. His chief pleasure has
been travelling and sailing, and he has travelled and sailed wherever a
horse or a dromedary, a schooner or a canoe, can penetrate. He has told
some of his travels in books so admirably written that, _mirabile
dictu_! they please both learned people and lazy people. They have
earned him a reputation beyond the drawing-rooms and clubs of his own
fashionable acquaintances. He has even considerable learning himself,
although he carries it so lightly that few people suspect it. He has had
a great many passions in his life, but they have none of them made any
very profound impression on him. When any one of them has grown tiresome
or seemed likely to enchain him more than he thought desirable, he has
always gone to Central Asia or the South Pole. The butterflies which he
has broken on his wheel have, however, been of that order which is not
crushed by abandonment, but mends itself easily and soars to new
spheres. He is incapable of harshness to either man or woman, and his
character has a warmth, a gayety, and a sincerity in it which endear him
inexpressibly to all his friends. His friendships have hitherto been
deeper and more enduring than his amours. He is, on the whole,
happy,--as happy as any thinking being can be in this world of anomalies
and purposeless pains.
"But then you always digest all you eat," Usk remarks to him, enviously.
"Put it the other way and be nearer the point," says Brandolin. "I
always eat what I can digest, and I always leave off with an appetite."
"I should be content if I could begin with one," says Usk.
Brandolin is indeed singularly abstemious in the pleasures of the table,
to which the good condition of his nerves and constitution may no doubt
be attributed. "I have found that eating is an almost entirely
unnecessary indulgence," he says in one of his books. "If an Arab can
ride, fight, kill lions, and slay Frenchmen on a mere handful of pulse
or of rice, why cannot we live on it too?" Whereat Usk wrote once on the
margin of the volume, in pencil, "Why should we?"
The author, seeing this one day, wrote also on the margin, "For the best
of all reasons: to do away with dyspepsia and with doctors, who keep
their carriages on our indigestion and make fifty thousand a year each
out of it."
Usk allowed that the reason was excellent; but then the renunciation
involved was too enormous.
CHAPTER III.
Let it not for an instant be supposed that the guests of Surrenden are
people looked in the least coldly or shyly on by society. Not they. They
go to drawing-rooms, which means nothing; they are invited to state
balls and state concerts, which means much. They are among the most
eminent leaders of that world of fashion which has of late
revolutionized taste, temper, and society in England. Mrs. Wentworth
Curzon sails a little near the wind, perhaps because she is careless,
and now and then Lady Dawlish has been "talked about," because she has a
vast number of debts and a lord who occasionally makes scenes; but, with
these exceptions, all these ladies are as safe on their pedestals as if
they were marble statues of chastity. That their tastes are studied and
their men asked to meet them everywhere is only a matter of delicate
attention, like the bouquets which the housekeeper sets out in their
bedrooms and the new novels which are laid on their writing-tables.
"I like my house to be pleasant," says Dorothy Usk, and she does not
look any further than that: as for people's affairs, she is not supposed
to know anything about them. She knows well enough that Iona would not
come to her unless she had asked the Marquise de Caillac, and she is
fully aware that Lawrence Hamilton would never bestow the cachet of his
illustrious presence on Surrenden unless Mrs. Wentworth Curzon brought
thither her _fourgons_, her maids, her collie dog, her famous emeralds,
and her no less famous fans. Of course she knows that, but she is not
supposed to know it. Nobody except her husband would be so ill-bred as
to suggest that she did know it; and if any of her people should ever by
any mischance forget their tact and stumble into the newspapers, or
become notorious by any other accident, she will drop them, and nobody
will be more surprised at the discovery of their naughtiness than
herself. Yet she is a kind woman, a virtuous woman, a very warm friend,
and not more insincere in her friendships than any one else; she is only
a hostess of the last lustre of the nineteenth century, a woman who
knows her London and follows it in all its amazing and illimitable
condonations as in its eccentric and exceptional severities.
The guests are numerous; they might even he said to be miscellaneous,
were it not that they all belonged to the same set. There is Dick
Wootton, who believes himself destined to play in the last years of the
nineteenth century the part played by Charles Greville in the earlier.
There is Lord Vanstone, an agreeable, eccentric, unsatisfactory
valetudinarian, who ought to have done great things with his life, but
has always been too indolent and had too bad health to carry out his
friends' very large expectations of him. There is the young Duke of
Whitby, good-natured and foolish, with a simple pleasant face and a very
shy manner. "If I had that ass's opportunities I'd make the world spin,"
says Wriothesley Ormond, who is a very poor and very witty member of
Parliament, and also, which he values more, the most popular member of
the Marlborough. There is Lord Iona, very handsome, very silent, very
much sought after and spoilt by women. There is Hugo Mountjoy, a pretty
young fellow in the Guards, with a big fortune and vague ideas that he
ought to "do something;" he is not sure what. There is Lawrence
Hamilton, who, as far as is possible in an age when men are clothed, but
do not dress, gives the law to St. James Street in matters of male
toilet. There is Sir Adolphus Beaumanoir, an ex-diplomatist, admirably
preserved, charmingly loquacious, and an unconscionable flirt, though he
is seventy. Each of these happy or unhappy beings has the lady invited
to meet him in whom his affections are supposed to be centred, for the
time being, in those tacit but potent relations which form so large a
portion of men's and women's lives in these days. It is this condonance
on the part of his wife which George Usk so entirely denounces, although
he would be very much astonished and very much annoyed if she made any
kind of objections to inviting Dulcia Waverley. Happily, there is no Act
of Parliament to compel any of us to be consistent, or where would
anybody be?
Lady Dolgelly, much older than himself, and with a _taille de
couturière_, as all her intimate friends delight to reveal, is supposed
to be indispensable to the existence of His Grace of Whitby; Lady
Leamington is not less necessary to the happiness of Wriothesley Ormond.
Mr. Wootton would be supposed incapable of cutting a single joke or
telling a single good story unless his spirits were sustained by the
presence of Mrs. Faversham, the prettiest brunette in the universe, for
whom Worth is supposed to make marvellous combinations of rose and gold,
of amber and violet, of deep orange and black, and of a wondrous yellow
like that of the daffodil, which no one dares to wear but herself. Mrs.
Wentworth Curzon is the momentary goddess of Lawrence Hamilton; and Lord
Iona, as far as he has ever opened his handsome mouth to say anything
"serious," has sworn himself the slave of Madame de Caillac. Sir
Adolphus has spread the ægis of his semi-paternal affection over the
light little head of that extravagant little beauty, Lady Dawlish;
whilst Hugo Mountjoy is similarly protected by the prescient wisdom and
the rare experience of his kindest of friends, Lady Arthur Audley.
Sir Hugo and several other gilded youths there present are all exact
patterns of one another, the typical young Englishman of the last years
of this curious century; the masher pure and simple; close-shaven,
close-cropped, faultlessly clothed, small of person, small of features,
stiff, pale, insignificant, polite, supercilious, indifferent;
occasionally amusing, but never by any chance original; much concerned
as to health, climate, and their own nerves; often talking of their
physicians, and flitting southward before cold weather like swallows,
though they have nothing whatever definite the matter with them.
These young men are all convinced that England is on the brink of ruin,
and they talk of it in the same tone with which they say that their
cigarette is out, or the wind is in the east. The Throne, the Church,
the Lords, and the Thirty-Nine Articles are all going down pell-mell
next week, and it is very shocking; nevertheless, there is no reason why
they should not be studious of their digestions and very anxious about
the parting of their hair.
It never occurs to them that they and their father's battue-shooting,
pigeon-shooting, absenteeism, clubism, and general preference for every
country except their own, may have had something to do with bringing
about this impending cataclysm. That all the grand old houses standing
empty, or let to strangers, among the rich Herefordshire pastures, the
green Warwickshire woods, the red Devon uplands, the wild Westmoreland
fells, may have also something to do with it, never occurs to them. That
while they are flirting at Aix, wintering at Pau, throwing comfits at
Rome, losing on the red at Monaco, touring in California, or yawning in
Berlin, the demagogue's agents are whispering to the smock-frocks in the
meadows, and pouring the gall of greed and hatred into the amber ale of
the village pothouse, never occurs to them. If any one suggests it, they
stare: "such a beastly climate, you know; nobody can stand it. Live in
the country? Oh, Lord! who could live in the country?"
And then they wonder that Mr. George has replaced Sir Roger de Coverley,
and that Joseph Chamberlain's voice is heard instead of Edmund Burke's.
Their host could kick them with a sensation of considerable
satisfaction. Their neatness, smallness, and self-complacency irritate
him excessively. The bloods of George the Fourth's time at least were
men,--so he says.
"You do these poor boys injustice," says Brandolin. "When they get out
in a desert, or are left to roast and die under the equator, they put
off all their affectations with their starched cambric, and are not
altogether unworthy of their great-grandfathers. Britons are still bad
ones to beat when the trial comes."
"They must leave their constitutions at their clubs, then, and their
nervous system in their hat-boxes," growls Usk. "If you are like those
namby-pamby fellows when you are twenty, Boom, I'll put a bullet through
your head myself," he says to his heir one morning, when that
good-looking and high-spirited boy has come back from Suffolk.
Boom laughs. He is a careless, high-spirited, extravagant lad, and he
does not at present lean towards the masher type. Gordon is in his head;
that is his idea of a man. The country had one hero in this century, and
betrayed him, and honors his betrayer; but the hearts of the boys beat
truer than that of the House of Commons and the New Electorate. They
remember Gordon, with a noble, headlong, quixotic wish to go and do
likewise. That one lonely figure standing out against the yellow light
of the desert may perhaps be as a pharos to the youth of his nation, and
save them from the shipwreck which is nigh.
"Curious type, the young fellows," says Brandolin, musingly. "I don't
think they will keep England what our fathers and grandfathers made it.
I don't think they will, even if Chamberlain and Company will let them,
which they certainly won't."
"Tell you what it is," says Usk, "it all comes of having second horses
hunting, and loaders behind you out shooting."
"You confound cause and effect. The race wouldn't have come to second
horses and men to load if it hadn't degenerated. Second horses and men
to load indicate in England just what pasties of nightingales' tongues,
and garlands of roses, indicated with the Romans,--effeminacy and
self-indulgence. The Huns and the Goths were knocking at their doors,
and Demos and the Débacle are knocking at ours. History repeats itself,
which is lamentable, for its amazing tendency to tell the same tale
again and again makes it a bore.
"I should like to know, by the way," he continues, "why English girls
get taller and taller, stronger and stronger, and are as the very palm
of the desert for vigor and force, whilst the English young man gets
smaller and smaller, slighter and slighter, and has the nerves of an old
maid and the habits of a valetudinarian. It is uncommonly droll; and, if
the disparity goes on increasing, the ladies will not only get the
franchise, but they will carry the male voter to the polling-place on
their shoulders."
"As the French women did their husbands out of some town that
surrendered in some war," said Boom, who was addicted to historical
illustration and never lost occasion to display it.
"They won't carry their _husbands_," murmurs Brandolin. "They'll drive
_them_, and carry somebody else."
"Will they have any husbands at all when they can do as they like?" says
Boom.
"Probably not," says Brandolin. "My dear boy, what an earthly paradise
awaits you when you shall be of mature age, and shall have seen us all
descend one by one into the tomb, with all our social prejudices and
antiquated ways!"
"I dare say he'll be a navvy in New Guinea by that time, and all his
acres here will be being let out by the state at a rack-rent which the
people will call free land," says the father, with a groan.
"Very possible, too," replies Brandolin.
The boy's eyes go thoughtfully towards the landscape beyond the windows,
the beautiful lawns, the smiling gardens, the rolling woods. A look of
resolution comes over his fair frank face.
"They shan't take our lands without a fight for it," he says, with a
flush on his cheeks.
"And the fight will be a fierce one," says Brandolin, with a sigh, "and
I am afraid it is in Mr. Gladstone's 'dim and distant future,'--that is
to say, very near at hand indeed."
"Well, I shall be ready," says the lad. Both his father and Brandolin
are silent, vaguely touched by the look of the gallant and gracious boy,
as he stands there with the sun in his brave blue eyes, and thinking of
the troubled time which will await his manhood in this green old
England, cursed by the spume of wordy demagogues, and hounded on to
envenomed hatreds and causeless discontents, that the professional
politician may fatten on her woes.
What will Boom live to see?
It will be a sorry day for the country when her wooded parks and stately
houses are numbered with the things that are no more.
Brandolin puts his arm over the boy's shoulder, and walks away with him
a little way under the deep boughs of yew.
"Look here, Boom," he says to him, "you won't care to be like those
fellows, but you don't know how hard it is to get out of the fashion of
one's set, to avoid going with the stream of one's contemporaries.
Nobody can say what will be the style of the 'best men' when you're of
age, but I'm much afraid it will still be the Masher. The Masher is not
very vicious, he is often cultured, he
|
away on the prairie,--a
call for his horseman, who had not yet reappeared.
Jack dragged the fawn and placed it beside its dam. There lay the two
pretty creatures, slaughtered by his hand.
"It can't be helped," thought he. "If it is right to hunt game, it is
right to kill it. If we eat flesh, we must take life."
So he tried to feel nothing but pure triumph at the sight. Yet I have
heard him say, in relating the adventure, that he could never afterwards
think of the dead doe and pretty fawn, lying there side by side, without
a pang.
He now backed his buggy out of the woods, set the seat forward in order
to make room for the deer behind, and waited for his horse.
"Where can that fellow have gone?" he muttered, with growing anxiety.
He went to a hill-top, to get a good view, and strained his vision,
gazing over the prairie. The sun was almost set, and all the hills were
darkening, save now and then one of the highest summits.
Over one of these Jack suddenly descried a distant object moving. It was
no deer this time, but a horse and rider far away, and going at a
gallop--in the wrong direction.
He gazed until they disappeared over the crest, and the faint sundown
glory faded from it, and he felt the lonesome night shutting down over
the limitless expanse. Then he smote his hands together with fury and
despair.
He knew that the horse was his own, and the rider the strange youth in
whose hands he had so rashly intrusted him. And here he was, five miles
from home, with the darkening forest on one side, and the vast prairie
on the other; the dead doe and fawn lying down there on the dewy grass,
the empty buggy and harness beside them; and only his dog to keep him
company.
CHAPTER V.
THE BOY WITH ONE SUSPENDER.
Jack's first thought, after assuring himself that his horse was
irrevocably gone, was to run for help to the line of settlements on the
other side of the grove, where some means of pursuit might be obtained.
He knew that the road which Mr. Wiggett had described could not be much
beyond the hollow where his wagon was; and, dashing forward, he soon
found it. Then, stopping to give a last despairing look at the billowy
line of prairie over which his horse had disappeared, he started to run
through the woods.
He had not gone far when he heard a cowbell rattle, and the voice of a
boy shouting. He paused to take breath and listen; and presently with a
crashing of bushes three or four horned cattle came pushing their way
through the undergrowth, into the open road, followed by a lad without a
jacket, with one suspender and a long switch.
"Boy," Jack cried, "how far is it to the nearest house?"
"Our house is jest down through the woods here," replied the boy,
stopping to stare.
"How far is that?"
"Not quite so far as it is to Peakslow's house."
"Where is Peakslow's house?"
"Next house to ours, down the river."
Seeing that this line of questions was not likely to lead to anything
very satisfactory, Jack asked,--
"Can I get a horse of anybody in your neighborhood,--a good fast horse
to ride?"
The boy whipped a bush with his switch, and replied,--
"There ain't any good horses around here, 'thout 'tis Peakslow's; but
one of his has got the spring halt, and t' other's got the blind
staggers; and he's too mean to lend his horses; and, besides, he went to
Chicago with 'em both this morning."
Jack did not stop to question the probability of a span thus afflicted
being driven on so long a journey; but asked if Mr. Wiggett had horses.
"No--yes. I believe his horses are all oxen," replied the boy; "not very
fast or good to ride either."
Thereupon Jack, losing all patience, cried out,--
"Isn't there a decent nag to be had in this region?"
"Who said there wasn't?" retorted the boy.
"Where is there one?"
"We've got one."
"A horse?"
"No; a mare."
"Why didn't you tell me before?"
"'Cause you asked for horses; you didn't say anything about mares."
"Is she good to ride?"
"Pretty good,--though if you make her go much faster 'n she takes a
notion to, she's got the heaves so folks'll think there's a small
volcano coming!"
"How fast will she go?"
"As fast as a good slow walk; that's her style," said the boy, and
whipped the bushes. "But, come to think, father's away from home, and
you'll have to wait till to-morrow night before you can see him, and get
him to let you take her."
"Boy," said Jack, tired of the lad's tone of levity, and thinking to
interest him by a statement of the facts in the case, "I've been
hunting, and a rascal I trusted with my horse has run off with him, and
I have a harness and a buggy and a couple of dead deer out there on the
prairie."
"Deer?" echoed the lad, pricking up his ears at once. "Did you shoot
'em? Where? Can I go and see 'em?"
Jack was beginning to see the hopelessness of pursuing the horse-thief
that night, or with any help to to be had in that region; and he now
turned his thoughts to getting the buggy home.
"Yes, boy; come with me," he said.
The boy shouted and switched his stick at the cattle browsing by the
wayside, and started them on a smart trot down the road, then hastened
with Jack to the spot where the wagon and game had been left, guarded by
Lion.
But Jack had another object in view than simply to gratify the lad's
curiosity.
"If you will hold up the shafts and pull a little, I'll push behind, and
we can take the buggy through the woods. After we get it up out of this
hollow, and well into the road, it will be down-hill the rest of the
way."
"You want to make a horse of me, do ye?" cried the boy. "I wasn't born
in a stable!"
"Neither was I," said Jack. "But I don't object to doing a horse's work.
I'll pull in the shafts."
"O good!" screamed the boy, making his switch whistle about his head.
"And I'll get on the seat and drive!" And he made a spring at the wagon.
But Lion had something to say about that. Having been placed on guard,
and not yet relieved, he would permit no hand but his master's to touch
anything in his charge. A frightful growl made the boy recoil and go
backwards over the dead deer.
"Here, Lion! down with you!" cried Jack, as the excited dog was pouncing
on the supposed intruder.
The boy scrambled to his feet, and was starting to run away, in great
terror, when Jack, fearing to lose him, called out,--
"Don't run! He may chase you if you do. Now he knows you are my friend,
you are safe, only stay where you are."
"Blast his pictur'!" exclaimed the boy. "He's a perfect cannibal! What
does anybody want to keep such a savage critter as that for?"
"I had told him to watch. Now he is all right. Come!"
"Me? Travel with that dog? I wouldn't go with him," the boy declared,
meaning to make the strongest possible statement, "if 't was a million
miles, and the road was full of sugar-candy!" And he backed off warily.
[Illustration: UP-HILL WORK.]
Jack got over the difficulty by sending the dog on before; and finally,
by an offer of money which would purchase a reasonable amount of
sugar-candy,--enough to pave the short road to happiness, for a boy of
thirteen,--induced him to help lift the deer into the buggy, and then to
go behind and push.
They had hard work at first, getting the wagon up out of the hollow; and
the boy, when they reached at last the top of the hill, and stopped to
rest, declared that there wasn't half the fun in it there was in going a
fishing; the justice of which remark Jack did not question. But after
that the way was comparatively easy; and with Jack pulling in the
shafts, his new acquaintance pushing in the rear, and Lion trotting on
before, the buggy went rattling down the woodland road in lively
fashion.
CHAPTER VI.
"LORD BETTERSON'S."
On a sort of headland jutting out from the high timber region into the
low prairie of the river bottom, stood a house, known far and near as
"Lord Betterson's," or, as it was sometimes derisively called, "Lord
Betterson's Castle," the house being about as much a castle as the owner
was a lord.
The main road of the settlement ran between it and the woods; while on
the side of the river the land swept down in a lovely slope to the
valley, which flowed away in a wider and more magnificent stream of
living green. It was really a fine site, shaded by five or six young
oaks left standing in the spacious door-yard.
The trouble was, that the house had been projected on somewhat too grand
a scale for the time and country and, what was worse, for the owner's
resources. He had never been able to finish it; and now its
weather-browned clapboards, unpainted front pillars, and general shabby,
ill-kept appearance, set off the style of architecture in a way to make
beholders smile.
"Lord Betterson took a bigger mouthful than he could swaller, when he
sot out to build his castle here," said his neighbor, Peakslow.
The proprietor's name--it may as well be explained--was Elisha Lord
Betterson. It was thus he always wrote it, in a large round hand, with a
bold flourish. Now the common people never will submit to call a man
_Elisha_. The furthest they can possibly go will be _'Lisha_, or
_'Lishy_; and, ten to one, the tendency to monosyllables will result in
_'Lishe_. There had been a feeble attempt among the vulgar to
familiarize the public mind with _'Lishe Betterson_; but the name would
not stick to a person of so much dignity of character. It was useless to
argue that his dignity was mere pomposity; or that a man who, in
building a fine house, broke down before he got the priming on, was
unworthy of respect; still no one could look at him, or call up his
image, and say, conscientiously, "'Lishe Betterson." He who, in this
unsettled state of things, taking a hint from the middle name,
pronounced boldly aloud, "LORD BETTERSON," was a public benefactor.
"Lord Betterson" and "Lord Betterson's Castle" had been popular ever
since.
The house, with its door-posts of unpainted pine darkly soiled by the
contact of unwashed childish hands, and its unfinished rooms, some of
them lathed, but unplastered (showing just the point at which the
owner's resources failed), looked even more shabby within than without.
This may have been partly because the house-keeper was sick. She must
have been sick, if that was she, the pale, drooping figure, sitting
wrapped in an old red shawl, that summer afternoon. She looked not only
sick, but exceedingly discouraged. And no wonder.
[Illustration: "LORD BETTERSON."]
At her right hand was an empty cradle; and she held a puny infant in her
arms, trying to still its cries. At her left was a lounge, on which lay
the helpless form of an invalid child, a girl about eleven years old.
The room was comfortless. An old, high-colored piece of carpeting half
covered the rough floor; its originally gaudy pattern, out of which all
but the red had faded, bearing witness to some past stage of family
gentility, and serving to set off the surrounding wretchedness.
Tipped back in a chair against the rough and broken laths, his knees as
high as his chin, was a big slovenly boy of about seventeen, looking
lazily out from under an old ragged hat-rim, pushed over his eyes.
Another big, slovenly boy, a year or two younger, sat on the doorstep,
whittling quite as much for his own amusement as for that of a little
five-year-old ragamuffin outside.
Not much comfort for the poor woman and the sick girl shone from these
two indifferent faces. Indeed, the only ray of good cheer visible in
that disorderly room gleamed from the bright eyes of a little girl not
more than nine or ten years old,--so small, in truth, that she had to
stand on a stool by the table, where she was washing a pan of dishes.
"O boys!" said the woman in a feeble, complaining tone, "do, one of you,
go to the spring and bring some fresh water for your poor, sick sister."
"It's Rufe's turn to go for water," said the boy on the doorstep.
"'T ain't my turn, either," muttered the boy tipped back against the
laths. "Besides, I've got to milk the cow soon as Link brings the cattle
home. Hear the bell yet, Wad?"
"Never mind, Cecie!" cried the little dish-washer, cheerily. "I'll bring
you some water as soon as I have done these dishes." And, holding her
wet hands behind her, she ran to give the young invalid a kiss in the
mean while.
Cecie returned a warm smile of love and thanks, and said she was in no
hurry. Then the child, stopping only to give a bright look and a
pleasant word to the baby, ran back to her dishes.
"I should think you would be ashamed, you two great boys!" said the
woman, "to sit round the house and let that child Lilian wait upon you,
get your suppers, wash your dishes, and then go to the spring for water
for your poor suffering sister!"
"I'm going to petition the Legislature," said Wad, "to have that spring
moved up into our back yard; it's too far to go for water. There come
the cattle, Rufe."
"Tell Chokie to go and head 'em into the barnyard," yawned Rufe, from
his chair. "I wonder nobody ever invented a milking-machine. Wish I had
one. Just turn a crank, you know."
"You'll be wanting a machine to breathe with, next," said the little
dish-washer.
"Y-a-as," drawled Rufe. "I think a breathing machine would be popular in
this family. Children cry for it. Get me the milk-pail, Lill; that's a
nice girl!"
"Do get it yourself, Rufus," said the mother. "You'll want your little
sister to milk for you, soon."
"I think it belongs to girls to milk," said Rufe. "There's Sal
Wiggett,--ain't she smart at it, though? She can milk your head off! Is
that a wagon coming, Wad?"
"Yes!" cried Wad, jumping to his feet with unusual alacrity. "A wagon
without a horse, a fellow pulling in the shafts, and Link pushing
behind; coming right into the front yard!"
Rufe also started up at this announcement, and went to the door.
"Hallo!" he said, "had a break-down? What's that in the hind part of
your wagon? Deer! a deer and a fawn! Where did you shoot 'em? Where's
your horse?"
"Look out, Rufe!" screamed the small boy from behind, rushing forward.
"Touch one of these deer, and the dog'll have ye! We've got two deer,
but we've lost our horse,--scamp rode him away,--and we want--"
"We do, do we?" interrupted Wad, mockingly. "How many deer did _you_
shoot, Link?"
"Well, I helped get the buggy over, anyway! And that's the savagest dog
ever was! And--say! will mother let us take the old mare to drive over
to North Mills this evening?"
CHAPTER VII.
JACK AT THE "CASTLE."
For an answer to this question, the person most interested in it, who
had as yet said least, was shown into the house. Rufe and Wad and Link
and little Chokie came crowding in after him, all eager to hear him talk
of the adventure.
"And, O ma!" cried Link, after Jack had briefly told his story, "he says
he will give us the fawn, and pay me besides, if I will go with him
to-night, and bring back the old mare in the morning."
"I don't know," said the woman, wrapping her red shawl more closely
about her, to conceal from the stranger her untidy attire. "I suppose,
if Mr. Betterson was at home, he would let you take the mare. But you
know, Lincoln,"--turning with a reproachful look to the small boy,--"you
have never been brought up to take money for little services. Such
things are not becoming in a family like ours."
And in the midst of her distress she put on a complacent smirk,
straightened her emaciated form, and sat there, looking like the very
ghost of pride, wrapped in an old red shawl.
"Did you speak of Mr. Betterson?" Jack inquired, interested.
"That is my husband's name."
"Elisha L. Betterson?"
"Certainly. You know my husband? He belongs to the Philadelphia
Bettersons,--a very wealthy and influential family," said the woman with
a simper. "Very wealthy and influential."
"I have heard of your husband," said Jack. "If I am not mistaken, you
are Mrs. Caroline Betterson,--a sister of Vinnie Dalton, sometimes
called Vinnie Presbit."
"You know my sister Lavinia!" exclaimed Mrs. Betterson, surprised, but
not overjoyed. "And you know Mr. Presbit's people?"
"I have never seen them," replied Jack, "but I almost feel as if I had,
I have heard so much about them. I was with Vinnie's foster-brother,
George Greenwood, in New York, last summer, when he was sick, and she
went down to take care of him."
"And I presume," returned Mrs. Betterson, taking another reef in her
shawl, "that you heard her tell a good deal about us; things that would
no doubt tend to prejudice a stranger; though if all the truth was known
she wouldn't feel so hard towards us as I have reason to think she
does."
Jack hastened to say that he had never heard Vinnie speak unkindly of
her sister.
"You are very polite to say so," said Mrs. Betterson, rocking the
cradle, in which the baby had been placed. "But I know just what she
has said. She has told you that after I married Mr. Betterson I felt
above my family; and that when her mother died (she was not _my_ mother,
you know,--we are only half-sisters), I suffered her to be taken and
brought up by the Presbits, when I ought to have taken her and been as a
mother to her,--she was so much younger than I. She is even younger by a
month or two than my oldest son; and we have joked a good deal about his
having an aunt younger than he is."
"Yes," spoke up Rufe, standing in the door; "and I've asked a hundred
times why we don't ever hear from her, or write to her, or have her
visit us. Other folks have their aunts come and see 'em. But all the
answer I could ever get was, 'family reasons, Rufus!'"
"That is it, in a word," said Mrs. Betterson; "family reasons. I never
could explain them; so I have never written to poor, dear
Lavinia--though, Heaven knows, I should be glad enough to see her; and I
hope she has forgiven what seemed my hardness; and--do tell me" (Mrs.
Betterson wiped her eyes) "what sort of a girl is she? how has she come
up?"
"She is one of the kindest-hearted, most unselfish, beautiful girls in
the world!" Jack exclaimed. "I mean, beautiful in her spirit," he added,
blushing at his own enthusiasm.
"The Presbits are rather coarse people to bring up such a girl," said
Mrs. Betterson, with a sigh--of self-reproach, Jack thought.
"But she has a natural refinement which nothing could make her lose," he
replied. "Then, it was a good thing for her to be brought up with George
Greenwood. She owes a great deal to the love of books he inspired in
her. You ought to know your sister, Mrs. Betterson."
The lady gave way to a flood of tears.
"It is too bad! such separations are unnatural. Certainly," she went on,
"I can't be accused of feeling above my family now. Mr. Betterson has
had three legacies left him, two since our marriage; but he has been
exceedingly unfortunate."
"Two such able-bodied boys must be a help and comfort to you," said
Jack.
"Rufus and Wadleigh," said Mrs. Betterson, "are good boys, but they have
been brought up to dreams of wealth, and they have not learned to take
hold of life with rough hands."
Jack suggested that it might have been better for them not to have such
dreams.
"Yes--if our family is to be brought down to the common level. But I
can't forget, I can't wish them ever to forget, that they have Betterson
blood in their veins."
Jack could hardly repress a smile as he glanced from those stout heirs
of the Betterson blood to the evidences of shiftlessness and
wretchedness around them, which two such sturdy lads, with a little
less of the precious article in their veins, might have done something
to remedy.
But his own unlucky adventure absorbed his thoughts, and he was glad
when Link vociferously demanded if he was to go and catch the mare.
"Yes! yes! do anything but kill me with that dreadful voice!" replied
the mother, waving him off with her trembling hand. "Don't infer from
what I have said," she resumed, gathering herself up again with feeble
pride, "that we are poor. Mr. Betterson will come into a large fortune
when an uncle of his dies; and he gets help from him occasionally now.
Not enough, however, to enable him to carry on a farm; and it requires
capital, you are aware, to make agriculture a respectable profession."
Jack could not forbear another hit at the big boys.
"It requires land," he said; "and that you have. It also requires bone
and muscle; and I see some here."
"True," simpered Mrs. Betterson. "But their father hasn't encouraged
them very much in doing the needful labors of the farm."
"He hasn't set us the example," broke in Rufe, piqued by Jack's remark.
"If he had taken hold of work, I suppose we should. But while he sits
down and waits for something or somebody to come along and help him,
what can you expect of us?"
"Our Betterson blood shows itself in more ways than one!" said Wad with
a grin, illustrating his remark by lazily seating himself once more on
the doorstep.
Evidently the boys were sick of hearing their mother boast of the
aristocratic family connection. She made haste to change the subject.
"Sickness has been our great scourge. The climate has never agreed with
either me or my husband. Then our poor Cecilia met with an accident a
year ago, which injured her so that she has scarcely taken a step
since."
"An accident done a-purpose!" spoke up Rufe, angrily. "Zeph Peakslow
threw her out of a swing,--the meanest trick! They're the meanest family
in the world, and there's a war between us. I'm only waiting my chance
to pay off that Zeph."
"Rufus!" pleaded the little invalid from the lounge, "you know he could
never have meant to hurt me so much. Don't talk of paying him off,
Rufus!"
"Cecie is so patient under it all!" said Mrs. Betterson. "She never
utters a word of complaint. Yet she doesn't have the care she ought to
have. With my sick baby, and my own aches and pains, what can I do?
There are no decent house-servants to be had, for love or money. O, what
wouldn't I give for a good, neat, intelligent, sympathizing girl! Our
little Lilian, here,--poor child!--is all the help I have."
At that moment the bright little dish-washer, having put away the
supper things, and gone to the spring for water, came lugging in a small
but brimming pail.
"It is too bad!" replied Jack. "You should have help about the hard
work," with another meaning glance at the boys.
"Yes," said Rufe, "we ought to; and we did have Sal Wiggett a little
while this summer. But she had never seen the inside of a decent house
before. About all she was good for was to split wood and milk the cow."
"O, how good this is!" said the invalid, drinking. "I was so thirsty!
Bless you, dear Lill! What should we do without you?"
Jack rose to his feet, hardly repressing his indignation.
"Would you like a drink, sir?" said Lill, taking a fresh cupful from her
pail, and looking up at him with a bright smile.
"Thank you, I should very much! But I can't bear the thought of your
lugging water from the spring for me."
"Why, Lilie!" said Cecie, softly, "you should have offered it to him
first."
"I thought I did right to offer it to my sick sister first," replied
Lill, with a tender glance at the lounge.
"You did right, my good little girl!" exclaimed Jack, giving back the
cup. He looked from one to the other of the big boys, and wondered how
they could witness this scene and not be touched by it. But he only
said, "Have these young men too much Betterson blood in them to dress
the fawn, if I leave it with you?"
"We'll fall back on our Dalton blood long enough for that," said Wad,
taking the sarcasm in good part.
"A little young venison will do Cecie so much good!" said Mrs.
Betterson. "You are very kind. But don't infer that we consider the
Dalton blood inferior. I was pleased with what you said of Lavinia's
native refinement. I feel as if, after all, she was a sister to be proud
of."
At this last display of pitiful vanity Jack turned away.
"The idea of such a woman concluding that she may be proud of a sister
like Vinnie!" thought he.
But he spoke only to say good by; for just then Link came riding the
mare to the door.
She was quickly harnessed to the buggy, while Link, at his mother's
entreaty, put on a coat, and made himself look as decent as possible.
Then Jack drove away, promising that Link, who accompanied him, should
bring the mare back in the morning.
"Mother," said the thoughtful Lill, "we ought to have got him some
supper."
"I thought of it," said the sick woman, "but you know we have nothing
fit to set before him."
"He won't famish," said Rufe, "with the large supply of sauce which he
keeps on hand! Mother, I wish you wouldn't ever speak of our Betterson
blood again; it only makes us ridiculous."
Thereupon Mrs. Betterson burst into tears, complaining that her own
children turned against her.
"O, bah!" exclaimed Rufe, with disgust, stalking out of the room,
banging a milk-pail, and waking the baby. "Be sharpening the knives,
Wad, while I milk; then we'll dress that fawn in a hurry. Wish the
fellow had left us the doe instead."
CHAPTER VIII.
HOW VINNIE MADE A JOURNEY.
Leaving Jack to drive home the borrowed mare in the harness of the
stolen horse, and to take such measures as he can for the pursuit of the
thief and the recovery of his property, we have now to say a few words
of Mrs. Betterson's younger sister.
Vinnie had perhaps thriven quite as well in the plain Presbit household
as she would have done in the home of the ambitious Caroline. The tasks
early put upon her, instead of hardening and imbittering her, had made
her self-reliant, helpful, and strong, with a grace like that acquired
by girls who carry burdens on their heads. For it is thus that labors
cheerfully performed, and trials borne with good-will and lightness of
heart, give a power and a charm to body and mind.
It was now more than a year since George Greenwood, who had been brought
up with her in his uncle's family, had left the farm, and gone to seek
his fortune in the city. A great change in the house, and a very unhappy
change for Vinnie, had been the result. It was not that she missed her
foster-brother so much; but his going out had occasioned the coming in
of another nephew, who brought a young wife with him. The nephew filled
George's place on the farm, and the young wife showed a strong
determination to take Vinnie's place in the household.
As long as she was conscious of being useful, in however humble a
sphere, Vinnie was contented. She did her daily outward duty, and fed
her heart with secret aspirations, and kept a brave, bright spirit
through all. But now nothing was left to her but to contend for her
rights with the new-comer, or to act the submissive part of drudge where
she had almost ruled before. Strife was hateful to her; and why should
she remain where her services were now scarcely needed?
So Vinnie lapsed into an unsettled state of mind, common enough to a
certain class of girls of her age, as well as to a larger class of boys,
when the great questions of practical life confront them: "What am I to
be? What shall I do for a living?"
How ardently she wished she had money, so that she could spend two or
three entire years at school! How eagerly she would have used those
advantages for obtaining an education which so many, who have them,
carelessly throw away! But Vinnie had nothing--could expect
nothing--which she did not earn.
At one time she resolved to go to work in a factory; at another, to try
teaching a district school; and again, to learn some trade, like that of
dress-maker or milliner. Often she wished for the freedom to go out into
the world and gain her livelihood like a boy.
In this mood of mind she received two letters. One was from Jack,
describing his accidental visit to her sister's family. The other was
from Caroline herself, who made that visit the occasion of writing a
plaintive letter to her "dear, neglected Lavinia."
Many tears she shed over these letters. The touching picture Jack drew
of the invalid Cecie, and the brave little Lilian, and of the sick
mother and baby, with Caroline's sad confession of distress, and of her
need of sympathy and help, wakened springs of love and pity in the young
girl's heart. She forgot that she had anything to forgive. All her
half-formed schemes for self-help and self-culture were at once
discarded, and she formed a courageous resolution.
"I will go to Illinois," she said, "and take care of my poor sister and
her sick children."
Such a journey, from Western New York, was no small undertaking in those
days. But she did not shrink from it.
"What!" said Mrs. Presbit, when Vinnie's determination was announced to
her, "you will go and work for a sister who has treated you so
shamefully all these years? Only a half-sister, at that! I'm astonished
at you! I thought you had more sperit."
"For anything she may have done wrong, I am sure she is sorry enough
now," Vinnie replied.
"Yes, now she has need of you!" sneered Mrs. Presbit.
"Besides," Vinnie continued, "I ought to go, for the children's sake, if
not for hers. Think of Cecie and the poor baby; and Lilian not ten years
old, trying to do the housework! I can do so much for them!"
"No doubt of that; for I must say you are as handy and willing a girl as
ever I see. But there's the Betterson side to the family,--two great,
lubberly boys, according to your friend's account; a proud, domineering
set, I warrant ye! The idee of making a slave of yourself for them!
You'll find it a mighty uncomf'table place, mark my word!"
"I hope no more so than the place I am in now,--excuse me for saying it,
Aunt Presbit," added Vinnie, in a trembling voice. "It isn't your fault.
But you know how things are."
"O, la, yes! _she_ wants to go ahead, and order everything; and I think
it's as well to let her,--though she'll find she can't run over _me_!
But I don't blame you the least mite, Vinnie, for feeling sensitive; and
if you've made up your mind to go, I sha'n't hender ye,--I'll help ye
all I can."
So it happened that, only four days after the receipt of her sister's
letter, Vinnie, with all her worldly possessions contained in one not
very large trunk, bid her friends good by, and, not without misgivings,
set out alone on her long journey.
She took a packet-boat on the canal for Buffalo. At Buffalo, with the
assistance of friends she had made on board the boat, she found the
captain of a schooner, who agreed to give her a passage around the lakes
to Chicago, for four dollars. There were no railroads through Northern
Ohio and across Michigan and Indiana in those days; and although there
were steamboats on the lakes, Vinnie found that a passage on one of them
would cost more money than she could afford. So she was glad to go in
the schooner.
The weather was fine, the winds favored, and the Heron made a quick
trip. Vinnie, after two or three days of sea-sickness, enjoyed the
voyage, which was made all the more pleasant to her by the friendship of
the captain and his wife.
She was interested in all she saw,--in watching the waves, the sailors
hauling the ropes, the swelling of the great sails,--in the vessels they
met or passed, the ports at which they touched,--the fort, the Indians,
and the wonderfully clear depth of the water at Mackinaw. But the voyage
grew tiresome toward the close, and her heart bounded with joy when the
captain came into the cabin early one morning and announced that they
had reached Chicago.
The great Western metropolis was then a town of no more than eight or
ten thousand inhabitants, hastily and shabbily built on the low level of
the plain stretching for miles back from the lake shore. In a short walk
with the captain's wife, Vinnie saw about all of the place she cared
to; noting particularly a load of hay "slewed," or mired, in the
mud-holes of one of the principal streets; the sight of which made her
wonder if a great and flourishing city could ever be built there!
Meanwhile the captain, by inquiry in the resorts of market-men, found a
farmer who was going to drive out to the Long Woods settlement that
afternoon, and who engaged to come with his wagon to the wharf where the
Heron lay, and take off Vinnie and her trunk.
"O, how fortunate!" she exclaimed. "How good everybody is to me! Only
think, I shall reach my sister's house to-night!"
CHAPTER IX.
VINNIE'S ADVENTURE.
In due time a rough farm-wagon was backed down upon the wharf, and a
swarthy man, with a high, hooked nose, like the inverted prow of a ship,
boarded the schooner, and scratched his head, through its shock of
stiff, coarse hair, by way of salutation to Vinnie, who
|
5-2708.)
THE PLAGUE OF FROGS.
And aaron held up his hond
to ðe water and ðe more lond;
ðo cam ðor up ſwilc froſkes here
ðe dede al folc egipte dere;
Summe woren wilde, and ſumme tame,
And ðo hem deden ðe moſte ſame;
In huſe, in drinc, in metes, in bed,
It cropen and maden hem for-dred;
Summe ſtoruen and gouen ſtinc,
And vn-hileden mete and drinc;
Polheuedes, and froſkes, & podes ſpile
Bond harde egipte folc un-ſile.[8]
And Aaron held up his hand
To the water and the greater land;
Then came there up such host of frogs
That did all Egypt's folk harm;
Some were wild, and some tame,
And those caused them the most (greatest) shame;
In house, in drink, in meats, in bed,
They crept and made them in great dread;
Some died and gave (out) stink,
And (others) uncovered meat and drink;
Tadpoles and frogs, and toad's venom
Bound hard Egypt's sorrowful folk.
—(ll. 2967-2978.)
The reader must not be disappointed if he fails to find many traces in this
work of our pious author's poetic skill; he must consider that the interest
attaching to so early an _English_ version of Old Testament History, as
well as the philological value of the poem, fully compensates him for the
absence of great literary merit, which is hardly to be expected in a work
of this kind. And, moreover, we must recollect that it is to the
patriotism, as well as piety, of such men as our author, that we owe the
preservation of our noble language. The number of religious treatises
written in English during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries proves
that the dialect of religion approached more closely to the speech of the
people than did the language of history or romance. And it is a curious
fact that the most valuable monuments of our language are mostly
theological, composed for the lewed and unlearned, who knew no other
language than the one spoken by their forefathers, and who clung most
tenaciously to their mother tongue, notwithstanding the changes consequent
upon the Norman invasion, and the oppression of Norman rule, which,
inasmuch as it fostered and kept up a patriotic spirit, exercised a most
important and beneficial influence upon Early English literary culture and
civilization.
DATE AND DIALECT OF THE POEM.
The mere examination of an Early English work with respect to its
vocabulary and grammatical forms, will not enable us (as Price asserts) to
settle satisfactorily the date at which it was written. The place of
composition must also be taken into consideration, and a comparison, if
possible, must be made with other works in the same dialect, the date of
which is known with some degree of certainty. The date of the text before
us must not, therefore, be confounded with that of the manuscript, which
is, perhaps, a few years earlier than A.D. 1300. A careful comparison of
the poem with the Bestiary, written in the same dialect, and most probably
by the same author[9] (and printed by Mr Wright in the Reliquiæ Antiquæ, p.
208, and by myself in an Old English Miscellany), leads me to think that
the present poem is not later than A.D. 1250.[10]
The vocabulary, which contains very few words of Romance origin,[11] is not
that of Robert of Gloucester, or of Robert of Brunne, but such as is found
in Laȝamon's Brut, or Orm's paraphrases, and other works illustrating the
second period of our language, i.e. the twelfth and earlier part of the
thirteenth centuries.
The employment of a _dual_ for the pronouns of the first and second persons
marks an _early_ date (certainly not much later than the time of Henry
III.) even in works composed in the Southern dialect, which, it is well
known, retained to a comparatively late period those Anglo-Saxon
inflections that had long previously been disused in more Northern
dialects.
The Corpus manuscript is evidently the work of a scribe, to whom the
language was more or less archaic, which accounts for such blunders as
_ðrosing_ for _ðrosem_, _waspene_ for _wastme_, _lage_ for _vn-lage_,
_insile_ for _vn-sile_, _grauen_ for _ðrauen_, etc.
The original copy of Genesis most probably terminated with ll. 2521-4:
"And here ended completely
The book which is called Genesis,
Which Moses, through God's help,
Wrote for precious souls' need."
The concluding lines, in which both the author and scribe are mentioned,
seem to me to be the work of a subsequent transcriber:
"God shield his soul from hell-bale,
Who made it thus in English tale (speech)!
And he that these letters wrote,
May God help him blissfully,
And preserve his soul from sorrow and tears,
Of hell-pain, cold and hot!"
The Ormulum is the earliest[12] printed Early English work which has come
down to us that exhibits the uniform employment of the termination _-en_
(_-n_) as the inflection of the plural number, present tense, indicative
mood; or, in other words, it is the earliest printed example we have of a
_Midland_ dialect. I say _a_ Midland dialect, because the work of Orm is,
after all, only a specimen of _one_ variety of the Midland speech, most
probably of that spoken in the northern part of the eastern counties of
England, including what is commonly called the district of East Anglia.
Next in antiquity to the Ormulum come the Bestiary, already mentioned, and
the present poem, both of which uniformly employ the Midland affix _-en_,
to the exclusion of all others, as the inflection of the present plural
indicative.
There are other peculiarities which these works have in common; and a
careful comparison of them with the Ormulum induces me to assign them to
the East Midland area; but there are certain peculiarities, to be noticed
hereafter, which induce me to believe that the work of Orm represents a
dialect spoken in the northern part of this district, while the Story of
Genesis and Exodus, together with the Bestiary, exhibits the speech of the
more southern counties of the East Midland district.[13] Thus, if the
former be in the dialect of _Lincoln_, the latter is in that of
_Suffolk_.[14]
The chief points in which the present poem and the Bestiary agree with the
Ormulum are the following:—
I. The absence of compound vowels.
In the Southern dialects we find the compound vowels _ue_, _eo_, _ie_, _ea_
(_yea_). In the Ormulum _eo_ occurs, but with the sound of _e_, and _ea_ in
Genesis and Exodus is written for _e_.
II. The change of an initial _ð_ (th) into _t_ after words ending in _d_,
_t_, _n_, _s_, that is to say, after a dental or a sibilant.[15]
"ðanne iſ _tis_ fruit wel ſwiðe good."—(_Gen. and Ex._, l. 334.)
"ðe firſt moned and _te_ firſt dai,
He ſag erðe drie & _te_ water awai."—(_Ibid._, l. 615-6.)
"ðin berg and _tin_ werger ic ham."—(_Ibid._, l. 926.)
"at _te_ welle[n]."—(_Ibid._, l. 2756.)
This practice is much more frequent in the Bestiary, which is a proof,
perhaps, that the present poem has suffered somewhat in the course of
transcription.
"neddre is _te_ name."—(_O.E. Miscellany_, p. 5.)
"it is _te_ ned."—(_Ibid._, p. 6.)
"ðis lif bitokneð ðe sti
ðat _te_ neddre gangeð bi,
and _tis_ is ðe ðirl of ðe ston,
ðat _tu_ salt ðurg gon."—(_Ibid._, p. 7.)
"at _tin_ herte."—(_Ibid._, p. 7.)
III. Simplicity of grammatical structure and construction of sentences.[16]
1. The neglect of _gender_ and _number_ in nouns.
2. The genitive singular of substantives end in _-es_ in all genders.[17]
3. The absence of the gen. pl. of substantives in _-ene_.
4. The employment of an uninflected article.[18]
5. The use of _ðat_ (that) as a demonstrative adjective, and not as the
neuter of the article. The form _ðas_ (those), common enough in the
fourteenth century, does not occur in this poem or in the Ormulum.
6. No inflection of the adjective in the accusative singular. The phrase
'_godun_ dai,' good day, in l. 1430, p. 41, contains a solitary instance of
the accusative of the adjective, but it is, no doubt, a mere remnant of the
older speech, just like our 'for _the n_once' (= for _then_ once), and is
no proof that the writer or his readers employed it as a common inflection.
The form _godun_ is a corruption of _godne_, as it is more properly written
in works in the Southern dialects as late as the middle of the fourteenth
century.
7. Adjectives and adverbs with the termination _-like_.
The Southern form is, for adjectives, _-lich_ (sing.), _-liche_ (pl.); for
adverbs _-liche_. Thus the adoption of this affix really (though at first
it appears a matter of no importance) marks a _stage_ in the language when
the distinction between the sing. and pl. form of adjectives was not very
strictly observed, and was, moreover, a step towards our modern _-ly_,
which is adjectival as well as adverbial.
Even in this poem adjectives occur in _-li_, as _reuli_ = piteous, which is
the earliest example I have met with. Orm employs double forms in _-like_
and _-liȝȝ_ (= _ly_?). _-ly_ has arisen not out of _-lich_ or _-liche_
(which would have become _lidge_ or _litch_), but out of some such softened
form as _liȝ_.
8. The tendency to drop the initial _y_, _i_ (A.S. _ge_) of the passive
participles of strong verbs.
The Ormulum has two or three examples of this prefixal element, and in our
poem it occurs but seldom.
IV. A tendency to drop the _t_ of the second person of verbs, as _as_,
hast; _beas_, beëst; _findes_, findest.
Examples of this practice are very common in the Bestiary and Genesis and
Exodus, but it occurs only four times in the Ormulum.[19] It was very
common for the West-Midland to drop the _-e_ of 2nd person in strong verbs.
See Preface to O.E. Homilies, 1st Series.
V. The use of _arn_, _aren_, for _ben_ of the Midland dialect, or _beð_ of
the Southern dialect.[20]
VI. The employment of the adverbs _thethen_, _hethen_, _quethen_ (of
Scandinavian origin),[21] instead of the Southern _thenne_ (_thennen_),
thence; _henne_ (_hennen_), hence; _whanne_ (_whanene_), whence.
VII. The use of _oc_, _ok_ (also, and), a form which does not occur in any
specimen of a Southern, West-Midland, or Northern dialect that has come
under my notice. The use of _on_, _o_, for the Southern _an_ or _a_, as
_onlike_, _olike_, alike, _on-rum_, apart, _on-sunder_, asunder, is also
worth noticing.
VIII. The coalition of the pronoun _it_ with pronouns and verbs, as _get_
(Bestiary) = she it (_ȝhöt_ in Ormulum; cf. _þüt_ = _thu itt_, thou it);
_tellet_ = tell it; _wuldet_ = would it; _ist_ = is it, is there; _wast_,
was it, was there, etc. _þit_ = _þe_ + _hit_ = who it, occurs in O.E.
Homilies, 2nd Series.
The Ormulum, the Bestiary, and Genesis and Exodus have some few other
points of agreement which will be found noticed in the Grammatical Details
and Glossary. There are, however, grammatical forms in the latter works
which do not present themselves in the former, and which, in my opinion,
seem to indicate a more Southern origin. (See Preface to O.E. Homilies, 2nd
Series.)
I. Plurals in _n_.
I do not recollect any examples of plurals in _n_ in the Ormulum, except
_ehne_, eyes; in this poem we have _colen_, coals; _deden_, deeds; _fon_,
foes; _siðen_, sides; _son_, shoes; _steden_, places; _sunen_, sons;
_tren_, trees; _teten_, teats; _wunen_, laws, abilities, etc. (see p.
xxii.)
II. The pronoun _is_ (_es_) = them.[22] In the fourteenth century we only
find this form _is_ (_hise_) in pure _Southern_ writers.[23]
"Diep he _iſ_ dalf under an ooc."[24]—(_Gen. and Ex._, l. 1873, p. 54.)
"For ſalamon findin _iſ_ ſal."[25]—(_Ibid._, l. 1877, p. 54.)
"He toc _iſ_."[26]—(_Ibid._, l. 2654, p. 76.)
"Alle hise fet steppes
After him he filleð,
Drageð dust wið his stert
(_O.E. Miscell._, p. 1.)
ðer he steppeð,
Oðer dust oðer deu,
ðat he ne cunne _is_ finden."[27]
Our author, however, employs this curious pronoun in a way quite peculiar
to himself, for he constantly joins it to a _pronoun_ or a _verb_,[28] and
the compound was at first rather perplexing. _Hes_ = _he_ + _is_, he, them;
_wes_ = _we_ + _is_, we, them;[29] _caldes_, called them; _dedis_, did
(placed) them; _settes_, set them; _wroutis_, wrought them, etc.
"Alle _hes_ hadde wið migte bi-geten."[30]—(_Gen. and Ex._, l. 911, p.
26.)
"Vndelt _heſ_ leide quor-so _heſ_ tok."[31]—(_Ibid._, l. 943, p. 27.)
"Ðe culuer haueð costes gode,
alle _wes_ ogen to hauen in mode."[32]—(_O.E. Miscell._, p. 25.)
"Bala two childre bar bi him,
Rachel _caldes_ dan(.) neptalim;
And zelfa two sunes him ber,
Lia _calde is_(.) Gad(.) and asser."[33]—(_Gen. and Ex._, l. 1700, p.
49.)
"ðe tabernacle he _dedis_ in."[34]—(_Ibid._, l. 3830, p. 109.)
"He _settes_ in ðe firmament."[35]—(_Ibid._, l. 135, p. 5.)
In the Kentish Ayenbite of 1340 _he_ never coalesces with _hise_ (them),
_e.g._:—
"He (the devil) is lyeȝere and vader of leazinges, ase he þet made þe
verste leazinge, and yet _he hise_ makeþ and tekþ eche daye."—(Ayenbite
of Inwyt, p. 47.)
(He is a liar and the father of leasings, as he that made the first
leasing, and yet _he them_, i.e. lies, maketh and teacheth each day.)
In Old Kentish Sermons (Old Eng. Miscell p. 28) _has_ = _ha_ + _es_ = he
them.
III. The pronoun _he_, they (Southern _hii_, _heo_; Northumbrian _thay_).
Orm uses _þeȝȝ_, as well as _þeȝȝer_ (their), _þeȝȝm_ (them).[36]
IV. _hine_, _hin_, _in_ = him. This form occurs as late as 1340, and still
exists under the form _en_, _un_, in the modern dialects of the South of
England, but is not employed by Orm; nor do we find any traces of _whan_
(whom), another very common example of the _-n_ accusative inflection,
either in the Ormulum or the present work.
V. The substitution of _n_ for a vowel-ending in nouns. Dr Guest has
noticed this peculiarity, but he confines this substitution to the
_nominative_ case of nouns of the _n_ declension,[37] and to the definite
form of the adjective, which has, no doubt, given rise to the O.E.
_himseluen_, etc., _bothen_ (both), as well as, perhaps, to _ouren_ (ours),
_heren_ (theirs), etc.
In the present poem, however, the _n_ seems added to the vowel-ending of
all cases except the possessive, in order to rhyme with a verb in the
infinitive, a passive participle, or an adverb terminating in _-en_, and is
not always limited to nouns of the _-n_ declension, but represents in A.S.
an _a_ or _e_: 'on _boken_,'[38] on book, l. 4; 'on _soðe-sagen_,' on
sooth-saw, l. 14; _meten_, (acc.) meat, l. 2255, (nom.) 2079; _sunen_,
(nom.) son, l. 1656; 'of _luuen_,' of love, 635; 'after ðe _wunen_' (after
the custom), l. 688; _steden_, (nom.) place, 1114; 'for _on-sagen_,' for
reproach, 2045; _wliten_, (nom.) face, 3614, (acc.) 2289; 'wið _answeren_,'
in answer, 2673; _bileuen_, (acc.) remainder, 3154; _uuerslagen_, (acc.)
lintel, 3155.
Dr Guest considers this curious nunnation to be a Northern peculiarity, but
as we do not meet with it (as far as I know) in any Northumbrian work, his
statement is rather doubtful. On the other hand, it is well known that the
plurals _bretheren_ (_broðeren_[39] in Shoreham), _calveren_[40] (calves),
_children_,[41] _doren_ (doors),[42] _eyren_ (eggs),[43] _honden_
(hands),[44] _kine_,[45] _lambren_ (lambs),[46] _soulen_ (souls)—very
common forms in the _Southern_ dialects in the thirteenth and fourteenth
centuries—are examples of the substitution of _n_ for, or in addition to,
the vowel-ending, and were unknown in the Northern dialect.
The Southern dialect could drop or retain, at pleasure, the _n_ final in
the past participles, the preterite plurals, and infinitive mood of verbs.
VI. A very small Norse element in the vocabulary.
The only words of undoubtedly Norse element that occur in the present poem,
and were unknown to Southern English, are—_fro_ (from), _ille_ (bad),
_for-sweðen_ (to burn), _flitten_ (to remove), _laðe_ (barn), _lowe_
(flame), _mirk_ (dark), _ransaken_ (to search), _swaðe_ (flame), _til_
(to), _uglike_ (horrible), _werre_ (worse).[47]
The Ormulum, being more Northern, contains a _larger_ number of words that
must be referred to one of the Scandinavian idioms:[48]—_afell_ (strength),
_afledd_ (begotten), _beȝȝsc_ (bitter), *_blunnt_ (blunt, dull), _bracc_
(noise), *_braþ_ (angry), *_braþþe_ (anger), *_brodd_ (shoot), _brodden_
(to sprout), _broþþfall_ (fit), *_bun_ (ready, _bound_), *_clake_
(accusation), *_croc_ (device), *_derf_ (bold), *_dill_ (sluggish),
*_eggenn_ (to urge, egg on), *_egginng_ (urging), *_ettle_, *_flittenn_ (to
remove, flit), *_flitting_ (change, removal), *_forrgart_ (opposed,
condemned), *_forrgloppned_ (disturbed with fear, astonishment), *_gate_
(way), _gowesst_ (watchest), *_haȝherr_ (dexterous), _haȝherleȝȝc_ (skill),
*_haȝherrlike_ (fitly), _hof_ (moderation), _hofelæs_ (immoderately),
*_ille_ (bad), *_immess_ (variously), *_kinndlenn_ (to kindle), *_lasst_
(crime, fault), _leȝhe_ (hire, pay), *_leȝȝtenn_ (O.E. _layte_, inquire,
seek), _o-loft_ (aloft), *_loȝhe_ (fire), *_mune_ (must, will), _naþe_
(grace), _nowwt_ (cattle, O.N. _naut_; the Southern form is _neet_, _nete_,
A.S. _neát_), *_ploh_ (plough), *_radd_ (afraid), *_ros_ (praise), *_rosen_
(to boast), *_rosinng_ (boast), _rowwst_ (voice), *_scaldess_ (poets, O.E.
_scald_, a great talker, boaster, E. _scold_), *_sit_ (pain), *_sket_
(quickly), *_skirpeþþ_ (rejecteth), *_sloþ_ (track, path), _smikerr_
(beautiful, Eng. _smug_), _sowwþess_ (sheep), _stoffnedd_ (generated, O.E.
_stoven_, trunk, stem), *_summ_ (as), *_till_ (to), *_tór_ (hard,
difficult), *_trigg_ (true), _uppbrixle_ (object of reproach, O.E.
_brixle_, reproach), _usell_ (wretched), *_wand_ (rod), *_wandraþ_, O.E.
_wandreth_ (trouble), *_werre_ (worse).
As most, if not all, of the words in the foregoing list are not found in
works written in the Southern dialect,—so far as we at present know them—we
may reasonably suppose that they indicate fairly the Danish element in the
English literature of the 12th and 13th centuries. In the Northumbrian, and
the West, and East-Midland productions of a century later this element
prevails to a much larger extent, and Herbert Coleridge's list of such
words may be largely increased (Phil. Soc. Trans., 1859, p. 26-30).
GRAMMATICAL DETAILS.
I. NOUNS.
1. _Number._—The plural is generally formed by adding _-es_ to the
singular. Some few nouns make the plural in _-en_, as _feren_[49]
(companions), _fon_ (foes), _goren_ (spears), _loten_ (features), _sunen_
(sons), _teten_ (teats), _tren_ (trees), _weden_ (garments), _wunen_
(laws). The plurals of _brother_ and _child_ are _brethere_ and _childere_.
_Der_ (deer), _erf_, _orf_ (cattle), _got_ (goat), _neat_ (oxen), _sep_
(sheep), _scrud_ (garbs), _wrim_ (reptiles), of the neuter gender, are
uninflected in the plural. _Winter_, _ger_ (year), and _nigt_ (night), are
plural as in Anglo-Saxon.
2. _Gender._—As a general rule the names of inanimate things are of the
neuter gender. The names of towns, however, are considered as masculine.
3. _Case._—The genitive singular and plural of masculine and feminine nouns
end in _-es_. Occasionally proper nouns form the genitive in _-is_. The
means or instrument occasionally stands in the genitive without the
preposition: '_deades_ driuen,' influenced by death; '_swerdes_ slagen,'
slain of the sword; '_teres_ wet,' wet with tears. Cf. '_floures bred_,'
bread made with flour; '_bredes_ mel,' meal consisting of bread; '_wines_
drinc,' drink consisting of wine.
Corresponding to the modern word _kinsmen_ we have such forms as
'_daiges-ligt_' (daylight), '_hines-folk_' (servants), '_wifeskin_'
(women). The genitive is used adverbially, as _newes_, anew; _liues_,
alive.
We have a few traces of the genitive in _-e_ in the following examples:
'_helle_ nigt,' l. 89 (hell's night); '_helle_ bale,' l. 2525 (hell's
bale); '_sterre_ name,' l. 134 (star's name); '_safte_ same,' l. 349 (shame
of form); '_werlde_ nigt,' l. 1318 (world's night).[50]
The genitive of _fader_ and _moder_ is, as is very seldom the case in Early
English writers, _fadres_ and _modres_.
An _n_ is often added to the final _-e_ (representing an A.Sax.
vowel-ending) in the nom., dat., and acc. of nouns. For examples, see p.
xxi.
II. ADJECTIVES.
1. Adjectives have a definite and an indefinite form; the former is used
when the adjective is preceded by the definite article, a demonstrative
adjective, or possessive pronoun.
Indef. _wis_ (wise), _god_ (good).
Def. _wise_, _gode_.
2. _Number._—The plural is formed by the addition of _e_ to the singular.
SINGULAR. PLURAL.
_fet_ (fat), _fette_.
_gret_ (great) _grete_.
_other_, _othere_.
_tother_, _tothere_.
But the _-e_ (pl.) is seldom added to the past participle of irregular
verbs. _This_ forms the plurals _thes_ (oblique cases _these_), _this_
(_thise_). _Tho_ is the plural of _that_.
_Cases._—_One_ makes the genitive _ones_; as, '_ones_ bles,' of one colour.
The gen. pl. _-re_ occurs in _ald-re_ (= _alre_), of all; as, 'hure _aldre_
bale,' the bale of us all; 'here _aldre_ heuedes,' the heads of them all.
_Degrees of comparison._—The comparative ends in _-ere_ (_-er_), the
superlative in _-este_ (_est_).[51] Very few irregular forms occur in the
present poem.
POSITIVE. COMPARATIVE. SUPERLATIVE.
ille, werre. ——
lite, lesse, leist.
long, { leng. } ——
{ lengere. }
mikel, { mo, } moste.
{ mor, }
neg, —— neste.
old, eldere, eldeste.
_Numerals._—The Northumbrian forms in _-nde_ have superseded the Southern
ones in _-the_; as, _seuende_ (seventh), _egtende_ (eighth), _tende_
(tenth).[52]
III. PRONOUNS.
1. The first personal pronoun _Ic_ is never found softened into _Ich_ as in
Laȝamon's Brut, the Ancren Riwle, and other Southern works. _I_ is found
only once or twice throughout the poem.
2. The first and second personal pronouns have a _dual_ as well as a plural
number; as, _wit_, we two; _unc_, us two; _gunc_, you two; _gunker_, of you
two.
3. _Hine_ (_hin_, _in_) (acc.) occasionally occurs, but more frequently
_him_ (dat.) does duty for it.
4. _Ge_, _ghe_,[53] she, represents the A.Sax. _héo_ (O.E. _heo_, _ho_, and
_hi_). The curious form _sge_ (= _sye_), as well as _sche_, occurs for she,
the earliest instance of which is _scæ_ in the A.Sax. Chronicle.
5. The neuter pronoun is written _it_ and not _hit_, and is frequently used
as a plural. It coalesces with the pronoun _ge_, _ghe_[54] (she), and with
the preterite of verbs terminating in _-de_ or _-te_,[55] and with some few
irregular verbs; as, _sagt_ (saw there), p. 37, l. 1301. The curious form
_negt_ (in l. 3964, p. 112) = _neg_ + _it_ = nigh it.
6. The A.Sax. _hi_ (they) is represented by _he_ = _hie_.[56] _He_ is
common enough in the Romance of Havelok the Dane.[57]
The pronouns, as has already been shown, coalesce with the plural (acc.)
_is_ (them), and give us the compounds _hes_, he + them; _wes_, we +
them;[58] mes = _me_ + _hes_ = one + them.[59]
Not satisfied with joining _he_ (they) to the pronoun _is_, the author of
this poem occasionally employs the more perplexing combination _hem_ = _he_
+ _hem_, he, them.
bred kalueſ fleiſ, and flures bred,
_Roasted calves' flesh, and flour-bread,_
And buttere, _hem_ ðo sondes bed,
_And butter, he them the messengers offered._—(l. 1014.)
In ſichem feld ne fonde _hem_ nogt,
_In Shechem field found he them not._—(l. 1933.)
Ðo ſette ſundri _hem_ to waken,
_Then set sundry he them to watch._—(l. 2551.)
ðo ſeide ðuſ quanne _hem_ cam dun,
_Then said thus when he to them came down._—(l. 4022.)
In l. 2673 _hem_ seems to stand for _he_ + _hem_, they + them.
And _hem_ ſeiden wið anſweren,[60]
_And they to them said in answer._
The Southern _me_, one (Fr. _on_), is absent from this poem as well as from
the Ormulum; its place is supplied by _man_ and _men_[61] used with a verb
in the singular number. _ðe_ is frequently used as a relative pronoun as
well as _ðat_, but uninflected; _quo_ (who), _quat_ (what), are
interrogative; _whether_ signifies which of two.
TABLE OF PRONOUNS.
SINGULAR.
Nom. Ic, I ðu
Gen. min ðin
Dat. me ðe
Acc. me ðe
DUAL. PLURAL. DUAL. PLURAL.
Nom. wit we —— ge
Gen. —— ure gunker gure
Dat. —— us —— gu
Acc. unc us gunc gu
SINGULAR.
Nom. He ge, ghe (sge, sche) It
Gen. His Hire Is, His
Dat. Him Hire It
Acc. { Hin } Hire It
{ Him }
PLURAL.
Masc. Neut. Interrogative.
Nom. He It | Quo
Gen. Here Here | Quase }
| Was }
Dat. Hem It | ——
Acc. Hem It | Quam
The third personal pronoun is occasionally used reflexively; as _him_ =
himself. _Self_ is used adjectively in the sense of own, very, and the form
_selven_ (from the A.Sax. _sylfa_) is joined to the personal pronouns; as
_ðeselven_, _himselven_, etc.
The independent possessives are _min_, _ðin_, _his_ (_hise_), _hire_
(hers), _ure_ (ours), _gure_ (yours), _here_ (theirs).[62]
IV. VERBS.
_Infinitive Mood._—The infinitive terminates in _-en_, which is seldom
dropped.
There are no infinitives in _-y_ or _-ie_, as in Southern English writers,
nor do we find them in the Ormulum, or in
|
. It is equally the fact
that I had never been alone, in the sense of holding unselfish converse
with myself. I had been solitary often enough, but nothing better.
Such was my condition when I sat down to my dinner that day, in the
kitchen of the old farm-house. Such was my condition when I lay on my
bed in the old farm-house that night, stretched out opposite the narrow
mullioned window, in the cold light of the moon, like a young vampire.
FIFTH CHAPTER
WHAT do I know of Hoghton Towers? Very little; for I have been
gratefully unwilling to disturb my first impressions. A house, centuries
old, on high ground a mile or so removed from the road between Preston
and Blackburn, where the first James of England, in his hurry to make
money by making baronets, perhaps made some of those remunerative
dignitaries. A house, centuries old, deserted and falling to pieces, its
woods and gardens long since grass-land or ploughed up, the Rivers Ribble
and Darwen glancing below it, and a vague haze of smoke, against which
not even the supernatural prescience of the first Stuart could foresee a
counter-blast, hinting at steam-power, powerful in two distances.
What did I know then of Hoghton Towers? When I first peeped in at the
gate of the lifeless quadrangle, and started from the mouldering statue
becoming visible to me like its guardian ghost; when I stole round by the
back of the farm-house, and got in among the ancient rooms, many of them
with their floors and ceilings falling, the beams and rafters hanging
dangerously down, the plaster dropping as I trod, the oaken panels
stripped away, the windows half walled up, half broken; when I discovered
a gallery commanding the old kitchen, and looked down between balustrades
upon a massive old table and benches, fearing to see I know not what
dead-alive creatures come in and seat themselves, and look up with I know
not what dreadful eyes, or lack of eyes, at me; when all over the house I
was awed by gaps and chinks where the sky stared sorrowfully at me, where
the birds passed, and the ivy rustled, and the stains of winter weather
blotched the rotten floors; when down at the bottom of dark pits of
staircase, into which the stairs had sunk, green leaves trembled,
butterflies fluttered, and bees hummed in and out through the broken
door-ways; when encircling the whole ruin were sweet scents, and sights
of fresh green growth, and ever-renewing life, that I had never dreamed
of,—I say, when I passed into such clouded perception of these things as
my dark soul could compass, what did I know then of Hoghton Towers?
I have written that the sky stared sorrowfully at me. Therein have I
anticipated the answer. I knew that all these things looked sorrowfully
at me; that they seemed to sigh or whisper, not without pity for me,
‘Alas! poor worldly little devil!’
There were two or three rats at the bottom of one of the smaller pits of
broken staircase when I craned over and looked in. They were scuffling
for some prey that was there; and, when they started and hid themselves
close together in the dark, I thought of the old life (it had grown old
already) in the cellar.
How not to be this worldly little devil? how not to have a repugnance
towards myself as I had towards the rats? I hid in a corner of one of
the smaller chambers, frightened at myself, and crying (it was the first
time I had ever cried for any cause not purely physical), and I tried to
think about it. One of the farm-ploughs came into my range of view just
then; and it seemed to help me as it went on with its two horses up and
down the field so peacefully and quietly.
There was a girl of about my own age in the farm-house family, and she
sat opposite to me at the narrow table at meal-times. It had come into
my mind, at our first dinner, that she might take the fever from me. The
thought had not disquieted me then. I had only speculated how she would
look under the altered circumstances, and whether she would die. But it
came into my mind now, that I might try to prevent her taking the fever
by keeping away from her. I knew I should have but scrambling board if I
did; so much the less worldly and less devilish the deed would be, I
thought.
From that hour, I withdrew myself at early morning into secret corners of
the ruined house, and remained hidden there until she went to bed. At
first, when meals were ready, I used to hear them calling me; and then my
resolution weakened. But I strengthened it again by going farther off
into the ruin, and getting out of hearing. I often watched for her at
the dim windows; and, when I saw that she was fresh and rosy, felt much
happier.
Out of this holding her in my thoughts, to the humanising of myself, I
suppose some childish love arose within me. I felt, in some sort,
dignified by the pride of protecting her,—by the pride of making the
sacrifice for her. As my heart swelled with that new feeling, it
insensibly softened about mother and father. It seemed to have been
frozen before, and now to be thawed. The old ruin and all the lovely
things that haunted it were not sorrowful for me only, but sorrowful for
mother and father as well. Therefore did I cry again, and often too.
The farm-house family conceived me to be of a morose temper, and were
very short with me; though they never stinted me in such broken fare as
was to be got out of regular hours. One night when I lifted the kitchen
latch at my usual time, Sylvia (that was her pretty name) had but just
gone out of the room. Seeing her ascending the opposite stairs, I stood
still at the door. She had heard the clink of the latch, and looked
round.
‘George,’ she called to me in a pleased voice, ‘to-morrow is my birthday;
and we are to have a fiddler, and there’s a party of boys and girls
coming in a cart, and we shall dance. I invite you. Be sociable for
once, George.’
‘I am very sorry, miss,’ I answered; ‘but I—but, no; I can’t come.’
‘You are a disagreeable, ill-humoured lad,’ she returned disdainfully;
‘and I ought not to have asked you. I shall never speak to you again.’
As I stood with my eyes fixed on the fire, after she was gone, I felt
that the farmer bent his brows upon me.
‘Eh, lad!’ said he; ‘Sylvy’s right. You’re as moody and broody a lad as
never I set eyes on yet.’
I tried to assure him that I meant no harm; but he only said coldly,
‘Maybe not, maybe not! There, get thy supper, get thy supper; and then
thou canst sulk to thy heart’s content again.’
Ah! if they could have seen me next day, in the ruin, watching for the
arrival of the cart full of merry young guests; if they could have seen
me at night, gliding out from behind the ghostly statue, listening to the
music and the fall of dancing feet, and watching the lighted farm-house
windows from the quadrangle when all the ruin was dark; if they could
have read my heart, as I crept up to bed by the back way, comforting
myself with the reflection, ‘They will take no hurt from me,’—they would
not have thought mine a morose or an unsocial nature.
It was in these ways that I began to form a shy disposition; to be of a
timidly silent character under misconstruction; to have an inexpressible,
perhaps a morbid, dread of ever being sordid or worldly. It was in these
ways that my nature came to shape itself to such a mould, even before it
was affected by the influences of the studious and retired life of a poor
scholar.
SIXTH CHAPTER
BROTHER HAWKYARD (as he insisted on my calling him) put me to school, and
told me to work my way. ‘You are all right, George,’ he said. ‘I have
been the best servant the Lord has had in his service for this
five-and-thirty year (O, I have!); and he knows the value of such a
servant as I have been to him (O, yes, he does!); and he’ll prosper your
schooling as a part of my reward. That’s what _he_’ll do, George. He’ll
do it for me.’
From the first I could not like this familiar knowledge of the ways of
the sublime, inscrutable Almighty, on Brother Hawkyard’s part. As I grew
a little wiser, and still a little wiser, I liked it less and less. His
manner, too, of confirming himself in a parenthesis,—as if, knowing
himself, he doubted his own word,—I found distasteful. I cannot tell how
much these dislikes cost me; for I had a dread that they were worldly.
As time went on, I became a Foundation-boy on a good foundation, and I
cost Brother Hawkyard nothing. When I had worked my way so far, I worked
yet harder, in the hope of ultimately getting a presentation to college
and a fellowship. My health has never been strong (some vapour from the
Preston cellar cleaves to me, I think); and what with much work and some
weakness, I came again to be regarded—that is, by my fellow-students—as
unsocial.
All through my time as a foundation-boy, I was within a few miles of
Brother Hawkyard’s congregation; and whenever I was what we called a
leave-boy on a Sunday, I went over there at his desire. Before the
knowledge became forced upon me that outside their place of meeting these
brothers and sisters were no better than the rest of the human family,
but on the whole were, to put the case mildly, as bad as most, in respect
of giving short weight in their shops, and not speaking the truth,—I say,
before this knowledge became forced upon me, their prolix addresses,
their inordinate conceit, their daring ignorance, their investment of the
Supreme Ruler of heaven and earth with their own miserable meannesses and
littlenesses, greatly shocked me. Still, as their term for the frame of
mind that could not perceive them to be in an exalted state of grace was
the ‘worldly’ state, I did for a time suffer tortures under my inquiries
of myself whether that young worldly-devilish spirit of mine could
secretly be lingering at the bottom of my non-appreciation.
Brother Hawkyard was the popular expounder in this assembly, and
generally occupied the platform (there was a little platform with a table
on it, in lieu of a pulpit) first, on a Sunday afternoon. He was by
trade a drysalter. Brother Gimblet, an elderly man with a crabbed face,
a large dog’s-eared shirt-collar, and a spotted blue neckerchief reaching
up behind to the crown of his head, was also a drysalter and an
expounder. Brother Gimblet professed the greatest admiration for Brother
Hawkyard, but (I had thought more than once) bore him a jealous grudge.
Let whosoever may peruse these lines kindly take the pains here to read
twice my solemn pledge, that what I write of the language and customs of
the congregation in question I write scrupulously, literally, exactly,
from the life and the truth.
On the first Sunday after I had won what I had so long tried for, and
when it was certain that I was going up to college, Brother Hawkyard
concluded a long exhortation thus:
‘Well, my friends and fellow-sinners, now I told you when I began, that I
didn’t know a word of what I was going to say to you (and no, I did
not!), but that it was all one to me, because I knew the Lord would put
into my mouth the words I wanted.’
(‘That’s it!’ from Brother Gimblet.)
‘And he did put into my mouth the words I wanted.’
(‘So he did!’ from Brother Gimblet.)
‘And why?’
(‘Ah, let’s have that!’ from Brother Gimblet.)
‘Because I have been his faithful servant for five-and-thirty years, and
because he knows it. For five-and-thirty years! And he knows it, mind
you! I got those words that I wanted on account of my wages. I got ’em
from the Lord, my fellow-sinners. Down! I said, “Here’s a heap of wages
due; let us have something down, on account.” And I got it down, and I
paid it over to you; and you won’t wrap it up in a napkin, nor yet in a
towel, nor yet pocketankercher, but you’ll put it out at good interest.
Very well. Now, my brothers and sisters and fellow-sinners, I am going
to conclude with a question, and I’ll make it so plain (with the help of
the Lord, after five-and-thirty years, I should rather hope!) as that the
Devil shall not be able to confuse it in your heads,—which he would be
overjoyed to do.’
(‘Just his way. Crafty old blackguard!’ from Brother Gimblet.)
‘And the question is this, Are the angels learned?’
(‘Not they. Not a bit on it!’ from Brother Gimblet, with the greatest
confidence.)
‘Not they. And where’s the proof? sent ready-made by the hand of the
Lord. Why, there’s one among us here now, that has got all the learning
that can be crammed into him. _I_ got him all the learning that could be
crammed into him. His grandfather’ (this I had never heard before) ‘was
a brother of ours. He was Brother Parksop. That’s what he was.
Parksop; Brother Parksop. His worldly name was Parksop, and he was a
brother of this brotherhood. Then wasn’t he Brother Parksop?’
(‘Must be. Couldn’t help hisself!’ from Brother Gimblet.)
‘Well, he left that one now here present among us to the care of a
brother-sinner of his (and that brother-sinner, mind you, was a sinner of
a bigger size in his time than any of you; praise the Lord!), Brother
Hawkyard. Me. _I_ got him without fee or reward,—without a morsel of
myrrh, or frankincense, nor yet amber, letting alone the honeycomb,—all
the learning that could be crammed into him. Has it brought him into our
temple, in the spirit? No. Have we had any ignorant brothers and
sisters that didn’t know round O from crooked S, come in among us
meanwhile? Many. Then the angels are _not_ learned; then they don’t so
much as know their alphabet. And now, my friends and fellow-sinners,
having brought it to that, perhaps some brother present—perhaps you,
Brother Gimblet—will pray a bit for us?’
Brother Gimblet undertook the sacred function, after having drawn his
sleeve across his mouth, and muttered, ‘Well! I don’t know as I see my
way to hitting any of you quite in the right place neither.’ He said
this with a dark smile, and then began to bellow. What we were specially
to be preserved from, according to his solicitations, was, despoilment of
the orphan, suppression of testamentary intentions on the part of a
father or (say) grandfather, appropriation of the orphan’s
house-property, feigning to give in charity to the wronged one from whom
we withheld his due; and that class of sins. He ended with the petition,
‘Give us peace!’ which, speaking for myself, was very much needed after
twenty minutes of his bellowing.
Even though I had not seen him when he rose from his knees, steaming with
perspiration, glance at Brother Hawkyard, and even though I had not heard
Brother Hawkyard’s tone of congratulating him on the vigour with which he
had roared, I should have detected a malicious application in this
prayer. Unformed suspicions to a similar effect had sometimes passed
through my mind in my earlier school-days, and had always caused me great
distress; for they were worldly in their nature, and wide, very wide, of
the spirit that had drawn me from Sylvia. They were sordid suspicions,
without a shadow of proof. They were worthy to have originated in the
unwholesome cellar. They were not only without proof, but against proof;
for was I not myself a living proof of what Brother Hawkyard had done?
and without him, how should I ever have seen the sky look sorrowfully
down upon that wretched boy at Hoghton Towers?
Although the dread of a relapse into a stage of savage selfishness was
less strong upon me as I approached manhood, and could act in an
increased degree for myself, yet I was always on my guard against any
tendency to such relapse. After getting these suspicions under my feet,
I had been troubled by not being able to like Brother Hawkyard’s manner,
or his professed religion. So it came about, that, as I walked back that
Sunday evening, I thought it would be an act of reparation for any such
injury my struggling thoughts had unwillingly done him, if I wrote, and
placed in his hands, before going to college, a full acknowledgment of
his goodness to me, and an ample tribute of thanks. It might serve as an
implied vindication of him against any dark scandal from a rival brother
and expounder, or from any other quarter.
Accordingly, I wrote the document with much care. I may add with much
feeling too; for it affected me as I went on. Having no set studies to
pursue, in the brief interval between leaving the Foundation and going to
Cambridge, I determined to walk out to his place of business, and give it
into his own hands.
It was a winter afternoon, when I tapped at the door of his little
counting-house, which was at the farther end of his long, low shop. As I
did so (having entered by the back yard, where casks and boxes were taken
in, and where there was the inscription, ‘Private way to the
counting-house’), a shopman called to me from the counter that he was
engaged.
‘Brother Gimblet’ (said the shopman, who was one of the brotherhood) ‘is
with him.’
I thought this all the better for my purpose, and made bold to tap again.
They were talking in a low tone, and money was passing; for I heard it
being counted out.
‘Who is it?’ asked Brother Hawkyard, sharply.
‘George Silverman,’ I answered, holding the door open. ‘May I come in?’
Both brothers seemed so astounded to see me that I felt shyer than usual.
But they looked quite cadaverous in the early gaslight, and perhaps that
accidental circumstance exaggerated the expression of their faces.
‘What is the matter?’ asked Brother Hawkyard.
‘Ay! what is the matter?’ asked Brother Gimblet.
‘Nothing at all,’ I said, diffidently producing my document: ‘I am only
the bearer of a letter from myself.’
‘From yourself, George?’ cried Brother Hawkyard.
‘And to you,’ said I.
‘And to me, George?’
He turned paler, and opened it hurriedly; but looking over it, and seeing
generally what it was, became less hurried, recovered his colour, and
said, ‘Praise the Lord!’
‘That’s it!’ cried Brother Gimblet. ‘Well put! Amen.’
Brother Hawkyard then said, in a livelier strain, ‘You must know, George,
that Brother Gimblet and I are going to make our two businesses one. We
are going into partnership. We are settling it now. Brother Gimblet is
to take one clear half of the profits (O, yes! he shall have it; he shall
have it to the last farthing).’
‘D.V.!’ said Brother Gimblet, with his right fist firmly clinched on his
right leg.
‘There is no objection,’ pursued Brother Hawkyard, ‘to my reading this
aloud, George?’
As it was what I expressly desired should be done, after yesterday’s
prayer, I more than readily begged him to read it aloud. He did so; and
Brother Gimblet listened with a crabbed smile.
‘It was in a good hour that I came here,’ he said, wrinkling up his eyes.
‘It was in a good hour, likewise, that I was moved yesterday to depict
for the terror of evil-doers a character the direct opposite of Brother
Hawkyard’s. But it was the Lord that done it: I felt him at it while I
was perspiring.’
After that it was proposed by both of them that I should attend the
congregation once more before my final departure. What my shy reserve
would undergo, from being expressly preached at and prayed at, I knew
beforehand. But I reflected that it would be for the last time, and that
it might add to the weight of my letter. It was well known to the
brothers and sisters that there was no place taken for me in _their_
paradise; and if I showed this last token of deference to Brother
Hawkyard, notoriously in despite of my own sinful inclinations, it might
go some little way in aid of my statement that he had been good to me,
and that I was grateful to him. Merely stipulating, therefore, that no
express endeavour should be made for my conversion,—which would involve
the rolling of several brothers and sisters on the floor, declaring that
they felt all their sins in a heap on their left side, weighing so many
pounds avoirdupois, as I knew from what I had seen of those repulsive
mysteries,—I promised.
Since the reading of my letter, Brother Gimblet had been at intervals
wiping one eye with an end of his spotted blue neckerchief, and grinning
to himself. It was, however, a habit that brother had, to grin in an
ugly manner even when expounding. I call to mind a delighted snarl with
which he used to detail from the platform the torments reserved for the
wicked (meaning all human creation except the brotherhood), as being
remarkably hideous.
I left the two to settle their articles of partnership, and count money;
and I never saw them again but on the following Sunday. Brother Hawkyard
died within two or three years, leaving all he possessed to Brother
Gimblet, in virtue of a will dated (as I have been told) that very day.
Now I was so far at rest with myself, when Sunday came, knowing that I
had conquered my own mistrust, and righted Brother Hawkyard in the
jaundiced vision of a rival, that I went, even to that coarse chapel, in
a less sensitive state than usual. How could I foresee that the
delicate, perhaps the diseased, corner of my mind, where I winced and
shrunk when it was touched, or was even approached, would be handled as
the theme of the whole proceedings?
On this occasion it was assigned to Brother Hawkyard to pray, and to
Brother Gimblet to preach. The prayer was to open the ceremonies; the
discourse was to come next. Brothers Hawkyard and Gimblet were both on
the platform; Brother Hawkyard on his knees at the table, unmusically
ready to pray; Brother Gimblet sitting against the wall, grinningly ready
to preach.
‘Let us offer up the sacrifice of prayer, my brothers and sisters and
fellow-sinners.’ Yes; but it was I who was the sacrifice. It was our
poor, sinful, worldly-minded brother here present who was wrestled for.
The now-opening career of this our unawakened brother might lead to his
becoming a minister of what was called ‘the church.’ That was what _he_
looked to. The church. Not the chapel, Lord. The church. No rectors,
no vicars, no archdeacons, no bishops, no archbishops, in the chapel,
but, O Lord! many such in the church. Protect our sinful brother from
his love of lucre. Cleanse from our unawakened brother’s breast his sin
of worldly-mindedness. The prayer said infinitely more in words, but
nothing more to any intelligible effect.
Then Brother Gimblet came forward, and took (as I knew he would) the
text, ‘My kingdom is not of this world.’ Ah! but whose was, my
fellow-sinners? Whose? Why, our brother’s here present was. The only
kingdom he had an idea of was of this world. (‘That’s it!’ from several
of the congregation.) What did the woman do when she lost the piece of
money? Went and looked for it. What should our brother do when he lost
his way? (‘Go and look for it,’ from a sister.) Go and look for it,
true. But must he look for it in the right direction, or in the wrong?
(‘In the right,’ from a brother.) There spake the prophets! He must
look for it in the right direction, or he couldn’t find it. But he had
turned his back upon the right direction, and he wouldn’t find it. Now,
my fellow-sinners, to show you the difference betwixt worldly-mindedness
and unworldly-mindedness, betwixt kingdoms not of this world and kingdoms
_of_ this world, here was a letter wrote by even our worldly-minded
brother unto Brother Hawkyard. Judge, from hearing of it read, whether
Brother Hawkyard was the faithful steward that the Lord had in his mind
only t’other day, when, in this very place, he drew you the picter of the
unfaithful one; for it was him that done it, not me. Don’t doubt that!
Brother Gimblet then groaned and bellowed his way through my composition,
and subsequently through an hour. The service closed with a hymn, in
which the brothers unanimously roared, and the sisters unanimously
shrieked at me, That I by wiles of worldly gain was mocked, and they on
waters of sweet love were rocked; that I with mammon struggled in the
dark, while they were floating in a second ark.
I went out from all this with an aching heart and a weary spirit: not
because I was quite so weak as to consider these narrow creatures
interpreters of the Divine Majesty and Wisdom, but because I was weak
enough to feel as though it were my hard fortune to be misrepresented and
misunderstood, when I most tried to subdue any risings of mere
worldliness within me, and when I most hoped that, by dint of trying
earnestly, I had succeeded.
SEVENTH CHAPTER
MY timidity and my obscurity occasioned me to live a secluded life at
college, and to be little known. No relative ever came to visit me, for
I had no relative. No intimate friends broke in upon my studies, for I
made no intimate friends. I supported myself on my scholarship, and read
much. My college time was otherwise not so very different from my time
at Hoghton Towers.
Knowing myself to be unfit for the noisier stir of social existence, but
believing myself qualified to do my duty in a moderate, though earnest
way, if I could obtain some small preferment in the Church, I applied my
mind to the clerical profession. In due sequence I took orders, was
ordained, and began to look about me for employment. I must observe that
I had taken a good degree, that I had succeeded in winning a good
fellowship, and that my means were ample for my retired way of life. By
this time I had read with several young men; and the occupation increased
my income, while it was highly interesting to me. I once accidentally
overheard our greatest don say, to my boundless joy, ‘That he heard it
reported of Silverman that his gift of quiet explanation, his patience,
his amiable temper, and his conscientiousness made him the best of
coaches.’ May my ‘gift of quiet explanation’ come more seasonably and
powerfully to my aid in this present explanation than I think it will!
It may be in a certain degree owing to the situation of my college-rooms
(in a corner where the daylight was sobered), but it is in a much larger
degree referable to the state of my own mind, that I seem to myself, on
looking back to this time of my life, to have been always in the peaceful
shade. I can see others in the sunlight; I can see our boats’ crews and
our athletic young men on the glistening water, or speckled with the
moving lights of sunlit leaves; but I myself am always in the shadow
looking on. Not unsympathetically,—God forbid!—but looking on alone,
much as I looked at Sylvia from the shadows of the ruined house, or
looked at the red gleam shining through the farmer’s windows, and
listened to the fall of dancing feet, when all the ruin was dark that
night in the quadrangle.
I now come to the reason of my quoting that laudation of myself above
given. Without such reason, to repeat it would have been mere
boastfulness.
Among those who had read with me was Mr. Fareway, second son of Lady
Fareway, widow of Sir Gaston Fareway, baronet. This young gentleman’s
abilities were much above the average; but he came of a rich family, and
was idle and luxurious. He presented himself to me too late, and
afterwards came to me too irregularly, to admit of my being of much
service to him. In the end, I considered it my duty to dissuade him from
going up for an examination which he could never pass; and he left
college without a degree. After his departure, Lady Fareway wrote to me,
representing the justice of my returning half my fee, as I had been of so
little use to her son. Within my knowledge a similar demand had not been
made in any other case; and I most freely admit that the justice of it
had not occurred to me until it was pointed out. But I at once perceived
it, yielded to it, and returned the money—
Mr. Fareway had been gone two years or more, and I had forgotten him,
when he one day walked into my rooms as I was sitting at my books.
Said he, after the usual salutations had passed, ‘Mr. Silverman, my
mother is in town here, at the hotel, and wishes me to present you to
her.’
I was not comfortable with strangers, and I dare say I betrayed that I
was a little nervous or unwilling. ‘For,’ said he, without my having
spoken, ‘I think the interview may tend to the advancement of your
prospects.’
It put me to the blush to think that I should be tempted by a worldly
reason, and I rose immediately.
Said Mr. Fareway, as we went along, ‘Are you a good hand at business?’
‘I think not,’ said I.
Said Mr. Fareway then, ‘My mother is.’
‘Truly?’ said I.
‘Yes: my mother is what is usually called a managing woman. Doesn’t make
a bad thing, for instance, even out of the spendthrift habits of my
eldest brother abroad. In short, a managing woman. This is in
confidence.’
He had never spoken to me in confidence, and I was surprised by his doing
so. I said I should respect his confidence, of course, and said no more
on the delicate subject. We had but a little way to walk, and I was soon
in his mother’s company. He presented me, shook hands with me, and left
us two (as he said) to business.
I saw in my Lady Fareway a handsome, well-preserved lady of somewhat
large stature, with a steady glare in her great round dark eyes that
embarrassed me.
Said my lady, ‘I have heard from my son, Mr. Silverman, that you would be
glad of some preferment in the church.’ I gave my lady to understand
that was so.
‘I don’t know whether you are aware,’ my lady proceeded, ‘that we have a
presentation to a living? I say _we_ have; but, in point of fact, _I_
have.’
I gave my lady to understand that I had not been aware of this.
Said my lady, ‘So it is: indeed I have two presentations,—one to two
hundred a year, one to six. Both livings are in our county,—North
Devonshire,—as you probably know. The first is vacant. Would you like
it?’
What with my lady’s eyes, and what with the suddenness of this proposed
gift, I was much confused.
‘I am sorry it is not the larger presentation,’ said my lady, rather
coldly; ‘though I will not, Mr. Silverman, pay you the bad compliment of
supposing that _you_ are, because that would be mercenary,—and mercenary
I am persuaded you are not.’
Said I, with my utmost earnestness, ‘Thank you, Lady Fareway, thank you,
thank you! I should be deeply hurt if I thought I bore the character.’
‘Naturally,’ said my lady. ‘Always detestable, but particularly in a
clergyman. You have not said whether you will like the living?’
With apologies for my remissness or indistinctness, I assured my lady
that I accepted it most readily and gratefully. I added that I hoped she
would not estimate my appreciation of the generosity of her choice by my
flow of words; for I was not a ready man in that respect when taken by
surprise or touched at heart.
‘The affair is concluded,’ said my lady; ‘concluded. You will find the
duties very light, Mr. Silverman. Charming house; charming little
garden, orchard, and all that. You will be able to take pupils. By the
bye! No: I will return to the word afterwards. What was I going to
mention, when it put me out?’
My lady stared at me, as if I knew. And I didn’t know. And that
perplexed me afresh.
Said my lady, after some consideration, ‘O, of course, how very dull of
me! The last incumbent,—least mercenary man I ever saw,—in consideration
of the duties being so light and the house so delicious, couldn’t rest,
he said, unless I permitted him to help me with my correspondence,
accounts, and various little things of that kind; nothing in themselves,
but which it worries a lady to cope with. Would Mr. Silverman also like
to—? Or shall I—?’
I hastened to say that my poor help would be always at her ladyship’s
service.
‘I am absolutely blessed,’ said my lady, casting up her eyes (and so
taking them off me for one moment), ‘in having to do with gentlemen who
cannot endure an approach to the idea of being mercenary!’ She shivered
at the word. ‘And now as to the pupil.’
‘The—?’ I was quite at a loss.
‘Mr. Silverman, you have no idea what she is. She is,’ said my lady,
laying her touch upon my coat-sleeve, ‘I do verily believe, the most
extraordinary girl in this world. Already knows more Greek and Latin
than Lady Jane Grey. And taught herself! Has not yet, remember, derived
a moment’s advantage from Mr. Silverman
|
may be, flutters over fifty feet of
flat rock, before it falls for another hundred, where it jumps from
shelf to shelf, first turning this way and that way, striving to get out
of the hollow, till it finally comes to the plain.”
Our party on this occasion consisted of three,—Peter Hummel, a
bark-gatherer, and myself. I had chosen these fellows for the
expedition, because of their friendship for me and their willingness to
go, and I now resolved to give them a treat at the “Grand Hotel,” which
the wild fellows in their ignorance had ever looked upon as a kind of
paradise. You are aware, I suppose, that the Mountain House is an
establishment vieing in its style of accommodations with the best hotels
of the city. Between it and the Hudson there is, during the summer, an
hourly line of stages, and it is the transient resort of thousands, who
go there for the novelty of the scenery. The edifice itself stands on a
cliff, within a few feet of the edge, and commands a most magnificent
prospect, extending from Long Island Sound to the Green and White
mountains. The first time I was there, I spent half the night at my
bedroom window, watching the fantastic performances of a thunder-storm
far below me, which made the building tremble like a leaf, and reminded
me of Milton’s description of hell; while the sky above was cloudless,
and studded with stars. Between this spot and South Peak, “there’s the
High Peak and the Round Top, which lay back, like a father and mother
among their children, seeing they are far above all the other hills.”
But to proceed. Coarsely and comically dressed as we were, we made a
very unique appearance as we paraded into the office of the hotel. I met
a few acquaintances there, to whom I introduced my comrades, and in a
short time each one of them was spinning a mountain legend to a crowd of
astonished and delighted listeners. In due time I ushered them into the
dining-room, where was enacted a scene which can be better imagined than
described. A Chinese in Victoria’s drawing-room, would not be more
completely out of his element, or be the cause of heartier laughter,
than were these men among the soup, ice-creams, and silver forks of the
“Yankee Palace,” as the house has been christened by the Dutch under the
mountains.
About the middle of the afternoon we commenced descending the beautiful
mountain road, and a jolly time we had of it, I assure you. A little
while before there had been a heavy shower, and a thousand happy rills
attended us with a song. A delightful nook on this road is pointed out
as the identical spot where Rip Van Winkle slept away a score of his
life. I reached home in time to spend the twilight hour in my room,
musing upon the solemn and much loved mountains. I had but one
companion, and that was a sweet whip-poor-will, which nightly comes to
my window sill, to tell me a tale of its love or of the woods and
solitary wilderness.
But the most unique and interesting of my fishing adventures, remains to
be described. I have heard a great deal about a certain lake among the
mountains, (the same alluded to above,) and I desired to visit it, and
spend a night upon its shore. Having again spoken to Peter Hummel, and
invited a neighbor to accompany us, whom they call White Yankee, the
noon-tide hour of last Thursday found us on our winding way. And such a
grotesque appearance as we made, would have caused you to laugh most
heartily, I am sure. The group was mostly _animated_, when climbing the
steep and rocky ravines which we were compelled to pass through. There
was Peter, “long, lank, and lean,” and wild in his attire and
countenance as an eagle of the wilderness, with an axe in his hand, and
a huge knapsack on his back, containing our provisions and utensils for
cooking. Next to him followed White Yankee, with three blankets lashed
upon his back, a slouched white hat on his head, and a half pound of
tobacco in his mouth. Crooked legged withal, and somewhat sickly was
this individual, and being wholly unaccustomed to this kind of business,
he went along groaning, grunting, and sweating, as if he was “sent for,
and _didn’t want_ to come.” In the rear trotted along your humble
friend, with a gun upon his shoulder, a powder-horn and shot-pouch at
his side, cowhide boots on his feet, and a cap on his head—his beard
half an inch long, and his long hair streaming in the wind.
We reached our place of destination about five o’clock, and halted under
a large impending rock, which was to be our sleeping place. We were
emphatically under the “shadow of a rock, in a weary land.” Our first
business was to build a fire, which we did with about one cord of green
and dry wood. Eighty poles were then cut, to which we fastened our
lines. The old canoe in the lake was bailed out, and, having baited our
hooks with the small fish which we brought with us, we arranged the
poles around the lake, in about seven feet water. We then prepared and
ate our supper, and awaited the coming on of night. During this
interval, I learned from Peter the following particulars concerning the
lake. It was originally discovered by a hunter named Shew, after whom it
has always been called. It was estimated to cover about fifty acres,
and, in some places, to be more than two hundred feet in depth. For my
part, however, I should have said that it did not contain five acres,
but the mountains, which lower above it on every side, are calculated to
deceive the eye; but, as to its depth, I could fancy it to be
bottomless, for the water is apparently as black as ink. To the number
of trout in it there seems to be no end. It is supposed they reach it,
when small, through the brook already mentioned, when they increase in
size, and multiply. Peter says he caught one there once which weighed a
little over five pounds, and a speckled, common trout, too. It also
abounds in green and scarlet lizards, which would be a serious drawback
to the pleasures of the fastidious. I asked Peter many questions
concerning his adventures about this lake, and he told me that the
number of “harmless murders” which he had committed here were two or
three hundred. In one day, he shot three deer; at another time, a dozen
turkeys; at another, twenty ducks; one night, an old bear; and again,
half a dozen coons; and, on one occasion, annihilated a den of
thirty-seven rattlesnakes. This will give you some idea of the stories
which I hear from this man; but you cannot conceive the peculiar
enjoyment they afford me: it is because they are associated with my
“boyhood’s home,”—my wilderness home, in my much-loved Michigan.
At nine o’clock, we lighted a torch and went to examine our lines; and
it was my peculiarly good fortune to haul out not less than forty-one
trout, weighing from one to two pounds a-piece. Now, if this wasn’t
sport, I should like to know what is? These we put into a spring of the
coldest water I ever tasted, and then “laid down in our loneliness,” as
Coleridge would have said on the occasion. Branches of hemlock
constituted our couch, and my station was between Peter and White
Yankee. Little did I dream, when I first saw these two bipeds, that I
should ever have them for my bedfellows. But who, alas! can always have
the bedfellow he desires? Think you that we could not sleep soundly in
that lap of the forest, between the sheltering rock and the roaring
fire? Yea, my friends were in the land of Nod in less than a dozen
minutes; but it was hard for me to go to sleep, tired as I was, in the
midst of such a scene. There I lay, flat upon my back, a stone and my
cap for a pillow, wrapt up in my blanket, with nothing but my nose and
eyes exposed to the chilly night air. Oh! what pictures did my fancy
conjure up, as I looked upon the army of trunks around me, glistening in
the fire-light. One moment they were a troop of Indians from the
spirit-land, come to revisit again the hunting-grounds of their fathers,
and weeping that the white man had desecrated their soil; and again, I
fancied them to be a congress of wild animals, assembled together to
try, execute, and devour us, for the depredations our fellows had
committed upon their kind for the last one hundred years. By and by, a
star peered upon me from between the branches of a tree, and my thoughts
ascended heavenward. And now, my eyes twinkled and blinked in sympathy
with the star, and I was a dreamer.
An hour after the witching time of night, I was startled from my sleep
by a bellowing halloo from Peter, who said it was time to examine the
lines again. Had you heard the echoes which were then awakened, far and
near, you would have thought yourself in enchanted land. But there were
_living_ answers to that shout, for a frightened fox began to bark; an
owl commenced its horrible hootings; a partridge its drumming; and a
wolf its howl. There was not a breeze stirring, and
“Nought was seen, in the vault on high,
But the moon, and the stars, and a cloudless sky,
And a river of white in the welkin blue.”
Peter and Yankee went out to haul in the trout, but I remained on shore,
to attempt a drawing, by moonlight, of the lake before me. The opposite
side of the mountain, with its dark tangled forest, was perfectly
mirrored in the waters below, the whole seeming as solid and variegated
as a tablet of Egyptian marble. The canoe with its inmates noiselessly
pursued its way, making the stillness more profound. In the water at my
feet I distinctly saw lizards sporting about, and I could not but wonder
why such creatures were created. I thought, with the Ancient Mariner,
“A thousand slimy things lived on,
And so did I.”
Again we retired to rest, and slept till day-break. We visited our hooks
once more, and took them up, and found that we had one hundred and two
trout, averaging more than a pound a-piece. We then partook of a
substantial breakfast of this delicious fish, which were cooked by me as
well as anybody could do it, and, having gathered up our plunder,
started for home.
The accidents we met with during the night were harmless, though they
might have proved serious. A paper of Locofoco matches, which Peter
carried in his breeches pocket, took fire, and gave him such a scorching
that he bellowed lustily. White Yankee, in his restless slumber, rolled
so near our watch-fire, that he barely escaped with one corner of his
blanket, the remainder having been consumed. As for me, I only got
pitched into the water up to my middle, while endeavoring to reach the
end of a log which extended into the lake. In descending the mountain, I
shot three partridges, and confoundedly frightened a fox, and by noon
was in my snug studio, commencing a picture from one of my last
sketches.
But lo! my candle is flickering in the socket, and I must say, Good
night!
A SPRING DAY
May is near its close, and I am still at work in the valley of the
Hudson. Spring is indeed come again, and this, for the present year, has
been its day of triumph. The moment I awoke, at dawn, this morning, I
knew by intuition that it would be so, and I bounded from my couch like
a startled deer, impatient for the cool delicious air. Spring is upon
the earth once more, and a new life is given me of enjoyment and hope.
The year is in its childhood, and my heart clings to it with a sympathy,
that I feel must be immortal and divine. What I have done to-day, I
cannot tell: I only know that my body has been tremulous with feeling,
and my eyes almost blinded with seeing. Every hour has been fraught with
a new emotion of delight, and presented to my vision numberless pictures
of surpassing beauty. I have held communion with the sky, the mountains,
the streams, the woods, and the fields: and these, if you please, shall
be themes of my present letter.
The sky! It has been of as deep an azure, and as serene, as ever
canopied the world. It seemed as if you could look _through_ it, into
the illimitable home of the angels—could almost behold the glory which
surrounds the Invisible. Three clouds alone have attracted my attention.
One was the offspring of the dawn, and encircled by a rim of gold; the
next was the daughter of noon, and white as a pearl; and the last, of
evening, and robed in deepest crimson. Wayward and coquettish creatures
were these clouds! Their chief ambition seemed to be to display their
charms to the best advantage, as if conscious of their loveliness; and,
at sunset, when the light lay pillowed on the mountains, it was a joyous
sight to see them, side by side, like three sweet sisters, as they were,
_going home_. Each one was anxious to favor the world with its own last
smile, so that, by their changing places so often, you would have
thought they were all unwilling to depart. But they were the ministers
of the Sun, and he would not tarry for them; and, while he beckoned them
to follow on, the Evening Star took his station in the sky, and bade
them depart: and when I looked again, they were gone. Never more,
thought I, will those clouds be a source of joy to a human heart. And in
this respect, also, they seemed to me to be the emblems of those
beautiful but thoughtless maidens, who spend the flower of youth
trifling with the affections of all whom they have the power to
fascinate.
The mountains! In honor of the season which has just clothed them in the
richest green, they have displayed every one of their varied and
interesting charms. At noon, as I lay under the shadow of a tree,
watching them “with a look made of all sweet accord,” my face was
freshened by a breeze. It seemed to come from the summit of South Peak,
and to be the voice of the Catskills. I listened, and these were the
words which echoed through my ear.
“Of all the seasons, oh, Spring! thou art the most beloved, and to us,
always the most welcome. Joy and gladness ever attend thy coming, for we
know that the ‘winter is past, the rains are over and gone, the time of
the singing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in
our land.’ And we know, too, that from thy hands flow unnumbered
blessings. Thou softenest the earth, that the husbandman may sow his
seed, which shall yield him a thousand fold at the harvest. Thou
releasest the rivers from their icy fetters, that the wings of commerce
may be unfurled once more. Thou givest food to the cattle upon a
thousand hills, that they, in their turn, may furnish man with necessary
food, and also assist him in his domestic labors. Thou coverest the
earth with a garniture of freshest loveliness, that the senses of man
may be gratified, and his thoughts directed to Him who hath created all
things, and pronounced them good. And, finally, thou art the hope of the
year, and thine admonitions, which are of the future, have a tendency to
emancipate the thoughts of man from this world, and the troubles which
may surround him here, and fix them upon that clime where an everlasting
spring abides.” “The voice in my dreaming ear melted away,” and I heard
the roaring of the streams as they fretted their way down the rocky
steeps.
The streams! Such “trumpets” as they have, blown to-day, would, I am
afraid, have caused Mr. Wordsworth to exclaim:
“The cataracts—_make a devilish noise up yonder_.”
The fact is, “all the earth is gay,” and all the springs among the
mountains “giving themselves up to jollity,” the streams are full to
overflowing, and rush along with a “vindictive looseness,” because of
the burden they have to bear. The falls and cascades, which make such
exquisite pictures in the summer months, are now fearful to behold, for,
in their anger, every now and then they toss some giant tree into an
abyss of foam, which makes one fear the effects of an earthquake. But,
after the streams have left the mountains, and are running through the
bottom lands, they still seem to be displeased at something, and at
_every turn_ they take, _delve_ into the “bowels of the harmless earth,”
making it dangerous for the angler to approach too near, but rendering
the haunt of the trout more spacious and commodious than before. The
streams are about the only things I cannot praise to-day, and I hope it
will not _rain_ for a month to come, if this is the way they intend to
act whenever we have a number of delightful showers.
The woods! A goodly portion of the day have I spent in one of their most
secret recesses. I went with Shakspeare under my arm, but could not
read, any more than fly, so I stretched myself at full length on a huge
log, and kept a sharp look-out for anything that might send me a waking
dream. The brotherhood of trees clustered around me, laden with leaves
just bursting into full maturity, and possessing that delicate and
peculiar green, which lasts but a single day, and never returns. A
fitful breeze swept through them, so that ever and anon I fancied a
gushing fountain to be near, or that a company of ladies fair were come
to visit me, and that I heard the rustle of their silken kirtles. And
now my eyes rested on a tree, that was entirely leafless, and almost
without a limb. Instead of grass at its foot, was a heap of dry leaves,
and not a bush or vine grew anywhere near it, but around its neighbors
they grew in great abundance. It seemed branded with a curse, alone,
forsaken of its own, and despised by all. Can this, thought I, be an
emblem of any human being? Strange that it should be, but it is
nevertheless too true. Only one week ago, I saw a poor miserable maniac,
bound hand and foot, driven from “home and all its treasures,” and
carried to a dark, damp prison-house in a neighboring town. We can be
reconciled to the mystery of a poisonous reptile’s existence, but it is
very hard to understand for what good purpose a maniac is created. But
to return. Another object I noticed, was a little tree about five feet
high, completely covered with blossoms of a gaudy hue. At first, I tried
to gather something poetical out of this thing, but could not to save my
life. It caused me a real hearty laugh as the idea expanded, for it
reminded me of a certain maiden lady of my acquaintance, who is _old_,
_stunted_, very fond of _tall men_, and always strutting round under a
weight of _jewelry_. But oh, what beautiful flowers did I notice in that
shady grove, whose whispering thrilled me with delight! Their names? I
cannot tell them to you—they _ought_ to have no names, any more than a
cloud or a foam-bell on the river. Some were blue, some white, some
purple, and some scarlet. There were little parties of them on every
side, and as the wind swayed their delicate stems, I could not but fancy
they were living creatures, the personified thoughts perhaps of happy
and innocent children. Occasionally, too, I noticed a sort of straggler
peeping at me from beside a hillock of moss, or from under the branches
of a fallen tree, as if surprised at my temerity in entering its
secluded haunt. Birds also were around me in that greenwood sanctuary,
singing their hymns of praise to the Father of mercies for the return of
spring. The nests of the females being already built, they had nothing
to do but be happy, anticipating the time when they themselves should be
the “dealers-out of some small blessings” to their own dear helpless
broods. As to their mates, they were about as independent, restless and
noisy as might be expected, very much as any rational man would be who
was the husband of a young and beautiful wife.
But the open fields to-day have superabounded with pictures to please
and instruct the mind. I know not where to begin to describe them. Shall
it be at the very threshold of our farm-house? Well, then, only look at
those lilac trees in the garden, actually top-heavy with purple and
white flowering pyramids. The old farmer has just cut a number of large
branches, and given them to his little daughter to carry to her mother,
who will distribute them between the mantel-piece, the table, and the
fire-place of the family sitting-room. But what ambrosial odor is that
which now salutes the senses? It comes not from the variegated corner of
the garden, where the tulip, the violet, the hyacinth, the blue bell,
and the lily of the valley are vieing to outstrip each other in their
attire; nor, from that clover-covered lawn, besprinkled with buttercups,
dandelions, strawberry blossoms, and honeysuckles; but from the orchard,
every one of whose trees are completely covered with snow-white
blossoms. And from their numberless petals, emanates the murmur of bees,
as they are busy extracting stores of honey. Oh, what an abundance of
fruit—of apples, cherries, peaches, and pears, do these sweet blossoms
promise! But, next week there _may_ be a bitter _frost_; and this is the
lesson which my heart learns. Now that I am in the spring-time of life,
my hopes, in number and beauty, are like the blossoms of trees, and I
know not but they may even on the morrow be withered by the chilly
breath of the grave. But let us loiter farther on. The western slope of
this gentle hill is equally divided, and of two different shades of
green; one is planted with rye, and the other with wheat. The eastern
slope of the hill has lately been loosened by the plough, and is of a
sombre color, but to my eye not less pleasing than the green. And this
view is enlivened with figures besides—for a farmer and two boys are
planting corn, the latter opening the bed with their hoes, and the
farmer dropping in the seed (which he carries in a bag slung at his
side), and pushing it with his foot. And now, fluttering over their
heads is a roguish bob-o-link, _scolding_ about something in their
_wake_, at a _respectful_ distance, and hopping along the ground are a
number of robins, and on the nearest fence a meadow-lark and bluebird
are “holding on for a bite.” But there is no end to these rural
pictures, so I will just take you into this neighboring meadow-pasture,
then into the poultry yard at home, and conclude my present epistle.
Here we are, then, in the midst of various domestic animals. Yonder, a
couple of black colts are chasing each other in play, while their
venerable mother (for they are brothers, though not twins) is standing a
little way off, watching their antics, and twisting about her ears, as
she remembers the happy days of her own colthood. Here are some half
dozen hearty cows, lying down and grazing, each one with a “pledge of
affection” sporting about her. There are six or eight oxen, eating away
as fast as they can, while one, who seems to be a sentinel, occasionally
rolls up his eye to see if the farmer is coming to renew his song of
“haw! gee! gee! haw!” Under the shadow of that old oak, whose _portrait_
I mean to take to-morrow, is a flock of sheep, with their lambs bounding
beside them, as to the “tabor’s sound;” but to me there comes no
“thought of grief” at the sight, wherein I must be suffered to disagree
with Wordsworth, to whom I have already alluded once or twice, and whose
celebrated and most wonderful ode has been echoing in my heart all the
day long. Some of the lines in it are appropriate to the day, the charms
of which I am attempting to make you _feel_, and you will oblige me by
reading and inwardly digesting, for the hundredth time, as I know it
will be, the following fragments of a whole, and yet really complete
poems:—
“The sunshine is a glorious birth.”
“The winds come to me from the fields of sleep.”
“And the babe leaps up on his mother’s arm.”
“Earth fills her lap with pleasures of her own.”
“Full soon thy soul shalt have her earthly freight,
And custom lie upon thee with a weight,
Heavy as fate, and deep almost as life.”
“O joy, that in our embers
Is something that doth live,
That nature yet remembers
What was so fugitive.”
“To me, the meanest flower that blows, can give
Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.”
Strange, that an immortal man, after dwelling upon such poetry, should
be willing to go into a _poultry_ yard. But why not? I should rather do
this _willingly_, than be compelled, as I have been, and may be again,
to hear a man say, after reading to him Wordsworth’s great Ode—“Why! of
what _use_ is such _stuff_ as that? what does it _prove_? will it
furnish a man with _bread and butter_? will it make the _pot boil_?” The
people of the poultry yard have been in such glee to-day, and
contributed so much to the gladness of the day, that I must pay them a
passing tribute. In the first place, our old gobbler, with his retinue
of turkey wives, has been on the point of bursting with pride ever since
sunrise. If the Grand Sultan of Turkey (who must be the father of all
turkeys) cuts the same kind of capers in the presence of his hundred
ladies, that must be a great country for lean people to “laugh and grow
fat.” Our _ring-tailed_ gobbler is a feathered personification of Jack
Falstaff, possessing his prominent trait of cowardice to perfection. I
flourished a red handkerchief in his face this morning, and, by the way
he strutted round and gobbled, you would have thought he was going to
devour you. About ten minutes after this, I threw down a handful of
corn, which was intended for him. While he was busy picking it up, a
certain rooster stept along side and commenced picking too: the
intruder, having got in the way of the gobbler, was suddenly pushed
aside; whereupon the gentleman with spurs chuckled and “showed fight,”
but the gobbler for a moment heeded him not. This the rooster could not
bear, so he pounced upon his enemy, and whipt him without mercy, until
the coward and fool ran away, with his long train of affectionate wives
following behind.
The roosters, hens and chickens, which have figured in the yard to-day,
would more than number a hundred, and such cackling, crowing, chuckling,
and crying as they have made, was anything but a “_concord_ of sweet
sounds.” But the creatures have been happy, and it was therefore a
pleasure to look at them. A young hen this morning made her first
appearance with a large brood of chickens, yellow as gold, and this
caused quite a sensation among the feathered husbands generally. The
mother, as she rambled about, seemed to say by her pompous air, to her
daughterless friends—“ar’nt they beautiful? don’t you wish you had a
few?” It was also very funny to see with what looks of astonishment the
youthful roosters surveyed these “infant phenomenons.” As to our ducks,
and geese, and guinea hens, they have minded their business pretty
well—the two former paddling about the creek and mud-puddles, and the
latter “between meals” roaming at large through the orchard and garden,
altogether the most beautiful and rational of the feathered tribes.
A mountaineer, who is to take this letter to the post-office, is waiting
for me below, and I must close,—hoping that the country figures I have
endeavored to sketch may have a tendency to make you feel a portion of
that joy, which has characterized this delightful Spring Day.
SOUTH PEAK MOUNTAINS.
I commence this letter in the language of Leather-Stocking: “You know
the Catskills, lad, for you must have seen them on your left, as you
followed the river up from York, looking as blue as a piece of clear
sky, and holding the clouds on their tops, as the smoke curls over the
head of an Indian chief at a council-fire.” Yes, everybody is acquainted
with the name of these mountains, but few with their peculiarities of
scenery. They are situated about eight miles from the Hudson, rise to an
average elevation of thirty-eight hundred feet, and running in a
straight line from north to south, cover a space of some twenty-five
miles. The fertile valley on the east is as beautiful as heart could
desire, watered by the Catskill, Plauterkill, and Esopus Creeks,
inhabited by a sturdy Dutch yeomanry, and is the mother of those three
most flourishing towns, Catskill, Saugerties, and Kingston. The upland
on the west, for some thirty miles, is rugged, dreary, and thinly
settled, but the winding valley of Schoharie, beyond, is possessed of a
thousand charms peculiarly American. The mountains themselves are
covered with dense forests, abounding in cliffs and waterfalls, and for
the most part untrodden by the footsteps of men. Looking at them from
the Hudson, the eye is attracted by two deep hollows, which are called
“cloves.” That one nearest to the Mountain House, Catskill Clove, is
distinguished for a remarkable fall, which is familiar to the world
through the pen of Bryant and the pencil of Cole; but it is fast filling
up with habitations of improvement, while the other, Plauterkill Clove,
though yet possessing much of its original glory, is certain of the same
destiny. The clove whence issues the Esopus is among the Shandaken
mountains, and is not visible from the Hudson.
My nominal residence at the present time is at the mouth of Plauterkill
Clove. I came into the country to study,—to forget the busy world, and
give myself up entirely to the hallowing influences of nature, and oh,
how many “mysteries sublime,” has she revealed to me in my journeyings
among the dear, dear Catskills!
To the west, and only half a mile from, my abode, are the beautiful
mountains, whose graceful outlines fade away to the north, like the
waves of the sea when covered with a _visible_ atmosphere. The nearest,
and to me most beloved of these, is called South Peak. It is nearly four
thousand feet in height, and covered from base to summit by one vast
forest of trees, varying from eighty to a hundred feet. Like most of its
brethren, it is a perfectly wild and uncultivated wilderness, richly
abounding in all the interesting features of mountain scenery. Like a
corner stone, it stands at the junction of the northern and western
ranges of the Catskills, and as its huge form looms up against the
evening sky, it inspires one with awe, as if it were the ruler of the
world; and yet I have learned to love it as a friend. Its name, its
image, and every tree, and shrub, and vine, which spring from its rocky
bosom, can never be forgotten. I have reflected upon it when reposing in
the noontide sunshine, or enveloped in clouds, when holding communion
with the most holy night, when trembling under the influence of a
thunder-storm, or encircled by a rainbow. It has filled my soul with
images of beauty and sublimity, and made me feel the omnipotence of God.
A day and night has it just been my privilege to spend on this mountain,
accompanied by a friend. We started at an early hour yesterday morning,
equipped in our brown fustians, and laden with well-filled knapsacks,
one of us with a hatchet in his belt, and the other with a brace of
pistols. We were bound to the extreme summit of the peak, where we
intended to spend the night, see the rising of the sun, and return at
our leisure on the following day. But when I tell you, my friend, that
our course lay right up the almost perpendicular side of the mountain,
where was no path save that formed by a torrent or a bear, you will
readily believe it was somewhat rare and wild. But this was what we
delighted in, so we shouted “Excelsior,” and commenced the ascent. The
air was excessively sultry, and the very first effort we made caused the
perspiration to start most profusely; upward, upward, was our
course,—now climbing through a tangled thicket, or under the spray of a
cascade, and then again supporting ourselves by the roots of saplings,
or scrambling under a fallen tree,—now, like the samphire gatherer,
scaling a precipice, and then again clambering over a rock, or
“shinning” up a hemlock tree, to reach a desired point. Our first halt
was made at a singular spot called “Hunter’s Hole,” which is a spacious
cavern or pit, forty feet deep and twenty wide, and approached only by a
crack in the mountain sufficiently large to admit a man. There is a
story connected with it worth recording. Many years ago, a farmer,
residing at the foot of the mountain, having missed a favorite dog, and
being anxious for his safety, called together his neighbors, and offered
a reward for the safe return of his canine friend. Always ready to do a
kind deed, a number of his neighbors immediately started in different
directions for the hunt. A barking sound having issued from this cavern,
it was discovered, and, at the bottom of it, the lost dog, which had
probably fallen in while chasing a fox. “But how is he to be extricated
from this hole?” was the general inquiry of the assembled hunters. Not
one of all the group would venture to descend, under any circumstances;
so the poor animal remained a prisoner for another night. But the next
morning he was released, and by none other than a brave boy, the son of
the farmer, and playmate of the dog. A large number of men were present
on the occasion. A strong rope was tied around the body of the boy, and
he was gently lowered down. Having reached the bottom, and by the aid of
his lamp discovered that he was in a “real nice place,” the little rogue
thought he would have some sport; so he continued to pull down, more
rope, until he had made a coil of two hundred feet, which was
bewildering enough to the crowd above; but nothing happened to him, and
the dog was raised. The young hero having played his trick so well, it
was generally supposed, for a long time after, that this cavern was two
hundred feet in depth
|
century) 177
116. Paintings in Cahors Cathedral. Horizontal projection of
the cupola 180
117. Paintings in Cahors Cathedral. One of the prophets in the
cupola 182
118. Paintings in Cahors Cathedral. Fragment of central frieze
of cupola 184
119, 120. Painted windows of the early twelfth century. From
St. Rémi, Rheims 187
121. Painted window of the twelfth century. Church of
Bonlieu, Creuse 188
122. Painted window of the thirteenth century. Chartres
Cathedral 189
123. Painted window of the thirteenth century. Chartres
Cathedral 190
124. Painted window of the thirteenth century. Church of St.
Germer, Troyes 191
125. Painted windows of the fourteenth century. Church of St.
Urbain, Troyes 193
126. Painted glass of the fourteenth century. Cathedral of
Châlons-sur-Marne 194
127. Painted window of the fifteenth century. Évreux Cathedral 195
128. Enamel of the eleventh century. Plaque cover of a MS. 196
129. Enamel of the thirteenth century. Plaque cover of an
Evangelium 198
130. Enamel of the twelfth century. Reliquary shrine of St.
Thomas à Becket 199
131. Enamel of the sixteenth century. Our Lady of Sorrows 200
132. Abbey of Mont St. Michel. Cloister (thirteenth century) 206
133. Abbey of Cluny. Gateway 216
134. Abbey of Cluny. Plan 219
135. Abbey of Cluny. Door of the Abbey Church 221
136. Abbey of St. Étienne at Caen. Façade 228
137. St. Alban's Abbey (England) 230
138. Abbey of Montmajour. Cloisters 231
139. Abbey of Elne. Cloisters 232
140. Abbey of Fontfroide. Cloisters 233
141. Abbey of Maulbronn (Wurtemberg). Plan 235
142. Abbey of Fontevrault. Kitchen 236
143. Cathedral of Puy-en-Velay. Cloisters 237
144. Abbey of La Chaise Dieu (Auvergne). Cloisters 239
145. _Chartreuse_ of Villefranche de Rouergue. Plan 242
146. _Chartreuse_ of Villefranche de Rouergue. Bird's-eye view 243
147. _Grande Chartreuse._ The Great Cloister 244
148. _Grande Chartreuse._ General View 245
149. Abbey of Mont St. Michel. General View 248
150. Abbey of Mont St. Michel. Plan at the level of the
entrance 249
151. Abbey of Mont St. Michel. Plan at the level of the
lower church 250
152. Abbey of Mont St. Michel. Plan at the level of the
upper church 252
153. Abbey of Mont St. Michel. Section from north to south 253
154. Abbey of Mont St. Michel. Section from west to east 254
155. Abbey of Mont St. Michel. Crypt known as the _Galerie
de l'Aquilon_ 256
156. Abbey of Mont St. Michel. North front 257
157. Abbey of Mont St. Michel. The almonry 258
158. Abbey of Mont St. Michel. A tympanum of the cloisters 259
159. Abbey of Mont St. Michel. The cellar 260
160. Abbey of Mont St. Michel. Refectory 262
161. Abbey of Mont St. Michel. Hall of the knights 263
162. St. Michael's Mount, Cornwall 264
163. Abbey of Mont St. Michel. Gate-house 270
164. City of Carcassonne. South-east ramparts 273
165. City of Carcassonne. North-west ramparts 274
166. Fortress of Kalaat-el-Hosn. Section 277
166_a_. Fortress of Kalaat-el-Hosn. General view 278
167. City of Carcassonne. Plan of the thirteenth century 279
168. City of Carcassonne. Ramparts, south-west angle 280
169. Ramparts of Aigues-Mortes, north and south 281
170. Ramparts of Avignon. Curtain and towers 282
170_a_. Machicolations 283
171. Ramparts of St. Malo 284
172. Mont St. Michel. South front 287
173. Mont St. Michel. As restored on paper 288
174. Castle of Angers 292
175. Carcassonne. Citadel 293
176. Loches Castle. Keep 294
177. Falaise Castle. Keep 297
178. Lavardin Castle. Keep 298
179. Keep of Aigues-Mortes 299
180. Provins Castle. Keep 300
181. Castle, Chinon 302
182. Castle, Clisson. Keep 303
183. Castle. Villeneuve-les-Avignon 304
184. Castle of Tarascon 305
185. Vitré Castle 307
186. City of Carcassonne. Castle gate 310
187. City of Carcassonne. Gate of the Lists 312
188. City of Carcassonne. Gate known as the _Porte Narbonaise_ 313
189. Ramparts of Aigues-Mortes. Drawbridge 314
190. Ramparts of Dinan. Gate known as the _Porte de Jerzual_ 315
191. Vitré Castle. Gate-house 317
192. Ramparts of Guérande. Gate known as the _Porte St.
Michel_ 318
193. Ramparts of Mont St. Michel. Gateway known as the
_Porte du Roi_ 320
194. Entrance to the Port of La Rochelle 322
195. Bridge at Avignon 323
196. Bridge of Montauban 325
197. Bridge of Cahor 326
198. Bridge of Orthez 327
199. Fortified bridge. Mont St. Michel 328
200. Town-hall at St. Antonin (Tarn et Garonne) 334
201. Barn at Perrières (Calvados) 335
201_a_. Barn at Perrières (Calvados). Section 336
201_b_. Barn at Perrières (Calvados). Plan 336
202. Tithe-barn at Provins 337
203. Granary of the Abbey of Vauclair 338
204. Hospital of St. John, Angers 339
205. Abbey of Ourscamps (Oise) 340
206. Lazar-house at Tortoir (Aisne) 341
207. Hospital at Tonnerre. Section 343
208, 208_a_. Houses at Cluny 347, 348
209, 210. Houses at Vitteaux and at St. Antonin 349
211, 212. Houses at Provins and at Laon 350, 351
213. House at Cordes. Albigeois 352
214. House at Mont St. Michel 354
215, 216. Wooden houses at Rouen and at Andelys 355, 356
217. Hôtel Lallemand at Bourges 357
218. Jacques Cœur's house at Bourges 358
219. Town-hall of Pienza, Italy 361
220. Town-hall and belfry at Ypres 363
221. Market and belfry at Bruges 365
222. Town-hall of Bruges 366
223. Town-hall at Louvain 368
224. Belfry of Tournai (Belgium) 370
225. Belfry of Ghent (Belgium) 371
226. Belfry at Calais (France) 374
227. Belfry of Béthune (France) 376
228. Belfry of Évreux (France) 377
229. Belfry of Avignon (France) 378
230. Belfry gate known as _La Grosse Cloche_, Bordeaux 379
231. Cloth hall known as _La Loge_, Perpignan 381
232. Bishop's Palace at Laon 382
233. Archbishop's Palace at Albi. Plan 383
234. Archbishop's Palace at Albi. General view 384
235. Palace of the Popes at Avignon. Plan 385
236. Palace of the Popes at Avignon. General view 387
GOTHIC ARCHITECTURE
INTRODUCTION
The term _Gothic_, as applied to the architectural period dating from
the middle of the twelfth to the end of the fifteenth century, is
purely conventional.
The expression is clearly misleading as indicating the architecture
of the Goths or Visigoths; for these tribes were vanquished by Clovis
in the sixth century, and left no monumental trace of their invasion.
Hence, their influence upon art was _nil_. The term is radically
false both from the historical and the archæological point of view,
and originates in an error which demands the strenuous opposition
due to persistent fallacies. By a strange irony of fate the term
_Gothic_, used in the last century merely as the opprobrious synonym
of _barbaric_, has been specialised within the last sixty years in
connection with that polished epoch of the Middle Ages which sheds
most lustre upon our national art. And this, in spite of its Germanic
origin.
Romanesque architecture, or to be exact, that architecture which,
by virtue of the archæologic convention of 1825, we agree to label
Romanesque, undoubtedly borrowed its essential elements from the
Romans and Byzantines, modifying and perfecting them by the genius
of Western Europe; but the architectural period which began in the
middle of the twelfth century, and is so unjustly dubbed _Gothic_, was
of purely French birth; its cradle was the nucleus of modern France.
Aquitaine, Anjou, and Maine were the provinces in which it first took
root. The royal domain, and notably the Ile-de-France, witnessed its
most marvellous developments, and it was from the very heart of France
that its splendour radiated throughout Europe.
But the tyranny of usage leaves us no choice as to the title of this
volume. We are compelled to style it _Gothic Architecture_, though we
would gladly have registered our protest by naming it _French Mediæval
Architecture_.[1]
[1] This idea, which has recently found support in quarters which
might have been considered free from such _chauvinism_, is based
upon a narrow and peculiarly modern view of art. Art activities in
the Middle Ages were as instinctive and unconscious as speech. The
forms of architecture were invented and elaborated much in the same
way as language. For the purpose of the historian of architecture,
the northern half of France, the three southern quarters of Great
Britain, and the districts threaded by the Rhine, form a single
country, a single _foyer_ of art. They all pressed on from similar
starting-points to similar goals; and if the French went ahead in
one direction, they fell astern in another. It may be allowed that,
on the whole, the architects of the _Ile-de-France_ did better than
their rivals. Gothic architecture is pre-eminently logical, and logic
is pre-eminently the artistic gift of the Frenchman. So that its more
scientific development in the "French royal domain" was only to be
expected. That success of this kind gives a right to call the whole
development "French mediæval architecture" cannot be allowed.--ED.
The term _Gothic_ is, however, purely arbitrary, as is also that
of _pointed_, which has been introduced by writers who admit the
principle of the broken arch as the characteristic of so-called Gothic
architecture.
The broken or pointed arch, which is formed by the intersection of
two opposite curves at an angle more or less acute, was known to
architects long before its systematic application. It occurs in
buildings of the ninth century in Cairo, and was used prior to this
in Armenia, and still earlier in Persia, where indeed it superseded
all other forms of span from the times of the last of the Sassanides
onwards. It is an expedient which gives increased power of resistance
to the arch by diminishing its lateral thrusts.
The pointed arch is a form which admits of infinite variations. The
one law which governs its construction is expediency. It frankly
abandons those rules of classic proportion which are the canons, so
to speak, of the round-headed arch. Thus we shall find the pointed
approximating to the round-headed form in the twelfth century, only
to diverge from it more widely than before, till, towards the close
of the thirteenth and throughout the fourteenth century, it took on
the acute proportions necessitated by a perilous disposition to prefer
loftiness to solidity.
Fundamentally, it is of little moment whether the architecture of the
twelfth to the sixteenth century be termed Gothic or pointed, when
we recognise these terms as equally inexact. The point to be really
insisted upon is that the filiation we have already demonstrated in
our book on Romanesque Architecture continued slowly, but surely, in
the wake of civilisation, of which architecture is ever one of the
most striking manifestations.
So-called Gothic architecture was not the product of a single
generation; it was the continuous logical development of the
Romanesque movement, just as the latter in its time had been the
outcome of a gradual adaptation of old traditions to new-born
exigencies. Thus our Aquitainian forbears, by their successful
translation into stone of the eastern cupola, prepared the way for
the groined vault, the embryo of which is clearly traceable in the
pendentives of the dome at St. Front.
The great churches which, towards the middle of the twelfth century,
rose throughout the rich Western provinces that cluster about
Aquitaine, were all constructed with groined vaults. In these examples
we can discern no halting, tentative application of newly adopted
principles. The work is that of consummate architects, who brought
to their labours the assurance born of experienced skill, and in the
later part of the twelfth century, the new system had replaced all
others for the construction of vaults throughout Western Europe.
The architects of the royal domain, and notably those of the
Ile-de-France, had been the first to adopt the groined vault. Towards
the close of the twelfth century their assimilation of the new
principles, their native ingenuity, and professional hardihood alike
urged them to its further development. They became the inventors of
the flying buttress.
The substitution of the groined vault for its parent, the cupola,
was the direct consequence of the old tradition. The development
was merely a stage in the march of ideas, a consummation logically
arrived at in the track which the Romans, constructors not less
bold though more prudent than their artistic progeny, had marked
out for them. The groined vault, in short, is simply the growth
of Roman principles perfected by continuous experiment. But the
flying buttress, or rather the system of construction based on its
use, caused a radical change in the art of building of the twelfth
century. Stability, which in the ancient buildings was ensured by
solid masses at the impost of vaults and arches, was replaced by the
balance of parts. From this daring system some of the most marvellous
of architectural effects have been won; but the innovation had a
dangerous inherent weakness, inasmuch as it involved the exterior
position of those essential vital organs for whose preservation the
ancients had wisely provided, by keeping them within the building.
It is therefore not surprising that though fifty years after its
introduction the groined vault was generally adopted throughout
Western Europe, and even in the East, the success of the flying
buttress was infinitely more gradual and restricted. Thus, in the
North, the multiplication of great religious monuments built, or even
rebuilt on the new lines, was simultaneous with the construction in
the South of vast churches on the old principles. The adventurous
builders of the North had eagerly adopted the new division of churches
into several aisles, all with groined vaults, the vault of the great
central nave relying upon exterior flying buttresses for resistance to
its thrust.
In the South, on the other hand, architects were prudent, either
through instinctive resistance to, or deliberate reaction from, the
innovating influence, or by way of fidelity to an ancient tradition.
They built with a single aisle, wide and lofty; the vaults were
indeed supported by ribs, but their thrusts were received by powerful
buttresses inside the walls, the projections thus formed being further
utilised for the construction of chapels in the intervals.
This latter system, which has the incontestable merit of perfect
solidity, recalls the construction of the Basilica of Constantine,
or of the tepidarium in the Baths of Caracalla. The stability of the
edifice was ensured by the resistance of masses at the imposts, and
the whole principle of construction formed, as it were, a protest
against the miracles of equilibrium so much in favour among the
Northerners.
The new system of vaults supported by flying buttresses made
very slight way in the South. It appears but rarely, and in the
few instances where it is used has entirely the air of a foreign
importation. Even in the cradle of its origin, it took root slowly
and with difficulty, for its first applications were not without
disaster. Lacking that mathematical knowledge which is the mainstay
of the modern architect, the experimental skill shown by the
thirteenth-century builder in constructing his vaults, and then
in neutralising their thrusts by flying buttresses reduced to
the legitimate function of permanent struts, was little short of
miraculous. For it must be borne in mind that the thrust of these
vaults, and the strength of the flying buttresses, varied of necessity
according to their span, and the resisting powers of their materials.
It was only by dint of long gropings in the dark that the necessarily
empirical formulæ of the innovators were gradually transformed into
recognised rules, and this knotty problem of construction received
no positive solution till the last years of the thirteenth, or more
emphatically, the first years of the fourteenth century. While even
then the solution could claim no universal acceptance, for what was
comparatively easy in countries where stone abounds became difficult,
if not impossible, in districts where such a material as brick was the
sole resource of builders.
Nevertheless, the growth of Gothic architecture was rapid, so rapid
that even in the fourteenth century it began to show symptoms of that
swift decadence which is the Nemesis of facile success. The abuse of
equilibrium, the excessive diminution of points of support--defects
often aggravated by insecurity of foundation and exaggerated loftiness
of structure--the poor quality of materials, and the faulty setting
thereof due to empirical methods, the over-rapidity of execution
caused by mistaken emulation, the dearth of funds consequent on
social and political convulsions complicated by the miseries of
war,--all these things joined hands for the extinction of a once
resplendent art. But the initial cause of its ruin must be sought in
its abandonment of antique traditions. These traditions had persisted
uninterruptedly throughout the so-called Romanesque period, only to
pave the way for a seductive art in novel form, which, casting aside
the trammels of the past in obedience to the dictates of the moment,
fell on decay as rapidly as it had risen to eminence. Dawning in the
France of Louis the Fat, it reached its apogee under St. Louis, and
was in full decadence before the close of the fifteenth century.
The narrow limits assigned to us forbid not only detailed discussion
of our great monuments, but even a summary of the most famous. We must
be content to work out that theory of evolution already put forward by
us in _L'Architecture Romane_. We propose merely to offer a synthesis
of that architectural development which succeeded the so-called
Romanesque epoch, from its birth in the twelfth to its extinction in
the fifteenth century.
And as the groined vault is, broadly speaking, the essential
characteristic of so-called Gothic architecture, and the flying
buttress one of its most interesting manifestations, we shall make
a special study of their origin, their modifications, and their
principal applications in connection with religious, monastic,
military, and civil architecture. We shall dwell more particularly
upon religious architecture as presenting the grandest and most
obvious evidences of artistic progress, not in its admirable buildings
alone, but in those masterpieces of painting and sculpture to which it
gave birth in France.
PART I
RELIGIOUS ARCHITECTURE
CHAPTER I
THE INFLUENCE OF THE CUPOLA UPON SO-CALLED GOTHIC ARCHITECTURE
_The cupola, in its symbolic aspect, was the germ, whence sprang
an architectural system the revolutionary action of which upon
art can scarcely be over-estimated._[2]
[2] _L'Architecture Romane_, by Ed. Corroyer; Quantin, Paris, 1888.
So-called Gothic architecture was no spontaneous and miraculous
manifestation. Like all human activities, its end is easy to
determine; but it is difficult to fix even an approximate date for
its beginning. The traces of its origin are lost in that period of
architectural activity which preceded it, and prepared its way by a
train of unbroken evolution.
The cupola of St. Front, which we may reasonably call the mother
cupola of France, was not an imitation of that of St. Mark at
Venice, for both were based upon the church built by Justinian at
Constantinople, in honour of the Holy Apostles. But the form thus
imported into Aquitaine received such modification and development, as
to make it virtually an original achievement. One of the knottiest of
architectural problems was solved in the process, and that admirable
constructive principle was established which consists in concentrating
the thrust of a vault upon four points of support strengthened by
pendentives.
The construction of such a cupola as that of St. Front in dressed
stone was an event of great moment in a district which still preserved
the Gallo-Roman tradition in its integrity, and was commonly reputed
the fatherland of our architecture. Its immediate consequences were
shown before the close of the eleventh century by the erection of
large abbey churches on the model of St. Front in various neighbouring
provinces.
But while accepting the new principle, the architects of the period
directed their energies to its perfectibility. Their efforts, and
even their successes, in this direction are manifest so early as the
first years of the twelfth century. The churches of Angoulême and
of Fontevrault may be cited in proof. "We here recognise the main
preoccupation of the Romanesque builders--namely, how best to reduce
the immense masses of churches built with the primitive cupola by a
more deliberate and judicious distribution of thrust and resistance.
We further see how the adoption of these principles led to the
emphasising of critical points by buttresses, which now began to
project from the exterior walls."[3]
[3] _L'Architecture Romane_, by Ed. Corroyer; Quantin, Paris, 1888.
The new system spread rapidly, notably in Anjou and Maine, its growth
being marked by an ever-increasing refinement and perfection. The
architects of the rich abbeys of these provinces, the importance of
which was aggrandised by their strong attachments to the all-powerful
religious organisation of the period, gave a further development
to the Aquitainian method. They transformed the pendentives of the
cupolas into independent arches which performed exactly the same
functions, thus logically working out an architectonic principle of
amazing simplicity, the success of which was so rapid that, by the
middle of the twelfth century, it was systematically applied to the
construction of great churches at Angers, Laval, and Poitiers.
The works of the Angevin architects were of course known to their
Northern brethren, who, in common with all the builders of the day,
had long been seeking the final solution of the great problem of
the vault. The architects of the Ile-de-France at once appropriated
the Angevin system with that special professional ingenuity which
characterised them, and applied it to the construction of innumerable
churches, large and small, all of them built on the basilican
plan--that is to say, with three, or even five aisles.
Thus the Aquitainian cupola of dressed stone exercised an absolutely
direct influence upon Gothic architecture, since it gave birth to the
_intersecting arch_, which is the main feature of so-called Gothic.
This influence was first manifested in the general arrangement of
single-aisled churches vaulted upon intersecting ribs, the earliest
departure from the original cupola. It was then more grandiosely
demonstrated in vast abbey or cathedral churches, built in accordance
with the basilican tradition, and all vaulted on the new principle.
Angers and Laval are primitive examples of churches whose square
compartments carry groined vaults, which thenceforth took the place of
cupolas with pendentives.
The abbey church of Noyon shows the application of this principle,
novel in the twelfth century, to the several-aisled churches of the
Northern architects. The _original_ vaults of Noyon[4] were planned in
square. The intersecting arches united the principal piers diagonally,
the strain being relieved by a subordinate or auxiliary arch which
rested upon secondary piers, indicated on the exterior by buttresses
less salient than those of the main piers, and on the interior by a
column receiving the lateral archivolts which united the chief piers.
[4] The original disposition of the vaults built about 1160 is
indicated by the spring of the arches above the capitals, and by the
base plan of the principal piers. The present vaults on rectangular
plan were built after the fire of 1238, in accordance with prevailing
fashions.
This system of construction, the principle of which was logically
developed at Noyon, for instance, no longer exists, save in its
traditional state in the great churches of Laon, and in the cathedrals
of Paris, Sens, and Bourges, to name but the principal, without regard
to the innumerable churches built on these principles throughout
Western Europe. In these great buildings the vaults were all square on
plan down to the adoption in the first half of the thirteenth century
of equal bays, vaulted on a rectangular plan, and marked inside and
out by equal piers and projections, as at Amiens, Rheims, and many
other churches of the period.
Hence we see how incontestable was the influence of the cupola
upon so-called Gothic architecture. This truth is demonstrated by
monuments yet in existence, lapidary documents above suspicion. It
cannot be insisted upon too strongly, not merely for the satisfaction
of archæeologic accuracy, but more especially as yet another proof
that the filiation between the art of the ancients and that of the
so-called Romanesque architects is no less evident than that which
links together the Romanesque and the so-called Gothic. Of this latter
filiation we have a direct proof in the Aquitainian cupola, the parent
of those of Angoumois, which in their turn gave birth to the Angevin
intersecting arch, and so prepared the way for the flying buttress,
which again was to mark a new departure.
CHAPTER II
THE ORIGIN OF THE INTERSECTING VAULT
So early as the eleventh century churches were built with one or
several aisles, and in this latter case the side aisles only had
ribbed vaults, the nave being covered by a timber roof. The next step
was to vault all three aisles, buttressing the barrel-vaulted nave by
continuous half-barrel vaults or ribbed vaults over the aisles, and
further strengthening it by projecting transverse arches, or _arcs
doubleaux_, the whole being crowned by a roof which embraced the side
aisles. These cumbrous and timidly constructed buildings were merely
imitations of the Roman basilicas. To ensure their solidity they had
perforce to be narrow; and the necessary abolition of top lighting
made them gloomy. We find then that, before the appearance of the
cupola, mediæval architects were perfectly acquainted both with the
barrel vault and the ribbed vault, the latter formed, on traditional
principles, by the interpenetration of two demi-cylinders. They had
even attempted to improve upon the construction by strengthening the
line of penetration with a salient rib, giving an elliptic arch. But
this rib was purely decorative, for in the Roman vault the stones
at the line of intersection, whether ribbed or not, were in complete
solidarity with the filling on either side in which they were buried.
It follows that we shall seek in vain in the Roman ribbed vault the
germ of the intersecting arch, with its essentially active functions.
For the origin of the intersecting arch we must turn to the eleventh
century. We shall find it in the dressed stone cupola of St. Front,
and more especially in its pendentives.
Fig. 1 gives the plan of one of the cupolas of St. Front. It is
composed of four massive transverse arches, the thrusts of which are
received upon four piers united by pendentives (Figs. 2 and 3) passing
from the re-entering angles at the spring of the arches to the base
of the circular dome itself, each of the concentric courses bearing
upon the keys of the _arcs-doubleaux_, and transmitting to them, and
therefore to the piers by which they are supported, the weight of the
cupola itself.
[Illustration: 1. PLAN OF A CUPOLA OF THE ABBEY CHURCH OF ST. FRONT AT
PÉRIGUEUX]
[Illustration: 2. PENDENTIVE (MARKED A) OF A CUPOLA OF THE ABBEY
CHURCH OF ST. FRONT]
[Illustration: 3. SECTION OF A PENDENTIVE ON THE DIAGONAL A TO B IN
PLAN, FIG. 1]
Fig. 3 is a section through one of the pendentives of St. Front,
following the line A B in Fig. 1. It shows that the first six courses
are cut so as to make what is called a _tas de chargé_; the upper
surfaces are horizontal, the faces curved to the radius of the dome
itself. After the sixth course the voussoirs are cut normally to the
curve of the arch. The vaulting of religious buildings having long
been the crux of mediæval architects, the construction of the St.
Front cupolas must have been an event much noised abroad, for towards
the close of the eleventh century a large number of churches with
cupolas were built in imitation of the mother church at Périgueux.
The construction of the churches of Angoulême and Fontevrault in the
first years of the twelfth century shows that the architects were
attempting to cover spaces of ever-increasing span on the Aquitainian
model, while at the same time they set themselves to lighten their
vaults, and consequently to reduce their points of support.
Fig. 4 gives the plan of one of the cupolas of Angoulême or of
Fontevrault, both being built on precisely similar plan, with the
exception of the number of bays to the nave.
[Illustration: 4. PLAN OF A CUPOLA OF ANGOULÊME OR FONTEVRAULT]
Fig. 5 gives the section of a bay in one of these churches, and
illustrates the considerable difference already existing between
the mother cupola of St. Front and its offspring. The cupola on
pendentives begins to show a certain attenuation, and we shall
presently note a fresh step forward towards the solution of that
problem so persistently grappled with by the mediæval architect--how
to reduce the weight of the vault.
[Illustration: 5. SECTION OF A BAY OF THE CUPOLAS OF ANGOULÊME]
The Church of St. Avit-Sénieur furnishes a most instructive example.
The cupola of this building is strengthened by stiffening ribs. It
becomes an annular vault, formed of almost horizontal keyed courses,
sustained by transverse and diagonal ribs, which act the part of a
permanent centering.
The Church of St. Pierre at Saumur marks a further step onwards in the
construction of vaults derived from the cupola.[5]
[5] _L'Architecture Romane_, by Ed. Corroyer.
Finally, the architects of Maine and Anjou achieved the long-desired
consummation. Under their treatment the pendentives resolved
themselves into their actively useful elements, the visible signs of
which were diagonal or intersecting arches, salient and independent,
set in precisely the same manner as the pendentives of the cupola
(Fig. 3), and performing identical functions (Fig. 8).
[Illustration: 6. SECTION OF A BAY IN THE CHURCH OF ST. AVIT-SÉNIEUR]
[Illustration: 7. PLAN OF VAULT ON INTERSECTING ARCHES]
The vault proper is no longer formed of concentric courses, as in the
mother cupola. It consists thenceforward of voussoirs cut normally to
the curve, and filling the triangles (A, B, C, D, Fig. 7) determined
by the longitudinal, the diagonal or intersecting, and the transverse
arches. These arches form a stone skeleton, no less solid though far
less ponderous than the cupola pendentives, and sustain the vault by
distributing its thrusts over four points of support.
The triangular fillings no longer imprison the ribs, or, more exactly
speaking, the intersecting arches, nor do they any longer neutralise
their active functions. These fillings, on the other hand, have, like
the intersecting arch, gained a new independence. They now contribute
to the elasticity of the divers organs of the vault, a most essential
element in its solidity. The peculiar arrangement of the intersecting
arches in the nave of Angers gives incontrovertible proof of the
direct filiation of this building to the Aquitainian cupola. The
voussoirs of the intersecting arches are about equal in horizontal
section to those of the transverse arches, while their vertical
section equals the thickness of the filling plus the internal salience
which marks their function. They look in fact like slices cut from
the pendentives of a cupola (A, Fig. 8).
|
Tickle-My-Toes were
very glad to see the children, especially Mrs. Meadows, who did
everything she could to make the youngsters feel that they had conferred
a great obligation on her by coming back again.
“I’ll be bound you forgot to bring me the apple I told you about,” said
she.
But Sweetest Susan had not forgotten. She had one in her pocket. It was
not very large, but the sun had painted it red and yellow, and the south
winds that kissed it had left it fragrant with the perfume of summer.
“Now, I declare!” exclaimed Mrs. Meadows. “To think you should remember
an old woman! You are just as good and as nice as you can be!” She
thanked Sweetest Susan so heartily that Buster John began to look and
feel uncomfortable,—seeing which, Mrs. Meadows placed her hand gently on
his shoulder. “Never mind,” said she, “boys are not expected to be as
thoughtful as girls. The next time you come, you may bring me a hatful,
if you can manage to think about it.”
“He might start wid ’em,” remarked Drusilla, “but ’fo’ he got here he’d
set down an’ eat ’em all up, ter keep from stumpin’ his toe an’ spillin’
’em.”
Buster John had a reply ready, but he did not make any, for just at that
moment a low, rumbling sound was heard. It seemed to come nearer and
grow louder, and then it died away in the distance.
“What is that?” asked Mrs. Meadows, in an impressive whisper.
“Thunder,” answered Mr. Rabbit, who had listened intently. “Thunder, as
sure as you’re born.”
“Yes,” said Mr. Thimblefinger. “I saw a cloud coming up next door, just
before we came through the spring gate.”
“I must be getting nervous in my old age,” remarked Mrs. Meadows. “I had
an idea that it was too late in the season for thunder-storms.”
“That may be so,” replied Mr. Thimblefinger, “but it’s never too late
for old man Thunder to rush out on his front porch and begin to cut up
his capers. But there’s no harm in him.”
“But the Lightning kills people sometimes,” said Buster John.
“The Lightning? Oh, yes, but I was talking about old man Thunder,”
replied Mr. Thimblefinger. “When I was a boy, I once heard of a little
girl”—Mr. Thimblefinger suddenly put his hand over his mouth and hung
his head, as if he had been caught doing something wrong.
“Why, what in the world is the matter?” asked Mrs. Meadows.
“Oh, nothing,” replied Mr. Thimblefinger. “I simply forgot my manners.”
“I don’t see how,” remarked Mr. Rabbit, frowning.
“Why, I was about to tell a story before I had been asked.”
“Well, you won’t disturb me by telling a story, I’m sure,” said Mr.
Rabbit. “I can nod just as well when some one is talking as when
everything is still. You won’t pester me at all. Just go ahead.”
“Maybe it isn’t story-telling time,” suggested Mrs. Meadows.
“Oh, don’t say that,” cried Sweetest Susan. “If it is a story, please
tell it.”
“Well, it is nothing but a plain, every-day story. After you hear it
you’ll lean back in your chair and wonder why somebody didn’t take hold
of it and twist it into a real old-fashioned tale. It’s old fashioned
enough, the way I heard it, but I always thought that the person who
heard it first must have forgotten parts of it.”
“We won’t mind that,” said Sweetest Susan.
Mr. Thimblefinger settled himself comfortably and began:—
“Once upon a time—I don’t know how long ago, but not very long, for the
tale was new to me when I first heard it—once upon a time there was a
little girl about your age and size who was curious to know something
about everything that happened. She wanted to know how a bird could fly,
and why the clouds floated, and she was all the time trying to get at
the bottom of things.
“Well, one day when the sky was covered with clouds, the Thunder came
rolling along, knocking at everybody’s door and running a race with the
noise it made; the little girl listened and wondered what the Thunder
was and where it went to. It wasn’t long before the Thunder came
rumbling along again, making a noise like a four-horse wagon running
away on a covered bridge.
“While the little girl was standing there, wondering and listening, an
old man with a bundle on his back and a stout staff in his hand came
along the road. He bowed and smiled when he saw the little girl, but as
she didn’t return the bow or the smile, being too much interested in
listening for the Thunder, he paused and asked her what the trouble was.
“‘I hope you are not lost?’ he said.
“‘Oh, no, sir,’ she replied; ‘I was listening for the Thunder and
wondering where it goes.’
“‘Well, as you seem to be a very good little girl,’ the old man said, ‘I
don’t mind telling you. The Thunder lives on top of yonder mountain. It
is not so far away.’
“‘Oh, I should like ever so much to go there!’ exclaimed the little
girl.
“‘Why not?’ said the old man. ‘The mountain is on my road, and, if you
say the word, we’ll go together.’
“The little girl took the old man’s hand and they journeyed toward the
mountain where the Thunder had his home. The way was long, but somehow
they seemed to go very fast. The old man took long strides forward, and
he was strong enough to lift the little girl at every step, so that when
they reached the foot of the mountain she was not very tired.
“But, as the mountain was very steep and high, the two travelers stopped
to rest themselves before they began to climb it. Its sides seemed to be
rough and dark, but far up on the topmost peak the clouds had gathered,
and from these the Lightning flashed incessantly. The little girl saw
the flashes and asked what they meant.
“‘Wherever the Thunder lives,’ replied the old man, ‘there the Lightning
builds its nest. No doubt the wind has blown the clouds about and torn
them apart and scattered them. The Lightning is piling them together
again, and fixing a warm, soft place to sleep to-night.’
“When they had rested awhile, the old man said it was time to be going,
and then he made the little girl climb on his back. At first she didn’t
want the old man to carry her; but he declared that she would do him a
great favor by climbing on his back and holding his bundle in place. So
she sat upon the bundle, and in this way they went up the high mountain,
going almost as rapidly as the little girl could run on level ground.
She enjoyed it very much, for, although the old man went swiftly, he
went smoothly, and the little girl felt as safe and as comfortable as if
she had been sitting in a rocking-chair.
“When they had come nearly to the top of the mountain, the old man
stopped and lifted the little girl from his back. ‘I can go no farther,’
he said. ‘The rest of the way you will have to go alone. There is
nothing to fear. Up the mountain yonder you can see the gable of the
Thunder’s house. Go to the door, knock, and do not be alarmed at any
noise you hear. When the time comes for you to go, you will find me
awaiting you here.’
“The little girl hesitated, but she had come so far to see where the
Thunder lived that she would not turn back now. So she went forward, and
soon came to the door of Mr. Thunder’s house. It was a very big door to
a very big house. The knocker was so heavy that the little girl could
hardly lift it, and when she let it fall against the panel, the noise it
made jarred the building and sent a loud echo rolling and tumbling down
the mountain. The little girl thought, ‘What have I done? If the Thunder
is taking a nap before dinner, he’ll be very angry.’
[Illustration:
SHE WAITED A LITTLE WHILE
]
“She waited a little while, not feeling very comfortable. Presently she
heard heavy footsteps coming down the wide hall to the door.
“‘I thought I heard some one knocking,’ said a hoarse, gruff voice. Then
the big door flew open, and there, standing before her, the little girl
saw a huge figure that towered almost to the top of the high door. It
wore heavy boots, a big overcoat, and under its long, thick beard there
was a muffler a yard wide. The little girl was very much frightened at
first, but she soon remembered that there was nothing for such a little
bit of a girl to be afraid of.
“The figure, that seemed to be so terrible at first glance, had nothing
threatening about it. ‘Who knocked at the door?’ it cried.
“Its voice sounded so loud that the little girl put her fingers in her
ears.
“‘Don’t talk so loud, please,’ she said. ‘I’m not deaf.’
“‘Oh!’ cried the giant at the door. ‘You are there, are you? You are so
small I didn’t see you at first. Come in!’
“The little girl started to go in, and then paused. ‘Are you the
Thunder?’ she asked.
“‘Why, of course,’ was the reply; ‘who else did you think it was?’
“‘I didn’t know,’ said the little girl. ‘I wanted to be certain about
it.’
“‘Come in,’ said the Thunder. ‘It isn’t often I have company from the
people below, and I’m glad you found me at home.’
The Thunder led the way down the hall and into a wide sitting-room,
where a fire was burning brightly in the biggest fireplace the little
girl had ever seen. A two-horse wagon could turn around in it without
touching the andirons. A pair of tongs as tall as a man stood in one
corner, and in the other corner was a shovel to match. A long pipe lay
on the mantel.
“‘There’s no place for you to sit except on the floor,’ said the
Thunder.
“‘I can sit on the bed,’ suggested the little girl.
“The Thunder laughed so loudly that the little girl had to close her
ears again. ‘Why, that is no bed,’ the Thunder said when it could catch
its breath; ‘that’s my footstool.’
“‘Well,’ said the little girl, ‘it’s big enough for a bed. It’s very
soft and nice.’
“‘I find it very comfortable,’ said the Thunder, ‘especially when I get
home after piloting a tornado through the country. It is tough work, as
sure as you are born.’
“The Thunder took the long pipe from the mantel and lit it with a pine
splinter, the flame of which flashed through the windows with dazzling
brightness.
“‘Folks will say that is heat lightning,’ remarked the little girl.
“‘Yes,’ replied the Thunder; ‘farmers to the north of us will say there
is going to be a drought, because of lightning in the south. Farmers to
the south of us will say there’s going to be rain, because of lightning
in the north. None of them knows that I am smoking my pipe.’
“But somehow, in turning around, the Thunder knocked the big tongs over,
and they fell upon the floor with a tremendous crash. The floor appeared
to give forth a sound like a drum, only a thousand times louder, and,
although the little girl had her fingers in her ears, she could hear the
echoes roused under the house by the falling tongs go rattling down the
mountain side and out into the valley beyond.
“The Thunder sat in the big armchair smoking, and listening with legs
crossed. The little girl appeared to be sorry that she had come.
“‘Now, that is too bad,’ said the Thunder. ‘The Whirlwind in the south
will hear that and come flying; the West Wind will hear it and come
rushing, and they will drag the clouds after them, thinking that I am
ready to take my ride. But it’s all my fault. Instead of turning the
winds in the pasture, I ought to have put them in the stable. Here they
come now!’
“The little girl listened, and, sure enough, the whirlwinds from the
south and the west came rushing around the house of the Thunder. The
west wind screamed around the windows, and the whirlwinds from the south
whistled through the cracks and keyholes.
“‘I guess I’ll have to go with them,’ said the Thunder, rising from the
chair and walking around the room. ‘It’s the only way to quiet them.’
“‘Do you always wear your overcoat?’ the little girl asked.
“‘Always,’ replied the Thunder. ‘There’s no telling what moment I’ll be
called. Sometimes I go just for a frolic, and sometimes I am obliged to
go. Will you stay until I return?’
“‘Oh, no,’ the little girl replied; ‘the house is too large. I should be
afraid to stay here alone.’
“‘I am sorry,’ said the Thunder. ‘Come and see me get in my carriage.’
“They went to the door. The whirlwinds from the south and the winds from
the west had drawn the clouds to the steps, and into these the Thunder
climbed.
“‘Good-by,’ he cried to the little girl. ‘Stay where you are until we
are out of sight.’
“There was a flash of light, a snapping sound, a rattling crash, and the
Thunder, with the clouds for his carriage and the winds for his horses,
went roaming and rumbling through the sky, over the hills and valleys.”
Mr. Thimblefinger paused and looked at the children. They, expecting him
to go on, said nothing.
“How did you like my story?” he asked.
“Is it a story?” inquired Buster John.
“Well, call it a tale,” said Mr. Thimblefinger.
“Hit’s too high up in de elements for ter suit me,” said Drusilla,
candidly.
“What became of the little girl?” asked Sweetest Susan.
“When the Thunder rolled away,” said Mr. Thimblefinger, “she went back
to where the old man was awaiting her, and he, having nothing to do,
carried her to the Jumping-Off Place.”
------------------------------------------------------------------------
III.
THE JUMPING-OFF PLACE.
The children looked at Mr. Thimblefinger to see whether he was joking
about the Jumping-Off Place, but he seemed to be very serious.
“I have heard of the Jumping-Off Place,” remarked Mrs. Meadows, “but I
had an idea it was just a saying.”
“Well,” replied Mr. Thimblefinger, “where you see a good deal of smoke,
there must be some fire. When you hear a great many different people
talking about anything, there must be something in it.”
“What did the little girl see when she got to the Jumping-Off Place?”
inquired Sweetest Susan.
“It was this way,” said Mr. Thimblefinger: “When the whirlwinds from the
south and the winds from the west, working in double harness, carried
the thick clouds away, and the Thunder with them, the little girl went
back to the place where she had left the old man who had carried her up
the mountain.
“She found him waiting. He was sitting at the foot of a tree, sleeping
peacefully, but he awoke at once.
“‘You see I am waiting for you,’ he said. ‘How did you enjoy your
visit?’
“‘I didn’t enjoy it much,’ replied the little girl. ‘Everything was so
large, and the Thunder made so much fuss.’
“‘I hope you didn’t mind that,’ said the old man. ‘The Thunder is a
great growler and grumbler, but when that’s said, all’s said. I am
sorry, though, you didn’t have a good time. I suppose you think it is my
fault, but it isn’t. If you say so, I’ll go to the Jumping-Off Place.’
“‘Where is that?’ asked the little girl.
“‘Just beyond the Well at the End of the World.’
“‘If it isn’t too far, let’s go there,’ said the little girl.
“So the old man lifted her on his back, and they went on their way. They
must have gone very swiftly, for it wasn’t long before they came to the
Well at the End of the World. An old woman was sitting near the Well,
combing her hair. She paid no attention to the travelers, nor they to
her. When they had gone beyond the Well a little distance, the little
girl noticed that the sky appeared to be very close at hand. It was no
longer blue, but dark, and seemed to hang down like a blanket or a
curtain.”
“But that couldn’t be, you know,” said Buster John, “for the sky is no
sky at all. It is nothing but space.”
“How comes it dey call it sky, ef ’t ain’t no sky?” asked Drusilla,
indignantly. “An’ how come’t ain’t no sky, when it’s right up dar, plain
ez de han’ fo’ yo’ face? Dat what I’d like ter know.”
“Why, the moon is thousands of miles away,” said Buster John, “and some
of the stars are millions and millions of miles farther than the moon.”
“Dat what dey say,” replied Drusilla, “but how dey know? Whar de string
what dey medjud ’em wid? Tell me dat!”
“What about our sky?” asked Mrs. Meadows, smiling. “You would never
think it was only the bottom of the spring if you didn’t know it; now
would you?”
Buster John had nothing to say in reply to this. Whereupon Sweetest
Susan begged Mr. Thimblefinger to please go on with his story.
“Well,” said he, “if I am to go on with it, I’ll have to tell it just as
I heard it. I’ll have to put the sky just where I was told it was. When
the little girl and the old man came close to the Jumping-Off Place,
they saw that the sky was hanging close at hand. It may have been far,
it may have been near, but to the little girl it seemed to be close
enough to touch, and she wished very much for a long pole, so that she
could see whether it was made of muslin or ginghams.
[Illustration:
PRESENTLY THEY CAME TO A PRECIPICE
]
“Presently they came to a precipice. There was nothing beyond it and
nothing below it. ‘This,’ said the old man to the little girl, ‘is the
Jumping-Off Place.’
“‘Does any one jump off here?’ said the little girl.
“‘Not that I know of,’ replied the old man, ‘but if they should take a
notion to, the place is all ready for them.’
“‘Where would I fall to, if I jumped off?’ the little girl asked.
“‘To Nowhere,’ answered the old man.
“‘That is very funny,’ said the little girl.
“‘Yes,’ remarked the old man, ‘you can get to the End of the World, but
you would have to travel many a long year before you get to Nowhere.
Some say it is a big city, some say it is a high mountain, and some say
it is a wide plain.’
“The little girl went to the Jumping-Off Place and looked over, the old
man holding her hand.
“‘Why, I see the moon shining down there,’ she said. She was glad to see
so familiar a face.
“The old man laughed. ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘the moon is very fond of shining
down there, and it runs away from the sun every chance it gets, and
hunts up the darkest places, so that it may shine there undisturbed.
To-day it is shining down there where the sun can’t see it, but to-night
it will creep up here, when the sun goes away, and shine the whole night
through.’
“Turning back, the old man and the little girl came again to the Well at
the End of the World. The old woman was sitting there, combing her long
white hair. This time she looked hard at the little girl and smiled,
singing:—
“‘When the heart is young the well is dry—
Oh, it’s good-by, dearie! good-by!’
“But the old man shook his head. ‘We have not come here for nothing,
Sister Jane,’ he said. With that he took a small vial, tied a long
string to it, and let it down the well. He fished about until the vial
was full of water, drew it to the top, and corked it tightly. The water
sparkled in the sun as if it were full of small diamonds. Then he placed
it carefully in his pocket, bowed politely to the old woman, who was
still combing her long, white hair, and, smiling, lifted the little girl
to his back, and returned along the road they had come, past the
Thunder’s house and down the mountain side, until they reached the
little girl’s home. Then he took the vial of sparkling water from his
pocket. ‘Take it,’ he said, ‘and wherever you go keep it with you. Touch
a drop of it to your forehead when Friday is the thirteenth day of a
month, and you will grow up to be both wise and beautiful. When you are
in trouble, turn the vial upside down—so—and hold it in that position
while you count twenty-six, and some of your friends will come to your
aid.’
“The little girl thanked the old man as politely as she knew how.
“‘Do you know why I have carried you to the Thunder’s house and to the
Jumping-Off Place, and why I have given you a vial of this rare water?’
The little girl shook her head. ‘Well, one day, not long ago, you were
sitting by the roadside with some of your companions. You were all
eating cake. A beggar came along and asked for a piece. You alone gave
him any, and you gave him all you had.’
“‘Were you the beggar?’ asked the little girl, smiling and blushing.
“‘That I leave you to guess,’ replied the old man. He kissed the little
girl’s hand, and was soon hid from sight by a turn in the road.”
Mr. Thimblefinger stopped short here, and waited to see what the
children would say. They had listened attentively, but they manifested
no very great interest.
“I reckon they think there is more talk than tale in what you have
told,” remarked Mr. Rabbit, leaning back in his chair. “That’s the way
it appeared to me.”
“Well, I’ll not say that I have come to the end of my story,” remarked
Mr. Thimblefinger, with some show of dignity, “but I have come to the
part where we can rest awhile, so as to give Mr. Rabbit a chance to see
if he can do any better. We’ll allow the little girl to grow some, just
as she does in the story.”
------------------------------------------------------------------------
IV.
THE BLUE HEN’S CHICKEN.
“I’m not much of a story-teller,” said Mr. Rabbit, “and I never set up
for one, but I will say that I like the rough-and-tumble tales a great
deal better than I do the kind where some great somebody is always
coming in with conjurings and other carryings-on. It’s on account of my
raising, I reckon.”
“Well, stories can’t be all alike,” remarked Mrs. Meadows. “You might as
well expect a fiddle to play one tune.”
“Tell us the kind of story you like best,” said Buster John to Mr.
Rabbit.
“No, not now,” responded Mr. Rabbit. “I’ll do that some other time. I
happened to think just now of a little circumstance that I used to hear
mentioned when I was younger.
“In the country next door there used to be a great many chickens. Some
were of the barnyard breed, some were of the kind they call game, some
were black, some were white, some were brown, some were speckled, and
some had their feathers curled the wrong way. Among all these there was
one whose name, as well as I can remember, was Mrs. Blue Hen.”
“Was she really blue?” Sweetest Susan inquired.
“Well, not an indigo blue,” replied Mr. Rabbit, after reflecting a
moment, “nor yet a sky blue. She was just a plain, dull, every-day blue.
But, such as she was, she was very fine. She belonged to one of the
first families and moved in the very best circles. She was trim-looking,
so I’ve heard said, and, as she grew older, came to have a very bad
temper, so much so that she used to fly at a hawk if he came near her
premises. Some of her neighbors used to whisper it around that she tried
to crow like a rooster, but this was after she had grown old and
hard-headed.
“When Mrs. Blue Hen was growing up, she was very nice and particular.
She couldn’t bear to get water on her feet, and she was always shaking
the dust from her clothes. Some said she was finicky, and some said she
was nervous. Once, when she fanned out little Billy Bantam, who called
on her one day, a great many of her acquaintances said she would never
settle down and make a good housekeeper.
“But after awhile Mrs. Blue Hen concluded that it was about time for her
to have a family of her own, so she went away off from the other
chickens and made her a nest in the middle of a thick briar patch. She
made her a nest there and laid an egg. It was new and white, and Mrs.
Blue Hen was very proud of it. She was so proud, in fact, that, although
she had made up her mind to make no fuss over it, she went running and
cackling toward the house, just as any common hen would do. She made so
much fuss that away down in the branch Mr. Willy Weasel winked at Miss
Mimy Mink.
“‘Do you hear that?’ says he.
“‘I never heard anything plainer in my life,’ says she.
“Mrs. Blue Hen was so proud of her new, white egg that she went back
after awhile to look at it. There it was, shining white in the grass.
She covered it up and hid it as well as she could, and then she went
about getting dinner ready.
“The next morning she went to the nest and laid another egg just like
the first one. This happened for three mornings; but on the fourth
morning, when Mrs. Blue Hen went back, she found four eggs in the nest,
and all four appeared to be dingy and muddy looking. She was very much
astonished and alarmed, as well she might be, for here right before her
eyes she saw four eggs, when she knew in reason that there should be but
three; and not only that, they were all dingy and dirty.
“Mrs. Blue Hen was so excited that she took off her bonnet and began to
fan herself. Then she wondered whether she had not made a miscount;
whether she had not really laid four instead of three eggs. The more she
thought about it, the more confused she became. She hung her bonnet on a
blackberry bush and tried to count off the days on her toes. She began
to count,—’One, two, three,’—and she would have stopped there, but she
couldn’t. She had four toes on her foot, and she was compelled to count
them all. There was a toe on the foot for every egg in the nest.
“This caused Mrs. Blue Hen to feel somewhat more comfortable in mind and
body, but she was left in such a hysterical state that she went off
cackling nervously, and postponed laying an egg until late in the
afternoon. After that there were five in the nest, and she kept on
laying until there were ten altogether. Then Mrs. Blue Hen rumpled up
her feathers and got mad with herself, and went to setting. I reckon
that’s what you call it. I’ve heard some call it ‘setting’ and others
‘sitting.’ Once, when I was courting, I spoke of a sitting hen, but the
young lady said I was too prissy for anything.”
“What is prissy?” asked Sweetest Susan.
Mr. Rabbit shut his eyes and scratched his ear. Then he shook his head
slowly.
“It’s nothing but a girl’s word,” remarked Mrs. Meadows by way of
explanation. “It means that somebody’s trying hard to show off.”
“I reckon that’s so,” said Mr. Rabbit, opening his eyes. He appeared to
be much relieved. “Well, Mrs. Blue Hen got mad and went to setting. She
was in a snug place and nobody bothered her. It was such a quiet place
that she could hear Mr. Willy Weasel and Miss Mimy Mink gossiping in the
calamus bushes, and she could hear Mrs. Puddle Duck wading in the
branch. One day Mrs. Puddle Duck made so bold as to push her way through
the briars and look in upon Mrs. Blue Hen. But her visit was not
relished. Mrs. Blue Hen rumpled her feathers up and spread out her tail
to such a degree and squalled out such a harsh protest that Mrs. Puddle
Duck was glad to waddle off with whole bones. But when she got back to
the branch she spluttered about a good deal, crying out:
“‘Aha! aha! quack, quack! Aha! You are there, are you? Aha! you’ll have
trouble before you get away. Aha!’
“Now the fact was that Mrs. Puddle Duck was the very one that had caused
Mrs. Blue Hen all the trouble,” said Mr. Rabbit, nodding his head
solemnly. “While wading in the branch, Mrs. Puddle Duck had seen Mrs.
Blue Hen going to her nest for three days, slipping and creeping through
the weeds and bushes, and she wanted to know what all the slipping and
creeping was about. So, on the third day Mrs. Puddle Duck did some
slipping and creeping on her own account. She crept up close enough to
see Mrs. Blue Hen on her nest, and she was near enough to see Mrs. Blue
Hen when she ran away cackling.
“Then Mrs. Puddle Duck waddled up and peeped in the nest. There she saw
three eggs as white and as smooth as ivory, and the sight filled her
with jealousy. She began to talk to herself:—
“‘I knew she must be mighty proud, the stuck-up thing! I can see that by
the way she steps around here. Quack, quack! and I’ll just show her a
thing or two.’
“Then and there Mrs. Puddle Duck, all muddy as she was, got in Mrs. Blue
Hen’s nest and sat on her beautiful white eggs and soiled them. And even
that was not all. Out of pure spite Mrs. Puddle Duck laid one of her own
dingy-looking eggs in Mrs. Blue Hen’s nest, and that was the cause of
all the trouble. That was the reason Mrs. Blue Hen found four dingy eggs
in her nest when there ought to have been three clean white ones.
“Well, Mrs. Blue Hen went to setting, and after so long a time nine
little chickens were hatched. She was very proud of them. She taught
them how to talk, and then she wanted to get off her nest and teach them
how to scratch about and earn their own living. But there was still one
egg to hatch, and so Mrs. Blue Hen continued to set on it. One day she
made up her mind to take her chicks off and leave the egg that wouldn’t
hatch. The old Speckled Hen happened to be passing and Mrs. Blue Hen
asked her advice. But the old Speckled Hen was very much shocked when
she heard the particulars.
“‘What! with nine chickens!’ she cried. ‘Why, nine is an odd number. It
would never do in the world. Hatch out the other egg.’
[Illustration:
ONE OF THEM WAS ENTIRELY DIFFERENT FROM ALL THE REST
]
“But young people are very impatient, and Mrs. Blue Hen was young. She
fretted and worried a good deal, but in a few days the tenth egg
hatched. Mrs. Blue Hen felt very much better after this. In fact, she
felt so comfortable that she didn’t take the trouble to look at the
chicken that hatched from the tenth egg. But when she brought her
children off the nest she was very much astonished to find that one of
them was entirely different from all the rest. She was not only
surprised, but shocked. Nine of her children were as neat-looking as she
could wish them to be, but the tenth one was a sight to see. It had weak
eyes, a bill as broad as a case-knife, and big, flat feet. Its feet were
so big that it waddled when it walked, and all the toes of each foot
were joined together.
“Mrs. Blue Hen had very high notions. She wanted everybody to think that
she belonged to the quality, but this wabbly chicken with a broad bill
and a foot that had no instep to it took her pride down a peg. She kept
her children hid as long as she could, but she had to come out in public
after a while, and when she did—well, I’ll let you know there was an
uproar in the barnyard. The old Speckled Hen was the first to begin it.
She cried out:—
“‘Look—look—look! Look at the Blue Hen’s chickens!’
“Then the Guinea hens began to laugh, and the old Turkey Gobbler was so
tickled he came near swallowing his snout. Mrs. Blue Hen hung her head
with shame, and carried her children away off in the woods.
“But her flat-footed chicken gave rise to a byword in all that country.
When any stranger came along looking rough and ragged, it was the common
saying that he was the Blue Hen’s chicken.”
“I’ve heard it many a time,” remarked Mrs. Meadows.
“There was no story in that,” Buster John suggested.
“No,” replied Mr. Rabbit. “Just some every-day facts picked up and
strung together.”
“Speaking of stories,” said Mrs. Meadows, “I have one in my mind that is
a sure enough story—one of the old-fashioned kind.”
“Well, please, ma’am, tell it,” said Buster John, so seriously that they
all laughed except Mr. Rabbit.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
V.
HOW A KING WAS FOUND.
“What about the little girl who had the vial of sparkling water?” said
Sweetest Susan, turning to Mr. Thimblefinger, just as Mrs. Meadows was
about to begin her story.
“Oh, she is growing,” replied Mr. Thimblefinger.
Buster John frowned at his sister, as boys will do when they are
impatient, and Sweetest Susan said no more.
“Once upon a time,” Mrs. Meadows began, rubbing her chin thoughtfully,
“there was a country that suddenly found itself without a king. This was
a long time ago, before people in some parts of the world began to think
it was unfashionable to have kings. I don’t know what the trouble was
exactly, whether the king died, or whether he was carried off, or
whether he did something to cause the people to take away his crown and
put him in the calaboose.
“Anyhow, they suddenly found themselves without a king, and it made them
feel very uncomfortable. They were so restless and uneasy that they
couldn’t sleep well at night. They were in the habit of having a king to
govern them, and they felt very nervous without one.
“Now in that country there were eleven wise men whose trade it was to
give advice. Instead of falling out and wrangling with one another and
ruining their business, these eleven wise men had formed a copartnership
and set up a sort of store, where anybody and everybody could get advice
by the wholesale or retail. I don’t know whether they charged anything,
because there never has been a time since the world had more than two
people in it that advice wasn’t as cheap as dirt.
“The eleven wise men were there, ready to give advice, and so the people
went to them and asked them how to select a king. The eleven wise men
put their heads together, and after a while they told the people that
they must select nine of their best men and send them out
|
'Main.' Watson, a secular
priest, whose main motive, in Professor Gardiner's view, was a hatred of
the Jesuits, had taken a leading part in reconciling the English
Catholics to James's accession. Irritated by the exaction of fines for
recusancy instituted at the beginning of the new reign, he allied
himself with Clarke, another priest, Sir Griffin Markham, a Catholic
gentleman discontented with the government for private reasons, George
Brooke, Lord Cobham's brother, and Lord Grey. A fantastic scheme
propounded by Markham was adopted, and the conspirators decided to seize
the King while hunting, to carry him to the Tower, on the plea of
protecting him from his enemies, and there install themselves in power
under the shadow of his name. They were, as represented by Coke in
Raleigh's trial, to swear to protect the Sovereign from all his enemies,
and they affected to have a large following in the country. Copley, an
insignificant recruit, was added to the party, and the execution of the
plot was fixed for the 24th of June. On that day, however, their
partisans proved to be too few for their designs, and the next day Grey
separated himself from them. Meanwhile the Jesuits had become aware of
the plot and communicated their knowledge to the government; and the
conspirators were soon arrested. The connection of Brooke with the 'Bye'
plot suggested Cobham's complicity; and Raleigh, as his nearest friend,
was summoned to Windsor by Cecil to be examined before the Council.
After this examination he wrote the letter to Cobham so often referred
to in the trial, saying that he had said nothing to compromise him, and
reminding him that one witness, possibly referring either to Aremberg's
servant, or Brooke, was not enough to convict of treason. He
subsequently wrote to Cecil informing him that Cobham had been in
communication with Aremberg, and Cobham was arrested. Raleigh's own
arrest followed on July 17th, and within a fortnight he attempted to
commit suicide. He and Cobham were both subsequently examined, with the
results that appear in the course of the trial. It must be remembered
that the government probably had a quantity of private information which
they did not produce, partly no doubt with the view of protecting
Aremberg. This is particularly so in relation to the most serious part
of the case; that, namely, relating to the scheme of placing Lady
Arabella on the throne; as to which see Gardiner's _History_, vol. i.
pp. 132, 133.
The leading members of the 'Bye' were tried and convicted two days
before Raleigh. Cobham and Grey were tried and convicted by the
Chancellor sitting as Lord Steward soon after. The two priests and
Brooke were hung. Cobham, Grey, and Markham were brought to the scaffold
that they might be induced to make their dying declarations, and were
then granted their lives. Cobham, when in instant expectation of death,
persisted in avowing Raleigh's guilt.
Beyond the interest that attaches to Raleigh's trial from the historical
and personal points of view, it is interesting as showing the methods in
which an important trial was conducted at the beginning of the
seventeenth century. The most remarkable feature of the trial itself in
the eyes of a modern reader, beyond its extreme informality, is that
Raleigh was condemned on the statement of a confederate, who spoke under
extreme pressure, with every inducement to exculpate himself at
Raleigh's expense, and whom Raleigh never had a chance of meeting. The
reasons given by Popham for refusing to allow Cobham to be called as a
witness at the trial are instructive, and, as Professor Gardiner points
out, prove that in political trials at all events, when the government
had decided that the circumstances of the case were sufficient to
justify them in putting a man on his trial, the view of the court before
which he was tried was that he was to be condemned unless he succeeded
in proving his innocence. This fact alone leads the modern Englishman
to sympathise with Raleigh, and this feeling is naturally increased by
what Sir James Stephen calls the 'rancorous ferocity' of Coke's
behaviour. The second cause added to Raleigh's popularity, and the
political reasons which led to his trial are probably what produced the
same feelings among his contemporaries. It is beyond my present purpose
to discuss how far Raleigh was really guilty of treason, even were I
competent to express any opinion on the subject worth attending to. But
for the credit of the lawyers who presided at the trial, I may point out
that the assertions that the statute of Edward VI., requiring two
witnesses in cases of treason, had been repealed, and that the trial at
common law was by examination, and not by a jury and witnesses, were not
as incomprehensibly unjust as they appear to us. A statute of Philip and
Mary enacted that cases of treason should be tried according to the due
order and course of common law, and the statute of Edward VI., being
regarded as an innovation upon the common law, was thus held to be
implicitly repealed. The rule as to the two witnesses seems to have been
construed as referring to trial by witnesses as it existed under the
civil law, which was taken to require two eye- or ear-witnesses to the
actual fact constituting the crime. With such a trial, trial by jury was
frequently contrasted, and if the rigour of the civil law was not to be
insisted on, the only alternative seemed to be that the jury should form
their opinion as they could, if not from their own knowledge, then from
any materials that might be laid before them. This naturally did away
with any rules of evidence as we understand them, and consequently
Cobham's confession became as good evidence as the jury could expect to
have. In fact, as Sir James Stephen says, 'The only rules of evidence as
to matters of fact recognised in the sixteenth century seem to have been
the clumsy rules of the mediæval civil law, which were supposed to be
based on the Bible. If they were set aside, the jury were absolute,
practically absolute, and might decide upon anything which they thought
fit to consider evidence.' See further Gardiner's _History_, vol. i. pp.
108-140; and Stephen's _History of the Criminal Law_, vol. i. pp.
333-337.
Sir Walter Raleigh was tried at Winchester on the 17th of November 1603
before a commission consisting of Thomas Howard,[3] Earl of Suffolk,
Lord Chamberlain; Charles Blunt,[4] Earl of Devon; Lord Henry Howard,[5]
afterwards Earl of Northampton; Robert Cecil,[6] Earl of Salisbury;
Edward, Lord Wotton of Morley; Sir John Stanhope, Vice-Chamberlain; Lord
Chief-Justice of England Popham;[7] Lord Chief-Justice of the Common
Pleas Anderson;[8] Justices Gawdie and Warburton; and Sir W. Wade.
The indictment charged Raleigh with high treason by conspiring to
deprive the King of his government; to alter religion; to bring in the
Roman Superstition; and to procure foreign enemies to invade the
kingdom. The facts alleged to support these charges were that Lord
Cobham,[9] on the 9th of June 1603, met Raleigh at Durham House in
London, and conferred with him as to advancing Lady Arabella Stuart[10]
to the throne; that it was there agreed that Cobham should, with
Aremberg, the ambassador of the Archduke of Austria, bargain for a bribe
of 600,000 crowns; that Cobham should go to the Archduke Albert, to
procure his support for Lady Arabella, and from him to the King of
Spain; that Lady Arabella should write three letters to the Archduke, to
the King of Spain, and to the Duke of Savoy, promising to establish
peace between England and Spain, to tolerate the Popish and Roman
superstition, and to be ruled by them as to her marriage. Cobham was
then to return to Jersey, where he would find Raleigh and take counsel
with him as to how to distribute Aremberg's bribe. On the same day
Cobham told his brother Brook of all these treasons, and persuaded him
to assent to them; afterwards Cobham and Brook spoke these words, 'That
there would never be a good world in England till the King (meaning our
sovereign lord) and his cubs (meaning his royal issue) were taken away.'
Further Raleigh published a book to Cobham, written against the title of
the King, and Cobham published the same book to Brook. Further, Cobham,
on the 14th of June, at Raleigh's instigation, moved Brook to incite
Lady Arabella to write the letters as aforesaid. Also on the 17th of
June Cobham, at Raleigh's instigation, wrote to Aremberg through one
Matthew de Lawrency, to obtain the 600,000 crowns, which were promised
to him on the 18th of June, and of which Cobham promised 8000 to Raleigh
and 10,000 to Brook.
To this indictment Raleigh pleaded Not Guilty; and a jury was sworn, to
none of whom Raleigh took any objection.
Heale, the King's Serjeant, then opened the case very shortly, merely
reciting the facts mentioned in the indictment, concluding: 'Now,
whether these things were bred in a hollow tree, I leave him to speak
of, who can speak far better than myself; and so sat down again.
ATTORNEY-GENERAL (Sir Ed. Coke[11])--I must first, my lords,
before I come to the cause, give one caution, because we shall
often mention persons of eminent places, some of them great
monarchs: whatever we say of them, we shall but repeat what
others have said of them; I mean the Capital Offenders, in their
Confessions. We professing law must speak reverently of kings
and potentates. I perceive these honourable lords, and the rest
of this great assembly, are come to hear what hath been
scattered upon the wrack of report. We carry a just mind, to
condemn no man, but upon plain Evidence.
Here is Mischief, Mischief _in summo gradu_, exorbitant
Mischief. My Speech shall chiefly touch these three points:
Imitation, Supportation, and Defence. The Imitation of evil ever
exceeds the Precedent; as on the contrary, imitation of good
ever comes short. Mischief cannot be supported but by Mischief;
yea, it will so multiply, that it will bring all to confusion.
Mischief is ever underpropped by falsehood or foul practices:
and because all these things did concur in this Treason, you
shall understand the main, as before you did the bye. The
Treason of the bye consisteth in these Points: first that the
lord Grey, Brook, Markham, and the rest, intended by force in
the night to surprise the king's court; which was a Rebellion in
the heart of the realm, yea, in the heart of the heart, in the
Court. They intended to take him that is a sovereign, to make
him subject to their power, purposing to open the doors with
musquets and cavaliers, and to take also the Prince and Council:
then under the king's authority to carry the King to the Tower;
and to make a stale of the admiral. When they had the King
there, to extort three things from him, first, A Pardon for all
their Treasons: Secondly, A Toleration of the Roman
Superstition; which their eyes shall sooner fall out than they
shall ever see; for the king hath spoken these words in the
hearing of many, 'I will lose the crown and my life, before ever
I will alter Religion.' And thirdly, To remove Counsellors. In
the room of the Lord Chancellor, they would have placed one
Watson, a priest, absurd in Humanity and ignorant in Divinity.
Brook, of whom I will speak nothing, Lord Treasurer. The great
Secretary must be Markham; _Oculus patriæ_. A hole must be found
in my Lord Chief-Justice's coat. Grey must be Earl-Marshal, and
Master of the Horse, because he would have a table in court;
marry, he would advance the earl of Worcester to a higher place.
All this cannot be done without a multitude: therefore Watson
the priest tells a resolute man that the king was in danger of
Puritans and Jesuits; so to bring him in blindfold into the
action saying, That the king is no king till he be crowned;
therefore every man might right his own wrongs: but he is _rex
natus_, his dignity descends as well as yours, my lords. Then
Watson imposeth a blasphemous Oath, that they should swear to
defend the king's person; to keep secret what was given them in
charge, and seek all ways and means to advance the Catholic
Religion. Then they intend to send for the Lord Mayor and the
Aldermen, in the king's name, to the Tower; lest they should
make any resistance, and then take hostages of them; and to
enjoin them to provide for them victuals and munition. Grey,
because the king removed before Midsummer, had a further reach
to get a Company of Sword-men to assist the action: therefore he
would stay till he had obtained a regiment from Ostend or
Austria. So you see these Treasons were like Sampson's foxes,
which were joined in their tails, though their heads were
severed.
RALEIGH--You Gentlemen of the Jury, I pray remember, I am not
charged with the Bye, being the Treason of the priest.
ATTORNEY--You are not. My lords, you shall observe three things
in the Treasons: 1. They had a Watch-word (the king's safety):
their Pretence was _Bonum in se_; their Intent was _Malum in
se_: 2. They avouched Scripture; both the priests had _Scriptum
est_: perverting and ignorantly mistaking the Scriptures; 3.
They avouched the Common Law, to prove that he was no king until
he was crowned; alledging a Statute of 13 Elizabeth.
He then proceeds to mention other cases of treason where the accused had
considered that their acts were _bonum in se_, and, defining treason,
lays down that--
There is Treason in the heart, in the hand, in the mouth, in
consummation: comparing that _in corde_ to the root of a tree;
_in ore_, to the bud; _in manu_, to the blossom; and that which
is _in consummatione_, to the fruit. Now I come to your Charge,
You of the Jury: the greatness of Treason is to be considered in
these two things, _determinatione finis_, and _electione
mediorum_. This Treason excelleth in both, for that it was to
destroy the king and his progeny. These treasons are said to be
_crimen læsæ majestatis_; this goeth further, and may be termed,
_crimen extirpandæ regiæ majestatis_, and _totius progenici
suæ_. I shall not need, my lord, to speak anything concerning
the king, nor of the bounty and sweetness of his nature whose
thoughts are innocent, whose words are full of wisdom and
learning, and whose works are full of honour, although it be a
true saying, _Nunquam nimis quod nunquam satis_. But to whom do
you bear Malice? To the Children?
RALEIGH--To whom speak you this? You tell me news I never heard
of.
ATTORNEY--O sir, do I? I will prove you the notoriest traitor
that ever came to the bar. After you have taken away the king,
you would alter Religion: as you, sir Walter Raleigh, have
followed them of the Bye in Imitation: for I will charge you
with the words.
RALEIGH--Your words cannot condemn me; my innocency is my
defence. Prove one of these things wherewith you have charged
me, and I will confess the whole Indictment, and that I am the
horriblest traitor that ever lived, and worthy to be crucified
with a thousand thousand torments.
ATTORNEY--Nay, I will prove all: thou art a monster; thou hath
an English face but a Spanish heart. Now you must have Money;
Aremberg was no sooner in England (I charge thee, Raleigh) but
thou incitest Cobham to go unto him, and to deal with him for
Money, to bestow on discontented persons, to raise Rebellion on
the kingdom.
RALEIGH--Let me answer for myself.
ATTORNEY--Thou shalt not.
RALEIGH--It concerneth my life.
LORD CHIEF-JUSTICE--Sir Walter Raleigh, Mr. Attorney is but yet
in the General: but when the king's Council have given the
evidence wholly you shall answer every Particular.
ATTORNEY--O! do I touch you?
LORD CECIL--Mr. Attorney, when you have done with this General
Charge, do you not mean to let him answer every Particular?
ATTORNEY--Yes, when we deliver the Proofs to be read. Raleigh
procured Cobham to go to Aremberg, which he did by his
instigation: Raleigh supped with Cobham before he went to
Aremberg; after supper, Raleigh conducted him to Durham-House,
from thence Cobham went with Lawrency, a servant of Aremberg's
unto him, and went in by a back way. Cobham could never be quiet
until he had entertained this motion, for he had four Letters
from Raleigh. Aremberg answered, The Money should be performed,
but knew not to whom it should be distributed. Then Cobham and
Lawrency came back to Durham-House, where they found Raleigh.
Cobham and Raleigh went up and left Lawrency below, where they
had secret conference in a gallery; and after, Cobham and
Lawrency departed from Raleigh. Your jargon was Peace: what is
that? Spanish invasion, Scottish subversion. And again, you are
not a fit man to take so much Money for procuring of a lawful
Peace, for Peace procured by money is dishonourable. Then Cobham
must go to Spain, and return by Jersey, where you were Captain:
and then, because Cobham had not so much policy, or at least
wickedness, as you, he must have your advice for the
distribution of the money. Would you have deposed so good a
king, lineally descended of Elizabeth, eldest daughter of Edward
IV.? Why then must you set up another? I think you meant to make
Arabella a Titular Queen, of whose Title I will speak nothing;
but sure you meant to make her a stale. Ah! good lady, you could
mean her no good.
RALEIGH--You tell me news, Mr. Attorney.
ATTORNEY--Oh sir! I am the more large, because I know with whom
I deal: for we have to deal to-day with a man of wit.
RALEIGH--Did I ever speak with this lady?
ATTORNEY--I will track you out before I have done. Englishmen
will not be led by persuasion of words, but they must have books
to persuade.
RALEIGH--The Book was written by a man of your profession, Mr.
Attorney.
ATTORNEY--I would not have you so impatient.
RALEIGH--Methinks you fall out with yourself; I say nothing.
ATTORNEY--By this Book you will persuade men, that he is not the
lawful king. Now let us consider some circumstances: my lords,
you will know my lord Cobham (for whom we all lament and
rejoice; lament in that his house, which hath stood so long
unspotted, is now ruinated: rejoice, in that his Treasons are
revealed): he is neither politician nor swordman; Raleigh was
both, united in the Cause with him and therefore cause of his
destruction. Another circumstance is, the secret contriving of
it. Humphry Stafford claimed Sanctuary for Treason: Raleigh, in
his Machiavelian policy hath made a Sanctuary for Treason: he
must talk with none but Cobham; because, saith he, one Witness
can never condemn me. For Brook said unto sir Griffith Markham,
'Take heed how you do make my lord Cobham acquainted; for
whatsoever he knoweth, Raleigh the witch will get it out of
him.' As soon as Raleigh was examined on one point of Treason
concerning my lord Cobham he wrote to him thus: 'I have been
examined of you, and confessed nothing.' Further, you sent to
him by your trusty Francis Kemish,[12] that one witness could
not condemn; and therefore bade his lordship be of good courage.
Came this out of Cobham's quiver? No: but out of Raleigh's
Machiavelian and devilish policy. Yea, for Cobham did retract
it; why then did ye urge it? Now then see the most horrible
practices that ever came out of the bottomless pit of the lowest
hell. After that Raleigh had intelligence that Cobham had
accused him, he endeavoured to have intelligence from Cobham
which he had gotten by young sir John Payton: but I think it was
the error of his youth.
RALEIGH--The lords told it me, or else I had been sent to the
Tower.
ATTORNEY--Thus Cobham, by the instigation of Raleigh, entered
into these actions: so that the question will be, whether you
are not the principal traitor and he would nevertheless have
entered into it? Why did Cobham retract all the same? First,
because Raleigh was so odious, he thought he should fare the
worse for his sake; secondly, he thought thus with himself, If
he be free I shall clear myself the better. After this, Cobham
asked for a Preacher to confer with, pretending to have Dr.
Andrews;[13] but indeed he meant not to have him but Mr.
Galloway,[14] a worthy and reverent preacher, who can do more
with the King (as he said) than any other; that he seeing his
constant denial, might inform the king thereof. Here he plays
with the preacher. If Raleigh could persuade the lords that
Cobham had no intent to travel, then he thought all should be
well. Here is forgery! In the Tower, Cobham must write to sir
Thos. Vane, a worthy man, that he meant not to go to Spain:
which letter Raleigh devised in Cobham's name.
RALEIGH--I will wash my hands of the indictment, and die a true
man to the king.
ATTORNEY--You are the absolutist traitor that ever was.
RALEIGH--Your phrases will not prove it.
ATTORNEY--Cobham writeth a letter to my lord Cecil, and doth
with Mellis's man to lay it in a Spanish Bible and to make as
though he found it by chance. This was after he had intelligence
with this viper, that he was false.
LORD CECIL--You mean a letter intended to me; I never had it.
ATTORNEY--No, my lord, you had it not. You, my masters of the
jury, respect not the wickedness and hatred of the man, respect
his cause: if he be guilty, I know you will have care of it, for
the preservation of the king, the continuance of the Gospel
authorized, and the good of us all.
RALEIGH--I do not hear yet, that you have spoken one word
against me; here is no Treason of mine done: If my lord Cobham
be a Traitor, what is that to me?
ATTORNEY--All that he did was by thy instigation, thou viper;
for I 'thou' thee, thou Traitor.
RALEIGH--It becometh not a man of quality and virtue to call me
so: But I take comfort in it, it is all you can do.
ATTORNEY--Have I angered you?
RALEIGH--I am in no case to be angry.
CHIEF-JUSTICE POPHAM--Sir Walter Raleigh, Mr. Attorney speaketh
out of the zeal of his duty, for the service of the king, and
you for your life; be valiant on both sides.
_The Lord Cobham's Examination._[15]
'He confesseth, he had a Passport to go into Spain, intending
to go to the Archduke, to confer with him about these Practices;
and because he knew the Archduke had not Money to pay his own
army, from thence he meant to go to Spain to deal with the king
for the 600,000 crowns, and to return by Jersey; and that
nothing should be done, until he had spoken with sir Walter
Raleigh for distribution of the Money to them which were
discontented in England. At the first beginning, he breathed out
oaths and exclamations against Raleigh, calling him Villain and
Traitor; saying he had never entered into these courses but by
his instigation, and that he would never let him alone.' (Here
Mr. Attorney willed the Clerk of the Crown Office to read over
these last words again, 'He would never let him alone.')
'Besides he spake of plots and invasions; of the particulars
whereof he could give no account, though Raleigh and he had
conferred of them. Further he said, he was afraid of Raleigh,
that when he should return by Jersey, that he would have
delivered him and the Money to the king.' 'Being examined of sir
A. Gorge he freed him, saying, They never durst trust him: but
sir Arthur Savage they intended to use, because they thought him
a fit man.'
RALEIGH--Let me see the Accusation: this is absolutely all the
Evidence that can be brought against me; poor shifts! You
Gentlemen of the Jury, I pray you understand this. This is that
which must either condemn, or give me life; which must free me,
or send my wife and children to beg their bread about the
streets. This is that which must prove me a notorious Traitor,
or a true subject to the king. Let me see my Accusation, that I
may make my Answer.
CLERK OF THE COUNCIL--I did read it, and shew you all the
examinations.
RALEIGH--At my first examination at Windsor, my lords asked me
what I knew of Cobham's practice with Aremberg; I answered
negatively: and as concerning Arabella I protest before God I
never heard one word of it. If that be proved, let me be guilty
of 10,000 Treasons. It is a strange thing you will impute that
to me, when I never so much as heard the name of Arabella
Stuart, but only the name of Arabella. After being examined, I
told my lords, that I thought my lord Cobham had conference with
Aremberg; I suspected his visiting of him; for after he departed
from me at Durham-house I saw him pass by his own stairs, and
passed over to St. Mary Saviours, where I knew Lawrency, a
merchant, and a follower of Aremberg, lay, and therefore likely
to go unto him. My lord Cecil asked my opinion concerning
Lawrency; I said that if you do not apprehend Lawrency, it is
dangerous, he will fly; if you do apprehend him, you shall give
my lord Cobham notice thereof. I was asked who was the greatest
man with my lord Cobham; I answered, I knew no man so great with
him as young Wyat of Kent. As soon as Cobham saw my Letter to
have discovered his dealing with Aremberg in his fury he accused
me; but before he came to the stair-foot, he repented, and said
he had done me wrong. When he came to the end of his Accusation
he added, that if he had brought this money to Jersey, he feared
that I would have delivered him and the Money to the King. Mr.
Attorney, you said this never came out of Cobham's quiver; he is
a simple man. Is he so simple? no: he hath a disposition of his
own, he will not easily be guided by others; but when he has
once taken head in a matter, he is not easily drawn from it: he
is no babe.
He then goes on to point out the inherent improbabilities of Cobham's
story; he himself had no means for persuading the King of Spain to
disburse money, having lost his wardenship of the Stannaries; he knew
England to be stronger and Spain to be weaker than they had been; the
Spanish fleet had been ruined, and the trade with the Indies had fallen
off. Cobham had no money of his own. When Raleigh was examined, he had
£40,000 worth of Cobham's jewels which he had bought of him. 'If he had
had a fancy to run away he would not have left so much as to have
purchased a lease in fee-farm. I saw him buy £300 worth of books to send
to his library at Canterbury, and a cabinet of £30 to give to Mr.
Attorney for drawing the conveyances; and God in Heaven knoweth, not I,
whether he intended to travel or not. But for that practice with
Arabella, or letters to Aremberg framed, or any discourse with him, or
in what language he spake unto him; if I knew any of these things, I
would absolutely confess the indictment, and acknowledge myself worthy
of ten thousand deaths.'
_Cobham's second Examination read._
The lord Cobham being required to subscribe to an Examination,
there was shewed a Note under sir Walter Raleigh's hand; the
which when he had perused, he paused, and after brake forth into
those Speeches: Oh Villain! oh Traitor! I will now tell you all
the truth; and then he said, His purpose was to go into
Flanders, and into Spain, for the obtaining the aforesaid Money;
and that Raleigh had appointed to meet him in Jersey as he
returned home, to be advised of him about the distribution of
the Money.
LORD CHIEF-JUSTICE POPHAM--When Cobham answered to the
Interrogatories, he made scruple to subscribe, and being urged
to it, he said, if he might hear me affirm, that if a person of
his degree ought to set his hand he would: I lying then at
Richmond for fear of the plague was sent for, and I told he
ought to subscribe; otherwise it were a Contempt of a high
nature: then he subscribed. The lords questioned with him
further, and he shewed them a letter, as I thought written to
me, but it was indeed written to my lord Cecil; he desired to
see the Letter again, and then said, 'Oh wretch! oh traitor!'
whereby I perceived you had not performed that trust he had
reposed in you.
RALEIGH--He is as passionate a man as lives; for he hath not
spared the best friends he hath in England in his passion. My
lords, I take it, he that has been examined, has ever been asked
at the time of his Examination, if it be according to his
meaning, and then to subscribe. Methinks, my lords, when he
accuses a man, he should give some account and reason of it: it
is not sufficient to say we talked of it. If I had been the
plotter, would not I have given Cobham some arguments, whereby
to persuade the king of Spain, and answer his objections? I
knew Westmoreland and Bothwell, men of other understandings
than Cobham, were ready to beg their bread.
SIR THOS. FOWLER (one of the Jury)--Did sir Walter Raleigh write
a letter to my lord before he was examined concerning him or
not?
ATTORNEY--Yes.
LORD CECIL--I am in great dispute with myself to speak in the
case of this gentleman; a former dearness between me and him
tyed so firm a knot of my conceit of his virtues, now broken by
a discovery of his imperfections. I protest, did I serve a king
that I knew would be displeased with me for speaking, in this
case I would speak, whatever came of it; but seeing he is
compacted of piety and justice, and one that will not mislike of
any man for speaking the truth, I will answer your question. Sir
Walter Raleigh was staid by me at Windsor, upon the first news
of Copley, that the king's person should be surprized by my lord
Grey, and Mr. Geo. Brook; when I found Brook was in, I suspected
Cobham, then I doubted Raleigh to be a partaker. I speak not
this, that it should be thought I had greater judgment than the
rest of my lords in making this haste to have them examined.
Raleigh following to Windsor, I met with him upon the Terrace
and willed him, as from the king, to stay; saying the lords had
something to say to him; then he was examined, but not
concerning my lord Cobham but of the surprizing treason. My lord
Grey was apprehended, likewise Brook; by Brook, we found that he
had given notice to Cobham of the surprizing treason, as he
delivered it to us; but with as much sparingness of a brother as
he might. We sent for my lord Cobham to Richmond, where he
stood upon his justification and his quality; sometimes being
froward; he said he was not bound to subscribe, wherewith we
made the king acquainted. Cobham said, if my Lord Chief-Justice
would say it was a Contempt, he would subscribe; whereof being
resolved, he subscribed. There was a light given to Aremberg,
that Lawrency was examined; but that Raleigh knew that Cobham
was examined is more than I know.
RALEIGH--If my lord Cobham had trusted me in the Main, was not I
as fit a man to be trusted in the Bye?
LORD CECIL--Raleigh did by his Letters acquaint us that my lord
Cobham had sent Lawrency to Aremberg, when he knew not he had
any dealings with him.
LORD H. HOWARD--It made for you if Lawrency had been only
acquainted with Cobham, and not with you. But you knew his whole
estate, and were acquainted with Cobham's practice with
Lawrency: and it was known to you before that Lawrency depended
upon Aremberg.
ATTORNEY--1. Raleigh protested against the surprizing treason.
2. That he knew not of the matter touching Arabella. I would not
charge you, sir Walter, with the matter of falsehood: you say
you suspected the Intelligence that Cobham had with Aremberg by
Lawrency.
RALEIGH--I thought it had been no other intelligence, but such
as might be warranted.
ATTORNEY--Then it was but lawful suspicion. But to that whereas
you said, that Cobham had accused you in passion, I answer three
ways. 1. I observed, when Cobham said let me see the letter
again, he paused
|
her happiness found
no sufficiently comprehensive outlet in that scarcely familiar tongue.
"Little one," he said, earnestly, "do you love me enough to be mine, to
take me for now and always?"
She nodded only, but her beautiful blue eyes, borrowing intensity from
the azure sky, seemed to answer and envelop him with an embrace of
adoration.
"You must obey me; you must trust me much, very much," he explained,
seriously, seeing the gaiety of her mood.
"To obey--to trust? Of course! Is not all enclosed in love? Have I not
said, 'I love you?'"
"Enough to leave everyone, to come----"
"How? Valentine?" she cried, with a sudden look of terror; "she
waits----"
"To-day," he admitted, "but to-morrow? You will be here in the same
place?" He leapt up and knelt imploringly on the dancing planks.
"Yes," she whispered.
"And from that hour you will give yourself to me?" he insisted.
"To you I gave myself a year ago," she said, with solemnity, her candid
Breton eyes beaming like a bluer heaven upon him.
He moved uneasily.
"You will not regret?" he urged, in some anxiety.
"Shall I regret that there is a God? that when we love He speaks with
us?"
He pressed her hands and kissed them. Her faith was vastly simple, yet
vastly complete.
That night he wandered about the restricted area of St Malo long after
the Curfew--La Noyette, as it is termed--had sounded and the private
dwellings were closed. He was distraught with misgivings. Was he a
latent blackguard? he asked himself, or had he yet the courage to
withdraw, to leave this innocent girl buried in her dungeon,
inconsolable and doubting his fidelity?
No, he had not the courage. Fate held out its magnet--he must go whither
it should lead. He was not an apostle--merely a man, an atom in the
fortuitous system to be swept where destiny should decide. Need he, an
artist, be more chivalrous--he put it baldly--more conventional and
self-abnegating than other men? Must he, when the delicious moment of
love's ripening had arrived, forbear to pluck, to eat? As he had loved
this Breton girl a year ago he loved her, despite their severance,
to-day. Nay, more, for in this year had he not flung himself headlong
into the orgies of his Bohemian life to strangle recollection, and had
he not been haunted by memory's unresting ghost, the more exquisite, the
more endearing for its intangible, ineffaceable outlines? He recalled
some verses of homage to the city he had encountered in an old St Malo
record:--
"Quiconque t'a connue aime ton souvenir
Et vers toi, tot ou tard, desire revenir."
He had come back to the "Souvenir" and realised how the character of
this _Ville d'elite_ so "_douce et pieuse_," so grandly sombre, so
exquisitely poetic and noble, was expressed and summed up in her, his
queenly, gracious Leonie. He decided finally that, come what might, she
should be won!
The next day he was seated on the raft full half an hour before she
appeared. In the lap of the waves he espied a purple-suited nymph,
enwound with a sash of Roman red, extending white arms that glistened
like newly chiselled marble in the green spray. Her pretty lips laughed
as she swam towards him, the sole atom in an immensity of chrysoprase.
That day the usual crowd on the shore was thinned; a market and fair of
some kind at St Servan had lured visitors and St Malouians to the other
side of the Pont Roulant. The beach was comparatively deserted, and even
the boatman who was deputed to row about the bathing course for purposes
of rescue, was, with his craft, apparently off duty.
"How well you swim," said her lover, admiringly, as he greeted the young
girl and noted enviously the drippings from her disfiguring cap that
were privileged to alight upon her dimpled cheeks. He was tempted to put
an arm round the pretty panting figure, but resisted.
"It is my one _passe temps_. I have swam half to Cezambre and back," she
exclaimed proudly, indicating, by a glance over her shoulder, an island
that reared its rocks some two miles distant.
He flushed slightly.
"It is there that I want you to swim--now, when you have rested."
"Too far," she sighed; "we could never get back."
"We should never come back," he announced with determination.
"Valentine? She will think I drown."
"She would prefer to bury you at La Chaumais?"
Leonie laughed.
"Are you ready?" he said, arresting further objections and crushing a
word of endearment that rose to his lips. To be successful he must be
matter-of-fact. Everything now depended on promptness and a cool head.
He pulled a knotted string and lifted from the water a cork belt.
"You must run no risk of fatigue," he said, fitting it to her fragile
form. "Now, let us start. Valentine will soon be on the _qui vive_."
Without demur she accepted his hand and leapt with him from the far side
of the raft.
The sea stretched a sheet of silver under a sky of gauzy opal, shot with
flame from the dozing sun; wind and tide were in their favour. Before
long they had passed from the sight of the shore to the shade of the
giant rock, whose railed summit, dedicated to Chateaubriand, seems to
commune with and command the elements. Cezambre in the distance was as
yet merely an apparent triangle of spikes jutting from mid ocean, but
towards it they plied their way valiantly, two moving human dots, on the
breast of the vast abyss. Once she laughed uproariously to relieve her
happiness, but he checked her.
"We must reserve our forces, my darling, every breath in us. Valentine
will give the alarm directly. She will wait and wait, and then there
will be a hue and cry. It will be a matter of life and death. Do you
understand?"
In the earnestness of his face she read for the first time all that this
adventurous swim would mean for them both.
"If they come," she panted, "you will not leave me, you will not give me
back to them?"
His jaws clenched hard.
"Never!" he vowed. "We will go under first!"
He trod the water for a moment while he scanned the expanse behind them.
"Go on," he begged of her; "I will catch you up: spare yourself as much
as you can."
His precaution was needless; nothing was to be seen on the still surface
of the sea, and, as the rock now screened the shore, it was impossible
to guess what might be taking place there. Presently he gained on her.
"Safe so far," he said. "Don't speak; float a little."
He caught the side of the life-belt she wore and swam out, drawing her
in the direction of the island. Some sailing boats fluttered across the
horizon, but their route lay in an opposite direction to that of the
swimmers, who had now left the rocks and were well in the open.
Gradually the St Malo coast grew more indistinct, and by degrees in
front of them the spikes that had represented Cezambre developed into
rocks. Then Leonie assembled her flagging forces and struck out with
renewed zest. The sun was going down, and a cool breeze came up behind
them and seemed to give them impetus and freshened courage. Before
twilight they had safely piloted themselves to shore.
As they rose from the depths he flung his arms round her with a sense of
ecstatic relief.
"Now, dearest, we must brave it out; go to the coastguard's hut,
and"--he pointed to an oilskin satchel which he had worn across his
shoulders--"buy him."
Leonie cast on her lover a glance of awe and pride and worship. He
seemed to be God and fairy tale miraculously combined. She believed
herself to be treading Elysium as they took their way to the humble
stone cabin occupied by the coastguard and his son, the only inhabitants
of the island. Her young brain reeled with the intoxication of freedom.
How much rosier than any she had before seen were the sea-pinks that
flowered their way; how surprisingly azure the common bluebells that
nodded and waved and seemed, as they passed, to be ringing chimes to
celebrate her happiness. And even the potatoes that grew in the little
garden plot where this coastguard Crusoe toiled, had they not a world of
wonder in their blossoms, in their golden eyes, which watched and
watched and glowed, as she believed, before the triumphant coming of
their Love?
A rude hobbledehoy of the St Malo peasant class opened the hut door and
stared. Then he said something in his opaque _patois_ which only Leonie
could elucidate. She had often imitated the vulgar of her race from
sheer _plaisanterie_.
She replied in the same key, and, seeing that the youth comprehended,
the artist prompted a duologue.
"He says," Leonie began by explaining, "the coastguard is ill, he cannot
leave him to go ashore, and does not know what to do. He refuses to take
us back in his boat."
"He is under the delusion we want to go back? Good! Give him money and
say we will stop here and attend his sick man."
This explanation ensured their entry. The boy was evidently relieved of
a burden. The hut was composed merely of two rooms, in one of which a
weather-beaten old man was evidently bedridden from pain. He looked
askance at the two bathers, but at the same time his son put a coin into
the sufferer's hand. The youth, with the acumen of his kind, understood
the relative value of eloquence and action.
"Clothes--food," Leonie translated at her lover's request.
The boy shook his head. Then his eyes fell on the rough suit belonging
to his father which was slung across the end of the bed.
"That might do for me," the artist cogitated, with wrinkled brow, "but
for you?" He looked seriously at his sweetheart. The boy's eyes followed
his glance and read it. The sick man turned in his bed, groaned, and
wondered when these troublesome people were going away.
Leonie rubbed a gentle hand on the invalid's shoulder; it was presumably
the seat of the worst pain. He suffered rheumatism in its most acute
form, so the coastguard explained between his throes. He was afraid to
seek help from the land, lest his condition should be known and he be
removed from his post. Their silence was implored with tears and
prayers--he would give them food and shelter if they would keep his
secret. They promised assuringly.
Meanwhile the lad had disappeared into the inner room--it suggested a
combined kitchen and workshop--and came back dangling from his arm some
fragmentary portions of his wardrobe, which he displayed with pride.
"If madame would condescend?" he hinted.
At the word "madame" Leonie blushed delightedly.
He led the way into the kitchen, and deposited the dry clothes on a
chair.
Ralph remained by the sick man, rubbing the afflicted limb, and
expressing himself in the vilest French he knew in hope to imitate the
local jargon.
He spoke sufficiently to crave bread and drink, and to learn that these
were only obtained when fetched from the land in the island boat. His
son, the coastguard said, was seldom allowed to go ashore, lest he
should commit himself and divulge the fact that illness kept his sire
from duty. Fortunately the boat had been provisioned that morning, and
there was food for several days.
During the conversation the artist adjusted the coastguard's overcoat
and trousers, which latter were three inches too short for his lengthy
British limbs.
Presently a transformed Leonie emerged from the inner chamber. "An ideal
fisher boy," the painter thought, as his enraptured eye travelled up and
down the coarse blue clothing. When it reached some loose locks of her
shining hair he became puzzled. She, divining his thought, felt in the
pocket of her newly-acquired coat, and drew forth a maze of gold, soft
as fleece of raw silk fresh from the cocoon, and gave it him.
He began to scold at the sacrifice.
"It is a web to entangle your love for always," she murmured, with
cooing lips, which seemed, there and then, to suck the heart out of him.
He would fain have swept the coastguard and his son from the hut, but
the exuberant _patois_ of "madame," the more exuberant by reason of her
characteristic disguise, broke out, demanding of the lad refreshment,
and illustrating her request with significant pantomime. The childish
joy of this noble Breton damsel as she devoured the rude meal in company
with their quaint hosts delighted him, and the charming _abandon_ with
which she threw herself into the comedy of the situation brought heat to
his already tingling blood.
Suddenly she grew grave.
"I was so hungry I forgot to ask a blessing," whereupon the buoyant
little creature uprose from her seat and offered a prayer. The short
Latin sentence was familiar to Ralph's ear; it was common to the whole
Catholic Church; but now it had a parenthesis--a parenthesis during
which her loving eyes looked first to his, then heavenward--a
parenthesis of praise and thanksgiving _for him_.
He bent his head to hide the flush that overspread his cheeks, and, for
an instant, he buried his face in his hands.
When the meal was over, Leonie ran into the potato garden. She gathered
some loose weeds of which he did not know the name, picking here and
there carefully that all of them should be of the right sort.
"I could not go to sleep and leave the old man to his pains," she said.
"Of these"--she pointed to the herbs--"the poor people make poultices
when they suffer."
He took the bundles from her hands and kissed her fingers. "You shall
sleep, dearest, and I will devote myself to the poor fellow. We have
reason to be very grateful to him."
"Very well, doctor," she laughed. "You must be careful to stew the
leaves very soft."
Then she walked in and commanded the boy to get grass in a bag for a
pillow, declaring merrily that some fishing nets and canvas in the
kitchen would make her a couch fit for a queen.
The poultices certainly soothed, though they did not cure, the sufferer.
This fact Ralph painfully discovered during the long hours of the night.
His limbs were weary, and though the floor at the foot of the
coastguard's bed was hard, he yearned heartily for rest. But the poor
invalid, by whose side the son snored obdurately, hourly implored
relief. Faithful to his word, the nurse, uprose at intervals and put
fresh leaves in the stewpan, warming them on a rustic stove till soft
enough for use. This lasted till day dawn. Then the lad went forth
a-shrimping, and Ralph decided to refresh himself with a plunge in the
sea. Washing utensils, he had discovered, were unknown in Cezambre.
He was speeding down the garden in bathing suit when he caught a glimpse
of his purple dolphin riding the waves.
"I squeezed myself out of the window so as not to wake you," she
spluttered, through the surf. "I thought, _mon cheri_, you would repose
for ever."
"The old man is very thankful to you for your prescription." He avoided
the confession of his night's unrest. "We must gather some more of those
herbs to-day."
"Perhaps, but not till evening. You don't know that we must hide. There
may come strangers for trips on boats from St Servan, and one is never
sure."
"Your people?"
"Oh no; they would do nothing so _roturier_--English and Americans----"
"They would not know us; you forget what a good gamin my noble lady
makes."
"I did forget," she chuckled. "I will dig potatoes, and you may take the
boy to the other side of the island. The strangers only go there to
stare one moment at the rocks and cry 'Oh!'"
When at midday the trippers landed at Cezambre, they saw no one but an
urchin bent double over a spade. His face was covered with mud, some of
which was also spattered on the floss silk of his hair.
A tourist addressed him, and received a reply in broad _patois_ which he
could not understand.
The youth was very voluble, despite the irresponsiveness of the
audience; he waved his hand indicating the beauties of the island with
an air of ownership. Now and then he punctuated his speech by rubbing
his fustian arm across his nose in true plebeian fashion. The tourists
were delighted, and, before departing, dropped a silver coin into his
grimy but exquisitely shaped palm.
When Ralph returned she met him, dancing and rubbing the mud from her
cheeks.
"See," she said, tossing the coin in the air, "this is the first wedding
present we have had. I will cut Cezambre upon it and wear it for ever.
But first you will come with me."
She took his hand and led the way to a curious cave carved in the rocks,
in the centre of which was a cross. The walls were frescoed with common
shells, the offerings, she explained, of poor pilgrims who had been
worshippers at this primitive shrine.
With unconscious grace she prostrated herself in prayer.
He watched her in silence, his artist eye greedily tracing the
picturesque in every line of this innocent devotion, though his panting
heart longed to intrude on the sanctity of her worship. Presently she
lifted her hand to his and drew him to his knees by her side.
Softly, like the sonorous gong from some grand cathedral belfry, she
commenced to recite or chant in Latin.
"Speak with me," she whispered, repeating the melodious words with an
accent of reverential appreciation.
He did as she bade. The fervour of her devotion communicated itself to
him, he followed word for word to the end. The burthen, though not the
absolute meaning of the sentences, inspired him--it was the ceremony of
marriage they quoted, it was God's blessing they mutually invoked.
* * * * *
When they had returned to the potato garden, and were plucking herbs for
the poultices he had promised to renew during his midnight vigils, he
suddenly remarked:--
"We must leave here for the English coast as soon as we can get a
fishing smack to take us along."
"Leave here?" she uttered in dismay. "I would remain for ever."
He gave a short gasp, clutched her hands, and looked straight into the
transparent blue depths of her eyes. Then he moved away a step or two
and shook his head.
"It is inevitable; we must go to England--give ourselves over to law and
parson."
"Here it is better," she cooed; "you are king and I am priest." But he
dissented.
"I never had much respect for Church or State. I appreciate them as one
appreciates steel to sharpen one's blade against."
She did not understand. Only the simplest English formed her vocabulary,
but she saw he disagreed with her.
"Here we are everything," she said; "we make laws straight from God for
ourselves."
He shrugged his shoulders and sighed. "Those, I find, are the toughest
laws of all! Come, darling, let us ask the boy yonder about the fishing
boats."
They were informed that one might possibly pass on the following night.
He borrowed from the youth a piece of hard chalk that acted in lieu of
pencil, and begged Leonie to write with it on some rough paper which had
served to wrap stores from the land.
"Tell your mother that we have decided, after three days on this island,
to leave for Brighton, on the British coast, there to marry. A year ago
we asked her blessing on our love, and she refused it; we pray that she
will now be more lenient."
"No good," murmured Leonie, translating, however, what he had dictated.
Below, he scribbled the address of an hotel in England, where a reply
might meet them.
"She is sure," he said, folding the note, "to call me a blackguard, and
as certain, I hope, to consent."
"My best and dearest," cried the girl in prospective contradiction of
anything that might be pronounced against him.
Twenty-four hours later, when the fishing smack alluded to hove in
sight, the missive was handed to the coastguard's son. He was ordered to
take it inland on the morrow, and deliver it without fail, at "La
Chaumais."
"But supposing my brother should not write? Supposing he should come?"
"That is what I hope. Le Sieur will support the dignity of the De
Quesnes--he will engage with the law and leave us to engage with only
love."
So the next evening they put out to sea through the gossamer scarves of
moving twilight--the man in his coastguard kit gay to frivolity, the
girl in fisher disguise, meditative, half tearful. She breathed not a
word while her straining eyes could clutch the outline of the land from
the embrace of night; but when all was wrapped in gloom she lifted her
gaze to the star-spangled heavens, and murmured with folded hands,
"_Cher Royaume de Cezambre, adieu!_"
Trooper Jones of the Light Brigade.
"To get myself in courage--crush out fears;
To strive with fate for something more than gold."
A year or two ago I received an envelope containing a lock of flame-red
hair wrapped in a soiled linen rag. By this token I knew that old
Sergeant Kemp--the name is a pseudonym, for reasons which will be
seen--Sergeant Kemp, formerly of the Light Brigade, was dead. This
knowledge unseals my lips, and permits me to divulge an extraordinary
episode of the charge of Balaclava which was related to me by the
veteran, and which, as far as I can judge, has entirely escaped the
research of the romanticist and historian.
My original intention in going to see the old hero was to interview him
and learn if he could throw any new light on the tragic and immemorial
events of '54-5-6, through which, with the exception of a slight wound
in the wrist, he had passed unscathed.
I propitiated him with gifts of tobacco, and, having found the "open
sesame" to the cave of his reminiscences, visited him often. My object
was to filch, surreptitiously as it were, the treasures I coveted,
before their valuable crudity could suffer the unconscious adulteration
to which such goods are liable at the hands of the professional
story-monger. But I found, when the strings of his tongue were unloosed,
he had very little more to relate about the events of the campaign than
is already recorded. In fact, like many an actor in the drama of life,
he really knew less about the general _mise-en-scene_ than I, who had
only reviewed it through the lorgnon of Tennyson and other contemporary
writers. Seeing, however, that a shade of disappointment was cast by the
fogginess of his disclosures, the old fellow one day abruptly asked if I
could keep a secret were he to tell it me. I vowed my complete
trustworthiness, but at the same time remonstrated that confidences so
hampered would be of absolutely no use to the work I had on hand. He
rose laboriously from his chair--lumbago had almost crippled him--and
produced from a tin box a soiled rag containing the curl of red hair
which is now in my possession.
"This 'air," he explained in mumbling tones, "was cut off the 'ead of
Trooper Jones of ours--in times of war one 'asn't much truck with the
barber," he parenthesised. "We called 'im 'Carrots,' as bein' most
convenient and discriptive like. And that there bit of shirt belonged to
my pal Jenkins, as good a chap as ever wore shako. It's the 'istory of
'em both as I've 'alf a mind to tell you, but you must be mum as old
bones about it--at all events till this 'ere bloke's a-carried out feet
foremost."
"And then?" I said, with unbecoming eagerness.
"Then you can jest do what ye darn please; the 'ole three of us 'll be
orf dooty together."
So he related to me in a fragmentary manner, halting now and again and
blowing clouds from his pipe as if to assist his ruminations, the
strange history of Trooper Jones, almost word for word as I have set it
down. He began:--
"It was in May that we got orders to embark.... I can remember turning
out at four in the mornin' to march to the dockyard, and 'ow the green
lanes was all a-sproutin' and a-shinin', and 'ow the sky was that pink
and streaky, for all the world like a prime rasher. But that's neither
'ere nor there.... We 'ad been billeted in the villages nigh Portsmouth
for several days, and my comrade, James Jenkins, and I 'ad been
quartered at an inn kept by Jones' father and 'is sister--a strappin'
girl, and as like her brother as one bullet's like another. They was
twins, them two--with top-knots the colour o' carrots, mouths as wide as
oyster-shells, allus grinnin', and a power of freckles that made their
faces as yeller as speckled eggs. But Jenny Jones was a stunner, she
was; she served at the bar, and gave the boys as good as they gave--'ot
sauce for the cheeky and a clout o' the 'ead if need be when mi lady's
blood was up. Woman-like, she was that contrary, wi' a tongue as sharp
as a razor for some o' us, and all butter and honey and eyes like a
sucking-calf whenever Jenkins so much as showed 'is nose. And 'e, 'e was
that sweet on 'er as though she'd been a Wenus cast in sugar."
The old fellow blew a mighty whiff from his pipe, a whiff that was akin
to a sigh, and for a few moments he became apparently fogged by the
retrospective haze that surrounded him. He seemed disinclined to relate
more, but as I remained silent he presently resumed:--
"I won't tell you of all the 'arrowin' sights of that there mornin', the
women--mothers and wives and sweethearts--a-snivellin' and a-sobbin',
the men lookin' all awry, as though they'd swallered a chemist shop and
couldn't get the taste out o' their mouths. All this wi' shoutin' of
orders, and noise of the 'orses bein' slung up the ship's side and let
down the main 'atchway into the 'old, and the playin' of the band, and
the cheerin' of the crowd in the dockyard, and the crews in the 'arbour,
and the youngsters on the _Victory_--old fellers they must be
now--a-roarin' fit to split 'emselves from the yards and riggin' so long
as we 'ad ears to 'ear.
"I, bein' som'at of a bachelor by instink, 'ad no gal to wish me
God-speed; but Jenkins, poor chap, was in the same boat. Jenny Jones 'ad
not put 'erself about to see 'im nor 'er brother orf, and as they stood
alongside one another looking that solemn and glum, I couldn't 'elp
thinkin' o' the 'eartlessness of wenches in general and that there in
pertikilar.
"But soon I thought no more on the subjec', for there was other things
to mind. There was dinner, and givin' out of sea kit and gettin' our
ration of grog--three parts water it was to one o' rum then, but it grew
to 'alf a gill and a gill a day later on."
"About Jenkins?" I reminded, seeing that his brain reeled with the
reminiscence of bygone potations.
"Oh, I didn't see 'im at that time. We went below to the stable; our
beasts was stood wi' heels to the ship's sides and their sorry 'eads
a-facin' of each other. They was awful bad, and mighty funky of the
lurchin's of the ship. I found Jones down there--'e was a-bathin' of 'is
'orse's nose with water and vinegar, and a-cheerin' of 'im up to eat,
which he wouldn't do for all the coaxin'. 'Carrots' spent all 'is spare
time at that there game, givin' short answers and cursin' freely now and
agin. But 'e did 'is work right enough--cleaned stalls, polished and
burnished 'is saddle and accoutrements like the best of us--though
whenever I looked at 'im there was some'at shifty in his eye and an odd
turn o' the 'ead, as though 'e'd been a-sneakin' rum, or a-doin'
somethin' as was contrary to regilations. And one day he turns on me
savage like:--
"'What the ---- are you lookin' at me for? Can't you mind your own
bloomin' business,' sez 'e. So I ups and sez what came to me all of a
flash:--
"'Yer no more Ben Jones than I be, and what's more----'
"Before I gets out another word 'e grips 'old of my hands and looks as
though 'e was a-goin' down on 'is bended knees afore me.
"'For Gord's sake, Bill, don't blow on me. I've been a-dodgin' of you so
careful, and you was the only one I was a-feared on. I've allus been
civil to 'e, Bill--I'll give 'e my rations of grog, Bill--I'll do
anythin' for ye so long as yer leaves me alone.'
"All this came a-rushin' from 'is mouth like a water-shoot in summer
that 'as been froze for 'arf the year. Then I slaps my knee and bursts
into a roar.
"'Good Gord, Jenny,' sez I, 'this 'ere is a go! It's a desp'rate game
you're a-playin' of.'
"'D'ye think,' she sez, 'I'd play it if I weren't desp'rate, too? 'Ere
was Jim and I just married, and I not on the "strength" and 'e a-goin'
sails set for the grave. Oh! I seed it, sure as I stands 'ere, and I sez
to mysel', wot's the fun of bein' twin with Ben if can't go like 'im,
an' fight shoulder to shoulder with my Jim? Wot's the good of this 'ere
life without 'im, a-fillin' and a-swillin' and nothin' more?--for that's
all's left for wummin when their 'earts is cut in two.'
"I put up my 'and, for there was someone a-comin', and we went on
a-cleanin' of the stalls; but d'rectly I was able I stalked Trooper
Jones and got the rest o' the 'istory out o' 'im. Course, I asks after
Ben, our real 'Carrots.' And she larfs with 'er mouth a-gape and 'er
white strong teeth a-shinin'.
"'Ben?' she sez, 'O, 'e was that sick 'e couldn't say me nay; he was
jist rolled up in bed like a worm, and fit to stay there a week or two.
Nothing pisonous, mind you; but all's fair in love or war, and this 'ere
game is both. So I got 'is kit and jist marched along at daybreak wi'
the lot of you. You should 'a' seed Jim's face when 'e recognises me. He
didn't guess whether 'e was glad nor glum, so he cussed like a good 'un,
and that did dooty either way.'
"Young Jenny larfed till the tears came a-rollin' down 'er uniform.
"'Yer brother's in for a nasty business," sez I.
"'Not a bit of it. I've settled it. 'E'll dye 'is carrots and imigrate.
Father'll see to 'im; 'e never 'ad the constitootion as was given to
compensate me for being a----'
"'Hold,' sez I, 'the timbers 'ave ears. I am a-goin' to forget as
there's any amphibus animals 'ereabouts; there's only troopers and
'osses as I knows of.'
"'Gord bless you, Bill! None of the other chaps 'ave twigged, and I've
scarce throwed a word at Jim since we got afloat. But I looked at 'im
and 'e at me, and folks with one 'eart between 'em don't need for
words.'"
Here the narrator put a square thumb over the brim of his pipe and
pressed the weed almost tenderly.
"In time," he went on, "I got quite proud o' young Jones, 'e was as
smart a dragoon as any, an 'orsemaster every inch of 'im. Why, the way
'ed whisper into the ear of them beasts would make 'em meek were they
contrary ever so....
"It took us over fifty days a-journeyin' past Malta and Constantinople
and the Black Sea. I was landed fust with one or two others to report
oursel's to Gen'ral the Earl of Lucan, who was a-commandin' of the
Cavalry Division. Jones and Jenkins and the rest of our fellers came
over fully accoutred in 'orse-boats, each at the 'ead of 'is charger. We
soon 'ad work enough, I can tell you, a tent pitchin' and gettin'
rations and makin' oursel's understood. The town was choke full o'
ruffians, Turks, Jews, Armenians, Greeks, all a-jawing in diff'rent
tongues and a quarrellin' like magpies over a bit of offal. 'Ere Jones
was full o' spirits, a-larfin' and a-swearin' with the best of us. 'E
'ad a way about 'im as licked the sourest grumbler into shape. And the
gals, such as they was, fancied 'is jovial mug and made eyes at 'im. It
was a rum sight to watch the poor things a-wastin' ammunishun on one of
their own sex. I mind me of a wivandeer of the Chasseurs D'Afrique, a
smart young lass in red trousers and a dark tunic, with 'er plumed 'at
all cockeye on 'er head, and 'er legs astride the saddle--she was quite
took up with Jones. And afterwards the Bulgarian gals was nuts on 'im,
too. Jones would give us real pantomimes a-snatchin' o' kisses from one
or another of 'em when they came to fill their wessels at the well.
"'E was good at work or play was 'Carrots.' Right well 'e came out of it
when we 'ad to turn our 'ands to odd jobs, such as mowin' and reapin'
and cookin', cos 'is fingers weren't thumbs like ours war. And at
skirmishin' and outpost drill, and a-chargin' in line and by squadrons,
he was real smart too; 'e took to them manoeuvres as a duck takes to
water,
|
down immediately."
"Mamma never thought for a moment... that there was no money left,"
said Addie.
"Nonsense!" said Van der Welcke.
But he seemed to consider it quite natural; and, when Constance came
downstairs, he said, laughing:
"Didn't you think that there was no money left?"
Constance glanced up, imagining that he meant to make a scene. But
he was smiling; and his question sounded good-humoured.
"No!" she said, as if it was only natural.
And now they all went into fits of laughter, Addie with his silent
convulsions, which made him shake up and down painfully.
"Do laugh right out, boy!" said Van der Welcke, teasing him. "Do
laugh right out, if you can."
They were very gay as they sat down to dinner.
"And just guess," said Constance, "whom I met in the hotel at
Nice, whom I sat next to at the table d'hôte: the d'Azignys, from
Rome.... The first people I met, the d'Azignys. It's incredible how
small the world is, how small, how small!"
He also remembered the d'Azignys: the French ambassador at Rome and
his wife... fifteen years ago now....
"Really?" he asked, greatly interested. "Were they all right?"
"Oh, quite," she said, "quite! I remembered them at once, but didn't
bow. But d'Azigny was very polite; and, after a minute or two, he
spoke to me, asked if he wasn't right in thinking I was the Baronne
de Staffelaer. 'Baronne van der Welcke,' I replied. He flushed up
and his wife nudged him, but after that they were very charming
and amiable all the time I was at Nice. I saw a lot of them and,
through their introduction, I went to a splendid ball at the Duc de
Rivoli's. I enjoyed it thoroughly. I wore a beautiful dress, I was in
my element once more, I was a foreigner, everybody was very pleasant
and I felt light-hearted again, quit of everything and everybody,
and I thought to myself...."
"Well, what did you think?"
"Oh, if only we had never gone back to Holland! If, when Brussels
became so dull, we had just moved to a town like Nice. It's delightful
there. As a foreigner, you need have nothing to trouble about,
you can do just as you like, know just whom you please. You feel
so free, so free.... And why, I thought, must Addie become and
remain a Dutchman? He could just as well be a Frenchman... or a
cosmopolitan...."
"Thank you, Mamma: I don't feel like being a Frenchman, nor yet a
cosmopolitan. And you'd better not say that to Uncle Gerrit, or you
can look out for squalls."
"Addie, I've met with so many squalls in my dear Holland that I feel
like blowing away myself, away from everybody...."
"Including your son?"
"No, my boy. I missed you. I thought of you every day. I am so glad
to see you again. But I did think to myself that we should have done
better never to come back to Holland."
"Yes," said Van der Welcke, thoughtfully.
"We could have lived at Nice, if we liked."
"Yes," Van der Welcke admitted, a little dubiously, "but you were
longing for your family."
She clenched her little hand and struck the table with it:
"And you!" she cried. "Didn't you long for your parents, for your
country?"
"But not so much as you did."
"And who thought it necessary for Addie? I didn't!" she exclaimed,
in a shrill voice. "I didn't for a moment! It was you!"
"Oh, d----," said Addie, almost breaking into an oath. "My dearest
parents, for Heaven's sake don't begin quarrelling at once, for I
assure the two of you that, if you do, I'll blow away and I'll go to
Nice... money or no money!"
Van der Welcke and Constance gave one roar and Addie joined in
the laugh.
"Oh, that boy!" said Van der Welcke, choking with merriment. "That
boy!"
Constance uttered a deep sigh:
"Oh, Addie!" she said. "Mamma does and says such strange things,
sometimes... but she doesn't mean them a bit. She's really glad
to be back again, in her horrid country... and in her own home,
her dear cosy home... and with her son, her darling boy!"
And, throwing her arm round his neck, she let her head fall on his
breast and she sobbed, sobbed aloud, so that Truitje, entering the
room, started, but then, accustomed to these perpetual, inevitable
scenes, quietly went on laying the dessert-plates.
Van der Welcke fiddled with his knife.
"Why can't those two manage to get on better together?" thought Addie,
sadly, while he comforted his mother and gently patted her shoulder....
CHAPTER IV
"And shall Mamma show you what she looked like at the Duc de Rivoli's?"
Dinner was over and she was sitting by her open trunk, while Truitje
helped her unpack and put the things away.
"I had my photograph taken at Nice. But first here's a work-box for
Truitje, with Nice violets on it. Look, Truitje: it's palm-wood inlaid;
a present for you. And here's one for cook."
"Oh, thank you, ma'am!"
"And for my wise son I hunted all over Nice for a souvenir and found
nothing, for I was afraid of bringing you something not serious enough
for your patriarchal tastes; and so I had myself photographed for
you. There: the last frivolous portrait of your mother."
She took the photograph from its envelope: it showed her at
full-length, standing, in her ball-dress; a photograph taken with a
great deal of artistry and chic, but too young, too much touched up,
with a little too much pose about the hair, the fan, the train.
He looked at her with a smile.
"Well, what do you think of it?" she asked.
"What a bundle of vanity you are, Mamma!"
"Don't you like it? Then give it back at once."
"Why, no, Mummy: I think it awfully jolly to have a photograph
of you...."
"Of my last mad mood. Now your mother is really going to grow old,
my boy. Upon my word, I believe Truitje admires my portrait more than
my son does!..."
"Oh, ma'am, I think it's splendid!"
"How many did you have done, Mummy?"
"Six. One for Granny, one for Uncle Gerrit, one for Uncle Paul,
one for you, one for myself...."
"And one for Papa."
"Oh, Papa owns the original!"
"No, give your husband one."
"Henri!" she called.
He came in.
"Here's a portrait of your wife."
"Lovely!" he exclaimed. "That's awfully good! Thanks very much."
"Glad you like it. My husband and my handmaid are satisfied, at any
rate. My son thinks me a bundle of vanity.... Oh, how glad I am to be
back!... Here's the ball-dress. We'll put it away to-morrow. I shall
never wear the thing again. A dress that cost six hundred francs for
one wearing. Now we'll be old again and economical."
They all laughed, including Truitje.
"Oh, how glad I am to be back!... My own room, my own
cupboards.... Truitje, what did you give your masters to eat?"
"Well, just what you used to, ma'am!..."
"So it was all right? I wasn't missed?..."
"Oh, but you mustn't go away for so long again, ma'am!" said Truitje,
in alarm.
Constance laughed and stretched herself out on her sofa, glad to be
home. Van der Welcke left the room with his photograph, Truitje with
her work-box.
"Come here, Addie. Papa has had you for seven weeks. Now you belong
to me... for an indefinite period."
She drew him down beside her, took his hands. It struck him that
she looked tired, more like her years, not like her photograph; and,
his mind travelling swiftly to his father, he thought his father so
young, outwardly a young man and inwardly sometimes a child: Ottocar
in a motor-car....
"It's strange, Addie," she said, softly, "that you are only fourteen:
you always seem to me at least twenty. And I think it strange also
that I should have such a big son. So everything is strange. And your
mother herself, my boy, is the strangest of all. If you ask me honestly
if I like being 'vain,' I mean, taking part in social frivolities,
I shouldn't know what to answer. I certainly used to enjoy it in the
old days; and, a fortnight ago, I admit I looked upon it as a sort
of youth that comes over one again; but really it all means nothing:
just a little brilliancy; and then you feel so tired and empty... and
so discontented...."
She stopped suddenly, not caring to say more, and looked at the
photograph, now lying on a table beside her. It made her laugh again;
and at the same time a tear trembled on her lashes. And she did not
know if it gave her a peaceful feeling to be growing old... or if
she regretted it. It was as though the sun of Nice had imbued her
with a strange, dull melancholy which she herself did not understand.
"To live!" she thought. "I have never lived. I would so gladly live
once... just once. To live! But not like this... in a dress that
cost six hundred francs. I know that, I know all about it: it is
just a momentary brilliancy and then nothing.... To live! I should
like to live... really... truly. There must be something. But it
is a mad wish. I am too old. I am growing old, I am becoming an old
woman.... To live! I have never lived... I have been in the world,
as a woman of the world; I spoilt that life; then I hid myself.... I
was so anxious to come back to my country and my family; and it all
meant nothing but a little show and illusion... and a great deal
of disappointment. And so the days were wasted, one after the other,
and I... have... never... lived.... Just as I throw away my money,
so I have thrown away my days. Perhaps I have squandered all my days
... for nothing. Oh, I oughtn't to feel like this! What does it mean
when I do? What am I regretting? What is there left for me? At Nice,
I thought for a moment of joining in that feminine revolt against
approaching age; and I did join in it; and I succeeded. But what
does it all mean and what is the use of it? It only means shining
a little longer, for nothing; but it does not mean living.... But to
long for it doesn't mean anything either, for there is nothing for me
now but to grow old, in my home; and, even if I am not exactly among my
people, my brothers and sisters, at any rate I have my mother... and,
perhaps for quite a long time still, my son too...."
"Mummy... what are you thinking about so deeply?"
But she smiled, said nothing, looked earnestly at him:
"He's much fonder of his father," she thought. "I know it, but it
can't be helped. I must put up with it and accept what he gives me."
"Come, Mummy, what are you thinking about?"
"Lots of things, my boy... and perhaps nothing.... Mamma feels so
lonely... with no one about her... except you...."
He started, struck by what she had said: it was almost the same words
that his father had used that afternoon.
"My boy, will you always stay with me? You won't go away, like
everybody?..."
"Come, Mummy, you've got Granny and Uncle Gerrit and Uncle Paul."
"Yes, they are nice," she said, softly.
And she thought:
"I shall lose him, later, when he's grown up.... I know that I shall
lose him...."
It made her feel very weak and helpless; and she began to cry....
He knelt down beside her and, in a stern voice, forbade her to be so
excitable, forbade her to cry about nothing....
It was heavenly to have him laying down the law like that. And she
thought:
"I shall lose him, when he's grown up.... Oh, let me be thankful that
I have him still!..."
Then, tired out, she went to sleep; and he left her, thinking to
himself:
"They both feel the same thing!"
CHAPTER V
She tried tyrannically to monopolize her son, so that Van der Welcke
became very jealous. It was the next day, Wednesday afternoon.
"Are you coming with me to Granny's?"
"I promised Papa to go cycling."
"You've had seven weeks for cycling with Papa."
"I promised him yesterday that I would go for a long ride to-day."
She was angry, offended:
"The first day that I'm home!..." she began.
He kissed her, with a shower of tiny little kisses, tried to appease
her wrath:
"I promised!" he said. "We don't go cycling together often. You will
have me to yourself all the evening. Be sensible now and nice; and
don't be so cross."
She tried to be reasonable, but it cost her an effort. She went alone
to Mrs. van Lowe's. She saw two umbrellas in the hall:
"Who is with mevrouw?" she asked the maid.
"Mrs. van Naghel and Mrs. van Saetzema."
She hesitated. She had not seen her sisters since that awful
Sunday-evening. She had gone abroad five days after. But she wanted
to show them....
She went upstairs. Her step was no longer as timid as when she
climbed those stairs ten months ago, when she first came back among
them all. She did not wish to seem arrogant, but also she did not
wish to be too humble. She entered with a smile:
"Mamma!" she cried, gaily, kissing her mother.
Mrs. van Lowe was surprised:
"My child!" she exclaimed, trembling. "My child! Are you back? Are
you back again? What a long time you've been abroad!"
"I've enjoyed myself immensely. How d'ye do, Bertha? How d'ye do,
Adolphine?"
She did not shake hands, but just nodded to them, almost
cordially, because of her mother, who looked anxiously at her three
daughters. Bertha and Adolphine nodded back. Carelessly and easily,
she took the lead in the conversation and talked about Nice. She
tried to talk naturally, without bragging; but in spite of herself
there was a note of triumph in her voice:
"Yes, I felt I wanted to go abroad a bit.... Not nice of me to run
away without saying good-bye, was it, Mamma dear? Well, you see,
Constance sometimes behaves differently from other people.... I had
a very pleasant time at Nice: full season, lovely weather."
"Weren't you lonely?"
"No, for on the very first day I met some of our Rome friends at
the hotel...."
She felt that Bertha started, blinked her eyes, disapproved of her
for daring to speak of Rome. And she revelled in doing so, casually
and airily, thought it delicious to dazzle Adolphine with a list of
her social triumphs, very naturally described:
"People we used to know in Rome: Comte and Comtesse d'Azigny. He was
French ambassador in those days. They recognized me at once and were
very kind; and through the introduction I went to a glorious ball
at the Duchesse de Rivoli's. And, Mummy, here's a portrait of your
daughter in her ball-dress."
She showed the photograph, enjoyed giving the almost too-well-executed
portrait to Mamma, not to her sisters, while letting them see it. She
described her dress, described the ball, bragging a little this time,
saying that, after all, parties abroad were always much grander than
that "seeing a few friends" in Holland, addressing all her remarks
to Mamma and, in words just tinged with ostentation, displaying no
small scorn for Bertha's dinners and Adolphine's "little evenings:"
"Everything here is on such a small scale," she continued. "There,
the first thing you see is a suite of twelve rooms, all with electric
light... or, better still, all lit up with wax-candles.... Yes, our
little social efforts at the Hague cut a very poor figure beside it."
She gave a contemptuous little laugh to annoy her sisters, while Mamma,
always interested in the doings of the great, did not notice the
contempt and was glad enough to see that the sisters behaved as usual
to one another. And now Constance went on to say that everything had
gone on so well at home, that Truitje had looked after everything, even
though Constance had gone away indefinitely, an unprecedented thing,
so unlike a Dutch housewife! Then she turned to her sisters with an
indifferent phrase or two; and they answered her almost cordially,
out of respect for Mamma....
Adolphine was the first to leave, exasperated by Constance'
insufferable tone, by all that talk about Nice, all those counts and
dukes whom Constance had mentioned; and, when Constance said good-bye,
Bertha also left and they went down the stairs together.
"Constance," said Bertha, "can I speak to you a minute in the
cloak-room?"
Constance looked up haughtily, surprised; but she did not like to
refuse. They went into the little cloak-room.
"Constance," said Bertha, "I do so want to say that I am sorry for
what happened between us. Really, it pained me very much. And I want
to tell you also that Van Naghel greatly appreciated Van der Welcke's
writing to him to apologize. He has written to Van der Welcke to say
so. But we should both like to call on you one day, to show you how
glad we should be to come back to the old terms once more."
"Bertha," said Constance, a little impatiently and wearily, "I am
prepared to receive your visit, but I should really like to know what
is the good of it and why you suggest it. Do let us have some sincerity
... when there is no occasion for hypocrisy. Sometimes one has to be
insincere... but there is no need for that between us now. We both
know that our mutual sympathy, if it ever existed, is dead. We never
meet except at Mamma's and we don't let her see our estrangement. Apart
from that, it seems to me that things are over between us."
"So you would rather that Van Naghel and I did not come?"
"It's not for me to decide, Bertha: I shall speak about it to Van
der Welcke and write you a line."
"Is that cold answer all you have to say to me, Constance?"
"Bertha, a little time ago, I was not backward in showing my affection
for you all. Perhaps I asked too much in return; but, in any case,
I was repulsed. And now I retire. That is all."
"Constance, you don't know how sorry we all are that the old aunts
... spoke as they did. They are foolish old women, Constance; they
are in their second childhood. Mamma had to take to her bed, her
nerves are still quite upset; she can't bear to see her sisters now;
and it sometimes sends her almost out of her mind. I have never seen
her like it before. And we are all of us, all of us, Constance, very,
very sorry."
"Bertha, those two old women only yelled out at the top of their
voices, as deaf people do, what the rest of you thought in your
hearts."
"Come, Constance, don't be so bitter. You are hard and unjust. I swear
that you are mistaken. It is not as you think. Let me show it to you
in the future, let me prove it to you... and please speak to Van der
Welcke and write and tell me a day when we shall find you at home,
so that Van Naghel can shake hands with Van der Welcke. He is not
a young man, Constance, and your husband is under forty. It's true,
Van der Welcke has apologized and Van Naghel appreciates it, but that
doesn't prevent him from wishing to shake hands with Van der Welcke."
"I'll tell my husband, Bertha. But I don't know that he will think it
so necessary to shake hands, any more than I do. We live very quietly
now, Bertha, and people, Hague people, no longer concern us. And Van
Naghel only wants to shake hands because of people."
"And because of the old friendship."
"Very well, Bertha," said Constance, coldly, "because of the old
friendship: a vague term that says very little to me. What I wished
for was brotherly and sisterly affection, cordial companionship. That
is no longer possible: it was a foolish fancy of mine, which has gone
forever. But, as I said, I shall speak to Van der Welcke."
They came out into the hall; the maid was waiting at the door. It
was raining. Bertha's carriage was outside, had been sent to fetch her.
"Shall I drop you on my way, Constance?"
"No, thank you, Bertha; the fresh air will do me good; I'd rather
walk."
And, as she walked, she thought:
"Oh, why did I go on like that to annoy them? And why didn't I welcome
Bertha's visit at once?... It's all so small, so petty...."
And she shrugged her shoulders under her umbrella, laughed at herself
a little, because she had shown herself so petty.
CHAPTER VI
At Addie's wish, at the little schoolboy's wish, the Van der Welckes
responded to Van Naghel's advances and Constance sent a note. The
visit was paid and the brothers-in-law shook hands. Van der Welcke
himself shrugged his shoulders over the whole business; but Addie
was pleased, started going for walks again with Frans and spoke to
Karel again at the grammar-school, though he did not much care for
him. Two days later, Marianne called in the afternoon, when the rain
was coming down in torrents. Constance was at home. The girl stood
in the door-way of the drawing-room:
"May I come in, Auntie?..."
"Of course, Marianne, do."
"I don't like to: I'm rather wet."
"Nonsense, come in!"
And the girl suddenly ran in and threw herself on her knees beside
Constance, almost with a scream:
"I am so glad, I am so glad!" she cried.
"Why?"
"That Uncle wrote to Papa... that Papa and Mamma have been here
... that everything is all right again.... It was so dreadful; it
kept me from sleeping. I kept on thinking about it. It was a sort
of nightmare, an obsession. Auntie, dear Auntie, is everything all
right now?"
"Yes, certainly, child."
"Really all right?... Are you coming to us again... and may I come
and see you... and will you ask me to dinner again soon? Is everything
all right, really all right?"
She snuggled up to her aunt like a child, putting her head against
Constance' knees, stroking her hands:
"You will ask me again soon, Auntie, won't you? I love coming to
you, I simply love it. I should have missed it so, I can't tell you
how much...."
Her voice broke, as she knelt by Constance' side, and she suddenly
burst into tears, sobbing out her words so excitedly that Constance
was startled, thinking it almost unnatural, absurd:
"I was nearly coming to you before Papa and Mamma had been.... But I
didn't dare.... I was afraid Papa would be angry.... But I can come
now, it's all right now...."
"Yes, it's all right now...."
She kissed Marianne. But the door opened and Van der Welcke entered.
"How do you do, Uncle?"
He always thought it odd when Marianne called him uncle, just like
that:
"Is it you, Marianne?... Constance, did I leave my Figaro down here?"
"The Figaro? No...."
He hunted for his paper and then sat down.
"Uncle," said Marianne, "I've just been telling Auntie, I'm so glad,
I'm so glad that everything's settled."
"So am I, Marianne."
Outside, the rain came pelting down, lashed by the howling
wind. Inside, all was cosiness, with Constance pouring out the tea
and telling them about Nice, while Marianne talked about Emilie and
Van Raven and how they were not getting on very well together and
how Otto and Frances were also beginning to squabble and how Mamma
took it all to heart and allowed it to depress her:
"I sha'n't get married," she said. "I see nothing but unhappy marriages
around me. I sha'n't get married."
Then she started. She had a knack of behaving awkwardly and tactlessly,
of saying things which she ought not to say. Van der Welcke looked
at her, smiling. To make up for her indiscretion, she was more
demonstrative than ever, profuse in exclamations of delight:
"Oh, Auntie, how glad I am to be with you once more!... I must be
off presently in the rain.... I wish I could stay...."
"But stay and dine," said Van der Welcke.
Constance hesitated: she saw that Marianne would like to stop on
and she did not know what to do, did not wish to seem ungracious;
and yet....
"Will you stay to dinner?" she asked.
Marianne beamed with joy:
"Oh, I should love to, Auntie! Mamma knows I'm here; she'll
understand...."
Constance was sorry that she had asked her; her nerves were feeling
the strain of it all; but she was determined to control herself,
to behave naturally and ordinarily. She could see it plainly: they
were too fond of each other!
They were in love! Long before, she had seemed to guess it, when she
saw them together, at her little dinners. The veriest trifle--an
intonation of voice, a laughing phrase, the passing of a dish of
fruit--had made her seem to guess it. Then the vague thought that went
through her mind, like a little cloud, would vanish at once, leaving
not even a shadow behind it. But the cloud had come drifting again and
again, brought by a gesture, a glance, a how-do-you-do or good-bye,
an appointment for a bicycle ride. On such occasions, the brothers had
always gone too--so had Addie--and there had never been anything that
was in the least incorrect; and at the little dinners there was never
a joke that went too far, nor an attempt at flirtation, nor the very
least resemblance to love-making. And therefore those vague thoughts
had always drifted away again, like clouds; and Constance would think:
"There is nothing, there is nothing. I am mistaken. I am imagining
something that doesn't exist."
She had not seen them together for two months; and she knew, had
understood from a word dropped here and there, that Van der Welcke had
not seen Marianne during those two months which had passed since that
Sunday evening. And now, suddenly, she was struck by it: the shy,
almost glad hesitation while the girl was standing at the door of
Constance' drawing-room; her unconcealed delight at being able to
come back to this house; the almost unnatural joy with which she
had sobbed at Constance' knee... until Van der Welcke came in,
after doubtless recognizing the sound of her voice in his little
smoking-room, as transparent as a child, with his clumsy excuse of
searching for a newspaper. And now at once she was struck by it: the
almost insuppressible affection with which they had greeted each other,
with a certain smiling radiance that beamed from them, involuntarily,
irresistibly, unconsciously.... But still Constance thought:
"I am mistaken, there is nothing; and I am imagining something that
doesn't exist."
And the thought passed away, that they were really in love with
each other; only this time there remained a faint wonder, a doubt,
which had never been there before. And, while she talked about Nice,
it struck her that Van der Welcke was still there... that he was
staying on in her drawing-room, a thing which he never did except
when Paul was there, or Gerrit.... He sat on, without saying much;
but that happy smile never left his lips.... Yet she still thought:
"I am mistaken; it is only imagination; there is nothing, or at most
a little mutual attraction; and what harm is there in that?"
But, be this as it might, she, who was so jealous where her son
was concerned, now felt not the least shade of jealousy amid her
wondering doubts. Yes, it was all gone, any love, passion, sentiment
that she had ever entertained for Henri. It was quite dead.... And,
now that he smiled like that, she noticed, with a sort of surprise,
how young he was:
"He is thirty-eight," she thought, "and looks even younger."
As he sat there, calmly, always with the light of a smile on
his face, it struck her that he was very young, with a healthy,
youthful freshness, and that he had not a wrinkle, not a grey hair
in his head.... His blue eyes were almost the eyes of a child. Even
Addie's eyes, though they were like his father's, were more serious,
had an older look.... And, at the sight of that youthfulness,
she thought herself old, even though she was now showing Marianne
the pretty photograph from Nice.... Yes, she felt old; and she was
hardly surprised--if it was so, if she was not mistaken--at that
youthfulness in her husband and at his possible love for that young
girl.... Marianne's youth seemed to be nearer to his own youth.... And
sometimes it was so evident that she almost ceased doubting and
promised herself to be careful, not to encourage Marianne, not to
invite her any more....
Unconscious: was it unconscious, thought Constance, on their part? Had
they ever exchanged a more affectionate word, a pressure of the hand,
a glance? Had they already confessed it to each other... and to
themselves? And a delicate intuition told her:
"No, they have confessed nothing to each other; no, they have not
even confessed anything to themselves."
Perhaps neither of them knew it yet; and, if so, Constance was the
only one who knew. She looked at Marianne: the girl was very young,
even though she had been out a year or two. She had something of
Emilie's fragility, but she was more natural, franker; and that
natural frankness showed in her whole attitude: she seemed not
to think, but to allow herself to be dragged along by impulse,
by sentiment.... She looked out with her smile at the pelting rain,
nestled deeper in her chair, luxuriously, like a kitten, then suddenly
jumped up, poured out a cup of tea for Constance and herself; and,
when Van der Welcke begged his wife's leave to smoke a cigarette,
she sprang up again, struck a match, held the light to him, with a
fragile grace of gesture like a little statue. Her pale-brown eyes,
with a touch of gold-dust over them, were like chrysolite; and they
gazed up enthusiastically and then cast their glance downwards timidly,
under the shade of their lids. She was pale, with the anæmic pallor
of alabaster, the pallor of our jaded society-girls; and her hands
moved feverishly and restlessly, as though the fingers were constantly
seeking an object for their butterfly sensitiveness....
Was it so? Or was it all Constance' imagination? And, amidst her
wondering doubts, there came suddenly--if it really was so--a spasm
of jealousy; but not jealousy of her husband's love: jealousy of
his youth. She suddenly looked back fifteen years and felt herself
grown old, felt him remaining young. Life, real life, for which she
sometimes had a vague yearning, while she felt herself too old for it,
after frittering away her days: that life he would perhaps still be
able to live, if he met with it. He at least was not too old for it!
It all filled her with a passion of misery and anger; and then again
she thought:
"No, there is nothing; and I am imagining all manner of things that
do not exist."
Addie came home; and, with the rain pelting outside, there was a
gentle cosiness indoors, at table. Constance was silent, but the
others were cheerful. And, when, after tea had been served, the fury
out of doors seemed to have subsided, Marianne stood up, almost too
unwilling to go away:
"It's time for me to go, Auntie...."
"Shall Addie see you home?"
"No, Addie's working," said Van der Welcke. "I'll see Marianne home."
Constance said nothing.
"Oh, Auntie," said Marianne, "I am so glad that everything's settled!"
She kissed Constance passionately.
"Uncle, isn't it a nuisance for you to go all that way with me?"
"I wish I had a bicycle for you!..."
"Yes, if only we had our tandem here!"
"It's stopped raining; we shall be able to walk."
They went, leaving Constance alone. Her eyes were eager to follow them
along the street. She could not help herself, softly opened a window,
looked out into the damp winter night. She saw them go towards the
Bankastraat. They were walking side by side, quite ordinarily. She
watched them for a minute or two, until they turned the corner:
"No," she said, "there is nothing. Oh, it would be too dreadful!"
CHAPTER VII
Van der Welcke and Marianne went side by side.
"How deliciously fresh it is now," she almost carolled. "The wind
has gone down and the air is lovely; and look, how beautiful the
sky is with those last black clouds.... Oh, I think it so ripping,
that everything's all right again between you and Papa! I did feel it
so. You know how fond I am of both of you, Aunt Constance and you,
and of Addie; and it was all so sad.... Tell me, does Auntie still
feel bitter about it? I expect she does.... Ah, I understand quite well
now... that she would have liked to come to our house... officially,
let me say! But why not first have spoken to Mamma... or to me, who
am so fond of you? Then we could have seen: we might have thought
of something. As it was, Mamma was so startled by that unexpected
visit.... Poor Aunt Constance, she isn't happy! How sad that you and
she aren't happier together! Oh, I could cry about it at times: it
seems such a shame!... A man and woman married... and then... and
then what I so often see!... I oughtn't to have said what I did before
dinner, it was stupid of me; but I may speak now, mayn't I?... Oh, I
sha'n't marry, I won't marry!... To be married like Otto and Frances,
like Emilie and Van Raven: I think it dreadful. Or like you and Auntie:
I should think it dreadful. Can't you be happier together? Not even for
Addie's sake? I wish you could; it would make me so happy. I can't bear
it, when you and Auntie quarrel.... She was sweet and gentle to-night,
but so very quiet. She is so nice.... That was a mad fit of hers, to
go abroad so suddenly; but then she had had so much to vex her. Oh,
those two old aunts: I could have murdered them! I can hear them
now!... Poor Auntie! Do try and be a little nice to her.... Has this
been going on between you for years? Don't you love each other any
longer?... No, I sha'n't marry, I sha'n't marry, I shall never marry."
"Come, Marianne: if some one
|
hastened to do, being a warm advocate of the war.
Meanwhile the flank companies of militia regiments of the counties of
Lincoln, Norfolk and York were embodied by General Brock, and drilled
six times a month. They numbered about 700 young men belonging to "the
best class of settlers." By the recent Militia Act, they were required
to arm and clothe themselves, and as many of them had far to travel,
Brock begged that they should at least receive an allowance for rations.
The Governor General suggested that the Government of the United States
entertained hopes that something might happen to provoke a quarrel
between its soldiers and the British troops on that frontier, and
desired him to take every precaution to prevent any such pretext for
hostilities.
Early in May, Brock made a rapid tour of inspection along the Niagara,
thence to the Mohawk village on the Grand river, returning to York by
way of Ancaster. He reported that the people generally seemed well
disposed and that the flank companies had mustered in full strength.
By the 17th of June six hundred American militia were stationed along
the river, and a complaint was made by three reputable inhabitants of
Fort Erie that their sentries were in the habit of wantonly firing
across the stream. On the 25th of the same month this period of suspense
was terminated by the arrival of a special messenger employed by Mr.
Astor and other American citizens interested in the Northwest fur trade,
to convey the earliest possible information of war to Colonel Thomas
Clark, of Queenston, who immediately reported his intelligence to the
commandant of Fort Erie. The messenger, one Vosburg, of Albany, had
travelled with relays of horses at such speed that he outrode the
official courier bearing despatches to Fort Niagara by fully
twenty-four hours. On his return he was arrested at Canandaigua, and
held to bail together with some of his employers, but it does not appear
that they were ever brought to trial.
Lieut. Gansevoort and a sergeant in the United States Artillery, who
happened to be on the Canadian side were made prisoners, and the ferry
boats plying across the river at Queenston and Fort Erie, were seized by
the British troops at those places. The people of Buffalo received their
first intimation of the declaration of war by witnessing the capture of
a merchant schooner off the harbor by boats from Fort Erie.
The flank companies of militia marched immediately to the frontier, and
were distributed along the river in taverns and farm houses. On the
second day, General Brock arrived from York, with the intention of
making an attack on Fort Niagara. He had then at his disposal, 400 of
the 41st Regiment, and nearly 800 militia. Success was all but certain,
as the garrison was weak and inefficient. His instructions however, were
to act strictly on the defensive, and he abandoned this project in the
conviction that the garrison might be driven out at any time by a
vigorous cannonade. Rumors of his design seem to have reached General P.
B. Porter, who commanded the militia force on the other side, and he
made an urgent demand for reinforcements.
"The British on the opposite side are making the most active
preparations for defence," Benjamin Barton wrote from Lewiston on the
24th of June, "New troops are arriving from the Lower Province
constantly, and the quantity of military stores etc. that have arrived
within these few weeks is astonishing. Vast quantities of arms and
ammunition are passing up the country, no doubt to arm the Indians
around the Upper Lakes, (for they have not white men enough to make use
of such quantities as are passing). One-third of the militia of the
Upper Province are formed into companies called flankers, and are well
armed and equipped out of the King's stores, and are regularly trained
one day in a week by an officer of the standing troops. A volunteer
troop of horse has lately been raised and have drawn their sabres and
pistols. A company of militia artillery has been raised this spring, and
exercise two or three days in the week on the plains near Fort George,
and practice firing and have become very expert. The noted Isaac Sweazy,
has within a few days received a captain's commission for the flying
artillery, of which they have a number of pieces. We were yesterday
informed by a respectable gentleman from that side of the river, that he
was actually purchasing horses for the purpose of exercising his men.
They are repairing Fort George, and building a new fort at York. A
number of boats are daily employed, manned by their soldiers, plying
between Fort George and Queenston, carrying stores, lime and pickets,
for necessary repairs, and to cap the whole, they are making and using
every argument and persuasion to induce the Indians to join them, and we
are informed the Mohawks have volunteered their service. In fact,
nothing appears to be left undone by their people that is necessary for
their defence."
However, the Governor General seized the first opportunity of again
advising his enterprising lieutenant to refrain from any offensive
movements. "In the present state of politics in the United States" he
said, "I consider it prudent to avoid any means which can have the least
tendency to unite their people. While dissension prevails among them,
their attempts on the Province will be feeble. It is therefore my wish
to avoid committing any act which may even from a strained construction
tend to unite the Eastern and Southern States, unless from its
perpetration, we are to derive an immediate, considerable and important
advantage."
Brock felt so confident at that moment of his ability to maintain his
ground on the Niagara, that he actually stripped Fort George of its
heaviest guns for the defence of Amherstburg, which he anticipated would
be the first point of attack. But the militia who had turned out so
cheerfully on the first alarm, after the lapse of a couple of uneventful
weeks, became impatient to return to their homes and families. They had
been employed as much as possible in the construction of batteries at
the most exposed points, and as they were without tents, blankets,
hammocks, kettles, or camp equipage of any kind, they had suffered
serious discomfort even at that season of the year. As their prolonged
absence from their homes, in some cases threatened the total destruction
of their crops, many were allowed to return on the 12th of July, and it
was feared that the remainder would disband in defiance of the law which
only imposed a fine of £20 for desertion. Nearly all of them were
wretchedly clothed, and a considerable number were without shoes, which
could not be obtained in the Province at any price. Many of the
inhabitants Brock indignantly declared, were "indifferent or American in
feeling."
However, the month of July passed away without developing any symptom of
an offensive movement on this frontier. On the 22nd, the session of the
Legislature began at York, with the knowledge that General Hull had
invaded the Province at Sandwich with a strong force, and in hourly
expectation of tidings that the garrison of Amherstburg had surrendered
to superior numbers. Yet amid these depressing circumstances, Brock
concluded his "speech from the throne" with these hopeful and inspiring
words. "We are engaged in an awful and eventful contest. By unanimity
and despatch in our councils, and by vigor in our operations, we may
teach the enemy this lesson, that a country defended by freemen who are
enthusiastically devoted to their King and Constitution can never be
conquered."
During the following week the most discouraging reports from Amherstburg
continued to arrive almost daily. It seemed as if the invading army
would be able to over run the whole of the Western District, with
scarcely a show of resistance on the part of the inhabitants. A
majority of the members of the Legislature were apathetic or despondent.
They passed a new militia act, and an act to provide for the defence of
the Province, but amended both in a highly unsatisfactory manner, after
which the House was hastily prorogued by the General who was eager to
proceed to the seat of war.
"The House of Assembly," he wrote on the 4th of August, "have refused to
do anything they are required. Everybody considers the fate of the
country as settled, and is afraid to appear in the least conspicuous in
the promotion of measures to retard it. I have this instant been
informed that a motion was made in the House and only lost by two votes,
that the militia should be at liberty to return home, if they did not
receive their pay on a fixed day every month."
On the succeeding day he began his march to the relief of Amherstburg.
Most of the regulars and some of the militia which had been hitherto
stationed along the Niagara, preceded or accompanied him on this
expedition, which they were fortunately enabled to do by the inactivity
of the enemy on the opposite bank, who actually do not seem to have
become aware of their absence until they had returned victorious. Lieut.
Col. Myers, the Assistant Quartermaster General, was left in command.
The men belonging to the flank companies who had been allowed to return
to their homes to assist in the harvest were summoned to rejoin, and 500
more held in readiness to support them.
On the 20th of August, the inhabitants were thrown into a frenzy of
delight by the almost incredible intelligence that Detroit had been
taken with the entire American army. A few hours later, General Van
Rensselaer who was still in ignorance of this event, signed an armistice
which put an end to any further apprehension of an attack for several
weeks.
The Americans did not remain idle during the interval. A body of five or
six thousand men was assembled and five detached batteries were
completed on the bank of the river, between Fort Niagara and Youngstown,
two of which were armed with very heavy guns, and two with mortars.
Upon the termination of the armistice, the militia generally returned to
their posts with alacrity, accompanied by a number of old loyalists
unfit for service in the field, but capable of performing garrison duty.
The Garrison Order-book of Fort George still exists to bear witness to
the ceaseless vigilance with which the movements of the enemy were
watched. On the 2nd of October an order was issued directing one-third
of the troopers to "sleep in their clothes, fully accoutred and ready to
turn out at a moment's notice." This was followed on the 6th by another,
requiring the whole of the regular troops and militia to be under arms
by the first break of day, and not to be dismissed until full daylight,
and on the 12th all communication with the enemy by flag of truce was
forbidden, unless expressly authorized by the commanding general.
On the morning of the 13th of October, as soon as General Brock was
convinced that the Americans were actually crossing the river at
Queenston, he directed Brigade Major Evans who remained in command at
Fort George, to open fire with every available gun upon Fort Niagara and
the adjacent batteries, and continue it until they were absolutely
silenced. This attack was forestalled by the enemy, who, as soon as they
perceived the columns of troops marching out on the road to Queenston,
turned the whole of their artillery upon Fort George and the neighboring
village, with such a disastrous effect, that in a few minutes the Jail
and Court House and fifteen or sixteen other buildings were set in a
blaze by their red hot shot. Major Evans had at his command not more
than twenty regular soldiers who composed the main guard for the day.
The whole of the small detachment of Royal Artillery usually stationed
in the Fort, had accompanied the field guns to repel the attack upon
Queenston. Colonel Claus, with a few men of the 1st Lincoln Regiment,
and Capt. Powell and Cameron with a small detachment of militia
artillery, alone remained to man the guns of the fort and batteries. The
gravity of the situation was greatly increased by the fact, that upwards
of three hundred prisoners were confined in the jail and guardhouse
which was now menaced with destruction. However, while the guards and
the greater part of the militia were vigorously engaged in fighting the
flames, amid an incessant cannonade, under the personal direction of
Major Evans and Captain Vigoreux of the Royal Engineers, the batteries
were served by the militia artillery men, assisted by two
non-commissioned officers of the 41st Regiment, with such energy and
success that in the course of an hour the American guns were totally
silenced. By that time the Court House and some other buildings had been
totally consumed, and the disheartening news arrived that Gen. Brock and
Colonel McDonell had been killed, and their men repulsed by the enemy
who were landing in great force at Queenston, and had obtained
possession of the heights. Evans rode off at once to send forward every
man that could be spared from the stations along the river. He had just
marched off a small party from Young's battery, when the American
batteries resumed firing, and obliged him to return at full speed to his
post. As he reached the main gate at Fort George, he encountered a party
of panic-stricken soldiers flying from the place, who informed him that
the roof of the magazine which was known to contain eight hundred
barrels of powder was on fire. Captain Vigoreux climbed upon the burning
building without an instant's hesitation, and his gallant example being
quickly followed by several others, the metal covering was soon torn
away and the flames extinguished in the wood beneath. The storehouses at
Navy Hall were, however, next set in a blaze which could not be overcome
owing to their exposed situation, and they were totally destroyed. The
artillery combat was resumed, and continued till not only Fort Niagara,
but all the other batteries on that side of the river were absolutely
silenced and deserted. One of the largest guns in that fort had burst,
completely wrecking the platform, disabling several men and dismaying
the remainder to such an extent that they deserted the place in a body,
and could not be induced to return until the firing had ceased. For
several hours the works were entirely abandoned, and could have been
taken without the least resistance, had Evans been able to spare men for
the purpose.
On the next day, a cessation of hostilities was again agreed upon which
continued until the evening of the 20th of November. During this
interval the six battalion companies of the First Lincoln Regiment were
consolidated into three, under the command of Captains John Jones,
Martin McClellan, and George Ball, each containing about eighty rank and
file.
At six o'clock on the morning of the 21st November, the guns of Fort
George and five detached batteries began a second bombardment of the
American works chiefly with the object of diverting the attention of the
enemy to that part of the line, as general Smyth who had succeeded Van
Rensselaer was massing his troops in the vicinity of Buffalo, with the
apparent intention of forcing the passage of the river between Fort Erie
and Chippawa. The fire from the American batteries, which appear to have
been weakly manned, was ill-directed and occasionally ceased altogether
for long intervals, while flames could be seen rising from their works,
apparently caused by the explosion of shells. One of these missiles fell
within the north blockhouse in Fort Niagara, and dismounted the only gun
there. Another shot from a twenty-four pounder on the right of Fort
George dismounted a heavy gun near Youngstown, while a third silenced
the piece on the roof of the messhouse at Fort Niagara for nearly an
hour. One of the guns in that place also burst with disastrous results,
killing two men and disabling others. A large building under the walls
which covered the landing of troops was entirely destroyed. By five
o'clock in the afternoon Fort Niagara was absolutely silenced, and only
the Youngstown "Salt" Battery continued to fire an occasional gun. At
dark the British guns ceased firing. But a single private of the 49th
Regiment, and a gallant old half-pay officer, Capt. Barent Frey, late of
Butler's Rangers, had been killed on the Canadian side of the river
during the cannonade. The latter had voluntarily occupied himself in
gathering the enemy's shot as they fell, for the purpose as he declared
of having them sent back to them as soon as possible. He is said to have
been killed by the wind of a cannon ball as it ricocheted along the
ground. The messhouse at Navy Hall was destroyed, and seventeen
buildings in the town itself were set on fire by heated shot, besides
many others considerably damaged by the cannonade. A small merchant
schooner lying at the wharf was sunk.
The American commandant at Fort Niagara, Colonel McFeely of the United
States' Artillery, admitted the loss of only eleven men killed and
wounded, though he estimated that not less than 2000 round shot and 180
shells had been discharged against his works from the British batteries.
He reported an instance of remarkable courage displayed by a woman.
Among the prisoners taken at Queenston on the 13th October, was a
private in the United States Artillery, named Andrew Doyle, who was
recognised as a British subject, born in the village of St. Davids. He
was accordingly included among those who were sent to England to be
brought to trial for treason. His wife remained in Fort Niagara
throughout the bombardment, and actually took part in working one of the
guns. "During the most tremendous cannonading I have ever seen" said
Colonel McFeely in his official letter, "she attended the six-pounder on
the old messhouse with the red hot shot and showed fortitude equal to
the Maid of Orleans."
Cannon balls were much too scarce and valuable to be wasted, and Col.
Myers took pains to state in his report that the number of round shot
picked up on the field exceeded the number fired from his guns on this
occasion.
This artillery duel put an end to actual hostilities in the vicinity of
Niagara for the remainder of the year. But the privations and sufferings
of the militia were not yet terminated. They were retained in service
until the middle of December, when winter set in with unusual severity,
and all danger of an invasion seemed at an end.
As early as the middle of November, Sir Roger Sheaffe had reported that
many of them were "in a very destitute state with respect to clothing,
and all that regards bedding and barrack comforts in general, these
wants cause discontent and desertion, but the conduct of a great
majority is highly honorable to them, and I have not failed to encourage
it by noticing it in public orders." In the order to which reference is
made he had said; "Major General Sheaffe has witnessed with the highest
satisfaction, the manly and cheerful spirit with which the militia on
this frontier have borne the privations which peculiar circumstances
have imposed upon them. He cannot but feel that their conduct entitles
them to every attention he can bestow upon them. It has furnished
examples of those best characteristics of a soldier, manly constancy
under fatigue and privation and determined bravery in the face of the
enemy."
On the 23rd of the same month he observed that the number of the militia
in service had constantly increased since the termination of the
armistice and that they seemed very alert and well disposed. Their duty
during the next three weeks was of the most wearisome and harassing kind
as none of them were permitted to take off their clothes by night, and
in the day they were kept fully accoutred with arms in their hands.
Strong patrols constantly moved along the river, keeping up the
communication between the posts, and owing to the smallness of the force
assembled to watch such an extensive line, the same men were frequently
placed on guard for several nights in succession. Their clothing was
insufficient to protect them from the cold, and numbers were actually
confined to barracks from want of shoes. Disease carried off Lieut. Col.
Butler, Captain John Lottridge, Lieut. John May, Sergeant Jacob Balmer,
and twenty privates of the Lincoln Regiments during the month of
December, and there was much sickness among those who survived. Many,
distressed beyond all endurance by the miserable condition of their
families in their absence, returned home without leave.
Late in November the Governor General issued a proclamation directing
all citizens of the United States residing in Upper Canada who still
declined to take an oath of allegiance, to leave the Province before the
first day of January, 1813. Among those who were banished at this time,
was Michael Smith, already mentioned, who published a few months later a
small volume, entitled "A Geographical view of the Province of Upper
Canada." This book met with such a favorable reception that five other
editions appeared at short intervals during the next three years,
several of them being materially revised and enlarged. His description
of the wretched state of this part of the Province was the result of
personal observation, and is certainly not overdrawn.
"In the course of the summer on the line between Fort George and Fort
Erie, there was not more than 1000 Indians in arms at any one time.
These Indians went to and fro as they pleased to their country and back,
and were very troublesome to the women when their husbands were gone, as
they plundered and took what they pleased, and often beat them to force
them to give them whiskey, even when they were not in possession of any,
and when they saw any man that had not gone to the lines, they called
him a Yankee, and threatened to kill him for not going to fight, and
indeed in some instances these threats have been put into execution.
They acted with great authority and rage when they had stained their
hands with human blood.
"The inhabitants at large would have been extremely glad to have got out
of their miserable situation at almost any rate, but they dared not
venture a rebellion without being sure of protection.
"From the commencement of the war there had been no collection of debts
by law in the upper part of the Province and towards the fall in no
part, nor would anyone pay another. No person could get credit from
anyone to the amount of one dollar, nor could anyone sell any of their
property for any price except provisions or clothing, for those who had
money were determined to keep it for the last resort. No business was
carried on by any person except what was necessary for the times.
"In the upper part of the Province all the schools were broken up and no
preaching was heard in all the land. All was gloom, war and misery.
"Upon the declaration of war the Governor laid an embargo on all the
flour destined for market, which was at a time when very little had
left the Province. The next harvest was truly bountiful as also the
crops of corn, buckwheat, and peas, the most of which were gathered
except the buckwheat which was on the ground when all the people were
called away after the battle of Queenston. Being detained on duty in the
fall not one half of the farmers sowed any winter grain."
All supplies from Montreal were cut off by the American fleet being in
possession of Lake Ontario from the 8th November until the close of
navigation. Flour and salt were scarcely to be purchased at any price
and the condition of many families soon became almost too wretched to be
endured. It is not surprising then that numbers of those who had no very
strong ties to retain them, seized the first opportunity of escape.
Lake Erie was frozen over as early as the 12th of January. A few days
later two deserters and three civilians made their way from Point Abino
to Buffalo upon the ice. They stated that the British forces were
greatly reduced by sickness and desertion and that they did not believe
there were more than thirty regulars stationed along the river between
Fort Erie and Niagara. In fact several companies of the 41st had been
recently despatched to strengthen the garrison of Amherstburg which was
again threatened with an attack, and a show of force was kept up by
ostentatiously sending out parties along the river in sleighs by day and
bringing them back to quarters after dark.
Stimulated by the information derived from these men the commandant at
Buffalo projected the surprise of Fort Erie by crossing on the ice, but
the desertion of a non-commissioned officer, Sergeant Major Macfarlane,
disconcerted his plans.
Late in March the arrival of three families of refugees at Buffalo by
the same route is recorded. They confirmed former accounts of want and
distress and the weakness of the British garrisons on the Niagara. The
American officers were enabled, by information obtained from these and
other sources, to estimate with precision the actual force which might
be assembled to resist an invasion. But as they failed to make their
attacks simultaneously it happened in several instances that they
encountered the same troops successively at different places many miles
apart. Soldiers of the 41st, who had been present with Brock at the
taking of Detroit fought at Queenston on the 13th of October and
returned in time to share in the victory at the River Raisin on the 22nd
January, 1813. Two companies of the 8th that took part in the assault
upon Ogdensburg on the 22nd February, faced the invaders at York on the
27th April and again at Fort George a month later. Finding themselves
repeatedly confronted with considerably larger forces than they had been
led to expect, the American generals soon ceased to put much confidence
in the reports of their spies.
The cabinet had at first designated Kingston, York, and Fort George
points of attack in the order named. The attempt upon Kingston was
quickly abandoned owing to a false report that the garrison had been
largely increased and it was determined to limit the operations of the
"Army of the Centre" in the first instance to the reduction of the two
latter places.
On the 17th of March, Major General Morgan Lewis, who had been appointed
to the command of the division on the Niagara, arrived at Buffalo
attended by a numerous staff. At noon of the same day, the batteries at
Black Rock began firing across the river and continued the cannonade
with little intermission until the evening of the 18th. A few houses
were destroyed and seven soldiers killed or wounded near Fort Erie.
Three of the American guns were dismounted by the British batteries. A
week later the bombardment was resumed with even less result.
York was taken without much difficulty on the 27th April, but it cost
the assailants their most promising general and between three and four
hundred of their best troops. They ascertained on that occasion that
they still had many warm sympathizers in that part of the Province. A
letter from an officer who accompanied this expedition, published in the
_Baltimore Whig_ at the time, states that "our adherents and friends in
Upper Canada suffer greatly in apprehension or active misery. Eighteen
or twenty of them who refused to take the oath of allegiance lived last
winter in a cave or subterraneous hut near Lake Simcoe. Twenty-five
Indians and whites were sent to take them but they killed eighteen of
the party and enjoyed their liberty until lately when being worn out
with cold and fatigue, they were taken and put in York jail whence we
liberated them." Michael Smith corroborates this account in some
respects. He relates that twelve days after the battle of Queenston
Colonel Graham, on Yonge Street, ordered his battalion to assemble that
a number might be drafted to go to Fort George. Forty of them did not
come but went out to Whitchurch township which was nearly a wilderness
and joined thirty more fugitives that were already there. Some men who
were home for a few days from Fort George offered to go and bring them
in but as they were not permitted to take arms they failed and the
number of fugitives increased by the first of December to 300. When on
my way to Kingston to obtain a passport, I saw about fifty of these
people near Smith's Creek in the Newcastle District on the main road
with fife and drum beating for recruits and huzzaing for Madison. Some
of them remained in the woods all winter, but the Indians went out in
the spring of 1813 and drove them into their caves where they were
taken.
So pronounced was the disaffection among the inhabitants in the vicinity
of York, that Chief Justice Powell warned the Governor General that "in
the event of any serious disaster to His Majesty's arms little reliance
is to be had on the power of the well disposed to depress and keep down
the turbulence of the disaffected who are very numerous."
On the 29th of April, the capture of York became known at Fort George
and the boats and stores deposited at Burlington were removed to a place
of safety. On the 8th of May the American fleet came over to Fort
Niagara and landed the brigade of troops that had been employed in
reduction of York. Although victorious they were described by General
Dearborn as being sickly and low spirited. Next day some of these troops
were sent in two schooners to Burlington Beach where they destroyed the
King's Head tavern, built by Lieut.-Governor Simcoe, which had served as
quarters for soldiers on their march to and from Niagara. These vessels
continued to cruise about the head of the lake, while the remainder of
their fleet sailed away, as it proved to bring forward another division
of troops.
Brigadier General John Vincent, had lately assumed command of the
British forces on the line of the Niagara, consisting of the 49th
Regiment, five companies of the 8th, three of the Glengarry Light
Infantry, two of the Royal Newfoundland Regiment, and a captain's
command of Royal Artillery with five held guns, numbering in all 1925
officers and men, of whom 1841 were effectiver. Besides these, Merritt's
troops of Provincial cavalry, Runchey's company of negroes, a company of
militia artillery and an uncertain and fluctuating number of militiamen
belonging to the five Lincoln Regiments were in service.
By a general order in March, about 1700 militia had been summoned to the
protection of the frontier, but when the alarm had subsided, most of
them had been allowed to return to their homes as it was felt that they
would be more usefully employed in cultivating their farms than in idly
waiting for an attack which the enemy appeared to be in no hurry to
make.
The regular troops were in high spirits and confident of victory, but
the militia appeared gloomy and depressed. Vincent complained ruefully,
"it is with regret that I can neither report favorably of their numbers
nor of their willing co-operation. Every exertion has been used and
every expedient resorted to, to bring them forward and unite their
efforts to those of His Majesty's troops with but little effect, and
desertion beyond all conception continues to mark their indifference to
the important cause in which we are now engaged. In considering it my
duty to offer a fresh exposition of my sentiments to Your Excellency
respecting the militia of this Province, I must at the same time express
a belief that when the reinforcements reach this frontier, many of the
inhabitants who have been for some time wavering and appalled by the
specious show of the enemy's resources will instantly rally round the
standard of their King and country."
Lieut.-Colonel John Harvey, a very able and enterprising young officer,
who had lately joined General Vincent's division as Deputy Adjutant
General, earnestly advised that accurate information of the enemy's
numbers and designs should be secured at any cost, and then "by a series
of both active and offensive movements, they should be thrown on the
defensive no matter how superior their numbers might be." Had the whole
of the 8th Regiment arrived in time this might have been accomplished,
but two of its companies had been nearly annihilated at York, and the
march of the remainder very much delayed by the attack on that place.
As late however, as the 20th of May, we find Colonel Myers writing to
the Adjutant General in these terms. "It is not wise to hold an enemy
too cheap, but I cannot divest myself of the idea that the foe opposite
is despicable and that it would be no hard task to dislodge him from the
entire of his lines on the Niagara River. With some subordinate attacks
upon his flanks, I am of opinion that it would be an enterprise of
little hazard for us to get an establishment on the heights above
Lewiston, opposite Queenston. This once affected, I cannot but feel the
strongest confidence that we would in a short time effect the object so
much to be desired. It would be giving such a turn to the war that I
conceive it would strike terror to the enemy, which would produce the
happiest effects."
The return of the American fleet with a numerous body of regular troops
on board put an end to these rather fantastic schemes of conquest. At
daybreak on the 21st, no less than seventeen armed vessels, and upwards
of one hundred Durham boats and batteaux were seen assembled near the
mouth of the Four Mile Creek in rear of Fort Niagara, from which several
thousand men were speedily disembarked.
For several days these troops paraded ostentatiously in plain view
probably in the hope of overawing their opponents by the display of
numbers. Many workmen were seen at the same time busily occupied in
constructing new batteries along the river and building boats.
Reinforcements continued to arrive daily until it was supposed that
about 7000 soldiers were encamped between Lewiston and Fort Niagara.
This force was composed almost wholly of regular troops that had been in
service for some time and included nine of the best regiments of
infantry in the United States army. They were accompanied by a strong
regiment of heavy artillery, a well appointed field-train and a
battalion of dragoons.
Major-General Henry Dearborn who was in command had distinguished
himself in the Revolutionary war during which he had commanded a
regiment in Arnold's expedition against Quebec and in Sullivan's
campaign against the Six Nations. But he was now past sixty years of age
and in ill health.
The Secretary of War had warned him to be careful to employ a sufficient
force to ensure success. Seven thousand men was the number deemed
requisite. "If the first step in the campaign fails," he wrote
plaintively, "our disgrace will be complete. The public will lose
confidence in us. The party who first opens a campaign has many
advantages over his antagonist, all of which, however, are the results
of his being able to carry his whole force against part of the enemy's.
We are now in that state of prostration Washington was in after he
crossed the Delaware, but like him we may soon get on our legs if we are
able to give some hard blows at the opening of the campaign. In this we
cannot fail provided the force we employ against his western posts be
sufficiently heavy. They must stand or fall by their own strength. They
are perfectly isolated, send, then, a force that shall overwhelm them.
When the fleet and army are gone we have nothing at Sackett's Harbor to
guard. How would it read if we had another brigade at Sackett's Harbor
when we failed at Niagara?"
The undisturbed control of Lake Ontario by his fleet gave the American
general a still greater advantage than his numerical superiority. It was
understood that the British squadron would not be able to leave Kingston
for at least a week, but two small vessels were detached to watch that
port while the remainder assembled at Niagara to cover the landing.
Vincent was accordingly thrown entirely upon the defensive. Had he only
had Dearborn's army to contend with, superior as it was, he might have
entertained a reasonable hope of being able to maintain his position but
the presence of the fleet would enable his antagonist to select the
point of attack at will and even to land a force in his rear.
Nor were the fortifications along the river in a satisfactory state. The
chief engineer had examined them during the winter and reported that
Fort George was still in a "ruinous and unfinished condition," although
the parapet facing the river had been somewhat strengthened. He had
recommended that it should be completed as a field work and that a
splinter-proof barracks capable of sheltering 400 men should be built
within, and the upper story of the blockhouses taken down to place them
on a level with the _terre pleine_. But these suggested improvements
could not be carried out for lack of materials and workmen. At this time
the fort mounted five guns; one twelve, two twenty four pounders, and
two mortars. On the left fronting Fort Niagara were no less than five
detached batteries armed with eleven guns, five of which were mortars.
All of these works were open in the rear, and could be enfiladed and
some of them taken in reverse by an enemy approaching on the lake. Six
other batteries had been constructed along the river between Fort George
and Queenston, two at Chippawa and three opposite Black Rock about two
miles below Fort Erie. All of these posts required men to occupy them
and there
|
, which had heretofore been carried in flasks, or in
small wooden bandoleers, each containing a charge, to be made up into
cartridges, and carried in pouches; and he formed each regiment into
two wings of musketeers, and a centre division of pikemen. He also
adopted the practice of forming four regiments into a brigade; and the
number of colours was afterwards reduced to three in each regiment.
He formed his columns so compactly that his infantry could resist the
charge of the celebrated Polish horsemen and Austrian cuirassiers; and
his armies became the admiration of other nations His mode of formation
was copied by the English, French, and other European states; but, so
great was the prejudice in favour of ancient customs, that all his
improvements were not adopted until near a century afterwards.
In 1664 King Charles II. raised a corps for sea-service, styled the
Admiral's regiment. In 1678 each company of 100 men usually consisted
of 30 pikemen, 60 musketeers, and 10 men armed with light firelocks. In
this year the king added a company of men armed with hand-grenades to
each of the old British regiments, which was designated the "grenadier
company." Daggers were so contrived as to fit in the muzzles of the
muskets, and bayonets similar to those at present in use were adopted
about twenty years afterwards.
An Ordnance regiment was raised in 1635, by order of King James II., to
guard the artillery, and was designated the Royal Fusiliers (now 7th
Foot). This corps, and the companies of grenadiers, did not carry pikes.
King William III. incorporated the Admiral's regiment in the Second
Foot Guards, and raised two Marine regiments for sea-service. During
the war in this reign, each company of infantry (excepting the
fusiliers and grenadiers) consisted of 14 pikemen and 46 musketeers;
the captains carried pikes; lieutenants, partisans; ensigns,
half-pikes; and serjeants, halberds. After the peace in 1697 the Marine
regiments were disbanded, but were again formed on the breaking out of
the war in 1702.[2]
During the reign of Queen Anne the pikes were laid aside, and every
infantry soldier was armed with a musket, bayonet, and sword; the
grenadiers ceased, about the same period, to carry hand-grenades; and
the regiments were directed to lay aside their third colour: the corps
of Royal Artillery was first added to the army in this reign.
About the year 1745, the men of the battalion companies of infantry
ceased to carry swords; during the reign of George II. light companies
were added to infantry regiments; and in 1764 a Board of General
Officers recommended that the grenadiers should lay aside their swords,
as that weapon had never been used during the seven years' war. Since
that period the arms of the infantry soldier have been limited to the
musket and bayonet.
The arms and equipment of the British troops have seldom differed
materially, since the Conquest, from those of other European states;
and in some respects the arming has, at certain periods, been allowed
to be inferior to that of the nations with whom they have had to
contend; yet, under this disadvantage, the bravery and superiority of
the British infantry have been evinced on very many and most trying
occasions, and splendid victories have been gained over very superior
numbers.
Great Britain has produced a race of lion-like champions who have dared
to confront a host of foes, and have proved themselves valiant with
any arms. At _Crecy_, King Edward III., at the head of about 30,000
men, defeated, on the 26th of August, 1346, Philip King of France,
whose army is said to have amounted to 100,000 men; here British valour
encountered veterans of renown:--the King of Bohemia, the King of
Majorca, and many princes and nobles were slain, and the French army
was routed and cut to pieces. Ten years afterwards, Edward Prince of
Wales, who was designated the Black Prince, defeated, at _Poictiers_,
with 14,000 men, a French army of 60,000 horse, besides infantry, and
took John I., King of France, and his son Philip, prisoners. On the
25th of October, 1415, King Henry V., with an army of about 13,000
men, although greatly exhausted by marches, privations, and sickness,
defeated, at _Agincourt_, the Constable of France, at the head of the
flower of the French nobility and an army said to amount to 60,000 men,
and gained a complete victory.
During the seventy years' war between the United Provinces of the
Netherlands and the Spanish monarch, which commenced in 1578 and
terminated in 1648, the British infantry in the service of the States
General were celebrated for their unconquerable spirit and firmness;[3]
and in the thirty years' war between the Protestant Princes and the
Emperor of Germany, the British troops in the service of Sweden and
other states were celebrated for deeds of heroism.[4] In the wars of
Queen Anne, the fame of the British army under the great MARLBOROUGH
was spread throughout the world; and if we glance at the achievements
performed within the memory of persons now living, there is abundant
proof that the Britons of the present age are not inferior to their
ancestors in the qualities which constitute good soldiers. Witness
the deeds of the brave men, of whom there are many now surviving, who
fought in Egypt in 1801, under the brave Abercromby, and compelled the
French army, which had been vainly styled _Invincible_, to evacuate
that country; also the services of the gallant Troops during the
arduous campaigns in the Peninsula, under the immortal WELLINGTON;
and the determined stand made by the British Army at Waterloo, where
Napoleon Bonaparte, who had long been the inveterate enemy of Great
Britain, and had sought and planned her destruction by every means he
could devise, was compelled to leave his vanquished legions to their
fate, and to place himself at the disposal of the British Government.
These achievements, with others of recent dates in the distant climes
of India, prove that the same valour and constancy which glowed in the
breasts of the heroes of Crecy, Poictiers, Agincourt, Blenheim, and
Ramilies, continue to animate the Britons of the nineteenth century.
The British Soldier is distinguished for a robust and muscular
frame,--intrepidity which no danger can appal,--unconquerable spirit
and resolution,--patience in fatigue and privation, and cheerful
obedience to his superiors. These qualities, united with an excellent
system of order and discipline to regulate and give a skilful direction
to the energies and adventurous spirit of the hero, and a wise
selection of officers of superior talent to command, whose presence
inspires confidence,--have been the leading causes of the splendid
victories gained by the British arms.[5] The fame of the deeds of the
past and present generations in the various battle-fields where the
robust sons of Albion have fought and conquered, surrounds the British
arms with an halo of glory; these achievements will live in the page of
history to the end of time.
The records of the several regiments will be found to contain a detail
of facts of an interesting character, connected with the hardships,
sufferings, and gallant exploits of British soldiers in the various
parts of the world where the calls of their Country and the commands
of their Sovereign, have required them to proceed in the execution
of their duty, whether in active continental operations, or in
maintaining colonial territories in distant and unfavourable climes.
The superiority of the British infantry has been pre-eminently set
forth in the wars of six centuries, and admitted by the greatest
commanders which Europe has produced. The formations and movements of
this _arme_, as at present practised, while they are adapted to every
species of warfare, and to all probable situations and circumstances
of service, are calculated to show forth the brilliancy of military
tactics calculated upon mathematical and scientific principles.
Although the movements and evolutions have been copied from the
continental armies, yet various improvements have from time to time
been introduced, to ensure that simplicity and celerity by which the
superiority of the national military character is maintained. The rank
and influence, which Great Britain has attained among the nations of
the world, have in a great measure been purchased by the valour of the
Army, and to persons, who have the welfare of their country at heart,
the records of the several regiments cannot fail to prove interesting.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] A company of 200 men would appear thus:--
20 20 20 30 2⚐0 30 20 20 20
Harque- Arch- Mus- Pikes. Hal- Pikes. Mus- Arch- Harque-
buses. ers. kets. berds. kets. ers. buses.
The musket carried a ball which weighed 1/10 of a pound; and the
harquebus a ball which weighed 1/23 of a pound.
[2] The 30th, 31st, and 32nd Regiments were formed as Marine corps
in 1702, and were employed as such during the wars in the reign of
Queen Anne. The Marine corps were embarked in the Fleet under Admiral
Sir George Rooke, and were at the taking of Gibraltar, and in its
subsequent defence in 1704; they were afterwards employed at the siege
of Barcelona in 1705.
[3] The brave Sir Roger Williams, in his Discourse on War, printed in
1590, observes:--"I persuade myself ten thousand of our nation would
beat thirty thousand of theirs (the Spaniards) out of the field, let
them be chosen where they list." Yet at this time the Spanish infantry
was allowed to be the best disciplined in Europe. For instances of
valour displayed by the British Infantry during the Seventy Years' War,
see the Historical Record of the Third Foot, or Buffs.
[4] Vide the Historical Record of the First, or Royal Regiment of Foot.
[5] "Under the blessing of Divine Providence, His Majesty ascribes
the successes which have attended the exertions of his troops in
Egypt, to that determined bravery which is inherent in Britons; but
His Majesty desires it may be most solemnly and forcibly impressed
on the consideration of every part of the army, that it has been a
strict observance of order, discipline, and military system, which
has given the full energy to the native valour of the troops, and has
enabled them proudly to assert the superiority of the national military
character, in situations uncommonly arduous, and under circumstances of
peculiar difficulty."--_General Orders in 1801._
In the General Orders issued by Lieut.-General Sir John Hope
(afterwards Lord Hopetoun), congratulating the army upon the successful
result of the Battle of Corunna, on the 16th of January, 1809, it is
stated:--"On no occasion has the undaunted valour of British troops
ever been more manifest. At the termination of a severe and harassing
march, rendered necessary by the superiority which the enemy had
acquired, and which had materially impaired the efficiency of the
troops, many disadvantages were to be encountered. These have all been
surmounted by the conduct of the troops themselves; and the enemy has
been taught, that whatever advantages of position or of numbers he
may possess, there is inherent in the British officers and soldiers
a bravery that knows not how to yield,--that no circumstances can
appal,--and that will ensure victory when it is to be obtained by the
exertion of any human means.
HISTORICAL RECORD
OF
THE FIRST,
OR
ROYAL REGIMENT OF FOOT:
CONTAINING AN ACCOUNT OF
THE ORIGIN OF THE REGIMENT
IN THE REIGN OF
KING JAMES VI. OF SCOTLAND,
AND
OF ITS SUBSEQUENT SERVICES
To 1846.
COMPILED BY
RICHARD CANNON, ESQ.
ADJUTANT-GENERAL'S OFFICE, HORSE GUARDS.
ILLUSTRATED WITH PLATES.
LONDON:
PARKER, FURNIVALL, & PARKER,
30, CHARING CROSS.
M DCCC XLVII.
LONDON:--PRINTED BY W. CLOWES & SONS, DUKE STREET, STAMFORD STREET,
FOR HER MAJESTY'S STATIONERY OFFICE.
THE FIRST,
OR
THE ROYAL REGIMENT OF FOOT
Bears on its Colours, as a Regimental Badge,
THE ROYAL CIPHER WITHIN THE CIRCLE OF ST. ANDREW,
SURMOUNTED WITH A CROWN.
In the corners of the second Colour
THE THISTLE AND CROWN,
WITH THE MOTTO
_"NEMO ME IMPUNE LACESSIT":_
ALSO THE
SPHYNX,
AND THE FOLLOWING INSCRIPTIONS:--
"EGMONT-OP-ZEE,"--"ST. LUCIA,"--"EGYPT,"--"CORUNNA,"--"BUSACO,"--
"SALAMANCA,"--"VITTORIA,"--"ST. SEBASTIAN,"--"NIVE,"--"PENINSULA,"--
"NIAGARA,"--"WATERLOO,"--
"NAGPORE,"--"MAHEIDPOOR,"--"AVA."
CONTENTS.
Anno Page
882 Origin of the _Scots Guards_ at the French Court 1
1420 Scots Auxiliaries sent to France 2
1421 Battle of Baugé 3
1422 Scots _Gendarmes_ instituted in France --
---- Capture of Avranches --
1423 Battle of Crevan --
1424 ---- Verneuille --
1440 Scots _Garde du Corps_ instituted in France --
1495 Conquest of Naples 4
1515 Battle of Pavia --
1590 Origin of the _Royal Regiment_ --
1613 _Scots Regiment in the service of Sweden_ 7
1615 Capture of Kexholm, and siege of Plesko --
1620 ---- Riga, Dunamond, and Mittau 8
---- Scots Companies in the service of the King of
Bohemia --
1621} Battles of Prague and Fleurus --
1622}
1625 _Hepburn's Scots Regiment in the Swedish Service_ 9
---- Capture of Selburg, Duneberg, Nidorp, and
Dorpat; and battle of Semigallia --
1626 Relief of Mew --
1627 Capture of Kesmark and Marienberg, and action
at Dirschan 10
1628 Capture of Newburg, Strasberg, Dribentz, Sweitz,
and Massovia --
---- Defence of Stralsund --
1629 Skirmish near Thorn --
1630 Relief of Rugenwald 12
---- Blockade of Colberg 13
1631 Capture of Frankfort on the Oder 14
---- ---- Landsberg 16
1631 Defence of the fortified camp at Werben 17
---- Battle of Leipsic --
---- Capture of Halle, and services in Franconia 21
---- ---- Wurtzburg and Marienberg 22
---- Defence of Oxenford --
---- Capture of Frankfort on the Maine 23
---- ---- Oppenheim and Mentz 24
1632 ---- Donawerth 26
---- Forcing the passage of the Lech 27
---- Capture of Augsburg --
---- Siege of Ingoldstadt --
---- Capture of Landshut and Munich 28
---- Relief of Weissemberg --
---- Defence of Nurenberg --
---- Capture of Rayn and Landsberg 30
---- Relief of Rayn 31
1633 Skirmish near Memmingen 32
---- Capture of Kaufbeuren --
---- Siege of Kempten --
1634 Battle of Nordlingen 33
_Hepburn's Scots Regiment in the French Service_:
---- Siege of La Motte, and relief of Heidelberg 34
1635 _Hepburn's two regiments incorporated_ 35
---- Action near Metz 36
1636 Capture of Saverne --
1638} Siege of St. Omer 38
}
1639} Capture of Renty, Catelet, and Hesdin 39
---- Skirmish near St. Nicholas 40
1643 Battle of Roucroy 41
---- Capture of Thionville and Turin --
1644 Capture of Gravelines 42
1646 ---- Courtray and Dunkirk 43
1648 Battle of Lens --
1649 Siege of Paris 44
1652 Action in the suburbs of Paris 45
---- Skirmish at Villeneuve, St. George's 47
---- Capture of Bar le Duc, and Ligny 48
1653 Capture of Château Portien and Vervins 49
1661 The Regiment proceeds to England 52
1662 Returns to France; Scots Guards incorporated in
the Regiment 53
1666 Proceeds to England, and afterwards to Ireland --
1668 Returns to France 54
1672 Capture of Grave --
1673 ---- Maestricht 55
1674 Skirmishes near Heidelberg --
---- Battle of Molsheim 56
1675 Capture of Dachstein 57
---- Defence of Treves --
1676 Skirmish near Saverne 58
1677 ---- Kochersberg and capture of Fribourg 59
1678 Returns to England 60
---- Grenadier Company added --
1679 Stationed in Ireland --
1680 Four Companies proceed to Tangier 61
---- Action with the Moors --
---- Twelve additional Companies proceed to Tangier 62
---- Actions with the Moors 63
1683 One Company from Tangier to England 67
1684 Fifteen Companies ditto --
---- Five Companies from Ireland to England --
---- Styled "_The Royal Regiment of Foot_" --
---- Reviewed by King Charles II. 68
1685 Battle of Sedgemoor 70
---- Rewards to Wounded Officers and Men 72
---- Reviewed by King James II. 73
1686 Divided into Two Battalions 74
---- 2nd Battalion proceeds to Scotland --
---- 1st " encamps on Hounslow Heath --
1688 1st " ditto 75
---- 2nd " from Scotland to England --
---- The Revolution --
1689 The Regiment mutinies 77
---- 2nd Battalion proceeds to Scotland 79
---- 1st " " the Netherlands --
---- 1st " Battle of Walcourt --
1690 2nd Battalion proceeds from Scotland to Holland 80
1692 Battle of Steenkirk 81
1693 ---- Landen 84
1695 1st Battalion, Siege of Namur 87
1696 Reviewed by King William III. 91
1698 Embarks for Ireland 92
1701 Embarks for Holland 93
1702 Covering the siege of Kayserswerth 94
---- Skirmish near Nimeguen --
---- Covering the sieges of Venloo and Ruremonde 95
---- Capture of Stevenswart and Liege --
1703 ---- Huy and Limburg 97
1704 Battle of Schellenberg 99
---- ---- Blenheim 102
---- Covering the siege of Landau 105
1705 Re-capture of Huy 106
---- Forcing the French lines at Neer-Hespen and
Helixem 107
---- Skirmish near the Dyle 108
1706 Battle of Ramilies 109
---- Covering the sieges of Dendermond, Ostend, and
Menin --
---- Capture of Aeth 110
1707 The regimental badge changed from the _Cross_
to the _Circle of St. Andrew_ --
1708 Battle of Oudenarde 111
---- Covering the siege of Lisle 112
---- Battle of Wynendale 113
---- Forcing the passage of the Scheldt 114
---- Capture of Ghent --
1709 Capture of Tournay 115
---- Battle of Malplaquet 116
---- Covering the siege of Mons 118
1710 ---- Douay and Bethune --
---- Capture of Aire 119
1711 ---- Bouchain --
1712 Covering the siege of Quesnoy 120
1714 Returns to England 121
1715 Proceeds to Ireland 122
1741 2nd Battalion proceeds to the West Indies 123
1742 2nd Battalion proceeds to England 123
1743 " returns to Ireland --
---- 1st Battalion proceeds to Flanders --
1745 " battle of Fontenoy 124
---- " embarks for England 125
---- 2nd Battalion ---- ditto --
---- " marches to Scotland 126
1746 " battle of Falkirk --
---- " ---- Culloden 127
---- 1st Battalion, expedition to L'Orient, &c. 128
1747 " proceeds to Holland 130
---- " relief of Hulst, and defence of
Fort Sandberg --
1748 2nd Battalion proceeds to Holland 131
1749 Both Battalions proceed to Ireland 132
1751 Regulation respecting Colours and Clothing; and
designated "_The First, or Royal Regiment
of Foot_" --
1757 2nd Battalion proceeds to North America 134
1758 " capture of Louisburg --
1759 " ---- Ticonderago, and Crown Point 135
1760 2nd Battalion, expedition against the Cherokees 136
---- " capture of Isle aux Noix, and
Montreal 141
---- 1st Battalion proceeds to Quiberon Bay; returns
to Ireland 142
1761 2nd Battalion, expedition against the Cherokees --
---- " capture of Dominico 144
1762 " capture of Martinico, and the
Havannah --
---- " re-capture of Newfoundland 147
1763 " returns to England 148
1764 " proceeds to Scotland --
1768 1st Battalion ---- Gibraltar --
---- 2nd Battalion returns to England --
1771 " proceeds to Minorca --
1775 Both Battalions return to England --
1780 1st Battalion proceeds to the West Indies 149
1781 1st Battalion, capture of St. Eustatia, St. Martin,
and Saba 149
1782 " defence of St. Christopher --
---- " returns to England 152
1784 2nd Battalion proceeds to Gibraltar 153
---- 1st Battalion ---- Ireland --
1790 " ---- West Indies --
1793 2nd Battalion, defence of Toulon --
1794 " descent on Corsica; capture of
Convention Redoubt, and Calvi 156
---- 1st Battalion proceeds to St. Domingo 159
---- " capture of Fort L'Acal --
---- " attack on Bombarde 160
---- " defence of a Block House --
---- " capture of Port-au-Prince --
---- " defence of Fort Bizzeton 161
1795 " ---- an out-post --
1796 2nd Battalion proceeds to Elba 162
1797 1st Battalion returns to England; proceeds to
Scotland 162
---- 2nd Battalion proceeds to Portugal --
1798 1st Battalion ---- Ireland 163
1799 2nd Battalion returns to England --
---- " expedition to Holland --
---- " action near the Helder --
---- " ---- Shagen 164
---- " battle of Egmont-op-Zee --
---- " returns to England 165
1800 " expedition to Ferrol and Cadiz --
---- 1st Battalion proceeds to Scotland 166
1801 2nd Battalion, expedition to Egypt --
---- " battle of Aboukir --
---- " ---- Alexandria 168
---- " skirmishes at Hamed, El Aft, &c. 170
---- " capture of Cairo, and Alexandria --
---- 1st Battalion returns to England 171
---- " proceeds to the West Indies --
---- " capture of St. Martin, St. Thomas,
St. John, and Santa Cruz 172
1801 2nd Battalion proceeds to Malta 172
1802 " ---- Gibraltar --
1803 " returns to England --
---- " proceeds to the West Indies --
---- " capture of St. Lucia, and Tobago 173
---- 1st Battalion ---- Essequibo, Demerara,
and Berbice 174
1804 _Two additional Battalions embodied_ --
1805 4th Battalion proceeds to Ireland --
---- 3rd Battalion ---- England --
---- 2nd Battalion ---- England 175
1806 4th Battalion ---- England --
1807 2nd Battalion ---- the East Indies --
---- 3rd Battalion ---- Ireland --
---- 4th Battalion ---- Scotland --
1808 " ---- England 176
---- 3rd Battalion, expedition to Spain --
1809 " battle of Corunna 177
---- " embarks for England 178
---- " expedition to Walcheren 179
---- " siege of Flushing --
---- " returns to England 180
1810 1st Battalion, capture of Guadaloupe --
---- 3rd Battalion proceeds to Portugal 181
---- " battle of Busaco --
---- 4th Battalion proceeds to Scotland 182
1811 3rd Battalion, battle of Fuentes d'Onor --
1812 " siege of Ciudad Rodrigo 183
---- Styled, "_First Regiment of Foot, or Royal Scots_" --
---- 3rd Battalion, siege of Badajoz --
---- " skirmish near Torrecille de la Orden 184
---- " battle of Salamanca --
---- " siege of Burgos 185
---- " skirmish near Palencia --
---- 1st Battalion proceeds to Canada 186
1813 " attack on Sackett's Harbour 188
---- " ---- Sodius --
---- " skirmish near Four-mile Creek 189
---- " ---- Cross-roads --
---- " capture of Fort Niagara --
1813 1st Battalion, capture of Black-rock and Buffalo 190
---- 3rd Battalion, skirmish near Osma 192
---- " battle of Vittoria --
---- " capture of St. Sebastian 193
---- " passage of the Bidassoa 195
---- " battles of Nivelle and Nive 196
---- 4th Battalion proceeds to Swedish Pomerania --
1814 1st Battalion, action at Longwood 197
---- " skirmish near Chippewa 198
---- " battle of Lundy's Lane 199
---- " siege of Fort Erie 201
---- " action at Cook's Mills 202
---- 2nd Battalion employed against the Pindarees 203
---- 3rd Battalion, blockade of Bayonne --
---- 4th Battalion, siege of Bergen-op-Zoom --
---- " returns to England 204
---- " proceeds to Canada 205
---- 3rd Battalion, repulsing the sortie from Bayonne --
---- " proceeds to Ireland 206
1815 1st and 4th Battalions return to England 207
---- 3rd Battalion proceeds to Flanders --
---- " battle of Quatre Bras 208
---- " ---- Waterloo 210
---- " advances to Paris 212
---- 4th Battalion proceeds to France --
1816 " _returns to England, and disbanded_ 214
---- 1st Battalion proceeds to Ireland --
1817 _3rd Battalion returns to England, and disbanded_ 215
---- Order respecting inscriptions on the colours --
---- 2nd Battalion, services against the Pindarees 216
---- " battle of Nagpore 217
---- " ---- Maheidpoor 221
1818 " capture of Fort Talnere 223
---- " capture of Forts Gawelghur, and
Narnullah 225
---- " operations against Peishwah Bajee
Rao 226
---- " capture of Forts Unkye, Rajdeir,
Inderye, Trimbuck, and Malleygaum 227
1819 " capture of Asseerghur
1819 2nd Battalion capture of Asseerghur 229
1821 The title of "_First, or Royal Regiment of Foot_"
restored 236
1825 2nd Battalion embarks for Rangoon --
---- " action at Donabew 237
---- " skirmishes at Padoun Mew 240
---- " action at Simbike 244
---- " action near the Irawaddy 246
1826 1st Battalion, Service Companies proceed to the
West Indies 248
---- " Reserve Companies proceed to
Scotland 249
---- 2nd Battalion, action at Melloone 250
---- " ---- Pagahm Mew 251
---- " returns to Madras 252
1831 " embarks for England 254
1832 " proceeds to Scotland 249
---- _The colours of both Battalions assimilated_ --
1833 1st Battalion, Reserve Companies proceed to
Ireland 255
---- 2nd Battalion proceeds to Ireland 256
---- 1st Battalion, Service Companies proceed to Ireland --
1836 2nd Battalion, ---- proceed to Canada --
1837 " Depôt companies proceed to England 257
---- " Service Companies, action at St.
Charles --
---- " ---- action at
Point Olivière 258
---- " ---- action at
St. Eustache 259
1838 1st Battalion proceeds to Scotland 261
1839 " Service Companies embark for
Gibraltar --
1841 " Depôt Companies proceed to Ireland --
1843 2nd Battalion, Service Companies embark for the
West Indies --
---- " Wreck of the Premier Transport,
and return of the head-quarter division
to Quebec --
1844 2nd Battalion, head-quarters, and three Companies
proceed to Nova Scotia, and embark
for the West Indies 261
1846 " Service Companies embark for Scotland,
and joined by Depôt Companies --
---- 1st Battalion, Service Companies embark for the
West Indies 262
---- The conclusion 263
SUCCESSION OF COLONELS.
1633 Sir John Hepburn 265
1636 James Hepburn 267
1637 Lord James Douglas --
1655 Lord George Douglas 268
1688 Frederick Duke Schomberg --
1691 Sir Robert Douglas 270
1692 Lord George Hamilton 271
1737 Honourable James St. Clair 272
1762 Sir Henry Erskine, Bart. 273
1765 John Marquis of Lorne --
1782 Lord Adam Gordon 274
1801 His Royal Highness the Duke of Kent 275
1820 George Marquis of Huntly 279
1834 Thomas Lord Lynedoch 280
1843 Sir George Murray, G.C.B. 285
1846 Sir James Kempt, G.C.B. 288
PLATES.
Colours of the Regiment, to precede Page 1
Colonel Sir Robert Douglas, at the Battle of Steenkirk,
to face 83
Uniform in 1838, to face 261
[Illustration: Colours of the 1st, or Royal Regiment of Foot.
To face
|
maiden developed early, for fourteen was considered as the
entrance into womanhood.
Hyacintha’s eyes were of that dusky hue which, taking a new colour with
every varying light, defies description. Her hair was of a deep golden
brown; and though she had every distinctive feature of her race in the
well-cut features, and curved, short upper lip, with rather a massive
chin, her complexion was fair.
Hyacintha had been born in the north during her father’s first year
of office about the person of the Governor; thus the Italian sunshine
had not given her complexion the rich dark hue which characterised her
mother.
No one could look at Hyacintha, even at that early age, without seeing
that there was in her something beyond the ordinary type of girlhood.
Her mother might dream away life, and know no higher pleasures than
the acquisition of beautiful dresses and ornaments, and in the
entertainment of guests, and driving along the level Watling Street
in her well-appointed chariot, but Hyacintha had already other aims
and views. The child had heard from her father that maidens of their
house had been chosen to keep the sacred fire burning in the temple
of Vesta--that fire which was never to be quenched--that light which,
coming from heaven, was to keep the sacred flame alive in every Roman’s
hearth and heart!
Hyacintha would ask her mother many questions about this temple, and
the beautiful city so far away, and when her mother complained of the
chilling winds and dark skies of the northern climate, she would ask--
“Why do we not return to Rome?”
The British slave-girl, Ebba, could tell her nothing of that distant
city; but of late, when she spoke of it, she would speak of another
city fairer and more beautiful than Rome could be, and when Hyacintha
asked how people reached it, she would clasp her hands and say--
“By a rough and terrible way, from which the timid shrank, but the
brave of heart went forth boldly to tread.”
Several times in the course of that long summer’s day did little
Hyacintha mount to the balcony and look out on the crowd which covered
the hill-side.
Now and then a few stragglers returned, or a chariot with prancing
steeds rolled along the great Watling Street.
Women, tired of carrying their children, came back to the city, and by
the evening there were knots of people in the city all talking of what
had happened on the hill above the river. Just at sunset the servants
of Severus’s household returned, and the evening meal was laid in
the inner hall or banqueting-room. Very soon the wheels of chariots
were heard rolling up, and Hyacintha ran down to meet her father and
brother, and hear the news.
Severus had several officers and gentlemen with him, and was scarcely
conscious of his little daughter’s presence till she pulled the sleeve
of his robe.
“Tell me, father, is the man dead?”
“Ay, little one, and so may all the enemies of the gods perish. But
such a story is not for thy ears, my Hyacintha. See, take thy lute and
play to us while we sup. These fellows have had enough of freedom for
one day, and the supper is late. How now, slaves!” Severus exclaimed,
clapping his hands, “let the guests be served.”
The couches were soon filled by the company, and Cæcilia reclined at
the head of the board, dressed in the richest violet silk, with gold
trimmings, a long veil floating at the back of her head.
Ebba was in attendance, and a seat at the end of the sofa or couch was
reserved for Hyacintha.
“Where have you left Casca? Where is my son?” Cæcilia asked.
“The boy is weary, and the day has been too much for him. He has not
the nerve and muscle of a Spartan,” was the reply; “not so much as our
little maiden here, I verily believe.”
“And, indeed,” said a grave man, who was one of the guests, “it was a
sight to affect a boy of your son’s tender years.”
The Roman father laughed.
“Nay, may he never see worse sights than that we have witnessed to-day.
There was not enough terror in it; these miserable Christians need
stronger discipline; they are so stubborn. When the beasts spring on
them in the arena, and a huge leopard plays with one like a ball, then
it is somewhat thrilling, I grant, but to-day! Fill the cups, and let
us drink to the health of the Governor, and pour out a libation to the
gods in token of gratitude that it has been given to us to crush out
another at least of these reptiles.”
“Nay, now,” said a young man, “you forget the executioner.”
“Aye, so I did, that was a fine addition to the scene. I could laugh
now to think of it!”
Severus saw that his little daughter was following every word that was
said with extreme earnestness, and that Ebba, who was standing with a
scent-bottle and a large fan close to her mistress, was scanning the
face of the last speaker eagerly.
“Bid the musicians strike up,” Severus said; “our talk is scarcely
pleasant for ladies to hear. And then, when we have had a good stirring
melody, my little daughter shall sing us a good-night strain on her
lute. Eh, my pretty one?”
“Father, I pray you to excuse me to-night,” Hyacintha said; “I am
weary, and I have no heart to sing.”
She stepped down from her place on her mother’s couch, and with a
curtsey, and graceful wave of her hand to the guests at the table,
disappeared.
CHAPTER II.
NIGHT.
Although Casca and Hyacintha were their parents’ only children, there
were no very intimate relations existing between them.
Casca was almost entirely at the schools, where he was preparing for
active service, and receiving such training as was deemed needful for
a young Roman. His father was disappointed that his only boy should
be pale and delicate, that his arms should not be muscular, and that
he was always at fault in any game, or trial of strength. Severus did
his best to harden his only son, and it was with that idea that he had
taken him with him that morning to see the execution of Alban.
Severus was in attendance on the Governor, and, shrinking and
frightened, the boy stood by his father’s side, hiding his face in his
short toga, when the martyr was scourged till the ground was moistened
with his blood. Judge and Governor alike were pitiless, and, believing
they were performing an act of service to their gods by crushing out
the confessors of the Christian faith in Verulam, they were determined
to make the whole scene as impressive as possible.
Alban was no common man: it was necessary that his execution should be
conducted in no ordinary fashion.
He had lived in one of the finest villas in the city, he was a learned
scholar, and had unquestioned taste in the fine arts which the Romans
were introducing into Britain.
Although born at Verulam, Alban had, in his youth, travelled to
Rome, and when he returned had been looked upon with veneration and
respect. Although a Pagan, and scrupulous in his attendance on all high
ceremonies in the temple of the gods, Alban had always been charitable
and compassionate, and the poor found in him a friend.
Thus, full of kindness, when the Emperor’s edict published against the
Christians at Rome and in all Roman provinces was issued, Alban opened
his house to a man who was fleeing from his persecutors, and a minister
of the religion of Christ. This was the turning-point of Alban’s life;
this was the first step to the martyrdom which he had suffered gladly
on this summer day for the faith of Christ crucified.
It is hard for us to realise, or grasp as facts, the terrible
persecutions of those distant times.
Perhaps nothing is a stronger testimony to the Christian faith than
that the more it was attacked, and the fiercer the persecution of its
disciples, the more it grew and strengthened.
It has been so in all times; it will be so in all future ages, “for
the Lord remaineth a King for ever.”
Hyacintha went to find her brother. The child’s head was filled with a
strange yearning curiosity to know all particulars of what had passed.
She went up the marble staircase once more, and again looked out from
the balcony over the city and the country.
The western sky was still aglow, and the outline of the hill was marked
against it in purple lines. The river caught a reflection from a
crescent moon which hung above it, and rippled in the silvery light.
The country beyond the city was asleep, but the city, which had been so
quiet in the morning, was now astir. The buzz and murmur of voices rose
on the still air, and slaves were seen conducting Roman citizens of
note to their homes. Torches were lighted, silver lamps burning in the
“Halls,” while strains of music and the voices of singing girls were
borne on the breath of the evening air.
But Hyacintha did not stay on the balcony long; she turned from it to
a room on the opposite side of the square opening, where she knew she
should find her brother.
She went softly round to the doorway, and gently clapped her hands.
“Enter!” was said in a low voice; “is that you, Claudius?”
“No, Casca, it is only Hyacintha;” and Hyacintha pushed back the
curtain and stood half shyly by her brother’s side.
He had thrown himself down on a couch, his hands folded behind his
head, and his whole attitude one of extreme weariness.
“What do you want, Hyacintha?”
“I want news,” she replied; “tell me what you have seen to-day. Do tell
me all the truth about the death of the evil man.”
Casca sprang up.
“Hush! Do not speak of that you know not, child. Evil, forsooth! he was
good, not evil.”
“That is what I want to be sure of. Be kind, brother, be kind, and tell
me the story.”
But Casca sank back again upon his cushion, and said--
“Not to-night. I shall never sleep if I rehearse it. I could not go
over it again. Who are below?” he asked, as the sounds of music and
singing came from the atrium.
“A few guests, some that my father brought home; no ladies but my
mother.”
“Is not Junia there, the sister of Claudius?”
“No, unless she has arrived since I left the banqueting-hall. I would
not stay, though father prayed me to sing to the lute. I could not
stay, because I wanted to find thee.”
“Dear little sister,” Casca said, “I would not be rough to thee.”
“Thou art never rough, brother,” was the answer, “and I love thee
dearly. I only wish I knew more of thy secrets. May I stay with thee?”
“Yes, draw that stool to the window, and pull the curtain aside. I like
to see the sky and the stars.”
Hyacintha obeyed, and waited for what her brother would say next; he
was contemplating the graceful outline of her head against the sky, as,
with her elbow on the deep stone ledge of the window, her cheek resting
upon her hand, she made a study any artist might long to put on canvas.
Hyacintha waited patiently for her brother to speak, and at last he
broke the silence, though not in the way she expected.
“I am a bitter disappointment to our father, Hyacintha, a poor, puny
weakling like me; there are times when I long for death, to be free of
this life. It may be that the gods would be merciful to me and give me
the strength hereafter I lack here. But to-day, when I saw death, I
shuddered and swooned. I am a wretched coward, with no power to live,
and no power to die.”
Hyacintha’s eyes filled with tears. What comfort had a heathen to offer
in all these exigencies of life and death? What could Hyacintha say
to throw any light or hope over her brother’s darkness? Though but
a child, she had heard much, from the grown-up people with whom she
associated, of the world, and the pleasures of dance and song, and
the games and all the luxuries and refinements of life, which were
supposed to be a cure for heart-aches and trials. But Ebba had talked
of feeding the hungry, nursing the sick, and clothing the naked, as a
way to be happy. She said this man, Alban, had done these things, and
that there was always a light on his face which was not shed there by
any of the pleasures in which others indulged. Poor Hyacintha’s mind
was all confused and bewildered; she almost wished she could be gay and
careless like Junia, whose voice, singing a familiar song, now sounded
from the atrium.
She began dimly to grasp the fact that something was wanted to make
life different from the life her mother led, and many ladies, who
frequented the atrium and lay on the luxurious couches there, and toyed
with their bracelets and ornaments.
“I will pray my father,” Hyacintha thought “that I may go to Rome, and
be trained for a priestess, in the temple of Vesta. Yes, I will pray
him that I may do this, then I shall be happier far, for it will be
doing something grand and noble.”
Her meditations were a second time broken in upon by her brother’s
voice.
“Hark! I think I hear Claudius’s footstep. Yes; run, Hyacintha, and
admit him.”
But Claudius did not wait to be admitted. He came springing in with a
light step, and a cheery voice, a voice that had laughter in it, like
the ripple of a brook hidden amongst moss and stones.
“So, here you are, hiding and moping! Wherefore such dolorous looks,
young Casca? I am in the highest spirits. What think you? I am chosen
for the race to-morrow, and I will win, too. Your pardon, fair
Hyacintha. I did not perceive you in the shadow of the curtain. What
ails you, Casca?”
“Weariness of myself and life, that is all,” the boy said; “you are in
its full zest and enjoyment, while I----”
“Pish! what folly! The best time is coming. Why, as soon as you wear
the toga virilis you will feel the man. Were you on the hill to-day?”
“Yes, I was _forced_ to be there by my father.”
“Forced! Well, it was a fine spectacle; though to say the truth,
there’s many a worse fellow than Alban about the city. Those sly
Christians are doing secretly here in Verulam what Alban did openly,
there’s the difference. They may be unearthed any day, and the sooner
the better.”
“I do not know the whole story,” Hyacintha said. “I pray you, Claudius,
tell it to me. If I ask my father he puts me off; and my mother says it
is only that some wicked men should be got rid of. And Ebba is full of
mystery, and sighs and mutters, but will not speak.”
“I will speak, if so it pleases you, little Hyacintha,” said Claudius,
“and tell what there is to be told, always providing that I agree with
your lady mother, the sooner the reptiles are crushed out the better.”
“You will find a draught in yonder cup,” Casca said, raising himself
lazily on one arm; “that will refresh you before you begin.” Claudius
soon trained the contents of the cup, and then replenished it from a
flagon which stood by it.
“Aye, that is like nectar,” he said. Then he threw his large muscular
limbs upon some cushions piled up in a corner near the window, where
Hyacintha sat, her figure a little bent forward, and her eyes fastened
upon the boy, as he began his tale.
“Only a few months ago, Alban was one of the most devoted worshippers
in the temple of Apollo. He spent large sums on sacrifices, and if
he poured out a libation, it was of the purest wine. There was no
stint with him, as you know, or ought to know. A man who professed to
teach and preach this new superstition was fleeing from his pursuers.
Walking along Watling Street, Alban, noticing his breathless condition,
inquired what ailed him. He said the Governor’s minions were upon him.
Alban, struck with the man’s agony, hastily conducted him to his house,
and harboured him there in secret.
“It is said that the miserable fugitive prayed night and day to his
God, asking for help, and also that Alban should be turned from the old
faith to believe these lies.”
“Are you--is any one--sure they _are_ lies?” Casca asked.
“Look you, Casca,” said Claudius, “it is not for any one here to ask
that question. Suffice it, that they are lies, base lies.”
Casca sighed heavily, and Claudius continued--
“The fugitive, whose name was Amphibalus, at last succeeded in his base
designs. Alban, whom every one respected and honoured here, professed
himself a Christian, and then the scene changed. So well had Alban
hidden this fellow, that it was not for many days that suspicion was
directed to his house. When at least it was searched, he, the stranger,
had fled. Alban had give him one of his best robes, and wearing that,
he escaped suspicion, and passed through the gates. But Alban himself,
clothed in the Caracalla, which is the robe the fellow wore, was now
under suspicion. ‘You will suffer in his stead, unless you at once
sacrifice to the images of the gods,’ the judge said.”
“To tell the truth,” said Claudius, “there was something noble in the
fellow, for no tortures could make him give in. Hush! what is that?”
A low voice was heard to say--
“Greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down his life for his
friends.”
“It is Ebba’s voice,” Hyacintha exclaimed, and running towards the
door, she found Ebba standing there.
“It is Ebba,” Hyacintha repeated. “Permit her to enter and hear the
story to the end.” Casca nodded his head by way of assent, and Ebba,
leaning against the wall over which a curtain hung, listened intently
while Claudius finished his story.
“No tortures,” he continued, “would make the fellow give in. The
scourge ploughed his back pretty well. He had thirty-nine stripes, and
we expected to see him fall down dead.”
“Were you in the hall?” Casca exclaimed.
“Yes, I have seen the whole play played out,” the boy said carelessly.
“The grand climax was to-day, when the executioner threw himself at
Alban’s feet, and begged to die with him, or for him. And then there
was an uproar indeed. A great multitude pressed round Alban, who was
praying and calling upon his God, and crying to Jesus to have mercy,
and turn the hearts of the people to himself.
“The governor and judge, however, made short work. A new executioner,
one of the soldiers, was easily found, and it was not long before the
heads of both Alban and Heraclius were rolling on the turf, and their
blood sprinkled on the flowers. But they say in the city to-night that
there are many who are full of this superstition, and that there will
be many more. Thank the gods I am not one!”
Ebba, who had been standing motionless by the door, murmured something,
which was not distinctly heard, and then vanished.
“I believe Ebba is one of them,” Casca said. “If it is so, it will
bring us all into trouble, and my father ought to know.”
“Well, a truce to the poor wretches. Now,” said Claudius, “let us talk
of other things. Ah! here is Ebba with the light. She will not leave us
in darkness.”
Ebba did not speak, but lighted the two hanging lamps, which cast a
soft radiance on the room, and on those who were in it. The beautiful
childlike face of Hyacintha was brought out from the shadows, and large
tears were seen upon her cheeks.
“Do not tell father, dear brother,” she said, “about Ebba. I pray
you, do not. It might end in her death. And, oh!” exclaimed Hyacintha
passionately, “I do dread death, the darkness whither we must go,
before we reach the Elysian fields.”
“Do not fret, little sister. You are too grave for your tender years;
come, sing to me and Claudius the good-night song you refused to sing
to the guests below.”
“Ah! sing to us, and then I must seek for my sister, and conduct her
home. The guests are leaving the hall, some of them are hilarious
enough.”
As he spoke, loud laughter ascended from the atrium, and the torches
which the attendants and slaves lifted flashed through the street.
There was not much need of their light this evening. The days of our
northern climate were at their longest, and almost before daylight
faded from the west, streaks of dawn brightened the east.
The people of Verulam had gone through a tiring day, and the city was
wrapt earlier than usual in repose.
It was just between midnight and the first hour of the coming day
that a figure, veiled closely, glided across the square, which lay on
one side of the villa Severus, and following the course of the river
crossed it towards the hill, where the great spectacle of the day
before had been witnessed by so many thousands. These were for the most
part sleeping peacefully in Verulam, but some were yet watching on the
spot where the martyrs had shed their blood.
One of them was the priest whose life Alban had saved at the expense
of his own, and as the dark-veiled figure crept up the hill-side he
advanced to meet it.
“Is it thou, my daughter, Ebba, the slave of the Roman house?”
“Yes, father, and I would fain follow thee. I am not afraid now. I will
confess Christ before men. If I am to die, He will be with me, and I
cannot--I dare not--tarry any longer. Baptise me; I am ready.”
“Art thou sure thou art in truth ready to leave all for Christ, to dare
to confess thy faith?”
The girl’s lips faltered, and she said--
“I would fain remain with my mistress if it were possible. I love her
little daughter so well.”
“Ah! I see, thou art _not_ ready to leave all for Christ. There must
be no halting between two opinions. My daughter, he who was done to a
cruel death on this spot to-day, and whose blessed body we have buried
here in silence and darkness, did not halt. Never can I forget the
decision he showed. In the very hour that he believed, he confessed,
and gave up all. Think what a renunciation it was: his fine house,
whither the noblest and the most learned scholars amongst the Romans
resorted; the honour paid him when he went to the temple to sacrifice
to the false gods; the respect also felt for his gifts and talents. Yet
he never faltered, and when the great trial-hour came he sent me forth
in his robe, with a face as glad as if, when he arrayed himself in my
Caracalla,[A] he had donned his wedding garment.
“That robe was the signal for his death. He did not fear to die for
Christ, and he stood before the Governor, so those tell me who saw
him, with a face shining like that of an angel. I have been in hiding
near by, and have remained under cover of the darkness, to make known
to the faithful whither I am gone, that they may perchance follow me,
and in the fastnesses of Wales, we may add daily to our number such as
shall be saved. Say, Ebba, wilt thou follow? See, there are signs of
dawn in the east. I may not tarry. That group yonder seen in dark, dim,
outline, is composed of those who are following me to a meeting-place I
have indicated. Wilt thou join thyself to them?”
The poor British slave bowed her head, and clasping her hands, said, “I
will follow thee.”
Then the priest led her to a spring, and baptised the heathen Ebba by
the name “Anna.”
The morning star was shining brightly, and the summer dawn breaking
over the hills, when, by the grave of the two martyrs, the cross was
signed upon the forehead of the British slave.
The ceremony was performed in haste, and then the little band
dispersed, to escape observation, some in one direction, some in
another, but all to meet in a thick wood, near a place called Radburn,
three miles distant from the city of Verulam.
Ebba, or Anna, as we must now call her, was committed to the care of
a recent convert, named Agatha, who had concealed a little band of
Christians in her house in the city, and who was an aunt to the soldier
who had thrown away his sword and died rather than execute the savage
commands of the Governor and Judge. There was no time for many words.
Agatha kissed Anna on the forehead and said--
“I welcome thee, my daughter, to the inheritance of the saints, be it
death or be it life.” And then in silence the two women pursued their
way through the flower-scented meadow-land, and reached the shelter of
the tangled wood at Radburn before the sun rose.
A cave in this wood, the mouth of which was covered with brushwood, was
the appointed meeting-place. Here Amphibalus the priest had been hiding
since Alban had permitted him to escape. And here, worn out with the
events of the previous day, on beds made of dry leaves and heather,
Anna lay down with her new friend to rest.
The cave was of some extent, and had several divisions. A fissure in
the rock above lighted the inner part, which was allotted to the women.
Even in summer it was a cold habitation, and only when the sun was high
in the heavens could any warmth and cheerfulness penetrate it. As Anna
lay gazing up into the roof, she could see the blue sky far above her
through the interlacing boughs of brambles, and low-growing maples
which grew over the opening.
The thrushes were singing their morning song, and there was innumerable
chirping of newly-fledged birds, while the lowing of distant cattle and
the nearer humming of bees, kept up a continuous low murmur.
Poor Anna could not sleep; she was thinking over the life in the Roman
villa, of all the little offices it would soon be time to perform for
her mistress and for Hyacintha. She knew full well that she would be
missed before long, and perhaps pursued and found. That punishment, if
not death, was the doom of the escaped slave, she knew well. The band,
the badge of that slavery, was still on her arm, and could only be
taken off by the hand of a smith. It would betray her as the runaway
slave of the noble Severus, though the cross, the sign of her new
faith, was invisible to all eyes but the angels.
Anna’s was not a strong, heroic soul; she was, as she had told her
little mistress, a coward. “Yet He giveth strength to the _weak_” was
a promise to be fulfilled in her case, as in that of the thousands who
have learned to “count all things but loss for the love of Christ.”
Agatha was of a very different nature. She was sleeping as soundly and
quietly as a child, while her young companion tossed and turned with
wide-open eyes and restless limbs till noonday was near. The outer
caves were getting full, and the whispers of the fugitives awoke Agatha.
“Have you slept, my daughter?” she said.
“Nay, I cannot sleep. I do not feel any peace, though I would not go
back if I could.” Then she added hastily, and in a weak, low voice, “I
am hungry.”
Agatha smiled.
“Ah!” she said, “hunger and weariness are a part of the cross we must
bear after Christ; but thou art young, my child, and I will see whether
I can find thee some food. We have had but scant measure here.”
Agatha disappeared within the outer cave, and presently returned,
beckoning Anna to follow her.
Awe-struck, the girl obeyed, and there, in the outer cave, a little
congregation was gathered round Amphibalus, who was kneeling at a rude
table formed by a fragment of rock which blocked up the entrance to the
cavern.
At a sign from Agatha, Anna knelt with the rest, and then Amphibalus
rising, turned to the people, and bade them draw near and receive the
sign of the love of the Crucified One, the bread and the wine which
He had commanded. In a few short words, he rehearsed the story of the
Cross to those poor trembling converts who at any moment might be
discovered and dragged off to a cruel death. He told of the life which
now is, and that hope of the life to come, as the blessed experience of
the Christian, and his anchor. For life here without Him is darkness,
and life there without Him is a dread void. What did stripes and
persecution weigh in the balance, when the future exceeding glory and
joy were on the other side! Then he went on to speak of Alban, and the
soldier who died with him, rather than live without him, and to bid all
those present to encourage each other in steadfastness and courage.
The Communion was then celebrated; the water from a neighbouring
spring, being coloured with wine which Amphibalus had preserved in
a small leathern flask in a secret pocket of his robe, filled the
rude cup which was offered to the little band, and small fragments of
wheaten bread were eaten.
The command thus obeyed in all simplicity of faith brought its blessing
with it. Surely the strengthening and refreshing of these fugitives
were a great reality, and poor Anna, rising from her knees with a smile
on her lips, whispered--
“I will feed on Thee in my heart, O Saviour, and I shall know neither
hunger nor thirst.”
There was need of faith, for the bodies of the little band were nearly
exhausted before food came. It was not till darkness covered the face
of the country that a messenger was sent to Radburn to buy bread. He
returned about midnight, with loaves concealed in his clothes, and a
pewter flagon or cup, that could be filled from the spring, and was
handed round.
When the bread was divided every one of the fainting converts received
the right share, and then Amphibalus prayed for a blessing, and that
this food might support the bodies of those who partook of it till more
bountiful provision was vouchsafed.
A consultation was held as to the future, and it was decided that the
small band should remain in hiding in the cave to await the coming in
of any more fugitives from the city.
Agatha, who was a strong and active woman, busied herself in making the
three caves more habitable, by heaping up the heather and dried leaves
for beds, and plaiting some of it into small baskets, which might be
useful for exchanging for food whenever there was any obtainable in
their wanderings.
Wales was the probable destination of the little community, where it
was hoped they might find employment as keepers of pigs and cattle,
and in the fastnesses of that district make converts from the scanty
population, and by degrees found a church there.
Agatha’s cheerful, bright spirit infected Anna, and she began to take
heart, and as the Gospel story was told her by her friend her soul
expanded under its influence, and she only longed that her dear little
mistress could have the same good news, and bitterly repented that
through fear and terror of the consequences she had kept silence, and
that she had not answered many earnest questions that the child had
asked her.
It was too late now.
CHAPTER III.
THE MISSING SLAVE.
There was a good deal of consternation in the household of the noble
Severus when Ebba’s flight was discovered.
An ominous frown upon Severus’s brow, as he entered his wife’s chamber,
showed that a storm was brewing.
His lady had just had her morning bath, and was crying in a very
undignified way for Ebba, declaring that the attendant, who was doing
her best to supply her place, scorched her head with the crimping iron;
that no one could plait her hair as Ebba did; that no one could twist
into it the gold threads, or place the plait in the right position, but
Ebba.
“Silence!” exclaimed Severus; “what mean you, to chide and wail like
a weakling infant? Begone, all of you,” he said, clapping his hands;
“begone, slaves, nor return till I bid you.”
The attendants, frightened by their master’s threatening air, took
flight like a flock of pigeons, and only Hyacintha remained.
“Didst hear my order, child?”
But Hyacintha, whose eyes were swollen with weeping, said--
“Father, do not send me hence, I pray you.”
Severus seldom said a harsh word to his little daughter, and it was not
often that she witnessed his outbursts of passion.
He offered no opposition when Hyacintha nestled closer to her mother on
the couch, merely saying--
“Then hold your peace if you stay, nor make a single objection to what
I have to say. This slave, Ebba, has, it seems, been in league with
the poor reptiles whom, by order of the Emperor, we are to do our
best to crush out of this land. By the gods! it is no pleasant thing
for me to have cold and scornful looks turned on me in the Governor’s
hall to-day; to be suspected as the master of a household of these
creatures. ‘Forsooth,’ one said in my ear, ‘the runaway slave is not
the only tainted one in thy house.’ I swear by the gods, that if he
referred to my own son, I will not spare him, no, I will deliver him
up.”
Hyacintha, who buried her face in her mother’s mantle, gave a low cry
of terror.
“Peace, child,” said her father; “I do not know if Casca is infected,
but I will take care to stop the infection if it be so. I have set a
price on Ebba’s head, and do not doubt I shall scent her out; but it
is of this daughter of ours I wish to speak. I propose to send her to
Rome without delay, to begin her training under our kinswoman, Terentia
Rufilla. It is time--high time--and I shall proceed at once.”
Cæcilia was not a mother to be too much concerned about her child’s
future. The loss of Ebba, which entailed personal inconvenience,
really distressed her more than this proposed separation from her only
daughter. Hyacintha had for some time heard a rumour that this office
in the temple of the goddess Vesta was to be her appointed lot. As,
in later times, the daughters of noble families were consigned to
the convent, and given no choice in the matter by their parents, but
compelled to take the veil, so, in the era of which I write, there
was no question as to the propriety of devoting them to the service
of Vesta, which was considered the most honourable of all services
connected with the temples of the gods.
There were often difficulties in the way, as many requirements had
to be satisfied before a candidate for the office was accepted, but
Hyacintha could fulfil these. She was of noble birth, and fair to look
upon; her disposition was gentle, and her temper sweet. She had never
rebelled against her parents’ wishes in her short life, and she was
not likely to do so now. Indeed, of late she had been herself looking
forward to the temple service; child as she was, she hungered for
service, to do some great and noble deed, and know some higher life
than that which the ladies about her led, of fe
|
possess a father
like yourself, a father who has never restricted his son's freedom of
action."
At first Arkady's voice had trembled a little, since not only did he
feel that he was doing the "magnanimous," but also he knew that he
was delivering something like a "lecture" to his father; but such an
effect does the sound of his own voice exercise upon a human being that
towards the end Arkady pronounced his words firmly, and even with a
certain degree of _empressement_.
"I thank you, Arkady," Nikolai Petrovitch said faintly as his fingers
began their customary perambulation of his forehead. "Nor is your
conjecture mistaken, for if this girl had not deserved the invitation,
I should not, of course, have--in other words, as you imply, this is no
frivolous whim on my part. Nor need I have spoken of the matter, were
it not that I desired you to understand that she might possibly have
felt embarrassed at meeting you on the very day after your arrival."
"Then let _me_ go and meet _her_," exclaimed Arkady with another access
of "magnanimity" as he sprang from his chair. "Yes, let _me_ go and
explain to her why she need not shun me."
Nikolai Petrovitch also rose.
"Arkady," he began, "pray do me a favour. Hitherto I had not warned you
that----"
But, without listening to him, Arkady darted from the terrace. For
a moment or two Nikolai Petrovitch gazed after him--then, overcome
with confusion, relapsed into a chair. His heart was beating rapidly.
Whether or not he was picturing to himself a strangeness of future
relations with his son; whether he was imagining that, had his son
refrained from interfering, the latter might have paid him more respect
in future; whether he was reproaching himself for his own weakness--it
is difficult to say what his thoughts were. Probably in them there was
a combination of the feelings just indicated, if only in the form of
apprehensions. Yet those apprehensions cannot have been deeply rooted,
as was proved by the fact that, for all the beating of his heart, the
colour had not left his face.
Soon hasty footsteps were heard approaching, and Arkady reappeared on
the terrace.
"I have made her acquaintance!" he shouted with a kindly,
good-humoured, triumphant expression. "That Theodosia Nikolaievna is
not well to-day is a fact; but also it is a fact that she is going to
appear later. And why did you not tell me that I had a little brother?
Otherwise I should have gone and kissed him last night, even as I have
done this moment."
Nikolai Petrovitch tried to say something--to rise and to make an
explanation of some sort; but Arkady cut him short by falling upon his
neck.
"What is this? Again embracing?" said Paul Petrovitch behind them.
As a matter of fact, neither father nor son was ill-pleased to see
him appear, for, however touching such situations may be, one may be
equally glad to escape from them.
"At what are you surprised?" asked Nikolai Petrovitch gaily. "Remember
that I have not seen Arkesha for several centuries--at all events, not
since last night!"
"Oh, I am not surprised," said Paul Petrovitch. "On the contrary, I
should not mind embracing him myself."
And Arkady, on approaching his uncle, felt once more upon his cheek the
impression of a perfumed moustache. Paul Petrovitch then sat down to
table. Clad in an elegant morning suit of English cut, he was flaunting
on his head a diminutive fez which helped the carelessly folded tie to
symbolise the freedom of a country life. At the same time, the stiff
collar of the shirt (which was striped, not white, as best befitted
a matutinal toilet) supported with its usual rigour an immaculately
shaven chin.
"Well, Arkady?" said he. "Where is your new friend?"
"Out somewhere. He seldom misses going for an early morning walk.
But the great thing is to take no notice of him, for he detests all
ceremony."
"So I have perceived." And with his usual deliberateness Paul
Petrovitch began to butter a piece of bread. "Will he be staying here
very long?"
"Well, as long as he may care to stay. As a matter of fact, he is going
on to his father's place."
"And where does his father live?"
"Some eighty versts from here, in the same province as ourselves. I
believe he has a small property, and used to be an army doctor."
"H'm! Ever since last night I have been asking myself where I can have
heard the name before. Nikolai, do you remember whether there was a
doctor of that name in our father's division?"
"Yes, there used to be."
"Then that doctor will be this fellow's father. H'm!" And Paul
Petrovitch twitched his moustache. "What exactly is your Bazarov?" he
enquired of Arkady.
"What _is_ he?" Arkady repeated smiling. "Do you really want me to tell
you what he is, Uncle?"
"If you please, my nephew."
"He is a Nihilist."
"A what?" exclaimed Nikolai Petrovitch, while even Paul Petrovitch
paused in the act of raising a knife to the edge of which there was a
morsel of butter adhering.
"A Nihilist," repeated Arkady.
"A Nihilist?" queried Nikolai Petrovitch. "I imagine that that must
be a term derived from the Latin _nihil_ or 'nothing.' It denotes,
I presume, a man who--a man who--well, a man who declines to accept
_anything_."
"Or a man who declines to _respect_ anything," hazarded Paul Petrovitch
as he re-applied himself to the butter.
"No, a man who treats things solely from the critical point of view,"
corrected Arkady.
"But the two things are one and the same, are they not?" queried Paul
Petrovitch.
"Oh no. A Nihilist is a man who declines to bow to authority, or to
accept any principle on trust, however sanctified it may be."
"And to what can that lead?" asked Paul Petrovitch.
"It depends upon the individual. In one man's case, it may lead to
good; in that of another, to evil."
"I see. But we elders view things differently. We folk of the
older generation believe that without principles" (Paul Petrovitch
pronounced the word softly, and with a French accent, whereas Arkady
had pronounced it with an emphasis on the leading syllable)--"without
principles it is impossible to take a single step in life, or to draw a
single breath. _Mais vous avez changé tout cela._ God send you health
and a general's rank, Messieurs Nihil--how do you pronounce it?"
"Ni-hi-lists," said Arkady distinctly.
"Quite so (formerly we had Hegelists, and now they have become
Nihilists)--God send you health and a general's rank, but also let us
see how you will contrive to exist in an absolute void, an airless
vacuum. Pray ring the bell, brother Nikolai, for it is time for me to
take my cocoa."
Nikolai Petrovitch did as requested, and also shouted for Duniasha;
but, instead of the latter, there issued on to the terrace Thenichka
in person. A young woman of twenty-three, she was pale, and
gentle-looking, with dark eyes and hair, a pair of childishly red,
pouting lips, and delicate hands. Also, she was clad in a clean
cotton gown, a new blue kerchief was thrown lightly over her rounded
shoulders, and she was carrying in front of her a large cup of cocoa.
Shyly she placed the latter before Paul Petrovitch, while a warm, rosy
current of blood suffused the exquisite skin of her comely face, and
then she remained standing by the table, with lowered eyes and the
tips of her fingers touching its surface. Yet, though she looked as
though she were regretting having come, she looked as though she felt
that she had a right to be there.
Paul Petrovitch frowned, and Nikolai Petrovitch looked confused.
"Good morning, Thenichka," the latter muttered.
"Good morning," she replied in a low, clear voice. Then she glanced
askance at Arkady, and he smiled at her in friendly fashion. Finally
she departed with a quiet step and slightly careless gait--the latter a
peculiarity of hers.
Silence reigned on the terrace. For a while Paul Petrovitch drank his
cocoa. Then he suddenly raised his head, and muttered:
"Monsieur Nihilist is about to give us the pleasure of his company."
True enough, Bazarov could be seen stepping across the flowerbeds. On
his linen jacket and trousers was a thick coating of mud, to the crown
of his ancient circular hat clung a piece of sticky marshweed, and in
his hand he was holding a small bag. Also, something in the bag kept
stirring as though it were alive. Approaching the terrace with rapid
strides, he nodded to the company and said:
"Good morning, gentlemen! Pardon me for being so late. I shall be back
presently, but first my captures must be stowed away."
"What are those captures?" Paul Petrovitch inquired. "Leeches?"
"No, frogs."
"Do you eat them? Or do you breed them?"
"I catch them for purposes of experiment," was Bazarov's only reply as
carelessly he entered the house.
"In other words, he vivisects them," was Paul Petrovitch's comment. "In
other words, he believes in frogs more than in principles."
Arkady threw his uncle a reproachful look, and even Nikolai Petrovitch
shrugged his shoulders, so that Paul Petrovitch himself felt his _bon
mot_ to have been out of place, and hastened to divert the subject to
the estate and the new steward.
VI
Bazarov, returning, seated himself at the table, and fell to drinking
tea. The brothers contemplated him in silence. Arkady glanced covertly
from his father to his uncle, and back again.
"Have you walked far this morning?" at length Nikolai Petrovitch
inquired.
"To a marsh beside an aspen coppice. By the way, Arkady, I flushed five
head of woodcock. Perhaps you would like to go and shoot them?"
"Then you yourself are no sportsman?"
"No."
"That is to say, you prefer physics to anything else?" This from Paul
Petrovitch.
"Yes, I prefer physics--in fact, the natural sciences in general--to
anything else."
"Well, I am told that the _Germanics_ have made great strides in that
department?" (Paul Petrovitch used the term "Germanics" instead of
"Germans" ironically, but no one noticed it.)
"True," was Bazarov's careless reply. "In fact, the Germans are, in the
same respect, our masters."
"You think highly of the Germans?" Paul Petrovitch's tone was now
studiously polite, for he was beginning to feel irritated with the
man--his aristocratic nature could not altogether stomach Bazarov's
absolute lack of ceremony, the fact that this doctor's son not only
knew no diffidence, but actually returned snappish and reluctant
answers, and infused a _brusquerie_ akin to rudeness into his tone.
"At least the savants of that part of the world have some energy in
them," retorted Bazarov.
"Quite so. And your opinion of our Russian savants is--well, perhaps
less flattering?"
"It is, with your leave."
"That constitutes a piece of laudable modesty on your part," Paul
Petrovitch observed with a slight hitch of his figure and a toss of his
head. "But how comes it about that Arkady has just told us that you
recognise no authorities whatsoever? Do you not trust authorities?"
"Why should I? Is anything in the world trustworthy? Certainly, should
I be told a fact, I agree with it, but that is all."
"Oh! Then the Germans confine themselves solely to facts?" Paul
Petrovitch's face had now assumed an expression of detachment, as
though he had suddenly become withdrawn to the ultimate heights of the
empyrean.
"No, not all Germans," replied Bazarov with a passing yawn. Clearly
he had no mind to continue the controversy. Meanwhile Paul Petrovitch
glanced at Arkady as much as to say: "Admit that your friend has
beautiful manners!"
"For my own part," he continued, ostentatiously, and with an effort,
"I, a fallible mortal, do _not_ favour the Germans. Of course, I am not
including in that category the _Russo_-Germans, who, as we know, are
birds of passage. Rather, it is the Germans of Germany proper whom I
cannot abide. Once upon a time they used to produce men like Schiller
and like--what's his name?--Goethe: for both of which authors my
brother has a marked predilection. But now the German nation has become
a nation solely of chemists and materialists."
"A good chemist is worth a score of your poets," remarked Bazarov.
"Quite so." Paul Petrovitch hitched his eyebrows a little, as though he
had come near to falling asleep. "Er--I take it then that you decline
to recognise art, but believe only in science?"
"I have told you that I believe in nothing at all. What after all, is
science--that is to say, science in the mass? A science may exist, even
as a trade or a profession may exist; but with regard to science in the
mass, there is no such thing."
"Very good. And, with regard to such other postulates as usually are
granted in human affairs, the attitude which you adopt is negative in
the same degree?"
"What is this?" suddenly countered Bazarov. "Is it an examination in
tenets?"
Paul Petrovitch turned pale, and Nikolai Petrovitch thought it time to
intervene in the dispute.
"Nay, we will debate the subject later," he said. "And then, while
recognising your views, good Evgenii Vasilitch, we will state our own.
Individually speaking, I am delighted that you should be interested in
the natural sciences. For instance, I am told that recently Liebig[1]
has made some surprising discoveries in the matter of the improvement
of soils. Consequently you might be able to help me in my agricultural
labours, and to give me much useful advice."
"Always I shall be at your service, Nikolai Petrovitch," replied
Bazarov. "But what has Liebig to do with us? First the alphabet should
be learnt before we try to read books. We have not even reached the
letter A."
"You are a Nihilist--that is plain enough," reflected Nikolai
Petrovitch; while aloud he added: "Yet allow me to seek your occasional
assistance. Brother Paul, I believe it is time that we interviewed our
steward."
Paul Petrovitch rose from his chair.
"Yes," he said, without looking at any one in particular, "it is indeed
a terrible thing to have lived five years in the country, and to have
stood remote from superior intellects! If one is _ab origine_ a fool,
one becomes so more than ever, seeing that, however much one may try
not to forget what one has learnt, there will dawn upon one, sooner
or later, the revelation that one's knowledge is all rubbish, that
sensible men have ceased to engage in such futilities, and that one has
lagged far behind the times. But, in such a case, what is one to do?
Evidently the younger generation know more than we do."
And, slowly turning on his heel, he moved away as slowly, with Nikolai
Petrovitch following in his wake.
"Does Paul Petrovitch always reside here?" asked Bazarov when the door
had closed upon the pair.
"Yes, he does. But look here, Evgenii. You adopted too sharp a tone
with my uncle. You have offended him."
"What? Am I to fawn upon these rustic aristocrats, even though their
attitude is one purely of conceit and subservience to custom? If such
be Paul Petrovitch's bent, he had better have continued his career in
St. Petersburg. Never mind him, however. Do you know, I have found a
splendid specimen of the water beetle _dytiscus marginatus_. Are you
acquainted with it? I will show it you."
"Did I not promise to tell you his history?" observed Arkady musingly.
"Whose history? The water beetle's?"
"No; my uncle's. At least you will see from it that he is not the man
you take him for, but a man who deserves pity rather than ridicule."
"I am not prepared to dispute it. But how come you to be so devoted to
him?"
"Always one ought to be fair."
"The connection I do not see."
"Then listen."
And Arkady related the story to be found in the following chapter.
[1] Justus Freiherr von Liebig (1803-1873), the great German
chemist--in particular, the founder of agricultural chemistry.
VII
"Like his brother, Paul Petrovitch Kirsanov received his early
education at home, and entered the Imperial Corps of Pages.
Distinguished from boyhood for his good looks, he had, in addition,
a nature of the self-confident, quizzical, amusingly sarcastic type
which never fails to please. As soon, therefore, as he had received
his officer's commission, he began to go everywhere in society, to
set the pace, to amuse himself, to play the rake, and to squander his
money. Yet these things somehow consorted well with his personality,
and women went nearly mad over him, while men called him 'Fate,' and
secretly detested him. Meanwhile he rented a flat with his brother, for
whom, in spite of their dissimilarity, he had a genuine affection. The
dissimilarity in question lay, among other things, in the fact that,
while Nikolai Petrovitch halted, had small, kindly, rather melancholy
features and narrow black eyes, and was of a disposition prone to
reading omnivorously, to bestirring himself but little, and to feeling
nervous when attending social functions, Paul Petrovitch never spent a
single evening at home, but was renowned for his physical dexterity and
daring (he it was who made gymnastics the rage among the gilded youth
of his day), and read, at most, five or six French novels. Indeed, by
the time that he reached his twenty-eighth year Paul had risen to be
a captain, and before him there seemed to lie a brilliant career; but
everything suddenly underwent a change, as shall be related forthwith.
"Among the society of St. Petersburg of that period there was
accustomed to appear, and to disappear, at irregular intervals a
certain Princess R. whose memory survives to this day. Though wedded to
a highly placed and very presentable (albeit slightly stupid) husband,
she had no children, and spent her time between making unexpected
visits abroad and unexpected returns to Russia. In short, she led a
very curious life, and the world in general accounted her a coquette,
in that she devoted herself to every sort of pleasure, and danced at
balls until she could dance no more, and laughed and jested with young
men whom she received before dinner in the half-light of a darkened
drawing-room. Yet, strangely enough, as the night advanced she would
fall to weeping and praying and wringing her hands, and, unable to
rest, would pace her room until break of day, or sit huddled, pale and
cold, over the Psalter. But no sooner would daylight have appeared than
she would once more become a woman of the world, and drive, and laugh,
and chatter, and fling herself upon anything which seemed to offer
any sort of distraction. Also, her power to charm was extraordinary;
for though no one could have called her a beauty (seeing that the one
good feature of her face lay in her eyes--and even then it was not the
small, grey eyes themselves which attracted, but the glance which they
emitted), she had hair of the colour and weight of gold which reached
to her knees. That glance!--it was a glance which could be careless to
the point of daring or meditative to the point of melancholy; a glance
so enigmatical that, even when her tongue was lisping fatuous nonsense,
there gleamed in her aspect something intangible and out of the common.
Finally, she dressed with exquisite taste.
"This woman Paul Petrovitch met at a ball; and at it he danced a
mazurka with her. Yet, though, during the dance, she uttered not a
single word of sense, he straightway fell in love with her, and, being
a man accustomed to conquests, attained his end in this case also.
Yet, strangely enough, the facility of his triumph in no way chilled
him, but led him on to become more and more resolutely, more and more
painfully, attached, and that though she was a woman in whom, even
after she had made the great surrender, there still remained something
as immutably veiled, as radically intangible, as before--something
which no one had yet succeeded in penetrating. What was in that soul
God alone knows. Almost would it seem as though she were subservient
to a mysterious force of which the existence was absolutely unknown
to her, but which sported with her as it willed, and whose whims
her mentality was powerless to control. At all events, her conduct
constituted a series of inconsistencies, and even the few letters which
she wrote to Paul Petrovitch--missives which would undoubtedly have
aroused her husband's suspicions had he seen them--were written to a
man who was practically a stranger to her. And in time her love began
to be succeeded by fits of despondency; she ceased to smile and jest
with the lover whom she had selected, and looked at him, and listened
to his voice, with reluctance. In fact, there were moments--for the
most part, unexpected moments--when this reluctance bordered upon chill
horror, and her face assumed a wild, corpse-like expression, and she
would shut herself up in her bedroom, whence her maid, with ear glued
to the keyhole, would hear issue sounds as of dull, hopeless sobbing.
Paul Petrovitch himself frequently found that, when returning home
after one of these tender interviews, there was naught within his
breast save the bitter, galling sensation which comes of final and
irrevocable failure. 'What more could I want?' he would say to himself
in his bewilderment; yet always he spoke with an aching heart.
"It happened that on one occasion he gave her a ring having a stone
carved in the figure of the Sphinx.
"'What?' she exclaimed. 'Do you offer me the Sphinx?'
"'I do,' he replied. 'The Sphinx is yourself.'
"'I?' she queried with a slow lift of her enigmatical eyes. 'You are
indeed flattering!'
"With the words went the ghost of a smile, while her eyes looked
stranger than ever.
"Even during the time that the Princess loved him things were difficult
for Paul Petrovitch; but when she cooled in her affection for him (as
soon happened) he came near to going out of his mind. Distracted with
jealousy, he allowed her no rest, but followed her to such an extent
that at length, worn out with his persistent overtures, she betook
herself on a tour abroad. Yet even then Paul Petrovitch listened to
neither the prayers of his friends nor the advice of his superior
officers, but, resigning his commission, set out on the Princess's
track. Thus four years were spent in hunting her down, and losing sight
of her again: and though, throughout, he felt ashamed of his conduct,
and disgusted with his lack of spirit, all was of no avail--her image,
the baffling, bewitching, alluring image which ever flitted before
his eyes, had implanted itself too deeply in his breast. At last--it
was at Baden--the pair once more came together; and though it seemed
that never had she loved him as she did now, before a month was over
another rupture had occurred, and, this time, a final one, as, with a
last flicker, the flame died down and went out. True, that the parting
would come he had foreseen; yet still he sought to be friends with her
(as though friendship with such a woman could have been possible!), and
only the fact that she quietly withdrew from Baden, and thenceforth
studiously avoided him, baffled his purpose. Returning to Russia, he
endeavoured to resume his former mode of life: but neither by hook nor
crook could he regain the old rut. As a man with a poisoned system
wanders hither and thither, so did he drive out, and retain all the
customs of a society _habitué_. Nay, he could even have boasted of
two or three new conquests. But no. What he wanted was obtainable
neither through himself nor others, since his whole power of initiative
was gone, and his head gradually growing grey. To sit at his club,
to consume his soul in jaundice and _ennui_, to engage in bachelor
disputes which failed to interest him--such was now become his sole
occupation. And, as we know, it is an occupation which constitutes the
worst of signs. Nor, for that matter, seems he to marriage to have
given a thought.
"Thus ten years elapsed in colourless, fruitless pursuits. Yet Paul
found time pass swiftly, indeed, with amazing swiftness, for nowhere
in the world does it fly as it does in Russia (in prison only is its
passage said to be still swifter); wherefore there came at length a
night when, while dining at his club, he heard that the Princess was
dead--that she had died in Paris in a state bordering upon insanity.
Rising from the table, he fell to pacing the rooms of the club with a
face like that of a corpse, and only at intervals halting to watch the
tables of the card-players; until, his usual time for returning home
having arrived, he departed. Soon after he had reached his flat there
was delivered for him a package containing the ring which he had given
to the Princess. The Sphinx on it was marked with a mark like the sign
of the cross, and enclosed also was a message to say that through the
cross had the enigma become solved.
"These things took place just at the time (early in '48) when Nikolai
Petrovitch had lost his wife, and removed to St. Petersburg; and
since, also, the period of Nikolai's marriage had coincided with the
earlier days of Paul's acquaintance with the Princess, Paul had not
seen his brother since the day when the latter had settled in the
country. True, on returning from abroad, Paul had paid Nikolai a visit
with the intention of staying with him for a couple of months, as a
congratulatory compliment on his happiness; but the visit had lasted
a week only, since the difference in the position of the two brothers
had been too great, and even now, though that difference had diminished
somewhat, owing to the fact that Nikolai Petrovitch had lost his wife,
and Paul Petrovitch his memories (after the Princess's death he made
it his rule to try and forget her)--even now, I say, there existed the
difference that, whereas Nikolai Petrovitch could look back upon a
life well spent, and had a son rising to manhood, Paul Petrovitch was
still a lonely bachelor, and, moreover, entering upon that dim, murky
period when regrets come to resemble hopes, and hopes are beginning to
resemble regrets, and youth is fled, and old age is fast approaching.
To Paul Petrovitch that period was particularly painful, in that, in
losing his past, he had lost his all.
"'I shall not invite you to come to Marino,' were Nikolai Petrovitch's
words to his brother. 'Even when my wife was alive, you found the place
tedious; and now it would kill you.'
"'Ah, but in those days I was young and foolish and full of vanity,'
replied Paul Petrovitch. 'Even though I may not have grown wiser, at
least am I quieter. So, if you should be willing, I will gladly come
and make your place my permanent home.'
"For answer Nikolai Petrovitch embraced him; and though a year and a
half elapsed before Paul Petrovitch decided to carry out his intention,
once settled on the estate, he has never left it--no, not even during
the three winters spent by Nikolai Petrovitch with his son in St.
Petersburg. Meanwhile he has taken to reading books--more especially
English books, and, in general, to ordering his life on the English
pattern. Rarely, also, does he call upon his neighbours, but confines
his excursions, for the most part, to attending election meetings,
where, as a rule, he holds his tongue, but occasionally amuses himself
by angering and alarming the older generation of landowners with
Liberal sallies. From the representatives of the younger generation he
holds entirely aloof. Yet both parties, though they reckon him haughty,
accord him respect. They do so because of his refined, aristocratic
manners, and of what they have heard concerning his former conquests,
and of the fact that he dresses with exquisite taste, that he always
occupies the best suites in the best hotels, that he dines sumptuously
every day, that once he took dinner with the Duke of Wellington at the
Court of Louis Philippe, that invariably he takes about with him a
silver _nécessaire_ and a travelling bath, that he diffuses rare and
agreeable perfumes, that he is a first-rate and universally successful
whist-player, and that his honour is irreproachable. The ladies too
look upon him as a man of charming melancholy: but with their sex he
has long ceased to have anything to do.
"You see, then, Evgenii," wound up Arkady, "that you have judged my
uncle very unfairly. Moreover, I have omitted to say that several times
he has saved my father from ruin by making over to him the whole of
his money (for they do not share the estate), and that he is always
ready to help any one, and, in particular, that he stands up stoutly
for the peasants, even though, when speaking to them, he pulls a wry
face, and, before beginning the interview, scents himself well with
eau-de-Cologne."
"We all know what nerves like his mean," remarked Bazarov.
"Perhaps so. Yet his heart is in the right place; nor is he in any
way a fool. To myself especially has he given much useful advice,
especially on the subject of women."
"Ah, ha! 'Scalded with milk, one blows to cool another's water.' That
is a truism."
"Finally, and to put matters shortly," resumed Arkady, "he is a man
desperately unhappy, not one who ought to be despised."
"_Who_ is despising him?" exclaimed Bazarov. "All that I say is that a
man who has staked his whole upon a woman's love, and, on losing the
throw, has turned crusty, and let himself drift to such an extent as
to become good for nothing--I say that such a man is not a man, a male
creature at all. He is unhappy, you say; and certainly you know him
better than I do; but it is clear also that he has not yet cleansed
himself of the fool. In other words, certain am I that, just because he
occasionally reads _Galignani_, and because, once a month, he saves a
peasant from distress for debt, he believes himself really to be a man
of action."
"But think of his upbringing!" expostulated Arkady. "Think of the
period in which he has lived his life!"
"His upbringing?" retorted Bazarov. "Why, a man ought to _bring
himself_ up, even as I had to do. And with regard to his period,
why should I, or any other man, be dependent upon periods? Rather,
we ought to make periods dependent upon _us_. No, no, friend!
Sensuality and frivolity it is that are at fault. For of what do the
so-called mysterious relations between a man and a woman consist? As
physiologists, we know precisely of what they consist. And take the
anatomy of the eye. What in it justifies the guesswork whereof you
speak? Such talk is so much Romanticism and nonsense and unsoundness
and artificiality. Let us go and inspect that beetle."
And the two friends departed to Bazarov's room, where he had already
succeeded in creating a medical-surgical atmosphere which consorted
well with the smell of cheap tobacco.
VIII
At his brother's interview with the steward (the latter was a tall,
thin man of shifty eyes who to every remark of Nikolai's replied in
an unctuous, mellifluous voice: "Very well, if so it please you")
Paul Petrovitch did not long remain present. Recently the system of
estate-management had been reorganised on a new footing, and was
creaking as loudly as an ungreased cartwheel or furniture which has
been fashioned of unseasoned wood. For the same reason, though never
actually giving way to melancholy, Nikolai Petrovitch often indulged
in moodiness and sighing, for the reason that it was clear that his
affairs would never prosper without money, and that the bulk of the
latter had disappeared. As for Arkady's statement that frequently Paul
Petrovitch had come to his brother's assistance, it had been perfectly
true, for on more than one occasion had Paul been moved by the sight of
his brother's perplexity to walk slowly to the window, to plunge a hand
into his pocket, to mutter, "_Mais je puis vous donner de l'argent_,"
and, lastly, to suit the action to the word. But on the day of which
we are speaking Paul had no spare cash himself; wherefore he preferred
to remove himself elsewhere, and the more so in that the _minutiæ_ of
estate-management wearied him, and that he felt certain that, though
powerless to suggest a better way of doing business than the present
one, he knew at least that Nikolai's was at fault.
"He is not sufficiently practical," would be his reflection. "He lets
these fellows cheat him right and left."
On the other hand, Nikolai had a high opinion of Paul's practicality,
and always sought his advice.
"I am a weak, easy-going fellow," he would say, "and have spent the
whole of my life in retirement; whereas you cannot have lived in the
world for nothing--you know it well, and have the eye of an eagle."
To this Paul Petrovitch would make no reply: he would merely turn away
without attempting to undeceive his brother.
After leaving Nikolai Petrovitch's study, Paul traversed the corridor
which separated the front portion of the house from the rear, and, on
reaching a low doorway, halted in seeming indecision, tugged at his
moustache for a moment, then tapped with his knuckles upon the panels.
"Who is there?" replied Thenichka from within. "Pray enter."
"It is I," said Paul Petrovitch as he opened the door.
Springing from the chair on which she had been seated with her baby,
she handed the latter to the nurse-girl (who at once bore it from the
room), and hastened to rearrange her bodice.
"Pardon me for having disturbed you," said Paul Petrovitch without
looking at her, "but my object in coming here is to ask you (for I
understand that you are sending in to the town to-day) if you would
procure me a little green tea for my own personal use."
"I will," replied Thenichka. "How much ought I to have ordered?"
"I think that half a pound will suffice. But what a change!" he went on
glancing around the room with an eye which included also in its purview
Thenichka's features. "It is those curtains that I am referring to,"
he explained on seeing that she had failed to grasp his meaning.
"Yes--those curtains. They were given me by Nikolai Petrovitch himself,
and have been hung
|
of Warwick_.
Cotton MS., Julius, E. iv., Art. 6, 250
A page from the Duke of Gloucester's Psalter. Royal MS.,
2, B. i., 322
[See pp. 432-433, 447-448.]
The Duke of Gloucester's Autograph and a Label from one
of his Books. Harleian MS., 1705, and Harleian MS., 33, 360
[See p. 430 and pp. 429-430.]
Capgrave presenting his _Commentary on Genesis_ to
Gloucester. Oriel College MS., xxxii., 386
[See pp. 428, 447.]
Drawing of the Old Divinity Schools, Oxford, dating from
1566. MS. Bodley, 13, 408
A page from the Duke of Gloucester's copy of 'Le Songe
du Vergier,' once part of the Library of Charles V..
of France. Royal MS., 19, C. iv., 416
[See p. 432.]
Several photographs for the above Illustrations have been kindly
lent by Mrs. Maude C. Knight, Richmond, Surrey.
ERRATA
P. 27, l. 10, for 'Abbéville' read 'Abbeville.'
P. 45, note 6, for 'Stowe' read 'Stow.'
P. 75, l. 5, for 'Ponte' read 'Pont.'
P. 92, l. 23, for 'Dowager-Duchess' read 'Dowager-Countess.'
P. 314, l. 13, for 'Northampton' read 'Northumberland.'
P. 366, l. 2, for 'Festus Pompeius' read 'Pomponius Festus.'
P. 378, l. 22, for 'Villari' read 'Villani.'
INTRODUCTION
It was Polydore Vergil who first drew attention to the fatality of the
Gloucester title. It was borne by luckless King John, Thomas of
Woodstock earned a violent death, Thomas le Despenser was beheaded,
while in days later than those treated of in this volume, King Richard
III. found that the hand of fate was against him. Humphrey Plantagenet
of the House of Lancaster was no exception to this rule. His life was
violent, his death suspicious, and even after this his misfortunes did
not desert him; for though the tradition of the 'Good Duke' lingers in
some quarters even to the present day, his importance is not recognised
by the historian. His selfishness and his lack of statesmanship have
made him a byword in fifteenth-century history, and his true title to
fame has been forgotten amidst the struggles which prepared the way for
the Wars of the Roses.
'It is rather remarkable,' wrote Bishop Creighton in 1895, 'that more
attention has not been paid to the progress of Humanism in England, and
especially to the literary fame of the Duke of Gloucester.' It is
certainly strange that this Duke should have found as his literary
executors only two men, both Germans, and they even have not devoted
more than a passing attention to his fame. Whilst there is no little
interest to be found in the story of his public career, the main
importance of his life is centred in his position as a literary patron.
He was unique in the history of his country and age, in taking an
interest in the classical authors of Greece and Rome, who had lain
buried beneath the accumulated dust of the Middle Ages, and to him we
can trace the renaissance of Greek studies in England, and the revival
of Litteræ Humaniores in the University of Oxford. The fifteenth
century, with all its foibles and all its baseness, has been disregarded
by many who prefer an age of heroism or an age of material progress. Yet
the picturesque is not lacking in Duke Humphrey's career, and his
influence is felt even at the present day. In his life we can trace the
spirit of his age, though many of the characters which flit across the
stage are indefinite, and bear few striking qualities.
This is particularly true of Gloucester himself. Few personal touches
are to be found in the historical writers of the period, and his
character is often elusive, his actions often uncertain. The present
volume aims at tracing the salient events of his career in relation to
the history of his times, and at showing his relationship to
fifteenth-century literary aspirations, both in Italy and in England. A
hero no biographer can make him in spite of his many virtues, but at
least he should be relieved of the universal blame cast upon him. In his
life he was typical of his age, in his death the outward failure of his
career was clearly evident; but as the first English patron of those
scholars who were to revolutionise the mental attitude of the world, he
deserves recognition and remembrance, if not reverence.
HUMPHREY, DUKE OF GLOUCESTER
CHAPTER I
EARLY LIFE
On the north-east border of the German-speaking races, there existed in
the latter days of the fourteenth century one of those old religious
military orders, which had been founded to carry on war against the
infidel in the Holy Land. Here, where German met Slav, and Christian met
Pagan, the Knights of St. Mary found a new sphere of usefulness, after
the military orders had become discredited, and in their war against the
heathen Lithuanians they attracted many of the adventurous spirits of
Christendom. Thus King John of Bohemia, who fell at Crécy, had lost his
eyesight fighting in these North German marches, and the adventurous
Henry of Bolingbroke, son and heir of John of Gaunt, spent some of his
energies in helping the Teutonic knights in their wars. It was on one of
these expeditions that at Königsberg news was brought to the future King
Henry IV. of England that his wife had borne him a son who had been
named Humphrey.[1] It was on November 1, 1390, that the sailor who
carried this news received his reward as the bringer of good tidings, so
the birth was probably in the preceding August or September.[2]
Humphrey was the fourth son of the union of Henry of Bolingbroke and
Mary Bohun, who was co-heiress to the princely inheritance of the Earls
of Hereford and Essex. This marriage had been one of the romantic
episodes of the time, and had brought John of Gaunt's eldest son
prominently forward during the reign of Richard II. The Bohun
inheritance had cast its glamour over the man who had thus secured a
part thereof, and he never neglected an opportunity of emphasising his
pride in the Bohun connection. Thus he adopted the badge of the Swan,
which was a Bohun cognisance, and in choosing the names of his sons he
only once, in the case of Thomas, selected one which was decidedly not
taken from his wife's family. In the case of his fourth and youngest son
this was especially marked, for Humphrey was a favourite Bohun name.[3]
Of the last six Earls of Hereford, five had borne it, so its youngest
recipient was made at his birth the inheritor of Bohun traditions--
traditions which spoke of a life which would be active, if not
turbulent, and which amidst some constitutional actions would have many
elements of ambition and self-seeking. The Earls of Hereford had taken a
prominent part in the past history of England, and this last inheritor
of their name, if not of their title, was not to be unknown in the
public life of his country. From his mother's family it may be that with
his name he inherited some part of that restless and unstable character
which was to influence his actions all through his life.
1399] ACCESSION OF HENRY IV.
Of the place of young Humphrey's birth we have no record, but much of
his childhood was spent at Eaton Tregoes, a place situated not far from
Ross on the banks of the Wye, and part of the Hereford inheritance.[4]
Here he was left in the care of Sir Hugh Waterton, along with his two
sisters, Blanche and Philippa, when his father was banished by the
capricious Richard II.[5] Here he mourned the death of his
grandfather,[6] and hence, too, in all probability he went to welcome
his father's triumphant return, since he did not accompany his brother
Henry to Ireland in the train of King Richard.[7]
The change of dynasty naturally had an influence on the life of Henry's
son. Hitherto Humphrey had been a child of little importance, the son of
a leading nobleman, and indeed a member of the blood royal, but this
last was a not uncommon distinction in the days when Edward III.'s
numerous descendants peopled the country. Of late, too, owing to his
father's banishment, he had been kept in seclusion by his faithful
guardian, waiting for happier days, which had now come. By the
parliamentary sanction of Henry of Bolingbroke's claim to the throne,
Humphrey became a prince in the line of succession, and the consequent
honours pertaining to a king's son fell to his lot. Accordingly he was
selected, together with his brothers Thomas and John, to gild the
inauguration of a new order of knighthood. The new Lancastrian dynasty
had not as yet secured a firm hold on the kingdom. John of Gaunt had
never been taken very seriously as a statesman, and his son was but
little known in his native land save for his short period of opposition
to Richard II. Something must be done to give stability to the new royal
house, and to borrow for it some of that outward respectability of
appearance which usually only comes with age. One of the expedients to
this end was the creation of a new order of knighthood, which should do
for the Lancastrians what the Order of the Garter had done for their
predecessors. Many have denied that the Order of the Bath owes its
inception to Henry IV., and it must be allowed that the ceremonial of
bathing on the eve of receiving knighthood dates back to Frankish
times, and by now had become hallowed by the Church and enforced by the
chivalric code which had come to soften the rough corners of Feudalism.
Nevertheless, no earlier mention of a definite Order of the Bath can be
found, and it was with the intention of giving dignity to this new
corporation of knights that the King's three youngest sons headed the
first list of creations.[8] On the Eve of the Translation of St. Edward
the knighthoods were conferred,[9] and when the Mayor and citizens of
London came to escort the King to Westminster, preparatory to his
coronation on the morrow, the new knights were assigned a place of
honour in the procession, riding before the King in long green coats,
with the sleeves cut straight and the hoods trimmed with ermine.[10] The
Feast day itself witnessed the coronation of Humphrey's father as King
Henry IV.[11] Though only nine years old the young prince had received
that inauguration into the ranks of men which the dignity of knighthood
conferred, and to emphasise this fact certain landed possessions were
given to him by the King. On December 2 were bestowed upon him the
manors of Cookham and Bray, near Maidenhead in Berkshire, to which were
added the manors of Middleton and Merden in Kent, all given to him for
himself and the heirs of his body.[12] Within these manors and hundreds
he received all royal as well as proprietory rights,[13] and some days
later he was relieved of all fees and fines payable on the receipt of
letters-patent and writs.[14] About the same time provision was made for
him in the shape of 'coursers, trotters, and palfreys' provided for his
use.[15]
1400] PLOT AGAINST THE NEW DYNASTY
Joy and sorrow, triumph and danger, were to succeed one another in
striking contrast all through Humphrey's life, and he was quickly to
learn that it was no untainted privilege to be numbered among kings'
sons. He had just received his first initiation into the pomps and
glories of royal state; he had taken part in one of those triumphal
processions which were the delight of his later years; he had begun to
realise, boy though he was, the pleasant side of high rank and popular
homage; almost immediately he was to learn that there was another side
to the picture, and to experience the first of those frequent attacks
from which the Lancastrian dynasty was never entirely free. After the
coronation festivities were over, he had been taken down to Windsor
together with his brothers and sister, and there his father kept the
Feast of Christmas, surrounded by his family. But all the time a plot
was brewing, and plans were being made for taking the King unawares at a
'momynge,' and destroying both him and his four sons. Warned in time,
Henry hastened to avert the blow. Humphrey and his brothers were taken
in the dead of the night of January 4 to London, and there safely housed
in the Tower, while their father sallied forth to subdue the rebels.
When the conspirators arrived at Windsor they found their quarry had
escaped. Their plans were not sufficiently organised to enable them to
meet this contingency; an attempt to raise the country in the name of
Richard II. failed; they scattered and fled, only to meet their death,
some at the hands of the mob, and others on the scaffold.[16] Humphrey
was too young to realise the import of this unsuccessful plot; indeed,
its lack of success would render it insignificant were it not the
precursor of many similar attempts. It speaks of the strong undercurrent
of opposition to the Lancastrian dynasty, which never ceased to flow
even during the seeming popularity of Henry V.; it shows tendencies
which Humphrey himself would have to face in later life, and which the
lack of statesmanship which was to characterise him and so many of his
house was not calculated to stem. For the present the failure of the
conspiracy only helped to increase his worldly possessions, and he must
have delighted in the tapestry hangings and other spoils taken from the
condemned traitor, the Earl of Huntingdon, which were his share of the
goods forfeited by the conspirators.[17] His property steadily increased
from other sources also, and from time to time we find him the recipient
of some castle or manor at the King's hands.[18]
We hear very little of the events in the life of the boy, but we get an
occasional glimpse of him. Thus he was present at the marriage of his
father to his second wife, Joan of Navarre, widow of the Duke of
Brittany, at Winchester in the early part of 1403, and he welcomed his
future step-mother with a tablet of gold as a wedding present.[19] The
scene soon changed from marriage celebrations to war, and Humphrey now
had his first experience of a battle. The rising of Sir Edmund Mortimer
with the Welsh and Harry Hotspur of the House of Percy called the King
to the north in July, and we are told that his youngest son took part in
the famous battle of Shrewsbury.[20] As the boy was but twelve years old
it is unlikely that he took any active share in the battle, though his
elder brother was grievously wounded;[21] but he was introduced to the
perils which beset the House of Lancaster, even amongst those whom they
had counted as friends, and to the methods of warfare he was later to
practise himself.
1403] HUMPHREY RECEIVES THE GARTER
The battle of Shrewsbury was an indirect means of conferring yet another
honour on Humphrey. It is probable that he had been elected a Knight of
the Garter early in the reign, at the same time as his eldest brother,
the Prince of Wales, but at that time there was no vacancy for him to
fill.[22] There are no extant records of elections earlier than the
reign of Henry V., in whose first year we find robes provided for
Thomas, John, and Humphrey.[23] These princes, however, were undoubtedly
Knights of the Garter at an earlier date than this, and it is recorded
in the Windsor tables that John succeeded to the stall of the Duke of
York, who died on August 1, 1402.[24] If the three younger sons of Henry
were elected together, and waited to obtain their stalls in order of
age, the first vacancy after John's enrolment would come in 1403, when
Humphrey probably succeeded to the stall of Edmund, Earl of Stafford, or
to that of Hotspur himself, who both fell in the battle of
Shrewsbury.[25] In any case, it is very doubtful that Humphrey had to
wait till a later date than this to be finally received into the Order
of the Garter.
Humphrey had now passed from the state of childhood; two years later we
find him with an establishment of his own at Hadleigh Castle, in
Essex;[26] and again in the following year his position in the line of
succession was definitely arranged.[27] Nevertheless we only catch an
occasional glimpse of him. In 1406 he accompanied his father as escort
to his sister Philippa to Lynn on her way to join her future husband,
the King of Denmark.[28] From Lynn father and son went on a visit to the
Abbey of Bardney, in Lincolnshire, where they arrived on August 21. They
were met at the gates by the Abbot and monks, before whom the King
knelt, and then, rising, proceeded to the High Altar; there the Abbot
delivered a speech of welcome, and Henry, having kissed the relics,
proceeded through the choir and the cloisters to the Abbot's room, where
he was to spend the night. Early in the morning the King heard Mass,
and, accompanied by his sons Thomas and Humphrey and the attendant lords
and clergy, joined a solemn procession round the Abbey. The day ended
with feasting, and on the morrow the King spent much time in the library
amidst the valuable books which the monks had collected or written
themselves. Here, if anywhere, he was accompanied by that youngest son
who was later to be known as the great patron of learning.[29] The early
training of Humphrey, we must remember, was more that of the scholar
than of the soldier or politician.
Having lost both his mother and his father's mother when he was not four
years old, Humphrey had no near relation to whom to look for guidance;
his father was far too deeply concerned in matters of state. He had been
handed over from his earliest years to the tender mercies of one
Katharine Puncherdon, who ministered to his bodily wants,[30] while a
certain priest, by name Thomas Bothwell, was appointed his tutor.[31] Of
his further education we know but little, though it is very probable
that he studied both rhetoric and _res naturales_ at Balliol College,
Oxford.[32]
1413] ACCESSION OF HENRY V.
During the reign of Henry IV. Humphrey took no definite part in public
life; however, we find record of one official appearance when, with his
brothers, he agreed to observe the treaty made in 1412 between the King
of England and the Dukes of Berri, Orleans, and Bourbon.[33] At the time
of his father's death he was present at Westminster, and accompanied the
body in its journey down the river to Gravesend, and thence overland to
Canterbury. After the funeral he returned with his brother, now King
Henry V., to London.[34] At the very beginning of the new reign he was
made Chamberlain of England,[35] an office which entailed his presence
at court 'at the five principall festes of the yeare to take suche
lyvery and servyse after the estate he is of,'[36] and added yet further
to his already extensive possessions lands situated in South Wales,[37]
together with an annuity of five hundred marks for himself and the heirs
male of his body, till such time as an equivalent in land was given
him.[38] Personal danger there was, too, even as there had been when
Henry IV. ascended the throne; an abortive rising of the Lollards
threatened for a moment the lives of the King and his brothers.[39]
The accession of Henry V. increased his youngest brother's dignity, for
besides bringing him a step nearer to the throne, it placed him more on
an equality of age and standing with those in whose hands the government
of the country rested. It may be, too, that the death of his father
changed his future life materially, for his entire absence from all
political functions, and his inactivity, whilst his brothers, little
older than himself, had taken an active part in the management of public
affairs, suggest the impression that he was not destined for a political
career. Moreover, for the first year of his brother's reign, Humphrey de
Lancaster, as he had hitherto been styled,[40] does not appear at all
prominently in public life, and it was not till he was twenty-three
years old--for those times a somewhat advanced age--that he took his
place definitely among the great men of the kingdom. On May 16, 1414,
letters-patent were issued creating him Earl of Pembroke and Duke of
Gloucester, at the same time that his brother John was made Earl of
Kendal and Duke of Bedford. Though only raised to the peerage at this
time, John had already taken his share in the duties of government, and
before this had represented the King in several important offices of
trust. The peerage thus conferred on Humphrey was for life only, and was
accompanied by a modest allowance of £60 to be paid out of the proceeds
of the county of Pembroke; of this £40 was for the maintenance of his
dignity as Duke, and the remaining £20 in respect of his Earldom.[41] At
once the new duke passed from insignificance to prominence. He had had
no education in the duties and responsibilities of high rank and
executive power, but by a stroke of the pen he became one of the chief
men of the kingdom, and by reason of his royal blood took precedence in
the peerage and in the kingdom of the holders of titles of longer
standing.[42]
1414] HENRY V.'s FRENCH POLICY
Humphrey was not slow to enter upon the duties of his new rank, and on
the very day of his elevation to the peerage he took his seat in the
Parliament then sitting at Leicester.[43] Here he witnessed the
enactment of severe measures for the repression of the Lollards,[44] in
pursuance of a policy which he himself was later to carry out: heresy,
it must be remembered, was under the Lancastrians a political danger,
for Henry IV. had usurped the throne as the champion of the Church. It
may be, too, that the newly created duke took part in a debate which
dealt with matters of more pressing interest. It has been said that the
negotiations which were proceeding with France were discussed at this
time, but the Rolls of Parliament bear no record of this; be this as it
may, the question of English relations with France had appeared on the
horizon to herald that second phase of the Hundred Years' War, which,
beginning in all its glory with the first appearance of Humphrey of
Gloucester in public life, was to end with its full complement of
disgrace and disaster almost simultaneously with his life.
To Henry at Leicester had come ambassadors from France--two rival
embassies in the interest of the two rival factions in that country.
With an insane king at the head of affairs, France was distraught by the
struggle of Burgundian and Armagnac for the control of the government.
The origin of this bitter strife dated some years back to the murder of
the Duke of Orleans in the streets of Paris at the instigation of the
Duke of Burgundy, in revenge, it is said, for the seduction of his wife
by the murdered man.[45] This personal hatred had rapidly developed into
a political struggle, and it had continued with varying successes till
at the present time Burgundy had been driven from Paris and declared to
be a rebel and an enemy to the kingdom. Thus the Armagnac faction, as
the party of the Orleanists was now called, was for the time supreme,
and it may naturally be supposed that Henry V., if he wished to take
advantage of these internal dissensions in the French kingdom, would
hope to secure more favourable terms from the exiled party, than from
those who held the supremacy. Thus at Leicester the envoys from the Duke
of Burgundy received a warmer welcome than their rivals, and agreed to
sign a defensive and offensive treaty with the English King, whereby
their master promised to help Henry in any attack he might make on
Armagnac territory.[46] The terms of this treaty, however, were not
revealed, and Burgundy denied the existence of any hostile alliance when
he came to a temporary agreement with the Armagnac faction at the Treaty
of Arras in February 1415.[47] The King of England, too, did not cease
to intrigue with both parties, for he was not slow to realise the
advantage which these dissensions gave him. He had meddled in French
politics before he came to the throne, not always to his father's
satisfaction, and now in the spirit of the old crusaders he meant to
take advantage of the sins of France, while at the same time he
fulfilled a divine commission to punish the transgressors. In him France
was to find her true redeemer, the healer of her internal wounds, and to
this end he continued his intrigues with both parties, offering to marry
both Catherine of France and Catherine of Burgundy as a means to
establish his purely illusory claim to the French throne.[48]
1414] GLOUCESTER'S FOREIGN POLICY
Meanwhile, in England, men's minds were turning to war. The martial
glories of Edward III.'s reign were not entirely forgotten, and the
trade interests of the kingdom were not inclined to oppose a policy
which might tend to stop the depredations of French privateers. The
Church, if not absolutely encouraging the war, as has been asserted by
later writers, did nothing to oppose it; dissentients there were, of
course, but for the King's councillors the only question was, with the
help of which party should Henry enter France. The King himself, with
Bedford and the Beauforts, looked to Burgundy as the most likely ally,
whilst Clarence, supported by Gloucester and the Duke of York, favoured
an Armagnac alliance.[49] This divided opinion was a renewal of the
disagreements which had arisen in the court of Henry IV. The younger
Henry had always inclined to the Burgundian alliance which his father
had opposed, and which now was no more favoured by his two brothers. In
the career of Humphrey it is interesting to note that on the first
occasion on which he definitely asserted his opinion he found himself in
opposition to the policy of the Beauforts, who were to be his bitterest
enemies through life, and in alliance with the House of York, the only
family which supported him in the later years of humiliation. Above all,
we must not ignore the fact that he here showed his distrust of
Burgundian methods and Burgundian policy, and that he now opposed an
alliance with a house whose strongest enmity he was to incur at a later
date; that, on the other hand, he advised an Armagnac alliance which was
to form an essential part of his policy in the days when this King
Henry's son was seeking to strengthen himself by a French marriage.
Nothing could give a more accurate forecast of his future life and
policy than the line which Humphrey took on this question, and it helps
to give a strange consistency to his career; to borrow something akin to
prophecy from the darkness of the unknown future.
It is probable that, in spite of his embassies and overtures, Henry
never expected to come to terms with either party; at any rate his
demands from the French King were too preposterous to be taken seriously
as an overture of peace,[50] and at home he never ceased to prepare for
war on a large scale. Ships were secured from Holland and Zealand; money
and munitions of war were collected for the great undertaking;
indentures were entered into with the chief men of the kingdom to serve
abroad with the King, and amongst these we find the names of the Dukes
of Clarence, Gloucester, and York.[51] With these preparations the time
wore on, Humphrey taking his share of the work. In April he appears as a
member of the King's Privy Council for the first time,[52] and in the
previous March he was employed to bring home to the city fathers the
immense advantages of English aggrandisement on the Continent.
Accompanied by the Dukes of Bedford and York, the Archbishop of
Canterbury and the Bishop of Winchester, he went to the Mayor and
Aldermen of the City of London, and, showing great deference to these
civic magnates, joined his associates in persuading them to support the
war with a substantial gift of money.[53] Thus early in his career he
was brought into close contact with the Londoners, who were to prove his
best and most faithful friends.
Though preparations for war had gone so far, negotiations with France
were still pending. The Dauphin, who had taken the place of his demented
father, after exasperating the English with his present of tennis balls
in the previous year,[54] had taken no steps to meet the danger which
threatened his country, and it was only at the instance of the Duke of
Berri, whom he had recently called to his councils, that an embassy was
despatched to meet Henry at Winchester on June 30.[55] The King was
holding his court in the bishop's palace, and there, with his three
brothers standing on his right and Chancellor Beaufort on his left, he
received the ambassadors with all pomp and ceremony. Both this and the
next day were occupied with formal receptions, wherein Gloucester was
specially prominent, for he alone of all the temporal peers was allotted
a special seat at the official banquet, being placed on the King's right
hand. When business began in earnest the Archbishop of Bourges and the
Bishop of Lisieux--'_vir verbosus et arrogans_,' says Walsingham--were
spokesmen for the French, whilst Beaufort spoke for the King of England.
The negotiations lasted till July 6, and were marked by a somewhat more
conciliatory attitude on the English side, but from the first they were
doomed to failure, for neither party meant to give way,[56] and at
length Henry broke up the meeting and dismissed the envoys with every
courteous attention.[57]
1415] THE SOUTHAMPTON CONSPIRACY
War had now become a mere matter of days. After a brief visit to London,
Henry went down to Southampton, whither probably Gloucester had gone
direct from the negotiations at Winchester, and the last preparations
for the expedition against France were being completed, when the young
Earl of March waited on the King, and laid before him the details of a
conspiracy against the House of Lancaster.[58] The Earl of Cambridge--a
worthless brother of the Duke of York--Henry Lord Scrope, and Sir Thomas
Grey of Heton were the authors of the plot, and their plan was to
proclaim an impostor who pretended to be Richard II., and was then in
Scotland, or in default of him the Earl of March himself.[59] At the
time of the discovery the scheme had not been fully developed, as it was
not intended that the matter should come to a head till Henry was safely
employed in France; indeed the only reason that definite action had
been taken, in so far as the Earl of March had been approached, was to
prevent the latter from accompanying the army.[60] There were, however,
traces that the conspiracy was spreading, and rumours were afloat that
the Lollards were going to seize the opportunity of internal
disturbances to strike a blow for their religion.[61] The King was not
slow to act on the information given him. On July 21 he issued a
commission to inquire into the matter, and on August 2 a jury was
empanelled, which indicted the three conspirators for plotting against
the King and his three brothers, the Dukes of Clarence, Bedford, and
Gloucester.[62] Cambridge and Grey confessed their guilt, and threw
themselves on the King's mercy, but Scrope denied any traitorous intent.
Grey as a commoner was executed at once, but the two lords were reserved
for the trial of their peers. Clarence was commissioned to summon a jury
of peers for this purpose, and among those who were called to take part
in the trial were the Duke of York--the brother of one of the
accused--and Gloucester--one of those against whom the conspiracy was
aimed.[63] The accused were condemned to death, and executed the same
day outside the North Gate of Southampton,[64] but the whole procedure
was so irregular that it was considered necessary to legalise it in the
next Parliament.[65]
1415] THE FRENCH WAR
The danger was past, but there was a lesson and a warning to be gathered
from the plot, though it passed unheeded. Humphrey, now on the threshold
of his public career, was brought face to face with an event which might
have taught him much, but which he failed to understand. This first
Yorkist conspiracy stood in the way, as did the prophets of old, and
foretold destruction and disaster to dynasty and kingdom if this
iniquitous and foolish French war were really undertaken. It showed that
there was a party in England which was opposed to the Lancastrian House,
and it pointed unmistakably to the time when civil war would drive out
the reigning dynasty. That Henry could have foreseen all the results of
his mistaken policy is impossible, but no ruler with the slightest claim
to be considered a statesman would have set up the false idea of foreign
conquest as an antidote to dissensions at home. This policy was no
remedy; it postponed the struggle only to enhance its bitterness and to
aggravate its disastrous results. Henry was blind to the signs which had
appeared on the political horizon to herald the coming storm, but this
very inability to gauge the significance of events has made him the idol
of successive generations of his countrymen, who care not for his policy
and its results, but appreciate only the dramatic setting of his life.
It was just this dramatic quality of the French wars which appealed to
Henry's youngest brother. In an age when the artistic side of life was
totally ignored by Englishmen, he was beginning to breathe the
atmosphere of new ideas, which rendered him susceptible to the charm of
large conceptions and dramatic episodes. He was at once attracted by the
brilliant aspect of this French policy with its splendid dreams of
territorial aggrandisement. But while Henry adopted the French war as a
policy, Humphrey saw in it not so much a policy as an idea, an idea
which he worshipped to the day of his death. Thus in estimating
Gloucester's later actions we must remember whence they took their
origin, and we must not forget his training in the policy of his eldest
brother. Both were blind to the folly of attacking France, but while the
King was to die before the results of his actions appeared, Humphrey was
to live on till the fields were ripe for harvest, and to die only on
the eve of that day when the harvest was gathered in. Thus from the
Southampton conspiracy he might have learnt the dangers which the French
war would foster, he might have learnt the lesson that a united aim and
common action were necessary for the prosperity of the House of
Lancaster, but he was deaf to the teaching of the incident. To
understand Gloucester's life-history, therefore, we must carefully
consider the early years of his active life, the training he received in
the wars of Henry V., and the attractiveness to a man of his temperament
of the false ideals taught him by his famous brother.
1415] GLOUCESTER'S RETINUE
The discovery of the Southampton plot only delayed Henry so long as was
necessary to punish the
|
have been simply
suicidal. Buller accordingly determined on a retreat.
On February 13 he evacuated Gubat. On March 1 his advance guard had
reached Korti. In this retreat the 19th Hussars again did splendid
work. For days on end the column was submitted to that unceasing
pelting of bullets which Buller characterised in one of his laconic
dispatches as "annoying." But Barrow, the Hussars' chief, was a master
of the art of reconnoitring. Time and again he and his men were able
to deceive the enemy as to the direction of the column's march. It was
then that French had his first experience in "masterly retreat."
How sorely the column was pressed may be shown from one incident.
While he was preparing to evacuate Abu Klea, Buller received
information to the effect that the enemy was advancing upon him with a
force of eight thousand men. He determined upon a desperate measure.
He left standing the forts which he had intended to demolish and
filled up the larger wells.
A desert well, to the Oriental, is almost sacred, and never even in
savage warfare would such a course have been adopted. But Buller knew
that the absence of water was the only thing that could check the rush
of the oncoming hordes, and this deed, terrible as it may have seemed
to the Eastern mind, was his sole means of covering his retreat.
Orders were therefore given to fill up all the principal wells with
stones and rubbish. It was certainly an effectual measure, for the
enemy would be delayed for many hours, perhaps days, before he could
restore the wells and obtain sufficient water to enable him to
continue in pursuit of the British force which was so hopelessly
outnumbered. In the circumstances Buller could not be blamed for
saving British lives at the price of Oriental tradition.
Sir Evelyn Wood was also sent with reinforcements from Korti to
strengthen the force at Gakdul Wells. There he met French for the
first time. "I saw him," Sir Evelyn relates, "when our people were
coming back across the desert after our failure, the whole force
depressed by the death of Gordon. I came on him about a hundred miles
from the river--the last man of the last section of the rear guard! We
were followed by bands of Arabs. They came into our bivouac on the
night of which I am speaking, and the night following they carried
off some of our slaughter cattle."[4]
[Page Heading: MENTIONED IN DISPATCHES]
Major French was quickly able to distinguish himself in the retreat.
For Buller was a believer in cavalry and used it wherever possible. In
his dispatch on the retreat he paid French the following handsome
tribute:
"I wish expressly to remark on the excellent work that has been done
by a small detachment of the 19th Hussars, both during our occupation
of Abu Klea and during our retirement. Each man has done the work of
ten; and it is not too much to say that the force owes much to Major
French and his thirteen troopers."
The flying column occupied just two months in its fruitless
expedition. But no more trying experience was ever packed into so
short a time. On that march across the Bayuda desert history has only
one verdict. It is that pronounced by Count von Moltke on the men who
accomplished it:--"They were not soldiers but heroes." None of the men
earned the title more thoroughly than Major French and his troopers.
"During the whole march from Korti," says Colonel Biddulph, "the
entire scouting duty had been taken by the 19th Hussars, so that each
day they covered far more ground than the rest of the force."[5] The
enemy themselves came to respect the little force of cavalrymen. "Even
the fierce Baggara horsemen appeared unwilling to cross swords with
our Hussars," wrote one who accompanied the column. Major French and
his regiment had firmly established their reputation.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] _With the Camel Corps up the Nile_, by Count Gleichen, by
permission of Messrs. Chapman and Hall.
[2] _With the Camel Corps up the Nile_, by Count Gleichen, by
permission of Messrs. Chapman and Hall.
[3] _With the Camel Corps up the Nile_, by Count Gleichen, by
permission of Messrs. Chapman and Hall.
[4] For this and much other valuable information the writer is
indebted to Field-Marshal Sir Evelyn Wood.
[5] _The Nineteenth and their Times_, by Col. J. Biddulph, by
permission of Mr. John Murray.
CHAPTER III
YEARS OF WAITING
Second in Command--Maintaining the Barrow tradition--The
Persistent Student--Service in India--Retires on
Half-pay--Renewed Activities--Rehearsing for South Africa.
After the success in the Soudan Major French had not long to wait for
promotion. A few days after General Buller's tribute he was appointed
Lieutenant-Colonel of his regiment. So that he came back to England as
second in command of the 19th Hussars.
From this time onward he became entirely absorbed in his profession.
It is true that he had always been interested in it; but there is no
question that Barrow was the man who had shown him the fascination of
scientific generalship. While making the reputation of the 19th,
Barrow had unhappily lost his own life. He died as the result of
re-opening an internal wound while tent-pegging in the following year.
French determined to carry on his work, and at Norwich the training
of the 19th Hussars rapidly became famous throughout the Army.
One young officer, now General Bewicke Copley,[6] was attached to the
19th from another regiment in order to study their methods. He tells
how he was greatly struck by the brilliant work which French was
doing. His strict discipline and his terrific ideas of what training
meant, may have struck some of his young subalterns as scarcely
yielding them the ideal existence of the _beau sabreur_. Probably they
were right; but they were being licked into a state of amazing
efficiency.
In 1887 it fell to Sir Evelyn Wood's lot to inspect the regiment.
Pointing to French, he asked his Colonel, "Of what value is that man?"
The reply was, "He is for ever reading military books." And he has
been reading them ever since!
A couple of years later he attained the rank of Colonel, with command
of his regiment. Very soon Sir Evelyn was to discover the answer to
his question. For he was anxious at that time to introduce the
squadron system. French was the one commanding officer who carried it
out. In spite of the very large amount of extra work it entailed, he
was willing to take any number of recruits and train them in the new
method. That method was finally allowed to lapse, although it has been
adopted in another form for infantry regiments. It is typical of
French that he was willing to slave over the unpopular way of doing
things, while other men adhered to the traditional and official
methods.
[Page Heading: THE AUTHORITIES ASTONISHED]
While French was still busy elaborating new theories and testing them
at manoeuvres, his regiment was ordered to India. There he met one of
his future colleagues in South Africa, Sir George White. He was also
fortunate in working with one of the most brilliant of all British
cavalry trainers, Sir George Luck.
The latter considered that the cavalry regiments in India required
drastic reorganisation. French was ready to carry it out. To increase
the efficiency of the cavalry extensive manoeuvres were organised.
French acted as Chief of the Staff to General Luck, and astonished the
authorities by the way in which "he conducted troops dispersed over a
wide area of ground, allotting to each section its appointed work and
bringing the complete movement to a brilliant conclusion."
But the Government's recognition of his brilliant work was by no means
encouraging. In 1893 Colonel French was actually retired on half-pay!
It is an admirable system which allows the middle-aged officer to
make way for youth in the British army; but the spectacle of a French
despatched into civil obscurity at the ripe age of forty-one, has its
tragic as well as its comic side. That it acutely depressed him we
know. For a time he was almost in despair as to his career.
Actually, however, these two years "out of action" were probably
invaluable to him--and to the army. For the first time he had the
opportunity for unrestrained study; and much of that time was spent,
no doubt, in thinking out the theories of cavalry action which were
yet to bring him fame and our arms success.
Much of his most valuable work dates from this period of enforced
retirement. He was present, for instance, during the cavalry
manoeuvres of 1894 in Berkshire. He took part in the manoeuvres as a
brigadier. His chief Staff Officer, by the way, was Major R.S.S. (now
Lieut.-General Sir Robert) Baden-Powell, while the aide-de-camp to the
Director-General of manoeuvres was Captain (now Lieut.-General Sir)
Douglas Haig. Here French formulated what was to be one of the axioms
of his future cavalry tactics. One of those present at headquarters
has recorded his remarks.
[Page Heading: THE FUNCTION OF CAVALRY]
"There is," said French, "no subject upon which more misconception
exists, even among service men, than as regards the real rôle of
cavalry in warfare. My conception of the duties and functions of the
mounted arm is not to cut and to hack and to thrust at your enemy
wherever and however he may be found. The real business of cavalry is
so to manoeuvre your enemy as to bring him within effective range of
the corps artillery of your own side for which a position suitable for
battle would previously have been selected."[7]
It is difficult to conceive a more clear and concise statement of the
function of cavalry. It differs widely from the rather grim utterance
of the late Sir Baker Russell, who stated that the duty of cavalry was
to look pretty during time of peace, and get killed in war.
Happily Colonel French's theorising was not without its effect. The
Berkshire manoeuvres showed a number of flagrant shortcomings in our
cavalry. Several military men, ably seconded by _The Morning Post_,
insisted on the reorganisation of that arm. After the customary
protest, officialdom bowed to the storm.
French's old chief, Sir George Luck, was brought back from India to
institute reforms. The first thing that the new Inspector-General of
Cavalry insisted upon was a revised Cavalry Drill Book. Who was to
write it? The answer was not easy. But eventually Colonel French was
called in from his retirement and installed in the Horse Guards for
that purpose.
The result was a masterpiece of lucid explanation and terse precision.
The book evolved into something much more than a mere manual of drill.
For it is also a treatise on cavalry tactics, a guide to modern
strategy, and a complete code of regulations for the organisation of
mounted troops.
No sooner was the book issued than another problem arose. Who was to
carry out all these drastic alterations? Once again, recourse was had
to the half-pay Colonel in Kent! Who so fit to materialise reforms as
the man who had conceived them? So in 1895 Colonel French was
ensconced in the War Office as Assistant Adjutant-General of Cavalry.
There were great reforms instituted.
British cavalry was placed on a brigade establishment at home
stations. Which means that, for the first time, three regiments were
grouped into a brigade and placed under the command of a staff
colonel, who was entirely responsible for their training. In the
summer months the regiments were massed for combined training.
In spite of the revolution he was accomplishing, it is doubtful
whether French was at all happy at the War Office. He is essentially a
man of action. Unlike Kitchener, he prefers execution to organisation,
and he probably chafed horribly over the interminable disentangling of
knots which is efficient organisation. His one consolation was the
solution every night before he left his desk of a refreshing problem
in tactics.
[Page Heading: FROM STOOL TO SADDLE]
There are endless stories of his pacing up and down that back room in
Pall Mall like a caged lion. Like Mr. Galsworthy's Ferrand he hates to
do "round business on an office stool." His temperament is entirely
dynamic. Everything static and stay-at-home is utter boredom to him.
Probably no soldier ever showed the qualities and the limitations of
the man of action in more vivid contrast.
His trials, however, were not of long duration. So soon as the brigade
system had been fully organised he was given command of one of the
units which he had created--the Second Cavalry Brigade at Canterbury.
Here he was able to achieve one of his most notable successes. It
happened during the 1898 manoeuvres. As commander of a brigade, French
was chosen to lead Buller's force in the mimic campaign. His opponent
was General Talbot, an older officer who worked on the stereo-typed
methods. The antiquity of his antagonist's ideas gave French his
opportunity. He made such a feature of reconnaissance that the experts
declared his tactics to be hopelessly rash. But by the mobility of his
force he continually checked and out-manoeuvred his opponent--appearing
in the most unexpected places in the most unaccountable ways.
[Page Heading: THE CRITICS ROUTED]
At the end of the manoeuvres the fighting centred round Yarmbury
Castle. All day French had been harassing General Talbot's forces. At
last, by a rapid movement, his cavalry surprised several batteries of
the enemy's horse artillery. He commanded them to dismount and made
the whole force his prisoners. When the umpires upheld his claim, the
experts aforesaid were given considerable food for thought.
The general conclusion was that luck had contributed to his success,
and that in actual warfare such recklessness might lead to disaster.
Consequently, French's opponents were justified to some extent in
their insistence that the old methods were best. Indeed, his success
only strengthened prejudice in certain quarters.
Happily, however, the original mind won the day. And in 1899, French
was given command of the first cavalry brigade at Aldershot, with the
rank of Major-General. This is the highest post open to a cavalry
officer in his own sphere during the time of peace. Thus French's
critics were finally routed, and he was free at last to train British
cavalry according to his own brilliant and original ideas.
FOOTNOTES:
[6] To General Bewicke Copley the writer is indebted for much kind
assistance in writing this chapter.
[7] Quoted in _M.A.P._, March 3, 1900.
CHAPTER IV
ELANDSLAAGTE AND RIETFONTEIN
The Unknown Commander of Cavalry--Who is General
French?--Advancing without Reinforcements--"This is your
Show, French"--The White Flag--The Chess-Player--The Victor
in Anecdote.
From the end of the South African War until the outbreak of the
European War the British nation had never taken its army seriously. At
best it had shown very tepid interest in its work. Some brief Indian
skirmishing might momentarily flash the names of a few regiments or a
stray general upon the public mind. But for the most part we were
content to take the army very much for granted, forgetful of Mr.
Dooley's sage pronouncement that "Standing armies are useful in time
of war." Prior to the Boer War the public ignorance on the subject was
even more appalling.
[Page Heading: A NEW STAR]
At the opening of the South African campaign there was a good deal of
vague discussion as to who should have the cavalry command in Natal.
But General French was not one of the officers prominently mentioned.
Yet, he had already risen to a position analogous to that which
General von Bernhardi then occupied in the German army. In any other
European country his name would have been practically a household
word. Even to the English newspaper writer it was a paradox and a
problem.
"Who is this General French?" people asked one another, when news of
his first victories came to hand. Scarcely anyone was able to answer
the question. One finds curious corroboration of the prevailing
ignorance of French's career in a society journal of that date. In
January of 1900, a then most popular social medium was almost
pathetically confessing its perturbation on the point. After giving a
description of General French, the writer goes on rather in wrath than
in apology--"Since I wrote the above paragraph, I have found a letter
in an Irish paper, which declares that the French of whom I have just
spoken is not the hero of Colesberg. The French of whom I have spoken
is George Arthur (_sic_), while the Colesberg French is John Denton
Pinkstone French. Of John Denton Pinkstone French I have found no
details in any of the ordinary books of reference. Probably some
correspondent will supply me with the details." There was a lapse or
six weeks before any further information was forthcoming.
But there was one man who knew his French. General Sir Redvers Buller
had found his worth on the Nile Expedition, in repeated autumn
manoeuvres at home, and in many a long discussion on military topics.
His casting vote, therefore, made French Commander of Cavalry in
Natal.
Major Arthur Griffiths has supplied an admirable little sketch of
French's appearance at this time. "He is short and thick, and of
rather ungainly figure. Although he can stick on a horse as well as
anyone, rides with a strong seat, and is indefatigable in the saddle,
he is not at all a pretty horseman. His mind is more set on
essentials, on effective leadership with all it means, rather than
what soldiers call 'Spit and polish': he is sound in judgment,
clear-headed, patient, taking everything quietly, the rough with the
smooth; but he is always on the spot, willing to wait, and still more
ready to act, when the opportunity comes, with tremendous effect."
That description is true in general, if not in detail. For patience is
certainly not one of French's personal, if it be one of his military
virtues. A close friend of his agreed to the word "tempestuous," as
most nicely describing his temperament. Like every good soldier, in
fact, French has a temper, for which he is none the worse. If apt to
flame out suddenly, it quickly burns itself out, leaving no touch of
resentment in the scorched.
[Page Heading: RECALLED TO LADYSMITH]
Ten days after the Boer ultimatum had been delivered to the British
agent at Pretoria, French was in Ladysmith. He arrived there, to be
pedantically accurate, on October 20, 1899, at 5 a.m. At 11 a.m. he
was in the saddle, leading a column out to recapture the railway
station at Elandslaagte, which, with a newly-arrived train of troops,
the Boers had seized overnight. No sooner had his men begun to locate
the enemy, than French was recalled to Ladysmith. Reluctantly the men
turned back to reinforce Sir George White's small garrison, for what
he feared might prove a night attack. Soon afterwards, however, news
of General Symons' victory at Talana came in to cheer the men after
their fruitless sortie.
At once Sir George White saw his opportunity. It was the Boers, and
not the British, who now stood in peril of a sudden attack. There was
little sleep for French's men that night. At 4 a.m. next morning they
were again on the march for Elandslaagte.
About eight o'clock on one of those perfect mist-steeped summer
mornings that presage a day of burning heat, French's force came in
sight of the Boer laagers. As the mist cleared the enemy could be
spied in large numbers about the station and the colliery buildings
and over the yellow veldt. French ordered the Natal Battery to turn
its little seven-pounder on the station. One of the first shots told;
and the Boers came tumbling out of their shelter, leaving the
trainload of British soldiers, captured the previous night, free to
join their comrades. Soon afterwards the station was in the hands of
the British, as the result of a dashing cavalry charge.
But the Boers were only temporarily dislodged. Their long range guns
very soon shelled the station from the neighbouring kopjes with deadly
effect. French was compelled to withdraw. The stupidity of the enemy,
in leaving the telegraph wires uncut, enabled him immediately to
acquaint Sir George White with the peril of his situation. White's
orders were emphatic: "The enemy must be beaten and driven off. Time
of great importance." The necessary reinforcements were hurried to the
spot.
[Page Heading: IN HIS ELEMENT]
French did not wait for their arrival before striking at the enemy.
The Light Horse, under Colonel Scott Chisholme, quickly took
possession of a low ridge near the railway station, which fronted the
main line of the enemy's kopjes. While he held this ridge French had
the satisfaction of seeing infantry, cavalry and artillery coming up
the railway line to his assistance. In the late afternoon his force
numbered something like three thousand five hundred men, outnumbering
the enemy by more than two to one.
Those who ask why so many men were required, do not understand the
position in which the British force found itself. The enemy were
entrenched on a series of high, boulder-strewn tablelands, which
offered almost perfect cover. Between these tablelands and French's
force lay a wide and partly scrubless stretch of veldt. Over that
terrible exposed slope his men must go, before they could come within
useful range of the enemy. French was faced with a most perilous and
difficult enterprise. However, that is precisely what French likes. He
rose to the situation with ready resource. It was not easy to locate
the exact position of the enemy ensconced amid these covering hills.
So in the afternoon he ordered a simultaneous frontal and flank
attack. Just which was front and which was flank it was for his
lieutenants to discover. Sir Ian Hamilton's instructions to the
infantry were brief but decisive. "The enemy are there," he said, "and
I hope you will shift them out before sunset--in fact, I know you
will."
When the action had fairly commenced, Sir George White and his staff
galloped over from Ladysmith. French approached, saluted, and asked
for instructions. The chivalrous White's only reply was, "Go on,
French; this is your show." All the afternoon he stayed on the field,
watching the progress of events, and approving French's dispositions.
The battle proved to be, in many ways, one of the most spectacular in
history. For as the infantry advanced, under a steady hail of shell
and bullets, the sky began to darken. The Boer positions stood
silhouetted by stray puffs of white smoke against a lowering cumulus
of clouds. While the artillery on both sides shook the ground with an
inferno of sound, the storm burst. The thunder of the heavens became a
spasmodic chorus to the roar of the guns. One correspondent has
described how he found himself mechanically humming the "Ride of the
Valkyries" that was being played on such a dread orchestra. Slipping
and stumbling, cursing and cheering, the Devons crept forward across
the sodden grass. Many of the bravest, among them Chisholme, went down
on that plain of death. Far beyond the level veldt there were
something like 800 feet to climb in the face of Mauser and shrapnel.
At length, however, the top of the ridge was reached. There stood the
three guns that had wrought such havoc, now silent among the corpses
of the frock-coated burghers who had served them.
[Page Heading: THE WHITE FLAG TRICK]
The Boers still kept up the fight, however, on the further side of the
plateau. The cheering Gordons, the Manchesters and the Devons now
flung themselves at the remnant of the foe. Suddenly a white flag was
seen to flutter defeat from a kopje beyond the laager. On the instant
the soldiers paused at the surprising notes of the "Cease fire,"
followed by the "Retire." For a moment they wavered between discipline
and dismay. At that instant from a small kopje east of the nek came a
violent burst of firing as some fifty of the enemy made a last effort
to regain their position.
There was a momentary panic in the British lines. But a little bugler
shouted "Retire be damned," and sounded the "Advance." Gradually the
infantry recovered, and the Gordons and Devons, rushing on the enemy,
took a fearful revenge for the dastardly trick.
French had scored his first victory within a day of his arrival. What
wonder if men called him "French the lucky?" From now onwards that
tradition was to cling to his name. But a great deal more than luck
went to the winning of Elandslaagte. Had French not advanced his men
throughout in open formation, the day might never have been his. It
has been said that he was our only general to master the Boer methods.
He was certainly the first and the most able imitator of those
methods. But he was prepared to meet them before he ever stepped on
South African soil. For his whole theory of cavalry tactics is based
on the realisation that massive formations are now hopelessly out of
date.
[Page Heading: LUCK OR BRAINS]
One of the newspaper correspondents[8] happened to run across French
twice during the battle. He tells how at the end of the engagement he
met the General, who had come along the ridge in the fighting line of
the Manchesters and Gordons, and offered him his congratulations on
the day. He adds: "Last time I had met him was when the artillery on
both sides were hard at it; he appeared then more like a man playing a
game of chess than a game of war, and was not too busy to sympathise
with me on the badness of the light when he saw me trying to take
snap-shots of the Boer shells bursting amid the Imperial Light Horse
near us."
French's luck lay in his ability to see his opportunities and grasp
them. But the soldier will never be convinced on that point, even if
French himself attempt his conversion. For him the British leader has
remained "The luckiest man in the army" ever since Elandslaagte. Yet
in a letter to Lady French after the engagement he had written, "I
never thought I would come out alive."
As frequently happened in the South African campaign, success could
not be followed up. Having cleared the railway line, French was unable
to garrison his position, and returned next morning to Ladysmith. A
couple of days later he was again in action, and again he was
successful. It had become necessary to keep the way open for General
Yule and his jaded forces now in retreat from Dundee. White determined
to sally out and distract the enemy. Once again the heavy share of the
work fell on French and his cavalry.
Marching out from the town towards Modder Spruit they found the enemy
holding a range of hills about seven miles from Ladysmith.
Flanked by the artillery, and supported from the rear by rifle fire,
the infantry advanced to a convenient ridge from which the Boer
position might be shelled. There they were joined by the field and
mountain batteries, whose well-directed fire played great havoc among
the enemy.
During the engagement one costly mistake was made. The Gloucesters on
reaching the summit of the slope, attempted to descend on the other
side. Their advancing lines were ploughed down by a deadly fire. "In
the first three minutes," said an eye-witness, "Colonel Wilford, who
was commanding the regiment, had fallen shot through the head, and a
number of the men lay dead and dying about him. So fierce was the
attack that no living thing could have remained upon the exposed
slope, which boasted not even a shred of cover of any kind." Slowly
and silently the Gloucesters retired.
By two o'clock the infantry fire had ceased, and White had received
news that Yule was nearing Ladysmith in safety. He therefore decided
to withdraw his troops. This was no easy matter, for the Boers,
instead of relinquishing their position, had merely retired for a
short distance. The retreat, however, was safely carried out, thanks
largely to the masterly fashion in which French's cavalry covered the
retirement.
From a military point of view the engagement would scarcely be called
important. But from a strategic point of view it was invaluable. It
certainly saved General Yule's force, which the Boers would otherwise
have cut off on its way to Ladysmith. This would scarcely have been
difficult, for the column was in no condition to fight. That it
covered twenty-three miles without food, water, or rest before
nightfall in its exhausted condition was in itself remarkable.
[Page Heading: THE ONLY GENERAL]
This was the last successful engagement that the British forces were
to fight for many a day. But that was not French's fault. In the first
week after his arrival he had scored two distinct successes and won
for himself a reputation among the Boers. He was indeed the only
British general for whom they at that time expressed the very
slightest respect. In a week his name became a by-word among them. A
soldier[9] has recorded how, when towns or railway stations were
captured, our men would find allusions to French chalked on the wall.
Thus: "We are not fighting the English--they don't count--we are only
fighting the 'French.'" Quite early in the campaign this inscription
was found on the wall of a Boer farm house: "Why are we bound to win?
Because although we have only 90,000 burghers, that means 90,000
generals--but the English, though they have 200,000 soldiers, have
only one General--and he is French." That was in the days before
Roberts and Kitchener were on the scene.
But the Boers were not alone in their appreciation of French. One of
the authorities of the German General Staff wrote of him "His
(French's) name was one of those most dreaded by the enemy," and "he
impressed his personality on the troops." Perhaps the best description
of the man ever penned, however, came from the brilliant American
journalist, Julian Ralph. "As to his personality, the phrase 'The
square little General' would serve to describe him in army circles
without a mention of his name.
"He is quiet, undemonstrative, easy, and gentle. When you are under
his command you don't notice him, you don't think about him--unless
you are a soldier, and then you are glad you are there."[10]
FOOTNOTES:
[8] The correspondent referred to is Mr. George Lynch.
[9] "A.D.C." _The Regiment_.
[10] In the _Daily Mail_.
CHAPTER V
THE TIDE TURNS
White's Dash from Ladysmith--Nicholson's Nek--The Reverse at
Lombard's Kop--A Cavalry Exploit--French's Dramatic Escape
from Ladysmith.
So far the tide of battle had flowed fairly equally between the two
armies. Thanks to French, White had won the two engagements which he
had to undertake in order to save Yule's column. In Ladysmith he had
now an admirably proportioned force of 10,000 men, quite adequate for
the town's defence. Across the Atlantic an Army Corps was hastening to
his succour. He had only to sit still and wait in Ladysmith,
fortifying it with all the ingenuity that time would permit.
Unfortunately he was not content to sit still and wait behind his
entrenchments. He determined not to be hemmed in without a struggle.
Be it remembered that at that time the British commanders had not
fully realised the numbers, the equipment and the intrepidity of
their opponents. The traditional chastening of experience was still
wanting. As Napier has it, "In the beginning of each war England has
to seek in blood the knowledge necessary to ensure success; and, like
the fiend's progress towards Eden, her conquering course is through
chaos followed by death."
It was a very beautiful if a rather optimistic plan of attack that
White arranged for the morning of October 30. He divided his forces
into three columns. During the night of the 29th Colonel Carleton,
with the Irish Fusiliers and the Gloucesters, was to advance upon and
seize a long ridge called Nicholson's Nek, some six miles north of
Ladysmith. This would protect his left wing. On the right flank the
infantry were to advance under cover of French's cavalry and mounted
infantry, while the artillery was to advance in the centre.
Provided that all went well the plan was of course superb. No sooner
had the main army won their action at Lombard's Cop than it would
swing round to the right and wedge the Boers in between its artillery
and the force on Nicholson's Nek. But suppose anything happened to
Carleton? Or suppose that the main action was lost? In either case
disaster would be inevitable. In the event, French was alone able to
stick to his time table. Misfortune befell both Carleton on the left,
and Grimwood on the right.
[Page Heading: THE MULES BOLT]
At 10.0 p.m. Carleton was on the march; and two and a half hours later
Grimwood's brigade had set out eastward. By some mistake two of his
battalions followed the artillery to the left instead of taking the
infantry route. Of that error Grimwood remained in ignorance until he
reached his destination near the south eastern flank of Long Hill
towards dawn. Soon afterwards the Gordon Highlanders were amazed to
find an officer in their ranks from Carleton's column, jaded and
spent. He reported that all the mules of his battery had bolted and
had not been recovered.
The day had begun with a double disaster. Grimwood's force was not all
at White's disposal; Carleton's was not to appear at all. Never had a
general's plans gone more thoroughly agley.
Of the unequal engagement which ensued little need be said here. A
ludicrously insufficient force was attempting to encircle a larger and
better equipped one. The result was not long in doubt. Although
White's forty-two guns pounded away bravely, they were no match for
the heavy artillery of the enemy. One huge Creusot gun had been
dragged to the top of Pepworth Hill whence it threw a 96lb. shell a
distance of four miles. There were also several 40 lb. howitzers which
hopelessly outranged the British guns.
From a front over eight miles in extent there poured in a converging
artillery fire against which our guns could do nothing. Gradually the
right flank was pushed back along with the centre; and the left flank
was now non-existent. During the afternoon the inevitable retirement
took place, under the Creusot's shells. Had not Captain Hedworth
Lambton rapidly silenced the gun on Pepworth Hill with his naval
battery, opportunely arrived at the critical moment, the retreat might
well have been a rout. As it was the tired force which wandered back
to Ladysmith had left 300 men on the field.
Irretrievable disaster had overtaken Carleton's column. While
breasting Nicholson's Nek in the darkness the men were surprised at
the sudden clattering by of a Boer picquet. The transport mules,
panic-stricken, fled _en masse_, wrecking the column as they stampeded
down the hillside, felling men as they went. It was a gunless,
ammunitionless and weary column which the Boers surprised in the early
morning. The end was the surrender of the force to the enemy.
[Page Heading: A BRILLIANT SUCCESS]
The British position was now serious. Nothing could prevent Sir George
White and his forces from being cooped in either Colenso or Ladysmith.
But it is typical of French that he found a last opportunity of
out-manoeuvring the Boers before leaving Ladysmith. In the battle of
Lombard's Cop his cavalry had taken but a small part. Had some of
them, however, been sent with Carlton's column to keep it in touch
with the base, the issue of its enterprise might possibly have been
different.
A couple of days afterwards, on November
|
the above conclusion cannot be
gainsaid on theoretical grounds, nor can the conclusions be ignored
to which they lead. They enable us to make calculations concerning
the average number of kinsfolk in each and every specified degree in
a stationary population, or, if desired, in one that increases or
decreases at a specified rate. It will here be supposed for
convenience that the average number of males and females are equal,
but any other proportion may be substituted. The calculations only
regard its fertile members; they show that every person has, on the
average, about one male fertile relative in each and every form of
specific kinship.
Kinsfolk may be divided into direct ancestry, collaterals of all
kinds, and direct descendants. As regards the direct ancestry, each
person has one and only one ancestor in each specific degree, one
_fa_, one _fa fa_, one _me fa_, and so on, although in each _generic_
degree it is otherwise; he has two grandfathers, four
great-grandfathers, etc. With collaterals and descendants the average
number of _fertile_ relatives in each specified degree must be
stationary in a stationary population, and calculation shows that
number is approximately _one_. The calculation takes no cognizance of
infertile relatives, and so its results are unaffected by the detail
whether the population is kept stationary by an increased birth-rate
of children or other infertiles, accompanied by an increased
death-rate among them, or contrariwise.
The exact conclusions were ("Nature," September 29, 1904, p. 529),
that if 2_d_ be the number of children in a family, half of them _on
the average_ being male, and if the population be stationary, the
number of fertile males in each specific ancestral kinship would be
_one_, in each collateral it would be _d_-½, in each descending
kinship _d_. If 2_d_ = 5 (which is a common size of family), one of
these on the average would be a fertile son, one a fertile daughter,
and the three that remained would leave no issue. They would either
die as boys or girls or they would remain unmarried, or, if married,
would have no children.
The reasonable and approximate assumption I now propose to make is
that the number of fertile individuals is not grossly different to
that of those who live long enough to have an opportunity of
distinguishing themselves. Consequently, the calculations that apply
to fertile persons will be held to apply very roughly to those who
were in a position, so far as age is concerned, to achieve
noteworthiness, whether they did so or not. Thus, if a group of 100
men had between them 20 noteworthy paternal uncles, it will be
assumed that the total number of their paternal uncles who reached
mature age was about 100, making the intensity of success as 20 to
100, or as 1 to 5. This method of roughly evading the serious
difficulty arising from ignorance of the true values in the
individual cases is quite legitimate, and close enough for present
purposes.
CHAPTER VIII.--NUMBER OF NOTEWORTHY KINSMEN IN EACH DEGREE.
The materials with which I am dealing do not admit of adequately
discussing noteworthiness in women, whose opportunities of achieving
distinction are far fewer than those of men, and whose energies are
more severely taxed by domestic and social duties. Women have
sometimes been accredited in these returns by a member of their own
family circle, as being gifted with powers at least equal to those of
their distinguished brothers, but definite facts in corroboration of
such estimates were rarely supplied.
The same absence of solid evidence is more or less true of gifted
youths whose scholastic successes, unless of the highest order, are a
doubtful indication of future power and performance, these depending
much on the length of time during which their minds will continue to
develop. Only a few of the Subjects of the pedigrees in the following
pages have sons in the full maturity of their powers, so it seemed
safer to exclude all relatives who were of a lower generation than
themselves from the statistical inquiry. This will therefore be
confined to the successes of fathers, brothers, grandfathers, uncles,
great-uncles, great-grandfathers, and male first cousins.
Only 207 persons out of the 467 who were addressed sent serviceable
replies, and these cannot be considered a fair sample of the whole.
Abstention might have been due to dislike of publicity, to inertia,
or to pure ignorance, none of which would have much affected the
values as a sample; but an unquestionably common motive does so
seriously--namely, when the person addressed had no noteworthy
kinsfolk to write about. On the latter ground the 260 who did not
reply would, as a whole, be poorer in noteworthy kinsmen than the 207
who did. The true percentages for the 467 lie between two limits:
the upper limit supposes the richness of the 207 to be shared by the
260; the lower limit supposes it to be concentrated in the 207, the
remaining 260 being utterly barren of it. Consequently, the upper
limit is found by multiplying the number of observations by 100 and
dividing by 207, the lower by multiplying by 100 and dividing by 467.
These limits are unreasonably wide; I cannot guess which is the more
remote from the truth, but it cannot be far removed from their mean
values, and this may be accepted as roughly approximate. The
observations and conclusions from them are given in Table VII., p. xl.
CHAPTER IX.--MARKED AND UNMARKED DEGREES OF NOTEWORTHINESS.
Persons who are technically "noteworthy" are by no means of equal
eminence, some being of the highest distinction, while others barely
deserve the title. It is therefore important to ascertain the amount
of error to which a statistical discussion is liable that treats
everyone who ranks as noteworthy at all on equal terms. The problem
resembles a familiar one that relates to methods for electing
Parliamentary representatives, such as have been proposed at various
times, whether it should be by the coarse method of one man one vote,
or through some elaborate arrangement which seems highly preferable
at first sight, but may be found on further consideration to lead to
much the same results.
In order to test the question, I marked each noteworthy person whose
name occurs in the list of sixty-six families at the end of this book
with 3, 2, or 1, according to what I considered his deserts, and soon
found that it was easy to mark them with fair consistency. It is not
necessary to give the rules which guided me, as they were very often
modified by considerations, each obvious enough in itself, but
difficult to summarize as a whole. Various provisional trials were
made; I then began afresh by rejecting a few names as undeserving any
mark at all, and, having marked the remainder individually, found
that a total of 657 marks had been awarded to 332 persons; 117 of
them had received 3 marks; 101, 2 marks; 104, 1 mark; so the three
subdivisions were approximately equal in number. The marks being too
few to justify detailed treatment, I have grouped the kinsmen into
first, second, and third degrees, and into first cousins, the latter
requiring a group to themselves. The first degree contains father and
brothers; the second, grandfathers and uncles; the third,
great-grandparents and great-uncles. The results are shown in Table
VI. The marks assigned to each of the groups are given in the first
line (total 657), and the number of the noteworthy persons in each
group who received any mark at all is shown in the third line (total
329). In order to compare the first and third lines of entries on
equal terms, those in the first were multiplied by 329 and divided by
657, and then entered in the second line. The closeness of
resemblance between the second and third lines emphatically answers
the question to be solved. There is no significant difference between
the results of the marked and the unmarked observations. The reason
probably is that the distribution of triple, double, and single marks
separately is much the same in each of the groups, and therefore
remains alike when the three sets of marks are in use at the same
time. It is thus made clear that trouble taken in carefully marking
names for different degrees of noteworthiness would be wasted in such
a rough inquiry as this.
TABLE VI.--COMPARISON OF RESULTS WITH AND WITHOUT
MARKS IN THE SIXTY-FIVE FAMILIES.
___________________________________________________________________
| | | | | | |
| | First | Second | Third | First | Total |
| | Degree.| Degree.| Degree.| Cousins.| |
|______________________|________|________|________|_________|_______|
| | | | | | |
|Number of marks | 225 | 208 | 102 | 122 | 657 |
| assigned | | | | | |
|______________________|________|________|________|_________|_______|
| | | | | | |
|Number of marks | | | | | |
| reduced | | | | | |
| proportionately | 113 | 104 | 51 | 61 | 329 |
|Number of individuals | | | | | |
| unmarked | 110 | 112 | 46 | 61 | 329 |
|______________________|________|________|________|_________|_______|
| | | | | | |
| Mean | 111 | 108 | 49 | 61 | 329 |
|______________________|________|________|________|_________|_______|
Table VII., in the next chapter, affords an interesting illustration
of the character of the ignorance concerning the noteworthiness of
kinsmen in distant degrees, showing that it is much lessened when
they bear the same surname as their father, or even as the maiden
surname of their mother. The argument is this: Table V. has already
shown that _me bros_ are, speaking roughly, as frequently noteworthy
as _fa bros_--fifty-two of the one to forty-five of the other--so
noteworthiness is so far an equal characteristic of the maternal and
paternal lines, resembling in that respect nearly all the qualities
that are transmitted purely through heredity. There ought, therefore,
to be as many persons recorded as noteworthy in each of the four
different kinds of great-grandparents. The same should be the case in
each of the four kinds of great-uncles. But this is not so in either
case. The noteworthy great-grandfathers, _fa fa fa_, who bear the
same name as the subject are twice as numerous as the _me fa fa_ who
bear the maiden surname of the mother, and more than five times as
numerous as either of the other two, the _fa me fa_ and _me me fa_,
whose surnames differ from both, unless it be through some accident,
whether of a cross marriage or a chance similarity of names. It is
just the same with the great-uncles. Now, the figures for
great-grandfathers and great-uncles run so closely alike that they
may fairly be grouped together, in order to obtain a more impressive
whole--namely, two sorts of these kinsmen, bearing the same name as
the Subject, contain between them 23 noteworthies, or 11.50 each; two
sorts having the mother's maiden surname contain together 11
noteworthies, or 5.50 each; four sorts containing between them 7
names, or an average of 1.75 each. These figures are self-consistent,
being each the sum of two practically equal constituents, and they
are sufficiently numerous to be significant. The remarkable
differences in their numbers, 11.50, 5.50, 1.75, when they ought to
have been equal, has therefore to be accounted for, and the
explanation given above seems both reasonable and sufficient.
CHAPTER X.--CONCLUSIONS.
The most casual glance at Table VII. leaves no doubt as to the rapid
diminution in the frequency of noteworthiness as the distance of
kinship to the F.R.S. increases, and it would presumably do the same
to any other class of noteworthy persons.
In drawing more exact conclusions, the returns must be deemed to
refer not to a group of 207 F.R.S., because they are not a fair
sample of the whole body of 467, and, for reasons already given, they
are too rich in noteworthiness for the one and too poor for the
other. They will, therefore, be referred to the number that is the
mean of these two limits--namely, to 337. I am aware of no obvious
guidance to any better hypothesis.
The value of the expectation that noteworthiness would be found in
any specified kinsman of an F.R.S., of whom nothing else is known,
may be easily calculated from Table VII. on the two hypotheses
already mentioned and justified: (1) That the figures should be taken
to refer to 337, and not to 207; (2) that 1 per cent. of the
generality are noteworthy--that is to say, there are 3.37
noteworthies to every 337 persons of the generality.
TABLE VII.--NUMBER OF NOTEWORTHY KINSMEN RECORDED
IN 207 RETURNS.
__________________________________________________________
| | || | |
| Kinship. | Numbers || Kinship. | Numbers |
| | Recorded.|| | Recorded. |
|_________________|__________||________________| __________|
| | || | |
| _fa_ | 81 || --- | --- |
| _bro_ | 104 || --- | --- |
| | || | |
| _fa fa_ | 40 || _fa fa fa_ | 11 |
| _me fa_ | 42 || _fa me fa_ | 2 |
| _fa bro_ | 45 || _me fa fa_ | 5 |
| _me bro_ | 52 || _me me fa_ | 1 |
| | || | |
| _fa bro son_ | 30 || _fa fa bro_ | 12 |
| _me bro son_ | 19 || _fa me bro_ | 2 |
| _fa si son_ | 28 || _me fa bro_ | 6 |
| _me si son_ | 22 || _me me bro_ | 2 |
|_________________|__________||________________|___________|
Thus, for the fathers of F.R.S., 81 are recorded as noteworthy,
against 3.37 of fathers of the generality--that is, they are 24.1
times as numerous. For the first cousins of F.R.S. there are 99
noteworthies, divided amongst four kinds of male first-cousins, or
24.75 on an average to each kind, against the 3.37 of the
generality--that is, they are 7.3 times as numerous.
On this principle the expectation of noteworthiness in a kinsman of
an F.R.S. (or of other noteworthy person) is greater in the following
proportion than in one who has no such kinsman: If he be a father, 24
times as great; if a brother, 31 times; if a grandfather, 12 times;
if an uncle, 14 times; if a male first cousin, 7 times; if a
great-great-grandfather on the paternal line, 3½ times.
The reader may work out results for himself on other hypotheses as to
the percentage of noteworthiness among the generality. A considerably
larger proportion would be noteworthy in the higher classes of
society, but a far smaller one in the lower; it is to the bulk, say,
to three-quarters of them, that the 1 per cent. estimate applies, the
extreme variations from it tending to balance one another.
The figures on which the above calculations depend may each or all of
them be changed to any reasonable amount, without shaking the truth
of the great fact upon which Eugenics is based, that able fathers
produce able children in a much larger proportion than the
generality.
* * * * *
The parents of the 207 Fellows of the Royal Society occupy a wide
variety of social positions. A list is given in the Appendix of the
more or less noteworthy parents of those Fellows whose names occur in
the list of sixty-six families. The parents are classified according
to their pursuits. Many parents of the other Fellows in the 207
families were not noteworthy in the technical sense of the word, but
were reported to be able. It was also often said in the replies that
the general level of ability among the members of the family of the
F.R.S. was high. Other parents were in no way remarkable, so the
future Fellow was simply a "sport," to use the language of
horticulturists and breeders, in respect to his taste and ability. It
is to be remembered that "sports" are transmissible by heredity, and
have been, through careful selection, the origin of most of the
valuable varieties of domesticated plants and animals. Sports have
been conspicuous in the human race, especially in some individuals of
the highest eminence in music, painting, and in art generally, but
this is not the place to enter further into so large a subject. It
has been treated at length by many writers, especially by Bateson and
De Vries, also by myself in the third chapter of "Natural
Inheritance" and in the preface to the second edition of "Hereditary
Genius."
NOTEWORTHY FAMILIES OF
FELLOWS OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY
LIVING IN 1904.
#AVEBURY#, Lord. See LUBBOCK.
#BALFOUR#, Right Hon. Arthur James (b. 1848), P.C., etc., F.R.S.,
Leader of the House of Commons, 1895; Prime Minister, 1902;
President of the British Association, 1904; author of "The
Foundations of Belief." [For fuller references, see "Who's Who"
and numerous other biographies.]
_bro_, Francis Maitland BALFOUR (1851-1882), F.R.S., Professor of
Animal Morphology at Cambridge; brilliant investigator in embryology;
gold medal, Royal Society, 1881; killed by a fall in the Alps.
_bro_, Right Hon. Gerald W. BALFOUR (b. 1853), P.C., Fellow of
Trinity College, Cambridge; President of the Board of Trade, 1902.
_si_, Eleanor Mildred (Mrs. Henry SIDGWICK), Principal of Newnham
College, Cambridge.
_si_, Evelyn, wife of LORD RAYLEIGH, F.R.S., and mother of Hon.
Robert John STRUTT, F.R.S. (q.v.).
_me bro_, 3rd Marquis of SALISBURY, Robert A.T. GASCOIGNE-CECIL
(1830-1903), K.G., P.C., etc., F.R.S.; eminent statesman; Prime
Minister, 1885-1886, 1886, 1895-1903; Chancellor of the University of
Oxford; President of the British Association, 1894; in earlier life
essayist and critic; also an experimenter in electricity.
It is difficult to distinguish those in the able family of the Cecils
whose achievements were due to sheer ability from those who were
largely helped by social influence. A second _me bro_ and five _me
bro sons_ are recorded in "Who's Who."
Sir Robert Stawell #BALL#, LL.D., F.R.S. (b. 1840), Lowndean Prof.
of Astronomy and Geometry, Cambridge; Fellow of King's College,
Cambridge; Member of the Council of the Senate; Director of the
Cambridge Observatory since 1892; Royal Astronomer of Ireland,
1874-1892; Ex-President of Royal Astronomical Soc., Mathematical
Assoc., and of Royal Zoological Soc. of Ireland; author of many
works on astronomical, mathematical, and physical
subjects.--["Who's Who."]
_fa_, Robert BALL (1802-1857), Hon. LL.D., Trinity Coll.,
distinguished naturalist; Secretary of Royal Zoological Soc. of
Ireland; President of Geological Soc. of Ireland; Director of
Trinity Coll. Museum, 1844.--["Dict. N. Biog."]
_bro_, Valentine BALL, LL.D., C.B., F.R.S. (1843-1895); on staff of
Geological Survey of India, 1864-1880; Prof. of Geology and
Mineralogy in the University of Dublin, 1880-1882; Director and
Organizer of National Museum, Dublin, 1882-1895; author of "Jungle
Life in India," of an elaborate treatise on the economic geology of
India, and of "Diamonds and Gold of India."--["Obit. Notice, P.R.S.,"
1895.]
_bro_, Sir Charles Bent BALL, M.D., M.Ch., F.R.C.S.I., Hon. F.R.C.S.,
England; Regius Professor of Surgery, Univ. of Dublin; Surgeon to Sir
Patrick Dun's Hospital, and Honorary Surgeon to the King in Ireland;
author of various surgical works.--["Who's Who."]
_me bro son_, Ames HELLICAR, the successful manager of the leading
bank in Sydney, N.S.W.
Thomas George #BARING#, first Earl of NORTHBROOK (1826-1904), P.C.,
D.C.L., LL.D., F.R.S.; Under-Secretary of State for India, Home
Department, and for War; Viceroy of India, 1872-1876; First Lord
of the Admiralty, 1880-1885.--["Who's Who," and "Ency. Brit."]
_fa fa fa_, Sir Francis BARING (1710-1810), Chairman of East India
Company, 1792-1793; created baronet 1793.--["Dict. N. Biog."]
_fa fa bro_, Alexander BARING, first Baron ASHBURTON (1774-1848),
financier and statesman; head for many years of Baring Brothers and
Co.; member of Sir Robert Peel's Cabinet of 1835; raised to peerage
1835; Commissioner to U.S.A., 1842, for Settlement "Ashburton Treaty"
of Boundary Dispute.--["Dict. N. Biog."]
_me me_, Hon. Lady GREY, née WHITBREAD (1770-1858), prominent in
every work of Christian philanthropy during twenty-four years in the
Commissioner's house in Plymouth, afterwards in Ireland.--["Record"
newspaper, May 26, 1858.]
_fa_, Francis Thornhill BARING (1786-1866), first Baron NORTHBROOK,
double first at Oxford, 1817; First Lord of the Admiralty.--["Dict.
N. Biog."]
_fa bro_, Thomas BARING (1799-1873), financier; refused
Chancellorship of Exchequer, also a peerage; head for many years of
Baring Brothers and Co.--["Dict. N. Biog."]
_fa bro_, Charles BARING (1807-1879), double first at Oxford, 1829;
Bishop of Gloucester and Bristol, 1856, of Durham, 1861.--["Dict. N.
Biog."]
_fa fa bro son_, Evelyn BARING (b. 1841), first Earl CROMER, P.C.,
son of H. Baring, M.P.; passed first into staff college from Royal
Artillery; made successively Baron, Viscount, and Earl, for services
in Egypt.--["Who's Who," and "Ency. Brit."]
_fa fa si son_, Henry LABOUCHERE (1798-1869), first Baron TAUNTON,
first-class "Greats" at Oxford; Cabinet Minister under Lord Melbourne
and Lord John Russell; raised to peerage 1859.--["Dict. N. Biog."]
_me bro_, Sir George GREY (1799-1882), Home Secretary 1846-1852,
1855-1858, 1861-1866; carried the Bill that abolished transportation.
_me fa bro_, Charles GREY (1764-1845), second Earl GREY, Prime
Minister; carried the Reform Bill.--["Dict. N. Biog."]
_me si son_, Sir Edward JENKINSON (b. 1835), K.C.B., Private
Secretary to Lord Spencer when Lord Lieutenant of Ireland.--["Who's
Who."]
Descended from _fa fa fa bro_, Rev. S. BARING-GOULD (b. 1834),
author of numerous novels and works on theology and history.--["Who's
Who."]
William Thomas #BLANFORD#, LL.D., F.R.S.; (1832-1905), on staff of
Geological Survey of India, 1855-1882; accompanied Abyssinian
Expedition and Persian Boundary Commission; sometime President of
Geological Society and of Asiatic Soc. of Bengal, also of
Geological Section British Assoc.; author of works dealing with
the geology and zoology of Abyssinia, Persia, and India.--["Who's
Who."]
_fa_, William BLANFORD, established a manufacturing business in
London, and was a founder, and for many years Chairman, of the Thames
Plate Glass Company.
_me bro_, Alfred SIMPSON, established a large and successful
manufacturing business in Adelaide, S. Australia.
_bro_, Henry Francis BLANFORD, F.R.S., for many years at the head of
the Indian Meteorological Department, which he originally organized.
Right Hon. Charles #BOOTH# (b. 1840), P.C., F.R.S., economist and
statistician; President of the Royal Statistical Soc., 1892-1894;
originated and carried through a co-operative inquiry in minute
detail into the houses and occupations of the inhabitants of
London, which resulted in the volumes "Life and Labour of the
People of London"; author of memoirs on allied subjects. ["Ency.
Brit.," xxvi. 306; "Who's Who."]
_fa fa_, Thomas BOOTH, successful merchant and shipowner at
Liverpool.
_fa bro_, Henry BOOTH (1788-1869), railway projector; co-operated
with Stephenson in applying steam to locomotion, published much
relating to railways, and invented mechanical contrivances still in
use on railways; secretary and then railway director.--["Dict. N.
Biog.," v. 382.]
_fa bro_, James BOOTH (1796-1880), C.B., Parliamentary draughtsman;
became Permanent Secretary to the Board of Trade.
_me si son_, Charles CROMPTON, Fourth Wrangler, Q.C., and for some
years M.P. for the Leek Division of Staffordshire.
_me si son_, Henry CROMPTON, a leader in the Positivist Community;
authority on Trades Union Law, and author of "Industrial
Conciliation."
_me si son_, Sir Henry Enfield ROSCOE, F.R.S. (q.v.)
Robert Holford Macdowall #BOSANQUET#, F.R.S. (b. 1841). Fellow of
St. John's Coll., Oxford; author of many mathematical and
physical memoirs, chiefly in the "Philosophical Magazine."
_fa fa bro_, Sir John Bernard BOSANQUET (1773-1847), Judge of Common
Pleas, 1830; Lord Commissioner of Great Seal, 1835-1836.--["Dict. N.
Biog."]
_bro_, Bernard BOSANQUET (b. 1848), Prof. of Moral Philosophy, St.
Andrews, since 1903; formerly Fellow of University Coll., Oxford;
worked in connection with Charity Organization Society; author of
many books on philosophy.--["Who's Who."]
_bro_, Vice-Admiral Day Hort BOSANQUET (b. 1843),
Commander-in-Chief West Indian Station since 1904; previously
Commander-in-Chief East Indian.--["Who's Who."]
_fa son_, Charles Bertie Pulleine BOSANQUET (b. 1834), a founder
and the first secretary of the Charity Organization Society.
_me fa bro_, Hay MACDOWALL (d. 1806), Commander-in-Chief of Madras
Presidency.
_fa son son_, Robert Carr BOSANQUET (b. 1871), archæologist,
director of British School of Archæology at Athens.
_me si son_, Ralph DUNDAS, head of large and influential firm of
Dundas and Wilson, Writers to the Signet, Edinburgh. His relatives on
his father's side include his--
_fa_, John DUNDAS, worked up the business of Dundas and Wilson
into its present position.
_fa fa son_, Sir David DUNDAS (1799-1877), Judge-Advocate-General
and Privy Councillor, 1849.--["Dict. N. Biog."]
_fa fa son_, George DUNDAS, Judge in Scotch Courts under the
title of Lord MANOR.
_fa fa son son_, David DUNDAS, K.C. (b. 1854), Judge in Scotch
Courts under the title of Lord DUNDAS; Solicitor-General for
Scotland, 1903.--["Who's Who."]
James Thomson #BOTTOMLEY# (Hon. LL.D., Glasgow), D.Sc., F.R.S.,
electrical engineer (1870-1899); Arnott and Thomson, Demonstrator
in the University of Glasgow.--["Who's Who."]
_me fa_, James THOMSON.
_me bro_, William THOMSON, Lord Kelvin, F.R.S.
_me bro_, James THOMSON, F.R.S.
See THOMSON for the above.
Sir Dietrich #BRANDIS# (b. 1824), K.C.I.E., F.R.S., Superintendent
of Forests, British Burmah, 1856-1864; Inspector-General of
Forests to the Government of India, 1864-1883.--["Who's Who."]
_fa fa_, Joachim Dietrich BRANDIS, born at Hildesheim, where his
ancestors had governed the town as Burgemeister for centuries;
practised medicine at Brunswick, Driburg, and Pyrmont; Professor of
Pathology at Kiel; ultimately physician to the Queen of Denmark.
_fa_, Christian August BRANDIS, secretary of the Prussian Legation in
Rome, 1818; afterwards Professor of Philosophy at Bonn; went to
Athens, 1837-1839, as confidential adviser to King Otho, partly with
regard to the organization of schools and colleges in Greece; author
of a "History of Greek Philosophy."
_me bro_, Friedrich HAUSMANN, Professor of Mineralogy and Geology at
Göttingen; author of a "Handbook of Mineralogy."
_bro_, Johannes BRANDIS, for many years Kabinetsrath of H.M. Empress
Augusta, Queen of Prussia.
_me si son_, Julius VON HARTMANN, commanded a cavalry division in the
Franco-German War; after the war was Governor of Strasburg.
Alexander Crum #BROWN# (b. 1838), M.D., D.Sc., LL.D., F.R.S.,
Professor of Chemistry at Edinburgh University since 1869;
president of the Chemical Soc., London, 1892-1893.--["Who's
Who."]
_fa fa fa_, John BROWN (1722-1787), of Haddington, Biblical
commentator; as a herd boy taught himself Latin, Greek, and learned
Hebrew with the aid of a teacher, at one time a pedlar; served as a
soldier in the Edinburgh garrison, 1745; minister to the Burgher
congregation at Haddington, 1750-1787; acted as Professor of Divinity
to Burgher students after 1767.--["Dict. N. Biog."]
_fa fa_, John BROWN (1754-1832), Scottish divine; minister of Burgher
church at Whitburn, 1776-1832; wrote memoirs of James Hervey, 1806,
and many religious treatises.--["Dict. N. Biog."]
_fa_, John BROWN (1784-1858), minister of Burgher church at Biggor,
1806; of Secession Church at Edinburgh, 1822; D.D., 1830; Professor
of Exegetics Secession Coll., 1834, and in United Presbyterian Coll.
1847; author of many exegetical commentaries.--["Dict. N. Biog."]
_me bro_, Walter CRUM, F.R.S., manufacturer at Thornliebank, near
Glasgow; a successful man of business and a very able chemist.
_fa son_, John BROWN (1810-1882), M.D., practised in Edinburgh with
success; author of "Horæ Subsecivæ," "Rab and his Friends."--["Dict.
N. Biog."]
_fa si son_, Robert JOHNSTONE (b.1832), D.D., LL.B., Professor of
New Testament Literature and Exegesis in the United Free Church
Coll., Aberdeen; has published works on the New Testament.--["Who's
Who."]
_si son_, Charles STEWART-WILSON, Postmaster-General, Punjab, since
1899.--["India List."]
_me bro son_, Alexander CRUM, managing director of the "Thornliebank
Co.," for some time M.P. for Renfrewshire.
Sir James Crichton #BROWNE# (b. 1840), M.D., LL.D., F.R.S., Lord
Chancellor's Visitor in Lunacy since 1875; Vice-President and
Treasurer Royal Institution since 1889; author of various works
on mental and nervous diseases.--["Who's Who."]
_me fa_, Andrew BALFOUR, successful printer in Edinburgh;
collaborated with Sir David Brewster in production of the "Edinburgh
Encyclopædia," the forerunner of the "Ency. Brit."; one of the
leaders of the Free Church disruption.
_fa_, William Alexander Francis BROWNE, F.R.S.E., physician; largely
instrumental in introducing humane methods for the treatment of the
insane into Scotland; was appointed First Scotch Commissioner in
Lunacy; author of works on mental diseases.
_me bro_, John Hutton BALFOUR (1808-1884), M.D., LL.D., F.R.S. and
F.R.S.E., Professor of Botany at Glasgow, 1841; and at Edinburgh,
1845; wrote botanical text-books.--["Dict. N. Biog."]
_bro_, John Hutton BALFOUR-BROWNE, K.C. (b. 1845), Leader of the
Parliamentary Bar; Registrar and Secretary to Railway Comm., 1874;
author of numerous legal works.--["Who's Who."]
_me bro son_, Isaac Bayley BALFOUR, M.D., D.Sc., LL.D., F.R.S. (b.
1853), King's Botanist in Scotland; Regius Keeper of Royal Botanic
Garden, Edinburgh; Professor of Botany at Glasgow and at Oxford, and
since 1888 at Edinburgh.--["Who's Who."]
Sir John Scott #BURDON-SANDERSON#, Bart., cr. 1899, M.D., D.C.L.,
LL.D., D.Sc., F.R.S.; held a succession of important offices,
beginning with Inspector Med. Dep. Privy Council, 1860-1865;
Superintendent Brown Institution, 1871-1878; Professor of
Physiology University Coll., London, 1874-1882; in Oxford,
1882-1895; President Brit. Assoc., 1893; Regius Professor of
Medicine at Oxford, 1895-1904
|
, scholars, and prelates of the realm, with all the members and
students of the Academy. He was buried near Sir Christopher Wren, in St.
Paul's Cathedral, where Vandyck had already been laid, and where, in
later years, a goodly number of painters have been buried around him. In
1813, a statue, by Flaxman, was erected to his memory near the choir of
the cathedral, and a Latin inscription recounts the talents and virtues
of the great man whom it commemorates.
[Illustration: THE LADIES WALDEGRAVE. (FROM A PAINTING BY SIR JOSHUA
REYNOLDS.)]
Having thus traced the story of Sir Joshua's life, it now remains to
speak of him more especially as an artist.
His highest fame is as a portrait painter, and as such he was a great
genius. He had the power to reproduce the personal peculiarities of his
subjects with great exactness; he was also able to perceive their
qualities of temper, mind, and character, and he made his portraits so
vivid with these attributes that they were likenesses of the minds as
well as of the persons of his subjects. In his portrait of Goldsmith,
self-esteem is as prominent as the nose; passion and energy are in every
line of Burke's face and figure; and whenever his subject possessed any
individual characteristics, they were plainly shown in Reynolds's
portraits. So many of these pictures are famous that we can not speak of
them in detail. Perhaps no one portrait is better known than that of
the famous actress, Mrs. Sarah Siddons, as the Tragic Muse. It is a
noble example of an idealized portrait, and it is said that the "Isaiah"
of Michael Angelo suggested the manner in which it is painted. Sir
Thomas Lawrence declared this to be the finest portrait of a women in
the world, and it is certain that this one picture would have made any
painter famous. Sir Joshua inscribed his name on the border of the robe,
and courteously explained to the lady, "I could not lose the honor this
opportunity afforded me of going down to posterity on the hem of your
garment."
The original of this work is said to be that in the gallery of the Duke
of Westminster; a second is in the Dulwich Gallery. In speaking of Sir
Joshua as a portrait painter, Mr. Ruskin says: "Considered as a painter
of individuality in the human form and mind, I think him the prince of
portrait painters. Titian paints nobler pictures, and Vandyck had nobler
subjects, but neither of them entered so subtly as Sir Joshua did into
the minor varieties of heart and temper."
His portraits of simply beautiful women can scarcely be equaled in the
world. He perfectly reproduced the delicate grace and beauty of some of
his sitters and the brilliant, dazzling charms of others. He loved to
paint richly hued velvets in contrast with rare laces, ermine, feathers,
and jewels. It is a regret that so many of his works are faded, but
after all we must agree with Sir George Beaumont, when he said: "Even a
faded picture from him will be the finest thing you can have."
The most attractive of his works are his pictures of children. It is
true that they too are portraits, but they are often represented in some
fancy part, such as the "Strawberry Girl,"[1] a portrait of his niece
Offy; Muscipula, who holds a mouse-trap; the Little Marchioness; the
Girl with a Mob-cap, and many others. He loved to paint pictures of boys
in all sorts of characters, street-peddlers, gipsies, cherubs, and so
on. He often picked up boy models in the street and painted from them in
his spare hours, between his appointments with sitters. Sometimes he
scarcely hustled a beggar boy out of his chair in time for some grand
lady to seat herself in it. It is said that one day one of these
children fell asleep in so graceful an attitude that the master seized a
fresh canvas and made a sketch of it; this was scarcely done, when the
child threw himself into a different pose without awakening. Sir Joshua
added a second sketch to the first and from these made his beautiful
picture of "The Babes in the Wood." More than two hundred of his
pictures of children have been engraved, and these plates form one of
the loveliest collections that can be made from the works of any one
artist.
[1] An engraving of this picture was given as the frontispiece of
ST. NICHOLAS for April, 1876; and our readers will remember
also the account of Sir Joshua Reynolds's portrait of "Little
Penelope Boothby" in ST. NICHOLAS for November, 1875,
illustrated with a full-page reproduction of the painting.--ED.
When Sir Joshua was at the height of his power, he was accustomed to
receive six sitters a day, and he often completed a portrait in four
hours.
Good prints from his works are now becoming rare and are valuable.
As we close this account of Sir Joshua Reynolds, it is pleasant to
remember that so great a man was so good a man, and to believe that
Burke did not flatter him when, in his eulogy, he said: "In full
affluence of foreign and domestic fame, admired by the expert in art and
by the learned in science, courted by the great, caressed by sovereign
powers, and celebrated by distinguished poets, his native humility,
modesty, and candor never forsook him, even on surprise or provocation;
nor was the least degree of arrogance or assumption visible to the most
scrutinizing eye in any part of his conduct or discourse."
RICHARD WILSON
was another original member of the Academy, and though not the first
English artist who had painted landscapes, he was the first whose
pictures merited the honorable recognition which they now have. Wilson's
story is a sad one; he was not appreciated while he lived, and his whole
life was saddened by seeing the works of foreign artists, which were
inferior to his own, sold for good prices, while he was forced to sell
his to pawnbrokers, who, it is said, could not dispose of them at any
price.
Wilson was the son of a clergyman and was born at Pinegas, in
Montgomeryshire, in 1713. He first painted portraits and earned money
with which, in 1749, he went to Italy, where he remained six years. His
best works were Italian views, and he is now considered as the best
landscape painter of his day, with the one exception of Gainsborough.
Wilson died in 1782, and it is pleasant to know that after more than
sixty years of poverty he received a legacy from a brother, and the last
two years of his life were years of peaceful comfort.
THOMAS GAINSBOROUGH,
though a great artist, had an uneventful life. He was the son of a
clothier and was born in Sudbury, in Suffolk, in 1727. His boyish habit
of wandering about the woods and streams of Suffolk, making sketches,
and finding in this his greatest pleasure, induced his father to send
him to London to study art, when about fifteen years old. He studied
first under a French engraver, Gravelot, who was of much advantage to
him; next he was a pupil of Francis Hayman at the Academy, in St.
Martin's Lane, but Nature was his real teacher.
After a time he settled in Hatton Square, and painted both portraits and
landscapes. But at the end of four years of patient work, his patrons
were so few that he left London and returned to Sudbury.
It happened that once when he was sketching a wood-scene, Margaret Burr
had crossed his line of sight; he had added her figure to his picture,
and from this circumstance they had come to be friends. Soon after,
Gainsborough returned to his home, and Margaret became his wife. He was
careless and unthrifty, while she was quite the reverse. She was thus a
true helpmate to him, and to her carefulness we owe the preservation of
many of his pictures.
After his marriage, Gainsborough settled in Ipswich; in 1760 he removed
to Bath, and here both in portraits and landscapes he made such a
reputation, that when, fourteen years later, he removed to London, he
was considered the rival of Reynolds in portraits and of Wilson as a
painter of scenery. Gainsborough was one of the original Academicians,
and on one occasion at a gathering of artists, Sir Joshua Reynolds
proposed the health of Gainsborough, and called him "the greatest
landscape painter of the day." Wilson, who was present, was piqued by
this, and exclaimed:
"Yes, and the greatest portrait painter, too."
Sir Joshua realized that he had been ungracious and apologized to
Wilson.
Gainsborough exhibited many works in the gallery of the Academy, but in
1783 he was offended by the hanging of one of his portraits, and refused
to send his pictures there afterward. He was an impulsive, passionate
man, and he had several disputes with Sir Joshua, who always admired and
praised the work of his rival. But when about to die, Gainsborough sent
for Reynolds to visit him, and all their differences were healed. The
truth was that they had always respected and admired each other. The
last words of Gainsborough were:
"We are all going to heaven, and Vandyck is of the company."
He died August 2, 1788.
The celebrated "Blue Boy," by Gainsborough, now in the Grosvenor
Gallery, is said to have been painted to spite Sir Joshua, who had said
that blue should not be used in masses.
But there was a soft and lovable side to this wayward man. His love for
music was a passion, and he once gave a painting of his, "The Boy at the
Stile," to Colonel Hamilton as a reward for his playing the flute.
His portraits may be thought to have too much of a bluish gray in the
flesh tints, but they are always graceful and pleasing. In 1876, his
famous painting "The Duchess of Devonshire" was sold for the
exceptionally high price of fifty thousand dollars.
GEORGE ROMNEY
was born at Beckside, in Cumberland, in 1734. His life was very
discreditable.
It is more pleasant to speak of his pictures, for his portraits were so
fine that he was a worthy rival to Sir Joshua Reynolds. His pictures are
mostly in private galleries, but that of the beautiful Lady Hamilton, in
the National Gallery, is a famous work. He was ambitious to paint
historical subjects, and some of his imaginary pictures are much
admired. He was fitful in his art, and he began so many works which he
left unfinished, that they were finally removed from his studio by
cart-loads. There was also an incompleteness in the pictures which he
called finished; in short, the want of steadfastness, which made him an
unfaithful husband and father, went far to lessen his artistic merit. At
the same time, it is true that he was a great artist and justly
celebrated in his best days; his works excel in vigorous drawing and
brilliant, transparent color. His pictures are rarely sold, and are as
valuable as those of his great contemporaries, Reynolds and
Gainsborough.
THOMAS LAWRENCE
is the only other portrait painter of whom mention need be made here. He
was born at Bristol, in 1769, and much of his work belongs to our own
century.
His father had been trained for the law, but had become an inn-keeper.
When a mere child, Thomas entertained his father's customers by his
recitations, and took their portraits with equal readiness.
When he was ten years old, his family removed to Oxford, where he
rapidly improved in his drawing. When he first saw a picture by Rubens
he wept bitterly and sobbed out:
"Oh, I shall never be able to paint like that!"
In 1785, he received a silver palette from the Society of Arts as a
reward for a copy of Raphael's "Transfiguration," which he had made when
but thirteen years old.
[Illustration: "THE BLUE BOY." (AFTER THE PAINTING BY THOMAS
GAINSBOROUGH. BY PERMISSION, FROM A FAC-SIMILE OF THE ETCHING
BY RAJON, PUBLISHED BY "L'ART.")]
In 1787, the young painter entered the Royal Academy, London, and from
that time his course was one of repeated successes. Sir Joshua Reynolds
was his friend and adviser; he early attracted the attention of the King
and Queen, whose portraits he painted when but twenty-two years old. He
was elected to the Academy in 1794; after Sir Joshua's death he was
appointed painter to the King; he was knighted in 1815, and five years
later he was elected president of the Academy. He was also a member of
many foreign academies and a Chevalier of the Legion of Honor. Rarely is
the path to honor and fame made so easy as it was to Sir Thomas
Lawrence.
[Illustration: COPY OF A PORTRAIT BY GEORGE ROMNEY.]
His London life was brilliant. His studio was crowded with sitters, and
money flowed into his purse in a generous stream,--for his prices were
larger than any other English painter had asked. But all this did him
little good, for somehow he was continually in debt and always poor.
In 1814 he visited Paris, but he was recalled that he might paint the
portraits of the allied sovereigns, their statesmen, and generals. These
works were the first of the series of portraits of great men in the
Waterloo Chamber at Windsor Castle. In 1818 he attended the Congress at
Aix-la-Chapelle, for the purpose of adding portraits of notable people
to the gallery of the Prince-Regent. At length he was sent to Rome to
paint a likeness of the Pope and Cardinal Gonsalvi. He seems to have
been inspired with new strength by his nearness to the works of the
great masters in the Eternal City, for those two portraits are in merit
far beyond his previous work, and after his return to England from 1820
to 1830, his pictures had a vigor and worth that was wanting at every
other period of his life. While in Rome, he also painted a portrait of
Canova which he presented to the Pope.
When he reached London, he found himself to be the president-elect of
the Academy; it was a great honor, and Lawrence accepted it with
modesty.
George IV., following the example of the graciousness of Charles I.
toward Vandyck, hung upon the painter's neck a gold chain bearing a
medal, on which the likeness of his majesty was engraved. In the
catalogue of the Academy, 1820, Lawrence is called "Principal Painter in
Ordinary to his Majesty, Member of the Roman Academy of St. Luke's, of
the Academy of Fine Arts in Florence, and of the Fine Arts in New York."
To the last he had been elected in 1818, and had sent to the academy a
full-length portrait of Benjamin West.
From that time on, there is little to relate of his life, except that he
was always busy and each year sent eight fine works to the Academy
Exhibition. His friends and patrons showed him much consideration, and
various honors were added to his list, already long. He was always
worried in regard to money matters, and he grieved much over the illness
of his favorite sister, but there was no striking event to change the
even current of his life.
On January 7, 1830, he expired suddenly, exclaiming, "This is
dying,"--almost the same words used by George IV., a few months later.
Sir Thomas Lawrence was a man of fine personal qualities; his generosity
may be called his greatest fault, for his impulses led him to give more
than he had--a quality which causes us to admire a man while at the same
moment it makes him guilty of grave faults.
He was always generous to unfortunate artists and, in that way, he spent
large sums. He was also true to his ideas of right and wrong, even at
the expense of his own advantage.
As an artist, Lawrence can not be given a very high rank, in spite of
the immense successes of his life. As in every case, there are opposite
opinions concerning him. He has hearty admirers, but he is also accused
of mannerisms and weakness. His early works are the most satisfactory,
because most natural; they are good in design, and rich in color.
JOSEPH MALLORD WILLIAM TURNER
was an artist of great genius, and has exercised a powerful influence on
the art of the nineteenth century. He was the son of a barber, and was
born in Maiden Lane, London (a squalid alley in the parish of Covent
Garden), on April 23, 1775. When the boy was five years old, he was
taken by his father to the house of a customer of the barber's, and
while the shaving and combing went on, the child studied the figure of a
rampant lion engraved upon a piece of silver. After his return home, he
drew a copy of the lion so excellent that it decided his career, for
then and there the father determined that his son should be an artist.
As a child and youth, he was always sketching, and while he was fond of
nature in all her features, he yet had a preference for water views with
boats and cliffs and shining waves.
In 1789, when fourteen years old, he entered the classes of the Royal
Academy, where he worked hard in drawing from Greek models. He had the
good fortune to be employed by Dr. Munro to do some copying and other
works, and by this stroke of luck he revelled in the fine pictures and
valuable drawings with which the house of his patron was filled. Toward
the end of Sir Joshua Reynolds's life, Turner was a frequent visitor at
his studio.
In 1790, he sent his first contribution to the Academy Exhibition; it
was a view of Lambeth Palace, in water-colors. During the next ten
years, he exhibited more than sixty works, embracing a great variety of
subjects. The pictures included views from more than twenty-six counties
of England and Wales.
In 1802, he was made a full member of the Academy and he also visited
the continent for the first time, traveling through France and
Switzerland only. He visited Italy in 1819, in 1829, and again in 1840.
The pictures of Turner are often compared with those of Claude Lorraine,
and at times he painted in rivalry with Cuyp, Poussin, and Claude,
aiming to adopt the manner of these masters.
In 1806, Turner followed the example of the great Lorraine in another
direction. Claude had made a _Liber Veritatis_, or "Book of Truth,"
containing sketches of his finished pictures, in order that the works of
other painters could not be sold as his. Turner determined to make a
_Liber Studiorum_, or "Book of Studies." It was issued in a series of
twenty numbers, containing five plates each, and the subscription price
was £17.10_s._ There were endless troubles with the engravers and it was
not paying well, and was abandoned after seventy plates were issued. It
seemed to be so worthless that Charles Turner, one of the engravers,
used some of the proofs for kindling paper. After the artist became
famous, however, this _Liber Studiorum_ grew to be very valuable. Before
Turner died, a copy was worth thirty guineas, and more recently a single
copy has brought three thousand pounds, or nearly fifteen thousand
dollars. Colnaghi, the London print dealer, paid Charles Turner fifteen
hundred pounds for the proofs which he had not destroyed; and when the
old engraver remembered how he had lighted his fires, he exclaimed, "I
have been burning bank-notes all my life."
[Illustration: COUNTESS GREY AND CHILDREN. (FROM A PORTRAIT BY SIR
THOMAS LAWRENCE.)]
Turner grew very rich, but he lived in a mean, careless style. As long
as his father lived, he waited upon his great son as a servant might
have done; and after his death, an untidy, wizened old woman, Mrs.
Danby, was the only person to care for the house or the interests of the
painter. His dress was that of a very common person, and it is
impossible to understand how a man who so admired the beautiful in
nature could live in so miserly a manner as that of Turner.
Some time before his death, Turner seemed to be hiding himself; his
friends could not discover his retreat, until, at last, his old
housekeeper traced him to a dingy Chelsea cottage. When his friends went
to him, he was dying, and the end soon came. His funeral, from Queen
Anne street, was an imposing one. The body was taken to St. Paul's
Cathedral, and there, surrounded by a large company of artists and
followed by the faithful old woman, it was laid to rest between the
tombs of Sir Joshua Reynolds and James Barry. His estate was valued at
about seven hundred thousand dollars and he desired that most of it
should be used to establish a home for poor artists, to be called
Turner's Gift. But the will was not clearly written--his relatives
contested it, and in the end, his pictures and drawings were given to
the National Academy; one thousand pounds was devoted to a monument to
his memory; twenty thousand pounds established the Turner Fund in the
Academy and yields annuities to six poor artists; and the remainder was
divided amongst his kinsfolk.
Perhaps there never was a painter about whose works more extreme and
conflicting opinions have been advanced. Some of his admirers claim for
him the very highest place in art. His enemies can see nothing good in
his works and say that they may as well be hung one side up as another,
since they are only a mixture of splashes of color, and lights and
shades. Neither extreme is correct. In some respects, Turner is at the
head of English landscape painters, and no other artist has had the
power to paint so many different kinds of subjects or to employ such
variations of style in his work. His water-colors are worthy of the
highest praise; indeed, he created a school of water-color painting. At
the same time, it is proper to say that the works executed in his latest
period are not even commended by Ruskin,--his most enthusiastic
admirer,--and are not to be classed with those of his earlier days and
his best manner.
This master was so fruitful, and he made so vast a number of pictures in
oil and water-colors, of drawings, and of splendid illustrations for
books, that we have no space in which to speak properly of the different
periods of his art. A large and fine collection of his paintings is in
the South Kensington Museum; "The Old Temeraire," the picture which he
would never sell, is there. "The Slave Ship," one of his finest
pictures, is owned in Boston, and other celebrated works of his are in
New York; but most of his pictures, outside the South Kensington Museum,
and the National Gallery, are in private collections, where no
catalogues have ever been made, so that no estimate of the whole number
can be given.
I shall tell you of but one more English painter,--an artist whose life
and works are both very interesting, and of whom all young people must
be fond,--
EDWIN LANDSEER.
He was the youngest of the three sons of John Landseer, the eminent
engraver, and was born at No. 83 Queen Anne street, London, in March,
1802. The eldest son, Thomas, followed the profession of his father, and
in later years, by his faithful engraving after the works of Edwin, he
did much to confirm the great fame of his younger brother. Charles, the
second son of John Landseer, was a painter of historical subjects, and
held the office of Keeper of the Royal Academy during twenty years.
Edwin Landseer had the good fortune to be aided and encouraged in his
artistic tastes and studies, even from his babyhood, for there are now
in the South Kensington Museum, sketches of animals made in his fifth
year, and good etchings which he did when eight years old.
John Landseer taught his son to look to nature alone as his model. When
fourteen, he entered the Academy schools, and divided his time between
drawing in the classes and sketching from the wild beasts at Exeter
Change. He was a handsome, manly boy, and the keeper, Fuseli, was very
fond of him, calling him, as a mark of affection, "My little dog boy."
He was very industrious and painted many pictures; the best of those
known as his early works is the "Cat's Paw." It represents a monkey
using the paw of a cat to push hot chestnuts from the top of a heated
stove; the struggles of the cat are useless and her kittens mew to no
purpose. This picture was once sold for one hundred pounds; it is now in
the collection of the Earl of Essex, at Cashiobury, and is worth more
than three thousand pounds. It was painted in 1822.
Sir Walter Scott was in London when the "Cat's Paw" was exhibited, and
he was so pleased by the picture that he sought out the young painter
and invited him to go home with him. Sir Walter's well-known love of
dogs was a foundation for the intimate affection which grew up between
himself and Landseer. In 1824, the painter first saw Scotland, and
during fifty years he studied its people, its scenery, and its customs;
he loved them all and could ever draw new subjects and new enthusiasm
from the breezy north. Sir Walter wrote in his journal, "Landseer's dogs
are the most magnificent things I ever saw, leaping and bounding and
grinning all over the canvas." The friendship of Sir Walter had a great
effect upon the young painter; it developed the imagination and romance
in his nature and he was affected by the human life of Scotland so that
he painted the shepherd, the gillie, and the poacher, and made his
pictures speak the tenderness and truth as well as the fearlessness and
the hardihood of the Gaelic race.
Landseer remained in the home of his father, until he was a person of
such importance that his friends felt that his dignity demanded a
separate establishment and urged this upon him. He could not lightly
sever his home ties, and it was after much hesitation that he removed to
No. 1 St. John's Wood Road, where he passed the remainder of his life.
He named his home "Maida Vale," in remembrance of the favorite dog of
Sir Walter Scott. It was a small house with a garden and a barn, which
he converted into a studio; from time to time he enlarged and improved
it, and it became the resort of a distinguished circle of people who
learned to love it for its generous hospitality and its atmosphere of
joyous content.
The best period of Landseer's life was from 1824 to 1840. In the latter
year, he had the first attack of a disease from which he was never again
entirely free; he suffered from seasons of depression that shadowed all
his life with gloom, and at times almost threatened the loss of his
reason.
It is said that Landseer was the first person who opened a communication
between Queen Victoria and the literary and artistic society of England.
Be that as it may, he was certainly the first artist to be received as a
friend by the Queen, who soon placed him on an unceremonious and easy
footing in her household.
He was a frequent visitor at the royal palaces and received many rich
gifts from both Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. Between 1835 and 1866,
he painted a great many pictures of the Queen, of the various members of
her family and of the pets of the royal household. In 1850 he was
knighted and was at the very height of his popularity and success.
With the single exception of Sir Joshua Reynolds, he visited and
received in his own house more distinguished persons than any other
British artist. He was the intimate friend of Dickens, Chantrey, Sidney
Smith, and other famous men.
Landseer had an extreme fondness for studying and making pictures of
lions, and from the time when, as a boy, he dissected one, he tried to
obtain the body of every lion that died in London. Dickens was in the
habit of relating that on one occasion, when he and others were dining
with the artist, a servant entered and asked, "Did you order a lion,
sir?" as if it was the most natural thing in the world. The guests
feared that a living lion was about to enter, but it turned out to be
the body of the dead "Nero," of the Zoölogical Gardens, which had been
sent as a gift to Sir Edwin.
His skill in drawing was marvelous, and was once shown in a rare way at
a large evening party. Facility in drawing had been the theme of
conversation, when a lady declared that no one had yet drawn two objects
at the same moment. Landseer would not allow that this could not be
done, and immediately took two pencils and drew a horse's head with one
hand and at the same time, a stag's head with the other hand. He painted
with great rapidity; he once sent to the exhibition a picture of rabbits
painted in three-quarters of an hour. Mr. Wells relates that at one time
when Landseer was visiting him, he left the house for church just as his
butler placed a fresh canvas on the easel before the painter; on his
return, three hours later, Landseer had completed a life-sized picture
of a fallow-deer, and so well was it done that neither he nor the artist
could see that it required retouching.
Several portraits of Landseer exist and are well known, but that called
the "Connoisseurs," painted in 1865 for the Prince of Wales, is of great
interest. Here the artist has painted a half-length portrait of himself
engaged in drawing, while two dogs look over his shoulders with a
critical expression.
In 1840, Landseer made a quite extended tour in Europe, and that was the
only time that he was long absent from Great Britain. In 1853, several
of his works were sent to the Exposition in Paris; he was the only
English artist who received the great gold medal.
Sir Edwin Landseer was also a sculptor, and though he executed but few
works in this art, the colossal lions at the base of Nelson's Monument
in Trafalgar Square, London, are a triumph for him. He was chosen for
this work on account of his great knowledge of the "king of beasts."
At his death he had modeled but one; the others were copied from it
under the care of the Baron Marochetti.
Sir Edwin continued to work in spite of sadness, failing health and
sight, and in the last year of his life he executed four pictures, one
being an equestrian portrait of the Queen.
He died October 1, 1873, and was buried with many honors in St. Paul's
Cathedral. He left a property of two hundred and fifty thousand pounds;
the pictures and drawings in his studio were sold for seventy thousand
pounds, and all this large sum, with the exception of a few small
bequests, was given to his brother Thomas and his three sisters, ten
thousand pounds being given to his brother Charles.
I suppose that many of the pictures of Sir Edwin Landseer are well known
to the readers of ST. NICHOLAS. "High Life" and "Low Life," "A Highland
Breakfast," "Dignity and Impudence," the "Cat's Paw," "The Monarch of
the Glen," the "Piper and Nutcrackers," and others, are familiar in the
form of prints to many people in many lands, and they are pictures which
all must love. It is needless to add any long opinion of the artistic
qualities of this master; the critic Hamerton has happily summed up an
estimate of him in these words: "Everything that can be said about
Landseer's knowledge of animals, and especially of dogs, has already
been said. There was never very much to say, for there was no variety of
opinions, and nothing to discuss. Critics may write volumes of
controversy about Turner and Delacroix, but Landseer's merits are so
obvious to every one that he stood in no need of critical explanations.
The best commentators on Landseer, the best defenders of his genius, are
the dogs themselves; and so long as there exist terriers, deer-hounds,
and blood-hounds, his fame will need little assistance from writers upon
art."
[Illustration: ONE OF THE LANDSEER LIONS AT THE BASE OF THE NELSON
MONUMENT, TRAFALGAR SQUARE, LONDON.]
UNDER THE SNOW.
BY LILIAN DYNEVOR RICE.
All in the bleak December weather,
When north winds blow,
Five little clovers lay warm together
Under the snow.
"Wait," said they, "till the robins sing;
Wait, till the blossoms bud and spring;
Wait, till the rain and the sunbeams gay
Our winter blanket shall fold away--
Then, we will try to grow."
All in the fragrant May-time weather,
When south winds blow,
Five little clovers crept close together
Under the snow.
Poor, pink babies! They might have known
'Twas only the pear-tree blossoms blown
By the frolic breeze; but they cried, "Oh, dear!
Surely the spring is late this year!
Still, we will try to grow."
All in the sultry August weather,
When no winds blow,
Five little clovers were sad together
Under the snow.
'Twas only the daisies waving white
Above their heads in the glowing light;
But they cried, "Will we never understand?
It always snows in this fairyland--
Yet, we will try to grow."
All in the bright September weather,
When west winds blow,
Five little clovers were glad together
Under the snow.
For now 'twas the muslin kerchief cool,
Of a dear little lass on her way to school.
"The sweetest snow-fall of all," said they;
"We knew our reward would come some day,
If only we'd try to grow!"
NAN'S REVOLT.
BY ROSE LATTIMORE ALLING.
CHAPTER V.
The Ferris tea-table was a very cheery board, where good spirits of a
most delightful and commendable kind flowed freely. The stiff and solemn
Wilders, who "partook of the joys of life furtively," were inclined to
be scandalized. Who cared? Not the Ferrises, and so, as has been said,
that happy family enjoyed life despite their critical neighbors, and as
they all gathered about the scarlet cloth that evening, they looked like
a band that ought never to be broken.
Fun and laughter ran so high that the dear, tired father forgot his
legal cares and cracked his jokes. These were more or less bad,--but
what matter so long as the children thought him "just the darlingest,
funniest man in the world." No guest remained long in that genial
atmosphere without discovering the source of this sunny family-life, and
the true tendency of the current beneath all the froth and ripple of the
nonsense.
From father and mother, down to little Claire, it was a family of
_friends_. That was the entire secret. There were no petty animosities,
no bickerings; everything was open and above-board. Sincere and loving
confidence bound them together. The girls were interested in all their
father's cases in court; while he, in turn, listened to all their
girlish performances with undivided attention. No new gown or hat was
completely satisfactory until he had passed a favorable judgment. Here
in his own small court he was "Judge Ferris," in that title's noblest
sense. And the mother? She was best sister of all among her
daughters,--"Mother and sister and queen,--all in one precious little
woman," as Nan said, lifting her off her feet with a vigorous embrace.
But the toast was getting cold, and the festivity began as the plates
went 'round. The judicial wrinkles in Mr. Ferris's forehead were pulled
out by those radiating from the outer corners of his kind eyes; the
mother utterly lost her
|
on the cause of civilization” by their
merciless and grasping control of the millions of acres they have
generally so unlawfully and immorally secured? Thousands, nay millions,
of acres are held by comparatively few men, without one thought for the
common good. The only idea in the minds of these men is the selfish
one: “What can I make out of it?”
Let us be honest with ourselves and call things by their proper names
in our treatment of the weaker race. If the Indian is in the way and
we are determined to take his land from him, let us at least be manly
enough to recognize ourselves as thieves and robbers, and do the act as
the old barons of Europe used to do it, by force of arms, fairly and
cheerfully: “You have these broad acres: I want them. I challenge you
to hold them: to the victor belongs the spoils.” Then the joust began.
And he who was the stronger gained the acres and the castle.
Let us go to the Indian and say: “I want your lands, your
hunting-grounds, your forests, your water-holes, your springs, your
rivers, your corn-fields, your mountains, your canyons. I need them for
my own use. I am stronger than you; there are more of us than there are
of you. I’ve got to have them. You will have to do with less. I’m going
to take them;” and then proceed to the robbery. But let us be above the
contemptible meanness of calling our theft “benevolent assimilation,”
or “manifest destiny,” or “seeking the higher good of the Indian.” A
nation as well as a race may do scoundrel acts, but let it not add
to its other evil the contemptible crime of conscious hypocrisy. The
unconscious hypocrite is to be pitied as well as shaken out of his
hypocrisy, but the conscious hypocrite is a stench in the nostrils of
all honest men and women. The major part of the common people of the
United States have been unconscious of the hypocritical treatment that
has been accorded the Indians by their leaders, whether these leaders
were elected or appointed officials or self-elected philanthropists and
reformers. Hence, while I would “shake them up” and make them conscious
of their share in the nation’s hypocrisy, I have no feeling of
condemnation for them. On the other hand, I feel towards the conscious
humbugs and hypocrites, who use the Indian as a cloak for their own
selfish aggrandizement and advancement, as the Lord is said to have
felt toward the lukewarm churches when He exclaimed: “I will spew thee
out of my mouth.”
In our treatment of the Indian we have been liars, thieves, corrupters
of the morals of their women, debauchers of their maidens, degraders
of their young manhood, perjurers, and murderers. We have lied to
them about our good, pacific, and honorable intentions; we have made
promises to them that we never intended to keep--made them simply to
gain our own selfish and mercenary ends in the easiest possible way,
and then have repudiated our promises without conscience and without
remorse. We have stolen from them nearly all they had of lands and
worldly possessions. Only two or three years ago I was present when a
Havasupai Indian was arrested for having shot a deer out of season,
taken before the courts and heavily fined, when his own father had
roamed over the region hunting, as his ancestors had done for centuries
before, ere there were any white men’s laws or courts forbidding them
to do what was as natural for them to do as it was to drink of the
water they found, eat of the fruits and berries they passed, or breathe
the air as they rode along. The law of the white man in reference to
deer and antelope hunting is based upon the selfishness of the white
man, who in a few generations has slain every buffalo, most of the
mountain sheep, elk, moose, and left but a comparative remnant of deer
and antelope. The Indian has never needed such laws. He has always been
unselfish enough to leave a sufficient number of this wild game for
breeding purposes, or, if it was not unselfishness that commanded his
restraint, his own self-interest in piling up meat was sacrificed to
the general good of his people who required meat also, and must be able
to secure it each year. Hence, to-day we shut off by law the normal and
natural source of meat supply of the Indian, without any consultation
with him, and absolutely without recourse or redress, because we
ourselves--the white race--are so unmitigatedly selfish, so mercenary,
so indifferent to the future needs of the race, that without such law
we would kill off all the wild game in a few short years.
[Illustration: A WALLAPAI BASKET WEAVER.]
Then who is there who has studied the Indian and the white man’s
relation to him, who does not know of the vile treatment the married
women and maidens alike have received at the hands of the “superior”
people. Let the story of the devilish debaucheries of young Indian
girls by Indian agents and teachers be fully written, and even the most
violent defamers of Indians would be compelled to hang their heads with
shame. To those who know, the name of Perris--a southern California
Indian school--brings up memories of this class of crime that make
one’s blood hot against the white fiend who perpetrated them, and I am
now as I write near to the Havasupai reservation in northern Arizona,
where one of the teachers had to leave surreptitiously because of his
discovered immoralities with Indian women and girls. Only a decade ago
the name of the Wallapai woman was almost synonymous with immorality
because of the degrading influences of white men, and one of the most
pathetic things I ever heard was the hopeless “What can we do about
it?” of an Indian chief on the Colorado desert, when I spoke to him of
the demoralization of the women of his people. In effect his reply was:
“The whites have so driven us to the wall that we are often hungry, and
it is far easier to be immoral than to go hungry.”
Then, read the reports of the various Indian agents throughout the
country who have sought to enforce the laws against whites selling
liquor to Indians. Officials and courts alike have often been supine
and indifferent to the Indian’s welfare, and have generally shown
far more desire to protect the white man in his “vested interests”
than to protect the young men of the Indian tribes against the evil
influences of liquor. Again and again I have been in Indian councils
and heard the old men declaim against the white man’s fire-water. The
Havasupais declare it to be _han-a-to-op-o-gi_, “very bad,” the Navahos
_da-shon-de_, “of the Evil One,” while one and all insist that their
young men shall be kept from its demoralizing influence. Yet there is
seldom a _fiesta_ at which some vile white wretch is not willing to
sell his own soul, and violate the laws of whites and Indians alike,
in order to gain a little dirty pelf by providing some abominable
decoction which he sells as whisky to those whose moral stamina is not
strong enough to withstand the temptation.
[Illustration: A SKILLED HOPI BASKET WEAVER.]
And as for perjury in our dealings with Indians: read the records of
broken treaties, violated pledges, and disregarded vows noted by Helen
Hunt Jackson in her “Century of Dishonor,” and then say whether the
charge is not sustained.
Yet, when the Indian has dared to resent the cruel and abominable
treatment accorded to him in so many instances and in such fearful
variety, he has been called “treacherous, vindictive, fiendish,
murderous,” because, in his just and righteous indignation and wrath,
he has risen and determined to slay all he could find of the hated
white race. No doubt his warfare has not always been civilized. Why
should it be? How could it be? He is not civilized. He knows nothing of
“christian” principles in a war which “christian” people have forced
upon him as an act of self-defense. He is a savage, battling with
savage ferocity, savage determination, to keep his home, that of his
ancestors, for himself, his children, and their children. Oom Paul
Kruger told the British that if they forced a war upon the Boers for
the possession of the Transvaal, they would win it at a price that
would “stagger humanity.” Yet thousands of good Americans honored Oom
Paul for his “bravery,” his “patriotism,” his “god-like determination
to stand for the rights of his people.” But if our Indian does the same
thing in the defense of his home and slaughters a lot of soldiers sent
to drive him away, he is guilty of murderous treachery; his killings
are “massacres,” and he must be exterminated as speedily as possible.
Who ever hears any other than the term “massacre” applied to the death
of Custer and his soldiers? The “Custer massacre” is as “familiar
as household words.” Yet what is a massacre? Webster says: “1. The
killing of a considerable number of human beings under circumstances
of atrocity or cruelty, or contrary to the usages of civilized people.
2. Murder.” With such definitions in view, look at the facts of the
case. I would not have it understood in what I say that I am condemning
Custer. He was a general under orders, and as a dutiful servant he
was endeavoring to carry them out. (The debatable question as to
whether he was obeying or disregarding orders I leave for military men
themselves to settle.) It is not Custer, or any other one individual,
that I am condemning, but the public, national policy. Custer’s army
was ordered to proceed against these men, and forcibly remove them from
the place they had chosen as their home--and which had been theirs
for centuries before a white man ever trod this continent--and take
them to a reservation which they disliked, and in the choice of which
their wishes, desires, or comfort had in no way been consulted. The
white soldiers were armed, and it is well known that they intended to
use these arms. Could they have come upon the Indians by stealth, or
by some stratagem, they would have done so without any compunctions
of conscience, and no one would ever have thought of administering a
rebuke to them, even though in the fight that would undoubtedly have
ensued every Indian had been slain. It would have been heralded as a
glorious victory, and we should have thanked God for His goodness in
directing our soldiers in their “honorable” warfare. But unfortunately,
the incident turned in another direction. The would-be captors were
the caught; the would-be surprisers were the surprised; the would-be
slayers were the slain. Custer and his band of men, brave and gallant
as United States soldiers generally are,--and I would resent with heat
any slanderous remark to the contrary,--were surrounded, surprised, and
slain to a man.
[Illustration: INDIAN BEADWORK OF INTERESTING DESIGN.]
Weep at the grave of Custer; weep at the graves of his men; weep
with the widows and orphans of those suddenly surprised and slain
soldiers. My own tears have fallen many a time as I have read and
reread the details of that awful tragedy; but still, in the weeping
do not be dishonest and ungenerous to the victors,--Indians though
they were. Upon the testimony of no less an authority than General
Charles King, who has known the Sioux personally and intimately for
years, they were ever the hospitable friends of the white race, until
a post commander,--whose name should be pilloried for the execration
of the nation,--imbued with the idea that the only good Indian was the
dead Indian, betrayed and slew in cold blood a number of them who had
trusted to his promises and placed themselves in his hands. The result
was, that the whole tribe took this slaughter to their own hearts, as
any true patriots would have done, and from that day to this the major
part of the Sioux have hated the white race with the undying, bitter
hatred of the vindictive savage.
Again and again when I have visited Indian schools the thoughtful
youths and maidens have come to me with complaints about the American
history they were compelled to study. In their simple, almost colorless
way of expressing themselves, a bystander would never dream of the
fierce anger that was raging within, but which I was too experienced
in Indian character not to perceive. Listen to what some of them
have said: “When we read in the United States history of white men
fighting to defend their families, their homes, their corn-fields,
their towns, and their hunting-grounds, they are always called
‘patriots,’ and the children are urged to follow the example of these
brave, noble, and gallant men. But when Indians--our ancestors, even
our own parents--have fought to defend us and our homes, corn-fields,
and hunting-grounds they are called vindictive and merciless savages,
bloody murderers, and everything else that is vile. You are the
Indians’ friend: will you not some time please write for us a United
States history that will not teach us such wicked and cruel falsehoods
about our forefathers because they loved their homes enough to fight
for them--even against such powerful foes as you have been.” And I have
vowed that if ever I have time and strength and feel competent to do
it, I will write such a history.
[Illustration: INDIAN BEADWORK.]
Yet this is by no means all the charge I have to make against my
own race in its treatment of the Indian. Not content with depriving
him of his worldly possessions, we have added insult to injury, and
administered a far deeper and more cutting wound to him by denying to
him and his wives and daughters the moral, poetical, and spiritual
qualities they possess. To many of the superior (!) race this is
utter nonsense. The idea that an Indian has any feelings to be hurt!
How ridiculous! Yet I make the assertion, fearless of successful
contradiction, that many Indians feel more keenly this ignoring of the
good, the poetic, the æsthetic, the religious or spiritual qualities
they possess than they do the physical wrongs that have been inflicted
upon them. As a race, we are prejudiced, bigoted, and “big-headed” when
looking upon any other race. We come by our prejudices naturally. The
Englishman looks down upon the “frog-eating Frenchman,” and used to say
he could lick ten or a dozen such. The Frenchman and Englishman both
scoff at the beer-drinking German and the stolid Dutchman, yet France
has to remember Sedan, and England still smarts at the name of Van
Tromp. The fact is that no nation can afford to look down upon another,
any more than any civilization can afford to crow over another. Each
has its own virtues, its own “goods,” its own advantages. France,
England, Germany, America, have never equaled, much less surpassed,
the architecture of Greece, Egypt, and Rome. The United States, with
all its brag and boast, has never had a poet equal to old blind Homer
or the Italian Dante. Germany’s Goethe is worthy to stand side by
side with England’s Shakspere, and the architecture of the rude and
vulgar “Goths” is the supremest crown of all building in the proud and
conceited English-speaking “Mother Country.”
And so have I learned to look at the Indian. He has many things that
we can take to our advantage and profit, and some of these have been
presented in the following pages. In the next chapter I have a few
necessary reservations and observations to make which I trust the
patience of the reader will permit him carefully to consider.
CHAPTER II
THE WHITE RACE AND ITS CIVILIZATION
I am by no means a blind worshiper of our so-called “higher” and
“advanced” civilization. I do not think we have advanced yet as far as
the Greeks in some things. Our civilization, in many respects, is sham,
shoddy, gingerbread, tinsel, false, showy, meretricious, deceptive. If
I were making this book an arraignment of our civilization there would
be no lack of counts in the indictment, and a plethora of evidence
could be found to justify each charge.
[Illustration: INDIAN BEADWORK OF RATTLESNAKE DESIGN].
As a nation, we do not know how to eat rationally; few people sleep as
they should; our drinking habits could not be much worse; our clothing
is stiff, formal, conventional, hideous, and unhealthful; our headgear
the delirium tremens of silliness. Much of our architecture is weakly
imitative, flimsy, without dignity, character, or stability; much of
our religion a profession rather than a life; our scholastic system
turns out anæmic and half-trained pupils who are forceful demonstrators
of the truth that “a little knowledge is a dangerous thing.” And as for
our legal system, if a body of lunatics from the nearest asylum could
not concoct for us a better hash of jurisprudence than now curses our
citizenship I should be surprised. No honest person, whether of the
law or out of it, denies that “law”--which Browning so forcefully
satirizes as “the patent truth-extracting process,”--has become a
system of formalism, of precedent, of convention, of technicality. A
case may be tried, and cost the city, county, or state thousands of
dollars; a decision rendered, and yet, _upon a mere technicality that
does not affect the real merits of the case one iota_, the decision
will be reversed, and either the culprit--whose guilt no one denies--is
discharged, or a new trial, with its attendant expense, is ordered.
The folly of such a system! The sheer idiocy of _men_ wasting time and
strength and energy upon such puerile foolishness. I verily believe the
world would be bettered if the whole legal system, from supreme court
of the United States down to pettiest justice court, could be abolished
at one blow, and a reversion made to the decisions of the old men of
each community known for their good common sense, fearlessness, and
integrity.
[Illustration: RAMONA AND HER STAR BASKET.]
It may be possible that some who read these words will deem me an
incontinent and general railer against our civilization. Such a
conclusion would be an egregious error. I rail against nothing in it
but that which I deem bad,--bad in its effect upon the bodies, minds,
or souls of its citizens. I do not rail against the wireless telegraph,
the ocean cables, the railway, the telephone, the phonograph, the
pianoforte, the automobile, the ice machine, refrigerating machine,
gas light, gas for heating and cooking, the electric light and heater,
electric railways, newspapers, magazines, books, and the thousand and
one things for which this age and civilization of ours is noted. But
I do rail against the abuse and perversion of these things. I do rail
against the system that permits gamblers to swindle the common people
by watering the stock of wireless telegraphy, cable, railway, or other
companies. I enjoy some phonographs amazingly, but I rail against
my neighbor’s running his phonograph all night. I think coal-oil a
good thing, but I rail against the civilization that allows a few
men to so control this God-given natural product that they can amass
in a few short years fortunes that so far transcend the fortunes of
the kings of ancient times that they make the wealth of Crœsus look
like “thirty cents.” I believe thoroughly in education; but I rail
earnestly, sincerely, and constantly against that so-called education
(with which nearly all our present systems are more or less allied)
of valuing the embalmed knowledge of books more than the personal,
practical, experimental knowledge of the things themselves. I enjoy
books, and would have a library as large as that of the British Museum
if I could afford it; but I rail persistently against the civilization
that leads its members to accept things they find in books more than
the things they think out for themselves. Joaquin Miller seemed to say
a rude and foolish thing when he answered Elbert Hubbard’s question,
“Where are your books?” with a curt, “To hell with books. When I want
a book I write one;” and yet he really expressed a deep and profound
thought. He wanted to show his absolute contempt for the idea that we
read books in order to help thought. The fact is, the reading too much
in books, and of too many books, is a definite hindrance to thought--a
positive preventive of thought. I do not believe in predigested food
for either body, mind, or soul; hence I am opposed to those features of
our civilization that give us food that needs only to be swallowed (not
masticated and enjoyed) to supply nutriment; that give us thought all
ready prepared for us that we must accept or be regarded as uneducated;
those crumbs of social customs that a frivolous four hundred condescend
to allow to fall from their tables to us, and that we must observe
or be ostracized as “boors” and “vulgar”; and those features of our
theological system that give us predigested spiritual food that we must
accept and follow or be damned. I am willing to go and feed with the
Scotch and the horses (_vide_ Johnson’s foolish remark about oatmeal),
and be regarded as uneducated and be ostracized both as a boor and a
vulgarian, and even be damned in words, which, thank God, is quite
as far as He allows any one human being to “damn” another. For I am
opposed to these things one and all.
I am not a pessimist about our civilization: I am an optimist. Yet I
often find my optimism strongly tinged with pessimistic color. And how
can it be otherwise?
Can any thinking man have much respect--any, in fact--for that phase
of his civilization which permits the building of colossal fortunes by
the monopolization of the sale of _necessities_, when the poor who are
compelled to buy these necessities are growing poorer and poorer each
year?
[Illustration: INDIAN BEADWORK OF GREEK FRET DESIGN.]
Can I respect any civilization that for the 125 years of its existence
has refused to pass laws for the preservation of the purity of the food
of its poor? The rich can buy what and where they choose, but for the
whole period of our existence we have been so bound, hand and foot,
by the money-makers who have vitiated our food supply that they might
add a few more millions to their dirty hoard of ungodly dollars that
we have closed our eyes to the physical and spiritual demoralization
that has come to the poor by the poisoned concoctions handed out to
them--under protection of United States laws--as foods.
Can I respect an educational institution that educates the minds of
its children at the expense of their bodies? That has so little common
sense and good judgment as to be putting its children through fierce
competitive examinations when they should be strengthening their bodies
at the critical age of adolescence?
Can I bow down before the civilization whose highest educational
establishments--Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Cornell, New York,
Columbia, Johns Hopkins, followed by hosts of others of lesser
institutions--every year send out from five to thirty per cent of
their students broken down in health? What is the good of all the
book-learning that all the ages have amassed unless one has physical
health to enjoy it? Only this last year a Harvard graduate came to
me who had taken high degree in the study of law and was adjudged
eminently prepared to begin to practice his profession. But his health
was gone. He was a nervous and physical wreck. His physicians commanded
complete rest for a year, and suggested that five years would be none
too long for him to spend in recuperation. When this young man asked
me to give him my candid expressions upon the matter, I asked him if
he thought imbeciles could have made a worse mess of his “education”
than had the present system, which had cultivated his intellect, but so
disregarded the needs of his body that his intellect was powerless to
act.
Let the wails of agony of the uncounted dead who have been hurried
to their graves by this idolatrous worship of a senseless, godless,
heartless Moloch called “education” answer for me when people ask me
to respect this feature of our higher civilization, and to these wails
let there be added those of awakened parents who have seen, when too
late, into what acts akin to murder their blind worship of this idol
had led them. Add to these the cries of pain from ten thousand beds
of affliction occupied by those still living, but whose bodies have
“broken down” as the result of “over-study.”
[Illustration: A SABOBA INDIAN WITH BASKET IN WHICH IS SYMBOLIZED THE
HISTORY OF HIS TRIBE.]
Then add to the vast pyramid of woe the heartaches of hopes banished,
of ambitions thwarted, of desires and aims completely lost, and one
can well understand why I am not a worshiper at this shrine. If I were
to choose--as every parent must for his young children who are not
yet capable of thought--between a happy, because physically healthy,
life, though uneducated by the schools, and an educated and unhappy,
because unhealthy, life for children, I would say: Give me ignorance
(of books and schools) and health, rather than education (of books and
schools) and a broken down, nervous, irritable body. But it is by no
means necessary to have uneducated children, even though they should
never see a school. While I now write (I am enjoying a few days on the
“rim” of the Grand Canyon) I am meeting daily a remarkable family. The
man is far above the average in _scholastic_ and book _education_. He
is a distinguished physician, known not only within the bounds of his
own large state, but throughout the whole United States and Europe;
his methods are largely approved by men at the head of the profession,
and his lucrative and enormous practice demonstrates the success of
his system, with the complete approval of the most conservative of
his rigidly conservative profession. He was until quite recently a
professor in one of the largest universities of the United States, and
was therefore competent from inside knowledge to pass judgment upon
the methods of the highest educational establishments. He has money
enough to place his two daughters wherever he chooses, and to spend
most of his time near them. Yet he has deliberately (and I think most
wisely) kept them out of school, and made the strength and vigor of
their bodies his first consideration. Both ride horseback (astride, of
course) with the poise and confidence of skilled vaqueros; both can
undertake long journeys, horseback or afoot, that would exhaust most
young men students; and now at 15 and 17 years of age they are models
of physical health and beauty, and at the same time the elder sister
is _better_ educated in the practical, sane, useful, living affairs of
men and women than any girl of her age I have ever met. I take this
object-lesson, therefore, as another demonstration of the truth of my
position, and again I refuse to bow down before the great fetich of
our modern civilization--“scholastic education.”
There have been wonderful civilizations in the past,--Persia, Asia
Minor, Etruria, Greece, Rome, Egypt, the Moors,--and yet they are gone.
A few remnants are left to us in desert temples, sand-buried propylæ,
dug-up vases and carvings, glorious architecture, sublime marbles,
and soul-stirring literature. Where are the peoples who created these
things? Why could they not propagate their kind sufficiently well to
at least keep their races intact, and hold what they had gained? We
know they did not do it. Why? Call it moral or physical deterioration,
or both, it is an undeniable fact that physical weakness rendered
the descendants of these peoples incapable of living upon their
ancestors’ high planes, or made them an easy prey to a stronger and
more vigorous race. I am fully inclined to the belief that it was their
moral declensions that led to their physical deterioration; yet I also
firmly believe that a better and truer morality can be sustained upon a
healthy and vigorous body than upon one which is diseased and enervated.
Hence I plead, with intense earnestness, for a better physical life for
our growing boys and girls, our young men and women, and especially
for our prospective parents. Healthy progeny cannot be expected
from diseased stock. The fathers and mothers of the race must be
strengthened physically. Every child should be healthily, happily, and
cheerfully _born_, as well as _borne_. The sunshine of love should
smile down from the faces of both parents into the child’s eyes the
first moment of its life. Thus the elixir of joy enters its heart, and
joy is as essential to the proper development of a child as sunshine
is to that of a flower. This is a physical world, even though it be
only passing phenomena, and upon its recognition much of our happiness
depends. Our Christian Science friends see in physical inharmony only
an error of mortal mind, to be demonstrated over by divine mind. That
demonstration, however, produces the effect we call physical health.
This is what I long for, seek after, strive for, both for myself, my
family, my children, my race. Any and all means that can successfully
be used to promote that end I believe in and heartily commend. Let us
call it what we will, and attain it as how we may, the desirable thing
in our national and individual life to-day is health,--health of the
whole man, body, mind, soul. Because I firmly believe the Indians have
ideas that, if carried out, will aid us to attain this glorious object,
I have dared to suggest that this proud and haughty white race may sit
at their feet and learn of them.
[Illustration: DAT-SO-LA-LE, THE WASHOE BASKET WEAVER, SOME OF WHOSE
BASKETS HAVE SOLD FOR FABULOUS PRICES.]
I myself began life handicapped with serious ill health, and for
twenty-two years was seldom free from pain. Nervous irritability
required constant battling. But when I began to realize the benefit
of life spent in God’s great out-of-doors, and devoted much of my
time to climbing up and down steep canyon walls, riding over the
plains and mountains of Nevada and California, wandering through the
aseptic wastes of the deserts of the Southwest, rowing and swimming
in the waters of the great Colorado River, sleeping nightly in the
open air, and in addition, coming in intimate contact with many tribes
of Indians, and learning from them how to live a simple, natural,
and therefore healthy life,--these things not only gave to me almost
perfect health, but have suggested the material of which this book is
made.
CHAPTER III
THE INDIAN AND NASAL AND DEEP BREATHING
The Indian believes absolutely in nasal breathing. Again and again I
have seen the Indian mother, as soon as her child was born, watch it
to see if it breathed properly. If not, she would at once pinch the
child’s lips together and keep them pinched until the breath was taken
in and exhaled easily and naturally through the nostrils. If this did
not answer, I have watched her as she took a strip of buckskin and tied
it as a bandage below the chin and over the crown of the head, forcing
the jaws together, and then with another bandage of buckskin she
covered the lips of the little one. Thus the habit of nasal breathing
was formed immediately the child saw the light, and it knew no other
method.
As one walks through the streets of every large city, he sees the
dull and vacant eye, the inert face, of the mouth-breather; for, as
every physician well knows, the mouth-breather suffers from lack of
memory and a general dullness of the intellect. Not only that, but
he habitually submits himself to unnecessary risks of disease. In
breathing through the nose, the disease germs, which abound in our
city streets and are sent floating through the air by every passing
wind, are caught by the gluey mucus or the capillaries of the mucous
membranes. The wavy air passages of the nose lead one to assume that
they are so constructed expressly for this purpose, as the germs, if
they escape being caught at one angle, are pretty sure to be trapped
in turning another. When this mucus is expelled in the act of “blowing
the nose,” the germs go with it, and disease is prevented. But when
these germs are taken in through the mouth, they go directly into
the throat, the bronchial tubes, and the lungs, and if they are
lively and strong, they lodge there and take root and propagate with
such fearful rapidity that in a very short time a new patient with
tuberculosis, diphtheria, typhoid, or some other disease, is created.
Hence, emulate the Indian. Breathe through your nose; do not use it as
an organ of speech. At the same time that you care for yourself, watch
your children, and even if you have to bandage them up while they are
asleep, as the Indians do, compel them to form early this useful and
healthful habit of nasal breathing.
[Illustration: INDIAN SHOWING EFFECT OF DEEP BREATHING IN WONDERFUL
LUNG DEVELOPMENT].
But not only do the Indians breathe through the nose: they are also
experts in the art of deep breathing. The exercises that are given in
open-air deep breathing at the Battle Creek sanitarium each morning
show that we are learning this useful and beneficial habit from them.
When I first began to visit the Hopis, in northern Arizona, I was
awakened every morning in the wee sma’ hours, as I slept in my blankets
in the open at the foot of the mesa upon which the towns are located,
by cow-bells, as if a number of cows were being driven out to pasture.
But in the daytime I could see no cows nor any evidence of their
existence. When I asked where they were, my questions brought forth
nothing but a wondering stare. Cows? They had no cows. What did I mean?
Then I explained about the bells, and as I explained, a merry laugh
burst upon my ears. “Cows? Those are not cows. To-morrow morning when
you hear them, you jump up and watch.” I did so, and to my amazement I
saw fleeing through the early morning dusk a score (more or less) of
naked youths, on each one of whom a cow-bell was dangling from a rope
or strap around his waist. Later I learned this running was done as a
matter of religion. Every young man was required to run ten, fifteen,
twenty miles, and even double this distance, upon certain allotted
mornings, as a matter of religion. This develops a lung capacity that
is nothing short of marvelous.
This great lung capacity is in itself a great source of health, vim,
energy, and power. It means the power to take in a larger supply of
oxygen to purify and vivify the blood. Half the people of our cities
do not know what real true life is, because their blood is not well
enough oxygenated. The people who are full of life and exuberance and
power--the men and women who accomplish things--generally have large
lung capacity, or else have the faculty of using all they have to the
best advantage.
To a public speaker, a singer, a lawyer, a preacher, or a teacher, this
large lung capacity is invaluable; for, all things else being equal,
the voice itself will possess a clearer, more resonant quality if the
lungs, the abdomen, and the diaphragm are full of, or stretched out by,
plenty of air. These act as a resonant sounding-chamber which increases
the carrying quality of the voice to a wonderful extent.
For years I have watched with keenest observation all our
|
roots 258
The “Fiddler-crab” 258
Some remarkable devices 262
Some remarkable methods of “courtship” 268
THE COURTSHIP OF ANIMALS
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
The nature of Life and its power of reproduction—The stuff of which
Life is made—The Emotions—The simplest living things—Where is neither
Birth nor Death yet the Population increases—The First Marriage—The
beginning of sex—The two dominating instincts—The conditions of
survival—The Oyster’s narrow world—“Fiddling work”—Amorousness—The
superior Male—Where Death begins—“Germ-plasm” and what it means—Sex and
“Secondary sexual Characters”—Some theories—“Hormones” what are they?
The nature of life is generally regarded as affording a theme which
possesses no more than an academic interest: but there is one aspect
of this great subject which must attract us all, and that is its power
of reproducing itself. Life begets Life, as Love is said to beget
Love. The nature of this mysterious power we can only dimly realize,
and the forces which underlie its manifestations few even suspect,
save perhaps in a vague way. Yet the tree of Knowledge bears no fruit
more vitally important to our well-being, than that which will make us
“as Gods, knowing good and evil” in all that concerns the processes
of reproduction. But curiously enough, this is a forbidden fruit, and
those who eat thereof are expected to maintain a discreet silence on
the subject. These enlightened ones, however, cannot remain altogether
dumb. But they speak, in the veiled language, of Art and Poetry,
Literature and the Drama. They talk round the subject rather than of
it. Love, Hate, Jealousy, and Envy, are but attributes thereof. We
profess to believe that “Knowledge is Power” and to desire to increase
its force among us by raising the standard of our system of education.
But education which does not, of set purpose, reveal the sources of our
being and of our emotions, good and evil, is no more than a travesty
of education; and they who seek to foist upon the community Knowledge
thus emasculated, are unworthy to wield the power which has been placed
in their hands. If social well-being be the aim of the high-priests
of Education, then something more than copybook maxims like “Be good
and you will be happy” must henceforth be preached. Of what avail is
it to exalt the name of Knowledge, while the straightest road thereto
is barred across and marked “No thoroughfare!” These blind leaders of
the blind seem to imagine that the social well-being they profess to
desire can only be attained by side roads, leading anywhere, save in
the direction of this Pool of Siloam.
The stuff of which living things are made is called “Protoplasm.”
Text-books of Physiology give its chemical constituents with fearsome
accuracy, and each of these constituents can be isolated in the
laboratory, but “all the king’s horses and all the king’s men” cannot
build these up again into living matter. Its consistent inconsistency
defies us; every statement we make of it has to be qualified by
reservations and saving clauses. Its permanency is attested by the
fact that it has endured through millions of years, yet we are daily
reminded of its evanescent nature. Its power of reproducing itself
according to type, none can doubt, yet no two individuals are exactly
alike.
The purely physical phenomena of life, to be rightly appreciated, must
always be considered in relation to the psychical phenomena which
are the soul of life. These subtle and intangible forces cannot be
experimented with in the laboratory, or expressed in formulæ; we
cannot denote their strength in horse-power. Just as the physical
manifestations of life begin with lowly types, so the psychical begin,
and they gather strength and complexity with the bodies they pervade.
These manifestations we call behaviour, and in their more intense
developments, “emotions.”
These emotions present an infinite range of variety in the higher
animals, and they attain their maximum of intensity wherever the
reproductive activities are concerned. The part which these activities
play in controlling behaviour is by no means always apparent, and
is commonly not even suspected. Even man himself is subject to this
control. And it is this fact which lifts the “Courtship” of the lower
animals out of the category of merely curious phenomena. For the
springs of his conduct, his behaviour and “emotions” under varying
circumstances, can only be understood, and even then but imperfectly,
by comparison with other creatures lower in the scale, so far, of
course, as comparison is possible.
This line of inquiry, then, takes one back to the simplest living
things, among which there is neither marrying nor giving in marriage,
neither birth nor death. Life is reduced to its simplest terms—a speck
of animated jelly is all that confronts one, and this is only to be
seen under a high power of the microscope. It has neither mouth nor
organs of digestion, no visible means of locomotion are traceable,
and the special senses of sight and hearing are wanting; but taste
and smell, of a nebulous kind, are there. Shape it cannot be said to
have, for its bodily outline is constantly changing, thereby it moves.
A long tongue of its jelly-like substance, or “protoplasm” as it is
called, is thrust forwards, and the rest of the body is, as it were,
dragged after it. Whatever animal, or vegetable, matter it passes
over, in the course of its wanderings, is drawn up into the semi-fluid
substance of this diaphanous body, and its juices extracted, the
undigestible residue is left behind in the course of the morning’s
walk! In due time it becomes adult; further growth is impossible. When
this stage is attained a strange thing happens. A certain minute, more
solid portion of this body, which lies in the very centre of the mass
and is known as the “nucleus,” begins to assume an hour-glass shape.
Speedily the constriction becomes apparent across the whole body and
rapidly increasing, cuts it in two, as if by the tightening of some
invisible thread. Here Death is cheated, and records of births are
unknown! And just as there are no parents so there are no children.
But a foreshadowing of what is to be occurs even here. For every now
and then two individuals, to all appearances identical, meet and
promptly begin to merge the one into the other till they twain become
one flesh in very truth. Here is the most primitive form of marriage
in Nature. And here, in this union, or fusion, of separate entities of
Germ-plasm, we have the beginning of sex. Such unions are common among
these primeval forms of life. In many cases this “marriage” takes place
between two particles of Protoplasm of which one is rather larger than
the other. In such case the smaller is regarded as male, the larger as
female. Here we have the first sign of “sexual differentiation” or the
evolution of “male” and “female” individuals.
Some such union, some such process of “rejuvenation” by the importation
of “fresh blood” seems to be imperative for the continuance of
existence throughout the whole animal world, even though it may take
place at rare intervals of time. Why should this be? Is this strange
meeting and commingling a matter of chance, or is the one seeking the
other possessed by a ravenous mate-hunger?
As we ascend higher in the scale it becomes apparent that life has
gathered force. That primitive speck of jelly, the Amœba, with which
we started, gave but two signs of animation—the power of movement,
and hunger. Whether these responses to internal stimuli can be called
instinctive is open to argument. But there can be no question about
the instinctive nature of the behaviour of these higher animals.
After the instinct to feed the two most powerful are the desire for
self-preservation—the avoidance of danger—and the desire to mate. These
two are the dominating instincts throughout the rest of the animal
world, not even excepting man himself.
The tremendous power of “mate-hunger” has been overlooked by a strange
confusion between cause and effect. Almost universally its sequel, the
production of offspring, has been regarded as the dominant instinct in
the higher animals. This view has no foundation in fact. “Desire” for
the sake of the pleasure it affords, and not its consequences, is the
only hold on life which any race possesses. And this is true both in
the case of man himself and of the beasts that perish. Wherever this
instinct becomes weak, or defective, extinction speedily and inevitably
follows. This “Amorousness” is the motive power of “Courtship” wherever
it is met with; manifesting itself in the eccentric, and often
grotesque posturings, or in the loud and often musical cries which
constitute the study of courtship. Intensity of desire is indispensable
to survival.
Only the lowly and sedentary types, of which the Oyster may be taken
as an example, lack this fire; and here because it is unnecessary. For
the reproductive germs of this animal are discharged into the water,
to take their chance of attaining their object. They are liberated
unconsciously, discharged like the undigested residue of the food,
without effort, and without cognizance of the act. This must be so,
for the Oyster merely lives—vegetates. Sightless, and without power
of movement, after its larval wanderings are over, it lives merely
to eat. And even in this, choice is denied it. The currents of water
mechanically brought to afford the necessary oxygen for the maintenance
of life, bring with them the food which is to restore the slowly
wasting tissues. To such a creature there can be no “outer-world,” no
consciousness of the existence of individuality other than its own.
The desire for sexual intercourse is met with only where the
co-operation of two individuals is necessary to ensure the production
of offspring. Such individuals being free to roam, must have some
incentive to seek one another at the time when their germ-cells have
attained maturity. And this incentive is furnished by the glands in
which these elements are produced: supplemented by the secretions
of certain ancillary glands. These stimulating juices, known as the
“Hormones,” will be presently described.
But if we owe our existence to the gratification of what may be called
our lower instincts, it is no less certain that all that is best in us
we owe to our offspring. We meet with the beginnings of altruism, which
the begetting of offspring entails, far down in the animal kingdom, and
it attains to its full perfection in the human race. Here only, in its
best and truest sense, Love begins: though affection may be found, and
in a high degree, in many of the lower animals.
Living things are as clay in the hands of the potter. But it is as if
they made themselves, for the designer and the guiding hand are alike
invisible. No vessel is exactly like its neighbour, either in the
quality of its substance or in the details of its construction. And
this because the clay of which it is made possesses that mysterious
property we call life. A property which endows each new feature as
it appears, with an individuality of its own, whose survival, or
suppression, depends entirely on its relationship to surrounding parts;
on its harmony with its environment, in short. Colour, size, shape,
temperament, behaviour, may each be regarded as so many entities
depending for survival on whether or not they can exist in harmony with
their environment—the several parts which make up what we call the
individual.
In like manner the individual—the complex bundle of parts and
qualities—must attain, and maintain, a certain harmony with its
environment—the outer world. The process of change, both in quality
and quantity, which is for ever going on among the several parts of
every separate individual, brings about the elimination of unfavourable
variations; and “selects” those which vary in the right direction:
that is to say, which serve to maintain a place in the sun for the
individual in which these momentous changes are going on. But it is not
enough that the individual should be in “working order”; it must be in
harmony with all the conditions on which existence depends. And the
standard of this harmony is set by that very exacting arbiter of life
and death, “Natural Selection.” It is not enough that the instincts
in regard to this or that habit should be keen, or that this or that
particular organ of the body should be efficient—a certain minimum,
all-round, standard of efficiency is demanded, or elimination follows.
It is through this instability of “temperament,” this tendency to vary
in infinite directions, that the balance between the individual and
the environment is maintained. Evolution follows the line of least
resistance.
The little boy who remarked that it must be “fiddling work, making
flies,” was more sage than he knew. The complex web of factors which
even a fly represents are beyond the grasp of human understanding. But
it is clear that the reproductive instincts, and the emotions they
beget, have played, and play, a tremendous part in the evolution of the
higher animals.
Those whose business it is, for one reason or another, to study
these emotions know well that “mate-hunger” may be as ravenous as
food-hunger, and that, exceptions apart, it is immensely more insistent
in the males than in the females. But for this, reproduction in many
species could not take place: for the sexes often live far apart, and
mates are only to be won after desperate conflict with powerful rivals
no less inflamed. Thus it is idle to speak of an equality between the
sexes in this matter, in regard to the human race. Dogmatism, and the
frequent repetition of pretty platitudes, will not alter what Nature
has ordained. The failure to realize this is painfully obvious in
the utterances of many who speak in the name of the newly-founded
“Eugenics” society, which seeks the means to ensure the well-being
of the race by the spread of a more intimate knowledge of this
all-important subject. The existence of what Mr. Heape has recently
called a “sex-antagonism” is beyond dispute, for the instincts of the
male and female are fundamentally different. The male is dominated
by the desire to gratify the sexual appetite; in the female this is
counteracted by the stimulation of other instincts concerned with the
cares of offspring.
Amorousness, then, is the dominant feature of the males among all
animals: and this sex presents yet another characteristic which is to
be borne in mind. In all that concerns the evolution of ornamental
characters the male leads. In him we can trace the trend which
evolution is taking; the female and young afford us the measure of the
advance along the new line which has been taken. Why this should be is
inexplicable. But sooner or later the females assume, or will assume,
all the features originally possessed by their lords; and finally the
young also follow suit. That is to say, the females and young tend to
retain the ancestral characters. In the course of time the ability to
develop new features by the male loses its impetus, and not till then,
apparently, do the females, and still later, the young, begin to share
his glory. These remarkable features are strikingly illustrated among
the birds, as these pages will show.
Nature is nothing, if not perverse. And hence it happens that there
are many exceptions to every rule which one formulates. Among the
birds, for example, there are species wherein the rule that the female
follows her mate in the acquisition of new characters is, so to
speak, set aside. She follows a line of her own. This is true, at any
rate, of superficial characters, such as coloration. By some curious
change in her “metabolism,” as the conversion into living tissue of
the substances taken as food is called, this coloration may attain
a brilliance in no way inferior to that of the male, but strikingly
different. The beautiful Orange Fruit-pigeon (_Chrysoenas victor_)
furnishes a case in point, the male being of a gorgeous orange-yellow,
the female of a no less vivid green. But the differences are not so
great as they appear at first sight. For the male was originally green,
and the female has thus but intensified the ancestral livery. Green,
it should be remarked, of a more or less olive shade, always precedes
yellow in development; and yellow may yield to red, but this order is
never reversed. A no less striking case is that of the Upland Goose
(_Cloephaga magellanica_), the male of which is pure white, while the
female wears a livery of chestnut and brown. But so sharply are the
colours defined that it would be difficult to say that one was of a
higher order of coloration than the other. To what causes or factors
are these departures due?
Reproduction in the simplest living things takes place by a simple
division of the body into two as soon as its maximum size or adult
condition has been attained. In such simple types the body consists
only of a single “blob,” or particle, of jelly. But a new era began
when large numbers of such particles, or “cells,” began to form
coherent masses, different parts of the mass performing different work
for the mutual benefit of the community. Some have come to form what
we call the body, which is born, and in due course dies. Others are
alone concerned with the task of reproduction. They are nourished by
the body, and on attaining maturity, give rise to new bodies. These
reproductive cells are excessively small. The male, or “sperm” cell,
can only be distinguished under the highest powers of the microscope.
The female cell, or “Ovum,” is always larger than the male, because, in
addition to the germinal matter which it contains, it is furnished with
a store of food in the shape of yolk. This accounts for the relatively
enormous size of the egg of the hen. Within the hardened shell the
germ develops into the chick, deriving food for its growth from this
generous store. Where this yolk is limited in quantity the growing
body is hastily fashioned, and launched forth into the world in the
form of a “larva,” when it must forage for itself till it has attained
its adult form. Or it is retained within the body of the mother until
development is complete.
The reproductive cells are the bearers of the Germ-plasm, the stuff
of which man and the beasts of the field alike are fashioned. Only a
portion of this germ-plasm gives rise to a new body; the rest is, as it
were, held over and stored within the new body to give rise to another
in due course. That which produces the body we call the “Somatoplasm,”
because it is the “plasm” or stuff of which the “Soma,” or body,
is made. As to the nature of this Germ-plasm and its mysterious
properties, a wide divergency of opinion exists among _savants_. But the
views which find most favour to-day are those of the veteran Professor
August Weissmann, as set forth in his work on the “Germ-Plasm, a Theory
of Heredity.”
The excessively minute quantity of this germ-plasm which suffices
to form a new body is incredible. By what miracle of miracles is
the essence of a man distilled? His body arises from the union or
commingling of two particles of living matter so minute as to be
invisible to the naked eye. One of these particles is the “sperm”—cell
furnished by the male parent; the other, the “ovum,” furnished by
the mother. True the ovum may measure as much as the one-hundred and
fiftieth part of an inch, but the bulk of this is yolk-food necessary
to furnish the tender germ with life and energy till it shall have
attached itself to the walls of the womb, whence all its future
nourishment is derived.
By no process of analysis known to us could the germ-plasm of man be
distinguished from that of, say, a jelly-fish; and in the matter of
quantity there is no more difference. Yet, identical to our senses, in
potentiality how amazingly different are these two particles of jelly!
In the lowliest animals, such as jelly-fish, one cannot distinguish
male and female at sight. The appearance of separate male and female
individuals begins somewhat high in the scale marking an epoch in
the history of animal life. For the birth of sex inaugurated not
merely individuals producing distinctive “male” and “female” germs,
but individuals which, by virtue of their sex, developed differences
of behaviour and mentality which were to be followed by tremendous
consequences. Certain aspects of this behaviour are to furnish the
theme of these pages; others, and no less important, those who will may
discover in Professor Arthur Thomson’s “Evolution of Sex.”
We are far, indeed, from being able to explain the attributes of sex.
At most, we can but endeavour to interpret the behaviour associated
therewith. This was the task which Darwin set himself to achieve in
his theory of sexual selection. He was influenced in the train of
thought which he followed up with such brilliant success by what he had
observed in the behaviour of highly-ornamented species, such as the
Peacock and the Birds of Paradise. The strange antics of these birds
when under the influence of sexual excitement persuaded him that they
were at least dimly conscious of their splendour, and of its power
to fascinate. The female, on the other hand, was supposed to be coy,
and to bestow her person on the finest performer. In this way the
dullest birds and the poorest performers were gradually eliminated.
Here, indeed, was sexual selection. The frills thus begotten he called
“Secondary Sexual Characters,” a term which is also used, and was used,
by him, to include any feature whereby the sexes can be distinguished
apart from the character of the genital organs.
Horns, tusks, and spurs are other forms of secondary sexual characters.
And these stand for another form of sexual selection—that of selection
by battle. Herein victory falls to the strongest and most pugnacious
male who, as the spoils of victory, annexes the females which formed
the subject of the duel. This theory, which must be discussed at
greater length in the course of these pages, has had many critics,
and among them men of mark. But whatever modifications may be deemed
necessary, they will be such as are demanded by the results of later
discoveries rather than to the force and subtlety of the arguments of
his opponents.
One of the most formidable of the opponents of the Sexual Selection
theory was Wallace. But his arguments were far from convincing, and
often inconsistent. He attributed the more frequent occurrence in male
animals of brilliant coloration and exaggerations of growth such as
give rise to manes, beards, long plumes, and so on, to a “surplus of
strength, vitality and growth-power which is able to expend itself
in this way without injury,” or, as he sometimes expresses it, to
superabundant vitality. He was evidently striving to find words for
the faith that was in him, and he was nearer the truth than he knew
or than his critics supposed. He was seeking facts which only the
physiologist could furnish. And these made their appearance long years
after with Professor Starling’s discovery of Hormones. We are far from
understanding the origin of these mysterious juices which must be so
frequently alluded to in these pages, but they are evidently intimately
associated with the expenditure of energy. This may sometimes find an
outlet in increased stature, sometimes in pure luxuries of growth. The
force of Wallace’s arguments was crushed out by the weight of detail
they were made to bear.
Mr. J. T. Cunningham a few years ago entered the lists and failed to
achieve his purpose no less completely. His was a theory which assumed
too much. In the first place it was based on the transmissibility of
acquired characters, of the truth of which there is at present no
evidence.
He contends, for example, that the vivid hues of scarlet, blue, yellow
and violet which colour the naked skin of the neck of the cassowaries
and of both sexes, and the curious horny casque which surmounts the
head, are the outcome of the constant laceration of the skin inflicted
by the males during their conflicts for the possession of the females.
He assumes that such conflicts take place, and he assumes that such
“acquired characters” are transmitted. Now, as a matter of fact, these
birds do not fight with their beaks, but with their feet. And to this
end the claw of the inner toe is enlarged to form a great spur. But
there is no evidence that the skin of the neck is ever damaged in such
conflicts as they may engage in. No scars are ever found, at any rate,
to lend support to this theory. The casque, which is similarly supposed
to be a mark of honourable conflict, is an “ornament” of great frailty,
for it is composed of a delicate filigree-work of bone covered with a
thin sheath of horn. In like manner, the long plumes which surmount the
heads of birds like the Peacock, and many Birds of Paradise, and the
wattle which surmounts the beak of the Turkey, are supposed to have
had their origin in similar pugilistic encounters in the past. Mr.
Cunningham is surely pushing the theory of the transmission of acquired
characters a little far. For what has been transmitted in these cases
is not a number of scarred surfaces, but a series of hypertrophied
structures. An amazing array of ornamental characters, symmetrically
disposed, and often vividly coloured, in short, has been produced from
lacerated tissues which in kind and extent can have varied but little.
Evidence has been accumulating during the last few years which would
have rejoiced the heart of Darwin. Had he known that birds of sober
hues “display” with the same animation and with as much elaboration
of posture as the Peacock and the Pheasant, his theory of “Sexual
Selection “would probably have left little for those who came after him
to criticize. Since his time it has been discovered that both permanent
and recurrent secondary sexual characters, such as the antlers of
deer and the temporary nuptial plumage of birds, such as the Ruff for
example, are controlled as to their growth by the stimulating action
of the “secretions or juices formed by certain of the ductless glands
“; that is to say, of glands having no apparent connection with their
surrounding tissues. We owe much of our knowledge of this subject to
Professor Starling, who has called these secretions “Hormones.”
Darwin knew that the essential sexual glands, the testes and the
ovaries, in some mysterious way controlled, in a large degree, the
development of these “hall-marks” of sex, for it was known in his
time that castrated stags failed to produce antlers, and that hen
pheasants, for example, in extreme old age, or when the ovaries were
damaged by disease or injury, at once assumed the plumage of the cock;
but the part played by these ductless glands was quite unsuspected.
They are the Thyroid, and the Thymus glands, which are attached to
the outer walls of the trachea or windpipe. The Pituitary body, which
forms part of the brain, and the Suprarenal bodies, attached to the
kidneys. It would be foreign to the purpose of these pages to enter
into the functions of these glands; suffice it to say, that the juices
formed therein are taken up by the blood, and distributed over the
system. Their action is only very imperfectly understood. We know
that any derangement in their efficiency results in disease, and that
they play a very important part in the reproductive system, as will
become abundantly evident in the course of these pages. Much hitherto
attributed to the action of “Sexual Selection” alone, it is now evident
is largely due to their action.
The all-sufficiency of the “Sexual Selection” theory to account for
the development of armature, such as horns, antlers, and the huge
spine-like outgrowths which form so conspicuous a feature of many
of the extinct Land-dragons, or Dinosaurs, has been by no means
universally accepted. Some authorities like Dr. A. Smith Woodward and
Professor Osborne interpret these after another fashion. They hold
that these are the “expression points” of inherent growth forces, a
process of concentration marking the final stages of evolution prior
to extinction. From which it may be inferred that there is a term to
the life of a species as there is to the life of the individual. In
many cases it is suggested the very exuberance of growth has been the
exterminating factor, as in the case of the huge antlers of the Irish
“elk,” whose enormous weapons hampered his endeavours to escape his
enemies. This is the theory of “Orthogenesis,” or direct development.
According to this, new structures, arising in the germ-plasm as
“variations,” will of their own inherent vitality go on increasing in
each generation unless, and until, checked by “Natural Selection.”
Changes in the character of the “Hormones” might very well bring
about these excesses of growth. It is well known that the exuberance
of growth which produces giants among the human race is due to a
derangement of the secretions or hormones of the pituitary body which
largely control growth.
Another factor of Sexual Selection which is commonly ignored, but which
is of profound importance, is to be found in the part played by the
emotions in regard to sexual relationships; the part which the “mind”
has played, and plays, in the mating of animals, at any rate of the
higher types.
Darwin touched but lightly on this theme. Later writers have almost
entirely ignored it. Almost all that is worth knowing on the subject
we owe to Professor Lloyd Morgan, who was one of the first to take up
this difficult line of investigation, and to Professor Groos. Their
researches have shown that there can be no doubt but that the emotions
have played and are playing an important part in the phenomena we are
striving to analyse. Sexual selection, in short, is concerned not
merely with the evolution of the physical characters of the body, but
also, and no less, with the psychological attributes thereof. Many new
and extremely valuable facts in this regard have been brought to light
by Mr. H. Eliot Howard in the course of his remarkable studies on our
native warblers. Not until the psychology of sex in the lower orders
of creation has been further investigated shall we have a properly
balanced account of the part played by sexual selection in the scheme
of evolution.
By now it will have become apparent that the study of the “Courtship”
of animals is one of alluring interest and full of pitfalls for the
unwary. And this because of the apparent difficulty in drawing any
hard-and-fast line between the part played by “Natural” and the part
played by “Sexual” Selection, at any rate in some cases.
To this aspect of the theme Professor Lloyd Morgan has drawn particular
attention. “It is difficult,” he remarks, to accept the view that
individual choice has played no part where the sexual instincts are
concerned. But supposing that it has played its part... the effects
will be wrought into the congenital tissue of the race if, and only
if, there are certain individuals which, through failure to elicit the
pairing response, die unmated. Is preferential mating, supposing it to
occur, carried to such a degree that some individuals fail to secure
a mate? That is the question. If so, sexual selection is a factor in
race progress; if not, though it may occur in nature, it is inoperative
as a means of evolutionary development. The whole question, in itself a
difficult one, is further complicated by the fact that the males which
are possessed of the most exuberant vitality, and are therefore by
hypothesis rendered the most acceptable through emotional suggestion,
are likely to compete with other males of less exuberant vitality by
direct combat. Such competition, by which the weakest are excluded from
mating through no choice on the part of the female, falls under the
head of natural selection, and not of sexual selection, if by that term
we understand preferential mating.
“This serves to bring out the difference... between natural selection
through elimination and conscious selection through choice....
Sexual selection by preferential mating begins by selecting the most
successful in stimulating the pairing instinct.... The process is
determined by conscious choice. It is in and through such choice that
consciousness has been a factor in evolution.”
Herein Lloyd Morgan, like Darwin, recognizes the existence of a
dual machinery in determining survival, where this depends on the
co-operation of two individuals leading separate existences—Natural,
and Sexual, Selection—sometimes the one and sometimes the other
prevailing. In the former, the females are seized by force; in the
latter, won by displays.
But is this really so? In these pages it is contended that a sharp
line must be drawn between all those attributes and characters which
are necessary to achieve individual survival, the survival of the
Ego, and all those which, on the other hand, are necessary to achieve
reproduction and the survival of the race. The former are governed, or
determined, by Natural, the latter by Sexual, Selection.
The sphere of influence of these two factors may be delimited, if
we regard natural selection as the factor accountable only for the
qualities necessary for the survival of the individual—necessary to
ensure success in the struggle for existence. Then it will become
apparent that the qualities and attributes necessary to achieve the
survival of the _race_ are of a different kind, and these are the
factors which are embraced under the term “Sexual Selection.”
It is a mistake to regard animals in relation to the selection theory
as if they were so many tailors’ “mannikins.” Yet a large number of the
critics of the selection theory seem to fall into this error, ignoring
all but the most superficial characters.
The peculiarities of colour, structure and behaviour, that is to say,
the characters and qualities which distinguish the individuals of any
given race, are due to inherent qualities of the germ-plasm. Each of
such qualities, therefore, may be regarded as entities. Selection
determines their survival. Intracellular selection is the first sieve
through which they have to pass, natural and sexual selection are
others, as circumstances may determine.
As a rule the sex of an individual is attested by more or less
conspicuous external features. These are known as the “Secondary Sexual
Characters.” But no hard-and-fast line can be established for these,
at any rate, so far as colour and ornament are concerned, for such, as
will become apparent in the course of these pages, tend to appear first
in the male, and then, later, to be acquired by the female, until in
many cases the two sexes become again indistinguishable.
CHAPTER II
“MANKIND IN THE MAKING”
The use of the term “Courtship”—Primitive Man and the Foundations
of Society—“Amorousness” as a motive force—Polygamy—Our half human
ancestors—Standards of Beauty—Disquieting signs.
Our ideas on the subject of the “Courtship” of animals are of necessity
largely framed on what has been observed by each of us in regard to our
own race; and without any very careful analysis of motives, or thought
of what lies behind. But no real insight into this most tremendous
subject can be gained which does not strive to penetrate beyond what is
actually seen; which does not endeavour to get at the source of conduct
in this regard.
“Courtship” is the word we commonly employ to describe the act of
wooing; and in civilized human society at any rate, the intensity of
the emotions which inspire the desire to woo are held in restraint by
a variety of causes—and hence the “Courtship.” In the lower animals it
is a moot point whether the term “Courtship” can be accurately applied.
They are governed by no conventions, for them there is neither modesty
nor immodesty. Desire with them is not made to walk delicately,
veiled according to custom; nor is it artificially fostered as among
civilized communities by stimulating food and the crowding together of
large numbers of both sexes in artificial surroundings. Rather it is
a natural, rhythmical, highly emotional state, which gathering force
inhibits the ordinary emotions, or, rather, overrides them, begetting
an intensity of passion which brooks no control. It demands, without
parleying, or mincing matters, what is really the object of courtship
among the civilized
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experience of all believing sinners agree in this matter, viz. their
soul presented to their view nothing but an abyss of sin, when the
grace of God that bringeth salvation appeared.
The Holy Spirit carried on his work in the subject of this Memoir, by
continuing to deepen in him the conviction of his ungodliness, and the
pollution of his whole nature. And all his life long, he viewed
_original sin_, not as an excuse for his actual sins, but as an
aggravation of them all. In this view he was of the mind of David,
taught by the unerring Spirit of Truth. See Psalm 51:4, 5.
At first light dawned slowly; so slowly, that for a considerable time
he still relished an occasional plunge into scenes of gaiety. Even
after entering the Divinity Hall, he could be persuaded to indulge in
lighter pursuits, at least during the two first years of his
attendance; but it was with growing alarm. When hurried away by such
worldly joys, I find him writing thus:--"_Sept. 14._--May there be few
such records as this in my biography." Then, "_Dec. 9._--A thorn in my
side--much torment." As the unholiness of his pleasures became more
apparent, he writes:--"_March 10, 1832._--I hope never to play cards
again." "_March 25._--Never visit on a Sunday evening again." "_April
10._--Absented myself from the dance; upbraidings ill to bear. But I
must try to bear the cross." It seems to be in reference to the
receding tide, which thus for a season repeatedly drew him back to the
world, that on July 8, 1836, he records: "This morning five years ago,
my dear brother David died, and my heart for the first time knew true
bereavement. Truly it was all well. Let me be dumb, for Thou didst it:
and it was good for me that I was afflicted. I know not that any
providence was ever more abused by man than that was by me; and yet,
Lord, what mountains Thou comest over! none was ever more blessed to
me." To us who can look at the results, it appears probable that the
Lord permitted him thus to try many broken cisterns, and to taste the
wormwood of many earthly streams, in order that in after days, by the
side of the fountain of living waters, he might point to the world he
had forever left, and testify the surpassing preciousness of what he
had now found.
Mr. Alexander Somerville (afterwards minister of Anderston Church,
Glasgow) was his familiar friend and companion in the gay scenes of
his youth. And he, too, about this time, having been brought to taste
the powers of the world to come, they united their efforts for each
other's welfare. They met together for the study of the Bible, and
used to exercise themselves in the Septuagint Greek and the Hebrew
original. But oftener still they met for prayer and solemn converse;
and carrying on all their studies in the same spirit, watched each
other's steps in the narrow way.
He thought himself much profited, at this period, by investigating the
subject of Election and the Free Grace of God. But it was the reading
of _The Sum of Saving Knowledge_, generally appended to our Confession
of Faith, that brought him to a clear understanding of the way of
acceptance with God. Those who are acquainted with its admirable
statements of truth, will see how well fitted it was to direct an
inquiring soul. I find him some years afterwards recording:--"_March
11, 1834._--Read in the _Sum of Saving Knowledge_, the work which I
think first of all wrought a saving change in me. How gladly would I
renew the reading of it, if that change might be carried on to
perfection!" It will be observed that he never reckoned his soul
saved, notwithstanding all his convictions and views of sins, until
he really went into the Holiest of all on the warrant of the
Redeemer's work; for assuredly a sinner is still under wrath, until he
has actually availed himself of the way to the Father opened up by
Jesus. All his knowledge of his sinfulness, and all his sad feeling of
his own need and danger, cannot place him one step farther off from
the lake of fire. It is "he that comes to Christ" that is saved.
Before this period he had received a bias towards the ministry from
his brother David, who used to speak of the ministry as the most
blessed work on earth, and often expressed the greatest delight in the
hope that his younger brother might one day become a minister of
Christ. And now, with altered views,--with an eye that could gaze on
heaven and hell, and a heart that felt the love of a reconciled
God,--he sought to become a herald of salvation.
He had begun to keep a register of his studies, and the manner in
which his time slipped away, some months before his brother's death.
For a considerable time this register contains almost nothing but the
bare incidents of the diary, and on Sabbaths the texts of the sermons
he had heard. There is one gleam of serious thought--but it is the
only one--during that period. On occasion of Dr. Andrew Thomson's
funeral, he records the deep and universal grief that pervaded the
town, and then subjoins: "Pleasing to see so much public feeling
excited on the decease of so worthy a man. How much are the times
changed within these eighteen centuries, since the time when Joseph
besought _the body_ in secret, and when he and Nicodemus were the only
ones found to bear the body to the tomb!"
It is in the end of the year that evidences of a change appear. From
that period and ever onward his dry register of every-day incidents is
varied with such passages as the following:--
"_Nov. 12._--Reading H. Martyn's Memoirs. Would I could imitate him,
giving up father, mother, country, house, health, life, all--for
Christ. And yet, what hinders? Lord, purify me, and give me strength
to dedicate myself, my all, to Thee!"
"_Dec. 4._--Reading Legh Richmond's Life. Poetentia profunda, non
sine lacrymis. Nunquam me ipsum, tam vilem, tam inutilem, tam
pauperim, et præcipue tam ingratum, adhuc vidi. Sint lacrymæ
dedicationis meæ pignora!'" ["Deep penitence, not unmixed with
tears. I never before saw myself so vile, so useless, so poor, and,
above all, so ungrateful. May these tears be the pledges of my
self-dedication!"] There is frequently at this period a sentence in
Latin occurring like the above in the midst of other matter,
apparently with the view of giving freer expression to his feelings
regarding himself.
"_Dec. 9._--Heard a street-preacher: foreign voice. Seems really in
earnest. He quoted the striking passage, 'The Spirit and the bride
say, Come, _and let him that heareth say, Come!'_ From this he seems
to derive his authority. Let me learn from this man to be in earnest
for the truth, and to despise the scoffing of the world."
_Dec. 18._--After spending an evening too lightly, he writes: "My
heart must break off from all these things. What right have I to steal
and abuse my Master's time? 'Redeem it,' He is crying to me."
"_Dec. 25._--My mind not yet calmly fixed on the Rock of Ages."
"_Jan._ 12, 1832.--Cor non pacem habet. Quare? Peccatum apud fores
manet." ["My heart has not peace. Why? Sin lieth at my door."]
"_Jan. 25._--A lovely day. Eighty-four cases of cholera at
Musselburgh, How it creeps nearer and nearer like a snake! Who will be
the first victim here? Let thine everlasting arms be around us, and we
shall be safe."
"_Jan. 29_, Sabbath.--Afternoon heard Mr. Bruce (then minister of the
New North Church, Edinburgh) on Malachi 1:1-6. It constitutes the very
gravamen of the charge against the unrenewed man, that he has
affection for his earthly parent, and reverence for his earthly
master, but none for God! Most noble discourse."
"_Feb. 2_.--Not a trait worth remembering! And yet these
four-and-twenty hours must be accounted for."
_Feb. 5_, Sabbath.--In the afternoon, having heard the late Mr. Martin
of St. George's,[1] he writes, on returning home: "O quam humilem, sed
quam diligentissimum; quam dejectum, sed quam vigilem, quam die
noctuque precantem, decet me esse quum tales viros aspicio. Juva,
Pater, Fili, et Spiritus!" ["Oh! how humble, yet how diligent, how
lowly, yet how watchful, how prayerful night and day it becomes me to
be, when I see such men. Help, Father, Son, and Spirit!"]
[1] He says of him on another occasion, _June 8, 1834_: "A man
greatly beloved of whom the world was not worthy." "An apostolic
man." His own calm deep holiness, resembled in many respects Mr.
Martin's daily walk.
From this date he seems to have sat, along with his friend Mr.
Somerville, almost entirely under Mr. Bruce's ministry. He took
copious notes of his lectures and sermons, which still remain among
his papers.
"_Feb. 28._--Sober conversation. Fain would I turn to the most
interesting of all subjects. Cowardly backwardness: 'For whosoever is
ashamed of me and my words,'" etc.
At this time, hearing, concerning a friend of the family, that she had
said, "_That she was determined to keep by the world,_" he penned the
following lines on her melancholy decision:--
She has chosen the world,
And its paltry crowd;
She has chosen the world,
And an endless shroud!
She has chosen the world
With its misnamed pleasures;
She has chosen the world,
Before heaven's own treasures.
She hath launched her boat
On life's giddy sea,
And her all is afloat
For eternity.
But Bethlehem's star
Is not in her view;
And her aim is far
From the harbor true.
When the storm descends
From an angry sky,
Ah! where from the winds
Shall the vessel fly?
[Away, then--oh, fly
From the joys of earth!
Her smile is a lie--
There's a sting in her mirth.]*
When stars are concealed,
And rudder gone,
And heaven is sealed
To the wandering one
The whirlpool opes
For the gallant prize;
And, with all her hopes,
To the deep she hies!
But who may tell
Of the place of woe,
Where the wicked dwell,
Where the worldlings go?
For the human heart
Can ne'er conceive
What joys are the part
Of them who believe;
Nor can justly think
Of the cup of death,
Which all must drink
Who despise the faith.
*Come, leave the dreams
Of this transient night,
And bask in the beams
Of an endless light.
*TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE: In the original "Memoirs and Remains of
the Reverend Robert Murray McCheyne", the passage in brackets
was the first half of the last, eight-line stanza, and the
following quartet was part of the eight-line stanza beginning
"When the storm descends".
"_March 6._--Wild wind and rain all day long. Hebrew class--Psalms.
New beauty in the original every time I read. Dr. Welsh--lecture on
Pliny's letter about the Christians of Bithynia. Professor Jameson on
quartz. Dr. Chalmers grappling with Hume's arguments. Evening--Notes,
and little else. Mind and body dull." This is a specimen of his
register of daily study.
_March 20._--After a few sentences in Latin, concluding with "In meam
animam veni, Domine Deus omnipotens," he writes, "Leaning on a staff
of my own devising, it betrayed me, and broke under me. It was not thy
staff. Resolving to be a god, Thou showedst me that I was but a man.
But my own staff being broken, why may I not lay hold of thine?--Read
part of the Life of Jonathan Edwards. How feeble does my spark of
Christianity appear beside such a sun! But even his was a borrowed
light, and the same source is still open to enlighten me."
"_April 8._--Have found much rest in Him who bore all our burdens for
us."
"April 26.--To-night I ventured to break the ice of unchristian
silence. Why should not selfishness be buried beneath the Atlantic in
matters so sacred?"
_May 6_, Saturday evening.--This was the evening previous to the
Communion; and in prospect of again declaring himself the Lord's at
his table, he enters into a brief review of his state. He had partaken
of the ordinance in May of the year before for the first time; but he
was then living at ease, and saw not the solemn nature of the step he
took. He now sits down and reviews the past:--
"What a mass of corruption have I been! How great a portion of my life
have I spent wholly without God in the world, given up to sense and
the perishing things around me! Naturally of a feeling and sentimental
disposition, how much of my religion has been, and to this day is,
tinged with these colors of earth! Restrained from open vice by
educational views and the fear of man, how much ungodliness has
reigned within me! How often has it broken through all restraints, and
come out in the shape of lust and anger, mad ambitions, and unhallowed
words! Though my vice was always refined, yet how subtile and how
awfully prevalent it was! How complete a test was the Sabbath--spent
in weariness, as much of it as was given to God's service! How I
polluted it by my hypocrisies, my self-conceits, my worldly thoughts,
and worldly friends! How formally and unheedingly the Bible was
read,--how little was read,--so little that even now I have not read
it all! How unboundedly was the wild impulse of the heart obeyed! How
much more was the creature loved than the Creator!--O great God, that
didst suffer me to live whilst I so dishonored Thee, Thou knowest the
whole; and it was thy hand alone that could awaken me from the death
in which I was, and was contented to be. Gladly would I have escaped
from the Shepherd that sought me as I strayed; but He took me up in
his arms and carried me back; and yet He took me not for anything that
was in me. I was no more fit for his service than the Australian, and
no more worthy to be called and chosen. Yet why should I doubt? not
that God is unwilling, not that He is unable--of both I am assured.
But perhaps my old sins are too fearful, and my unbelief too glaring?
Nay; I come to Christ, not _although_ I am a sinner, but just
_because_ I am a sinner, even the chief." He then adds, "And though
sentiment and constitutional enthusiasm may have a great effect on
me, still I believe that my soul is in sincerity desirous and earnest
about having all its concerns at rest with God and Christ,--that his
kingdom occupies the most part of all my thoughts, and even of my
long-polluted affections. Not unto me, not unto me, be the shadow of
praise or of merit ascribed, but let all glory be given to thy most
holy name! As surely as Thou didst make the mouth with which I pray,
so surely dost Thou prompt every prayer of faith which I utter. Thou
hast made me all that I am, and given me all that I have."
Next day, after communicating, he writes: "I well remember when I was
an enemy, and especially abhorred this ordinance as binding me down;
but if I be bound to Christ in heart, I shall not dread any bands that
can draw me close to Him." Evening--"Much peace. Look back, my soul,
and view the mind that belonged to thee but twelve months ago. My
soul, thy place is in the dust!"
"_May 19._--Thought with more comfort than usual of being a witness
for Jesus in a foreign land."
"June 4.--Walking with A. Somerville by Craigleith. Conversing on
missions. If I am to go to the heathen to speak of the unsearchable
riches of Christ, this one thing must be given me, to be out of the
reach of the baneful influence of esteem or contempt. If worldly
motives go with me, I shall never convert a soul, and shall lose my
own in the labor."
"_June 22._--Variety of studies. Septuagint translation of Exodus and
Vulgate. Bought Edwards' works. Drawing--Truly there was nothing in me
that should have induced Him to choose me. I was but as the other
brands upon whom the fire is already kindled, which shall burn for
evermore! And as soon could the billet leap from the hearth and become
a green tree, as my soul could have sprung to newness of life."
_June 25._--In reference to the office of the holy ministry; "How apt
are we to lose our hours in the vainest babblings, as do the world!
How can this be with those chosen for the mighty office?
fellow-workers with God? heralds of His Son? evangelists? men set
apart to the work, chosen out of the chosen, as it were the very pick
of the flocks, who are to shine as the stars forever and ever? Alas,
alas! my soul, where shall thou appear? O Lord God, I am a little
child! But Thou wilt send an angel with a live coal from off the
altar, and touch my unclean lips, and put a tongue within my dry
mouth, so that I shall say with Isaiah, 'Here am I, send me.'" Then,
after reading a little of Edwards' works: "Oh that heart and
understanding may grow together, like brother and sister, leaning on
one another!"
"_June 27._--Life of David Brainerd. Most wonderful man! What
conflicts, what depressions, desertions, strength, advancement,
victories, within thy torn bosom! I cannot express what I think when I
think of thee. To-night, more set upon missionary enterprise than
ever."
"_June 28._--Oh for Brainerd's humility and sin-loathing
dispositions!"
"_June 30._--Much carelessness, sin, and sorrow. 'Oh wretched man than
I am, who shall deliver me from this body of sin and death?' Enter
thou, my soul, into the rock, and hide thee in the dust for fear of
the Lord and the glory of his majesty." And then he writes a few
verses, of which the following are some stanzas:--
I will arise and seek my God,
And, bowed down beneath my load,
Lay all my sins before Him;
Then He will wash my soul from sin,
And put a new heart me within,
And teach me to adore Him.
O ye that fain would find the joy--
The only one that wants alloy--
Which never is deceiving;
Come to the Well of Life with me,
And drink, as it is proffered, free,
The gospel draught receiving.
I come to Christ, because I know
The very worst are called to go;
And when in faith I find Him,
I'll walk in Him, and lean on Him,
Because I cannot move a limb
Until He say, "Unbind him."
"_July 3._--This last bitter root of worldliness that has so often
betrayed me has this night so grossly, that I cannot but regard it as
God's chosen way to make me loathe and forsake it forever. I would
vow; but it is much more like a weakly worm to pray. Sit in the dust,
O my soul!" I believe he was enabled to keep his resolution. Once
only, in the end of this year, was he again led back to gaiety; but it
was the last time.
"_July 7_, Saturday.--After finishing my usual studies, tried to fast
a little, with much prayer and earnest seeking of God's face,
remembering what occurred this night last year." (Alluding to his
brother's death.)
"_July 22._--Had this evening a more complete understanding of that
self-emptying and abasement with which it is necessary to come to
Christ,--a denying of self, trampling it under foot,--a recognizing of
the complete righteousness and justice of God, that could do nothing
else with us but condemn us utterly, and thrust us down to lowest
hell,--a feeling that, even in hell, we _should_ rejoice in his
sovereignty, and say that all was rightly done."
"_Aug. 15._--Little done, and as little suffered. Awfully important
question, Am I redeeming the time?"
"_Aug. 18._--Heard of the death of James Somerville[2] by fever,
induced by cholera. O God, thy ways and thoughts are not as ours! He
had preached his first sermon. I saw him last on Friday, 27th July, at
the College gate; shook hands, and little thought I was to see him no
more on earth."
[2] Son of the minister of Drumelzier,--very promising and very
amiable.
"_Sept. 2_, Sabbath evening.--Reading. Too much engrossed, and too
little devotional. Preparation for a fall. Warning. We may be too
engrossed with the shell even of heavenly things."
"_Sept. 9._--Oh for true, unfeigned humility! I know I have cause to
be humble; and yet I do not know one-half of that cause. I know I am
proud; and yet I do not know the half of that pride."
"_Sept. 30._--Somewhat straitened by loose Sabbath observance. Best
way is to be explicit and manly."
"_Nov. 1._--More abundant longings for the work of the ministry. Oh
that Christ would but count me faithful, that a dispensation of the
gospel might be committed to me!" And then he adds, "Much peace.
_Peaceful, because believing_."
_Dec. 2._--Hitherto he used to spend much of the Sabbath evening in
extending his notes of Mr. Bruce's sermons, but now, "Determined to be
brief with these, for the sake of a more practical, meditative,
resting, sabbatical evening."
"_Dec. 11._--Mind quite unfitted for devotion. Prayerless prayer."
"_Dec. 31._--God has in this past year introduced me to the
preparation of the ministry,--I bless Him for that. He has helped me
to give up much of my shame to name his name, and be on his side,
especially before particular friends,--I bless Him for that. He has
taken conclusively away friends that might have been a snare,--must
have been a stumbling-block,--I bless Him for that. He has introduced
me to one Christian friend, and sealed more and more my amity with
another,--I bless Him for that."
_Jan. 27_, 1833.--On this day it had been the custom of his brother
David to write a "Carmen Natale" on their father's birth-day. Robert
took up the domestic song this year; and in doing so, makes some
beautiful and tender allusions.
Ah! where is the harp that was strung to thy praise,
So oft and so sweetly in happier days?
When the tears that we shed were the tears of our joy,
And the pleasures of home were unmixed with alloy?
The harp is now mute--its last breathings are spoken--
And the cord, though 'twas threefold, is now, alas, broken!
Yet why should we murmur, short-sighted and vain,
Since death to that loved one was undying gain?
Ah, fools! shall we grieve that he left this poor scene,
To dwell in the realms that are ever serene?
Through he sparkled the gem in our circle of love,
He is even more prized in the circles above.
And though sweetly he sung of his father on earth,
When this day would inspire him with tenderest mirth,
Yet a holier tone to his harp is now given,
_As he sings to his unborn Father in heaven_.
Feb. 3.--Writing to a medical friend of his brother William's, he
says, "I remember long ago a remark you once made to William, which
has somehow or other stuck in my head, viz. that medical men ought to
make a distinct study of the Bible, purely for the sake of
administering conviction and consolation to their patients. I think
you also said that you had actually begun with that view. Such a
determination, though formed in youth, is one which I trust riper
years will not make you blush to own."
"_Feb. 11._--Somewhat overcome. Let me see: there is a creeping defect
here. Humble purpose-like reading of the word omitted. What plant can
be unwatered and not wither?"
"_Feb. 16._--Walk to Corstorphine Hill. Exquisite clear view,--blue
water, and brown fields, and green firs. Many thoughts on the follies
of my youth. How many, O Lord, may they be? Summed up in
one--ungodliness!"
"_Feb. 21._--Am I as willing as ever to preach to the lost heathen?"
"_March 8._--Biblical criticism. This must not supersede heart-work.
How apt it is!"
"_March 12._--Oh for activity, activity, activity!"
"_March 29._--To-day my second session (at the Divinity Hall) ends. I
am now in the middle of my career. God hold me on with a steady pace!"
"_March 31._--The bull tosses in the net! How should the Christian
imitate the anxieties of the worldling!"
_April 17._--He heard of the death of one whom many friends had
esteemed much and lamented deeply. This led him to touch the strings
of his harp again, in a measure somewhat irregular, yet sad and sweet.
"WE ALL DO FADE AS A LEAF."
SHE LIVED--
So dying-like and frail,
That every bitter gale
Of winter seemed to blow
Only to lay her low!
She lived to show how He,
Who stills the stormy sea,
Can overrule the winter's power,
And keep alive the tiniest flower--
Can bear the young lamb in his arms
And shelter it from death's alarms.
SHE DIED--
When spring, with brightest flowers,
Was fresh'ning all the bowers.
The linnet sung her choicest lay,
When her sweet voice was hush'd for aye
The snowdrop rose above the ground
When she beneath her pillow found,
Both cold, and white, and fair,--
She, fairest of the fair,
She died to teach us all
The loveliest must fall.
A curse is written on the brow
Of beauty; and the lover's vow
Cannot retain the flitting breath,
Nor save from all-devouring death.
SHE LIVES--
The spirit left the earth;
And he who gave her birth
Has called her to his dread abode,
To meet her Saviour and her God.
She lives, to tell how blest
Is the everlasting rest
Of those who, in the Lamb's blood laved,
Are chosen, sanctified, and saved!
How fearful is their doom
Who drop into the tomb
Without a covert from the ire
Of Him who is consuming fire!
SHE SHALL LIVE--
The grave shall yield his prize,
When, from the rending skies,
Christ shall with shouting angels come
To wake the slumberers of the tomb.
And many more shall rise
Before our longing eyes.
Oh! may we all together meet,
Embracing the Redeemer's feet!
"_May 20._--General Assembly. The motion regarding Chapels of Ease
lost by 106 to 103. Every shock of the ram is heavier and stronger,
till all shall give way."
"_June 4._--Evening almost lost. Music will not sanctify, though it
make feminine the heart."
"_June 22._--Omissions make way for commissions. Could I but take
effective warning! A world's wealth would not make up for that saying,
'If any man sin, we have an Advocate with the Father.' But how shall
we that are dead to sin live any longer therein?"
"_June 30._--Self-examination. Why is a missionary life so often an
object of my thoughts? Is it simply for the love I bear to souls?
Then, why do I not show it more where I am? Souls are as precious here
as in Burmah. Does the romance of the business not weigh anything with
me?--the interest and esteem I would carry with me?--the nice journals
and letters I should write and receive? Why would I so much rather go
to the East than to the West Indies? Am I wholly deceiving my own
heart? and have I not a spark of true missionary zeal? Lord, give me
to understand and imitate the spirit of those unearthly words of thy
dear Son: 'It is enough for the disciple that he be as his Master, and
the servant as his Lord.' 'He that loveth father or mother more than
me, is not worthy of me.' _Gloria in excelsis Deo!_
"_Aug. 13._--Clear conviction of sin is the only true origin of
dependence on another's righteousness, and therefore (strange to say!)
of the Christian's peace of mind and cheerfulness."
"_Sept. 8._--Reading _Adams' Private Thoughts_. Oh for his
heart-searching humility! Ah me! on what mountains of pride must I be
wandering, when all I do is tinctured with the very sins this man so
deplores; yet where are my wailings, where my tears, over my love of
praise?"
"_Nov. 14._--Composition--a pleasant kind of labor. I fear the love of
applause or effect goes a great way. May God keep me from preaching
myself instead of Christ crucified."
"_Jan. 15_, 1834.--Heard of the death of J.S., off the Cape of Good
Hope. O God! how Thou breakest into families! Must not the disease be
dangerous, when a tender-hearted surgeon cuts deep into the flesh? How
much more when God is the operator, 'who afflicteth not _from his
heart_ [[Hebrew: meilivo]], nor grieveth the children of men!' Lam.
3:33."
"_Feb. 23_, Sabbath.--Rose early to seek God, and found Him whom my
soul loveth. Who would not rise early to meet such company? The rains
are over and gone. They that sow in tears shall reap in joy."
_Feb. 24._--He writes a letter to one who, he feared, was only
sentimental, and not really under a sense of sin. "Is it possible,
think you, for a person to be conceited of his miseries? May there not
be a deep leaven of pride in telling how desolate and how unfeeling we
are?--in brooding over our unearthly pains?--in our being excluded
from the unsympathetic world?--in our being the invalids of Christ's
hospital?" He had himself been taught by the Spirit that it is more
humbling for us to _take what grace offers_, than to bewail our wants
and worthlessness.
Two days after, he records, with thankful astonishment, that for the
first time in his life he had been blest to awaken a soul. All who
find Christ for themselves are impelled, by the holy necessity of
constraining love, to seek the salvation of others. Andrew findeth his
brother Peter, and Philip findeth his friend Nathanael. So was it in
the case before us. He no sooner knew Christ's righteousness as his
own covering, than he longed to see others clothed in the same
spotless robe. And it is peculiarly interesting to read the feelings
of one who was yet to be blest in plucking so many brands from the
fire, when, for the first time, he saw the Lord graciously employing
him in this more than angelic work. We have his own testimony. "_Feb.
26._--After sermon. The precious tidings that a soul has been melted
down by the grace of the Saviour. How blessed an answer to prayer, if
it be really so! 'Can these dry bones live? Lord, Thou knowest.' What
a blessed thing it is to see the first grievings of the awakened
spirit, when it cries, 'I cannot see myself a sinner; I cannot pray,
for my vile heart wanders!' It has refreshed me more than a thousand
sermons. I know not how to thank and admire God sufficiently for this
incipient work. Lord, perfect that which Thou hast begun!" A few days
after: "Lord, I thank Thee that Thou hast shown me this marvellous
working, though I was but an adoring spectator rather than an
instrument."
It is scarcely less interesting, in the case of one so gifted for the
work of visiting the careless, and so singularly skilled in
ministering the word by the bedside of the dying, to find a record of
the occasion when the Lord led him forth to take his first survey of
this field of labor. There existed at that time, among some of the
students attending the Divinity Hall, a society, the sole object of
which was to stir up each other to set apart an hour or two every week
for visiting the careless and needy in the most neglected portions of
the town. Our rule was, not to subtract anything from our times of
study, but to devote to this work an occasional hour in the intervals
between different classes, or an hour that might otherwise have been
given to recreation. All of us felt the work to be trying to the flesh
at the outset; but none ever repented of persevering in it. One
Saturday forenoon, at the close of the usual prayer-meeting, which met
in Dr. Chalmers' vestry, we went up together to a district in the
Castle Hill. It was Robert's first near view of the heathenism of his
native city, and the effect was enduring.
"_March 3._--Accompanied A.B. in one of his rounds through some of the
most miserable habitations I ever beheld. Such scenes I never before
dreamed of. Ah! why am I such a stranger to the poor of my native
town? I have passed their doors thousands of times; I have admired the
huge black piles of building, with their lofty chimneys breaking the
sun's rays,--why have I never ventured within? How dwelleth the love
of God in me? How cordial is the welcome even of the poorest and most
loathsome to the voice of Christian sympathy! What imbedded masses of
human beings are huddled together, unvisited by friend or minister!
'No man careth for our souls' is written over every forehead. Awake,
my soul! Why should I give hours and days any longer to the vain
world, when there is such a world of misery at my very door? Lord, put
thine own strength in me; confirm every good resolution; forgive my
past long life of uselessness and folly."
He
|
pupils. To facilitate such a
selection, page references are given in the details of the Course of
Study, which in reality forms a detailed expansion of the Public and
Separate School Course in Nature Study. By means of these references,
the teacher may find, in any department of the subject, typical matter
suited to the development of his pupils.
The numerous type lessons that are contained in the Manual are intended
to suggest principles of method that are to be applied in lessons upon
the same and similar topics, but the teacher is cautioned against
attempting to imitate these lessons. This error can be avoided by the
teacher's careful preparation of the lesson. This preparation should
include the careful study of the concrete materials that are to be used.
The books, bulletins, etc., that are named in the Manual as references
will be found helpful.
To facilitate teaching through the experimental and investigation
methods, special attention has been given to the improvising of simple
apparatus from materials within the reach of every teacher.
From the character of the subject the Course of Study must be more or
less elastic, and the topics detailed in the programme are intended to
be suggestive rather than prescriptive. It may be that, owing to local
conditions, topics not named are among the best that can be used, but
all substitutions and changes should be made a subject of consultation
with the Inspector. The treatment of the subject must always be suited
to the age and experience of the pupils, to the seasons of the year,
accessibility of materials, etc. Notes should not be dictated by the
teacher. Mere information, whether from book, written note, or teacher,
is not Nature Study. The acquisition of knowledge must be made secondary
to awakening and maintaining the pupil's interest in nature and to
training him to habits of observation and investigation.
As a guide to the minimum of work required, it is suggested that at
least one lesson be taught from the subjects outlined under each general
heading in the detailed Course of Study, with a minimum average of three
lessons from the subjects under each general heading.
PUBLIC AND SEPARATE SCHOOL
COURSE OF STUDY
DETAILS
FORM I
AUTUMN
GARDEN WORK AND GARDEN STUDIES:
Division of the garden plots, removal of weeds and observations on these
weeds, identification of garden plants, observation lessons based on
garden plants, selection of seeds, harvesting and disposing of the crop.
(See pp. 54-9.)
STUDY OF PLANTS:
Class lessons based on a flowering garden plant, as pansy, aster,
nasturtium; study of a field plant, as buttercup, goldenrod, dandelion.
(See pp. 55-9.)
Potted and garden plants: Observation lesson based on a bulb; planting
bulbs in pots, or in the garden. (See pp. 69-71.)
BIRDS AND CONSPICUOUS INSECTS:
Identification of a few common birds, as robin, English sparrow,
meadow-lark; observation lessons on the habits of these birds;
collection of the adult forms, the larvæ and the cocoons of a few common
moths and butterflies, as emperor-moth, promothea moth, eastern
swallow-tail butterfly. (See pp. 30-9 and 93-8.)
COMMON TREES:
Identification of a few common trees, as white pine, elm, maple;
observations on the general shape, branches, leaves, and bark of these
trees. (See pp. 62-7 and 79-82.)
WINTER
FARM ANIMALS, INCLUDING FOWLS:
Habits and characteristics of a few domestic animals, as horse, cow,
sheep, hen, duck; the uses of these animals, and how to take care of
them. (See pp. 83-6.)
PET ANIMALS:
Observations on the habits, movements, and characteristics of pet
animals, as cat, pigeon, bantam, rabbit, etc.; conversations about the
natural homes and habits of these animals, and inferences upon their
care. (See pp. 72-7.)
COMMON TREES:
Observations on the branching of common trees. (See pp. 79-82.)
SPRING
GARDEN WORK:
Preparation, planting, and care of the garden plot; observations on the
growing plants. (See pp. 87-90.)
FLOWERS:
Identification and study of a few spring flowers, as trillium,
bloodroot, hepatica, spring-beauty. (See pp. 90-2.)
BIRDS AND INSECTS:
Identification and study of the habits of a few common birds, as
song-sparrow, blue-bird, wren; observations of the form and habits of a
few common insects, as house-fly, dragon-fly. (See pp. 30-3 and 93-9.)
COMMON TREES:
Observations on the opening buds of the trees which were studied in the
Autumn. (See p. 65.)
FORM II
AUTUMN
BIRDS AND INSECTS:
Autumn migration of birds; identification and observations on the habits
and movements of a few common insects, including their larval forms, as
grasshopper, eastern swallow-tail butterfly. (See pp. 113-4 and 118-9.)
ANIMALS OF THE FARM, FIELD, AND WOOD:
Observations on the homes and habits of wild animals, as frog, toad,
squirrel, ground-hog; habits and structures, including adaptive
features, of domestic animals, as dog, cat, horse, cow. (See pp. 83 and
123-30.)
TREES OF THE FARM, ROADSIDE, WOOD, AND ORCHARD:
Observations on the shapes, sizes, rate of growth, and usefulness of
common orchard, shade, and forest trees, as apple, elm, horse-chestnut.
(See pp. 109-10.)
WILD FLOWERS AND WEEDS:
Identification and study of a few common weeds, noting their means of
persistence and dispersal. (See pp. 139-40.)
CARE OF POTTED AND GARDEN PLANTS:
Preparation of pots and garden beds for bulbs; selecting and storing
garden seeds; observations on the habits of climbing plants, and
application of the knowledge gained to the care required for these
plants. (See pp. 101-9 and 120.)
WINTER
BIRDS:
Identification of winter birds and study of their means of protection
and of obtaining food. (See pp. 130-2.)
ANIMALS OF THE FARM:
Comparative study of the horse and cow, of the dog and cat, and of the
duck and hen. (See pp. 123-8.)
ANIMALS OF THE PARK AND ZOOLOGICAL GARDEN:
Observations on the general structural features, noting the natural
adaptations of such animals as bear, lion, deer, tiger, etc. (See p.
132.)
TREES:
Winter study of trees, noting buds, branches, and foliage of spruce,
cedar, horse-chestnut, etc. (See pp. 121-3.)
SPRING
BIRDS AND INSECTS:
Observations on the structure, adaptations and development of insect
larvæ kept in an aquarium, as larva of mosquito, dragon-fly,
caddice-fly; spring migration of birds. (See pp. 149-153.)
ANIMALS OF THE FIELD AND WOODS:
Observations on the forms, homes, habits, and foods of wild animals,
continued. (See pp. 114-8, 143-9.)
ORCHARD TREES:
The buds and blossoms of apple, and cherry or plum, observed through the
stages up to fruit formation. (See pp. 141-3.)
EXPERIMENTS IN THE GERMINATION OF SEEDS:
Germination of seeds and general observations on the stages of
development; testing the conditions required for seed germination;
introductory exercises in soil study as a preparation for seed planting.
(See pp. 133-8 and 112-3.)
WILD FLOWERS AND WEEDS:
Field and class-room study of marsh marigold, Jack-in-the-pulpit,
violet, etc. (See pp. 139-40.)
FORM III
AUTUMN
BIRDS AND INSECTS:
Observations on the habits and the ravages of common noxious insects, as
cabbage-worm, grasshopper, tussock-moth, etc.; discussion of means of
checking these insects. (See pp. 156-7 and 172-7.)
FARM AND WILD ANIMALS OF THE LOCALITY:
Field study and class-room lessons on the habits and structure,
including adaptive features, of common animals, as musk-rat, fox, fish,
sheep. (See pp. 99 and 183-5.)
GARDEN AND EXPERIMENTAL PLOTS:
Harvesting of garden and field crops; preparation of cuttings from
geraniums, begonia, currant, etc.; identification of garden plants; seed
dispersal. (See pp. 154, 179-80, and 164-8.)
STUDY OF COMMON FLOWERS, TREES, AND FRUITS:
Characteristics of annuals, biennials, and perennials; life histories of
common plants, as sweet-pea, Indian corn, etc. (See pp. 158-64 and
168-70.)
STUDY OF WEEDS AND THEIR ERADICATION:
Identification of the common noxious weeds of the locality; collection,
description, and identification of weed seeds; cause of the prevalence
of the weeds studied, and means of checking them. (See pp. 164-8 and
170-2.)
WINTER
FARM AND WILD ANIMALS OF THE LOCALITY:
Habits and instincts of common domestic animals, as fowls, sheep, and
hogs; the economic values of these animals. (See pp. 185-8.)
GARDEN WORK AND EXPERIMENTAL PLOTS:
The characteristics of common house plants, and care of these plants.
(See pp. 178-9.)
STUDY OF COMMON FLOWERS, TREES, AND FRUITS:
Comparative study of common evergreens, as balsam, spruce, hemlock,
etc.; collection of wood specimens. (See pp. 181-3.)
OBSERVATIONS OF NATURAL PHENOMENA:
Simple experiments to show the nature of solids, liquids, and gases.
(See pp. 188-9.)
HEAT PHENOMENA:
Source of heat, changes of volume in solids, liquids, and gases,
accompanying changes in temperature; heat transmission; the thermometer
and its uses. (See pp. 189-200.)
SPRING
BIRDS AND INSECTS:
Field and class lessons on the habits, movements, and foods of common
birds, as crow, woodpecker, king-bird, phoebe, blackbird, etc. (See pp.
217-22.)
GARDEN WORK AND EXPERIMENTAL PLOTS:
Care of garden plots; transplanting; testing best varieties; making of,
and caring for, window boxes; propagation of plants by budding,
cuttings, and layering. (See pp. 201-3 and 208-13.)
COMMON WILD FLOWERS:
Field lessons on the habitat of common wild flowers; class-room study of
the plant organs including floral organs; study of weeds and weed seeds
continued, also the study of garden and field annuals, biennials, and
perennials. (See Autumn.) (See pp. 170-2 and 212-5.)
SOIL STUDIES AND EXPERIMENTS:
The components of soils, their origin, properties, and especially their
water absorbing and retaining properties; the relation of soils to plant
growth; experiments demonstrating the benefits of mulching and of
drainage. (See pp. 203-6.)
FORM IV
AUTUMN
INJURIOUS AND BENEFICIAL INSECTS AND BIRDS:
Identification of common insects and observations on their habits; means
of combating such insects, as codling moth, etc.; bird identification,
and study of typical members of some common families, as woodpeckers,
flycatchers; spiders. (See pp. 217-22 and 240-5.)
ORNAMENTAL AND EXPERIMENTAL GARDEN PLOTS:
Observations and conclusions based upon experimental plots; common
shrubs, vines, and trees, and how to grow them. (See pp. 225-30 and
279.)
FUNCTIONS OF PLANT ORGANS:
Simple experiments illustrating roots as organs of absorption, stems as
organs of transmission, and leaves as organs of respiration,
transpiration, and food building. (See pp. 273-8.)
ECONOMIC STUDY OF PLANTS:
Comparative study of varieties of winter apples, of fall apples, or of
other fruits of the locality; visits to orchards; weed studies
continued. (See Form III.) (See pp. 229-30 and 239-40.)
RELATION OF SOIL AND SOIL TILLAGE TO FARM CROPS:
Soil-forming agents, as running water, ice, frost, heat, wind, plants,
and animals, and inferences as to methods of tillage. (See pp. 268-70.)
WINTER
AIR AND LIQUID PRESSURE:
Simple illustrations of the buoyancy of liquids and of air; simple tests
to demonstrate that air fills space and exerts pressure; the application
of air pressure in the barometer, the common pump, the bicycle tire,
etc. (See pp. 248-52.)
OXYGEN AND CARBON DIOXIDE:
Generate each of these gases and test for properties, as colour, odour,
combustion, action with lime-water; the place occupied by these gases in
nature. (See pp. 252-5.)
PRACTICAL APPLICATION OF HEAT, STEAM, AND ELECTRICITY:
Making a simple voltaic cell, an electro-magnet, and a simple
electroscope. Test the current by means of the two latter and also with
an electric bell. Explain the application of the above in the electric
telegraph and motor. Simple demonstration of pressure of steam; history
and uses of the steam-engine. (See pp. 259-60.)
SPRING
INJURIOUS AND BENEFICIAL INSECTS AND BIRDS:
Identification of noxious insects and observations thereon; study of
representatives of common families of birds, as thrushes, warblers,
sparrows; economic values of birds. (See pp. 283-5 and 286-7.)
AQUATIC ANIMALS:
Observation exercises upon the habits, movements, and structures,
including adaptive features of aquatic animals, as crayfish, mussel,
tadpole, etc. (See pp. 285-6.)
ORNAMENTAL AND EXPERIMENTAL GARDEN PLOTS:
Experimental plots demonstrating the benefits of seed selection;
ornamental plots of flowering perennials and bulbous plants; how to
improve the school grounds and the home lawns. (See pp. 270-3 and
263-5.)
TREE STUDIES:
Comparison of the values of the common varieties of shade trees, how to
plant and how to take care of shade trees. (See pp. 280-2.)
THE FUNCTIONS OF PLANT ORGANS:
Examination of the organs of common flowers; use of root, flower organs,
fruit, and seed. (See pp. 273-8.)
ECONOMIC STUDY OF PLANTS:
Plants of the lawn and garden; weed studies. (See pp. 263-5, 270-3, and
278-9.)
RELATION OF SOIL AND SOIL TILLAGE TO FARM CROPS:
Study of subsoils; capillarity in soils; benefits of crop rotations and
mulching; experiments in fertilizing, mulching, depth of planting, and
closeness of planting. (See pp. 265-7.)
NATURE STUDY
CHAPTER I
THE AIMS OF NATURE STUDY
Nature Study means primarily the study of natural things and preferably
of living things. Like all other subjects, it must justify its position
on the school curriculum by proving its power to equip the pupil for the
responsibilities of citizenship. That citizen is best prepared for life
who lives in most sympathetic and intelligent relation to his
environment, and it is the primary aim of Nature Study to maintain the
bond of interest which unites the child's life to the objects and
phenomena which surround him. To this end it is necessary to adapt the
teaching, in matter and method, to the conditions of the child's life,
that he may learn to understand the secrets of nature and be the better
able to control and utilize the forces of his natural environment.
At all times, the teacher must keep in mind the fact that it is not the
quantity of matter taught but the interest aroused and the spirit of
investigation fostered, together with carefulness and thoroughness,
which are the important ends to be sought. With a mind trained to
experiment and stimulated by a glimpse into nature's secrets, the worker
finds in his labour a scientific interest that lifts it above drudgery,
while, from a fuller understanding of the forces which he must combat
or with which he must co-operate, he reaps better rewards for his
labours.
The claims of Nature Study to an educative value are based not upon a
desire to displace conventional education, but to supplement it, and to
lay a foundation for subsequent reading. Constant exercise of the senses
strengthens these sources of information and develops alertness, and at
the same time the child is kept on familiar ground--the world of
realities. It is for these reasons that Nature Study is frequently
defined as "The Natural Method of Study". Independent observation and
inference should be encouraged to the fullest degree, for one of the
most important, though one of the rarer accomplishments of the modern
intellect, is to think independently and to avoid the easier mode of
accepting the opinions of others. Reading from nature books, the study
of pictures, and other such matter, is not Nature Study. These may
supplement Nature Study, but must not displace the actual vitalizing
contact between the child and natural objects and forces.
It is this contact which is at the basis of clear, definite knowledge;
and clearness of thought and a feeling of at-homeness with the subject
is conducive to clearness and freedom of expression. The Nature Study
lesson should therefore be used as a basis for language lessons.
Undoubtedly one of the most important educative values that can be
claimed for Nature Study is its influence in training the pupil to
appreciate natural objects and phenomena. This implies the widening and
enriching of human interests through nurturing the innate tendency of
the child to love the fields and woods and birds; the checking of the
selfish and destructive impulses by leading him to see the usefulness of
each creature, the harmony of its relation to its environment, and the
significance of its every part. Nor is it a mistake to cultivate the
more sentimental love of nature which belongs to the artist and the
poet. John Ruskin emphasizes this value in these words: "All other
efforts are futile unless you have taught the children to love trees and
birds and flowers".
GENERAL METHODS IN NATURE STUDY
CONCRETE MATERIAL
It is evident that concrete material must be provided and so distributed
that each member of the class will have a direct opportunity to exercise
his senses, and, from his observations, to deduce inferences and form
judgments. The objects chosen should be mainly from the common things of
the locality. The teacher should be guided in the selection by the
interests of the pupils, first finding out from them the things upon
which they are expending their wonder and inquiry. Trees, field crops,
flowers, birds, animals of the parks, woods, or farmyard, all form
suitable subjects for study.
TOPICS AND MATERIAL MUST SUIT THE SEASON
The material should be selected not only with reference to locality but
also with due regard to season. For example, better Nature Study lessons
can be taught on the elm tree of the school grounds than on the giant
Douglas fir of British Columbia; and on the oriole whose nest is in the
elm tree than on the eagle portrayed in Roberts' animal stories; and it
is manifestly unwise to teach lessons on snow in summer, or on flowers
and ants in winter.
MATTER MUST BE SUITED TO THE CHILD
For the urban pupil the treatment of the material must be different from
that in the case of the pupil of the rural school. Rural school pupils
have already formed an extensive acquaintance with many plants and
animals which are entirely unknown to the children of the city. The
simpler facts which are interesting and instructive to the pupils of the
urban classes would prove commonplace and trivial to rural pupils. For
example, while it is necessary to show the city child a squirrel that he
may learn the size, colour, and general appearance of the animal, the
efforts of the pupil of the rural school should be directed to the
discovery of the less evident facts of squirrel life.
USE OF THE COMMONPLACE
It must be kept in mind that besides leading the pupils to discover new
sources of interest, the teacher should strive to accomplish that which
is even greater, namely, to lead them to discover new truth and new
beauty in old, familiar objects. It may be true that "familiarity breeds
contempt" and there is always a danger that the objects with which
children have associated in early life may be passed by as uninteresting
while they go in search of something "new and interesting".
For example, to be able to recognize many plants and to call them by
name is no doubt something of an accomplishment, but it should not be
the chief aim of the teacher in conducting Nature Study lessons on
plants. It is of much greater importance that the child should be led to
love the flowers and to appreciate their beauty and their utility. Such
appreciation will result in the desire to protect and to produce fine
flowers and useful plants, and this end can be reached only through
intelligent acquaintanceship. There can be no true appreciation without
knowledge, and this the child gets chiefly by personal observation and
experiment. With reference to the wild flowers of the woods and fields,
the method employed is that of continuous observation.
ORDER OF DEVELOPMENT OF THE LESSON
Each animal or plant should be studied as a living, active organism. The
attention of the pupils should be focused upon activities; for these
appeal to the child nature and afford the best means for securing
interest and attention. What does this animal do? How does it do it? How
is it fitted for doing this? How does this plant grow? What fits it for
growing in this way? These are questions which should exercise the mind
of the child. They are questions natural in the spirit of inquiry in
child nature and give vitality to nature teaching. They are an effective
means of establishing a bond of sympathy between the child and nature.
The child who takes care of a plant or animal because it is his own,
does so at first from a purely personal motive, which is perfectly
natural to childhood; but while he studies its needs and observes its
movements and changes, gradually and unconsciously this interest will be
transferred to the plant or animal for its own sake. The nature of the
child is thus broadened during the process.
PROBLEMS IN OBSERVATION
In studying the material provided, whether it be in the class-room, or
during a nature excursion, or by observations made in the farmyard at
home, the teacher must guide the efforts of the pupils by assigning to
them definite and suitable problems. Care must be taken to reach the
happy mean of giving specific directions without depriving the pupils of
the pleasure of making original discovery. For example, instead of
asking them to study the foot of the horse and learn all they can about
it, more specific problems should be assigned, such as: Observe how the
hoof is placed on the ground in walking. What are the arrangements for
lessening the shock when the hoof strikes the ground? Examine the under
surface of the hoof and discover what prevents the unshod horse from
slipping.
NOTE-BOOKS AND RECORDS
In Grades higher than Form I, written exercises should be required and
also sketches representing the objects studied. For this purpose a
Nature Study note-book is necessary--a loose-leaf note-book being
preferable because of necessary corrections, rearrangements, additions,
or omissions.
In all records and reports, independence of thought and of expression
should be encouraged. The drawing and the oral or written description
should express what is actually observed, not what the book or some
member of the class says has been, or should be, observed. The
descriptions should be in the pupil's own words, because these are most
in keeping with his own ideas on the subject. More correct forms of
expression may be obtained when notes are taken from the teacher's
dictation, but this is fatal to the development of originality.
The disparity of the results in individual work gives opportunity for
impressing upon the pupil, in the first place, the necessity for more
accurate observation and, secondly, the impossibility of reaching a
correct general conclusion without having studied a large number of
examples. The development of critical and judicious minds, which may
result from carefully observing many examples and generalizing from
these observations, is vastly more important than the memorizing of many
facts.
THE SCHOOL GARDEN
In the study of garden plants there is added a certain new interest
arising out of experimentation, cultivation, and ownership. The love of
the gardener has in it elements that the love of the naturalist does not
usually possess--a sort of paternal love and care for the plants
produced in his garden; but every gardener should be a naturalist as
well. Most people have a higher appreciation for that which they own and
which they have produced or acquired at some expense or personal
sacrifice; therefore it is that the growing of plants in home and school
gardens or in pots and window boxes is so strongly advocated throughout
this Course. Ownership always implies responsibility, which is at once
the chief safeguard of society and the foundation of citizenship. A
careless boy will never respect the property of others so much as when
he himself has proprietary interests involved. We believe, therefore,
that every teacher should encourage his pupils to cultivate plants and,
if possible, to own a plot of ground however small.
The teacher should not merely aim at _making_ a garden in the school
grounds. The great question is rather how best to use a school garden in
connection with the training of boys and girls. To learn to do garden
work well is indeed worth while and provides a highly beneficial kind of
manual training. To understand something of soils and methods of
cultivation, of fertilizers and drainage, the best kinds of flowers,
vegetables, fruits, and farm crops, and how to grow them successfully,
is very important in such a great agricultural country as this; but the
greatest of all results which we may hope to realize in connection with
school gardening is the ennobling of life and character. The pupils are
taught to observe the growing plants with great care, noting
developments day by day. This adds to their appreciation of the beauties
and adaptations found among plants on every side, and cannot fail to
produce good results in moral as well as in mental development. The
teachers must always remember that the gardeners with whom they are
working are more important than the gardens which they cultivate.
The best garden is not always the largest and most elaborate one. It is
rather the garden that both teacher and pupils have been most deeply
interested in. It is the garden in which they have experienced most
pleasure and profit that makes them want to have another better than the
last. No school is too small to have a garden of some kind, and no
garden is too small to become the joy and pride of some boy or girl.
SUGGESTIONS
For the benefit of teachers beginning their duties on the first of
September, in school sections where school gardening has never been
carried on, the following suggestions are offered:
1. See if the grounds will permit of a part being used for a garden. To
ascertain this, note the size of the present grounds and see if they
meet the requirements of the Department as laid down in the Regulations.
If they do not, consult your Inspector at once and acquaint him with
your plans. If the grounds are to be enlarged, try to take in sufficient
land of good quality to make a good garden. The part chosen for the
garden should be both convenient and safe. Examine the soil to see if it
is well drained and sufficiently deep to permit of good cultivation.
Lack of fertility can be overcome by good fertilizing.
2. See that the fences and gates are in good repair. When circumstances
will permit, a woven wire fence that will exclude dogs, pigs, and
poultry is most desirable. If not used to inclose the whole grounds, it
should at least inclose the part used for gardening.
3. Begin modestly and provide room for extension as the work progresses.
Sow clover on the part to be held in reserve for future gardening
operations.
4. If local public sentiment is not strongly in favour of school
gardening, or is somewhat adverse, begin on a small scale. If the work
is well done, you will soon have both moral and financial support.
5. See that the land is well drained. Plough it early in the autumn and,
if a load of well-rotted manure is available, spread it on the land
before ploughing. Commercial fertilizer may also be used on the plots
the following spring, but no stable manure.
6. In spring, when dry enough, cultivate thoroughly with disc and drag
harrows. Build up a compost heap in the rear of the garden with sods and
stable manure, for use in the autumn and also the following spring.
GARDEN EXPENSES
In connection with those schools where the teacher holds a diploma from
the Ontario Agricultural College in Elementary Agriculture and
Horticulture, there is no difficulty in meeting the expenses for seeds,
tools, fertilizers, and labour, as the Government grant for such
purposes is sufficient. In other schools, however, where the teacher
holds no such diploma (and such is the case in most of the schools as
yet), other means of meeting the expenses must be resorted to. The
following are offered as suggestions along this line:
1. Part of the grant made to every school for the maintaining of the
school grounds should be available for school garden expenses.
2. An occasional school entertainment may add funds that could not be
used to better advantage.
3. An occasional load of stable manure supplied free from neighbouring
farms will help to solve the fertilizer problem.
4. Donations of plants and seeds by the parents and other interested
persons and societies will be forthcoming, if the teacher is in earnest
and his pupils interested.
5. If it is required, the trustees could make a small grant each year
toward the cost of tools.
6. Fencing and cultivation of the garden can often be provided for by
volunteer assistance from the men of the school section.
7. It is often possible to grow a garden crop on a fairly large scale,
the school being formed into a company for this purpose and the proceeds
to be used to meet garden expenses.
8. The pupils can readily bring the necessary tools from home for the
first season's work.
9. Many Agricultural and Horticultural societies offer very substantial
cash prizes for school garden exhibits, and all funds so obtained should
be used to improve the garden from which the exhibits were taken.
10. An earnest, resourceful teacher will find a way of meeting the
necessary expenses.
THE EXCURSION
Nature Study is essentially an outdoor subject. While it is true that a
considerable amount of valuable work may be done in the class-room by
the aid of aquaria, insectaria, and window boxes, yet the great book of
nature lies outside the school-house walls. The teacher must lead or
direct his pupils to that book and help them to read with reverent
spirit what is written there by its great Author.
~Value.~--The school excursion is valuable chiefly because it brings the
pupil into close contact with the objects that he is studying, permits
him to get his knowledge at first hand, and gives him an opportunity of
studying these objects in their natural environment. Incidentally the
excursion yields outdoor exercise under the very best conditions--no
slight advantage for city children especially; and it gives the teacher
a good opportunity to study the pupils from a new standpoint. It also
provides a means of gathering Nature Study material.
~Difficulties.~--Where is the time to be found? How can a large class of
children be managed in the woods or fields? If only one class be taken,
how, in an ungraded school, are the rest of the children to be employed?
Will the excursion not degenerate into a mere outing? What if the woods
are miles away? These are all real problems, and the Nature Study
teacher, desirous of doing his work well, will have to face some of them
at least.
SHORT EXCURSIONS
The excursion need not occupy much time. It should be well planned
beforehand. _One_ object only should be kept in view and announced to
the class before starting. Matters foreign or subordinate to this
should be neglected for the time. The following are suggested as objects
for excursions:
~Objects.~--A bird's nest in an adjacent meadow; a ground-hog's hole; a
musk-rat's home; crayfish or clams in the stream near by; a pine (or
other) tree; a toad's day-resort; the soil of a field; the pests of a
neighbouring orchard; a stone-heap or quarry; ants' nests or earthworms'
holes; the weeds of the school yard; buds; the vegetable or animal life
of a pond; sounds of spring; tracks in the snow; a spider's web.
Such excursions may be accomplished at the expenditure of very little
time. Many of them will take the pupils no farther than the boundaries
of the school yard.
Of course the locality will influence the character of the excursion, as
it will that of the whole of the work done in Nature Study, but in any
place the thoughtful teacher may find material for open-air work at his
very door.
Much outside work can be done without interfering with the regular
programme. The teacher may arrange a systematic list of questions and
problems for the pupils to solve from their own observations, and these
observations may be made by the pupils at play hours, or while coming or
going from school, or on Saturdays. The following will serve as an
example of the treatment that may be followed:
~Pests of Apple Trees.~--Look on the twigs of your apple trees for little
scales. Bring an infected branch to school. Note whether
unhealthy-looking or dead branches are infected. Examine scales with a
lens. Loosen one, turn it over, and examine with a lens the under side.
For eggs, look closely at the twigs in June. Do you see white specks
moving? If so examine them with a lens.
Are there any small, prematurely ripe apples on the ground in the
orchard? Cut into one of these and look for a "worm". Look for apples
with worm holes in the side. Are there worms in these apples? What is in
them? Note the dirty marks that the larva has left. Keep several apples
in a close box and watch for the "worms" to come out. Examine the bark
of apple trees for pupæ in the fall.
FREQUENCY OF EXCURSIONS
As to the frequency of excursions, the teacher will be the best judge.
It is desirable that they occur naturally in the course of the Nature
Study work as the need for them arises. One short trip each week with a
single object in view is much more satisfactory than a whole afternoon
each term spent in aimless wandering about the woods.
EXCURSIONS TO A DISTANCE
Long-distance excursions will of necessity be infrequent. If the woods
are far away, one such trip in May or June would prove valuable to
enable the pupils to become acquainted with wild flowers, and another in
October to gather tree seeds, autumn leaves, pupæ, and other material
for winter study. When a large class is to be taken on an excursion,
preparations must be made with special care. The teacher and one or two
assistants should go over the ground beforehand and arrange for the work
to be done. Some work must be given to every pupil, and prompt obedience
to every command and signal must be required. The class, for example,
may decide to search a small wood or meadow to find out what flowers are
there. The pupils should be dispersed throughout the field to hunt for
specimens and to meet at a known signal to compare notes.
SUGGESTIONS FOR UNGRADED SCHOOLS
1. The teacher may take all the classes, choosing an object of study
from which he can teach lessons suitable to all ages, a bird's nest, for
example.
2. In many sections, the little ones are dismissed at 3.30 p.m.
Opportunity is thus given for an excursion with the seniors.
3. The older pupils may be assigned work and left in charge of a
monitor, elected by themselves, who shall be responsible for their
conduct, while the teacher is working outside with the lower Forms.
4. Boys who are naturally interested in outdoor work should be
encouraged to show the others anything of interest
|
In a roadside planting I cut a walking-stick of hazel, and presently
struck off the highway up a by-path which followed the glen of a
brawling stream. I reckoned that I was still far ahead of any pursuit,
and for that night might please myself. It was some hours since I had
tasted food, and I was getting very hungry when I came to a herd’s
cottage set in a nook beside a waterfall. A brown-faced woman was
standing by the door, and greeted me with the kindly shyness of
moorland places. When I asked for a night’s lodging she said I was
welcome to the “bed in the loft”, and very soon she set before me a
hearty meal of ham and eggs, scones, and thick sweet milk.
At the darkening her man came in from the hills, a lean giant, who in
one step covered as much ground as three paces of ordinary mortals.
They asked me no questions, for they had the perfect breeding of all
dwellers in the wilds, but I could see they set me down as a kind of
dealer, and I took some trouble to confirm their view. I spoke a lot
about cattle, of which my host knew little, and I picked up from him a
good deal about the local Galloway markets, which I tucked away in my
memory for future use. At ten I was nodding in my chair, and the “bed
in the loft” received a weary man who never opened his eyes till five
o’clock set the little homestead a-going once more.
They refused any payment, and by six I had breakfasted and was striding
southwards again. My notion was to return to the railway line a station
or two farther on than the place where I had alighted yesterday and to
double back. I reckoned that that was the safest way, for the police
would naturally assume that I was always making farther from London in
the direction of some western port. I thought I had still a good bit of
a start, for, as I reasoned, it would take some hours to fix the blame
on me, and several more to identify the fellow who got on board the
train at St Pancras.
It was the same jolly, clear spring weather, and I simply could not
contrive to feel careworn. Indeed I was in better spirits than I had
been for months. Over a long ridge of moorland I took my road, skirting
the side of a high hill which the herd had called Cairnsmore of Fleet.
Nesting curlews and plovers were crying everywhere, and the links of
green pasture by the streams were dotted with young lambs. All the
slackness of the past months was slipping from my bones, and I stepped
out like a four-year-old. By-and-by I came to a swell of moorland which
dipped to the vale of a little river, and a mile away in the heather I
saw the smoke of a train.
The station, when I reached it, proved to be ideal for my purpose. The
moor surged up around it and left room only for the single line, the
slender siding, a waiting-room, an office, the station-master’s
cottage, and a tiny yard of gooseberries and sweet-william. There
seemed no road to it from anywhere, and to increase the desolation the
waves of a tarn lapped on their grey granite beach half a mile away. I
waited in the deep heather till I saw the smoke of an east-going train
on the horizon. Then I approached the tiny booking-office and took a
ticket for Dumfries.
The only occupants of the carriage were an old shepherd and his dog—a
wall-eyed brute that I mistrusted. The man was asleep, and on the
cushions beside him was that morning’s _Scotsman_. Eagerly I seized on
it, for I fancied it would tell me something.
There were two columns about the Portland Place Murder, as it was
called. My man Paddock had given the alarm and had the milkman
arrested. Poor devil, it looked as if the latter had earned his
sovereign hardly; but for me he had been cheap at the price, for he
seemed to have occupied the police for the better part of the day. In
the latest news I found a further instalment of the story. The milkman
had been released, I read, and the true criminal, about whose identity
the police were reticent, was believed to have got away from London by
one of the northern lines. There was a short note about me as the owner
of the flat. I guessed the police had stuck that in, as a clumsy
contrivance to persuade me that I was unsuspected.
There was nothing else in the paper, nothing about foreign politics or
Karolides, or the things that had interested Scudder. I laid it down,
and found that we were approaching the station at which I had got out
yesterday. The potato-digging station-master had been gingered up into
some activity, for the west-going train was waiting to let us pass, and
from it had descended three men who were asking him questions. I
supposed that they were the local police, who had been stirred up by
Scotland Yard, and had traced me as far as this one-horse siding.
Sitting well back in the shadow I watched them carefully. One of them
had a book, and took down notes. The old potato-digger seemed to have
turned peevish, but the child who had collected my ticket was talking
volubly. All the party looked out across the moor where the white road
departed. I hoped they were going to take up my tracks there.
As we moved away from that station my companion woke up. He fixed me
with a wandering glance, kicked his dog viciously, and inquired where
he was. Clearly he was very drunk.
“That’s what comes o’ bein’ a teetotaller,” he observed in bitter
regret.
I expressed my surprise that in him I should have met a blue-ribbon
stalwart.
“Ay, but I’m a strong teetotaller,” he said pugnaciously. “I took the
pledge last Martinmas, and I havena touched a drop o’ whisky sinsyne.
Not even at Hogmanay, though I was sair temptit.”
He swung his heels up on the seat, and burrowed a frowsy head into the
cushions.
“And that’s a’ I get,” he moaned. “A heid better than hell fire, and
twae een lookin’ different ways for the Sabbath.”
“What did it?” I asked.
“A drink they ca’ brandy. Bein’ a teetotaller I keepit off the whisky,
but I was nip-nippin’ a’ day at this brandy, and I doubt I’ll no be
weel for a fortnicht.” His voice died away into a splutter, and sleep
once more laid its heavy hand on him.
My plan had been to get out at some station down the line, but the
train suddenly gave me a better chance, for it came to a standstill at
the end of a culvert which spanned a brawling porter-coloured river. I
looked out and saw that every carriage window was closed and no human
figure appeared in the landscape. So I opened the door, and dropped
quickly into the tangle of hazels which edged the line.
It would have been all right but for that infernal dog. Under the
impression that I was decamping with its master’s belongings, it
started to bark, and all but got me by the trousers. This woke up the
herd, who stood bawling at the carriage door in the belief that I had
committed suicide. I crawled through the thicket, reached the edge of
the stream, and in cover of the bushes put a hundred yards or so behind
me. Then from my shelter I peered back, and saw the guard and several
passengers gathered round the open carriage door and staring in my
direction. I could not have made a more public departure if I had left
with a bugler and a brass band.
Happily the drunken herd provided a diversion. He and his dog, which
was attached by a rope to his waist, suddenly cascaded out of the
carriage, landed on their heads on the track, and rolled some way down
the bank towards the water. In the rescue which followed the dog bit
somebody, for I could hear the sound of hard swearing. Presently they
had forgotten me, and when after a quarter of a mile’s crawl I ventured
to look back, the train had started again and was vanishing in the
cutting.
I was in a wide semicircle of moorland, with the brown river as radius,
and the high hills forming the northern circumference. There was not a
sign or sound of a human being, only the plashing water and the
interminable crying of curlews. Yet, oddly enough, for the first time I
felt the terror of the hunted on me. It was not the police that I
thought of, but the other folk, who knew that I knew Scudder’s secret
and dared not let me live. I was certain that they would pursue me with
a keenness and vigilance unknown to the British law, and that once
their grip closed on me I should find no mercy.
I looked back, but there was nothing in the landscape. The sun glinted
on the metals of the line and the wet stones in the stream, and you
could not have found a more peaceful sight in the world. Nevertheless I
started to run. Crouching low in the runnels of the bog, I ran till the
sweat blinded my eyes. The mood did not leave me till I had reached the
rim of mountain and flung myself panting on a ridge high above the
young waters of the brown river.
From my vantage-ground I could scan the whole moor right away to the
railway line and to the south of it where green fields took the place
of heather. I have eyes like a hawk, but I could see nothing moving in
the whole countryside. Then I looked east beyond the ridge and saw a
new kind of landscape—shallow green valleys with plentiful fir
plantations and the faint lines of dust which spoke of highroads. Last
of all I looked into the blue May sky, and there I saw that which set
my pulses racing....
Low down in the south a monoplane was climbing into the heavens. I was
as certain as if I had been told that that aeroplane was looking for
me, and that it did not belong to the police. For an hour or two I
watched it from a pit of heather. It flew low along the hill-tops, and
then in narrow circles over the valley up which I had come. Then it
seemed to change its mind, rose to a great height, and flew away back
to the south.
I did not like this espionage from the air, and I began to think less
well of the countryside I had chosen for a refuge. These heather hills
were no sort of cover if my enemies were in the sky, and I must find a
different kind of sanctuary. I looked with more satisfaction to the
green country beyond the ridge, for there I should find woods and stone
houses.
About six in the evening I came out of the moorland to a white ribbon
of road which wound up the narrow vale of a lowland stream. As I
followed it, fields gave place to bent, the glen became a plateau, and
presently I had reached a kind of pass where a solitary house smoked in
the twilight. The road swung over a bridge, and leaning on the parapet
was a young man.
He was smoking a long clay pipe and studying the water with spectacled
eyes. In his left hand was a small book with a finger marking the
place. Slowly he repeated—
As when a Gryphon through the wilderness
With wingèd step, o’er hill and moory dale
Pursues the Arimaspian.
He jumped round as my step rung on the keystone, and I saw a pleasant
sunburnt boyish face.
“Good evening to you,” he said gravely. “It’s a fine night for the
road.”
The smell of peat smoke and of some savoury roast floated to me from
the house.
“Is that place an inn?” I asked.
“At your service,” he said politely. “I am the landlord, sir, and I
hope you will stay the night, for to tell you the truth I have had no
company for a week.”
I pulled myself up on the parapet of the bridge and filled my pipe. I
began to detect an ally.
“You’re young to be an innkeeper,” I said.
“My father died a year ago and left me the business. I live there with
my grandmother. It’s a slow job for a young man, and it wasn’t my
choice of profession.”
“Which was?”
He actually blushed. “I want to write books,” he said.
“And what better chance could you ask?” I cried. “Man, I’ve often
thought that an innkeeper would make the best story-teller in the
world.”
“Not now,” he said eagerly. “Maybe in the old days when you had
pilgrims and ballad-makers and highwaymen and mail-coaches on the road.
But not now. Nothing comes here but motor-cars full of fat women, who
stop for lunch, and a fisherman or two in the spring, and the shooting
tenants in August. There is not much material to be got out of that. I
want to see life, to travel the world, and write things like Kipling
and Conrad. But the most I’ve done yet is to get some verses printed in
_Chambers’s Journal_.”
I looked at the inn standing golden in the sunset against the brown
hills.
“I’ve knocked a bit about the world, and I wouldn’t despise such a
hermitage. D’you think that adventure is found only in the tropics or
among gentry in red shirts? Maybe you’re rubbing shoulders with it at
this moment.”
“That’s what Kipling says,” he said, his eyes brightening, and he
quoted some verse about “Romance brings up the 9.15.”
“Here’s a true tale for you then,” I cried, “and a month from now you
can make a novel out of it.”
Sitting on the bridge in the soft May gloaming I pitched him a lovely
yarn. It was true in essentials, too, though I altered the minor
details. I made out that I was a mining magnate from Kimberley, who had
had a lot of trouble with I.D.B. and had shown up a gang. They had
pursued me across the ocean, and had killed my best friend, and were
now on my tracks.
I told the story well, though I say it who shouldn’t. I pictured a
flight across the Kalahari to German Africa, the crackling, parching
days, the wonderful blue-velvet nights. I described an attack on my
life on the voyage home, and I made a really horrid affair of the
Portland Place murder. “You’re looking for adventure,” I cried; “well,
you’ve found it here. The devils are after me, and the police are after
them. It’s a race that I mean to win.”
“By God!” he whispered, drawing his breath in sharply, “it is all pure
Rider Haggard and Conan Doyle.”
“You believe me,” I said gratefully.
“Of course I do,” and he held out his hand. “I believe everything out
of the common. The only thing to distrust is the normal.”
He was very young, but he was the man for my money.
“I think they’re off my track for the moment, but I must lie close for
a couple of days. Can you take me in?”
He caught my elbow in his eagerness and drew me towards the house. “You
can lie as snug here as if you were in a moss-hole. I’ll see that
nobody blabs, either. And you’ll give me some more material about your
adventures?”
As I entered the inn porch I heard from far off the beat of an engine.
There silhouetted against the dusky West was my friend, the monoplane.
He gave me a room at the back of the house, with a fine outlook over
the plateau, and he made me free of his own study, which was stacked
with cheap editions of his favourite authors. I never saw the
grandmother, so I guessed she was bedridden. An old woman called Margit
brought me my meals, and the innkeeper was around me at all hours. I
wanted some time to myself, so I invented a job for him. He had a motor
bicycle, and I sent him off next morning for the daily paper, which
usually arrived with the post in the late afternoon. I told him to keep
his eyes skinned, and make note of any strange figures he saw, keeping
a special sharp look-out for motors and aeroplanes. Then I sat down in
real earnest to Scudder’s note-book.
He came back at midday with the _Scotsman_. There was nothing in it,
except some further evidence of Paddock and the milkman, and a
repetition of yesterday’s statement that the murderer had gone North.
But there was a long article, reprinted from the _Times_, about
Karolides and the state of affairs in the Balkans, though there was no
mention of any visit to England. I got rid of the innkeeper for the
afternoon, for I was getting very warm in my search for the cypher.
As I told you, it was a numerical cypher, and by an elaborate system of
experiments I had pretty well discovered what were the nulls and stops.
The trouble was the key word, and when I thought of the odd million
words he might have used I felt pretty hopeless. But about three
o’clock I had a sudden inspiration.
The name Julia Czechenyi flashed across my memory. Scudder had said it
was the key to the Karolides business, and it occurred to me to try it
on his cypher.
It worked. The five letters of “Julia” gave me the position of the
vowels. A was J, the tenth letter of the alphabet, and so represented
by X in the cypher. E was U=XXI, and so on. “Czechenyi’ gave me the
numerals for the principal consonants. I scribbled that scheme on a bit
of paper and sat down to read Scudder’s pages.
In half an hour I was reading with a whitish face and fingers that
drummed on the table.
I glanced out of the window and saw a big touring-car coming up the
glen towards the inn. It drew up at the door, and there was the sound
of people alighting. There seemed to be two of them, men in aquascutums
and tweed caps.
Ten minutes later the innkeeper slipped into the room, his eyes bright
with excitement.
“There’s two chaps below looking for you,” he whispered. “They’re in
the dining-room having whiskies-and-sodas. They asked about you and
said they had hoped to meet you here. Oh! and they described you jolly
well, down to your boots and shirt. I told them you had been here last
night and had gone off on a motor bicycle this morning, and one of the
chaps swore like a navvy.”
I made him tell me what they looked like. One was a dark-eyed thin
fellow with bushy eyebrows, the other was always smiling and lisped in
his talk. Neither was any kind of foreigner; on this my young friend
was positive.
I took a bit of paper and wrote these words in German as if they were
part of a letter—
... “Black Stone. Scudder had got on to this, but he could not act for
a fortnight. I doubt if I can do any good now, especially as Karolides
is uncertain about his plans. But if Mr T. advises I will do the best
I....”
I manufactured it rather neatly, so that it looked like a loose page of
a private letter.
“Take this down and say it was found in my bedroom, and ask them to
return it to me if they overtake me.”
Three minutes later I heard the car begin to move, and peeping from
behind the curtain caught sight of the two figures. One was slim, the
other was sleek; that was the most I could make of my reconnaissance.
The innkeeper appeared in great excitement. “Your paper woke them up,”
he said gleefully. “The dark fellow went as white as death and cursed
like blazes, and the fat one whistled and looked ugly. They paid for
their drinks with half-a-sovereign and wouldn’t wait for change.”
“Now I’ll tell you what I want you to do,” I said. “Get on your bicycle
and go off to Newton-Stewart to the Chief Constable. Describe the two
men, and say you suspect them of having had something to do with the
London murder. You can invent reasons. The two will come back, never
fear. Not tonight, for they’ll follow me forty miles along the road,
but first thing tomorrow morning. Tell the police to be here bright and
early.”
He set off like a docile child, while I worked at Scudder’s notes. When
he came back we dined together, and in common decency I had to let him
pump me. I gave him a lot of stuff about lion hunts and the Matabele
War, thinking all the while what tame businesses these were compared to
this I was now engaged in! When he went to bed I sat up and finished
Scudder. I smoked in a chair till daylight, for I could not sleep.
About eight next morning I witnessed the arrival of two constables and
a sergeant. They put their car in a coach-house under the innkeeper’s
instructions, and entered the house. Twenty minutes later I saw from my
window a second car come across the plateau from the opposite
direction. It did not come up to the inn, but stopped two hundred yards
off in the shelter of a patch of wood. I noticed that its occupants
carefully reversed it before leaving it. A minute or two later I heard
their steps on the gravel outside the window.
My plan had been to lie hid in my bedroom, and see what happened. I had
a notion that, if I could bring the police and my other more dangerous
pursuers together, something might work out of it to my advantage. But
now I had a better idea. I scribbled a line of thanks to my host,
opened the window, and dropped quietly into a gooseberry bush.
Unobserved I crossed the dyke, crawled down the side of a tributary
burn, and won the highroad on the far side of the patch of trees. There
stood the car, very spick and span in the morning sunlight, but with
the dust on her which told of a long journey. I started her, jumped
into the chauffeur’s seat, and stole gently out on to the plateau.
Almost at once the road dipped so that I lost sight of the inn, but the
wind seemed to bring me the sound of angry voices.
Chapter IV.
The Adventure of the Radical Candidate
You may picture me driving that 40 h.p. car for all she was worth over
the crisp moor roads on that shining May morning; glancing back at
first over my shoulder, and looking anxiously to the next turning; then
driving with a vague eye, just wide enough awake to keep on the
highway. For I was thinking desperately of what I had found in
Scudder’s pocket-book.
The little man had told me a pack of lies. All his yarns about the
Balkans and the Jew-Anarchists and the Foreign Office Conference were
eyewash, and so was Karolides. And yet not quite, as you shall hear. I
had staked everything on my belief in his story, and had been let down;
here was his book telling me a different tale, and instead of being
once-bitten-twice-shy, I believed it absolutely.
Why, I don’t know. It rang desperately true, and the first yarn, if you
understand me, had been in a queer way true also in spirit. The
fifteenth day of June was going to be a day of destiny, a bigger
destiny than the killing of a Dago. It was so big that I didn’t blame
Scudder for keeping me out of the game and wanting to play a lone hand.
That, I was pretty clear, was his intention. He had told me something
which sounded big enough, but the real thing was so immortally big that
he, the man who had found it out, wanted it all for himself. I didn’t
blame him. It was risks after all that he was chiefly greedy about.
The whole story was in the notes—with gaps, you understand, which he
would have filled up from his memory. He stuck down his authorities,
too, and had an odd trick of giving them all a numerical value and then
striking a balance, which stood for the reliability of each stage in
the yarn. The four names he had printed were authorities, and there was
a man, Ducrosne, who got five out of a possible five; and another
fellow, Ammersfoort, who got three. The bare bones of the tale were all
that was in the book—these, and one queer phrase which occurred half a
dozen times inside brackets. (“Thirty-nine steps”) was the phrase; and
at its last time of use it ran—(“Thirty-nine steps, I counted them—high
tide 10.17 p.m.”). I could make nothing of that.
The first thing I learned was that it was no question of preventing a
war. That was coming, as sure as Christmas: had been arranged, said
Scudder, ever since February 1912. Karolides was going to be the
occasion. He was booked all right, and was to hand in his checks on
June 14th, two weeks and four days from that May morning. I gathered
from Scudder’s notes that nothing on earth could prevent that. His talk
of Epirote guards that would skin their own grandmothers was all
billy-o.
The second thing was that this war was going to come as a mighty
surprise to Britain. Karolides’ death would set the Balkans by the
ears, and then Vienna would chip in with an ultimatum. Russia wouldn’t
like that, and there would be high words. But Berlin would play the
peacemaker, and pour oil on the waters, till suddenly she would find a
good cause for a quarrel, pick it up, and in five hours let fly at us.
That was the idea, and a pretty good one too. Honey and fair speeches,
and then a stroke in the dark. While we were talking about the goodwill
and good intentions of Germany our coast would be silently ringed with
mines, and submarines would be waiting for every battleship.
But all this depended upon the third thing, which was due to happen on
June 15th. I would never have grasped this if I hadn’t once happened to
meet a French staff officer, coming back from West Africa, who had told
me a lot of things. One was that, in spite of all the nonsense talked
in Parliament, there was a real working alliance between France and
Britain, and that the two General Staffs met every now and then, and
made plans for joint action in case of war. Well, in June a very great
swell was coming over from Paris, and he was going to get nothing less
than a statement of the disposition of the British Home Fleet on
mobilization. At least I gathered it was something like that; anyhow,
it was something uncommonly important.
But on the 15th day of June there were to be others in London—others,
at whom I could only guess. Scudder was content to call them
collectively the “Black Stone”. They represented not our Allies, but
our deadly foes; and the information, destined for France, was to be
diverted to their pockets. And it was to be used, remember—used a week
or two later, with great guns and swift torpedoes, suddenly in the
darkness of a summer night.
This was the story I had been deciphering in a back room of a country
inn, overlooking a cabbage garden. This was the story that hummed in my
brain as I swung in the big touring-car from glen to glen.
My first impulse had been to write a letter to the Prime Minister, but
a little reflection convinced me that that would be useless. Who would
believe my tale? I must show a sign, some token in proof, and Heaven
knew what that could be. Above all, I must keep going myself, ready to
act when things got riper, and that was going to be no light job with
the police of the British Isles in full cry after me and the watchers
of the Black Stone running silently and swiftly on my trail.
I had no very clear purpose in my journey, but I steered east by the
sun, for I remembered from the map that if I went north I would come
into a region of coalpits and industrial towns. Presently I was down
from the moorlands and traversing the broad haugh of a river. For miles
I ran alongside a park wall, and in a break of the trees I saw a great
castle. I swung through little old thatched villages, and over peaceful
lowland streams, and past gardens blazing with hawthorn and yellow
laburnum. The land was so deep in peace that I could scarcely believe
that somewhere behind me were those who sought my life; ay, and that in
a month’s time, unless I had the almightiest of luck, these round
country faces would be pinched and staring, and men would be lying dead
in English fields.
About midday I entered a long straggling village, and had a mind to
stop and eat. Half-way down was the Post Office, and on the steps of it
stood the postmistress and a policeman hard at work conning a telegram.
When they saw me they wakened up, and the policeman advanced with
raised hand, and cried on me to stop.
I nearly was fool enough to obey. Then it flashed upon me that the wire
had to do with me; that my friends at the inn had come to an
understanding, and were united in desiring to see more of me, and that
it had been easy enough for them to wire the description of me and the
car to thirty villages through which I might pass. I released the
brakes just in time. As it was, the policeman made a claw at the hood,
and only dropped off when he got my left in his eye.
I saw that main roads were no place for me, and turned into the byways.
It wasn’t an easy job without a map, for there was the risk of getting
on to a farm road and ending in a duck-pond or a stable-yard, and I
couldn’t afford that kind of delay. I began to see what an ass I had
been to steal the car. The big green brute would be the safest kind of
clue to me over the breadth of Scotland. If I left it and took to my
feet, it would be discovered in an hour or two and I would get no start
in the race.
The immediate thing to do was to get to the loneliest roads. These I
soon found when I struck up a tributary of the big river, and got into
a glen with steep hills all about me, and a corkscrew road at the end
which climbed over a pass. Here I met nobody, but it was taking me too
far north, so I slewed east along a bad track and finally struck a big
double-line railway. Away below me I saw another broadish valley, and
it occurred to me that if I crossed it I might find some remote inn to
pass the night. The evening was now drawing in, and I was furiously
hungry, for I had eaten nothing since breakfast except a couple of buns
I had bought from a baker’s cart.
Just then I heard a noise in the sky, and lo and behold there was that
infernal aeroplane, flying low, about a dozen miles to the south and
rapidly coming towards me.
I had the sense to remember that on a bare moor I was at the
aeroplane’s mercy, and that my only chance was to get to the leafy
cover of the valley. Down the hill I went like blue lightning, screwing
my head round, whenever I dared, to watch that damned flying machine.
Soon I was on a road between hedges, and dipping to the deep-cut glen
of a stream. Then came a bit of thick wood where I slackened speed.
Suddenly on my left I heard the hoot of another car, and realized to my
horror that I was almost up on a couple of gate-posts through which a
private road debouched on the highway. My horn gave an agonized roar,
but it was too late. I clapped on my brakes, but my impetus was too
great, and there before me a car was sliding athwart my course. In a
second there would have been the deuce of a wreck. I did the only thing
possible, and ran slap into the hedge on the right, trusting to find
something soft beyond.
But there I was mistaken. My car slithered through the hedge like
butter, and then gave a sickening plunge forward. I saw what was
coming, leapt on the seat and would have jumped out. But a branch of
hawthorn got me in the chest, lifted me up and held me, while a ton or
two of expensive metal slipped below me, bucked and pitched, and then
dropped with an almighty smash fifty feet to the bed of the stream.
Slowly that thorn let me go. I subsided first on the hedge, and then
very gently on a bower of nettles. As I scrambled to my feet a hand
took me by the arm, and a sympathetic and badly scared voice asked me
if I were hurt.
I found myself looking at a tall young man in goggles and a leather
ulster, who kept on blessing his soul and whinnying apologies. For
myself, once I got my wind back, I was rather glad than otherwise. This
was one way of getting rid of the car.
“My blame, sir,” I answered him. “It’s lucky that I did not add
homicide to my follies. That’s the end of my Scotch motor tour, but it
might have been the end of my life.”
He plucked out a watch and studied it. “You’re the right sort of
fellow,” he said. “I can spare a quarter of an hour, and my house is
two minutes off. I’ll see you clothed and fed and snug in bed. Where’s
your kit, by the way? Is it in the burn along with the car?”
“It’s in my pocket,” I said, brandishing a toothbrush. “I’m a colonial
and travel light.”
“A colonial,” he cried. “By Gad, you’re the very man I’ve been praying
for. Are you by any blessed chance a Free Trader?”
“I am,” said I, without the foggiest notion of what he meant.
He patted my shoulder and hurried me into his car. Three minutes later
we drew up before a comfortable-looking shooting-box set among pine
trees, and he ushered me indoors. He took me first to a bedroom and
flung half a dozen of his suits before me, for my own had been pretty
well reduced to rags. I selected a loose blue serge, which differed
most conspicuously from my former garments, and borrowed a linen
collar. Then he haled me to the dining-room, where the remnants of a
meal stood on the table, and announced that I had just five minutes to
feed. “You can take a snack in your pocket, and we’ll have supper when
we get back. I’ve got to be at the Masonic Hall at eight o’clock, or my
agent will comb my hair.”
I had a cup of coffee and some cold ham, while he yarned away on the
hearthrug.
“You find me in the deuce of a mess, Mr ——; by-the-by, you haven’t told
me your name. Twisdon? Any relation of old Tommy Twisdon of the
Sixtieth? No? Well, you see I’m Liberal Candidate for this part of the
world, and I had a meeting on tonight at Brattleburn—that’s my chief
town, and an infernal Tory stronghold. I had got the Colonial
ex-Premier fellow, Crumpleton, coming to speak for me tonight, and had
the thing tremendously billed and the whole place ground-baited. This
afternoon I had a wire from the ruffian saying he had got influenza at
Blackpool, and here am I left to do the whole thing myself. I had meant
to speak for ten minutes and must now go on for forty, and, though I’ve
been racking my brains for three hours to think of
|
possible comparison between
it and his own; and, once back in his studio, he destroyed his own work,
which did not seem to him worthy to hang beside his comrade's
masterpiece. This fact will give some idea of his artistic integrity,
which never wavered between the call of justice and that of personal
interest.
Highly educated, with a mind as refined as nature and study could make
it, my father throughout his whole life shrank instinctively from
undertaking any work of great magnitude. The lack of robust health may
partly explain this peculiarity in a man of such great powers; perhaps,
too, the cause may be discovered in his strong tendency towards absolute
freedom and independence of thought. Either circumstance may explain his
dislike to undertaking anything likely to absorb all his time and
strength. The following anecdote gives colour to this view.
Monsieur Denon, at that time Curator of the Louvre Museum, and also, I
believe, Superintendent of the Royal Museums of France, was an intimate
friend of my father's, and had, besides, the highest opinion of his
talent as a draughtsman and etcher. One day he invited him to execute a
number of etchings of the drawings forming the collection known as the
"Cabinet des Medailles," with an annual fee of 10,000 francs during the
period covered by the work. Such an offer meant affluence to a needy
household like ours, in those days especially. The sum would have
provided ample support for husband, wife, and two children. Well! my
father refused point-blank. He would only undertake to do a few
specially ordered portraits and lithographs, some of which are of the
highest artistic value, and carefully treasured by the descendants of
those for whom they were originally executed.
Indeed, my mother's unconquerable energy had to assert itself often
before these very portraits, with their delicate sense of perception and
unerring talent of execution, could leave the studio. How many would
even now have remained unfinished, had she not taken them in hand
herself? How many times had she to set and clean the palettes with her
own hands? And this was but a fraction of her task. As long as his
artistic interest was awake;--while the human side of his model--the
attitude, the expression, the glance, the look, the Soul in
fact--claimed his attention,--my father's work went merrily. But when it
came to small accessories, such as cuffs and ornaments, embroideries and
decorations, ah! then his interest failed him, and his patience too. So
the poor wife took up the brush, cheerfully slaving at the dull details,
and by dint of intelligence and courage finished the work begun with
such enthusiasm and talent, and dropped from instinctive dread of being
bored.
Happily my father had been induced to hold a regular drawing-class in
his own house. This, with what he made by painting, brought us in
enough to live on, and indirectly, as will be apparent later, became the
starting-point of my mother's career as a pianoforte teacher.
So the modest household lived on, till my father was carried off by
congestion of the lungs on the 4th of May 1823. He was sixty-four years
old, and left his widow with two boys--my elder brother, aged fifteen
and a half, and myself, who would be five years old on the 17th of the
following June.
My father, when he left this world, left us without a bread-winner. I
will now proceed to show how my mother, by dint of her wonderful energy
and unequalled tenderness, supplied in "over-flowing measure" that
protection and support of which his death had robbed us.
* * * * *
In those days there lived, on the Quai Voltaire, a lithographer of the
name of Delpech. It is not so very long since his name disappeared from
the shop-front of the house he used to occupy. My father had not been
dead many hours before my mother went to him.
"Delpech," she said, "my husband is dead. I am left alone with two boys
to feed and educate. From this out I must be their mother and their
father as well. I mean to work for them. I have come to ask you two
things--first, how to sharpen a lithographer's style; second, how to
prepare the stones.... Leave the rest to me; only I beg of you to get me
work."
My mother's first care was to publish the fact that, if the parents of
pupils at the drawing-class would continue their patronage, there would
be no interruption in the regular course of lessons.
The immediate and unanimous response amply proved the public
appreciation of the courage shown by the noble-hearted woman, who,
instead of letting her grief overwhelm and absorb her, had instantly
risen to the necessity of providing for her fatherless children. The
drawing-class was continued, therefore, and a number of new pupils were
soon added to the attendance. But my mother, being already known to be a
good musician as well as a clever draughtswoman, it came about that many
parents begged her to instruct their daughters in the former art.
She did not hesitate to grasp at this fresh source of income to our
little household, and for some time music and drawing were taught side
by side within our walls; but at length it became necessary to
relinquish either one or the other. It would have been bad policy on
her part to try to do more than physical endurance would permit, and, in
the event, my mother decided to devote herself to music.
* * * * *
I was so young when my father died, that my recollection of him is very
indistinct. I can only recall three or four memories of him with any
degree of certainty, but they are as clear as those of yesterday. The
tears rise to my eyes as I commit them to this paper.
One impression indelibly stamped upon my brain is that of seeing him
sitting with his legs crossed (his customary attitude) by the chimney
corner, absorbed in reading, spectacles on nose, dressed in a white
striped jacket and loose trousers, and a cotton cap similar to those
worn by many painters of his day. I have seen the same cap, many years
since then, on the head of Monsieur Ingres, Director of the Académie de
France at Rome--my illustrious, and, I regret to say, departed friend.
As a rule, while my father was thus absorbed in his book, I would be
sprawling flat in the middle of the room, drawing with a white chalk on
a black varnished board, my subjects being eyes, noses, and mouths of
which my father had drawn me models. I can see it all now, as if it were
yesterday, although I could not have been more than four or four and a
half. I was so fond of this employment, I recollect, that had my father
lived, I make no doubt I should have desired to be a painter rather than
a musician; but my mother's profession, and the education she gave me
during my early youth, turned the scale for music.
Shortly after my father's death, which took place in the house which
bore, and still bears, the number 11 in the Place St. André-des-Arts (or
rather "des Arcs"), my mother took another, not very far away from our
old home. Our new abode was at 20 Rue des Grands Augustins. It is from
that flitting that I can date my first real musical impressions.
My mother, who nursed me herself, had certainly given me music with her
milk. She always sang while she was nursing me, and I can faithfully say
I took my first lessons unconsciously, and without being sensible of the
necessity so irksome to any child, and so difficult to impress on him,
of fixing my attention on the instruction I was receiving. I had
acquired a very clear idea of the various intonations, of the musical
intervals they represent, and of the elementary forms of modulation.
Even before I knew how to use my tongue, my ear appreciated the
difference between the major and the minor key. They tell me that
hearing some one in the street--some beggar, doubtless--singing a song
in a minor key, I asked my mother why he sang "as if he were crying."
Thus my ear was thoroughly practised, and I easily held my place, even
at that early age, in a Solfeggio class. I might have acted as its
teacher.
Proud that her little boy should be more than a match for grown-up
girls, especially as it was all thanks to her, my mother could not
resist the natural temptation to showing off her little pupil before
some eminent musical personage.
* * * * *
In those days there was a musician of the name of Jadin, whose son and
grandson both made themselves an honoured name among contemporary
painters. Jadin himself was well known as a composer of romances, very
popular in their day. He was, if I am not mistaken, accompanist at the
well-known Choron School of Religious Music.
My mother wrote and asked him to come and pass judgment on my musical
abilities.
Jadin came--put me in the corner of the room, with my face to the wall
(I see that corner now), and sitting down to the piano, improvised a
succession of chords and modulations. At each change he would ask, "What
key am I playing in?" and I never made a single mistake in all my
answers.
He was amazed, and my mother was triumphant. My poor dear mother! Little
she thought that she herself was fostering the birth of a resolve, in
her boy's mind, which was some years later to cause her sore uneasiness
as to his future. Nor did she dream, when she took me, a six-year-old
boy, to the Odéon to hear "Robin Hood," that she had stirred my first
impulse towards the art that was to govern all my life.
My readers will have wondered at my saying nothing so far about my
brother. I must explain that I cannot recall any memory of him till
after I had passed my sixth birthday; prior to that time I remember
nothing of him.
My brother, Louis Urbain Gounod, was ten and a half years older than
myself, he having been born on December 13, 1807.
When he was about twelve he entered the Lycée at Versailles, where he
remained till he was eighteen. My first recollections of that best of
brothers are connected with my memories of Versailles. Alas! I lost him
just when I was beginning to appreciate the value of his fraternal
friendship.
Louis XVIII. had appointed my father Professor of Drawing to the Royal
Pages, and having a strong personal regard for him, he had granted us
permission, during our temporary residence at Versailles, to occupy
rooms in the huge building known as No. 6 Rue de la Surintendance, which
runs from the Place du Château to the Rue de l'Orangerie.
Our apartment, which I remember well, and which could only be reached by
a number of most confusing staircases, looked out over the "Pièce d'Eau
des Suisses" and the big wood of Satory. A corridor ran outside all our
rooms, and looked to me quite endless. It led to a suite of rooms
occupied by the Beaumont family. One of this family, Edouard Beaumont,
was one of my earliest friends. He ultimately became a distinguished
painter. Edouard's father was a sculptor, his duties at that time being
to restore the various statues in the château and park at Versailles,
which duties carried with them the right of occupying the rooms next
ours.
When my father died in 1823, my mother was still allowed to live in
these rooms during the annual holidays. This permission was extended to
her during the reign of Charles X., that is, up to 1830, but was
withdrawn on the accession of Louis-Philippe. My brother, who, as I said
above, was a student at the Lycée at Versailles, always spent his
holidays with us there.
* * * * *
An old musician named Rousseau was then chapel-master of the Palace
Chapel at Versailles. His particular instrument was the 'cello (the
"bass," as it was called in those days), and my mother persuaded him to
give my brother lessons. The latter had a beautiful voice, and often
sang in the services at the Royal Chapel.
I really cannot tell whether old Père Rousseau played upon his
violoncello well or ill; what I do clearly remember is that my brother
was not proficient on the instrument. But I was young, and my small mind
could not grasp the fact that playing out of tune was possible; I
thought when an instrument was put into a person's hands, he must
produce pure tone. I had no conception of what the word beginner meant.
Once I was listening to my brother practising in the next room. My ear
was getting very sore from the continual discords, so, in all innocence,
I asked my mother, "Why is Urbain's violoncello so fearfully out of
tune?" I do not remember what she answered, but I am sure she laughed
over my simple question.
I mentioned that my brother had a beautiful voice. I was able to judge
it later on by my own ears. And I can also quote another testimony, that
of Wartel, who often sang with him in the Chapel-Royal at Versailles.
Wartel studied at the Choron School, and sang at the Opera in Nourrit's
time; ultimately he took to teaching, and earned a great and
well-deserved reputation in that line.
* * * * *
In 1825 my mother's health broke down. I was then about seven years old.
Our family doctor at that time was Monsieur Baffos; he had brought me
into the world, and had known us all for many years. Our former doctor,
Monsieur Hallé, had recommended him to us when he himself retired. As my
mother's work consisted in giving music lessons at her own house all
the day long, and as the presence of a child of my age was a source of
anxiety and even worry to her, Baffos suggested my spending the day at a
boarding-school, whence I was fetched back every evening at dinner-time.
The school selected was kept by a certain Monsieur Boniface in the Rue
de Touraine, close to the École de Médecine, and not far from our home
in the Rue des Grands Augustins. Its quarters were soon shifted to the
Rue de Condé, nearly opposite the Odéon.
There I first met Duprez, destined to become the celebrated tenor, who
shone so brilliantly on the Opera boards.
Duprez, nine years older than myself, must have been about sixteen or
seventeen at the time I speak of. He was a pupil of Choron's, and taught
Solfeggio in Monsieur Boniface's school. He soon took a fancy to me when
he found I could read a musical score with the same ease as a printed
book--much better indeed, I make no doubt, than I can do it now. He used
to take me on his knee, and when one of my little comrades made a
mistake, would say, "Come, little man, show them how to do it!"
Years afterwards I reminded him of this fact, now so far behind us both.
It seemed to come back to him suddenly and he cried, "What! were you the
small boy who solfa-ed so well?"
But it was growing high time for me to set about my education after a
more serious and systematic fashion. Monsieur Boniface's establishment
was really more of a day nursery than a school.
* * * * *
So I was entered as a boarder at Monsieur Letellier's institution in the
Rue de Vaugirard, at the corner of the Rue Ferou. Monsieur Letellier
soon retired, and was succeeded by Monsieur de Reusse. I remained there
for a year, and was then removed to the school of Monsieur
Hallays-Dabot, in the Place de l'Estrapade, close to the Panthéon.
My recollection of Monsieur Hallays-Dabot and his wife is as clear and
distinct as though they were present here. Nothing could exceed the
warm-hearted kindness of my reception in their house. It sufficed to
dispel my horror of a system from which I had an instinctive shirking.
The almost paternal care they gave me quite destroyed this feeling, and
allayed the doubts I had entertained as to the possibility of being
happy in a boarding-school.
The two years I spent in his house were, in fact, two of the happiest in
my life; his even-handed justice and his kindly affection never failed.
When I reached the age of eleven it was decided that my education should
be continued at the Lycée St. Louis. When I left Monsieur
Hallays-Dabot's care, he gave me a certificate of character so
flattering in its terms that I refrain from reproducing it. I have felt
it a duty to make this public acknowledgment of all he did for me.
The good testimonials I brought from Monsieur Hallays-Dabot's
establishment gained me a _quart de bourse_ at the Lycée St. Louis,[1]
which I accordingly entered at the close of the holidays in October
1829. I was then just eleven years old.
The then Principal of the Lycée was an ecclesiastic, the Abbé Ganser, a
gentle, quiet-natured man much inclined to meditation, and very paternal
in his dealings with his pupils.
I was at once put into what was known as the sixth class. From the
outset of my school career I had the good fortune of being under a man
who, in the course of the years I studied with him, gained my deepest
affection--Adolphe Régnier, Membre de l'Institut, my dear and honoured
master, formerly the tutor, and still, as I write, the friend of the
Comte de Paris.
I was not stupid, and as a rule my teachers liked me; but I must confess
I was very careless, and was often punished for inattention, even more
so during preparation hours than in the actual school-work.
I mentioned that I joined St. Louis as a "quarter scholar." This means
that my college fees were reduced one-quarter. It was incumbent on me to
endeavour, by diligence and good conduct, to rise to the position of
half scholar, three-quarter scholar, and finally to that of full
scholar, and so relieve my mother of the expense of keeping me at
college. Seeing I adored my mother, and that my greatest joy should
therefore have been to help her by my own exertions, this sacred object
ought to have been ever present with me.
But woe is me! Instincts forcibly repressed are apt to wake again with
tenfold fierceness. And so mine did, many a time and often--far too
often, alas!
One day I had got into a scrape for some piece of carelessness or other,
some exercise unfinished, or lesson left unlearnt. I suppose I thought
my punishment out of proportion to my crime, for I complained, the sole
result being that the penalty was largely increased. I was marched off
to the college prison, a sort of dungeon, where I was to be kept on
bread and water till I had finished an enormous imposition of I know not
how many lines, some five hundred or a thousand, I think--something
absurd, I know! When I found myself under lock and key I began to think
I was a brute. The feelings of Orestes when the Furies reproached him
with his mother's death were not more bitter than mine when I was given
my prison fare! I looked at the bread, and burst into tears. "Oh! you
scoundrel, you brute, you beast," I cried; "look at the bread your
mother earns for you! Your mother who is coming to see you after school,
and will hear you are in prison, and will go home weeping through the
streets, without having seen or kissed you! Come, come, you are a
wretch; you do not even deserve to have dry bread!"
And I put it aside, and went hungry.
However, in my normal condition I worked on fairly enough, and, thanks
to the prizes I won every year, I gradually progressed towards that
ardently wished-for goal, a "full scholarship."
There was a chapel in the Lycée Saint Louis, where musical masses were
sung every Sunday. The gallery, which occupied the full width of the
chapel, was divided into two parts, and in one of these were the
choristers' seats and the organ. When I joined the Lycée, the
chapel-master was Hyppolyte Monpou, then accompanist at the Choron
School of Music, well known in later years as the composer of a number
of melodies and theatrical works, which brought him some considerable
popularity.
* * * * *
Thanks to the training my mother had given me ever since my babyhood, I
could read music at sight; and my voice was sweet and very true. On
entering the college I was at once handed over to Monpou, who was
astonished by my aptness, and forthwith appointed me solo soprano of
his little choir, which consisted of two sopranos, two altos, two
tenors, and two basses.
I lost my voice owing to a blunder of Monpou's. He insisted on my
singing while it was breaking, although complete silence and rest are
indispensable while the vocal chords are in their transitional stage;
and I never recovered the power and ring and tone I had as a child, and
which constitute a really good singing voice. Mine has always been husky
ever since. But for this accident, I believe I should have sung well in
after life.
At the Revolution of 1830, the Abbé Ganser ceased to be our Principal.
He was succeeded by Monsieur Liez, a former Professor at the Lycée Henri
IV., strongly attached to the new régime, and a zealous advocate of the
system of military drill forthwith introduced into the various colleges.
He used to come and watch us drilling, standing bolt upright like any
sergeant instructor or colonel on parade, and with his right hand thrust
into the breast of his coat, like Napoleon I.
Two years afterwards Monsieur Liez was superseded by Monsieur Poirson.
It was while he was Principal that the various circumstances which
decided the ultimate bent of my life took place.
Among my many faults was one pet sin. I worshipped music; the first
storms that ruffled the surface of my youthful existence originated with
the overmastering passion, which had such paramount influence on my
ultimate career.
* * * * *
Anybody who knows anything about a Lycée has heard of the Festival of
Saint Charlemagne, so dear to every schoolboy.
One feature of the festival is a great banquet, to which every student
who has gained either one first or two second places in the various
competitions during that term is bidden. On this banquet follows a two
days' holiday, which gives the boys a chance of "sleeping out"--in other
words, of spending a night at home--a rare treat universally coveted.
The festival fell in mid-winter. In 1831 I had the good luck to be one
of the invited guests; and to reward me, my mother promised I should go
in the evening to the Théâtre Italien with my brother, to hear Rossini's
"Otello." Malibran played Desdemona; Rubini, Otello; and Lablache, the
Father.
I was nearly wild with impatience and delight. I remember I could not
eat for excitement, so that my mother said to me at dinner, "If you
don't eat your dinner I won't let you go to the opera," and forthwith I
began to consume my victuals, in a spirit of resignation at all events.
We had dined early that evening, as we had no reserved seats (this would
have been far too costly), and we had to be at the opera house before
the doors were opened, with the crowd of people who waited on the chance
of finding a couple of places untaken in the pit. Even this was a
terrible expense to my poor mother, as the seats cost 3 frs. 75 c. each.
It was bitterly cold; for two mortal hours did Urbain and I wait,
stamping our frozen toes, for the happy moment when the string of people
began to move past the ticket office window.
We got inside at last. Never shall I forget my first sight of the great
theatre, the curtain and the brilliant lights. I felt as if I were in
some temple, as if a heavenly vision must shortly rise upon my sight.
At last the solemn moment came. I heard the stage-manager's three
knocks, and the overture began. My heart was beating like a
sledge-hammer.
Oh, that night! that night! what rapture, what Elysium! Malibran,
Rubini, Lablache, Tamburini (he sang Iago); the voices, the orchestra! I
was literally beside myself.
I left that theatre completely out of tune with the prosaic details of
my daily life, and absolutely wedded to the dream which was to be the
very atmosphere and fixed ideal of my existence.
That night I never closed my eyes; I was haunted, "possessed;" I was
wild to write an "Otello" myself!
I am ashamed to say my work in school betrayed my state of mind. I
scamped my duties in every possible way; I used to dash off my exercises
without making any draft, so as to gain more time to give to musical
composition, my favourite occupation--the only one worth attention, as
it seemed to me. Many were the tears and heavy the troubles that
resulted. One day, the master on duty, seeing me scribbling away on
music paper, came and asked for my work. I handed him my fair copy. "And
where is your rough draft?" said he. As I hadn't got one to show, he
snatched my music paper and tore it up. Of course I objected, and got
punished for my pains. Another protest, and an appeal to the Principal,
only resulted in a repetition of the old story; I was kept in school,
given extra work, imprisoned, &c., &c.
This first tormenting, far from having its intended effect, only
inflamed my ardour, and made me resolve to ensure myself free indulgence
of my taste by doing my school-work thoroughly and regularly.
Thus things stood when I took the step of drawing up a kind of
"profession of faith," wherein I warned my mother of my fixed
determination to embrace the artistic career. I had hesitated some time,
so I declared, between music and painting; but I was now convinced that
whatever talent I possessed would find its best outlet in the former
art, and my decision, I added, was final.
My poor mother was distracted. She knew too well all an artist's life
entails, and probably she shrank from the thought that her son's might
be no better than a second edition of the bitter struggle she had shared
with my poor father.
In her despair she sought our Principal, Monsieur Poirson, and consulted
him about her trouble. He cheered her up.
"Do not be the least uneasy," so he spoke to her; "your son shall not be
a musician. He is a good little boy, and does his lessons well. The
masters are all pleased with him. I will take the matter into my own
hands, and later on you will see him in the École Normale. Do not worry
about him, Madame Gounod; as I said before, your son shall not be a
musician."
My mother retired, greatly comforted, and the Principal sent for me to
his study.
"Well, little man," said he, "what is this I hear? You want to be a
musician?"
"Yes, sir."
"But what are you dreaming of? A musician has no real position at all!"
"What, sir! Is it not a position in itself to be able to call oneself
Mozart or Rossini?" Fourteen-year-old boy as I was, I felt a glow of
indignant pride.
The Principal's face changed at once.
"Oh! you look at it in that way, do you? Very well. Let us see if you
have the making of a musician in you. I have had a box at the Opera for
over ten years, so I am a pretty fair judge."
He opened a drawer, took out a sheet of paper, and wrote down some lines
of poetry.
"Take this away," he said, "and set it to music for me."
Full of delight, I took my leave and went back to the class-room. On the
way I devoured the poetry he had given me, with feverish haste. It was
the romance from "Joseph"--"À peine au sortir de l'enfance," &c.
I had never heard of "Joseph" nor of Méhul, so I had no reminiscences to
confuse me or make me fear I might fall into plagiarism. My profound
indifference to Latin exercises, at this rapturous moment, may well be
imagined.
By the next play hour my ballad was set to music, and I hurried with it
to the Principal's room.
"Well! what's the matter, my boy?"
"I have finished the ballad, sir."
"What! already?
"Yes, sir."
"Let me see--now sing it through to me."
"But, sir, I want a piano for the accompaniment."
(I knew there was one in the next room, on which Monsieur Poirson's
daughter was learning music.)
"No, never mind; I don't want a piano."
"Yes, sir, but I do, because of my harmonies."
"Your harmonies! what harmonies? Where are they?"
"Here, sir," said I, putting my finger to my forehead.
"Oh, really! Well, never mind; sing it, all the same. I shall understand
it well enough without the harmonies."
I saw there was no way out of it, so I sang it through.
Before I got half-way through the first verse I saw my judge's eye
soften. Then I took courage--I felt myself winning the game--I went on
boldly, and when I had finished, the Principal said--
"Come, we will go to the piano."
My triumph was certain. I was sure of all my weapons. I sang my little
ballad over again, and at length poor Monsieur Poirson, completely
beaten, took my face in his hands, kissed me with tears in his eyes, and
said--
"Go on, my boy; you _shall_ be a musician!"
My dear mother had acted prudently. Her opposition had been dictated by
her maternal solicitude, but the danger of consenting too precipitately
to my desire was outweighed by the heavy responsibility of perhaps
impeding my natural vocation. The Principal's encouragement robbed my
mother's objections of their chief support, and herself of the aid she
had most reckoned upon to make me change my mind. The assault had been
delivered. The siege had begun. It was time to capitulate. But she held
out as long as she could, and, in her dread of yielding too soon and too
easily to my prayers, she betook herself to the following plan, as her
final resource.
* * * * *
There then lived in Paris a German named Antoine Reicha, who had the
highest possible reputation as a theoretical musician. Besides being
Professor of Composition at the Conservatoire (of which Cherubini was at
that time Director), Reicha received private pupils in his own home. My
mother thought of placing me under him to study harmony, counterpoint,
and fugue--the elements of the art of composition, in fact. She
therefore asked the Principal's permission to take me to him on Sundays
during the boys' walking hour. As the time spent in going to and from
Reicha's house, added to that spent over my lesson, practically covered
the same period as the boys' airing, my regular studies were not likely
to be interfered with by this special favour.
The Principal gave his consent, and my mother took me to Reicha's house.
But, before she handed me over to him, she thus (as she told me herself
long afterwards) addressed him privately--
"My dear Monsieur Reicha, I bring you my son, a mere child, who desires
to devote himself to musical composition. I bring him against my own
judgment; I dread an artist's life for him, knowing, as I do, the many
difficulties which beset it. But I will not ever reproach myself, nor
let my son reproach me, with having hindered his career, or spoilt his
happiness. I want to make quite sure, before all else, that his talent
is real and his vocation true. And so I beg you will put him to the
severest test. Place everything that is most difficult before him. If he
is destined to be a true artist, no trouble will discourage him; he will
triumph over it all. If, on the other hand, he loses heart, I shall know
where I am; and shall certainly not allow him to embark on a career,
the first obstacles in which he has not energy to overcome."
Reicha promised my mother I should be treated as she wished; and he kept
his word, as far as in him lay.
As samples of my boyish talent, I had brought him a few sheets of
manuscript music--ballads, preludes, scraps of valses, and so
forth,--the musical trifles my boyish brain had woven.
After looking them over, Reicha said to my mother, "This child already
knows a good deal of what I shall have to teach him, but he is
unconscious of the knowledge he possesses."
In a year or two I had reached a point in my harmony studies which was
rather beyond the elementary stage--counterpoint of all kinds, for
instance, fugues, canons, &c. My mother then asked him--
"Well, what do you think of him?"
"I think, my dear lady, that it is no use trying to stop him; nothing
disheartens him. He finds pleasure and interest in everything; and what
I like best about him is, he always wants to know the'reason why.'"
"Well," said my mother, "I suppose I must give in."
I knew right well there was no trifling with her. Often she would say to
me--
"You know, if you don't get on well, round comes a cab, and off you go
to the notary." The very idea of a notary's office was enough to make me
do miracles.
But, anyhow, my college reports were good; and though I was threatened
with extra work to make up for lost time, I took good care the masters
should have no cause to complain that my music interfered with my other
studies.
Once indeed I was punished, and pretty sharply too, for having left some
work or other unfinished. The master had given me a heavy imposition,
500 lines or thereabouts to write out. I was writing away (or rather I
was scribbling with the careless haste which is usually bestowed on such
a task) when the usher on duty came to the table. He watched me silently
for some minutes, then laid his hand quietly on my shoulder and said--
"You know you are writing dreadfully badly."
I looked up and answered, "You surely don't think I'm doing it for
pleasure, do you?"
"It only bores you because you do it badly." He went on quietly, "If you
took a little more trouble about it, it would bore you less."
The simple, sensible words, and the gentle and persuasive kindness which
marked their quiet utterance, made such an impression on me, that I do
not think I ever offended again by negligence or inattention to my work.
They brought me a sudden revelation, as complete as it was precise, of
what diligence and attention really mean. I returned to my imposition,
and finished it in a very different frame of mind. The irksomeness of
the task was lost in the satisfaction and benefit of the good advice I
had been given.
Meanwhile my musical studies bore good fruit, and daily grew more and
more absorbing.
My mother seized the opportunity of a vacation of some days' duration,
the New Year's holidays, to give me what was at once a great pleasure
and an exceedingly precious lesson.
Mozart's "Don Giovanni" was being played at the Théâtre Italien, and
thither she took me herself. The exquisite evening I
|
when she came to a
place where I didn't agree with her I wuz to lift up my right hand and
she wuz to stop rehearsin', and we wuz to argue with each other back and
forth and try to convince each other.
And when we got it all arranged Josiah and I set out for home, I calm in
my frame, though dreadin' the job some.
CHAPTER III.
But Josiah Allen wuz jest crazy over that lecture--crazy as a loon. He
raved about it all the way home, and he would repeat over lots of it
to me. About “how a man's love was the firm anchor that held a woman's
happiness stiddy; how his calm and peaceful influence held her mind in
a serene calm--a waveless repose; how tender men wuz of the fair sect,
how they watched over 'em and held 'em in their hearts.”
“Oh,” sez he, “it went beyond anything I ever heard of. I always knew
that men wuz good and pious, but I never realized how dumb pious they
wuz till to-night.”
“She said,” sez I, in considerable dry axents--not so dry as I keep by
me, but pretty dry--“No true man would let a woman perform any manuel
labor.”
“Wall, he won't. There ain't no need of your liftin' your little finger
in emanuel labor.”
“Manuel, Josiah.”
“Wall, I said so, didn't I? Hain't I always holdin' you back from work?”
“Yes,” sez I. “You often speak of it, Josiah. You are as good,” sez I,
firmly, “full as good as the common run of men, and I think a little
better. But there are things that have to be done. A married woman that
has a house and family to see to and don't keep a hired girl, can't get
along without some work and care.”
“Wall I say,” sez he, “that there hain't no need of you havin' a care,
not a single care. Not as long as I live--if it wuzn't for me, you might
have some cares, and most probable would, but not while I live.”
I didn't say nothin' back, for I don't want to hurt his feelin's, and
won't, not if I can help it. And he broke out again anon, or nearly
anon--
[Illustration: “OH, WHAT A LECTURE THAT WUZ.”]
“Oh, what a lecture that wuz. Did you notice when she wuz goin' on
perfectly beautiful, about the waveless sea of married life--did you
notice how it took the school house down? And I wuz perfectly mortified
to see you didn't weep or even clap your hands.”
“Wall,” sez I, firmly, “when I weep or when I clap, I weep and clap
on the side of truth. And I can't see things as she duz. I have been
a-sailin' on that sea she depictured for over twenty years, and have
never wanted to leave it for any other waters. But, as I told her, and
tell you now, it hain't always a smooth sea, it has its ups and downs,
jest like any other human states.”
Sez I, soarin' up a very little ways, not fur, for it wuz too cold, and
I was too tired, “There hain't but one sea, Josiah Allen, that is calm
forever, and one day we will float upon it, you and me. It is the sea
by which angels walk and look down into its crystal depths, and behold
their blessed faces. It is the sea on whose banks the fadeless lilies
blow--and that mirrors the soft, cloudless sky of the Happy Morning. It
is the sea of Eternal Repose, that rude blasts can never blow up into
billows. But our sea--the sea of married life--is not like that, it is
ofttimes billowy and rough.”
“I say it hain't,” sez he, for he was jest carried away with the
lecture, and enthused. “We have had a happy time together, Josiah Allen,
for over twenty years, but has our sea of life always been perfectly
smooth?”
“Yes, it has; smooth as glass.”
“Hain't there never been a cloud in our sky?”
“No, there hain't; not a dumb cloud.”
Sez I, sternly, “There has in mine. Your wicked and profane swearin' has
cast many and many a cloud over my sky, and I'd try to curb in my tongue
if I was in your place.”
“'Dumb' hain't swearin',” sez he. And then he didn't say nothin' more
till anon, or nearly at that time, he broke out agin, and sez he:
“Never, never did I hear or see such eloquence till to-night I'll have
that girl down to our house to stay a week, if I'm a living Josiah
Allen.”
“All right,” sez I, cheerfully. “I'd love to have her stay a week or
ten days, and I'll invite her, too, when she comes down to rehearse her
lecture.”
Wall we got home middlin' tired, and the subject kinder dropped down,
and Josiah had lots of work come on the next day, and so did I, and
company. And it run along for over a week before she come. And when she
did come, it wuz in a dreadful bad time. It seems as if she couldn't
have come in a much worse time.
It wuz early one mornin', not more than nine o'clock, if it wuz that.
There had come on a cold snap of weather unexpected, and Josiah wuz
a-bringin' in the cook stove from the summer kitchen, when she come.
Josiah Allen is a good man. He is my choice out of a world full of men,
but I can't conceal it from myself that his words at such a time are
always voyalent, and his demeanor is not the demeanor that I would wish
to have showed off to the public.
He wuz at the worst place, too. He had got the stove wedged into the
entry-way door, and couldn't get it either way. He had acted awkward
with it, and I told him so, and he see it when it wuz too late.
He had got it fixed in such a way that he couldn't get into the kitchen
himself without gettin' over the stove, and I, in the course of duty,
thought it wuz right to tell him that if he had heerd to me he wouldn't
have been in such a fix. Oh! the voyalence and frenzy of his demeanor as
he stood there a-hollerin'. I wuz out in the wood-house shed a-bilin' my
cider apple sass in the big cauldron kettle, but I heard the racket,
and as I come a-runnin' in I thought I heard a little rappin' at the
settin'-room door, but I didn't notice it much, I wuz that agitated to
see the way the stove and Josiah wuz set and wedged in.
There the stove wuz, wedged firm into the doorway, perfectly sot there.
There wuz sut all over the floor, and there stood Josiah Allen, on the
wood-house side, with his coat off, his shirt all covered with black,
and streaks of black all over his face. And oh! how wild and almost
frenzied his attitude wuz as he stood there as if he couldn't move nor
be moved no more than the stove could. And oh! the voyalence of the
language he hurled at me acrost that stove.
“Why,” sez I, “you must come in here, Josiah Allen, and pull it from
this side.”
And then he hollered at me, and asked me:
“How in thunder he was a goin' to _get_ in.” And then he wanted to know
“if I wanted him squshed into jelly by comin' in by the side of it--or
if I thought he wuz a crane, that he could step over it or a stream
of water that he could run under it, or what else do you think?” He
hollered wildly.
“Wall,” sez I, “you hadn't ort to got it fixed in that shape. I told
you what end to move first,” sez I. “You have moved it in side-ways. It
would go in all right if you had started it the other way.”
“Oh, yes! It would have been all right. You love to see me, Samantha,
with a stove in my arms. You love it dearly. I believe you would be
perfectly happy if you could see me a luggin' round stoves every day.
But I'll tell you one thing, if this dumb stove is ever moved either way
out of this door--if I ever get it into a room agin, it never shall
be stirred agin so much as a hair's breadth--not while I have got the
breath of life in me.”
Sez I, “Hush! I hear somebody a-knockin' at the door.”
“I won't hush. It is nothin' but dumb foolishness a movin' round stoves,
and if anybody don't believe it let 'em look at me--and let 'em look at
that stove set right here in the door as firm as a rock.”
[Illustration: “WON'T YOU BE STILL?”]
Sez I agin in a whisper, “Do be still, and I'll let 'em in, I don't want
them to ketch you a talkin' so and a-actin'.” “Wall, I want 'em to
ketch me, that is jest what I want 'em to do. If it is a man he'll say
every word I say is Gospel truth, and if it is a woman it will make her
perfectly happy to see me a-swelterin' in the job--seven times a year do
I have to move this stove back and forth--and I say it is high time I
said a word. So you can let 'em in just as quick as you are a mind to.”
Sez I, a whisperin' and puttin' my finger on my lip:
“Won't you be still?”
“No, I won't be still!” he yelled out louder than ever. “And you may go
through all the motions you want to and you can't stop me. All you have
got to do is to walk round and let folks in, happy as a king. Nothin'
under the heavens ever made a woman so happy as to have some man
a-breakin' his back a-luggin' round a stove.”
I see he wouldn't stop, so I had to go and open the door, and there
stood Serena Fogg, there stood the author of “Wedlock's Peaceful
Repose.” I felt like a fool. For I knew she had heard every word, I see
she had by her looks. She looked skairt, and as surprised and sort o'
awe-stricken as if she had seen a ghost. I took her into the parlor, and
took her things, and I excused myself by tellin' her that I should have
to be out in the kitchen a-tendin' to things for a spell, and went back
to Josiah.
And I whispered to him, sez I: “Miss Fogg has come, and she has heard
every word you have said, Josiah Allen. And what will she think now
about Wedlock's Peaceful Repose?”
But he had got that wild and reckless in his demeanor and acts, that
he went right on with his hollerin', and, sez he, “She won't find much
repose here to-day, and I'll tell her that. This house has got to be all
tore to pieces to get that stove started.”
Sez I, “There won't be nothin' to do only to take off one side of the
door casin'. And I believe it can be done without that.”
“Oh, you believe! you believe! You'd better take holt and lug and lift
for two hours as I have, and then see.”
Sez I, “You hain't been here more'n ten minutes, if you have that. And
there,” sez I, liftin' up one end a little, “see what anybody can do who
is calm. There I have stirred it, and now you can move it right along.”
“Oh, _you_ did it! I moved it myself.”
I didn't contend, knowin' it wuz men's natural nater to say that.
[Illustration: “AND HE SAID I HAD RUBBED 'EM OUT.”]
Wall, at last Josiah got the stove in, but then the stove-pipe wouldn't
go together, it wouldn't seem to fit. He had marked the joints with
chalk, and the marks had rubbed off, and he said I had “rubbed 'em out.”
I wuz just as innocent as a babe, but I didn't dispute him much, for I
see a little crack open in the parlor door, and I knew the author of
“Wedlock's Peaceful Repose” was a-listenin'.
But when he told me for the third time that I rubbed 'em out on purpose
to make him trouble, and that I had made a practice of rubbin' 'em out
for years and years--why, then I _had_ to correct him on the subject,
and we had a little dialogue.
I spoze Serena Fogg heard it. But human nater can't bear only just so
much, especially when it has stoves a dirtien up the floor, and apple
sass on its mind, and unexpected company, and no cookin' and a threshin'
machine a-comin'.
CHAPTER IV.
Never knew a word about the threshin' machine a-comin' till about half
an hour before. Josiah Allen wuzn't to blame. It come just as onexpected
onto him as it did onto me.
Solomon Gowdey wuz a-goin' to have 'em first, which would have left me
ample time to cook up for 'em. But he wuz took down bed sick, so they
had to come right onto us with no warnin' previous and beforehand.
They wuz a drivin' up just as Josiah got the stove-pipe up. They had to
go right by the side of the house, right by the parlor winders, to get
to the side of the barn where they wanted to thresh; and just as they
wuz a-goin' by one of the horses got down, and of all the yellin' I ever
heard that was the cap sheaf.
Steve Yerden is rough on his horses, dretful rough. He yells at 'em
enough to raise the ruff. His threshin' machine is one of the kind where
the horses walk up and look over the top. It is kinder skairful any way,
and it made it as bad agin when you expected to see the horse fall out
every minute.
Wall, that very horse fell out of the machine three times that day. It
wuz a sick horse, I believe, and hadn't ort to have been worked. But
three times it fell, and each time the yellin' wuz such that it skairt
the author of “Peaceful Repose,” and me, almost to death.
The machine wuz in plain sight of the house, and every time we see the
horse's head come a mountin' up on top of the machine, we expected that
over it would go. But though it didn't fall out only three times, as I
said, it kep' us all nerved up and uneasy the hull of the time expectin'
it. And Steve Yerden kep' a-yellin' at his horses all the time; there
wuzn't no comfort to be took within a mile of him.
I wuz awful sorry it happened so, on her account.
[Illustration: “IT DIDN'T FALL OUT ONLY THREE TIMES.”]
Wall, I had to get dinner for nine men, and cook if all from the very
beginnin'. If you'll believe it, I had to begin back to bread. I hadn't
any bread in the house, but I had it a-risin', and I got two loaves out
by dinner time. But I had to stir round lively, I can tell you, to make
pies and cookies and fried cakes, and cook meat, and vegetables of all
kinds.
The author of “Wedlock's Peaceful Repose” came out into the kitchen. I
told her she might, if she wanted to, for I see I wuzn't goin' to have a
minute's time to go into the parlor and visit with her.
She looked pretty sober and thoughtful, and I didn't know as she liked
it, to think I couldn't do as I promised to do, accordin' to agreement,
to hear her lecture, and lift my hand up when I differed from her.
But, good land! I couldn't help it. I couldn't get a minute's time to
lift my hand up. I could have heard the lecture, but I couldn't spare my
hands.
And then Josiah would come a-rushin' in after one thing and another,
actin' as was natural, accordin' to the nater of man, more like a wild
man than a Christian Methodist. For he was so wrought up and excited by
havin' so much on his hands to do, and the onexpectedness of it, that he
couldn't help actin' jest as he did act. I don't believe he could. And
then Steve Yerden is enough to distract a leather-man, any way.
[Illustration: “TO FIND A PIECE OF OLD ROPE TO TIE UP THE HARNESS.”]
Twice I had to drop everything and find cloths to do up the horse's
legs, where it had grazed 'em a-fallin' out of the machine. And once I
took my hands out of the pie-crust to find a piece of old rope to tie up
the harness. It seemed as if I left off every five minutes to wait on
Josiah Allen, to find somethin' that he wanted and couldn't find, or
else to do somethin' for him that he couldn't do.
Truly, it was a wild and harrowin' time, and tegus. But I kept a firm
holt of my principles, and didn't groan--not when anybody could hear me.
I won't deny that I did, out in the buttery by myself, give vent to a
groan or two, and a few sithes. But immegiately, or a very little after,
I was calm again.
Wall, worse things wuz a-comin' onto me, though I didn't know it. I owed
a tin peddler; had been owin' him for four weeks. I owed him twenty-five
pounds of paper rags, for a new strainer. I had been expectin' him for
over three weeks every day. But in all the three hundred and sixty-five
days of the year, there wuzn't another day that would satisfy him; he
had got to come on jest that day, jest as I wuz fryin' my nut cakes for
dinner.
I tried to put him off till another day. But no! He said it wuz his last
trip, and he must have his rags. And so I had to put by my work, and lug
down my rag-bag. His steel-yards wuz broke, so he had to weigh 'em in
the house. It wuz a tegus job, for he wuz one of the perticuler kind,
and had to look 'em all over before he weighed 'em, and pick out every
little piece of brown paper, or full cloth--everything, he said, that
wouldn't make up into the nicest kind of writin' paper.
And my steel-yards wuz out of gear any way, so they wouldn't weigh but
five pounds at a time, and he wuz dretful perticuler to have 'em just
right by the notch.
And he would call on me to come and see just how the steel-yards stood
every time. (He wuz as honest as the day; I hain't a doubt of it.)
But it wuz tegus, fearful tegus, and excitin'. Excitin', but not
exhileratin', to have the floor all covered with rags of different
shapes and sizes, no two of a kind. It wuz a curius time before he come,
and a wild time, but what must have been the wildness, and the curosity
when there wuz, to put a small estimate on it, nearly a billion of crazy
lookin' rags scattered round on the floor.
[Illustration: “SHE LOOKED CURIUS, CURIUSER THAN THE FLOOR LOOKED.”]
But I kep' calm; I have got giant self-control, and I used every mite of
it, every atom of control I had by me, and kep' calm. I see I must--for
I see that Miss Fogg looked bad; yes, I see that the author of
“Wedlock's Peaceful Repose” wuz pretty much used up. She looked curius,
curiuser than the floor looked, and that is goin' to the complete end of
curosity, and metafor.
Wall, I tussled along and got dinner ready. The tin peddler had to stay
to dinner, of course. I couldn't turn him out jest at dinner time. And
sometimes I almost think that he delayed matters and touzled 'round
amongst them rags jest a purpose to belate himself, so he would have to
stay to dinner.
I am called a good cook. It is known 'way out beyend Loontown and
Zoar--it is talked about, I spoze. Wall, he stayed to dinner. But he
only made fourteen; there wuz only thirteen besides him, so I got along.
And I had a good dinner and enough of it.
I had to wait on the table, of course--that is, the tea and coffee. And
I felt that a cup of good, strong tea would be a paneky. I wuz that wore
out and flustrated that I felt that I needed a paneky to soothe.
And I got the rest all waited on and wuz jest a liftin' my cup to my
lips, the cup that cheers everybody but don't inebriate 'em--good,
strong Japan tea with cream in it. Oh, how good it smelt. But I hadn't
fairly got it to my mouth when I wuz called off sudden, before I had
drinked a drop, for the case demanded help at once.
Miss Peedick had unexpected company come in, jest as they wuz a-settin'
down to the dinner-table, and she hadn't hardly anything for dinner, and
the company wuz very genteel--a minister and a Justice of the Peace--so
she wanted to borrow a loaf of bread and a pie.
She is a good neighbor and is one that will put herself out for a
neighborin' female, and I went into the buttery, almost on the run, to
get 'em for her, for her girl said she wanted to get 'em into the house
and onto the table before Mr. Peedick come in with 'em from the horse
barn, for they knew that Mr. Peedick would lead 'em out to dinner the
very second they got into the house, and Miss Peedick didn't want her
husband to know that she had borrowed vittles, for he would be sure to
let the cat out of the bag, right at the table, by speakin' about 'em
and comparin' 'em with hern.
I see the necessity for urgent haste, and the trouble wuz that I hurried
too much. In takin' down a pie in my awful hurry, I tipped over a pan of
milk right onto my dress. It wuz up high and I wuz right under the
shelf, so that about three tea-cupsful went down into my neck. But the
most went onto my dress, about five quarts, I should judge besides that
that wuz tricklin' down my backbone.
[Illustration: “I SEE THE NECESSITY FOR URGENT HASTE.”]
Wall, I started Serintha Ann Peedick off with her ma's pie and bread,
and then wiped up the floor as well as I could, and then I had to go and
change my clothes. I had to change 'em clear through to my wrapper, for
I wuz wet as sop--as wet as if I had been takin' a milk swim.
CHAPTER V.
Wall, the author of “Wedlock's Peaceful Repose” wuz a-waitin' for me to
the table; the men had all got through and gone out. She sot right by
me, and she had missed me, I could see. Her eyes looked bigger than
ever, and more sad like.
She said, “she was dretful sorry for me,” and I believed her.
She asked me in a awe-stricken tone, “if I had such trials every day?”
And I told her “No, I didn't.” I told her that things would run along
smooth and agreeable for days and days, but that when things got to
happenin', they would happen right along for weeks at a time, sometimes,
dretful curius. A hull batch of difficulties would rain down on anybody
to once. Sez I, “You know Mr. Shakespeare says that' Sorrows never come
a-spyin' along as single fighters, but they come in hull battles of
'em,' or words to that effect.”
Sez I, in reasonable axents, “Mebby I shall have a hull lot of good
things happen to me right along, one after another, some dretful
agreeable days, and easy.”
Sez she in the same sad axents, and wonderin', “Did you ever have
another day in your hull life as hard as this you are a-passin'
through?”
“Oh, yes,” sez I, “lots of'em--some worse ones, and,” sez I, “the day
has only jest begun yet, I presume I shall have lots and lots of new
things happen to me before night. Because it is jest as I tell you, when
things get to happenin' there hain't no tellin' when they will ever
stop.”
Miss Fogg groaned, a low, deep groan, and that is every word she said,
only after a little while she spoke up, and sez:
“You hain't eaten a bit of dinner; it all got cold while you wuz a
changin' your dress.”
“Oh, wall,” sez I, “I can get along some way. And I must hurry up and
get the table cleared off any way, and get to my work agin', for I have
got to do a lot of cookin' this afternoon. It takes a sight of pies and
cakes and such to satisfy twelve or a dozen men.”
So I went to work vigorously agin. But well might I tell Miss Fogg “that
the day had only jest begun, and there wuz time for lots of things
to happen before night,” for I had only jest got well to work on the
ingregiences of my pies when Submit Tewksbury sent over “to see if I
could let her have them sturchien seeds I had promised her--she wanted
'em to run up the inside of her bedroom winder, and shade her through
the winter. She wuz jest a-settin' out her winter stock of flower roots
and seeds, and wanted 'em immegiatly, and to once, that is, if it was
perfectly convenient,” so the boy said.
Submit is a good creeter, and she wouldn't have put that burden on me on
such a time for nothin', not if she had known my tribulations; but she
didn't, and I felt that one trial more wouldn't, as the poet hath well
said, “either make or break me.”
So I went to huntin' for the seeds. Wall, it wuz a good half-hour before
I could find 'em, for of course it wuz natural nater, accordin' to the
total deprivity of things, that I should find 'em in the bottom of the
last bag of seeds that I overhauled.
But Submit had been disappointed, and I didn't want to make her burdens
any heavier, so I sent her the sturchien seeds.
But it wuz a trial I do admit to look over more than forty bags of
garden and flower seeds in such a time as that. But I sent 'em. I sent
Submit the sturchien seeds, and then I laid to work again fast as I
possibly could.
But I sez to the author of “Peaceful Repose,” I sez to her, sez I:
“I feel bad to think I hain't gettin' no time to hear you rehearse your
lecture, but you can see jest how it is; you see I hain't had a minute's
time today. Mebby I will get a few minutes' time before night; I will
try to,” sez I.
“Oh,” sez she, “it hain't no matter about that; I--I--I somehow--I don't
feel like rehearsin' it as it was.” Sez she, “I guess I shall make some
changes in it before I rehearse it agin.”
Sez I, “You lay out to make a more mean thing of it, more megum.”
“Yes,” sez she, in faint axents, “I am a-thinkin' of it.”
[Illustration: “AS I STARTED FOR THE BUTTERY.”]
“Wall,” sez I cheerfully, as I started for the buttery with a pile of
cups in one hand, the castor and pickle dish in the other, and a pile of
napkins under my arm, “I believe I shall like it as well again if you
do, any way,” sez I, as I kicked away the cat that wuz a-clawin' my
dress, and opened the door with my foot, both hands bein' full.
“Any way, there will be as much agin truth in it.”
Wall, I went to work voyalently, and in two hours' time I had got my
work quelled down some. But I had to strain nearly every nerve in the
effort.
And I am afraid I didn't use the colporter just exactly right, who come
when I wuz right in the midst of puttin' the ingregiences into my tea
cakes. I didn't enter so deep into the argument about the Revised
New Testament as I should in easier and calmer times. I conversed
considerable, I argued some with him, but I didn't get so engaged as
mebby I had ort to. He acted disappointed, and he didn't stay and talk
more'n an hour and three quarters.
He generally spends half a day with us. He is a master hand to talk;
he'll make your brain fairly spin round he talks so fast and handles
such large, curius words. He talked every minute, only when I wuz
a-answerin' his questions.
[Illustration: “THERE WUZ SOMETHIN' WRONG ABOUT 'EM.”]
Wall, he had jest gone, the front gate had just clicked onto him, when
Miss Philander Dagget came in at the back door. She had her press-board
in her hand, and a coat over her arm, and I see in a minute that I had
got another trial onto me. I see I had got to set her right.
I set her a chair, and she took off her sun-bonnet and hung it over the
back of her chair, and set down, and then she asked me if I could spend
time to put in the sleeves of her husband's coat. She said “there wuz
somethin' wrong about em', but she didn't know what.”
She said “she wouldn't have bothered me that day when I had so much
round, but Philander had got to go to a funeral the next day, as one of
the barriers, and he must have his coat.”
Wall, I wrung my hands out of the dish-water they was in at the time,
and took the coat and looked at it, and the minute I set my eyes on it
I see what ailed it I see she had got the sleeves sot in so the elbows
come right in front of his arms, and if he had wore it in that condition
to the funeral or anywhere else he would have had to fold up his arms
right acrost his back; there wuzn't no other possible way.
And then I turned tailoress and helped her out of her trouble. I sot
the sleeves in proper, and fixed the collar. She had got it sot on as a
ruffle. I drawed it down smooth where it ort to be and pinned it--and
she went home feelin' first rate.
I am very neighborly, and helpful, and am called so. Jonesville would
miss me if any thing should happen.
[Illustration: “SHE IS APT TO GET THINGS WRONG.”]
I have often helped that woman a sight. She is a good, willin' creeter,
but she is apt to get things wrong, dretful apt. She made her little
boy's pantaloons once wrong side before, so it would seem that he would
have to set down from the front side, or else stand up.
And twice she got her husband's pantaloons sewed up so there wuz no way
to get into em' only to crawl up into 'em through the bottom of the
legs. But I have always made a practice of rippin' and tearin' and
bastin', and settin' her right, and I did now.
Wall, she hadn't hardly got out of the back door, when Josiah Allen came
in in awful distress, he had got a thorn in his foot, he had put on an
old pair of boots, and there wuz a hole in the side of one of 'em, and
the thorn had got in through the hole. It pained him dretfully, and he
wuz jest as crazy as a loon for the time bein'. And he hollered the
first thing that “he wanted some of Hall's salve.” And I told him “there
wuzn't a mite in the house.”
And he hollered up and says, “There would be some if there wuz any sense
in the head of the house.”
[Illustration: “HE WANTED SOME OF HALL'S SALVE.”]
I glanced up mechanically at his bald head, but didn't say nothin', for
I see it wouldn't do. And he hollered out agin, “Why hain't there any
Hall's salve?” Sez I, “Because old Hall has been dead for years and
years, and hain't made any salve.”
“Wall, he wouldn't have been dead if he had had any care took of him,”
he yelled out.
“Why,” sez I, “he wuz killed by lightnin'; struck down entirely
onexpected five years ago last summer.”
“Oh, argue and dispute with a dying man. Gracious Peter! what will
become of me!” he groaned out, a-holdin' his foot in his hand.
Sez I, “Let me put some Pond's Extract on it, Josiah.”
“Pond's Extract!” he yelled, and then he called that good remedy words I
wuz ashamed to hear him utter.
And he jumped round and pranced and kicked just as it is the nater of
man to act under bodily injury of that sort. And then he ordered me to
take a pin and get the thorn out, and then acted mad as a hen at me
all the time I wuz a-doin' it; acted jest as if I wuz a-prickin' him
a-purpose.
He talked voyalent and mad. I tried to hush him down; I told him the
author of “Wedlock's Peaceful Repose” would hear him, and he hollered
back “he didn't care a cent who heard him. He wuz killed, and he
shouldn't live to trouble anybody long if that pain kept up.”
His acts and words wuz exceedingly skairful to anybody who didn't
understand the nater of a man. But I wuzn't moved by 'em so much as the
width of a horse hair. Good land! I knew that jest as soon as the pain
subsided he would be good as gold, so I kep' on, cool and collected, and
got the thorn out, and did up the suffering toe in Pond's Extract, and I
hadn't only jest got it done, when, for all the
|
, he spent some
Time in Prayer; then the Great Chamberlain or Grand Master of the Wardrobe
talk'd to him about Affairs of State, or such as were Domestic; when those
Gentlemen were retir'd, the Prince employed himself in reading Dispatches,
or in Writing; after which he dress'd himself: About 11 o'Clock he went
to Mass, accompany'd by the Prince his Son-in-Law, and the Princess his
Daughter: When he held a Council there, 'twas after Mass was over: Upon
other Days he play'd at Billiards till Dinner-time, which held a long
while, and sometimes a little too much was drank at it; which indeed they
could not well help, the Wine there was so delicious. After Dinner was
over, his Electoral Highness went with the Princess his Daughter to her
Apartment, where he stay'd a little while, and then retir'd to his own,
where he caus'd himself to be undress'd, and went to Bed for a few Hours.
About 5 or 6 o'Clock in the Evening he was dress'd, after which he gave
public Audiences, or else apply'd himself to something in his Study. At 7
o'Clock he went into the Assembly Room, where he found the Princess and
the whole Court; and after having chatted some Time, he sate down to
Picquet, or to a Pair of Tables; but when the Game was over, he retired,
and the Princess went to Supper.
In the Afternoon, when the Elector was withdrawn, the Princess went into
her Lady of Honour's Apartment, where there was always a great Assembly,
and often a Concert, in which the Princess sung some _Italian_ Song or
other, together with _Signora Claudia_, one of her Waiting-Women. This
little Concert was made up also of some Musicians selected out of the
Elector's Band, and is one of the completest that I ever heard. The Prince
of _Sultzbach_ assisted at it sometimes; but he most commonly retir'd to
his Apartment at the same Time that the Elector did to his.
As these Two Princes shew'd me great Marks of their Goodness, the
Courtiers too, in Imitation of their Masters, were mighty civil to me: I
was invited to the best Houses, and treated every Day with grand Feasts,
and fresh Parties of Pleasure; and in a Word I pass'd the little Time I
stay'd at _Heidelberg_ very pleasantly. I was so charm'd with that Court,
that I had a great Mind to put in for some Employment there; and for that
end I engag'd some Persons, who I thought could do me most Service; but
notwithstanding the Courtiers seem'd so fond of me, I found a Cabal in my
Way, which was powerful enough to hinder me from obtaining my Wish. These
were, to my Misfortune, Persons of very good Credit, who did not care to
see any body in Place, but such, as they knew, would truckle to them. The
Great Chamberlain, to whom I plainly saw I was not acceptable, was one of
those who made the greatest Opposition to my Advancement. 'Tis true, that
I drew his Resentment upon me by my own Rashness and Folly: For one Day,
as I was attending the Elector from the Princess's Apartment to his own, I
went into a Room which, according to the Custom of the Court, no body was
permitted to enter, except the Great Chamberlain; but this was more than I
then knew, and therefore I went boldly into the Room, when a Harbinger of
the Court came, and, with a very impertinent Air, bad me _turn out_----I
ask'd him, Whether he had his Order for saying so from the Elector? He
said, No; but from the Great Chamberlain: I then made him an Answer in a
Style that surpriz'd him, and bad him tell the Grand Chamberlain something
that I knew he would not be pleas'd with: At the same time I talk'd both
against the Chamberlain and his Emissary in such a manner as gave Vent to
my Spleen, but excluded me from the Service of one of the best Princes in
the World. I took Leave afterwards of the Elector, who bad me Farewel,
made me a considerable Present, and moreover gave me Letters of
Recommendation to _Vienna_, where I intended to solicit some Employment.
I shall now give you a brief Account of the City and Castle of
_Heidelberg_: The City stands on the Banks of the _Neckar_, with high
Mountains on each Side, and only a narrow Passage between them, from which
however there's a Prospect of the noblest Plain in _Germany_. In this City
there was formerly a famous University, founded by _Rupert the Ruddy_,
Count Palatine and Duke of _Bavaria_ in 1346. Here was to be seen one of
the finest Libraries in _Europe_, but General _Tilly_ carry'd it off in
1622, and sent it to _Rome_, where it makes a considerable Part of the
_Vatican_ Library. _Lewis_ the Dauphin of _France_, Grandfather of _Lewis_
XV. made himself Master of _Heidelberg_ by a Capitulation in 1698.
nevertheless, all manner of Disorders were committed in it; a Part of the
Electoral Palace was blown up, the City was burnt, and the very Corpses of
the Electors, which were in the Coffins with the Ornaments of their
Dignity, were dragg'd out of their Graves into the Square: And the
_French_ would undoubtedly have committed greater Cruelties, if the Army
of the Empire had not advanc'd towards _Heidelberg_, of which the
_Germans_ made themselves Masters; and the Governor was prosecuted for
Treachery, and sentenc'd to have his Choice, Whether to die by the Sword,
or to have his Coat of Arms defac'd, his Sword broke, to be kick'd by the
Hangman, and turn'd out of the Army with his Life: But he was so
mean-spirited, as to prefer Infamy to Death, and retir'd to _Hildesheim_,
where he has the Misfortune to be still living.
Some Time after this, the Marshal _de Lorge_ attack'd _Heidelberg_, but he
could not master it, tho' the Place was defenceless. A Song was made upon
him, the Burden of which was, _He would have taken_ Heidelberg, _if he had
found the Door open_. There's no Sign now that _Heidelberg_ was ever
ruin'd; 'tis well rebuilt; and if the present Elector had continued his
Residence in it, would have been one of the finest Towns in _Germany_; but
'twas owing to the Protestants, that the Elector remov'd to _Manheim_.
What gave Occasion to it was this: The Protestants of _Heidelberg_ and the
Catholics have one Church between them, where the Nave of it belongs to
the Protestants, and the Choir to the Catholics. When the present Elector
had fix'd his Residence at _Heidelberg_, he desir'd that this Church, in
which the Electors are interr'd, might be intirely Catholic; and for this
end he made a Proposal to the Protestants, to give up the Nave, and
engag'd that another Church should be built for them. The Inhabitants were
very willing to consent to it, but the Ministers oppos'd it, and
represented to the Citizens, that 'twas of dangerous Consequence to resign
that Church, which was included in the Treaty of _Westphalia_, and in all
the Treaties that had been made with the Princes of _Neubourgh_, on their
Accession to the Electorate; that, after such a Resignation was once made,
they could no longer expect the Protection of the Powers of their own
Communion; and finally, that even the new Church, which was promis'd to be
built for them, might with very great Ease be taken from them. The Elector
having declar'd that he would be obey'd, the Ministers apply'd to the
Protestant Body at the Dyet of the Empire. The Affair made a great Noise;
and the Elector threatened the Inhabitants to abandon them; but they did
not seem to be much concern'd at it, because they imagin'd, that if the
Court went, the Regency and the Courts of Justice would remain with them,
as they did in the Time of the late Elector. Nevertheless they were out in
their Calculation, and the Elector, justly incens'd at the Disrespect of
his Subjects, abandon'd them, and transfer'd his Court and all the
Tribunals to _Manheim_; so that the Citizens, whose sole Dependance was on
the Court, or the Officers of those Tribunals, are now very poor. They
were quickly sensible of the Error they had committed, and went and threw
themselves at the Elector's Feet; but the Prince gave no Ear to them, and
has caus'd the City and Castle of _Manheim_ to be rebuilt.
The Castle of _Heidelberg_ to this Day shews the Marks of the Disorder
committed there by the _French_; for there's a great Part of it in Ruins;
and out of Four considerable Mansions, of which it consisted, there was
only one that was not damag'd. That which remains of the Palace is in a
Stile of Architecture, which I should be at a Loss to explain; 'tis
neither Gothic nor Modern, but a _Rhapsody_ of all the Orders heap'd one
upon another, without Fancy or Judgment; as if the Architect who conducted
the Work, had only design'd a Building of great Expence, without troubling
himself whether it was done well or ill. This Palace stands upon a very
high Hill, with a magnificent Terrass towards the Town, from whence
there's a Prospect of the Plain and of the Country too for several
Leagues. The Inside of the Palace is scarce more regular than the
Outside. The Elector's Apartment consists of a long Suite of Rooms,
without Beauty or Proportion. Nor is there any thing agreeable in the
whole but its Situation, which is owing to the Prospect that it commands.
The other Apartments are very small, and of pretty difficult Access,
because of a great many little Steps that lead up and down to them.
In the Vaults of this Palace there's the Tun, so famous for its enormous
Size; 'tis said to contain 26,250 Gallons _Paris_ Measure. The Electors
have had frequent Carousals on the Platform which is over it. I own to
you, that I can't comprehend what Pleasure there can be in Tippling-Bouts
of this Kind, at a Place where one cannot be at Ease; since a Man need not
be very tall, for his Head to touch the Roof of the Vault, which besides
is very dark.
As I was preparing to set out for _Vienna_ where I intended, as I said, to
sollicit Employment, I receiv'd a Letter from _Paris_, with Advice that
the Storm I so much dreaded was dispers'd, and that all my Fears were ill
grounded, the Regent having no manner of Suspicion of me, but on the
contrary, more inclin'd than ever to shew me the Effects of his
Protection; thereupon I was earnestly exhorted to return to _Paris_, which
Advice coming from a good Hand, I made no Scruple to comply with it.
* * * * *
At my Arrival there I went to the Royal Palace as before: The Regent gave
me a very good Reception, and _Madame_ made me so welcome, that it
confirm'd my Hopes, that I should at length obtain something at the Court
of _France_. I found People very much divided about the War which had been
just declar'd against _Spain_: The _French_ were indeed for a War, but
they were sorry to make it against a Prince who was born among them, and
for whose Establishment they had expended so many Millions, and so much
Blood. The Regent was even at a Loss to find any one to command the Army,
because several had excus'd themselves. Only the Marshal _de Berwic_, the
Natural Son of _James_ II. King of _England_, prefer'd the Service of the
Regency to the old Obligations he had to the King of _Spain_. His Catholic
Majesty, whose Forces this Duke had commanded, had heap'd Favours upon
him; he had not only made him and his Son Grandees of _Spain_, but had
moreover granted to both of 'em the Golden Fleece, and the Duchy of
_Liria_ for his Son and his Posterity. Nevertheless, he accepted of the
Command with Pleasure, and set out for _Spain_.
The Regent having engag'd the Prince of _Conti_ to take upon him the
Command of the Cavalry, order'd him 100,000 Crowns for his Equipage, and
granted him 60,000 Livres a Month to keep an open Table; besides which,
his Horses were to be kept at the King's Expence. When his Royal Highness
had appointed these Two Generals, he was not very much at a Loss for
subaltern Officers: To encourage them to serve with the more Zeal, there
was a great Promotion, consisting of 6 Lieutenant-Generals, 72
Major-Generals, and 196 Brigadiers. The Regent also gave Pensions to above
Threescore Officers, who repair'd to the Marshal _de Berwic_ in _Navarre_,
where the Campaign was open'd by the Siege of _Fontarabia_. At the same
Time the Regent caus'd a Manifesto to be publish'd, which was couch'd in
Terms full of Regard to the King of _Spain_, Cardinal _Alberoni_ being
reproach'd for every Thing that was blameworthy in that Prince's Conduct;
and accus'd of being the Author of the War between the Two Crowns, and of
having hinder'd the King his Master from accepting the Treaty of the
Quadruple Alliance, a Treaty which had not been concluded, said the
Regent, but for the Welfare of _Europe_, and particularly of _France_ and
_Spain_. His Royal Highness protested, that the War was only made to
induce the King of _Spain_ to a Peace; and affirm'd, That _France_ did not
mean to make any Conquest upon his Dominions; and that if she was
compell'd to do it, she should be always ready to restore such Conquests
at the Peace.
Cardinal _Alberoni_ dispers'd several Pieces in the Name of his Master, by
which he invited the _French_ Soldiers to take the Part of his Catholic
Majesty; and to succeed the better in this Design, he engag'd the King of
_Spain_ to head his Army, hoping, that upon his very first Appearance, one
Half of the Army of _France_ would desert to his Standard. The Cardinal
being full of Notions so chimerical and so injurious to Officers and
Troops, as incapable of Cowardice as of Treachery; he oblig'd the
_Chevalier de S----_ who had been a Colonel in _France_, but by
Misfortunes was forc'd to go to _Spain_, to write to some of the chief
Commanders, and solicit them to come over with their Regiments to the
_Spanish_ Service. The _Chevalier_, who built Hopes of a considerable
Fortune upon the Success of this Project, wrote to the Lieutenant-Colonel
of _Normandy_, and sent the Letter to him by an Officer, who was indeed a
Gentleman, but at that Time committed an Action unworthy of that
Character. This Officer came to the _French_ Army, and gave the Letter to
the Person it was directed to, who carrying it to the Marshal _de
Berwic_, he caus'd the unfortunate Courier to be arrested, and hang'd up
in Two Hours after. The Cardinal was very much mortify'd by having
miscarry'd in this Attempt, not considering that the same was
impracticable, by reason the Fidelity of the _French Officers_ was never
to be corrupted; but it was not so at that Time with the _Soldiers_, of
whom a great Number deserted to the _Spanish_ Army. Persons of Credit, who
at that Time saw Cardinal _Alberoni_ in private, assur'd me, that Minister
was so fully persuaded that whole Regiments at a Time would come over to
the _Spanish_ Service; that when he was told 50 or 100 Deserters, more or
less, were newly come; _What signifies that_, said he? _His Majesty wants
to see Colours and Standards arrive, and not a Handful of Men._ The
Cardinal had a great many Fortune-hunters about him, who were continually
telling him, that intire Battalions were just coming over; and by the
Favour of such Predictions, which never came to any Thing, they got out of
him what they wanted, for no other Consideration but a sorry improbable
Scheme, and which tended even sometimes to deceive the Minister and betray
him. One may guess at the Character of those Gentlemen by one _F----_, who
had been a Reformado-Colonel in _France_, but being press'd hard by
merciless Creditors, could find no other Means to escape from their ill
Humour, than by taking Shelter under Cardinal _Alberoni_. This _F----_ was
a terrible Rattle, and could rodomontade better than any body. The
Minister made him a Brigadier, and withal gave him a Gratuity of 100
Pistoles; but our Spark not thinking this sufficient, wanted forsooth to
be a Major-General, and teiz'd the Cardinal for it to such a Degree, that
to get rid of such an importunate Solicitor, his Eminency was oblig'd to
promise him, that it should not be long before he should be prefer'd. My
Gentleman had no Time to wait, and renew'd his Solicitations; but being
put off, he was quite out of Patience, and at last declar'd, that he would
serve no longer if he was not made a Major-General. His Eminence grew
angry, so that _F----_ thought it was proper to submit, or at least to
assume a submissive Air. Mean while he study'd Revenge, and imagin'd the
only way to make his Fortune in _France_ would be, to seize the Cardinal,
and run away with him to the Regent. The Thing that remain'd to be
consider'd was, what Methods he should take to succeed; and 'tis even
said, that he had laid his Plot so well, that had it not been for the
Treachery of one of the Conspirators who discover'd the whole Mystery, the
same would have succeeded. The Cardinal caus'd _F----_ to be arrested, and
sent Prisoner to _Pampeluna_, and from thence to the Castle of _Segovia_,
where he was try'd, and would infallibly have been beheaded, but Cardinal
_Alberoni_ happen'd to be disgrac'd at the same Time, as I shall have the
Honour to tell you anon.
While these Trifles pass'd in the _Spanish_ Army, the _French_ went on
furiously to Action. _Fontarabia_ was closely besieg'd, upon which the
King and Queen made as if they would relieve it; but while they were
consulting about it, the Marshal _de Berwic_ oblig'd it to capitulate.
This Conquest, tho' to the Advantage of _France_, did not abate one Jot of
that Aversion which the _French_ had to the War. The People contributed to
it not without Reluctance; nevertheless it was the Regent's Interest to
continue it; and as he perceiv'd they were already so over-burden'd with
Taxes, that 'twas in vain to think of creating new ones, he contriv'd new
Methods to fill the Treasury. He obtain'd an Arret of Council for making a
considerable Number of Bank Bills, those which had been made before having
been soon snatch'd up. Then the Council pass'd another Arret, for
diminishing the Value of the Species. The Bustle this Arret occasion'd at
_Paris_ is not to be imagin'd; every body was glad to part with their
Cash, upon which they apprehended there would be a Loss, and they hurry'd
to receive Paper in Exchange, upon the Promise which the Council had made,
that the Value of the Bills should be fix'd, so as never to rise nor fall.
Nevertheless, it was not long before the People seriously reflected upon
the Invalidity of the Matter, into which their Gold and Silver was
transform'd, and the Hurry to the Bank abated. But the Regent soon
contriv'd a way to bring in the little Cash that remain'd in private
Hands; for he caus'd an Arret of Council to pass, which forbad any one's
having more than 500 Livres about him, upon the Penalty of a great Fine.
In Pursuance of this Arret, People began again to change their Species for
Bank Bills, which were in Truth more commodious than Cash, because People
might then carry the Value of several Millions about them, without
sweating under the Load. This was a rare way to thrive, when a Man carry'd
his whole Estate thus in his Pocket!
By this Means did the Duke Regent provide for the immense Charges of the
War with _Spain_, which was carry'd on with Vigour; and soon after the
taking of _Fontarabia_, the _French_ Army laid Siege to _St. Sebastian_,
which held but Twenty-five Days, when both the Town and Castle
surrender'd.
As long as the War continued with Success in _Spain_ I never left
soliciting at the Royal Palace, but always in vain. I spent most of my
Time in the Regent's Antichamber, and now-and-then went for Recreation to
the House of _Madame de R----_, whom I have not had the Honour of
mentioning to you for a good while, but my Passion was now grown cool, so
that all those Visits were but a melancholy Relief in the Situation that I
then stood in. My Friends made me reflect seriously on the small Hopes I
ought to entertain of succeeding at the Court of _France_. The _Abbe de
Asfeld_ perceiving the Anxiety I was under, took the Advantage of it to
drive me, as I may term it, from a Place where I lost my Time, and spent
the little Money I had to no Purpose; therefore I left _Paris_ once more,
and travelled by the Way of _Metz_, to avoid the troublesome Questions of
the King's Lieutenant at _Toul_.
* * * * *
I pass'd thro' St. MENEHOULT, which is a Town in _Champagne_, built in a
Morass, between Two Eminencies. A little after I was there, it had the
Misfortune to be burnt. I was told, that the Jews of _Metz_ offer'd to
rebuild it intirely, on condition they might be permitted to have a
Synagogue there.
* * * * *
From _St. Menehoult_ I went to VERDUN, an Episcopal City, whose Bishops
take the Titles of Counts of _Verdun_, and Princes of the Holy Empire.
This Diocese makes Part of the Three Bishopricks yielded to _France_ by
_Lorrain_. The Cathedral is dedicated to our Lady. In this Church there's
a Well, which is preserv'd there for a Supply of Water in case of Fire,
because the Place being on a very high Ground, it would be difficult to
bring Water to it.
* * * * *
From _Verdun_ I went to METZ, where I made some Stay. This is a very large
Town, at the Conflux of the _Moselle_ and the _Seille_. It was heretofore
the Capital of _Austrasia_, and afterwards reckon'd as an imperial City
till 1552, that the Constable of _Montmorency_ made a Conquest of it for
_Henry_ II. King of _France_. The Emperor _Charles_ V. try'd in vain to
retake it, when the Duke of _Guise_, who commanded in the Place, acquir'd
great Reputation in the Defence of it, and oblig'd him to raise the Siege,
at which the Emperor was so mortify'd, that he resign'd his Dominions, and
retir'd to a Cloyster. _Metz_, _Toul_ and _Verdun_ were confirm'd to
_France_ in 1559, by the Treaty of _Chateau-Cambresis_, and this Cession
was afterwards confirm'd by the Peace of _Munster_ in 1648.
The Cathedral of _Metz_, which is dedicated to St. _Stephen_, is a Church
of greater Note for its Antiquity than for its Beauty. The most remarkable
Thing in it is its baptismal Font, which is of one intire Piece of
_Porphyry_ about 10 Foot in Length.
There is very good Company at _Metz_, and I should have been glad to have
stay'd there longer, if my private Affairs would have permitted it. There
is a Parliament, which consists of a good Number of Men of Quality, who
are all very rich. Besides, here is always a strong Garison, and several
Persons of easy Fortunes, who commonly spend the Winter here. When I was
here, _M. de Saillant_ was the commanding Officer. He liv'd with
Splendor, and I commonly din'd with him, and supp'd with the Intendant of
the Province, who was then _M. de Celi_ of the _Harlay_ Family, and was
very much esteem'd.
* * * * *
When I set out from _Metz_, I struck into the Road for _Germany_, and went
to SPIRES. This Town may be consider'd as a Monument of the Ravage of War,
there being a great many Ruins to be seen in it, which are the Remains of
the Houses burnt by the _French_, in the War they made for the Destruction
of the Palatinate. It was formerly the Seat of the Imperial Chamber, which
after 'twas ruin'd, was transfer'd to _Wetzlar_. _Spires_ is the See of a
Bishop Suffragan to the Bishop of _Mentz_.
* * * * *
I pass'd the _Rhine_ at _Spires_, over a Bridge of Boats, and arrived in a
few Hours at _Heidelberg_, from whence I went to _Stutgard_, and so to
ULM.[3] This is one of the most considerable Cities in _Germany_, and has
magnificent Structures both sacred and prophane, and great Squares adorn'd
with Fountains. Our Lady's, which is the most considerable of all the
Churches, belongs to the Lutherans, who are the Magistrates of the City;
but the Roman Catholics are allow'd the free Exercise of their Religion
here. This City was formerly but a Village, which _Charlemain_ granted to
the Abbey of _Reichenau_. The Inhabitants of _Ulm_ redeem'd their Liberty
on the Payment of a considerable Sum, after which they got their Town made
an Imperial City, and at last it became the Capital of _Swabia_.
_Ulm_ is very well fortify'd; it maintains a stout Garison, and its
Ramparts are furnish'd with good Cannon; nevertheless, the Elector of
_Bavaria_ took it with Ease in the Beginning of the late War, when that
Prince declar'd for his Nephew the King of _Spain_, tho' 'tis said, his
Electoral Highness had a Correspondence at the same time in the Town. But
the Battle of _Hochstet_ help'd to restore it to its Liberty, and
notwithstanding the Menaces of the _Marshal de Villars_, it receiv'd an
Imperial Garison.
* * * * *
From _Ulm_ I went to AUGSBOURG[4], a very ancient City, where a _Roman_
Colony was planted by the Emperor _Augustus_, from whom it had the Latin
Name _Augusta_. It has from time to time undergone several Revolutions: In
1518 _Luther_ came hither to give a public Account of his Doctrine; and in
1530, _Charles_ V. summon'd the Dyet of the Empire hither, which Dyet was
famous for the noted _Confession_ of _Augsbourg_, that the Protestants
presented to the Emperor. In another Dyet held in 1548, the same _Charles_
V. propos'd that Formulary call'd the _Interim_, with regard to the
Communion in both Kinds, and the Marriage of Priests: This Formulary has
done irreparable Injury to the Catholic Religion.
_Augsbourg_ had a very great Share in the Civil Wars between our
Ancestors, on account of Religion. During that Period, the Protestants
seiz'd the City, and turn'd out the Bishop and Clergy; but _Charles_ V.
having retaken it, re-establish'd the _Romish_ Religion in it, and alter'd
the whole Government, which continued in that State till the Beginning of
_April_ 1552, when the Protestants took it again, and restor'd what the
Emperor had destroy'd; and at length a Peace was concluded at _Augsbourg_;
but the City did not long enjoy the Sweets of it, and Violences were soon
committed on both Sides. The famous _Gustavus Adolphus_, King of _Sweden_,
came to the Aid of the Protestants. He arriv'd at _Augsbourg_ in 1632. The
Inhabitants paid him extraordinary Honours, which was very provoking to
the Catholic Princes, and to the Duke of _Bavaria_, who Two Years after
punish'd them for it. This Prince having declared himself the Protector of
the ancient Religion, besieg'd _Augsbourg_, and reduc'd the Citizens to
such Extremity, that they eat Rats, Cats, and even human Flesh. It was
settled at the Peace of _Westphalia_, that the Catholics and Lutherans
should tolerate one another, which was afterwards punctually observ'd.
Nevertheless, this City was again molested by the Elector of _Bavaria_ in
the last War, when he made himself Master of it, but his Troops abandon'd
it immediately after the Battle of _Hochstet_. After the Peace of
_Westphalia_, the Emperor _Leopold_ summon'd the Dyet of the Empire to
_Augsbourg_ in 1690, and there he caus'd himself to be crown'd, and his
Son _Joseph_ to be elected King of the _Romans_.
The assembling of the Dyets, and the flourishing Trade at _Augsbourg_,
have render'd it one of the most magnificent Cities in _Germany_. Its
Squares are large, its Streets spacious, and its Fountains very beautiful.
The Town-House is one of the finest Buildings that I have seen. 'Tis a
vast square Edifice, well built of Free-Stone. The Porch is all of Marble.
Almost all the Rooms are wainscotted and ceil'd with very fine Timber.
There's a Hall 110 Feet long, 58 broad, and 52 Feet in Height, the
Pavement of which is Marble, and its Walls adorn'd with Paintings,
intermix'd with Emblems and Devices relating to the Government. The
Ceiling, which exceeds all the rest for its Beauty, has Compartments, the
Squares and Pannels whereof are inrich'd with Sculptures, very finely
gilt, and full of beautiful Pictures and other Ornaments. The Cathedral is
large and spacious, with a most remarkable great Gate, all of Brass, over
which there are several Scripture Passages, represented in _Basso-Relievo_
of very nice Workmanship. The Episcopal Palace has nothing extraordinary.
The present Bishop is of the Family of _Newbourg_, and Brother to the
Elector of _Triers_, and the Elector Palatine. The Dignity of Prince of
the Empire is annex'd to that of Bishop of _Augsbourg_, in the same manner
as it is to all the Bishopricks of _Germany_. He is chose by the Chapter,
which is compos'd of Canons, who are noble by Sixteen Descents. The
Bishop's Sovereignty extends over almost all the Territory of _Augsbourg_.
* * * * *
I am now going to give you an Account of one of the most splendid Courts
in all _Germany_, I mean that of _Bavaria_, which I had the Honour to see
at MUNICH, whither I went at my Departure from _Augsbourg_.[5]_Munich_,
which is the Capital of _Bavaria_, stands upon the River _Iser_, that
falls into the _Danube_, for which Reason the Neighbourhood is almost all
Meadow Land. The Town is not large, but very well built, so that I have
scarce seen any that makes so gay an Appearance. _Munich_ contains several
stately Buildings, both sacred and profane. Among the former, the Two
finest, that I took Notice of, are, our Lady's Church, and that of the
Jesuits.
In our Lady's Church there's a magnificent Tomb of the Emperor _Lewis_ IV.
adorn'd with Figures of Marble and Brass. There's one Thing remarkable in
this Church, and that is, at the Entrance of the great Gate there's a
particular Place, from whence, as one stands, we observe such a Regularity
in the Disposition of the Pillars which support the Roof, that there is
not a Window to be perceiv'd in it, tho' there are a great many.
The Jesuits Church is also extremely magnificent. It consists intirely of
one Nave, very lofty and spacious, the Roof of which is very noble, and
adorn'd all over with Sculpture. The Vestry contains a great deal of
Wealth in Relics, and in Vessels of Gold and Silver.
Their College is as magnificent as their Church, there can be nothing
finer; and I could not help thinking the Outside of it exceeded the
Electoral Palace. In the Inside there are great Rooms, which serve as
Classes for the Scholars that come to study with them.
The Elector's Palace deserves a diligent View, for it may compare with the
Palaces of the most powerful Sovereigns; and I think that, excepting the
Palace of the _Tuileries_, there's none so big. Yet for all this it has
one Defect, common to the Palaces of all Sovereigns, it having been built
at several Times, and being by Consequence irregular. The first Time I saw
it, I own to you that I was disgusted at this Irregularity; and that it
fell vastly short of the Idea I had conceiv'd of the Building from what I
had read of it in the Relations publish'd by Travellers.
Of all the Parts of the Electoral Palace, there's not one that is more
magnificent than that which is commonly call'd the _Emperor's Apartment_:
The principal Room in it is a Hall, which is 118 Feet long, and 52 broad,
and may be reckon'd a complete Piece of Work; 'tis adorn'd with fine
Paintings, representing sacred and profane History, which are rang'd in
exact Order, one over-against the other; and under each of the historical
Passages there are _Latin_ Verses explaining the Subject: The
Chimney-piece is as magnificent as the rest of the Apartment; on the Top
of it there's the Statue of _Porphyry_, of admirable Workmanship,
representing _Virtue_, holding a Spear in her Right Hand, and a Branch of
gilt Palm in her Left. The Ceiling is adorn'd with gilt Compartments, and
with Paintings of a noble Design.
Going out of the great Hall, we pass thro' a very spacious Antichamber
into the Hall of Audience, which is very much ornamented, as is all the
rest. 'Tis there that the Electors give Audience to the foreign Ministers,
and there are Eight great Compartments, shewing the
|
found under the epithelium of the suspensoria. A somewhat
similarly located center of spontaneity described by Romanes for
_Staurophora laciniata_ (Hydromedusa) has already been noted.
As to the rapid pulsations of the bell after cutting out the stomach
end, this also is similar to Romanes’ results on Aurelia and other
Scyphomedusæ, when he cut off parts of the manubrium or an aboral ring
out of the bell. In these instances, however, Romanes soon obtained
a slackening of the rhythm following the temporary acceleration. The
temporary acceleration he attributes to the stimulus of cutting, and the
slackening to a lack of some afferent stimulus from the removed tissue.
Conant obtained the same results on Polyclonia by removing the oral arms
(see Polyclonia) but says nothing about a slackening of the rhythm in
Charybdea. I believe the increased rhythm in Charybdea was in part due to
the decreased amount of labor necessary to force the water out of two
openings instead of one, namely, past the velarium. Just how much this
observation bears upon Romanes’ theory of rhythmic contraction, that the
rhythm is due to an alternate exhaustion and recovery of the contractile
tissue, as opposed to the ganglionic theory of rhythm of physiologists,
one does not wish to speculate much. Yet, I feel that the observation
rather supports this theory. The tissue having to do less work, would
become less exhausted at each contraction and require less time for
recovery and hence have a more rapid rhythm.
I here sum up Romanes’ theory in a few words. The ganglia liberate a
constant and comparatively weak stimulus, one perhaps about minimal. This
stimulus sets off the contractile tissue; but as the tissue contracts
and becomes exhausted the constant stimulus becomes, in relation to it,
sub-minimal, and it does not contract again until it has recovered and
the stimulus is again strong enough to set it off. The ganglionic theory
of rhythmic contraction supposes that the ganglia liberate stimuli to
the contractile tissue at successive intervals. Romanes had this theory
suggested to him by the rhythmic contractions he succeeded in obtaining
by subjecting deganglionated bells to a continuous but weak faradic
stimulus, or by placing them into weakly acidulated water, or into 5 per
cent. glycerine. Romanes claims that his theory better explains muscular
tonus and the contraction of involuntary muscle. He does not, however,
hold this theory to the exclusion of the ganglionic theory, since only
too often does he speak in terms of the latter. He further brings in his
support the fact that the frog’s tongue, in which no ganglia have been
demonstrated, can be made to contract rhythmically when subjected to a
weak and continuous stimulus. He also calls attention to the rhythmic
contractions seen in the Protozoa, the snail’s heart, etc. Finally,
physiologists are much inclined to explain the rhythmic contraction of
the heart and other involuntary muscles, in part, at least, as due to a
property of the contractile tissue.
_Margin, Radial Ganglia, Nerve_--Experiments 18, 21-23, 30.--Complete
removal of the margin did not stop pulsation; but the removal of the
radial ganglia stopped it permanently. While this experiment seems to
have been tried only once, yet, taking into consideration the results of
other operations, it would seem that the principal centers of spontaneity
reside in these ganglia. (It should here be remembered that the
interradial ganglia were probably removed at the removing of the margin.)
Cutting the nerve in the eight adradii caused the _pedalia_ to bend
inwards at right angles to their normal position but did not in the least
affect the coördination of the sides. When, however, the sides were cut
in the eight adradii to the base of the stomach, coördination for the
main part ceased, and each side pulsated in its own rhythm.
I have said that the principal centers of spontaneity reside in the
radial ganglia. Upon further thought this hardly seems warranted. No
doubt, among the principal motor centers must be placed the ganglionic
masses of the clubs, and the radial ganglia, together with the homologous
interradial ganglia, represent centers of equal value. I speak of these
two sets of ganglia as homologous, since strictly speaking, they both
belong to the margin, and the clubs at whose bases they lie probably
represent modified tentacles. Conant’s experiments leave us in the
dark as to the function of these ganglia. Next in order, it would
seem, are the ganglion cells in the suspensoria, as is suggested by
the contractions of an isolated side with a portion of a suspensorium
attached. (See previous head.) While we have seen that the frenula and
the velarium can contract by themselves, yet, I find no evidence that
these can impart their contractions to any adjacent tissue.
Conant’s results on cutting the nerve eight times and then continuing the
cuts to the base of the stomach are quite the same as Romanes and Eimer
obtained upon Aurelia. Romanes, however, concludes that in his Sarsia,
Tiaropsis, etc., coördination was broken when only short incisions were
made in the margin. Charybdea appears, then, to agree with Aurelia rather
than with the Hydromedusæ. Yet, since Romanes at first obtained similar
results to those of Charybdea on Sarsia, but on further experimenting
concluded that coördination had really been destroyed at the first
cutting, we cannot speak with certainty that coördination had not been
destroyed in Charybdea before the cuts had been continued to the base of
the stomach. I say not with certainty, because the injury to the bell
being slight, coördination may have been maintained on the principle of
a simultaneously (simultaneous for the octants) alternate exhaustion and
recovery of the contractile tissue on the principle of Romanes’ theory.
_Stimulation._--Romanes found when he stimulated a deganglionated bell
of a Hydromedusa, that it responded by a single contraction, while that
of a Scyphomedusa responded with several quite rhythmic contractions.
Charybdea in this respect agrees with the Scyphomedusæ. Romanes’ results
were also verified on Aurelia. (Experiments 12c, 15, 50, 51.)
_Activity of Charybdea._--In speaking of the activity of Charybdea, I
cannot do better than refer the reader to the notes. (Experiment 41.)
Conant remarks in his dissertation what an active swimmer Charybdea is,
and this is further borne out by his later observations.
_Temperature._--Ice in the water seemed to have no effect, except when
held against an animal, when a slowing of pulsation followed in a few
instances. On some pulsating actively in the sun the temperature of the
water was found to be 92° F. (Experiments 33-35.)
Conant does not tell us how cold the water became when he placed ice in
it, but judging from his results, it seems that he might have obtained
a decided slowing of pulsation if the water in which the medusæ swam
had been permitted to approach anywhere near the freezing point, say
35-40° F. Romanes obtained decided slowing of pulsation, and even
complete inhibition, on a bell of Aurelia, as also a lengthening of the
latent period on some strips cut from a bell of Aurelia, by lowering
the temperature of the water. Replacing Aurelia in warmer water had
the effect of immediate recovery and increased rhythm. In Aurelia,
raising the temperature increased the rhythm but diminished it when the
temperature of the water became 70-80° F. After a slowing of pulsation
due to such a rise of temperature, it would not quicken again when the
animal was placed in water of its normal temperature. Romanes explains
this by supposing that the tissue of the medusa had been permanently
injured by the abnormally high temperature. It would be interesting to
observe how the tropical Aurelia behaved under such treatment, seeing
that Charybdea pulsated actively and without apparent injury in water at
92° F. _Limnocodium_, noted by Romanes, and probably a tropical species,
lived happily in water at 85° F. in the lily house of the Royal Botanical
Society. The temperature of the water could be raised to 100° F. before
it proved fatal to this medusa. Such facts point to a decided difference
in the constitution of the protoplasm of tropical and temperate medusæ.
Romanes’ Sarsia became frantic when placed in milk-warm water.
While writing the above, I was led to wonder whether the temperature
of the water may not have been the stimulating influence in those
experiments on light (previously noted) in which the medusæ continued to
swim actively in the sunlight.
_Food and Feeding._--See Experiment 36.
I again make note of a few observations made by myself on the Olindiad.
A crustacean became entangled in the tentacles of a medusa; apparently
this wished to retain it, for the proboscis reached in the direction
of the crustacean, which, however, got away. I then placed, by means
of a needle, another small crustacean against one of the tentacles.
This was seized but not retained, for the animal pulsated and it was
washed away by the water. Twice I saw a good-sized crustacean in the
proboscis. In one instance the velum appeared to hold the part of the
crustacean not yet in the proboscis. I noticed another with a crustacean
wholly in the proboscis, which was much lengthened out, the upper part
of the crustacean being in the stomach. The next morning the crustacean
was wholly in the stomach and the proboscis normal. At 5.30 P. M. the
crustacean was ejected, nothing but the shell and some rubbish remaining.
These medusæ seem to pay no attention to being touched by one of their
kind, except to give a pulsation or two.
The proboscis appears very “intelligent” in its actions.[c] First, some
of the tentacles can be seen to contract and to bend inwards, then the
side next the tentacles contracts and the proboscis is seen to reach in
that direction. I could not see, however, what the irritant was.
_Occurrence of Charybdea_--Experiments 37-40.--Dr. Conant’s remarks
(“Cubomedusæ”) on the occurrence of Charybdea at the surface of quite
shallow water and near the shore (which is quite at variance with former
observations, that the Cubomedusæ are essentially deep-sea forms) are
further borne out by his observations at Port Antonio. As already noted
in the Introduction, Charybdea was here found in abundance in quite
shallow water and near shore, but on the bottom instead of at the
surface as at Port Henderson. It is possible that the animals had been
active near the surface earlier in the morning and that some unknown
conditions determined their settling to the bottom earlier in the former
place than in the latter.
Conant’s conjecture, “whether these were their natural conditions,
or whether the two forms,” Charybdea and Tripedalia, “were driven by
some chance from the deep ocean into the harbor and there found their
surroundings secondarily congenial, so to speak,” seems to be borne out
in favor of the former supposition (for Charybdea at least),--that these
are their natural conditions and that Charybdea Xaymacana is essentially
a shore form.
AURELIA AND POLYCLONIA (CASSIOPŒA)
Experiments 42-53.
Many of the observations on these forms relate to the rate of pulsation.
In an Aurelia, following the removal of a lithocyst, there was a pause
followed by pulsations. In about two minutes rhythmic pulsations were
renewed. Four minutes after the operation there were nineteen pulsations
to the half minute, while twenty minutes after there were only nine,
and these in groups of six and three. The normal rate of pulsation was
twenty-five to the half minute.
Polyclonia behaved much in the same manner as Aurelia. Upon the removal
of lithocyst pulsations continued, but in groups with short pauses. The
normal rate of pulsation was twenty-seven to the half minute, while three
minutes after the operation it was seventeen, and eleven minutes after,
fifteen to the half minute. The tissue connected with a removed lithocyst
gave contractions. Placing a Polyclonia in fresh sea-water more than
doubled the rate of pulsation, which, however, soon fell to the normal
rate, and lower in one instance. In small individuals the rhythm is
decidedly more rapid than in those of larger size. The few observations
on this point would seem to show that it is in inverse proportion to the
squares of the diameters of the bells.
The removal of a single oral arm or of the whole eight, in Polyclonia,
had much the same effect as the removal of a lithocyst: there was a
decided slowing of the rate of pulsation, while the immediate effect of
cutting was an acceleration or a return to near the normal rate. About
a day later this same animal had quite regained its normal rate of
pulsation and continued to live over two weeks. A long latent period
followed the cutting of an arm, before the stimulation of cutting
manifested itself.
An Aurelia, with all its lithocysts removed, still gave spontaneous
and coördinated contractions after allowing time for recovery from the
operation. This was the result in one instance, while in several others
only a few contractions were observed. Removal of the sixteen marginal
bodies (lithocysts) in a Cassiopœa produced paralysis for a time but
recovery soon followed. A Polyclonia with its entire margin removed was
paralyzed but had so far recovered in a day as to be able, at intervals,
to give spontaneous pulsations.
The removed margin of a Polyclonia pulsated vigorously. This margin was
then split so as to make a ring within a ring but connected at one point
by a small bridge of tissue. The waves of contraction, which always
originated on the ring with the lithocysts, passed the bridge to the
inner ring quite as Romanes experienced. The outer ring was next split
so as to separate the exumbral portion from the subumbral, when it was
found that the contractions always originated from the latter. Seven
days after its removal, this same margin was still alive and pulsating
vigorously, and broken-off pieces of the subumbral portion were pulsating
by themselves. Fifteen of the ganglia were removed. It was then found
that while most of the pulsations originated at the remaining ganglion,
now and then contractions originated in other parts where no ganglion
remained. Two days later this margin was still alive with contractions
originating as often from other parts as from the ganglion. A similar
observation was made on a margin of Cassiopœa.
A Polyclonia with the eight lithocysts of one side removed, to compare
with a normal one, gave no evidence of affected coördination.
An oral lobe from an Aurelia could give contractions some minutes after
removal.
In another Aurelia a circular cut was made about the base of the oral
lobes through the epithelium of the subumbrella. The animal could pulsate
well enough but coördination seemed a little affected, while in another
one with a like cut but semicircular, no effect was noticed.
These results on the removal of the lithocysts (and margin in Polyclonia)
in Aurelia, Polyclonia and Cassiopœa agree quite with those on Charybdea
and, of course, also with Romanes’ and Eimer’s results as to paralysis
and recovery following the removal of the lithocysts, or margin, in
Aurelia, Cyanea, etc. I recall no similar observations, however, on
removing a single lithocyst, and the question of an explanation for
the slowing of the rhythm thus brought about arises. Romanes gives as
an explanation for the slowing of the rhythm (Aurelia, Cyanea, etc.)
following the temporary acceleration upon removing the manubrium or a
portion from the center of the bell, as due to a lack of an afferent
stimulating influence upon the ganglia from the excised tissue. May
a similar explanation not serve to explain the slowing following the
removal of a single lithocyst, above noted? The removed lithocyst could
no longer give its efferent stimulus to the remaining ganglia nor to the
tissue, so that the former would have a weaker stimulating influence,
in consequence of which the latter (the contractile tissue) would be
deprived of a part of the original stimulus of the remaining ganglia as
also of that of the removed ganglion. The whole would thus result in
giving to the contractile tissue a weaker stimulus, which, again, would
require longer and greater recovery on the part of the tissue in order
to be set off by the stimulus at hand. This explanation is given on the
basis of Romanes’ theory of rhythmic contraction previously explained.
Of course, it may be suggested that the musculature had lost tonus,
due to the lack of influence of the removed ganglion (lithocyst), in
consequence of which there was a lowering of irritability on the part
of the contractile tissue. This would require a greater summation of
stimulating influence (Ganglionic theory of contraction) on the part of
the remaining ganglia to set it off. Again, the loss of irritability
on the part of the contractile tissue may have been due to a lack of
nutritive influence from the removed ganglion.
Romanes’ explanation, that the slowing of the rhythm following the
removal of the manubrium and central parts of the bell in Aurelia and
Cyanea is due to a lack of an afferent stimulus on the ganglia from the
removed tissue, likewise explains the similar results obtained by Conant
by removing the oral arms from Polyclonia.
The fact that a margin of Cassiopœa and also of Polyclonia, connected
with but one ganglion, often originated contractions in other parts as
well as from the ganglion, seems to show that motor centers resided
in the margin outside of the ganglia. This would be somewhat at
variance with Romanes’ conclusion, that no such centers existed in the
Scyphomedusæ. Conant does not state whether the Polyclonia margin in
question was kept in fresh sea-water or whether the water was not changed
during the seven days. If the latter is the case, then some poisonous
compounds may have been formed that acted as a stimulus much as weakly
acidulated water served Romanes in producing rhythmic contractions in
deganglionated bells.
Again, while it is true that no ganglia are known to exist in the margins
of the Scyphomedusæ outside of the ganglia in the marginal bodies, yet,
ganglion cells and nerve fibers are found in the subumbral part of the
margin as well as in the rest of the umbrella. And as I know no reason
why scattered ganglion cells may not function as ganglia, it is possible
that the contractions in question were spontaneous.
Finally, is it possible that the remaining ganglion originated the
contractions in different parts of the margin, thus acting at a distance
from the points at which contractions originated? Romanes gives an
instance in which he believed to have evidence that this was the case.
Upon a final consideration I am inclined to this latter explanation.
SUMMARY.
Summing up for Charybdea, we have seen that it is very sensitive to
light, strong light as also darkness inhibiting pulsations, while
moderate light stimulates it to activity. Also, a sudden change from
weaker to stronger light, or _vice versa_, may inhibit or stimulate to
activity respectively. This behavior of Charybdea seems to be correlated
with its habit of life on the bottom. We have no reason to doubt but that
the eyes of the sensory clubs are the seat of light sensation.
The experiments on equilibration are negative, giving us no certain
light on the function of the concretions, though it appears that they
may serve, in part at least, for keeping the sensory clubs properly
suspended. Their function in giving the animal sensations of space
relations is not, however, excluded.
Excision of the sensory clubs demonstrates that they are the seat of
important ganglionic centers, the removal of which results in temporary
paralysis and weakness. That they also are the seat of organs (eyes,
network-cells, concretions) that are of importance in giving information
in the life of Charybdea, is evident from the reaching motion of the
proboscis after the removal of the sensory clubs. Other centers of
spontaneity in their order of importance probably are: the radial ganglia
(one experiment); the interradial ganglia (?); the suspensoria, as shown
by their supplying stimuli to isolated pieces of the sides connected with
them; the frenula and the velarium, the latter of which gave contractions
when removed with the frenula or in pieces only. No evidence is given
that the frenula or the velarium can impart their contractions to other
tissue, though this seems probable for the former. The proboscis can also
contract of itself.
Reflexes between the velarium, frenula, subumbrella, sensory clubs,
nerve, and any one pedalium, on the one hand, and the pedalia on the
other hand, are very common, and point to the pedalia with the tentacles
as organs of defense and offense. The pedalia serve also as rudders in
swimming.
Finally, as judged by the results in this paper, Charybdea seems to
occupy, physiologically, a position intermediate between the Hydromedusæ
and the Scyphomedusæ. In its great activity as a swimmer, in its response
to light, and in its reflexes it is Hydromedusan, while in the paralysis
and recovery following the removal of its marginal bodies, as also in its
response with several pulsations instead of one, when a deganglionated
bell is stimulated, it is Scyphomedusan.
The observations on the Discomedusæ, Aurelia, Polyclonia, Cassiopœa,
demonstrate the existence of motor nerve centers in the marginal bodies;
but that other centers are present is shown by the recovery of pulsation
following the removal of the marginal bodies or the margin. These results
are mainly confirmatory of those of Romanes and Eimer. They differ from
these in the fact that margins of Polyclonia and Cassiopœa, with only one
ganglion attached, originated contractions distant from the ganglion.
Removing of a single lithocyst resulted in a slowing of pulsation, as did
also the removal of the oral lobes, though the immediate effect in the
latter case was an acceleration. Isolated pieces of the subumbrella could
contract.
DR. CONANT’S NOTES.
Below follow Dr. Conant’s notes. They are printed about as Conant left
them. Their order of succession, however, has been changed to bring
similar experiments together, while useless and often repeated ones
have been omitted, and short elliptical sentences completed. Where the
present writer wished to add any explanation, the same has been placed in
brackets.
CHARYBDEA.
_Light and Darkness._--1. Eight medusæ, in a deep glass jar and covered
by a black coat, except one inch around the top, were placed in the
dark-room.
a. When light from a lamp was thrown on the surface (one inch) layer, the
animals were active near the surface; when the light was withdrawn, one
or two were on the bottom and not moving but were probably pulsating.
b. After four or five minutes in the dark, three or four besides a feeble
one are on the bottom. It took about two minutes to get them all to
swim [by the lamp]. Of the three on the bottom, one, at any rate, was
not pulsating. [Three other attempts like a and b were made, with very
similar results.]
2. Experiment No. 1 was repeated several weeks later. Four in a large
round glass dish were placed in the dark-room. A lamp being held to the
dish all but one were found to be on the bottom. That one quickly went to
the bottom, while two of those on the bottom quickly came to the top. In
two or three minutes the one that had gone to the bottom began to pulsate
and at about the same time the other one that had remained on the bottom
also began to pulsate, while the two that had gone to the top stayed
there swimming very actively. [Repeated with like results.]
3. Fresh ones did not show the reaction to light after darkness so
well as did those in the experiments previously recorded. They were
experimented with about nine A. M., while usually they were tried later
in the day. I had rather suspected from previous work that they would not
react so well when fresh.
4. a. In walking with the jar (1) of jelly-fish of experiment 1 from
the dark-room to the back porch of the laboratory (fifty steps), in the
bright sun and a cool breeze, all were found upon entering the laboratory
door to have settled to the bottom and most of them to have ceased active
swimming. In five minutes two or three were swimming somewhat, and in
five minutes more all but one or two (eight in all) were swimming.
Walking with the jar about the laboratory did not suffice to make any
change in their swimming, nor did blowing on the surface make any
appreciable change.
b. Upon taking the jar to the back porch and placing it on the stone or
cement flags, in the shade and a cool breeze, in four minutes time all
were on the bottom not even pulsating.
Upon replacing them on the laboratory table all began to swim about at
once. [Repeated.]
c. The jar (1) was placed on the back porch again; in fifteen seconds
three were on the bottom; in one-half minute all but one. In three or
four minutes all were on the bottom, but two were swimming lively and the
others pulsating. In another minute all were swimming.
d. The jar (1) was tried again, not resting it on the flags but holding
it by my hands on the sides. The effect was just as quick; they stopped
pulsating at once. By the time I had got back to my table in the
laboratory, one was at the surface and another arrived just as the jar
was set down.
[Several other experiments of an order similar to those just noted were
tried, with very similar results.]
5. Two buckets stood side by side in the laboratory. One bucket (1) had
more Charybdeas in it than the other bucket (2), and also had more since
brought in (about an hour). The water of one (1) was also more discolored
and with more organic matter (sea weed, etc.). In the laboratory the
animals were active on the surface of both buckets. Placed in the
sunlight on the porch, no breeze, the sun slanting so that one side of
the water in the buckets was bright while the other side was shaded, the
jelly-fish in (1) went mostly to the bottom, while those in (2) seemed
unaffected though some showed a tendency to go to the bottom after a
longer exposure. The experiment with (1) was repeated and it took some
five minutes for them all to go to the bottom. In a few minutes after
replacing them in the laboratory several were active again on the surface.
6. Jar (a) with five large ones stood on my table; they were quite
active. Placed in the sun (no breeze), on the porch, one or two sank
to the bottom at once and the others seemed to slow their activities
somewhat but not very markedly. In a few minutes all were swimming,
apparently more actively than before, in the bright sunlight.
[In other experiments Conant shows that it is not the stimulus of walking
that causes them to swim when carried into the room, for they would not
swim when he walked with them on the porch. Also, he shows how they may
change, some swimming, others not, when left for some time in any one
place.]
7. In a tumbler were two pulsating very vigorously. Placed in the bright
sunlight, very little breeze now and then, they showed no change whatever.
8. Some in a jar were covered with a black coat. The coat was taken off,
and almost immediately they stopped pulsating, or pulsated but feebly,
and sank to the bottom. The coat was put on again with one part near the
bottom of the jar exposed. Almost at once, the animals, which were quite
motionless, pulsating but little, resumed pulsation, which became more
and more vigorous, and quickly swam to the top again. It seems plainly
to be a reaction to light. [Such experiments as this were repeated at
different times with very like results.]
9. A bucket with several bobbing actively on the surface was set out in a
smart shower, and the animals continued bobbing on the surface as before.
I could not see that they made the slightest attempt to go below.
There can be no doubt but that there is an individual difference in
sensitiveness to the reaction of light after darkness. E. g., I just
removed the coat from a dish with four in it; one went to the bottom at
once, another presently, a third remained active at the surface, the
fourth when noticed was on the bottom.
There is also a difference in the length of time they stay on the bottom
as well as in the quickness in the response to light. Some recover very
quickly, should say in less than a minute, and at once become very
active. Some stay for a long time and only resume activity upon the coat
being placed over them. Perhaps this explains some of the observations in
Experiment 1.
_Sensory Clubs._--10. All four concretions were removed and the animal
stood the operation well. It swam more restlessly, however, than others
did in the same surroundings. It seemed at first to show a trace of loss
of sense-perception. It swam up, and down again, more changeable than
those intact, which stay rather more constantly either on the bottom
or at the surface. This may, however, have been due solely to the
restlessness of the animal after the operation. Later it swam actively
for by far the most part on the surface only, which points to the truth
of the preceding statement.
It showed no reaction to _light_. A coat placed over the jar was removed,
when it was found to be on the surface and it remained there. This was
twice repeated. I noticed specially that on pushing the bell above the
surface of the water it at once turned and went deeper as the normal
animal does. Finally, given another a trial with removing the coat from
the jar, it went to the bottom as the normal animal usually does. After
this, when next seen, it was keeping to the bottom. [This experiment was
repeated on another occasion with almost identical results, no loss of
sense-perception being noticeable.]
Sometimes it seemed as if access of _light_ at removing the coat acted
as a stimulus to one or more of those that were quiescent on the bottom.
This was noticed again on the following day.
11. Two more were operated upon. These did not stand the operation well
and stayed on the bottom, one swimming, while eight hours later one
was in better condition (pulsating) than two left in the same dish for
comparison.
12. a. Three clubs were cut off leaving only the stalks. A temporary
paralysis of the power to swim was the immediate effect. Later it
partially recovered this power. The proboscis, which was previously
quiet, now showed convulsive twitchings and movements. It continued for
some time to move to one side and then the other (after short pauses of
varied length) as if to grasp some object. The lips of the _proboscis_
were also moving and at times expanding. Often the movements were towards
the side on which the club was uninjured.
b. The fourth club was next removed. A temporary paralysis as before
resulted, followed by a quick recovery of pulsation; but the animal was
now much weakened. The movement of the proboscis continued--shortening,
lips expanding, moving to this side or that. The pulsations of the bell
were kept up even when too weak to swim.
c. The sensory niches of this same animal were treated with 2.5 per cent.
acetic acid by means of a pipette. The stalks of all four clubs showed
white. Pulsations ceased. The velarium showed feeble local contractions.
The movements of the proboscis and suspensoria drawing down the stomach
continued. Upon stirring the animal it gave rather feeble, somewhat
convulsive pulsations with local (fibrillar) contractions; the pulsations
in some cases were pretty well coördinated, but were more on the
twitching kind.
13. Three clubs were removed. The animal pulsated well, only a little
less strongly, perhaps. After a minute or two the fourth club was
removed. It pulsated almost immediately, perhaps thirty seconds after the
operation. It swam very well and pulsated feebly five hours after the
operation.
14. One from jar (a) (Experiment 6) was operated upon. When the first
club was cut off there was a paralysis of pulsation followed by a quick
recovery. Cutting off the second club seemed to stimulate pulsation,
the third to diminish it; after cutting off the fourth club it still
pulsated. When placed in a large jar it pulsated on the bottom, but not
strong enough to swim. The pulsations were fairly regular and sometimes
seemed to occur in groups of two, but these groups were not well marked.
15. Another one from jar (a) was taken. One club was cut out, upon
which there was a very temporary paralysis followed by good pulsations
afterwards. The _proboscis_, as in all cases noticed, gave active
movements to this side and that side. These movements of the proboscis
were often very quick and definitely directed as if a well defined
stimulus were given. After the operation one _pedalium_ contracted so as
to be at a right angle to the main axis of the bell; shortly a second
pedalium also contracted. Placed in a small round dish the animal swam
actively.
A second club was removed, and it swam as well as before. After fifteen
minutes it was not swimming but pulsating against the jar. Upon stirring
it a little it swam vigorously ten to fifteen strokes and then stopped.
It seemed weak and its movements appeared not so definite, though this
might be due to weakness.
A third club was removed. The only change seemed to be rather greater
weakness.
After about five minutes the fourth club was removed. Paralysis of
pulsation followed. It had the power to contract its _pedalia_ when these
were rather vigorously stimulated with a needle. It also gave one feeble
pulsation when so stimulated.
16. The sensory clubs were removed from another. After removal of
the third one it still pulsated actively, but stopped completely and
apparently for good after the removal of the fourth club. Another one
stopped pulsating apparently for good upon removing the third club.
17. All four sensory clubs were removed from one, cutting as high up as
possible so as to remove the endodermal tract of nerve fibers of the
peduncle. It pulsated afterwards apparently the same as if the stalks had
been left intact.
18. A small piece surrounding a sensory club and including the _margin_
can contract by itself. The piece observed pulsated with quick pulsations
and rhythmically but intermittently. After a fresh cutting away of such
a piece, the portion of the _velarium_ attached was seen to contract
rhythmically, while the rest of the _subumbrella_ was not so seen. The
part of the subumbrella above the radial ganglion that was cut off did
not contract by itself. The same portion of the velarium cut off did give
contractions.
19. A sensory club with the surrounding region cut out pulsated
rhythmically; when the club was cut from the end of its stalk pulsation
stopped. This
|
,--
"Indeed, sir, we have been wretchedly supplied,--scarcely two rations
in succession have been regularly drawn, yet we are not despondent.
While we can procure an ear of corn apiece, or anything that will
answer as a substitute for it, we shall continue our exertions to
accomplish the object for which we were sent."
Here, being informed that General White was only twenty-five miles
distant up the river, he sent him a despatch to hasten, at once, to
the fort. In the mean time, General Coffee, who had returned
successful from his southern expedition, was sent to attack a large
body of Indians at Tallushatchee, some thirty miles distant. With nine
hundred men, this gallant officer advanced, and succeeded in
completely surrounding them; and though the savages fought desperately
to the last, but few escaped. A hundred and eighty warriors lay
stretched around the ashes of their dwellings. Among the slain, was a
mother, on whose bosom her infant boy was found, struggling in vain to
draw nourishment from the lifeless breast. When he was brought to
camp, Jackson endeavored to persuade some of the female captives to
take care of him, but they all refused, saying, "His relations are
all dead, kill him too." He then ordered some sugar to be given him,
and sent him to Huntsville, where he could be properly cared for. He
afterwards adopted him, gave him a good education, and placed him at a
saddler's to learn a trade. The latter was accustomed to spend every
Sunday at the Hermitage, with his adopted father, who was strongly
attached to him. But he always pined for the free, wild life of his
race. The close air of the shop and the drudgery of an apprentice did
not agree with him, and he soon after sickened. He was then taken home
to the Hermitage, where he lingered some time, and died.
At length, on the 7th of November, an Indian runner arrived in camp,
stating that Fort Talladega, about thirty miles distant, was
surrounded by the hostile Red-sticks, and if he did not hurry to its
relief, the friendly Indians, who had taken refuge in it must be
massacred. The runner had scarcely finished his message when the order
to march was issued, and in a few minutes the columns were in motion.
It was midnight, and through the dim cathedrals of nature, lighted
only by the stars of heaven, Jackson led his two thousand men towards
the Talladega. Eight hundred of these were mounted riflemen, who
presented a picturesque appearance, as they wound slowly along the
rough forest path underneath the autumnal woods, each with unceasing
watchfulness, piercing the surrounding gloom, and every hand grasping
a trusty rifle. Their heavy tramp frightened the wild beasts from
their lairs, and awoke strange echoes in the solitude. Now straining
up steep ascents, and now swimming deep rivers, the fearless and
gallant band pressed forward. In three columns, so as to prevent the
confusion that might arise from a sudden surprise, it forced its
difficult way through the forest, and at night arrived within six
miles of the besieged fort. Here Jackson halted, and sent forward two
friendly Indians and a white man, to reconnoitre. About eleven o'clock
they returned, and reported the enemy in great force, and within a
quarter of a mile of the fort. No time was to be lost, and though the
troops had been without sleep, and constantly on the strain for
twenty-four hours, another night, and a battle, lay between them and
repose.
It was four o'clock of a cool November morning, when the three columns
again moved forward. Advancing with the utmost caution and quietness
to within a mile of the Indian encampment, they halted, and formed in
order of battle. Two hundred and fifty of the cavalry, under
Lieut.-Col. Dyer, were left in the rear of the centre to act as a
reserve, while the remaining four hundred and fifty were ordered to
push forward to the right and left on either side, until the heads of
their columns met beyond the hostile encampment, and thus completely
encircle it. The two brigades of Hall and Roberts, occupying the right
and left, were directed to advance, while the ring of cavalry was
steadily to contract, so as to shut in every savage and prevent
escape. At eight o'clock, Colonel Carroll boldly charged the position
in front of him, and carried it; he then retreated, in order to draw
the Indians in pursuit. They charged after him with such terrific
whoops and screams, that a portion of General Roberts' brigade, on
whom they were rushing with uplifted tomahawks, broke and fled. This
made a chasm in the line, which Jackson immediately ordered Colonel
Bradley to fill with his regiment, that for some reason, known only to
the latter, had lagged behind, to the great detriment of the order of
battle. But not only had he proved a laggard in the approach, but he
refused to fill the chasm, as ordered by his commander, and the latter
was compelled to dismount his reserve and hurry them forward. As these
steadily and firmly advanced, and poured in their volleys, the
panic-stricken militia recovered their courage and resumed their
places in the line. In the mean time, the encircling cavalry came
galloping, with loud hurrahs, towards the centre. The next moment the
forest rang with the sharp reports of their rifles. In fifteen minutes
the battle was over, and the terrified savages were wildly skirting
the inner edge of this circle of fire, seeking, in vain, an avenue to
the open forest beyond. Turned back at every step, they fell like the
autumn leaves which the wind shook around them. At length they
discovered a gap, made by the neglect of Colonel Bradley and the delay
of a portion of the cavalry, which had taken too wide a circuit, and
poured like a torrent that has suddenly found vent, through it. The
mounted riflemen wheeled and streamed after; and the quick, sharp
reports of their pieces, and the receding yells rising from the
forest, told how fiercely they pressed on the flying traces of the
foe. The savages made straight for the mountains, three miles distant,
fighting as they went. The moment they bounded up the steep acclivity
they were safe, and the wearied horsemen turned again to the camp.
Their way back was easily tracked by the swarthy forms that lay
stretched on the leaves, showing where the flight and pursuit had
swept. Of the thousand and more who had composed the force of the
enemy, more than half were killed or wounded. Three hundred were left
dead on the spot where they had first fought. The loss of the
Americans in killed and wounded, was ninety-five.
The friendly Indians, who had been so long shut up without a drop of
water, in momentary expectation of being massacred, listened to the
uproar without, with beating hearts; but when the battle was over,
they rushed forth with the most frantic cries of joy, and leaped and
shouted around their deliverers in all the wildness of savage delight.
They crowded around Jackson as if he had been their deity, toward whom
they could not show too much reverence.
The refusal of General White to march to Fort Strother, left the
feeble garrison of the latter in a perilous state. If it should fall,
Jackson's whole line of retreat would be cut off; and he, therefore,
with deep pain, was compelled to stop in his victorious progress, and
return to the fort. On his arrival, he found that no supplies had
reached it, and that the soldiers, half-starved, were bordering on
mutiny. General Cocke, from the first, seemed resolved to withhold all
aid from Jackson, lest he himself should be eclipsed in the campaign.
[Sidenote: Nov. 11.] This officer directed his movements against the
Hillabee towns. General White, with the mounted men, succeeded in
destroying the place, killing and capturing three hundred and sixteen
warriors.
[Sidenote: Nov. 18.]
Jackson, however, endeavored to keep alive the spirits and courage of
his troops, and distributed all his private stores to the feeble and
wounded. Having nothing left for himself and staff, he repaired to the
bullock-pen, and from the offals cut tripe, on which he and they lived
for days, in the vain hope of receiving the long-promised supplies.
One day, as he sat at the foot of a tree, thinking of the hard
condition of his men, and planning how he might find some relief from
the increasing difficulties that pressed so hard upon him, one of the
soldiers, observing that he was eating something, approached, and
asked for a portion. Jackson looked up with a pleasant smile, and
said, "I will, most cheerfully, divide with you what I have;" and
taking some acorns from his pocket, he handed them to the astonished
and mortified soldier. His solicitude for the army did not expend
itself in words, for he shared with the meanest soldier his privations
and his wants, while many of his subordinate officers possessed
abundance. He let the latter enjoy the rations to which they were
legally entitled, but himself scorned to sit down to a well-supplied
table, while the army was perishing with want.
This state of things, of course, could not last long. The soldiers
believed themselves neglected by the State for whose safety they were
fighting; else why this protracted refusal to send them provisions?
The incipient discontent was fed and aggravated by several of the
officers, who were getting tired of the campaign, and wished to return
home, till at last it broke out into open revolt. The militia
regiments, _en masse_, had resolved to leave. Jackson received the
communication with grief and indignation. He felt for his poor,
half-starved men, but all his passionate nature was roused at this
deliberate defiance of his authority. The militia, however, did not
regard his expostulations or threats, and they fixed on a morning to
commence their march. But as they drew out to take their departure,
they found, to their astonishment, the volunteers paraded across the
path, with Jackson at their head. He ordered them to return to their
position, or they should answer for their disobedience with their
lives. They obeyed; but the volunteers, indignant that they had been
made the instrument of quelling the revolt, and anxious as the others
were to get away, resolved next morning to depart themselves. To their
surprise, however, they saw the militia drawn up in the same position
they had occupied the day before, to arrest the first forward movement
that was made. This was a dangerous game to play with armed men, and
would not bear a second trial.
The cavalry, on the ground that the country yielded no forage for
their horses, were permitted to retire to the neighborhood of
Huntsville, where they promised to wait the orders of their commander.
In the mean time, Jackson hearing that provisions were on the way,
made an effort to allay the excited, angry feelings that existed in
the army, and so, on the 14th of November, invited all the field and
platoon officers to his quarters, and after informing them that
abundant supplies were close at hand, addressed them in a kind and
sympathizing manner, told them how deeply he felt for their
sufferings, and concluded by promising, if provisions did not arrive
within two days, to lead them back himself to Tennessee. But this kind
and conciliatory speech produced no effect on a portion of the army,
and the first regiment of volunteers insisted on abandoning the fort.
Permission to leave was granted, and Jackson, with chagrin and
anguish, saw the men whom he refused to abandon at Natchez, forsake
him in the heart of the forest, surrounded by hostile savages.
The two days expiring without the arrival of provisions, he was
compelled to fulfill his promise to the army, and preparations were
made for departure. In the midst of the breaking up of the camp, he
sat down and wrote a letter to Colonel Pope, the contractor, which
exhibits how deeply he felt, not merely this abandonment of him, but
the failure of the expedition. He says in conclusion:
"I cannot express the torture of my feelings, when I reflect that a
campaign so auspiciously begun, and which might be so soon and so
gloriously terminated, is likely to be rendered abortive for the want
of supplies. For God's sake, prevent so great an evil."
As the baggage-wagons were loaded up, and the men fell into marching
order, the palpable evidence of the failure of the project on which
he had so deeply set his heart, and the disgrace that awaited his
army, became so painful, that he could not endure the sight, and he
exclaimed in mingled grief and shame,
"If only two men will remain with me, I will never abandon the post."
"You have one, General!" exclaimed Captain Gordon, of the spies, who
stood beside him.
The gallant captain immediately began to beat up for volunteers, and
it was not long before a hundred and nine brave fellows surrounded
their general, swearing to stand by him to the last.
The latter then put himself at the head of the militia, telling them
he should order them back, if they met provisions near by. They had
gone but ten or twelve miles, when they met a hundred and fifty beeves
on their way to the fort. The men fell to, and in a short time were
gorging themselves with half roasted meat. Invigorated by their
gluttonous repast, most of them consented to return. One company,
however, quietly resumed its journey homeward. When Jackson was
informed of it, he sprang into his saddle, and galloping a quarter of
a mile ahead, where General Coffee with his staff and a few soldiers
had halted, ordered them to form across the road, and fire on the
first man that attempted to pass. As the mutineers came up and saw
that living barrier before them, and in front of it the stern and
decided face of their commander, they wheeled about, and retraced
their steps. Jackson then dismounted and began to mingle among the
men, to allay their excitement, and conciliate their feelings. While
he was thus endeavoring to reduce to cheerful obedience this
refractory company, he was told, to his utter amazement, that the
other portion of the army had changed their mind, and the whole
brigade was drawn up in column, and on the point of marching homeward.
He immediately walked up in front of it, snatched a musket from the
hands of a soldier, and resting it across the neck of his horse, swore
he would shoot the first man who attempted to move. The soldiers stood
and looked in sullen silence at that resolute face, undecided whether
to advance or not, when General Coffee and his staff galloped up.
These, together with the faithful companies, Jackson ordered to form
behind him, and fire when he did. Not a word was uttered for some
time, as the two parties thus stood face to face, and gazed on each
other. At length a murmur rang along the column--rebellion was
crushed, and the mutineers consented to return. Discontent, however,
prevailed, and the volunteers looked anxiously forward to the 10th of
December, the time when they supposed the term of their enlistment
expired. They had originally enlisted for twelve months, and counting
in the time they had been disbanded, after their return from Natchez,
the year would be completed on that date. But Jackson refused to allow
the time they were not in actual service. Letters passed between the
officers and himself, and every effort was made on his part to allay
the excitement, and convince the troops of the justice of his demands.
He appealed to their patriotism, their courage, and honor, and finally
told them if the General Government gave permission for their
discharge, he would discharge them, otherwise they should walk over
his dead body before they stirred a foot, until the twelve months'
actual service was accomplished. [Sidenote: Dec.] Anticipating
trouble, he wrote home for reinforcements, and sent off officers for
recruits.
In the mean time, the 10th of December drew near, and every heart was
filled with anxiety for the result. A portion of the army was resolved
to _take_ their discharge, whether granted or not. It was not a sudden
impulse, created by want and suffering, but a well-considered and
settled determination, grounded on what they considered their rights.
The thing had been long discussed, and many of the officers had given
their decided opinion that the time of the men actually expired on the
10th. Jackson knew that his troops were brave, and when backed by the
consciousness of right, would be resolute and firm. But he had made up
his mind to prevent mutiny, though he was compelled to sacrifice a
whole regiment in doing it.
At length, on the evening of the 9th, Gen. Hall entered the tent of
Jackson, and informed him that his whole brigade was in a state of
revolt. The latter immediately issued an order stating the fact, and
calling on all the officers to aid in quelling it. He then directed
the two guns he had with him, to be placed, one in front and the other
in the rear, and the militia on the rising ground in advance, to check
any movement in that direction, and waited the result. The brigade
assembled, and were soon in marching order. Jackson then rode slowly
along the line, and addressed the soldiers. He reminded them of their
former good conduct, spoke of the love and esteem he had always borne
them, of the reinforcements on the way, saying, also, that he expected
every day, the decision of the government, on the question of their
discharge, and wound up by telling them emphatically, that he had done
with entreaty,--go they should not, and if they persisted, he would
settle the matter in a very few minutes. He demanded an immediate and
explicit answer. They persisted. He repeated his demand, and still
receiving no answer, he ordered the artillerists to prepare their
matches, and at the word "Fire!" to pour their volleys of grape-shot
into the closely crowded ranks. There he sat, gazing sternly down the
line, while the few moments of grace allowed them, were passing
rapidly away. The men knew it was no idle threat. He had never been
known to break his word, and that sooner than swerve one hair from his
purpose, he would drench that field in blood. Alarmed, they began to
whisper one to another, "Let us go back." The contagion of fear
spread, and soon the officers advanced, and promised, on behalf of the
men, that they would return to their quarters.
As if to try this resolute man to the utmost, and drive him to
despair, no sooner was one evil averted than another overtook him. He
had, by his boldness, quelled the mutiny; but he now began again to
feel the horrors of famine. Supplies did not arrive; or in such scanty
proportion, that he was compelled, at last, to discharge the troops,
and, notwithstanding all the distressing scenes through which he had
passed to retain them, see them take up their line of march for home,
leaving him, with only a hundred devoted followers, shut up in the
forest.
[Sidenote: Dec. 23.]
While these things were passing, General Clairborne, with his
volunteers, passed up the east side of the Alabama, and piercing to
the towns above the Cahawba, gave battle to the Indians under their
great leader, Weathersford, and defeated them, with the loss of but
one man killed and seven wounded. Destroying their villages, he
returned to Fort Clairborne. [Sidenote: 1814.] Jackson remained idle
till the middle of January, when he was gladdened by the arrival of
eight hundred recruits. Not deeming these, however, sufficient to
penetrate into the heart of the Creek country, he resolved to make a
diversion in favor of General Floyd, who was advancing from the east.
[Sidenote: Dec. 29.] This officer, leaving his encampment on the
Chattahouche, and advancing into the Indian territory along the
southern bank of the Talapoosa River, came on the morning of the 29th
upon the town of Autossee, where a large number of Indians were
assembled. Having marched since one o'clock in the morning, he took
the savages by surprise. They however rallied and fought desperately,
retreating only before the fire of the artillery. Two towns, within
sight of each other, were soon in flames. Several hundred of the enemy
were killed and wounded, while the loss of the Americans was but
sixty-five. Among the wounded was General Floyd, who was struck by a
shot while gallantly leading on his command. Hearing that a large
number of Indians were encamped on the Emuckfaw Creek, where it
empties into the Tallapoosa River, Jackson marched thither, and on the
evening of the 21st of January, arrived within a short distance of
their encampment. The Indians were aware of his approach, and resolved
to anticipate his attack. To prevent a surprise, however, Jackson had
ordered a circle of watch-fires to be built around his little band.
The men stood to their arms all night; and just before daylight a wild
yell, which always precedes an attack, went up from the forest, and
the next moment the savages charged down on the camp. But, the instant
the light of the watch-fires fell on their tawny bodies they were
swept with such a destructive volley, that they again took shelter in
the darkness. At length, daylight appeared, when General Coffee
ordered a charge, which cleared the field. He was then directed to
advance on the encampment with four hundred men, and carry it by
storm. On his approach, however, he found it too strong for his force,
and retired. Jackson, attacked in return, was compelled to charge
repeatedly, before the savages finally took to flight. Many of their
bravest warriors fell in this short conflict; while, on the American
side, several valuable officers were badly wounded, among them General
Coffee, who, from the commencement to the close, was in the thickest
of the fight.
Notwithstanding his victory, Jackson prudently determined to retreat.
He had gained his object; for in drawing the attention of the Indians
to his own force, he had diverted it from that under Gen. Floyd.
Besides, his horses had been without forage for two days, and would
soon break down. He, therefore, buried the dead on the field where
they had fallen; and, on the 23d, began to retrace his footsteps.
Judging from the quietness of the Indians since the battle, he
suspected they were lurking in ambush ahead. Remembering also what an
excellent place there was for a surprise at the ford of Enotochopeo,
he sent men in advance to reconnoitre, who discovered another ford
some six hundred yards farther down the stream. Reaching this just at
evening, he encamped there all night, and the next morning commenced
crossing. He expected an attack while in the middle of the stream,
and, therefore, had his rear formed in order of battle. His
anticipations proved correct; for no sooner had a part of the army
reached the opposite bank, than an alarm-gun was heard in the rear. In
an instant, all was in commotion. The next moment, the forest
resounded with the war-whoop and yells of the savages, as they came
rushing on in great numbers. As they crowded on the militia, the
latter, with their officers, gave way in affright, and poured
pell-mell down the bank. Jackson was standing on the shore
superintending the crossing of his two pieces of artillery, when his
broken ranks came tumbling about him. Foremost among the fugitives was
Captain Stump; and, Jackson, enraged at the shameful disorder, aimed a
desperate blow at him with his sword, fully intending to cut him down.
One glance of his eye revealed the whole extent of the danger. But
for Gen. Carroll, who, with Capt. Quarles and twenty-five men, stood
nobly at bay, beating back with their deliberate volleys the hordes of
savages, the entire rear of the army would have been massacred. But,
over the din and tumult, Jackson's voice rang clear and steady as a
bugle-note, as he rapidly issued his orders. The gallant and intrepid
Coffee, roused by the tumult, raised himself from the litter on which
he lay wounded, and casting one glance on the panic, and another upon
the little band that stood like a rock embedded in the farther bank,
leaped to the ground, and with one bound landed in his saddle. The
next moment, his shout of encouragement broke on the ears of his
companions as he dashed forward to the conflict. Jackson looked up in
surprise as that pale face galloped up the bank, and then his rage at
the cowardice of the men gave way to the joy of the true hero when
another hero moves to his side, and he shouted, "We shall whip them
yet, my men! _the dead have risen, and come to aid us_." The company
of artillery followed, leaving Lieutenant Armstrong and a few men to
drag up the cannon. When one of the guns, at length, reached the top
of the bank, the rammer and picker were nowhere to be found. A man
instantly wrenched the bayonet from his musket, and rammed home the
cartridge with the stock, and picked it with his ramrod. Lieutenant
Armstrong fell beside his piece; but as he lay upon the ground, he
cried out, "My brave fellows, some of you must fall; but save the
cannon." Such heroism is always contagious; and the men soon rallied,
and charging home on the savages, turned them in flight on every side.
After burying his dead and caring for the wounded, Jackson resumed his
march; and, four days after, reached Fort Strother in safety. Nearly
one-eighth of his little army had been killed or wounded since he left
the post, and he now dismissed the remainder, who claimed that the
time of their enlistment was expired; and quietly waited till
sufficient reinforcements should arrive for him to undertake a
thorough campaign into the Creek country.
[Sidenote: Jan. 27.]
Four days after this, General Floyd again advancing into the Creek
country, was attacked just before daylight by a large body of Indians,
who rushed on him with terrible impetuosity. Determined on victory,
they advanced within thirty steps of the artillery, and would have
taken it but for the uncommon coolness and bravery of the subordinate
officers. At length a charge of bayonet sent them flying in all
directions. The cavalry then charged, and the horses rushing furiously
forward, to the sound of bugles, completed the terror of the savages,
who disappeared like frightened deer in the surrounding forests,
leaving thirty-seven dead on the field.
Reinforcements soon began to come in to Jackson; for his bravery and
success awakened confidence, and stimulated the ambition of thousands,
who were sure to win distinction under such a leader; and, by March,
he found himself at the head of four thousand militia and volunteers,
and a regiment of regular troops, together with several hundred
friendly Indians. While preparing to advance, mutiny again broke out
in the camp. He determined this time to make an example which should
deter others in future; and a private, being tried and convicted, was
shot. The spectacle was not lost on the soldiers, and nothing more was
heard of a revolt.
Having completed all his arrangements, Jackson, with four thousand
men, advanced, on the 16th of March, into the Creek country. At the
junction of the Cedar Creek with the Coosa River, he established Fort
Williams, and left a garrison. He then continued his march, with some
two thousand five hundred men, towards his previous battle-ground at
Emuckfaw. About five miles below it, in the bend of the Tallapoosa,
the Indians, a thousand strong, had entrenched themselves, determined
to give battle. They were on sacred ground; for all that tract between
the Coosa and Tallapoosa Rivers, known as the "hickory ground," their
prophets had told them the white man could never conquer. This bend
contained about a hundred acres, around which the river wrapped
itself in the form of a horse-shoe, from whence it derived its name.
Across the neck leading to this open plain, the Indians had erected a
breastwork of logs, seven or eight feet high, and pierced it with a
double row of port-holes. Behind it, the ground rose into an
elevation; while still farther back, along the shore, lay the village,
in which were the women and children. Early in the morning of the
25th, Jackson ordered General Coffee to take the mounted riflemen
together with the friendly Indians and cross the river at a ford
below, and stretch around the bend, on the opposite bank from the
village, so as to prevent the fugitives from escaping. He then
advanced in front, and took up his position, and opened on the
breastwork with his light artillery. The cannonade was kept up for two
hours without producing any effect. In the mean time, the friendly
Indians attached to General Coffee's command had swam the river and
loosened a large number of canoes, which they brought back. Captain
Russell's company of spies immediately leaped into them, and, with the
friendly Indians, crossed over and set the village on fire, and with
loud shouts pressed towards the rear of the encampment. The Indians
returned the shout of defiance, and, with a courage and steadiness
they seldom exhibited, repelled every effort to advance.
The troops under Jackson heard the din of the conflict within, and
clamored loudly to be led to the assault. He, however, held them back,
and stood and listened. Discovering, at length, by the incessant
firing in a single place, that the Americans were making no progress,
he ordered the drums to beat the charge. A loud and thrilling shout
rolled along the American line, and, with levelled bayonets, the
excited ranks precipitated themselves on the breastwork. A withering
fire received them, the rifle-balls sweeping like a sudden gust of
sleet, in their very faces. Not an Indian flinched, and many were
pierced through the port-holes; while, in several instances, the
enemy's bullets were welded to the American bayonets. The swarthy
warriors looked grimly through the openings, as though impervious to
death. This, however, was of short duration, and soon the breastwork
was black with men, as they streamed up the sides. Major Montgomery
was the first who planted his foot on the top, but he had scarcely
waved his sword in triumph above his head, when he fell back upon his
companions, dead. A cry of vengeance swelled up from his followers,
and the next moment the troops rolled like a sudden inundation over
the barrier. It then became a hand-to-hand fight. The Indians refused
to yield, and with gleaming knives and tomahawks, and clubbed rifles
and muskets, closed in a death grapple with their foes. Civilization
gave the bold frontiersmen no advantage here--it was a personal
struggle with his swarthy rival for the mastery, where they both
claimed the right of possession. The wild yell of the savage blended
in with the stem curse of the Anglo-Saxon, while high and shrill over
the clangor and clash of arms, arose the shouts of the prophets, as
dancing frantically around their blazing dwellings, they continued
their strange incantations, still crying victory.
At length one was shot in the mouth, as if to give the lie to his
declarations. Pressed in front and rear, many at last turned and fled.
But the unerring rifle dropped them along the shore; while those who
endeavored to save themselves by swimming, sunk in mid-stream under
the deadly fire of Coffee's mounted men. The greater part, however,
fought and fell, face to face, with their foes. It was a long and
desperate struggle; not a soul asked for quarter, but turned, with a
last look of hate and defiance, on his conqueror. As the ranks grew
thin, it ceased to be a fight, and became a butchery. Driven at last
from the breastwork, the few surviving warriors took refuge in the
brush and timber on the hill. Wishing to spare their lives, Jackson
sent an interpreter to them, offering them pardon; but they proudly
refused it, and fired on the messenger. He then turned his cannon on
the spot, but failing to dislodge them, ordered the grass and brush to
be fired. Driven out by the flames, they ran for the river, but most
of them fell before they reached the water. On every side the crack of
the rifle told how many eyes were on the fugitives. Darkness at last
closed the scene, and still night, broken only by the cries of the
wounded, fell on the forest and river. Nearly eight hundred of the
Indians had fallen, five hundred and fifty-seven of whom lay stark and
stiff around and in that encampment. The loss of the Americans, in
killed and wounded, was about two hundred.[1]
[Footnote 1: An incident occurred after the battle, which presented in
striking contrast the two opposite natures of Jackson. An Indian
warrior, severely wounded, was brought to him, whom he placed at once
in the hands of the surgeon. While under the operation, the bold,
athletic warrior looked up, and asked Jackson in broken English, "Cure
'im, kill 'im again?" The latter replied, "No; on the contrary, he
should be well taken care of." He recovered, and Jackson pleased with
his noble bearing, sent him to his own house in Tennessee, and
afterwards had him taught a trade in Nashville, where he eventually
married and settled down in business. When that terrible ferocity,
which took entire possession of this strange, indomitable man in
battle, subsided away, the most gentle and tender emotions usurped its
place. The tiger and the lamb united in his single person.]
The tired soldier slept on the field of slaughter, around the
smouldering fires of the Indian dwellings. The next morning they sunk
the dead bodies of their companions in the river, to save them from
the scalping-knives of the savages, and then took up their backward
march to Fort William.
The original design of having the three armies from Tennessee,
Georgia, and Mississippi, meet in the centre of the Creek nation, and
thus crush it with one united effort, had never been carried out, and
Jackson now resolved alone to overrun and subdue the country. Issuing
a noble address to his troops, he, on the 7th of April, set out for
the Indian village of Hoithlowalle. But he met with no opposition; the
battle of Tohopeka had completely prostrated the tribe, and the war
was virtually at an end. He, however, scoured the country, the Indians
everywhere fleeing before the terror of his name. On his march, he
sent orders to Colonel Milton, who, with a strong force, was also
advancing into the Creek country, to send him provisions. The latter
returned a cavalier refusal. Jackson then sent a peremptory order, not
only to forward provisions, but to join him at once with his troops.
Colonel Milton, after reading the order, asked the bearer what sort of
a man Jackson was. "One," he replied, "who intends, when he gives an
order, to have it obeyed." The colonel concluded to obey, and soon
effected a junction with his troops. Jackson then resumed his march
along the banks of the Tallapoosa; but he had hardly set the leading
column in motion, when word was brought him that Colonel Milton's
brigade was unable to follow, as the wagon-horses had strayed away
during the night, and could not be found. Jackson immediately sent
him word to detail twenty men to each wagon. The astonished colonel
soon found horses sufficient to draw the wagons.
The enemy, however, did not make a stand, and either fled, or came in
voluntarily to tender their submission. The latter part of April,
General
|
from the smallest
fragments of fossil bones, or the vague pictures of animals brought home
by unscientific travellers. If it were necessary for the comparative
philologist to acquire a critical or practical acquaintance with all the
languages which form the subject of his inquiries, the science of language
would simply be an impossibility. But we do not expect the botanist to be
an experienced gardener, or the geologist a miner, or the ichthyologist a
practical fisherman. Nor would it be reasonable to object in the science
of language to the same division of labor which is necessary for the
successful cultivation of subjects much less comprehensive. Though much of
what we might call the realm of language is lost to us forever, though
whole periods in the history of language are by necessity withdrawn from
our observation, yet the mass of human speech that lies before us, whether
in the petrified strata of ancient literature or in the countless variety
of living languages and dialects, offers a field as large, if not larger,
than any other branch of physical research. It is impossible to fix the
exact number of known languages, but their number can hardly be less than
nine hundred. That this vast field should never have excited the curiosity
of the natural philosopher before the beginning of our century may seem
surprising, more surprising even than the indifference with which former
generations treated the lessons which even the stones seemed to teach of
the life still throbbing in the veins and on the very surface of the
earth. The saying that "familiarity breeds contempt" would seem applicable
to the subjects of both these sciences. The gravel of our walks hardly
seemed to deserve a scientific treatment, and the language which every
plough-boy can speak could not be raised without an effort to the dignity
of a scientific problem. Man had studied every part of nature, the mineral
treasures in the bowels of the earth, the flowers of each season, the
animals of every continent, the laws of storms, and the movements of the
heavenly bodies; he had analyzed every substance, dissected every
organism, he knew every bone and muscle, every nerve and fibre of his own
body to the ultimate elements which compose his flesh and blood; he had
meditated on the nature of his soul, on the laws of his mind, and tried to
penetrate into the last causes of all being—and yet language, without the
aid of which not even the first step in this glorious career could have
been made, remained unnoticed. Like a veil that hung too close over the
eye of the human mind, it was hardly perceived. In an age when the study
of antiquity attracted the most energetic minds, when the ashes of Pompeii
were sifted for the playthings of Roman life; when parchments were made to
disclose, by chemical means, the erased thoughts of Grecian thinkers; when
the tombs of Egypt were ransacked for their sacred contents, and the
palaces of Babylon and Nineveh forced to surrender the clay diaries of
Nebuchadnezzar; when everything, in fact, that seemed to contain a vestige
of the early life of man was anxiously searched for and carefully
preserved in our libraries and museums,—language, which in itself carries
us back far beyond the cuneiform literature of Assyria and Babylonia, and
the hieroglyphic documents of Egypt; which connects ourselves, through an
unbroken chain of speech, with the very ancestors of our race, and still
draws its life from the first utterances of the human mind,—language, the
living and speaking witness of the whole history of our race, was never
cross-examined by the student of history, was never made to disclose its
secrets until questioned and, so to say, brought back to itself within the
last fifty years, by the genius of a Humboldt, Bopp, Grimm, Bunsen, and
others. If you consider that, whatever view we take of the origin and
dispersion of language, nothing new has ever been added to the substance
of language, that all its changes have been changes of form, that no new
root or radical has ever been invented by later generations, as little as
one single element has ever been added to the material world in which we
live; if you bear in mind that in one sense, and in a very just sense, we
may be said to handle the very words which issued from the mouth of the
son of God, when he gave names to “all cattle, and to the fowl of the air,
and to every beast of the field,” you will see, I believe, that the
science of language has claims on your attention, such as few sciences can
rival or excel.
Having thus explained the manner in which I intend to treat the science of
language, I hope in my next lecture to examine the objections of those
philosophers who see in language nothing but a contrivance devised by
human skill for the more expeditious communication of our thoughts, and
who would wish to see it treated, not as a production of nature, but as a
work of human art.
LECTURE II. THE GROWTH OF LANGUAGE IN CONTRADISTINCTION TO THE HISTORY OF
LANGUAGE.
In claiming for the science of language a place among the physical
sciences, I was prepared to meet with many objections. The circle of the
physical sciences seemed closed, and it was not likely that a new claimant
should at once be welcomed among the established branches and scions of
the ancient aristocracy of learning.(13)
The first objection which was sure to be raised on the part of such
sciences as botany, geology, or physiology is this:—Language is the work
of man; it was invented by man as a means of communicating his thoughts,
when mere looks and gestures proved inefficient; and it was gradually, by
the combined efforts of succeeding generations, brought to that perfection
which we admire in the idiom of the Bible, the Vedas, the Koran, and in
the poetry of Homer, Virgil, Dante, and Shakespeare. Now it is perfectly
true that if language be the work of man, in the same sense in which a
statue, or a temple, or a poem, or a law are properly called the works of
man, the science of language would have to be classed as an historical
science. We should have a history of language as we have a history of art,
of poetry, and of jurisprudence, but we could not claim for it a place
side by side with the various branches of Natural History. It is true,
also, that if you consult the works of the most distinguished modern
philosophers you will find that whenever they speak of language, they take
it for granted that language is a human invention, that words are
artificial signs, and that the varieties of human speech arose from
different nations agreeing on different sounds as the most appropriate
signs of their different ideas. This view of the origin of language was so
powerfully advocated by the leading philosophers of the last century, that
it has retained an undisputed currency even among those who, on almost
every other point, are strongly opposed to the teaching of that school. A
few voices, indeed, have been raised to protest against the theory of
language being originally invented by man. But they, in their zeal to
vindicate the divine origin of language, seem to have been carried away so
far as to run counter to the express statements of the Bible. For in the
Bible it is not the Creator who gives names to all things, but Adam. “Out
of the ground,” we read, “the Lord God formed every beast of the field,
and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he would
call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the
name thereof.”(14) But with the exception of this small class of
philosophers, more orthodox even than the Bible,(15) the generally
received opinion on the origin of language is that which was held by
_Locke_, which was powerfully advocated by _Adam Smith_ in his Essay on
the Origin of Language, appended to his Treatise on Moral Sentiments, and
which was adopted with slight modifications by _Dugald Stewart_. According
to them, man must have lived for a time in a state of mutism, his only
means of communication consisting in gestures of the body, and in the
changes of countenance, till at last, when ideas multiplied that could no
longer be pointed at with the fingers, “they found it necessary to invent
artificial signs of which the meaning was fixed by mutual agreement.” We
need not dwell on minor differences of opinion as to the exact process by
which this artificial language is supposed to have been formed. Adam Smith
would wish us to believe that the first artificial words were _verbs_.
Nouns, he thinks, were of less urgent necessity because things could be
pointed at or imitated, whereas mere actions, such as are expressed by
verbs, could not. He therefore supposes that when people saw a wolf
coming, they pointed at him, and simply cried out, “He comes.” Dugald
Stewart, on the contrary, thinks that the first artificial words were
nouns, and that the verbs were supplied by gesture; that, therefore, when
people saw a wolf coming, they did not cry “He comes,” but “Wolf, Wolf,”
leaving the rest to be imagined.(16)
But whether the verb or the noun was the first to be invented is of little
importance; nor is it possible for us, at the very beginning of our
inquiry into the nature of language, to enter upon a minute examination of
a theory which represents language as a work of human art, and as
established by mutual agreement as a medium of communication. While fully
admitting that if this theory were true, the science of language would not
come within the pale of the physical sciences, I must content myself for
the present with pointing out that no one has yet explained how, without
language, a discussion on the merits of each word, such as must
necessarily have preceded a mutual agreement, could have been carried on.
But as it is the object of these lectures to prove that language is not a
work of human art, in the same sense as painting, or building, or writing,
or printing, I must ask to be allowed, in this preliminary stage, simply
to enter my protest against a theory, which, though still taught in the
schools, is, nevertheless, I believe, without a single fact to support its
truth.
But there are other objections besides this which would seem to bar the
admission of the science of language to the circle of the physical
sciences. Whatever the origin of language may have been, it has been
remarked with a strong appearance of truth, that language has a history of
its own, like art, like law, like religion; and that, therefore, the
science of language belongs to the circle of the _historical_, or, as they
used to be called, the _moral_, in contradistinction to the _physical_
sciences. It is a well-known fact, which recent researches have not
shaken, that nature is incapable of progress or improvement. The flower
which the botanist observes to-day was as perfect from the beginning.
Animals, which are endowed with what is called an artistic instinct, have
never brought that instinct to a higher degree of perfection. The
hexagonal cells of the bee are not more regular in the nineteenth century
than at any earlier period, and the gift of song has never, as far as we
know, been brought to a higher perfection by our nightingale than by the
Philomelo of the Greeks. “Natural History,” to quote Dr. Whewell’s
words,(17) “when systematically treated, excludes all that is historical,
for it classes objects by their permanent and universal properties, and
has nothing to do with the narration of particular or casual facts.” Now,
if we consider the large number of tongues spoken in different parts of
the world with all their dialectic and provincial varieties, if we observe
the great changes which each of these tongues has undergone in the course
of centuries, how Latin was changed into Italian, Spanish, Portuguese,
Provençal, French, Wallachian, and Roumansch; how Latin again, together
with Greek, and the Celtic, the Teutonic, and Slavonic languages, together
likewise with the ancient dialects of India and Persia, must have sprung
from an earlier language, the mother of the whole Indo-European or Aryan
family of speech; if we see how Hebrew, Arabic, and Syriac, with several
minor dialects, are but different impressions of one and the same common
type, and must all have flowed from the same source, the original language
of the Semitic race; and if we add to these two, the Aryan and Semitic, at
least one more well-established class of languages, the Turanian,
comprising the dialects of the nomad races scattered over Central and
Northern Asia, the Tungusic, Mongolic, Turkic,(18) Samoyedic, and Finnic,
all radii from one common centre of speech:—if we watch this stream of
language rolling on through centuries in these three mighty arms, which,
before they disappear from our sight in the far distance, clearly show a
convergence towards one common source: it would seem, indeed, as if there
were an historical life inherent in language, and as if both the will of
man and the power of time could tell, if not on its substance, at least on
its form. And even if the mere local varieties of speech were not
considered sufficient ground for excluding language from the domain of
natural science, there would still remain the greater difficulty of
reconciling with the recognized principles of physical science the
historical changes affecting every one of these varieties. Every part of
nature, whether mineral, plant, or animal, is the same in kind from the
beginning to the end of its existence, whereas few languages could be
recognized as the same after the lapse of but a thousand years. The
language of Alfred is so different from the English of the present day
that we have to study it in the same manner as we study Greek and Latin.
We can read Milton and Bacon, Shakespeare and Hooker; we can make out
Wycliffe and Chaucer; but, when we come to the English of the thirteenth
century, we can but guess its meaning, and we fail even in this with works
previous to the Ormulum and Layamon. The historical changes of language
may be more or less rapid, but they take place at all times and in all
countries. They have reduced the rich and powerful idiom of the poets of
the Veda to the meagre and impure jargon of the modern Sepoy. They have
transformed the language of the Zend-Avesta and of the mountain records of
Behistún into that of Firdusi and the modern Persians; the language of
Virgil into that of Dante, the language of Ulfilas into that of
Charlemagne, the language of Charlemagne into that of Goethe. We have
reason to believe that the same changes take place with even greater
violence and rapidity in the dialects of savage tribes, although, in the
absence of a written literature, it is extremely difficult to obtain
trustworthy information. But in the few instances where careful
observations have been made on this interesting subject, it has been found
that among the wild and illiterate tribes of Siberia, Africa, and Siam,
two or three generations are sufficient to change the whole aspect of
their dialects. The languages of highly civilized nations, on the
contrary, become more and more stationary, and seem sometimes almost to
lose their power of change. Where there is a classical literature, and
where its language is spread to every town and village, it seems almost
impossible that any further changes should take place. Nevertheless, the
language of Rome, for so many centuries the queen of the whole civilized
world, was deposed by the modern Romance dialects, and the ancient Greek
was supplanted in the end by the modern Romaic. And though the art of
printing and the wide diffusion of Bibles, and Prayer-books, and
newspapers have acted as still more powerful barriers to arrest the
constant flow of human speech, we may see that the language of the
authorized version of the Bible, though perfectly intelligible, is no
longer the spoken language of England. In Booker’s Scripture and
Prayer-book Glossary(19) the number of words or senses of words which have
become obsolete since 1611, amount to 388, or nearly one fifteenth part of
the whole number of words used in the Bible. Smaller changes, changes of
accent and meaning, the reception of new, and the dropping of old words,
we may watch as taking place under our own eyes. Rogers(20) said that
“_cóntemplate_ is bad enough, but _bálcony_ makes me sick,” whereas at
present no one is startled by _cóntemplate_ instead of _contémplate_, and
_bálcony_ has become more usual than _balcóny_. Thus _Roome_ and _chaney_,
_layloc_ and _goold_, have but lately been driven from the stage by
_Rome_, _china_, _lilac_, and _gold_, and some courteous gentlemen of the
old school still continue to be _obleeged_ instead of being _obliged_.
_Force_,(21) in the sense of a waterfall, and _gill_, in the sense of a
rocky ravine, were not used in classical English before Wordsworth.
_Handbook_,(22) though an old Anglo-Saxon word, has but lately taken the
place of _manual_, and a number of words such as _cab_ for cabriolet,
_buss_ for omnibus, and even a verb such as _to shunt_ tremble still on
the boundary line between the vulgar and the literary idioms. Though the
grammatical changes that have taken place since the publication of the
authorized version are yet fewer in number, still we may point out some.
The termination of the third person singular in _th_ is now entirely
replaced by _s_. No one now says _he liveth_, but only _he lives_. Several
of the irregular imperfects and participles have assumed a new form. No
one now uses _he spake_, and _he drave_, instead of _he spoke_, and _he
drove_; _holpen_ is replaced by _helped_; _holden_ by _held_; _shapen_ by
_shaped_. The distinction between _ye_ and _you_, the former being
reserved for the nominative, the latter for all the other cases, is given
up in modern English; and what is apparently a new grammatical form, the
possessive pronoun _its_, has sprung into life since the beginning of the
seventeenth century. It never occurs in the Bible; and though it is used
three or four times by Shakespeare, Ben Jonson does not recognize it as
yet in his English Grammar.(23)
It is argued, therefore, that as language, differing thereby from all
other productions of nature, is liable to historical alterations, it is
not fit to be treated in the same manner as the subject-matter of all the
other physical sciences.
There is something very plausible in this objection, but if we examine it
more carefully, we shall find that it rests entirely on a confusion of
terms. We must distinguish between historical change and natural growth.
Art, science, philosophy, and religion all have a history; language, or
any other production of nature, admits only of growth.
Let us consider, first, that although there is a continuous change in
language, it is not in the power of man either to produce or to prevent
it. We might think as well of changing the laws which control the
circulation of our blood, or of adding an inch to our height, as of
altering the laws of speech, or inventing new words according to our own
pleasure. As man is the lord of nature only if he knows her laws and
submits to them, the poet and the philosopher become the lords of language
only if they know its laws and obey them.
When the Emperor Tiberius had made a mistake, and was reproved for it by
Marcellus, another grammarian of the name of Capito, who happened to be
present, remarked that what the emperor said was good Latin, or, if it
were not, it would soon be so. Marcellus, more of a grammarian than a
courtier, replied, “Capito is a liar; for, Cæsar, thou canst give the
Roman citizenship to men, but not to words.” A similar anecdote is told of
the German Emperor Sigismund. When presiding at the Council of Costnitz,
he addressed the assembly in a Latin speech, exhorting them to eradicate
the schism of the Hussites. “Videte Patres,” he said, “ut eradicetis
schismam Hussitarum.” He was very unceremoniously called to order by a
monk, who called out, “Serenissime Rex, schisma est generis neutri.”(24)
The emperor, however, without losing his presence of mind, asked the
impertinent monk, “How do you know it?” The old Bohemian school-master
replied, “Alexander Gallus says so.” “And who is Alexander Gallus?” the
emperor rejoined. The monk replied, “He was a monk.” “Well,” said the
emperor, “and I am Emperor of Rome; and my word, I trust, will be as good
as the word of any monk.” No doubt the laughers were with the emperor; but
for all that, _schisma_ remained a neuter, and not even an emperor could
change its gender or termination.
The idea that language can be changed and improved by man is by no means a
new one. We know that Protagoras, an ancient Greek philosopher, after
laying down some laws on gender, actually began to find fault with the
text of Homer, because it did not agree with his rules. But here, as in
every other instance, the attempt proved unavailing. Try to alter the
smallest rule of English, and you will find that it is physically
impossible. There is apparently a very small difference between _much_ and
_very_, but you can hardly ever put one in the place of the other. You can
say, “I am very happy,” but not “I am much happy,” though you may say “I
am most happy.” On the contrary, you can say “I am much misunderstood,”
but not “I am very misunderstood.” Thus the western Romance dialects,
Spanish and Portuguese, together with Wallachian, can only employ the
Latin word _magis_ for forming comparatives:—Sp. _mas dulce_; Port. _mais
doce_; Wall, _mai dulce_; while French, Provençal, and Italian only allow
_of plus_ for the same purpose: Ital. _più dolce_; Prov. _plus dous_; Fr.
_plus doux_. It is by no means impossible, however, that this distinction
between _very_, which is now used with adjectives only, and _much_, which
precedes participles, should disappear in time. In fact, “very pleased”
and “very delighted” are Americanisms which may be heard even in this
country. But if that change take place, it will not be by the will of any
individual, nor by the mutual agreement of any large number of men, but
rather in spite of the exertions of grammarians and academies. And here
you perceive the first difference between history and growth. An emperor
may change the laws of society, the forms of religion, the rules of art:
it is in the power of one generation, or even of one individual, to raise
an art to the highest pitch of perfection, while the next may allow it to
lapse, till a new genius takes it up again with renewed ardor. In all this
we have to deal with the conscious acts of individuals, and we therefore
move on historical ground. If we compare the creations of Michael Angelo
or Raphael with the statues and frescoes of ancient Rome, we can speak of
a history of art. We can connect two periods separated by thousands of
years through the works of those who handed on the traditions of art from
century to century; but we shall never meet with that continuous and
unconscious growth which connects the language of Plautus with that of
Dante. The process through which language is settled and unsettled
combines in one the two opposite elements of necessity and free will.
Though the individual seems to be the prime agent in producing new words
and new grammatical forms, he is so only after his individuality has been
merged in the common action of the family, tribe, or nation to which he
belongs. He can do nothing by himself, and the first impulse to a new
formation in language, though given by an individual, is mostly, if not
always, given without premeditation, nay, unconsciously. The individual,
as such, is powerless, and the results apparently produced by him depend
on laws beyond his control, and on the co-operation of all those who form
together with him one class, one body, or one organic whole.
But, though it is easy to show, as we have just done, that language cannot
be changed or moulded by the taste, the fancy, or genius of man, it is
very difficult to explain what causes the growth of language. Ever since
Horace it has been usual to compare the growth of languages with the
growth of trees. But comparisons are treacherous things. What do we know
of the real causes of the growth of a tree, and what can we gain by
comparing things which we do not quite understand with things which we
understand even less? Many people speak, for instance, of the terminations
of the verb, as if they sprouted out from the root as from their parent
stock.(25) But what ideas can they connect with such expressions? If we
must compare language with a tree, there is one point which may be
illustrated by this comparison, and this is that neither language nor the
tree can exist or grow by itself. Without the soil, without air and light,
the tree could not live; it could not even be conceived to live. It is the
same with language. Language cannot exist by itself; it requires a soil on
which to grow, and that soil is the human soul. To speak of language as a
thing by itself, as living a life of its own, as growing to maturity,
producing offspring, and dying away, is sheer mythology; and though we
cannot help using metaphorical expressions, we should always be on our
guard, when engaged in inquiries like the present, against being carried
away by the very words which we are using.
Now, what we call the growth of language comprises two processes which
should be carefully distinguished, though they may be at work
simultaneously. These two processes I call,
1. _Dialectical Regeneration._
2. _Phonetic Decay._
I begin with the second, as the more obvious, though in reality its
operations are mostly subsequent to the operations of dialectical
regeneration. I must ask you at present to take it for granted that
everything in language had originally a meaning. As language can have no
other object but to express our meaning, it might seem to follow almost by
necessity that language should contain neither more nor less than what is
required for that purpose. It would also seem to follow that if language
contains no more than what is necessary for conveying a certain meaning,
it would be impossible to modify any part of it without defeating its very
purpose. This is really the case in some languages. In Chinese, for
instance, _ten_ is expressed by _shĭ_. It would be impossible to change
_shĭ_ in the slightest way without making it unfit to express _ten_. If
instead of _shĭ_ we pronounced _t’sĭ_, this would mean _seven_, but not
_ten_. But now, suppose we wished to express double the quantity of ten,
twice ten, or twenty. We should in Chinese take _eúl_, which is two, put
it before _shĭ_, and say _eúl-shĭ_, twenty. The same caution which applied
to _shĭ_, applies again to _eúl-shĭ_. As soon as you change it, by adding
or dropping a single letter, it is no longer twenty, but either something
else or nothing. We find exactly the same in other languages which, like
Chinese, are called monosyllabic. In Tibetan, _chu_ is ten, _nyi_ two;
_nyi-chu_, twenty. In Burmese _she_ is ten, _nhit_ two; _nhit-she_,
twenty.
But how is it in English, or in Gothic, or in Greek and Latin, or in
Sanskrit? We do not say _two-ten_ in English, nor _duo-decem_ in Latin,
nor _dvi-da’sa_ in Sanskrit.
We find(26) in Sanskrit _vin’sati_.
in Greek _eikati_.
in Latin _viginti_.
in English _twenty_.
Now here we see, first, that the Sanskrit, Greek, and Latin, are only
local modifications of one and the same original word; whereas the English
_twenty_ is a new compound, the Gothic _tvai tigjus_ (two decads), the
Anglo-Saxon _tuêntig_, framed from Teutonic materials; a product, as we
shall see, of Dialectical Regeneration.
We next observe that the first part of the Latin _viginti_ and of the
Sanskrit _vin’sati_ contains the same number, which from _dvi_ has been
reduced to _vi_. This is not very extraordinary; for the Latin _bis_,
twice, which you still hear at our concerts, likewise stands for an
original _dvis_, the English _twice_, the Greek _dis_. This _dis_ appears
again as a Latin preposition, meaning _a-two_; so that, for instance,
_discussion_ means, originally, striking a-two, different from
_percussion_, which means striking through and through. _Discussion_ is,
in fact, the cracking of a nut in order to get at its kernel. Well, the
same word, _dvi_ or _vi_, we have in the Latin word for twenty, which is
_vi-ginti_, the Sanskrit _vin-’sati_.
It can likewise be proved that the second part of _viginti_ is a
corruption of the old word for ten. Ten, in Sanskrit, is _da’san_; from it
is derived _da’sati_, a decad; and this _da’sati_ was again reduced to
_’sati_; thus giving us with _vi_ for _dvi_, two, the Sanskrit _vi’sati_
or _vin’sati_, twenty. The Latin _viginti_, the Greek _eikati_, owe their
origin to the same process.
Now consider the immense difference—I do not mean in sound, but in
character—between two such words as the Chinese _eúl-shĭ_, two-ten, or
twenty, and those mere cripples of words which we meet with in Sanskrit,
Greek, and Latin. In Chinese there is neither too much, nor too little.
The word speaks for itself, and requires no commentary. In Sanskrit, on
the contrary, the most essential parts of the two component elements are
gone, and what remains is a kind of metamorphic agglomerate which cannot
be understood without a most minute microscopic analysis. Here, then, you
have an instance of what is meant by _phonetic corruption_; and you will
perceive how, not only the form, but the whole nature of language is
destroyed by it. As soon as phonetic corruption shows itself in a
language, that language has lost what we considered to be the most
essential character of all human speech, namely, that every part of it
should have a meaning. The people who spoke Sanskrit were as little aware
that _vin’sati_ meant _twice ten_ as a Frenchman is that _vingt_ contains
the remains of _deux_ and _dix_. Language, therefore, has entered into a
new stage as soon as it submits to the attacks of phonetic change. The
life of language has become benumbed and extinct in those words or
portions of words which show the first traces of this phonetic mould.
Henceforth those words or portions of words can be kept up only
artificially or by tradition; and, what is important, a distinction is
henceforth established between what is substantial or radical, and what is
merely formal or grammatical in words.
For let us now take another instance, which will make it clearer, how
phonetic corruption leads to the first appearance of so-called grammatical
forms. We are not in the habit of looking on _twenty_ as the plural or
dual of _ten_. But how was a plural originally formed? In Chinese, which
from the first has guarded most carefully against the taint of phonetic
corruption, the plural is formed in the most sensible manner. Thus, man in
Chinese is _ģin_; _kiai_ means the whole or totality. This added to _ģin_
gives _ģin-kiai_, which is the plural of man. There are other words which
are used for the same purpose in Chinese; for instance, _péi_, which means
a class. Hence, _ĭ_, a stranger, followed by _péi_, class, gives _ĭ-péi_,
strangers. We have similar plurals in English, but we do not reckon them
as grammatical forms. Thus, _man-kind_ is formed exactly like _ĭ-péi_,
stranger-kind; _Christendom_ is the same as all Christians, and _clergy_
is synonymous with _clerici_. The same process is followed in other
cognate languages. In Tibetan the plural is formed by the addition of such
words as _kun_, all, and _t’sogs_, multitude.(27) Even the numerals,
_nine_ and _hundred_, are used for the same purpose. And here again, as
long as these words are fully understood and kept alive, they resist
phonetic corruption; but the moment they lose, so to say, their presence
of mind, phonetic corruption sets in, and as soon as phonetic corruption
has commenced its ravages, those portions of a word which it affects
retain a merely artificial or conventional existence, and dwindle down to
grammatical terminations.
I am afraid I should tax your patience too much were I to enter here on an
analysis of the grammatical terminations in Sanskrit, Greek, or Latin, in
order to show how these terminations arose out of independent words, which
were slowly reduced to mere dust by the constant wear and tear of speech.
But in order to explain how the principle of phonetic decay leads to the
formation of grammatical terminations, let us look to languages with which
we are more familiar. Let us take the French adverb. We are told by French
grammarians(28) that in order to form adverbs we have to add the
termination _ment_. Thus from _bon_, good, we form _bonnement_, from
_vrai_, true, _vraiment_. This termination does not exist in Latin. But we
meet in Latin(29) with expressions such as _bonâ mente_, in good faith. We
read in Ovid, “Insistam forti mente,” I shall insist with a strong mind or
will, I shall insist strongly; in French, “J’insisterai fortement.”
Therefore, what has happened in the growth of Latin, or in the change of
Latin into French, is simply this: in phrases such as _forti mente_, the
last word was no longer felt as a distinct word, and it lost at the same
time its distinct pronunciation. _Mente_, the ablative of _mens_, was
changed into _ment_, and was preserved as a merely formal element, as the
termination of adverbs, even in cases where a recollection of the original
meaning of _mente_ (with a mind), would have rendered its employment
perfectly impossible. If we say in French that a hammer falls
_lourdement_, we little suspect that we ascribe to a piece of iron a heavy
mind. In Italian, though the adverbial termination _mente_ in _claramente_
is no longer felt as a distinct word, it has not as yet been affected by
phonetic corruption; and in Spanish it is sometimes used as a distinct
word, though even then it cannot be said to have retained its distinct
meaning. Thus, instead of saying, “claramente, concisamente y
elegantemente,” it is more elegant to say in Spanish, “clara, concisa y
elegante mente.”
It is difficult to form any conception of the extent to which the whole
surface of a language may be altered by what we have just described as
phonetic change. Think that in the French _vingt_ you have the
|
with their
voices and fingers the flattering plaudit. One voice alone was mute; for
Adonijah, a captive Hebrew, was new to slavery and despised the
effeminate tyrant whom the chances of war had made the arbiter of his
destiny. The ears of Nero, ringing with the adulatory huzza, perceived
not the omission, but his quick restless eye caught for an instant among
the crowd of workmen the scornful smile that curled the proud lip of the
Jew; then lost his features in the dense mass of labourers surrounding
him, whose hands were intended to complete what his imperial ones had
begun. Yet, though swallowed up in those living waves, the form, the
noble outline, of Adonijah dwelt in the memory of Nero; for never had he
beheld hatred, scorn, and despair united with such manly and heroic
beauty.
Who was this unknown slave who disdained the Emperor of Rome? Nero
frowned as he internally asked the question; the self-abhorrent feeling
that often made him a burden to himself was stealing over him, even in
the face of this triumphant day, when the well-timed flattery of Julius
Claudius, a young patrician who stood high in his favour, dispelled the
gathering cloud on the imperial brow, and restored Nero to himself. The
example of Julius was followed by the court; and the sovereign,
forgetting the cause of his disquiet, left Adonijah to breathe a foreign
air and to mingle the bitter bread of captivity with weeping.
Jerusalem, that holy city, over whose coming miseries the Lord of life
had wept, was now “encompassed round with” the “armies” of the Gentile.
The time of her desolation was at hand, and “the cup of the Lord’s fury”
like a torrent was overflowing the land. The very heavens showed fearful
signs of her approaching doom, for nightly a blazing star, resembling a
sword, hung over the devoted city, while the cry of “Woe, woe to the
inhabitants of Jerusalem!” rang through every street. Yet her fanatic
tribes still confidently expected the coming of the Messiah, still
obstinately contested every foot of their beloved land.
Never had Rome, since she first flew her conquering eagles, encountered
a foe so fiercely determined to be free. Bent upon exterminating the
Roman name, the Jew, whenever he gained a transitory advantage, left no
foe to breathe. From the hour in which he conquered Cestius Gallus and
his legions he never sheathed the sword, but obstinately maintained the
contest till the prophecies were fulfilled, and “Zion became a heap of
desolation.”
The time of the dispersion of the tribes of Israel was then about to be
accomplished; and the recent victories of Vespasian had given the first
fruits of the glory and beauty of the Holy Land into the enemy’s hand.
Among these Adonijah was numbered, for he had been taken in arms at
Jotapata;[4] but, unlike its obsequious governor Josephus, disdained to
receive favour or pay servile homage to the conquering Roman general.
He had, during the siege, more than once scornfully rejected the
overtures of Vespasian, who vainly tried to seduce him from his duty.
Nay, more, when an apostate Jew without the walls, once numbered among
his chosen friends, dared, at the bidding of the victor, to tamper with
his honour, a javelin, flung with so true an aim that it reached the
traitor’s heart and pinned him to the ground, was the only answer the
bold young leader deigned to give to the infamous suggestion.
Something like enthusiasm warmed the cold bosom of Vespasian when
informed of the tragical fate of his messenger, and a desire to converse
with the heroic stripling whose fidelity was so incorruptible made him
command his soldiers, when about to storm the city, to take him alive—a
solitary exception of mercy to the general order of the day.
Adonijah, throughout the carnage of that dreadful assault, vainly sought
the sole reward that Jewish valour might then claim—a warrior’s grave.
His parents, his kindred, his faithful friends, all perished with
Jotapata, while he was delivered alive and unwounded into Vespasian’s
hands. Bold, haughty, zealous of the law—a Pharisee in sect, and
despising all other nations—to be taken captive by the Gentile
conqueror was bitterer than death to Adonijah, who, like Job, “cursed
his day” and fiercely resented his preservation.
Vespasian, who hoped to make his captive a means to gain over his
countrymen, commanded Josephus, the late governor of the conquered city,
to visit and induce him by his eloquence and learning to favour his
views.
Adonijah received his old commander with lively affection and devoted
respect. All that man could do had been done by Josephus, and his young
partisan shed tears while he pressed him to his bosom; but when his
revered chief spake of submission to the Roman yoke, and hinted things
still less consistent with the duty of a patriot, he turned away with
indignation, sorrow, and contempt, nor would he again listen to the man
who had ceased to love his country.
Then Vespasian himself, accompanied by his son Titus, condescended to
visit his captive, but he too found him alike insensible to threats or
promises. He charged his prisoner with ingratitude.
“Ingratitude!” scornfully reiterated the Hebrew. “You have left nothing
breathing to claim near kindred with Adonijah. The last sound that smote
mine ear as your people were leading me away a fettered captive, was the
cry of my virgin sister. A Roman ruffian’s hand was twisted in her
consecrated locks, his sword was glittering over her devoted head; I
heard her cry, but could not save her from his fury. O Tamar! O my
sister! Would to God I had died for thee, my sister! Such are the deeds,
vindictive Roman, for which thou claimest my gratitude: but know, I hate
existence, and loathe thee for prolonging mine.”
Incensed by the boldness of this language, Vespasian included his
intractable prisoner in the number of those captives[5] required by Nero
to carry into effect his projected scheme of cutting through the Isthmus
of Corinth.
Bitterer than death, bitterer even than slavery, were the feelings that
wrung the bosom of the exile as he turned a last look upon the land of
his nativity. All he loved had perished there by the sword, yet he did
not, he could not regret them, while he felt the chains of the Gentile
around his impatient limbs. They were free—they would rise again and
inherit the paradise of the faithful—while he must wither in slavery.
No soft emotion for any fair virgin of his people shared the indignant
feelings of his heart at this moment, though patriotism claimed not all
his burning regret; for ungratified revenge, that ought at least to have
had a Roman for its object, occasioned a part of his present grief.
Born of the house and lineage of David, Adonijah gloried in his proud
descent, “though the sceptre had departed from Judah,” and the base
Idumean line reigned on the throne of her ancient kings. Ithamar, a
young leader in the Jewish war, boasting the same advantages, rivalled
him in arms, and from a rival became his enemy. Both were obstinately
bent on delivering their country from a foreign yoke, and for that end
would have shed their blood drop by drop—would have done anything but
give up their animosity.
It is difficult to define from what cause this unnatural hatred and
rivalry sprang up. Perhaps it derived its source from religious
differences, Adonijah being a strict Pharisee, Ithamar a Sadducee, and
both were bigoted to the peculiar doctrines of their several sects.
Their individual hatred, however, bore a more decided character than
that they cherished against Rome. Those who are acquainted with the
dreadful records of the last days of Jerusalem will not be surprised at
the ill-feeling here described as existing between Adonijah and Ithamar.
The moral justice of the Pharisee of that day was comprised in the
well-known maxim, “Thou shalt love thy friend, and hate thine enemy;” an
axiom adopted by the rival Sadducee in the same spirit, and acted upon
with equal fidelity. A perfect unanimity in this one respect existing
between the disciples of these differing sects.
The idea that Ithamar would rejoice in his degradation was like fire to
the proud heart of Adonijah, who shook his chained hands in impotent
despair as the mortifying thought intruded upon him. Must he then die
unrevenged, and be led into captivity, while Ithamar enjoyed freedom? He
wrapped his face in his mantle, and sank into a state of sullen gloom,
whose darkness no beam of hope could penetrate. Yet, in the true spirit
of the Pharisee, even while longing to gratify revenge—the worst
passion that can defile the human heart—he considered himself a perfect
follower of the holy law of God.
-----
[1] Hegesippus, the earliest ecclesiastical historian,—quoted by
Eusebius,—establishes the fact that an interval of years elapsed
between the first and second appearance of St. Paul before the imperial
tribunal.
[2] The reader will find this curious fact in the works of Clemens
Alexandrinus and Chrysostom. It is quoted also by Doddridge.
[3] See Appendix, Note I.
[4] See Appendix, Note II.
[5] See Appendix, Note III.
CHAPTER II.
“Night is the time for care;
Brooding on hours misspent,
To see the spectre of despair
Come to our lonely tent,
Like Brutus, midst his slumbering host,
Startled by Cæsar’s stalwart ghost.”
J. MONTGOMERY.
The Emperor of Rome was intensely jealous of the fame of the great Roman
to whom he had given an immense share of power, little indeed inferior
to that formerly granted by the senate to Pompey the Great. He did not
distrust the commander of whose probity he had received so many proofs;
but the splendid career of Domitius Corbulo excited odious comparisons
between the sovereign and his lieutenant. His dislike was well known to
his confidants, and by them was communicated to Arrius Varus, a brave
but unprincipled young man, who, thinking it afforded him an opportunity
of pushing his own fortunes at Corbulo’s expense, secretly accused his
commander of treason, in a letter addressed to the emperor himself.
Nero did not believe the accusation, and he was undecided respecting the
use to which he should put it; for he required the services of his
lieutenant in the East, and had not quite made up his mind to kill the
man whom Tiridates had styled “a most valuable slave.” He resolved to be
guided by circumstances, and contented himself with writing to Domitius
Corbulo a pressing invitation to visit his court at Corinth.[6] With the
profound dissimulation in which Nero was an adept, he informed him of
the accusation made by Varus, assuring him at the same time that he did
not believe in its truth. The apparent frankness and generosity of his
sovereign made the impression he had intended on the honourable mind of
his general, who came to Corinth without the slightest suspicion of any
sinister design entertained by Nero. He was accompanied by a few friends
alone, and without a guard. Among those individuals who were honoured by
his confidence was a military tribune or colonel, named Lucius Claudius,
whose distant relationship to the emperor gave him some importance in
the eyes of the Roman people; a cadet of a house associated by its
greatness or guilt with every page of the republican and imperial
history,—which had given to Rome more consuls, dictators, and censors
than any other line,—which boasted Appius Cæcus, and Nero, the
conqueror of Asdrubal,—and of which also had sprung Appius Claudius the
decemvir, Clodius the demagogue, Tiberius the emperor, Drusus and
Germanicus, Caligula, Claudius, and Nero. Lucius Claudius had apparently
entered life under peculiarly fortunate circumstances; though the
military tribune did not resemble in character his ambitious ancestral
race. The men we have just cited of the proud Claudian line were before
their times, while he was behind those in which he lived. His noble
temper, frank, generous, fearless, and true, had been formed by his
revered commander, by whom Lucius had been trained to arms; his life had
been passed in the camp, far from the corruption of Nero’s court and
capital. His father was no more, his brother Julius, one of Nero’s
dissipated companions, was with the emperor at Corinth, and his sister
Lucia Claudia was the youngest of the vestal priestesses, but he had not
seen her since the hour in which she was dedicated to Vesta.
Lucius came to Corinth, like his commander, without distrust or
apprehension, for Nero was beloved in the provinces; his guilt, his
licentiousness, were little known on the distant Roman frontier; and
when Corbulo requested an audience of his sovereign, he had employed the
interval in seeking for his brother. Upon learning that Julius Claudius
was in the theatre, witnessing the imperial performance, he had retired
to take the repose his weary frame required.
Nero, when he received intelligence of his lieutenant’s arrival, was
dressed for the stage, in the habit proper to the comic part he was
about to perform. The unsuitableness of his garb to that of a Roman
emperor, about to give audience to the greatest commander of the time,
and the impossibility of denying himself to a man like Domitius Corbulo,
decided the fate of his general. Nero took the easiest way of settling a
difficult point of etiquette, by sending a centurion with the imperial
mandate, commanding his officer to end his days.
Corbulo without a guard or means of defence, received the ungrateful
message with the stoical fortitude of an ancient Roman. “I have deserved
this,” was his brief remark to his friends as he fell upon his sword.
Nero went on the stage to play his part out, and in its comic excitement
forgot the tragedy of which he had made his brave lieutenant the hero.
The plaudits of his audience were at length over, and Nero, withdrawing
to his dormitory, gave the watchword, and received the report from the
centurion on duty of Corbulo’s death. The last speech of his lieutenant
awakened a throng of conflicting passions in his bosom; he called for
wine and drank deeply to drown remorse, but instead of the oblivion he
sought, he became franticly delirious and rushed forth into the midnight
air, none of his attendants daring to detain or follow their miserable
prince, who, passing through the streets with mad precipitation, never
halted till he found himself near the scene of his labours, the Isthmian
trench. The beauty of the moonlight, the deep stillness of the night,
undisturbed even by a wandering breeze, allayed the fever in the
emperor’s throbbing veins. Thousands were sleeping around him, sleeping
in their chains. He contemplated the toil-worn wretches with feelings of
envy. He gazed intently upon them as they lay fettered in pairs upon the
earth, and as his mind became more calm he examined their features with
curiosity and interest. In sleep the mask, habitual cunning or reserve
wears by day, is thrown off, and the true character may be distinctly
traced. On the brows of the Roman criminals their crimes were legibly
written. Pride, sensuality, rapacity, cunning, and cruelty, marked them
as the outcasts of the corrupt and wicked city, the spiritual Babylon.
The Jewish captives, who were all young and chosen men, bore the
expression of sullen gloom, unsatisfied revenge, defiance, indignation,
and despair; and even in slumber murmured, complained, or acted again
the strife they had maintained so vainly against the Roman arms. One
alone of all these thousands smiled, and he was the noblest and fairest
of them all. From his parted lips a holy strain of melody broke forth,
then died away in imperfect murmurs; but the listening tyrant recognised
in the sleeper the slave whose scornful look had awakened his angry
passions on the day when he opened the trench. Adonijah’s dreams are of
his own land. He is going up to Jerusalem, to keep the feast of the
Passover. His slaughtered brethren are with him, and Tamar, that fair
and virgin sister, that Nazarite dedicated from childhood to the Lord,
is dancing before them with the timbrel in her hand, singing, “I was
glad when they said unto me, Let us go into the house of the Lord.”
Suddenly, with the capriciousness of fancy, the scene changes. Again he
hears the war-cry of his own people, again hangs upon the flying legions
of Cestius Gailus, captures the idol standard, and calls upon the name
of the Messiah, the promised deliverer of Israel. He comes, the mighty,
the long-expected. The Romans are driven forth from the sacred soil, the
valley of Hamoth Gog is full of slaughter, and Adonijah hails the king
of Judah, the anointed one of the Lord, with holy joy. But swifter than
lightning vanishes the glorious vision from his sight, he awakes, and
finds himself a slave in a foreign land.
He looked around him doubtfully. The land before him is like the garden
of Eden, and the breezes that fan his glowing cheek are fresh and balmy
as those that wander over his beloved Judea. The mountains, whose
summits are gilded in the radiant moonlight, remind him of those that
encompass the holy city. His perception is still visionary and
indistinct, the blue waves on either side the Isthmus, the scene of his
labours, his raven locks wet with the dews of night, appeal to his
scattered senses. The chains upon his free-born limbs sullenly clank as
he rises from the earth, memory resumes her powers, he remembers that he
is a slave.
Despair seizes upon his heart, his thoughts revert to his beloved
sister. He no longer sees her bounding along the rocky heights in all
the beauty of holiness and youthful enthusiasm, her form graceful as the
palm-tree, from which she derives her name, but mentally views her
sinking beneath the cruel sword of the Gentile. Her cry is in his ears,
and again he utters the bitter cry, “O Tamar! O my sister! would to God
that I had died with thee, my sister! Why was I not buried beneath the
ruins of Jotapata? Why am I cast forth like an abominable branch to
wither in this strange land?”
The wretched Hebrew sank upon the ground, wrapped his face in his
garment, and sobbed aloud in the bitterness of his heart.
Though the emperor was ignorant of the language in which these words
were spoken, he knew they were the accents of despair. A few minutes
since he believed himself to be the most wretched man in his wide
dominions, but this slave appeared as miserable, was he as guilty? as
himself; for Nero, burdened with his crimes, felt that utter misery can
only dwell with sin.
He addressed the slave in the Greek language, and bade him declare the
cause of his passionate complaints.
Surprised, and not immediately recognising the emperor, who was still
attired as a comedian, Adonijah unveiled his convulsed features and
replied in the same tongue, one which was familiar to him.
“Why troublest thou me with questions? I was free—I am a slave. I had
kindred ties—I am alone among the thousands of Israel. I had a God, and
he has forsaken me. Whose sorrow can be compared to my sorrow? who among
the children of men can be compared in misery to me?”
A wild scornful laugh broke upon the ear of Adonijah, who started upon
his feet and gazed upon the figure, doubtful whether the being before
him was of earthly mould or one of those evil spirits who were believed
to haunt unfrequented places. In breaking the ground groans were said to
have been heard, and blood had been seen to issue as from fresh wounds,
and apparitions had warned the workmen to forbear. Superstitious
feelings crept over the bold spirit of Adonijah; he pronounced the name
of God and looked once more upon the countenance of the emperor. The
wild expression of derision was gone, despair alone pervaded it. The
features, the brow, were beautiful, but it was beauty stained with sin;
the lineaments were youthful, though marked with an age of crime; the
sneer on the lip bespoke scorn of himself and all mankind, but the eye
was cruel, and expressed lawless power rather than princely majesty;
although, degraded as he was, there was still an air that showed he had
been accustomed to command. In this second glance Adonijah recognised
the master of the Roman world.
“Is this all thy sum of care, and darest thou claim from Nero the
supremacy of sorrow?” continued the prince. “Slave, thou art happier in
thy chains than Cæsar on his throne! Dost thou see the dagger of the
assassin lurking under the garments of every person who approaches thee?
Art thou loathed by those who flatter thee, and secretly cursed by those
who bend the knee before thee? Hast thou plunged in all riot, known all
vice, revelled in all luxury, and only found satiety and loathing? Hast
thou found pleasure weariness, happiness a chimera, and virtue an empty
name? Speak, audacious slave.”
“Not so, Cæsar, for all the commandments of my God I have kept unbroken
from my youth,” returned the self-righteous Hebrew. “Happiness dwells
not with excess, for as Solomon saith, ‘Better is the wise poor man than
the son of a king that doeth evil.’ Thou art wretched because thou art
guilty.”
“Once, once I was innocent,” groaned the emperor; “years of sin have not
effaced the recollection of that blessed time. No indignant phantom then
banished slumber from my pillow, for I was guiltless in those happy
hours. Then came ambition, and I grasped the imperial sceptre, and
stained my hands with blood, innocent blood. My mother, my wife, my
kindred, all perished. Rome was laid in ashes, but not by me; but the
Christians died to remove from me the imputation of that crime. Hark!
hear you not those cries? See you not a ghostly train approaching?” The
eyes of the horror-stricken emperor fearfully expanded, he grasped the
arm of the slave, muttering, “’Tis Agrippina, ’tis my mother; the
scorpion-whip is in her hand, she comes, she comes to torture me.
Octavia, gentle Octavia, stay her relentless hand. Mother, spare your
wretched son. I did not bid them slay thee; it was the men you gave me
for my guides that urged me to that crime.” Cold drops stood on the brow
of the emperor, the muscles of his throat worked frightfully, and while
he leaned against the person of Adonijah for support, the Hebrew felt
the agonized and audible pulsation of his heart thrill through his own
nerves. From this momentary trance of horror the terrors of conscience
again awakened Nero. “Thou, too,” shrieked he—“thou, too, Corbulo—dost
thou pursue me?” Then, with a cry of horror that dispelled slumber from
every weary eye, he fled in frantic haste from the new phantom his
delirious horror had created.
“This is the hand of God,” said Adonijah, turning his eyes on the
awakened thousands, amongst whom he might have vainly sought for guilt
or woe like Nero’s. Even his own misery was nothing in comparison to the
terrors that haunted the bosom of the master of the world.
The murmured inquiry that passed along that chained host was like the
sound of many waters, but died away instantly into such stillness that
the murmur of the waves might be distinctly heard on either shore. The
strangely mingled multitude, composed of every creed and nation, looked
anxiously around, then pointing to the earth, from whose inmost cavities
they superstitiously imagined these shrieks had issued, sank down upon
her bosom to sleep and dream of home. Adonijah alone knew the cries came
from the tortured spirit of the mighty potentate who ruled the kingdoms
of the world, and he remained awake. He had lost his partner in
misfortune by death, and no unhappy countryman shared his chain—a
circumstance that left him more liberty than those whose deep slumbers
he vainly envied.
-----
[6] See Appendix, Note IV.
CHAPTER III.
“The Jews, like their bigoted sires of yore,
By gazing on the clouds, their God adore:
Our Roman customs they contemn and jeer,
But learn and keep their country rites with fear.
That worship only they in reverence have,
Which in dark volumes their great Moses gave.
So they are taught, and do it to obey
Their fathers, who observe the Sabbath-day.”
JUVENAL.
The morrow was the Sabbath of the Lord. Unused to labour, the toil-worn
Hebrew slaves hailed its approach with joy. Even a Roman enemy had
respected the sacred day of rest, but the bosom of Nero was a stranger
to the generous feelings of Titus. The boon the prisoners confidently
expected he would concede to them was peremptorily refused, and the work
was commanded to be carried on as on other days. The Hebrews looked upon
each other in silence, and with dejected countenances took up their
tools, groaning within themselves, yet preparing to obey the mandate of
the emperor. Adonijah contemplated these preparations with a glance, in
which pity, indignation, surprise, and contempt were strangely blended.
The burning blush of shame overspread his fine countenance as he cried,
“Will ye indeed sin against the Lord, my brethren, and disobey his
commandment at the bidding of a heathen master?”
Some of the captives sighed and pointed to their chains; others boldly
averred “that it was useless to serve a God who had utterly forsaken
them;” the timid reminded Adonijah that resistance would be vain, that
they must obey Cæsar or perish miserably.
“Better is it for ye to die, O house of Israel, than to suffer such
bitter bondage. Death is to be chosen rather than sacrilege. The Lord of
Hosts perchance hath only hidden his face from us for a little while,
and may yet turn our captivity as the rivers in the south. We are too
many to be given up to the sword; the tyrant cannot spare our labours
from his vain attempt.” The ardent youth paused and looked around him
upon his countrymen, hoping to excite a kindred feeling among the
children of his people.
Sighs and groans alone met his ear, like the last wail of crushed and
broken hearts—hearts that felt their degradation, but that could not
yet resolve to die.
“Hearken to me, my countrymen,” continued the speaker; “this Nero, whom
ye fear more than Jehovah, hath nearly filled up the measure of his
crimes. I saw him last night, when the terror of the Lord was upon him,
driven forth to wander like the impious king of Babylon in madness and
misery, and will ye obey such a one rather than God?”
The sullen Jews gave him no reply, but silently resumed their detested
tasks.
Burning tears of indignation filled the eyes of the devoted and
enthusiastic Adonijah. He threw himself upon the earth, exclaiming as he
did so, “Here will I hallow the Sabbath of the Lord, even in the midst
of this idolatrous land will I glorify His name.”
“What are you about to do, rash man?” said a military tribune,
approaching Adonijah, and accosting him through the medium of the Greek
tongue.
“To die,” replied the Hebrew, undauntedly regarding the interrogator.
“For what?” remarked Lucius Claudius sarcastically, “for a mere
superstitious observance that doubtless took its rise from an indolent
love of ease.”
“No, Roman, no,” returned the captive, “our Sabbath was hallowed and
ordained by God Himself when He rested from all His works upon the
seventh day, and pronounced them good. The first Sabbath was celebrated
by the holy angels, for it is written, ‘The morning stars sang together,
and all the sons of God shouted for joy.’”
Lucius Claudius put back with his hand the lictors who approached to
seize Adonijah, and then drawing nearer to the Hebrew, said in a low
voice, “I have heard strange things respecting the worship ye pay some
unknown god in the temple at Jerusalem. ’Tis said that Antiochus
Epiphanes found there the image of a vile animal in the secret place ye
call the Holy of Holies.”
“Roman, ’tis false,” replied the slave. “We worship the great First
Cause, the Source of light and life—the creative and preserving Power
who formed the universe and all that is therein, and continually
sustaineth by His good providence the things that He hath made, and we
worship Him under no similitude, for nothing is worthy in heaven above,
nor earth beneath, to typify His glorious majesty.”
The tribune listened to this description of the only true God with the
ear of a man who hears surprising truths for the first time in his life,
which he neither rejects altogether, nor receives. Like Felix, he
contented himself with saying, “I will hear thee again on this matter;”
adding, “Take the counsel of a Roman who wishes you well, resume your
labours, which it shall be the care of Lucius Claudius to lighten, and
look for better times.” Thus saying, he placed the tools that lay near
Adonijah in that daring Hebrew’s hand, with the air of a man more
accustomed to command than persuade.
Adonijah put them back with a gesture indicative of horror. “No,
generous Roman, I cannot break a Commandment which has been hallowed by
me from my youth; I have fought for my faith and my country, I will die
as I have lived, true to the God of my forefathers.”
“You have been a warrior, and death appears less dreadful to a soul like
yours than slavery; but look around you, Hebrew, for it is no soldier’s
death that is preparing for you; to a lofty mind the shame of the
scourge and the cross is bitterer even than the torturing pangs they
inflict.”
The lofty glow of enthusiasm faded from the flushed cheek of Adonijah,
and the spirit that could have endured the sharpest pangs unmoved,
shrank in horror from the idea of disgrace; but this weakness was
momentary, the next instant he raised his majestic head and said, “Be it
so, be mine that doom of shame, for even that will I endure for the
honour of my God.”
A tear glistened in the manly eye of Lucius Claudius, but he was
evidently ashamed of the unwonted guest, for he hastily dashed away the
intruding witness of his sympathy. “Why were you not a Roman, noble
youth?” cried he; then after a pause, he added, “If I can procure your
freedom, will you cease to be an enemy to Rome.”
“Not while your idol ensigns pollute the hills of Judea can I cease to
be a foe to Rome. Released from slavery, I should again wage war with
your people, and fight or die in defence of the land that gave me
birth.”
“Then you would disdain to serve me, though the bonds of friendship
should soften those of slavery. Tell me why a haughty warrior could
submit to chains at all? I had thrown myself upon my sword; but perhaps
life then had charms.”
“Suicide is held in abomination by us Jews,” replied Adonijah, “for we
know the spirit shall survive the grave; to be united again to the body
at the resurrection, when every man shall be judged according to his
works. The Gentiles, plunged in dark idolatry, are ignorant of this
great truth, and therefore, shrinking from the trials of adversity, to
avoid the lesser evil rush upon the greater. Life for me has no charms,
though I endure its burden. Seest thou yonder tree, over which the storm
hath lately passed? In its days of strength and beauty it was a fitting
emblem of Adonijah, so now in its ruin you may behold a lively image of
his desolation. Like him it still exists, though like him it will never
renew its branches, or fulfil the glorious promise of its youth. Yet,
generous Roman, I should not refuse to serve him who would save me from
a shameful and accursed death.”
The reverence and self-devotion of Adonijah for the Supreme Being was
perfectly unintelligible to the tribune, whose mind, although it had
shaken off the superstitious idolatry of his ancestors, was deeply
infected with the atheistical philosophy of the times. Matter was the
only divinity the young soldier acknowledged; for Lucius Claudius
believed either “that there were no gods, or gods that cared not for
mankind.” The existence of the soul after death, and a future state of
reward and punishment, had never been entertained by him for a moment.
The heathen mythology indeed darkly inculcated these two great points of
faith, but Lucius Claudius derided the heathen deities whose attributes
rather gave him the idea of bad men exercising ill-gotten power than
those which his reason ascribed to divinity. Murder, rapine, lust, and
cruelty, that in life deserved, in his opinion, the scourge and cross,
had been deified by flattering men after death. Yet, though refusing to
pay any worship to the host of idols Rome with blind stupidity had
gathered from all the countries she had conquered, Lucius Claudius had
dedicated his fair young sister to the service of Vesta before his
departure for the Parthian war, either from the idea prevalent among
free-thinking men, even in our day, that women ought to be religious, or
that he thought to secure Lucia Claudia from those snares which a
corrupt city like Rome offered to her youth and beauty. Julius Claudius,
the younger brother of the tribune, was esteemed too careless and
dissolute a character to be intrusted with the guardianship of a lady of
whose family every daughter had been chaste.
Lucius bribed the lictors to delay the execution of the refractory slave
till he had spoken to the emperor, and departed to consult with his
brother respecting the means to be taken with Nero, to avert the doom of
a person whose constancy he deemed worthy even of the ancient Roman
name.
CHAPTER IV.
“But thou, with spirit frail and light,
Wilt shine awhile and pass away,
As glowworms sparkle through the night,
But dare not stand the test of day.”
BYRON.
The magnificent apartment into which the manly step of Lucius Claudius
intruded was darkened with painted blinds, and yet further veiled from
the beams of day by curtains of rose-coloured cloth. The furniture
glittered with gold and gems, and the delicious odours of the costly
bath preparing for the voluptuous Julius in the adjoining bathing-room
filled the gorgeous dormitory. The sleeper was lying on a couch under a
gilt canopy, wrapt in such deep repose that even the bold approach of
his brother did not disturb his rest. It might be that the foot of the
indignant Roman fell on a carpet of unrivalled brilliancy and softness,
or that the last
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have any difficulty in getting them.
A Boston firm puts up a preparation with aromatic naphthalens and
camphor, in packages which cost twenty-five cents, and is very good.
One package dissolved in two gallons of kerosene makes a good mixture
to spray house, nests and roosts. For the birds themselves, paint the
inside of a box with the liquid, and keep a bird in it for from fifteen
to twenty minutes. I had a box made with a compartment one foot square,
so that we could treat six birds at one time. Near the top of each
compartment there is a hole large enough for the bird to put his head
through, and outside we put a trough which is slightly raised from
the ground, so that the birds can just reach the contents. Fill it
with small grain, and they keep busy most of the time, which insures
their not being smothered, and their necks passing through the hole
prevents the fume of the wash escaping too rapidly. Of course, someone
must remain and watch the birds all the time; otherwise there is the
danger of the bird pulling its head in and being suffocated. To be sure
that the bird is perfectly clean, fumigation should be repeated three
times, with an interval of three days after each. If houses are kept
clean and all new birds are thoroughly fumigated before they are turned
into the flock, it will not be necessary to attack the whole flock more
than once or twice a year. Nests for setting hens are always swabbed
out with the mixture, and brood coops get a dose once a week. As soon
as any hen shows signs of getting broody, she is dredged with powder,
which is well rubbed down into the “fluff” of the feathers; then on the
tenth and nineteenth days she is again well powdered, and from the time
the chicks are a week old she receives a dose of powder once a week as
long as she broods them. The recipe for the insect powder is as follows:
To one peck of freshly slaked lime add half an ounce of carbolic
acid. Mix very thoroughly, and add same quantity, in bulk, of tobacco
dust. Another powder recommended by Dr. Woods in the same article,
and which I have used very frequently, is made by mixing equal parts
of finely-sifted coal ashes and tobacco dust, then moisten the whole
with the liquid louse exterminator. Allow it to dry and it is ready for
use. When purchasing carbolic acid, ask for ninety per cent. strength,
otherwise they are very likely to give you a much weaker preparation,
fit only for medical use.
THE SITTING HEN AND THE INCUBATOR
Looking back over the memories of my farm initiation, it seems as if I
had not fully realised the possibilities of my new undertaking until
the first incubator was inaugurated. As I have already told you, I
did all the first year’s hatch under hens, and still set every hen
that evinces any desire to assume the cares of motherhood, because it
seems Nature’s plan to keep the egg machine in good working order.
If a broody hen is not allowed to sit, it takes several days of
incarceration to break up her desire, then several days more after she
is freed before she commences to lay, and invariably the sitting fever
will attack her again within a few weeks. Now, incubation takes only
three weeks; brooding of chicks, another four or six weeks, and Mrs.
Biddy has had a complete rest, followed by vigorous exercise while
scratching for her babies. So when she is returned to the yard she is
in perfect condition to produce eggs. Let Biddy sit whenever she wants
to, but don’t wait her pleasure in the early spring, for you might have
no young chickens to sell when they bring good prices.
THE SELECTION OF THE INCUBATOR
There are a great many incubators on the market, some heated by hot
air, others by hot water. If you select any one of the standard makes
advertised you will get a good, practical hatcher. Printed instructions
for setting up and running are sent out with every machine, but they
don’t emphasise all the important points quite strongly enough for
amateurs. Lots of people can’t drive a screw home accurately, and fail
to realise that if the head is slightly to the right or left it throws
the fixture which is being attached to the machine out of plumb, and
a hair’s breadth makes a difference when such delicate appliances as
thermostatic rods (the power which controls the heat), are concerned.
A blunder supplies much knowledge. I should never have realised the
necessity for absolute exactness if one of the screws used in attaching
the lamp support to our second incubator had not gone slightly awry. It
caused the chimney almost to touch one side of the socket into which it
fits. That, in turn, drew the flame to one side, and caused it to smoke
at night when turned up for extra heat. It was a very little blunder,
apparently, but it almost spoiled the incubator, and quite spoiled the
hatch.
To be sure that the incubator fixtures are plumb, use a spirit level,
the only safe guide. After starting the machine, practise running it
for a few days before putting in the eggs. When the heat reaches one
hundred and two and one-half degrees, with the escape dial hanging the
width of a match from the opening, put in the trays, which, being cold,
will lower the heat, and should close the dial until the trays become
warm, and the thermometer in the machine again registers one hundred
and two and one-half, when the dial should once more be dangling the
match width above the opening. Should the closing and opening not take
place as the heat varies, the machine is not properly adjusted, and you
must practise until it will bear the test before putting in the eggs.
The thermometers are supposed to have been tested before they are
shipped, but it is well to buy an extra one and compare them; or get
your doctor, who is sure to have an accurate thermometer, to do it for
you. The egg tester comes with the incubator. It is a tin, funnel-like
chimney that fits over the lamp, and has a projecting opening, bordered
with black, before which to hold the eggs. The first test should be
made on the seventh day; the second on the fifteenth day. Hold the egg,
large end uppermost, in front of the opening. If it looks perfectly
clear it is infertile and can be used to feed young chicks. If it
shows a dark-red spot with spidery legs it is fertile, and must be
returned to the incubator. Dead germs are rarely discernible at the
first testing, except to the expert eye. By the fifteenth, the veriest
amateur will be able to detect them.
Successful incubation depends principally on being able to maintain
the amount of heat and moisture necessary at the different stages of
development. A thermometer is furnished with most incubators, but as
yet hygrometers are not, so it is advisable to buy one. For as they
only cost $1.50 each, it would be pennywise and pound-foolish to do
without one. Having these two little instruments to tell exactly the
amount of heat and moisture present in the machine, simplifies the
work wonderfully.
Personally, I like to have the thermometer register 102 degrees, and
the hygrometer 75, when I first put the eggs in the incubator. The
second week, the heat is increased to 102½, and the moisture lowered to
70 degrees. The third week, heat from 102½ to 103; moisture not over 45
until the nineteenth day, when the moisture is again increased to 55 or
60 degrees.
The reason for such fluctuation in the moisture may need some
explanation. During the first stages of incubation it is necessary to
prevent the escape of the water which is part of the egg, as it is
needed to keep the albumen in the right condition for the development
of the germ. After the tenth day, when the embryo is formed, the water
should be gradually allowed to evaporate, so that the amount of air
inside the shell increases, as it is needed to aid the circulation of
the blood and permit the growth of the chick. Increasing the moisture
again on the nineteenth day is simply done to soften the inside skin of
the egg and make it easy for the chick to break through.
When extra moisture is to be supplied, place a pan of wet sand or a
damp sponge in the bottom of the incubator. If the machine is standing
in a very damp cellar, the difficulty is often to keep down the
moisture rather than to increase it.
In this case, keep the trays out of the machine for a greater length
of time when you turn the eggs each day, and open the ventilators.
Probably the safest and simplest way to learn how to gauge this
important point of moisture, is to set a hen at the same time that you
start the incubator, and then compare the development of the air-cell
in the egg every few days. If the development is too slow, open the
ventilators at the side of the incubator wider, and air the eggs a
little longer each day when you have the trays out to turn the eggs.
Reverse affairs if the development is too quick. It is better to run
the machine a degree or two above the given temperature than below it,
especially during the last few days.
After the morning of the twentieth day don’t open the incubator until
the hatch is over, or until late on the twenty-second day, and don’t
get nervous if the temperature runs to one hundred and four or even to
one hundred and five; it is caused by the animal heat of the chicks,
and will do them no harm. Turning down the lamp slightly will of course
reduce the heat; but be very careful not to let it run below one
hundred and three during the last twenty-four hours. Low temperature
prolongs the hatch, weakens the chickens and makes them susceptible to
all sorts of ailments.
Individual outdoor brooders I think are the best, for in very cold
weather they can stand in a light outhouse. I used to monopolise the
summer kitchen from February to April, and then have them placed out
in the orchard. Placing an outdoor brooder under cover is really only
for the convenience of the attendant, for they are storm proof. If you
commence with an incubator that holds one hundred and twenty to one
hundred and sixty eggs you will require two brooders, and if in a
cold or Northern locality, some small house which can be warmed during
very cold weather, if you propose commencing to incubate in January.
A brooder supposed to hold one hundred chickens will accommodate that
number comfortably for about nine days, after which not more than
fifty should be kept in it. Hence the necessity for two brooders.
When the chicks are six weeks old in cold weather, and four weeks
old in moderate weather, they can be removed to the small house (the
temperature of which should be kept at sixty degrees during the night).
Remember, incubation takes only twenty-one days, so you must allow at
least three weeks to elapse before starting the incubator a second time.
Give the brooder a good coat of whitewash inside before using it. Cover
the drum which furnishes the heat under the hover with two or three
thicknesses of flannel, to make it soft for the little bodies to cuddle
up against. Cover the floor of the hover compartment with a piece of
old carpet or felt, and the outside compartment with sweepings from
the haymow. Have the heat running steadily at ninety-five degrees for
several hours before the chicks are to be put into it, and keep it at
that heat the first seven or eight days. Then gradually let it fall to
seventy-five degrees. Of course, I mean the heat under the hover. The
rest of the brooder will be--and should be--several degrees lower.
THE CARE OF THE CHICKS IN THE BROODER
Keep fresh water in vessels into which the chicks can get only their
bills in the outer compartment. Never neglect seeing that they are all
safely cuddled up to the heat at dusk.
During the bright, sunny hours in the middle of the day let the chicks
have plenty of fresh air in the playroom; at feeding time, when they
are all busy, give the hover compartment a thorough airing.
When Biddy is doing the brooding, remember she is pretty sure to need
dusting with some good insect powder. The nest box she sat in should
have been cleaned, and a handful of camphor balls scattered under the
hay of the nest. Moreover, each hen should be dusted before setting,
twice during the twenty-one days, three days after the hatch is out,
and each week so long as she broods the chicks.
Fresh air, warmth and good food prevent many troubles almost impossible
to cure if once contracted; so look to the little things.
Thirty hours must be allowed for the proper digestion and assimilation
of the yolk, which is absorbed into the abdomen immediately before the
chick breaks through the shell. When Biddy has done the hatching do not
move her to the brood coop for twenty-four hours, unless she is flighty
and keeps getting off the nest, in which case it is better to keep the
chicks in a covered box by the kitchen stove until some more motherly
hen can be persuaded to adopt them. Always try to set two or three
hens at the same time. Good hens that are well fed and have not been
bothered with vermin seldom give any trouble about the last twenty-four
hours.
HOW TO DIVERSIFY THE DAILY RATION
Now about the all-important question of feeding: For the first two or
three days get ten pounds of rape and millet seed, pin-head oatmeal and
cracked corn, charcoal, and fine, sharp grit. Mix all together. If you
cannot get pin-head oatmeal, buy hulled oats and break them up fine.
The grain must also be cracked quite fine; in fact, it is safer to put
the mixture through a sieve which will allow nothing larger than millet
to go through. Then there is no danger of chicks being choked. Feed the
mixture by scattering among the sweepings, to encourage the chicks to
scratch and take exercise.
Morning and evening make a mash by chopping a hard-boiled egg, shell
and all, green onion tops or sprouts. Mix with stale bread crumbs, and
feed on a flat pie plate or strip of wood. After the chicks are two
weeks old the oats and corn need not be quite so fine--more the size of
hemp seed, which can be added to the mixture; so can cracked wheat or
barley, and the mash can be made of ground corn and oats, with onions
and scalded liver, chopped, three times a week (about a small cupful to
a quart of mash).
What I mean by scalded liver is liver dropped into a kettle of boiling
water and let boil up once. Leave to cool in the water. Quite raw it
is too strong for little chicks. For a change I mix the grain with
scalding milk two or three times a week. Never make more at a time than
will be fed within the next few hours, as it sours.
Pot cheese is a favourite dish with all poultry, and very wholesome. If
there is any tendency to bowel trouble, give them rice water in place
of the drinking water.
Keep brooders and brood coops clean and dry. The grass around the coops
should be kept cut loose, so that the chicks can run about easily.
See that every coop is closed at night, and do not let the chicks out
while the grass is dewy. Don’t give the hens too many chicks to brood
in winter, for if she cannot keep them close to her they will die of
chill.
RAISING EARLY BROILERS
A distinct branch of the poultry business, and one that is extremely
profitable for those who can run it successfully, is raising young
chicks in the winter for early broilers. To commence on a large scale
requires as large capital, but there are hundreds of men and women who
have accommodations on their premises that would enable them to start
in a small way, and by investing the profits from the first year they
could obtain a really good equipment for the business.
Of course, the real starting-point should be a good flock of healthy
hens, all of one breed, preferably Wyandottes or Rocks, for really
the hen who lays the egg has as much to do with the success in
broiler-making as the care one may bestow on the business.
Next in importance is a well-constructed new incubator. Don’t be
tempted to buy a second-hand machine, which has usually been allowed to
stand in a damp cellar or in some outside shed while not in use, for
it will in all probability warp or go to pieces when put in commission
again.
Brooders come third on the list, but are quite as important as the
two foregoing, for there is no use hatching a chick unless it can be
reared, and the heat and ventilation of the artificial mother is more
than half the battle.
The up-to-date broiler plant consists of an incubator-cellar,
a nursery, or brooder-house, as it is usually called, and a
broiler-house. Both the latter are divided into small pens, about two
feet wide and five feet long. In the nursery-house, the top ends of the
pens are inclosed like boxes to the depth of about a foot and a half,
and have hot-water pipes running through them to furnish heat for the
chicks to brood under. A flannel curtain cut into strips falls from the
top of the inclosed part to divide it from the rest of the pen, which
runs down to the outer wall of the house, where a large window lets
in light and sun. The pens should have board floors slightly elevated
above the main floor, to avoid dampness, and the divisions are made
with a foot board about nine inches high, and one inch netting two feet
high above that. The brooder-house is divided in the same way, but the
hot-water pipes only run around the walls of the house, as the birds
don’t need the immediate heat to brood under, after they leave the
nursery, when they are five or six weeks old.
But, until you can afford the proper equipment, one or two incubators
can be run in the cellar of the house or an unused room where there is
no other heat. Individual brooders can be used in place of the nursery
and brooder-house, if you have any light outbuilding to stand them in.
In fact, I like the individual brooders better for the nursery period
than the pipe-house system, because it is only necessary to heat as
many as are needed, and with the pipe system the entire house has to be
heated, even if you are only going to use one section.
Most of the different makes of brooders on the market are made with
two compartments: A chamber with a round hover, which is heated with a
lamp, and an outer compartment for exercise and feeding. The average
price is nine dollars, and the machines are supposed to hold one
hundred chickens, but seventy-five are quite enough; and even that
number should be decreased to fifty the second week, and twenty-five
the fourth week--that is, if the chicks are to be confined entirely
to the brooder. But if it stands in a warm room, where a small outer
inclosure can be made on the floor of the house for a playroom, fifty
chicks can be carried through to the squab-broiler age in one brooder.
Chicks hatched specially for the broiler trade have to be steadily
pushed along; plump, juicy meat being the main object. The first
requisite is warmth. Have the compartment in which the hover is
situated heated up to ninety-eight degrees before the chicks are put in
and keep it so for the first three days and nights. Keep the door in
the outer compartment shut for the same length of time. On the fourth
day it can be opened and the chicks allowed to run into it, but the
room in which the brooder stands should be warm, and the little ones
should be watched toward bedtime, for they are apt to remain in the
outer compartment and become chilled.
Being chilled even for a short time is fatal to young chicks, for if it
does not kill outright, it causes bowel trouble and gives them a bad
setback which will surely delay the day of marketing, if nothing worse.
After they are three weeks old, the door in the outer compartment can
be opened, so that they can run out on to the floor of the room. Let
them have plenty of scratching material. If the weather is fine and
mild, it will do them good to let them have an outside run for an hour
or two in the middle of the day, but don’t be in a hurry to harden them
before they are five weeks old, for it is a risky experiment.
Wyandotte chickens when hatched will weigh two ounces. If all goes well
they should gain two ounces during the first ten days; four ounces for
the third week; another two ounces in the fourth week, and at the end
of the eighth week they should weigh two pounds.
The entire life of a chicken intended for a broiler is so artificial
that few if any of the rules for raising ordinary chicks can be applied
to them. The great aim is to develop them as quickly as possible, for,
to get the best price, a broiler must grow quickly and be plump.
Like all newly-hatched birds, they must have nothing to eat for the
first thirty-six hours. After that commercial chick-feed (which is a
mixture of all sorts of small seeds and cracked grains) should be
their sole diet for ten days.
When there are only small quantities of chicks to feed, and cash is
of more value than time, it will be cheaper to mix the feed at home.
Take one quart each of finely-cracked corn, bran and hulled oats; mix
with the same quantity of golden millet, rape, Kafir-corn and very
sharp, fine gravel, crushed charcoal and finely-chopped clover-hay.
Mix thoroughly, then pass through a fine sieve, to insure there being
no large pieces of the corn or oats for the babies to choke themselves
with. For the three days they are confined to the hover department,
put a small pan filled with the mixture in each corner and, instead of
water, fill a small drinking-fountain with milk which has been scalded
and allowed to cool. Leave it with them for ten or fifteen minutes, at
morning, noon and again at about 3:00 P. M. It must not be allowed to
remain all the time, because the heat from the hover will turn it sour.
After they are allowed access to the outer compartment, mixed grain
should be scattered on the cut hay (or whatever is used to cover the
floor) so that the chicks will have to scratch which compels them to
take enough exercise for healthy growth. The plan is to feed little and
often. The milk can be allowed to stand in the outer compartment, but
the fountain must be thoroughly cleansed and scalded every day.
After the tenth day, the door of the outer compartment can be opened
and the chicks given further liberty, if there is a stove in the
building to warm the atmosphere; but if there is not, don’t let them
out of the brooder until they are four weeks old. In either case
their diet must be slightly changed after the tenth day. Steam some
of the chopped clover-hay--about a quart--and add one pint of coarse
corn-meal, one pint of ground oats and half a small cupful of chopped
liver which has been boiled for five minutes (raw liver is too strong
for such young birds, but it should not be boiled more than the five
minutes). Feed once a day at noon. Put the mash into two or three
dishes, so they can all get a chance to eat at once. Remove any that
is left at the end of ten minutes. If it is not possible to get fresh
liver, use one teaspoonful of beef-meal or any of the commercial meat
preparations which are ground fine. Continue to scatter the dry grains
three times a day.
When they are four weeks old, give mash twice a day about 9:00 A. M.
and 2:00 P. M., increasing the allowance of meat slightly; and if you
have plenty of skim-milk, make cottage cheese and give it to them as an
extra once or twice a week. From the fourth week keep a pan containing
grit and charcoal always before them. After they are six weeks old
increase the quantity of corn-meal in the mash, and correspondingly
decrease the ground oats, until all corn-meal and no oats are being
used. Also, stop steaming the clover and mix it dry with the other
ingredients; then moisten the mash in scalded milk in which suet has
been boiled (one pound of chopped suet to four quarts of milk). Boil
for fifteen minutes. Feed it three times a day--9:00 A. M., 12:00 M.
and 3:00 P. M. The last two weeks before killing, omit all the dry
grain; feed nothing but mash, made as before, only as soft as possible
without being sloppy. Feed four times a day all they will eat in ten
minutes, but on no account leave food before them longer than that,
or they will become satiated. Birds pushed along should be in fine
condition for market when from ten to twelve weeks old.
Our broilers are never given water to drink, but always scalded milk.
Scalded milk invariably checks any tendency toward bowel trouble and is
also a strong factor in making the flesh tender and juicy.
THE POULTRY-YARD IN MID-SEASON
Baby chicks are so pretty, and appeal so strongly to the sentimental
feeling most people have for infant things, that they are invariably
well cared for until they are deposed by new arrivals, or reach the
half-fledged, long-legged period of gawky ugliness. Then they are
almost surely neglected, especially by the amateur, who does not
realise that the intermediate stages are of paramount importance. It is
a waste of time and money to hatch chicks and feed hens heavily in the
winter, if they are allowed to reach a standstill period during growth.
When chicks are eight weeks old, they should be separated from their
mothers, and the families divided; the young pullets being relegated
to colony coops, in an orchard or partly shaded meadow, where they
will have extensive free range; the cockerels being placed in the
semi-confinement of yards, as their ultimate fate is the frying-pan,
which necessitates plump bodies, while free range would only develop
frame and muscle.
Our colony houses are six feet long, three feet wide, thirty-six
inches high in front, and twenty-four inches at the back. They are
made of light scantling; the ends, back and roof being covered with
roofing-paper, and the front, to within eight inches of the ground,
with unbleached muslin, which insures perfect ventilation and prevents
rain beating in upon the birds when they are on the roosts, which are
fixed a foot from the bottom and nine inches from the back of the coop.
Two holes are made, nine inches apart, in the middle of each end of the
coop, and a heavy rope knotted through them, to form handles.
The coops having no flooring, and the whole construction being light,
they are easily moved to fresh ground each week, and so kept clean with
little trouble, an important item when there is a large quantity being
used. Having a large orchard, we placed the coops in rows thirty feet
apart, as two sides of the orchard adjoin woodland, through which a
never-failing spring-stream runs, so the birds have a splendid range.
Twenty birds are placed in each coop. The first week a portable
yard, five feet long, is placed in front of each coop so that the
young chicks cannot wander off and get lost, as they surely would
in strange quarters. During that time a self-feeding hopper and a
drinking-fountain are placed inside of the coop. When the yard is
removed, the individual vessels are dispensed with, large drinking-tubs
and feed-hoppers being stationed midway between every four coops, to
reduce time and labour in caring for the birds.
[Illustration: THE POULTRY YARD]
The large hoppers are nothing more than boxes, five feet long, two feet
wide and six inches deep, over which is placed an A-shaped cover, made
of slats, one inch apart, to prevent the birds getting into the box
and scratching the grain onto the ground, where it will be wasted. For
water, five-gallon kegs are used, with an automatic escape, which keeps
a small pan continually full. Both feed and water are placed under a
rough shelter, to protect them from sun and rain. Using such large
receptacles, it is only necessary to fill them every other day.
Feed consists of a dry mash, composed of ten pounds of wheat bran,
ten pounds of ground oats, one pound of white middlings, one pound of
old-process oil-meal and ten pounds of beef scraps, all well mixed. In
addition to that, they receive at night a feed of wheat and cracked
corn--two parts of the former to one of the latter. About half a pint
is scattered in front of each coop, at about four P. M.
Grit is supplied in large quantities. Being near a stone-crusher,
we buy the screenings by the cart-load and dump it in heaps on the
outskirts of the orchard, where it does not show, but is quite
accessible to the chicks.
On these rations, without any variation, the pullets are kept until
September, when they are transferred to their winter quarters--houses
twelve feet wide, ten feet high in front, sloping to eight feet at
the back. Each house is divided by wire netting into twelve-foot
compartments, in each of which forty birds are kept.
Winter feeding commences as soon as the birds are settled in their
houses, and consists of the same mash as when on range, except that
ten pounds of corn-meal is added, and, instead of the ten pounds of
commercial beef scraps, sixteen pounds of freshly cracked green bone is
used, and, in place of being before them all the time, it is fed once a
day, just what they will eat up clean in fifteen minutes.
Until three years ago, we used to moisten the mash and feed at eight
o’clock in the morning. Now we feed it dry, at 2 P. M.; at night,
wheat, cracked and whole corn, scattered over cut straw, which covers
the floor of the house. The proportions are three pounds of whole
corn, one pound of wheat and two pounds of cracked corn. The birds are
always eager for the whole corn, and, as they run about to pick it up,
the cracked corn and wheat get shaken down into the litter, so they
rarely get any but the whole corn at night, which fills up their crops
and keeps them warm until morning, when the fine grain induces them
to scratch--vigorous exercise, which sets their blood circulating and
keeps them busy until 8 A. M., when the drinking-fountains are filled
up with hot water.
For green food we use Swiss chard, cabbage and rape until frost
destroys the supply, after which we resort to clover hay, chopped
and steamed. It is fed at about 11 A. M., a large panful to each
compartment, and at the same time a pint of wheat and cracked oats is
scattered on the floor. Sharp grit and oyster-shells are always before
them, and in very cold weather the drinking-fountains are filled up
again with hot water at eleven and three o’clock.
If you have no orchard, or other partly shady place for coops, it
will be necessary to erect some sort of shelters for the birds to rest
under during the heat of the day. Any sort of material or shape will
do, so long as protection from the sun is afforded. If free range is
quite impossible (as it often is for suburban poultry-keepers), the
birds must be given as large yards as possible and supplied with lots
of scratching material, over which small grain must be scattered two
or three times a day. Fresh green bone will be better than the beef
scraps. Vegetable food is most imperative under such circumstances. Sow
a large patch of Swiss chard; it is a true cut-and-come-again crop.
Oats and rape are also useful crops for poultry-keepers who can give
their birds free range through the summer.
A word of warning: If you are reduced to cutting grass, or use
lawn-clippings, be careful to have them cut into short lengths of not
more than an inch, otherwise the birds may become crop-bound.
The cockerels which go into the market-pen are fattened and sold as
quickly as possible, except the few we keep for stock, and these are
given large yards and fed in the same manner as pullets on range.
For fattening birds, use ground corn and oats in equal parts, add half
a part of charcoal and moisten with skim-milk. Give plenty of green
food and sharp grit. Feed little and often. All expedition must be used
in the matter of marketing, for every day’s delay after they reach the
desired weight is a dead loss.
Constant culling and marketing is one of the great secrets of success.
Culling must be observed just as rigidly when selecting winter stock.
Discard any faulty birds. There are always some in every flock, even
if the parent birds have been blue-ribbon specimens: Crooked tails
or feet, ear-lobes which are red instead of white, or white instead
of red, according to the variety you may be keeping. Wyandottes,
Orpingtons, Plymouth Rocks, Brahmas or Cochins should all have
bright-red ear-lobes. Leghorns, Minorcas and Andalusians should be pure
white. It is a bright, energetic-looking pullet which makes the best
layer, and it is not profitable to keep any but the best layers, so put
them into small pens and fatten. The young roosters bring good prices
in the fall, and their absence from the farm reduces feed-bills and
prevents crowding in the house, which is always disastrous.
Do not delay, after September first, in getting the pullets into their
winter quarters, for it is most important that they become accustomed
to their new surroundings and reconciled to the change from free range
to semi-inactivity. It often takes five or six weeks for them to become
accustomed to the new conditions, and, unless they have time to adjust
themselves, they won’t start laying until cold weather sets in, which
means that the egg-crop is likely to be unprofitably delayed.
JULY IN THE POULTRY-YARD
It is strange that few people except the real poultry-farmers realise
that July is one of the most important months in the year. The desire
to have eggs in zero weather invariably compels good attention to the
hens during the winter. Baby chicks arouse interest in the spring, but
as the weather gets warmer, eggs are plentiful, and the pretty, fluffy
babies developed into long, lanky creatures, who seem nothing but a
nuisance specially ordained to destroy the garden, so the poor things
are shut up in small quarters and woefully neglected. During the fall
and winter I am repeatedly asked how to make pullets and hens lay, but
I can rarely suggest a remedy, because nine times out of ten it is the
result of blunders made during the preceding summer.
I don’t believe in sacrificing the garden to the chickens, but I do
think they should be properly controlled. A roll of two-inch-mesh
wire netting five feet high costs only about four dollars. At the
price of eggs nowadays a few dozen will pay for it. Posts can be cut
in the wood-lot on most farms, so a yard for a good-sized flock can
easily be made for less than five dollars. The best plan is to run a
division fence down the centre, so the birds can be confined in one
half alternately, for by such means a supply of green food can be kept
growing until frost. The ground should be ploughed, and seeded to rye
or oats, before the wire is put up. If poultry is to be profitable,
the old and young stock must be kept apart, because it is impossible
to feed correctly when they are all together. Young birds need plenty
of nutritious food to push them along quickly, and laying hens must
be put on special rations to bring about early molting, which is the
foundation of a good winter supply of eggs.
About July 5th commence to cut down the feed gradually, until at the
end of two weeks forty hens are having only a pint of oats and a pint
of wheat mixed, night and morning. Scatter it amongst cut straw or
some litter, so they will have to scratch for every grain. The first
of August commence to increase the
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the lost hero, they chose his son Alfonso their commander-in-chief.
After a struggle of two years, in which the youth bore himself bravely,
he made peace and left the country. Accompanied by many companions
in arms, he went to France, formed his followers into a Corsican
regiment, of which Charles the Ninth appointed him colonel. Other
Corsicans, taking refuge in Rome, formed themselves into the Pope’s
Corsican guard.
Thrown back into the power of Genoa, Corsica suffered all the ills of
the oppressed. Wasted by war, famine, plague, misgovernment, a more
wretched land was not to be found. Deprived of its privileges, drained
of its resources, ravaged by Turks and pillaged by Christians, it bled
also from family feuds. The courts being corrupt, the vendetta raged
with fury. In many parts of the country, agriculture and peaceful
pursuits were abandoned. And this frightful condition prevailed for
half a century.
The Genoese administration became ever more unbearable. A tax of twelve
dollars was laid on every hearth. The governors of the island were
invested with the power to condemn to death without legal forms or
proceedings.
One day, a poor old man of Bustancio went to the Genoese collector
to pay his tax. His money was a little short of the amount due--a
penny or so. The official refused to receive what was offered, and
threatened to punish the old man if he did not pay the full amount.
The ancient citizen went away grumbling. To his neighbors, as he met
them, he told his trouble. He complained and wept. They sympathized and
wept. Frenzied by his own wrongs, the old man began to denounce the
Genoese generally,--their tyranny, cruelty, insolence, and oppression.
Crowds gathered, the excitement grew, insurrectionary feelings spread
throughout the land. Soon the alarm bells were rung, and the war
trumpet sounded from mountain to mountain. This was in October, 1729.
A war of forty years ensued. Genoa hired a large body of Germans from
the Emperor, and eight thousand of these mercenaries landed in Corsica.
At first they beat the ill-armed islanders, who marched to battle bare
of feet and head. But in 1732 the Germans were almost destroyed in the
battle of Calenzala. Genoa called on the Emperor for more hirelings.
They were sent; but before any decisive action had taken place, there
arrived orders from the Emperor to make peace. Corsica had appealed
to him against Genoa, and he had decided that the Corsicans had been
wronged. Corsica submitted to Genoa, but her ancient privileges were
restored, taxes were remitted, and other reforms promised.
No sooner had the Germans left the island than Genoese and Corsicans
fell to fighting again. Under Hyacinth Paoli and Giafferi, the brave
islanders defeated the Genoese, at all points; and Corsica, for the
moment, stood redeemed.
In 1735 the people held a great meeting at Corte and proclaimed their
independence. A government was organized, and the people were declared
to be the only source of the laws.
Genoa exerted all her power to put down the revolt. The island was
blockaded, troops poured in, the best generals were sent. The situation
of the Corsicans was desperate. They stood in need of almost everything
requisite to their defence, except brave men. The blockade cut off any
hope of getting aid from abroad. English sympathizers sent two vessels
laden with supplies, and keen was the joy of the poor islanders. With
the munitions thus obtained they stormed and took Alesia.
But their distress was soon extreme again, and the struggle hopeless.
At this, the darkest hour, came a very curious episode. A German
adventurer, Theodore de Neuhoff, a baron of Westphalia, entering the
port with a single ship, under the British flag, offered himself to the
Corsicans as their king. Promises of the most exhilarating description
he made as to the men, money, munitions of war he could bring to
Corsican relief. Easily believing what was so much to their interest,
and perhaps attaching too much importance to the three English ships
which had recently brought them supplies, the Corsican chiefs actually
accepted Neuhoff for their king.
The compact between King Theodore and the Corsicans was gravely reduced
to writing, signed, sealed, sworn to, and delivered. Then they all
went into the church, held solemn religious services, and crowned
Theodore with a circlet of oak and laurel leaves. Theodore took himself
seriously, went to work with zeal, appointed high dignitaries of the
crown, organized a court, created an order of knighthood, and acted as
if he were a king indeed. He marched against the oppressors, fought
like a madman, gained some advantages, and began to make the situation
look gloomy to the Genoese.
Resorting to a detestable plan, they turned loose upon the island a
band of fifteen hundred bandits, galley-slaves, and outlaws. These
villains made havoc wherever they went. In the meantime, the Corsican
chiefs began to be impatient about the succors which Theodore had
promised. Evasions and fresh assurances answered for a while, but
finally matters reached a crisis. Theodore was told, with more or less
pointedness, that either the succors must come or that he must go. To
avoid a storm, he went, saying that he would soon return with the
promised relief. Paoli and the other Corsican chiefs realized that in
catching at the straw this adventurer had held out to them, they had
made themselves and Corsica ridiculous. They accordingly laid heavy
blame on Theodore.
Cardinal Fleury, a good old Christian man, who was at this time (1737)
minister of France, came forward with a proposition to interfere in
behalf of Genoa, and reduce the Corsicans to submission. Accordingly
French troops were landed (1738), and the islanders rose _en masse_ to
resist. Bonfires blazed, bells clanged, war trumpets brayed. The whole
population ran to arms. The French were in no haste to fight, and for
six months negotiations dragged along. Strange to say, the Corsicans,
in their misery, gave hostages to the French, and agreed to trust
their cause to the king of France. At this stage who should enter but
Theodore! The indefatigable man had ransacked Europe, hunting sympathy
for Corsica, and had found it where Americans found it in a similar
hour of need--in Holland. He had managed to bring with him several
vessels laden with cannon, small arms, powder, lead, lances, flints,
bombs, and grenades. The Corsican people received him with delight,
and carried him in triumph to Cervione, where he had been crowned; but
the chiefs bore him no good-will, and told him that circumstances had
changed. Terms must be made with France; Corsica could not at this time
accept him as king--oaths, religious services, and written contract to
the contrary notwithstanding. Theodore sadly sailed away.
The appeal to the French king resulted in the treaty of Versailles,
by whose terms some concessions were made to the Corsicans, who were
positively commanded to lay down their arms and submit to Genoa.
Corsica resisted, but was overcome by France. In 1741 the French
withdrew from the island, and almost immediately war again raged
between Corsican and Genoese.
In 1748 King Theodore reappeared, bringing munitions of war which
the island greatly needed. He seems to have succeeded in getting the
Corsicans to accept his supplies, but they showed no inclination to
accept himself. Once again he departed--to return no more. The gallant,
generous adventurer went to London, where his creditors threw him into
prison. The minister, Walpole, opened a subscription which secured his
release. He died in England, and was buried in St. Anne’s churchyard,
London, December, 1756.
Peace was concluded between Genoa and Corsica, whose privileges were
restored. For two years quiet reigned. Family feuds then broke out, and
the island was thrown into confusion. Following this came a general
rising against the Genoese, in which the English and Sardinians aided
the Corsicans. Genoa applied to France, which sent an army. Dismayed
by the appearance of the French, the island came to terms. Cursay, the
commander of the French, secured for the unfortunate people the most
favorable treaty they had ever obtained. Dissatisfied with Cursay, the
Genoese prevailed on France to recall him. Whereupon the Corsicans rose
in arms, Gaffori being their chief. He displayed the genius and the
courage of Sampiero, met with the success of the earlier hero, and like
him fell by treachery. Enticed into an ambuscade, Gaffori was slain
by Corsicans, his own brother being one of the assassins. The fall
of the leader did not dismay the people. They chose other leaders,
and continued the fight. Finally, in July, 1755, the celebrated
Paschal Paoli was chosen commander-in-chief. At this time he was but
twenty-four years old. Well educated, mild, firm, clear-headed, and
well balanced, he was very much more of a statesman than a warrior. His
first measure, full of wisdom, was the abolition of the vendetta.
Mainly by the help of his brother Clemens, Paoli crushed a rival
Corsican, Matra, and established himself firmly as ruler of the island.
Under his administration it flourished and attracted the admiring
attention of all European liberals. Genoa, quite exhausted, appealed
to France, but was given little help. As a last resort, treachery was
tried: Corsican was set against Corsican. The Matra family was resorted
to, and brothers of him who had led the first revolt against Paoli took
the field at the head of Genoese troops. They were defeated.
Genoa again turned to France, and on August 6, 1764, was signed an
agreement by which Corsica was ceded to France for four years. French
garrisons took possession of the few places which Genoa still held.
During the four years Choiseul, the French minister, prepared the way
for the annexation of Corsica to France. As ever before, there were
Corsicans who could be used against Corsica. Buttafuoco, a noble of
the island, professed himself a convert to the policy of annexation.
He became Choiseul’s apostle for the conversion of others. So adroitly
did he work with bribes and other inducements, that Corsica was soon
divided against herself. A large party declared in favor of the
incorporation of the island with France. In 1768 the Genoese realized
that their dominion was gone. A bargain was made between two corrupt
and despotic powers by which the one sold to the other an island it
did not own, a people it could not conquer,--an island and a people
whose government was at that moment a model of wisdom, justice, and
enlightened progress. Alone of all the people of Europe, Corsica
enjoyed self-government, political and civil freedom, righteous laws,
and honest administration. Commerce, agriculture, manufactures, had
sprung into new life under Paoli’s guidance, schools had been founded,
religious toleration decreed, liberty of speech and conscience
proclaimed. After ages of combat against awful odds, the heroic people
had won freedom, and, by the manner in which it was used, proved that
they had deserved to win it. Such were the people who were bargained
for and bought by Choiseul, the minister of France, at and for the sum
of $400,000. The Bourbons had lost to England an empire beyond seas--by
this act of perfidy and brutality they hoped to recover some of their
lost grandeur.
Terrible passions raged in Corsica when this infamous bargain became
known. The people flew to arms, and their wrongs sent a throb of
sympathy far into many lands. But France sent troops by the tens of
thousands; and while the Corsicans accomplished wonders, they could not
beat foes who outnumbered them so heavily. Paoli was a faithful chief,
vigilant and brave, but he was no Sampiero. His forces were crushed at
Ponte Nuovo on June 12, 1769, and Corsica laid down her arms. The long
chapter was ended, and one more wrong triumphant.
Chief among the painful features of the drama was that Buttafuoco and a
few other Corsicans took service with France, and made war upon their
own people.
Paoli with a band of devoted supporters left the island. From Leghorn,
through Germany and Holland, his journey was a triumphal progress.
Acclaimed by the liberals, honors were showered upon him by the towns
through which he passed; and in England, where he made his home, he was
welcomed by the people and pensioned by the government.
The French organized their administration without difficulty. The
Buttafuoco element basked in the warmth of success and patronage.
For a while all was serene. Later on the French grip tightened, the
Corsican time-honored privileges were set aside, the old democracy
was no longer the support of a government which relied more and more
on French soldiers. Power, taken from the village communities, was
placed entirely in the hands of a military governor and a council of
twelve nobles. Frenchmen filled all the important offices. The seat of
government was moved from Corte to Bastia and Ajaccio. The discontent
which these changes caused broke into open rebellion. The French
crushed it with savage cruelty. After that Corsica was a conquered
land, which offered no further resistance; but whose people, excepting
always those who had taken part with France, nursed intensely bitter
feelings against their conquerors.
Of this fiery, war-worn, deeply wronged people, Napoleon Bonaparte was
born; and it must be remembered that before his eyes opened to the
light his mother had thrilled with all the passions of her people, her
feet had followed the march, her ears had heard the roar of battle. As
Dumas finely says, “The new-born child breathed air that was hot with
civil hates, and the bell which sounded his baptism still quivered with
the tocsin.”
CHAPTER II
“From St. Charles Street you enter on a very small square. An elm tree
stands before a yellowish gray plastered house, with a flat roof and
a projecting balcony. It has six front windows in each of its three
stories, and the doors look old and time-worn. On the corner of this
house is an inscription, _Letitia Square_. The traveller knocks in vain
at the door. No voice answers.”
Such is the picture, drawn in 1852, of the Bonaparte mansion in
Ajaccio. Few tourists go to see it, for Corsica lies not in the direct
routes of the world’s trade or travel. Yet it is a house whose story
is more fascinating, more marvellous, than that of any building which
cumbers the earth this day.
We shut our eyes, and we see a picture which is richer than the richest
page torn from romance. We see a lean, sallow, awkward, stunted lad
step forth from the door of the old house and go forth into the world,
with no money in his pocket, and no powerful friends to lift him over
the rough places. He is only nine years old when he leaves home, and
we see him weep bitterly as he bids his mother good-by. We see him at
school in France, isolated, wretched, unable at first to speak the
language, fiercely resenting the slights put upon his poverty, his
ignorance, his family, his country--suffering, but never subdued. We
see him rise against troubles as the eagle breasts the storm. We see
him lay the better half of the civilized world at his feet. We see him
bring sisters and brothers from the island home, and put crowns on
their heads. We see him shower millions upon his mother; and we hear
him say to his brother on the day he dons the robes of empire, “Joseph,
suppose father were here--!”
As long as time shall last, the inspiration of the poor and the
ambitious will be the Ajaccio lawyer’s son: not Alexander, the born
king; not Cæsar, the patrician; but Napoleon, the moneyless lad from
despised Corsica, who stormed the high places of the world, and by his
own colossal strength of character, genius, and industry took them!
As long as time shall last his name will inspire not only the
individual, but the masses also. Wherever a people have heard enough,
read enough, thought enough to feel that absolutism in king or priest
is wrong; that special privilege in clan or clique is wrong; that
monopoly of power, patronage, wealth, or opportunity is wrong, there
the name of Napoleon will be spoken with reverence, despot though he
became, for in his innermost fibre he was a man of the people, crushing
to atoms feudalism, caste, divine right, and hereditary imposture.
* * * * *
As early as the year 947 there had been Bonapartes in Corsica, for
the name of one occurs as witness to a deed in that year. There were
also Bonapartes in Italy; and men of that name were classed with the
nobles of Bologna, Treviso, and Florence. It is said that during the
civil wars of Italy, members of the Bonaparte family took refuge in
Corsica, and that Napoleon’s origin can be traced to this source. It is
certain that the Bonapartes of Corsica continued to claim kindred with
the Italian family, and to class themselves as patricians of Italy;
and both these claims were recognized. In Corsica they ranked with the
nobility, a family of importance at Ajaccio.
At the time of the French invasion the representatives of the family
were Lucien, archdeacon of Ajaccio, and Charles Bonaparte, a young man
who had been left an orphan at the age of fourteen.
Born in 1746, Charles Bonaparte married, in 1764, Letitia Ramolino,
a Corsican girl of fifteen. She was of good family, and she brought
to her husband a dowry at least equal to his own estate. Beautiful,
high-spirited, and intelligent, Madame Letitia knew nothing of books,
knew little of the manners of polite society, and was more of the proud
peasant than of the grand lady. She did not know how to add up a column
of figures; but time was to prove that she possessed judgment, common
sense, inflexible courage, great loftiness and energy of character.
Misfortune did not break her spirit, and prosperity did not turn her
head. She was frugal, industrious, strong physically and mentally,
“with a man’s head on a woman’s shoulders,” as Napoleon said of her.
Charles Bonaparte was studying law in Italy when the war between France
and Corsica broke out. At the call of Paoli, the student dropped
his books and came home to join in the struggle. He was active and
efficient, one of Paoli’s trusted lieutenants. After the battle of
Ponte Nuovo, realizing that all was lost, he gave in his submission
(May 23, 1769) to the French, and returned to Ajaccio.
The policy of the French was to conciliate the leading Corsicans, and
special attention seems to have been given to Charles Bonaparte. His
mansion in Ajaccio, noted for its hospitality, became the favorite
resort of General Marbeuf, the bachelor French governor of the
island. With an ease which as some have thought indicated suppleness
or weakness of character, Bonaparte the patriot became Bonaparte the
courtier. He may have convinced himself that incorporation with France
was best for Corsica, and that his course in making the most out of the
new order of things was wisdom consistent with patriotism.
Resistance to France having been crushed, the policy of conciliation
inaugurated, and the Corsicans encouraged to take part in the
management of their own affairs, subject to France, one might hesitate
before condemning the course of Charles Bonaparte in Corsica, just as
we may hesitate between the policies of Kossuth and Déak in Hungary,
or of Kosciusko and Czartoryski in Poland. We may, and do, admire the
patriot who resists to the death; and, at the same time, respect the
citizen who fights till conquered, and then makes the best of a bad
situation.
In 1765 Madame Letitia Bonaparte gave birth to her first child; in
1767, to her second, both of whom died while infants. In 1768 was born
Joseph, and on August 15, 1769, Napoleon.[1]
[1] During the period of this pregnancy, Corsica was in
the storm of war; and Madame Bonaparte, following her
husband, was in the midst of the sufferings, terrors, and
brutalities which such a war creates. The air was still
electrical with the hot passions of deadly strife when the
young wife’s time came. On the 15th of August, 1769, Madame
Bonaparte, a devout Catholic, attended service at the
church; but feeling labor approaching, hastened home, and
was barely able to reach her room before she was delivered
of Napoleon on a rug upon the floor.
The authority for this statement is Madame Bonaparte herself,
who gave that account of the matter to the Permons in Paris,
on the 18th of Brumaire, the day on which the son thus born
was struggling for supreme power in France.
The story which represents the greatest of men and warriors
as having come into the world upon a piece of carpet,
or tapestry, upon which the heroes of the “Iliad” were
represented, is a fable, according to the express statement
made by Madame Bonaparte to the American General Lee, in
Rome, in 1830.
Other children came to the Bonapartes in the years following, the
survivors of these being: Elisa, Lucien, Louis, Pauline, Caroline, and
Jerome. To support this large family, and to live in the hospitable
fashion which custom required of a man of his rank, Charles Bonaparte
found a difficult matter, especially as he was a pleasure-loving,
extravagant man whose idea of work seemed to be that of a born
courtier. He returned to Italy after the peace; spent much of his
patrimony there; made the reputation of a sociable, intelligent,
easy-going gentleman; and took his degree of Doctor of Laws, at Pisa,
in November, 1769.
It was his misfortune to be cumbered with a mortgaged estate and a
hereditary lawsuit. Whatever surplus the mortgage failed to devour
was swallowed by the lawsuit. His father had expensively chased this
rainbow, pushed this hopeless attempt to get justice; and the steps of
the father were followed by the son. It was the old story of a sinner,
sick and therefore repentant; a priest holding the keys to heaven and
requiring payment in advance; a craven surrender of estate to purchase
the promise of salvation. Thus the Jesuits got Bonaparte houses and
lands, in violation of the terms of an ancestor’s will, the lawsuit
being the effort of the legal heirs to make good the testament of the
original owner.
In spite of all they could do, the Bonapartes were never able to
recover the property.
Charles Bonaparte, a man of handsome face and figure, seems to have
had a talent for making friends, for he was made assessor to the
highest court of Ajaccio, a member of the council of Corsican nobles,
and later, the representative of these nobles to France. With the
slender income from his wife’s estate and that from his own, aided by
his official earnings, he maintained his family fairly well; but his
pretensions and expenditures were so far beyond what he was really able
to afford that, financially, he was never at ease.
It was the familiar misery of the gentleman who strives to gratify a
rich man’s tastes with a poor man’s purse. There was his large stone
mansion, his landed estate, his aristocratic associates, his patent of
nobility signed by the Duke of Florence; and yet there was not enough
money in the house to school the children.
The widowed mother of Madame Letitia had married a second husband,
Fesch, a Swiss ex-captain of the Genoese service, and by this marriage
she had a son, Joseph Fesch, known to Napoleonic chronicles as “Uncle
Fesch.” This eleven-year-old uncle taught the young Napoleon the
alphabet.
In his sixth year Napoleon was sent to a dame’s school. For one of the
little girls at this school the lad showed such a fondness that he was
laughed at, and rhymed at, by the other boys.
_Napoleon di mezza calzetta
Fa l’armore a Giacominetta._[2]
[2]Napoleon with his stockings half off
Makes love to Giacominetta.
The jeers and the rhyme Napoleon answered with sticks and stones.
It is not very apparent that he learned anything here, for we are told
that it was the Abbé Recco who taught him to read; and it was this
Abbé whom Napoleon remembered in his will. As to little Giacominetta,
Napoleonic chronicles lose her completely, and she takes her place
among the “dream children” of very primitive poesy.
Just what sort of a boy Napoleon was at this early period, it is next
to impossible to say. Perhaps he did not differ greatly from other
boys of his own age. Probably he was more fractious, less inclined to
boyish sports, quicker to quarrel and fight. But had he never become
famous, his youthful symptoms would never have been thought to indicate
anything uncommon either for good or evil.
At St. Helena, the weary captive amused himself by picturing the young
Napoleon as the bad boy of the town. He quarrelled, he fought, he bit
and scratched, he terrorized his brothers and sisters, and so forth. It
may be true, it may not be; his mother is reported as saying that he
was a “perfect imp of a child,” but the authority is doubtful.
The Bonaparte family usually spent the summer at a small country-seat
called Milleli. Its grounds were beautiful, and there was a glorious
view of the sea. A large granite rock with a natural cavity, or grotto,
offered a cool, quiet retreat; and this is said to have been Napoleon’s
favorite resort. In after years he improved the spot, built a small
summer-house there, and used it for study and meditation.
It is natural to suppose that Napoleon as a child absorbed a good deal
of Corsican sentiment. His wet-nurse was a Corsican peasant, and from
her, his parents, his playmates, and his school companions he probably
heard the story of Corsica, her wrongs, her struggles, and her heroes.
Della Rocca, Sampiero, Gaffori, and Paoli were names familiar to his
ears. At a very early age he had all the passions of the Corsican
patriot. The French were masters, but they were hated. While the
Bonapartes had accepted the situation, they may not have loved it.
The very servants in the house vented their curses on “those dogs of
French.”
General Marbeuf, the warm friend of the family, encouraged Charles
Bonaparte to make the attempt to have the children educated at the
expense of France. In 1776 written application was made for the
admission of Joseph and Napoleon into the military school of Brienne.
At that time both the boys were on the safe side of the age-limit of
ten years. But the authorities demanded proofs of nobility,--four
generations thereof,--according to Bourbon law; and before these proofs
could be put into satisfactory shape, Joseph was too old for Brienne.
Chosen in 1777 by the nobles of Corsica as their deputy to France,
Charles Bonaparte set out for Versailles in 1778, taking with him his
sons Joseph and Napoleon. Joseph Fesch accompanied the party as far as
Aix, where he was to be given a free education for the priesthood by
the seminary at that place. Joseph and Napoleon both stated in after
years that their father visited Florence on the way to France, and was
given an honorable reception at the ducal court.
The Bishop of Autun, nephew of General Marbeuf, had been interested
in behalf of the Bonapartes; and it was at his school that Joseph was
to be educated for the Church. Napoleon was also placed there till he
could learn French enough for Brienne. On January 1, 1779, therefore,
he began his studies.
The Abbé Chardon, who was his teacher, says that he was a boy of
thoughtful and gloomy character. “He had no playmate and walked about
by himself.” Very naturally. He was a stranger to all the boys, he was
in a strange country, he could not at first speak the language, he
could not understand those who did speak it--how was the homesick lad
to be sociable and gay under such conditions? Besides, he was Corsican,
a despised representative of a conquered race. And the French boys
taunted him about it. One day, according to the teacher, the boys threw
at him the insult that “the Corsicans were a lot of cowards.” Napoleon
flashed out of his reserve and replied, “Had you been but four to one
you would never have conquered us, but you were ten to one.” To pacify
him the teacher remarked, “But you had a good general--Paoli.”--“Yes,”
answered the lad of ten, “and I would like to resemble him.”
According to the school register and to Napoleon’s own record, he
remained at Autun till the 12th of May, 1779. He had learned “enough
French to converse freely, and to make little themes and translations.”
In the meantime, Charles Bonaparte had been attending his king, the
young Louis XVI., at Versailles. Courtier in France as in Ajaccio, the
adroit lawyer had pleased. A bounty from the royal purse swelled the
pay of the Corsican delegates, a reward for “their excellent behavior”;
and for once Charles Bonaparte was moderately supplied with funds.
On May 19, 1779, Napoleon entered the college of Brienne. Its teachers
were incompetent monks. The pupils were mainly aristocratic French
scions of the privileged nobility, proud, idle, extravagant, vicious.
Most of these young men looked down upon Napoleon with scorn. In him
met almost every element necessary to stir their dislike, provoke
their ridicule, or excite their anger. In person he was pitifully thin
and short, with lank hair and awkward manners; his speech was broken
French, mispronounced and ungrammatical; it was obvious that he was
poor; he was a Corsican; and instead of being humble and submissive, he
was proud and defiant. During the five years Napoleon spent here he was
isolated, moody, tortured by his own discontent, and the cruelty of his
position. He studied diligently those branches he liked, the others he
neglected. In mathematics he stood first in the school, in history and
geography he did fairly well; Latin, German, and the ornamental studies
did not attract him at all. The German teacher considered him a dunce.
But he studied more in the library than in the schoolroom. While the
other boys were romping on the playground, Napoleon was buried in some
corner with a book.
On one occasion Napoleon, on entering a room and seeing a picture of
Choiseul which hung therein, burst into a torrent of invective against
the minister who had bought Corsica. The school authorities punished
the blasphemy.
At another time one of the young French nobles scornfully said to
Napoleon, “Your father is nothing but a wretched tipstaff.” Napoleon
challenged his insulter, and was imprisoned for his temerity.
Upon another occasion he was condemned by the quartermaster, for some
breach of the rules, to wear a penitential garb and to eat his dinner
on his knees at the door of the common dining-room. The humiliation was
real and severe; for doubtless the French lads who had been bullying
him were all witnesses to the disgrace, and were looking upon the
culprit with scornful eyes, while they jeered and laughed at him.
Napoleon became hysterical under the strain, and began to vomit. The
principal of the school happening to pass, was indignant that such a
degradation should be put upon so dutiful and diligent a scholar, and
relieved him from the torture.
“Ah, Bourrienne! I like you: you never make fun of me!” Is there
nothing pathetic in this cry of the heart-sick boy?
To his father, Napoleon wrote a passionate appeal to be taken from
the school where he was the butt of ridicule, or to be supplied
with sufficient funds to maintain himself more creditably. General
Marbeuf interfered in his behalf, and supplied him with a more liberal
allowance.
The students, in turn, were invited to the table of the head-master.
One day when this honor was accorded Napoleon, one of the
monk-professors sweetened the boy’s satisfaction by a contemptuous
reference to Corsica and to Paoli. It seems well-nigh incredible
that the clerical teachers should have imitated the brutality of
the supercilious young nobles, but Bourrienne is authority for the
incident. Napoleon broke out defiantly against the teacher, just as
he had done against his fellow-students: “Paoli was a great man; he
loved his country; and I will never forgive my father for his share in
uniting Corsica to France. He should have followed Paoli.” Mocked by
some of the teachers and tormented by the richer students, Napoleon
withdrew almost completely within himself. He made no complaints,
prayed for no relief, but fell back on his own resources. When the boys
mimicked his pronunciation, turned his name into an offensive nickname,
and flouted him with the subjection of his native land, he either
remained disdainfully silent, or threw himself single-handed against
his tormentors.
To each student was given a bit of ground that he might use it as he
saw fit. Napoleon annexed to his own plat two adjacent strips which
their temporary owners had abandoned; and by hedging and fencing made
for himself a privacy, a solitude, which he could not otherwise get.
Here he took his books, here he read and pondered, here he indulged his
tendency to day-dreaming, to building castles in the air.
His schoolmates did not leave him at peace even here. Occasionally they
would band together and attack his fortress. Then, says Burgoing, one
of his fellow-students, “it was a sight to see him burst forth in a
fury to drive off the intruders, without the slightest regard to their
numbers.”
Much as he disliked his comrades, there was no trace of meanness in
his resentments. He suffered punishment for things he had not done
rather than report on the real offenders. Unsocial and unpopular, he
nevertheless enjoyed a certain distinction among the students as well
as with the teachers. His pride, courage, maturity of thought, and
quick intelligence arrested attention and compelled respect.
When the students, during the severe winter of 1783–84, were kept
within doors, it was Napoleon who suggested mimic war as a recreation.
A snow fort was built, and the fun was to attack and defend it with
snowballs. Then Napoleon’s natural capacity for leadership was seen.
He at one time led the assailants, at another the defenders, as
desperately in earnest as when he afterward attacked or defended
kingdoms. One student refusing to obey an order, Napoleon knocked him
down with a chunk of ice. Many years after this unlucky person turned
up with a scar on his face, and reminded the Emperor Napoleon of the
incident; whereupon Napoleon fell into one of his best moods, and dealt
liberally with the petitioner.
During the whole time Napoleon was at Brienne he remained savagely
Corsican. He hated the French, and did not hesitate to say so. Of
course the French here meant were the
|
love of talking, and not for any deeds of glory, descanted before a
numerous company upon the well-known bravery of his ancestors and
relations. He then, to show that the race had not degenerated,
_modestly_ launched into a _faithful_ description of his own battles,
duels, and successes. He was once, he said, a passenger on board a
French frigate during the war, and, falling in with an English squadron
composed of three seventy-fours, fought with them for five hours, when
luckily, the ship taking fire, he was blown up, with ten of his
countrymen, and dropped into one of the seventy-fours, the crew of which
laid down their arms and surrendered; while the two remaining
men-of-war, struck with dismay at the sight of one of their ships in the
possession of the enemy, crowded sails and ran away!
Such were his _faithful_ accounts, with which he would still have
continued to annoy the company, had not one of his countrymen, more
enlightened, frankly acknowledged the natural propensity which leads the
inhabitants of Gascony to revel in imaginary scenes, resolved to awe him
into silence, and thus addressed him: "All your exploits are mere
commonplace, in comparison to those which I have achieved; and I will
relate a single one that surpasses all yours."
The babbler opened his ears, no doubt secretly intending to appropriate
this story to himself in future time, when none of the hearers should be
present, and modestly owned, that all those he had mentioned were mere
children's tricks, performed without any exertion, but that he had some
in store which might shine unobscured by the side of the most brilliant
deeds of ancient ages.
"One evening," said the other, "as I was returning to town from the
country, I had to pass through a narrow lane, well known for being
infested with highwaymen. My horse was in good order, my pistols loaded,
and my broadsword hung at my side; I entered the lane without any
apprehension. Scarcely had I reached the middle when a loud shout behind
me made me turn my head, and I saw a man with a short gun running fast
towards me. I was going to face him with my horse, when two men with
large cudgels in their hands, rushing from the hedge, seized the reins,
and threatened me with instant death. Undaunted, I took my two pistols;
but, before I had time to fire, one was knocked out of my hand, the
other went off, and one of the robbers fell. I then drew my sword, and,
though bruised by the blows I had received, struck with all my might,
and split the head of the other in two. Freed from my danger on their
side, I attempted a second time to turn my horse." Here he paused a
while; and our babbler, longing to know the end of this adventure,
exclaimed, "And the third!" "Oh, the third!" answered the other; "he
shot me dead."
ABSENT MAN
[Sidenote: _Percy Anecdotes_]
A celebrated living poet, occasionally a little absent in mind, was
invited by a friend, whom he met in the street, to dine with him the
next Sunday at a country lodging, which he had taken for the summer
months. The address was, "near the _Green Man_ at _Dulwich_"; which, not
to put his inviter to the trouble of pencilling down, the _absent_ man
promised faithfully to remember. But when Sunday came, he, fully late
enough, made his way to Greenwich, and began inquiring for the sign of
the _Dull Man_! No such sign was to be found; and, after losing an hour,
a person guessed that though there was no _Dull Man_ at Greenwich, there
was a _Green Man_ at Dulwich, which the _absent_ man might _possibly_
mean! This remark connected the broken chain, and the poet was under the
necessity of taking his chop by himself.
PRIDE
[Sidenote: _Percy Anecdotes_]
A Spaniard rising from a fall, whereby his nose had suffered
considerably, exclaimed, "Voto, a tal, esto es caminar por la turru!"
(This comes of walking upon earth!)
WITTY COWARD
[Sidenote: _Percy Anecdotes_]
A French marquis having received several blows with a stick, which he
never thought of resenting, a friend asked him, "How he could reconcile
it with his honour to suffer them to pass without notice?" "Poh!"
replied the marquis, "I never trouble my head with anything that passes
behind my back."
VALUING BEAUTY
[Sidenote: _Percy Anecdotes_]
The Persian Ambassador, Mirza Aboul Hassan, while he resided in Paris
was an object of so much curiosity that he could not go out without
being surrounded by a multitude of gazers, and the ladies even ventured
so far as to penetrate his hotel.
On returning one day from a ride, he found his apartments crowded with
ladies, all elegantly dressed, but not all equally beautiful. Astonished
at this unexpected assemblage, he inquired what these European
odalisques could possibly want with him. The interpreter replied that
they had come to look at his Excellency. The Ambassador was surprised to
find himself an object of curiosity among a people who boast of having
attained the acme of civilisation; and was not a little offended at
conduct which, in Asia, would have been considered an unwarrantable
breach of good-breeding; he accordingly revenged himself by the
following little scheme.
The illustrious foreigner affected to be charmed with the ladies; he
looked at them attentively alternately, pointing to them with his
finger, and speaking with great earnestness to his interpreter, who, he
was well aware, would be questioned by his fair visitants; and whom he
therefore instructed in the part he was to act. Accordingly, the eldest
of the ladies, who, in spite of her age, probably thought herself the
prettiest of the whole party, and whose curiosity was particularly
excited, after his Excellency had passed through the suite of rooms,
coolly inquired what had been the object of his examination? "Madam,"
replied the interpreter, "I dare not inform you." "But I wish
particularly to know, sir." "Indeed, madam, it is impossible!" "Nay,
sir, this reserve is vexatious; I desire to know." "Oh! since you
desire, madam, know then that his Excellency has been valuing you!"
"Valuing us! how, sir?" "Yes, ladies, his Excellency, after the custom
of his country, has been setting a price upon each of you!" "Well,
that's whimsical enough; and how much may that lady be worth, according
to his estimation?" "A thousand crowns." "And the other?" "Five hundred
crowns." "And that young lady with fair hair?" "The same price." "And
that lady who is painted?" "Fifty crowns." "And pray, sir, what may I be
worth in the tariff of his Excellency's good graces?" "Oh, madam, you
really must excuse me, I beg." "Come, come, no concealments." "The
Prince merely said as he passed you--" "Well, what did he say?" inquired
the lady with great eagerness. "He said, madam, that he did not know the
small coin of this country."
PRO ARIS ET FOCIS
[Sidenote: _Percy Anecdotes_]
At the establishment of volunteer corps, a certain corporation agreed to
form a body, on condition that they should _not be obliged to quit the
country_. The proposal was submitted to Mr. Pitt; who said he had no
objection to the terms, if they would permit him to add, "_except_, in
case of _invasion_."
THE GENTLE READER
[Sidenote: _Anon._]
No British Museum the fisherman needs:
He simply goes down to the river and reeds.
CLERGYMEN AND CHICKENS
[Sidenote: _Samuel Butler_]
Why, let me ask, should a hen lay an egg, which egg can become a chicken
in about three weeks and a full-grown hen in less than a twelvemonth,
while a clergyman and his wife lay no eggs, but give birth to a baby
which will take three-and-twenty years before it can become another
clergyman? Why should not chickens be born and clergymen be laid and
hatched? Or why, at any rate, should not the clergyman be born
full-grown and in Holy Orders, not to say already beneficed?
MELCHISEDEC
[Sidenote: _Samuel Butler_]
He was a really happy man. He was without father, without mother, and
without descent. He was an incarnate bachelor. He was a born orphan.
EATING AND PROSELYTISING
[Sidenote: _Samuel Butler_]
All eating is a kind of proselytising--a kind of dogmatising--a
maintaining that the eater's way of looking at things is better than the
eatee's. We convert the food, or try to do so, to our own way of
thinking, and, when it sticks to its own opinion and refuses to be
converted, we say it disagrees with us. An animal that refuses to let
another eat it has the courage of its convictions, and, if it gets
eaten, dies a martyr to them....
It is good for the man that he should not be thwarted--that he should
have his own way as far, and with as little difficulty, as possible.
Cooking is good because it makes matters easier by unsettling the meat's
mind and preparing it for new ideas. All food must first be prepared for
us by animals and plants, or we cannot assimilate it; and so thoughts
are more easily assimilated that have been already digested by other
minds. A man should avoid converse with things that have been stunted or
starved, and should not eat such meat as has been overdriven or underfed
or afflicted with disease, nor should he touch fruit or vegetables that
have not been well grown.
Sitting quiet after eating is akin to sitting still during divine
service so as not to disturb the congregation. We are catechising and
converting our proselytes, and there should be no row. As we get older
we must digest more quietly still; our appetite is less, our gastric
juices are no longer so eloquent, they have lost that cogent fluency
which carried away all that came in contact with it. They have become
sluggish and unconciliatory. This is what happens to any man when he
suffers from an attack of indigestion.
Or, indeed, any other sickness, is the inarticulate expression of the
pain we feel on seeing a proselyte escape us just as we were on the
point of converting it.
ASSIMILATION AND PERSECUTION
[Sidenote: _Samuel Butler_]
We cannot get rid of persecution; if we feel at all we must persecute
something; the mere acts of feeding and growing are acts of persecution.
Our aim should be to persecute nothing but such things as are absolutely
incapable of resisting us. Man is the only animal that can remain on
friendly terms with the victims he intends to eat until he eats them.
NIGHT-SHIRTS AND BABIES
[Sidenote: _Samuel Butler_]
On Hindhead, last Easter, we saw a family wash hung out to dry. There
were papa's two great night-shirts and mamma's two lesser night-gowns,
and then the children's smaller articles of clothing and mamma's drawers
and the girls' drawers, all full swollen with a strong north-east wind.
But mamma's night-gown was not so well pinned on, and, instead of being
full of steady wind like the others, kept blowing up and down as though
she were preaching wildly. We stood and laughed for ten minutes. The
housewife came to the window and wondered at us, but we could not
resist the pleasure of watching the absurdly life-like gestures which
the night-gowns made. I should like a _Santa Famiglia_ with clothes
drying in the background.
A love-story might be told in a series of sketches of the clothes of two
families hanging out to dry in adjacent gardens. Then a gentleman's
night-shirt from one garden and a lady's night-gown from the other
should be shown hanging in a third garden by themselves. By and by there
should be added a little night-shirt.
A philosopher might be tempted, on seeing the little night-shirt, to
suppose that the big night-shirts had made it. What we do is much the
same, for the body of a baby is not much more made by the two old
babies, after whose pattern it has cut itself out, than the little
night-shirt is made by the big ones. The thing that makes either the
little night-shirt or the little baby is something about which we know
nothing whatever at all.
DOES MAMMA KNOW?
[Sidenote: _Samuel Butler_]
A father was telling his eldest daughter, aged about six, that she had a
little sister, and was explaining to her how nice it all was. The child
said it was delightful, and added:
"Does mamma know? Let's go and tell her."
CROESUS AND HIS KITCHEN-MAID
[Sidenote: _Samuel Butler_]
I want people to see either their cells as less parts of themselves than
they do, or their servants as more.
Croesus's kitchen-maid is part of him, bone of his bone and flesh of his
flesh, for she eats what comes from his table, and, being fed of one
flesh, are they not brother and sister to one another in virtue of
community of nutriment, which is but a thinly veiled travesty of
descent? When she eats peas with her knife, he does so too; there is not
a bit of bread and butter she puts into her mouth, nor a lump of sugar
she drops into her tea, but he knoweth it altogether, though he knows
nothing whatever about it. She is en-Croesused and he en-scullery-maided
so long as she remains linked to him by the golden chain which passes
from his pocket to hers, and which is greatest of all unifiers.
True, neither party is aware of the connection at all as long as things
go smoothly. Croesus no more knows the name of, or feels the existence
of, his kitchen-maid than a peasant in health knows about his liver;
nevertheless, he is awakened to a dim sense of an undefined something
when he pays his grocer or his baker. She is more definitely aware of
him than he of her, but it is by way of an overshadowing presence rather
than a clear and intelligent comprehension. And though Croesus does not
eat his kitchen-maid's meals otherwise than vicariously, still to eat
vicariously is to eat: the meals so eaten by his kitchen-maid nourish
the better ordering of the dinner which nourishes and engenders the
better ordering of Croesus himself. He is fed, therefore, by the feeding
of his kitchen-maid.
And so with sleep. When she goes to bed he, in part, does so too. When
she gets up and lays the fire in the back kitchen he, in part, does so.
He lays it through her and in her, though knowing no more what he is
doing than we know when we digest, but still doing it as by what we call
a reflex action. _Qui facit per alium facit per se_, and when the
back-kitchen fire is lighted on Croesus's behalf it is Croesus who
lights it, though he is all the time fast asleep in bed.
Sometimes things do not go smoothly. Suppose the kitchen-maid to be
taken with fits just before dinner-time; there will be a reverberating
echo of disturbance throughout the whole organisation of the palace. But
the oftener she has fits, the more easily will the household know what
it is all about when she is taken with them. On the first occasion Lady
Croesus will send some one rushing down into the kitchen; there will, in
fact, be a general flow of blood (i.e. household) to the part affected
(that is to say, to the scullery-maid); the doctor will be sent for and
all the rest of it. On each repetition of the fits the neighbouring
organs, reverting to a more primary undifferentiated condition, will
discharge duties for which they were not engaged, in a manner for which
no one would have given them credit; and the disturbance will be less
and less each time, till by and by, at the sound of the crockery
smashing below, Lady Croesus will just look up to papa and say:
"My dear, I am afraid Sarah has got another fit."
And papa will say she will probably be better again soon, and will go on
reading his newspaper.
In course of time the whole thing will come to be managed automatically
downstairs without any references either to papa, the cerebrum, or to
mamma, the cerebellum, or even to the _medulla oblongata_, the
housekeeper. A precedent or routine will be established, after which
everything will work quite smoothly.
But though papa and mamma are unconscious of the reflex action which has
been going on within their organisation, the kitchen-maid and the cells
in her immediate vicinity (that is to say, her fellow-servants) will
know all about it. Perhaps the neighbours will think that nobody in the
house knows, and that, because the master and mistress show no sign of
disturbance, therefore there is no consciousness. They forget that the
scullery-maid becomes more and more conscious of the fits if they grow
upon her, as they probably will, and that Croesus and his lady do show
more signs of consciousness, if they are watched closely, than can be
detected on first inspection. There is not the same violent
perturbation that there was on the previous occasions, but the tone of
the palace is lowered. A dinner-party has to be put off; the cooking is
more homogeneous and uncertain, it is less highly differentiated than
when the scullery-maid was well; and there is a grumble when the doctor
has to be paid, and also when the smashed crockery has to be replaced.
If Croesus discharges his kitchen-maid and gets another, it is as though
he cut out a small piece of his finger and replaced it in due course by
growth. But even the slightest cut may lead to blood-poisoning, and so
even the dismissal of a kitchen-maid may be big with the fate of
empires. Thus the cook--a valued servant--may take the kitchen-maid's
part and go too. The next cook may spoil the dinner and upset Croesus's
temper, and from this all manner of consequences may be evolved, even to
the dethronement and death of the King himself. Nevertheless, as a
general rule, an injury to such a low part of a great monarch's organism
as a kitchen-maid has no important results. It is only when we are
attacked in such vital organs as the solicitor or the banker that we
need be uneasy. A wound in the solicitor is a very serious thing, and
many a man has died from failure of his bank's action.
It is certain, as we have seen, that when the kitchen-maid lights the
fire it is really Croesus who is lighting it, but it is less obvious
that when Croesus goes to a ball the scullery-maid goes also. Still,
this should be held in the same way as it should be also held that she
eats vicariously when Croesus dines. For he must return from the ball
and the dinner-parties, and this comes out in his requiring to keep a
large establishment whereby the scullery-maid retains her place as part
of his organism and is nourished and amused also.
On the other hand, when Croesus dies it does not follow that the
scullery-maid should die at the same time. She may grow a new Croesus,
as Croesus, if the maid dies, will probably grow a new kitchen-maid;
Croesus's son or successor may take over the kingdom and palace, and the
kitchen-maid, beyond having to wash up a few extra plates and dishes at
coronation time, will know little about the change. It is as though the
establishment had had its hair cut and its beard trimmed; it is
smartened up a little, but there is no other change. If, on the other
hand, he goes bankrupt, or his kingdom is taken from him and his whole
establishment is broken and dissipated at the auction-mart, then, even
though not one of its component cells actually dies, the organism as a
whole does so, and it is interesting to see that the lowest, least
specialised, and least highly differentiated parts of the organism, such
as the scullery-maid and the stable-boys, most readily find an entry
into the life of some new system, while the more specialised and highly
differentiated parts, such as the steward, the old housekeeper, and,
still more so, the librarian or the chaplain, may never be able to
attach themselves to any new combination, and may die in consequence. I
heard once of a large builder who retired unexpectedly from business and
broke up his establishment, to the actual death of several of his older
employés.
So a bit of flesh, or even a finger, may be taken from one body and
grafted on to another, but a leg cannot be grafted; if a leg is cut off
it must die. It may, however, be maintained that the owner dies, too,
even though he recovers, for a man who has lost a leg is not the man he
was.
ADAM AND EVE
[Sidenote: _Samuel Butler_]
A little boy and a little girl were looking at a picture of Adam and
Eve.
"Which is Adam and which is Eve?" said one.
"I do not know," said the other, "but I could tell if they had their
clothes on."
FIRE
[Sidenote: _Samuel Butler_]
I was at one the other night, and heard a man say: "That corner stack is
alight now quite nicely." People's sympathies seem generally to be with
the fire so long as no one is in danger of being burned.
THE ELECTRIC LIGHT IN ITS INFANCY
[Sidenote: _Samuel Butler_]
I heard a woman in a 'bus boring her lover about the electric light. She
wanted to know this and that, and the poor lover was helpless. Then she
said she wanted to know how it was regulated. At last she settled down
by saying that she knew it was in its infancy. The word "infancy" seemed
to have a soothing effect upon her, for she said no more, but, leaning
her head against her lover's shoulder, composed herself to slumber.
NEW-LAID EGGS
[Sidenote: _Samuel Butler_]
When I take my Sunday walks in the country, I try to buy a few really
new-laid eggs warm from the nest. At this time of the year (January)
they are very hard to come by, and I have long since invented a sick
wife who has implored me to get a few eggs laid not earlier than the
self-same morning. Of late, as I am getting older, it has become my
daughter, who has just had a little baby. This will generally draw a
new-laid egg, if there is one about the place at all.
At Harrow Weald it has always been my wife who for years has been a
great sufferer and finds a really new-laid egg the one thing she can
digest in the way of solid food. So I turned her on as movingly as I
could not long since, and was at last sold some eggs that were no
better than common shop-eggs, if so good. Next time I went I said my
poor wife had been made seriously ill by them; it was no good trying to
deceive her; she could tell a new-laid egg from a bad one as well as any
woman in London, and she had such a high temper that it was very
unpleasant for me when she found herself disappointed.
"Ah! sir," said the landlady, "but you would not like to lose her."
"Ma'am," I replied, "I must not allow my thoughts to wander in that
direction. But it's no use bringing her stale eggs, anyhow."
SNAPSHOTTING A BISHOP
[Sidenote: _Samuel Butler_]
I must some day write about how I hunted the late Bishop of Carlisle
with my camera, hoping to shoot him when he was sea-sick crossing from
Calais to Dover, and how St. Somebody protected him and said I might
shoot him when he was well, but not when he was sea-sick. I should like
to do it in the manner of the "Odyssey":
... And the steward went round and laid them all on the sofas and
benches, and he set a beautiful basin by each, variegated and adorned
with flowers; but it contained no water for washing the hands, and
Neptune sent great waves that washed over the eyelet-holes of the cabin.
But when it was now the middle of the passage and a great roaring arose
as of beasts in the Zoological Gardens, and they promised hecatombs to
Neptune if he would still the raging of the waves....
At any rate I shot him and have him in my snap-shot book; but he was not
sea-sick.
_From the Note-Books of Samuel Butler._
GOETHE'S MOTHER
[Sidenote: _G.H. Lewes_]
That he was the loveliest baby ever seen, exciting admiration wherever
nurse or mother carried him, and exhibiting, in swaddling clothes, the
most wonderful intelligence, we need no biographer to tell us. Is it not
said of every baby? But that he was in truth a wonderful child we have
undeniable evidence, and of a kind less questionable than the statement
of mothers and relatives. At three years old he could seldom be brought
to play with little children, and only on the condition of their being
pretty. One day, in a neighbour's house, he suddenly began to cry and
exclaim, "That black child must go away! I can't bear him!" And he
howled till he was carried home, where he was slowly pacified; the whole
cause of his grief being the ugliness of the child.
A quick, merry little girl grew up by the boy's side. Four other
children also came, but soon vanished. Cornelia was the only companion
who survived, and for her his affection dated from the cradle. He
brought his toys to her, wanted to feed her and attend on her, and was
very jealous of all who approached her. "When she was taken from the
cradle, over which he watched, his anger was scarcely to be quieted. He
was altogether much more easily moved to anger than to tears." To the
last his love for Cornelia was passionate.
In old German towns, Frankfurt among them, the ground-floor consists of
a great hall where the vehicles were housed. This floor opens in folding
trap-doors, for the passage of wine-casks into the cellars below. In one
corner of the hall there is a sort of lattice, opening by an iron or
wooden grating upon the street. This is called the Geräms. Here the
crockery in daily use was kept; here the servants peel their potatoes,
and cut their carrots and turnips, preparatory to cooking; here also the
housewife would sit with her sewing, or her knitting, giving an eye to
what passed in the street (when anything did pass there) and an ear to a
little neighbourly gossip. Such a place was, of course, a favourite with
the children.
One fine afternoon, when the house was quiet, Master Wolfgang, with his
cup in his hand, and nothing to do, finds himself in this Geräms,
looking out into the silent street, and telegraphing to the young
Ochsensteins who dwelt opposite. By way of doing something, he begins to
fling the crockery into the street, delighted at the smashing music
which it makes, and stimulated by the approbation of the brothers
Ochsenstein, who chuckle at him from over the way. The plates and dishes
are flying in this way, when his mother returns: she sees the mischief
with a housewifely horror, melting into girlish sympathy, as she hears
how heartily the little fellow laughs at his escapade, and how the
neighbours laugh at him.
This genial, indulgent mother employed her faculty for story-telling to
his and her own delight. "Air, fire, earth, and water I represented
under the forms of princesses; and to all natural phenomena I gave a
meaning, in which I almost believed more fervently than my little
hearers. As we thought of paths which led from star to star, and that we
should one day inhabit the stars, and thought of the great spirits we
should meet there, I was as eager for the hours of story-telling as the
children themselves; I was quite curious about the future course of my
own improvisation, and any invitation which interrupted these evenings
was disagreeable. There I sat, and there Wolfgang held me with his large
black eyes; and when the fate of one of his favourites was not according
to his fancy, I saw the angry veins swell on his temples, I saw him
repress his tears. He often burst in with 'But, mother, the princess
won't marry the nasty tailor, even if he does kill the giant.' And when
I made a pause for the night, promising to continue it on the morrow, I
was certain that he would in the meanwhile think it out for himself, and
so he often stimulated my imagination. When I turned the story according
to his plan, and told him that he had found out the _dénouement_, then
was he all fire and flame, and one could see his little heart beating
underneath his dress! His grandmother, who made a great pet of him, was
the confidante of all his ideas as to how the story would turn out, and
as she repeated these to me, and I turned the story according to these
hints, there was a little diplomatic secrecy between us, which we never
disclosed. I had the pleasure of continuing my story to the delight and
astonishment of my hearers, and Wolfgang saw, with glowing eyes, the
fulfilment of his own conceptions, and listened with enthusiastic
applause." What a charming glimpse of mother and son!
She is one of the pleasantest figures in German literature, and one
standing out with greater vividness than almost any other. Her simple,
hearty, joyous, and affectionate nature endeared her to all. She was the
delight of children, the favourite of poets and princes. To the last
retaining her enthusiasm and simplicity, mingled with great shrewdness
and knowledge of character, "Frau Aja," as they christened her, was at
once grave and hearty, dignified and simple. She had read most of the
best German and Italian authors, had picked up considerable desultory
information, and had that "mother wit" which so often in women and poets
seems to render culture superfluous, their rapid intuitions anticipating
the tardy conclusions of experience. Her letters are full of spirit: not
always strictly grammatical; not irreproachable in orthography; but
vigorous and vivacious. After a lengthened interview with her, an
enthusiast exclaimed, "Now do I understand how Goethe has become the
man he is!" Wieland, Merck, Bürger, Madame de Staël, Karl August, and
other great people sought her acquaintance. The Duchess Amalia
corresponded with her as with an intimate friend; and her letters were
welcomed eagerly at the Weimar Court. She was married at seventeen to a
man for whom she had no love, and was only eighteen when the poet was
born. This, instead of making her prematurely old, seems to have
perpetuated her girlhood. "I and my Wolfgang," she said, "have always
held fast to each other, because we were both young together." To him
she transmitted her love of story-telling, her animal spirits, her love
of everything which bore the stamp of distinctive individuality, and her
love of seeing happy faces around her. "Order and quiet," she says in
one of her charming letters to Freiherr von Stein, "are my principal
characteristics. Hence I despatch at once whatever I have to do, the
most disagreeable always first, and I gulp down the devil without
looking at him. When all has returned to its proper state, then I defy
any one to surpass me in good humour." Her heartiness and tolerance are
the causes, she thinks, why every one likes her. "I am fond of people,
and _that_ every one feels directly--young and old. I pass without
pretension through the world, and that gratifies men. I never
_bemoralise_ any one--_always seek out the good that is in them, and
leave what is bad to Him who made mankind, and knows how to round off
the angles_. In this way I make myself happy and comfortable." Who does
not recognise the son in those accents? The kindliest of men inherited
his loving, happy nature from the heartiest of women.
WHERE--AND OH! WHERE?
[Sidenote: _Henry S. Leigh_]
Where are the times when--miles away
From the din and the dust of cities--
Alexis left his lambs to play,
And wooed some shepherdess half the day
With pretty and plaintive ditties?
Where are the pastures daisy-strewn
And the flocks that lived in clover;
The Zephyrs that caught the pastoral tune
And carried away the notes as soon
As ever the notes were over?
Where are the echoes that bore the strains
Each to his nearest neighbour;
And all the valleys and all the plains
Where all the nymphs and their love-sick swains
Made merry to pipe and tabor?
Where are they gone? They are gone to sleep
Where Fancy alone can find them;
But Arcady's times are like the sheep
That quitted the care of Little Bo-peep,
For they've left their tales behind them!
THE SECRETS OF THE HEART
[Sidenote: _Austin Dobson_]
"Le coeur mène où il va"
_SCENE--A Chalet covered with honeysuckle_
NINETTE NINON
NINETTE
This way--
NINON
No, this way--
NINETTE
This way, then.
(_They enter the Chalet_)
You are as changing, child,--as men.
NINON
But are they? Is it true, I mean?
Who said it?
NINETTE
Sister Séraphine.
She was so pious and so good,
With such sad eyes beneath her hood,
And such poor little feet,--all bare!
Her name was Eugénie la Fère.
She used to tell us,--moonlight nights,--
When I was at the Carmelites.
NINON
Ah, then it must be right. And yet,
Suppose for once--suppose, Ninette--
NINETTE
But what?
NINON
Suppose it were not so?
Suppose there _were_ true men, you know!
NINETTE
And then?
NINON
Why, if that _could_ occur,
What kind of men should you prefer?
NINETTE
What looks, you mean?
NINON
Looks, voice and all.
NINETTE
Well, as to that, he must be tall,
Or say, not "tall"--of middle size;
And next, he must have laughing eyes;
And a hook-nose,--with, underneath,
Oh! what a row of sparkling teeth!
NINON (_touching her cheek suspiciously_)
Has he a scar on this side?
NINETTE
Hush!
Some one is coming. No; a thrush:
I see it swinging there.
NINON
Go on.
NINETTE
Then he must fence (ah, look, 'tis gone!)
And dance like Monseigneur, and sing
"Love was a Shepherd,"--everything
That men do. Tell me yours, Ninon.
NINON
Shall I
|
don't mind taking particular care of _you_ and your little sister
there, but I would prefer to leave Aunt Peggy, as you call her, and the
darkey to shift for themselves."
"Then I do not want you to do anything for Eva and me," said Maggie,
resolutely, feeling that she was throwing away invaluable time by
holding converse with this man; "God has been better to us than we
deserve, and we shall leave all with him."
She turned to move off, much to the relief of Aunt Peggy, who had hard
work to hide her impatience, when Golcher saw that he had gone too far.
Catching her arm, he said:
"Don't be so fast; where will you go, if you don't go with me?"
"Gravity is our guide."
"I haven't told you I wouldn't take care of you, have I?"
"But if you are unwilling to include _all_ of us, I do not want your
friendship."
"Then for the sake of _you_ I will save you _all_, though nobody beside
me would do so; but, Maggie, I'll expect a little better treatment from
you when I come to your house again."
At this point Golcher saw that the patience of the young lady was
exhausted. Her companions were ready to chide her for halting to speak
to him, though the words that passed took but a few minutes. He reached
out his hand to lay it on her arm, but she drew back.
"Maggie," said he, warningly; "when I came down the river bank, I left
six Seneca warriors among the trees back there; they are tired waiting
for me; their guns are loaded, and I have only to raise my hand over my
head to have 'em fire every one of 'em; if they do it, they will all be
_pointed this way_."
Maggie Brainerd was sure the Tory spoke the truth.
"You will not do that, Jake, I am sure."
"Not if you act right; follow me."
Maggie reached out her hand as an invitation for Eva to come to her;
but Aunt Peggy grasped one of the little palms in her own, for she had
overheard the invitation. When Maggie looked around, her aunt compressed
her thin lips and shook her head in a most decided fashion.
"_No, ma'am_; Eva stays here: if you want to go off with that scamp you
can do so, but the rest of us _don't_."
"But, aunt, what shall we do? There's no escape for us unless we put
ourselves in his care; Jake has promised to see that no harm befalls us
from the Indians."
"Ugh!" exclaimed the aunt, with a shudder of disgust: "I'd rather trust
myself with the worst Indians that are now in the valley than with
_him_."
"Them's my sentiments," broke in Gravity; "we don't want to fool away
any more time with _him_."
"Then you'll take the consequences," said the Tory, trembling with
anger. "I offered to protect you and you refused to have me; I'll still
take care of Maggie and Eva, but as for you others, you shall see--"
CHAPTER VI.
The last few sentences that passed between Maggie Brainerd and Golcher,
the Tory, were heard, not only by Aunt Maggie, but by the African
servant.
This was due to the fact that the renegade in his excitement forgot his
caution, besides which the servant took occasion to approach quite close
to the two.
A very brief space of time was occupied in the conversation, but brief
as it was, Gravity was resolved that it should end. He did not believe
the declaration of Golcher that he had a party of half-a-dozen Senecas
within call, though it was possible that he spoke the truth; but beyond
a doubt the savages were so numerous that a summons from the Tory would
bring a number to the spot.
When, therefore, Jake adjusted his lips for a signal, Gravity bounded
forward and caught him by the throat.
"Don't be in a hurry to let out a yawp; if dere's any hollerin' to be
done, I'll take charge of it."
Golcher was as helpless as a child in the vise-like grip of those iron
fingers. He not only was unable to speak, but he found it hard work to
breathe.
Dropping his gun, he threw up both hands in a frantic effort to loosen
the clutch of those fingers.
"Why, Gravity," said the horrified Maggie; "I'm afraid you will strangle
him."
"And I'm afraid I _won't_," replied the African, putting on a little
more pressure.
Gravity, however, had no intention of proceeding to extremities, though
he might have found justification in so doing. He regulated the pressure
of his powerful right hand so that his victim, by putting forth his best
efforts, was able to get enough breath to save himself.
"Young man," said Gravity, still holding him fast, "I don't think dis am
a healthy place for you; de best ting you can do am to leave a little
sooner dan possible."
"Let--me--let--me--go!" gurgled Golcher, still vainly trying to free
himself.
"I don't find dat I've got much use for you, so I'll let you off, but de
next time I lays hand onto you, you won't got off so easy, and bein' as
you am goin', I'll give you a boost."
To the delight of Aunt Peggy and the horror of Maggie Brainerd, Gravity
Gimp now wheeled the Tory around as though he were the smallest child,
and actually delivered a kick that lifted him clear of the ground.
Not only once, but a second and third time was the indignity repeated.
Then, with a fierce effort, Golcher wrenched himself free from the
terrible fingers on the back of his neck, and, plunging among the trees,
vanished.
"Dat ar might come handy," said Gravity, picking up the loaded musket
which the panic-stricken Tory had left behind him and handing it to Aunt
Peggy, who asked, with a shudder:
"Do you s'pose I would touch it?"
"Let me have it," said Maggie; "I consider it fortunate that we have
two guns with us."
It was a good thing, indeed, for Maggie Brainerd, like many of the brave
maidens of a hundred years ago, was an expert in handling the awkward
weapons of our Revolutionary sires. With this at her command, the
chances were she would be heard from before the rising of the morrow's
sun.
But, if Jake Golcher was a mild enemy before, it was certain he was now
an unrelenting one. He would neglect no effort to avenge himself upon
all for the indignity he had received.
The African understood this, and he lost no time in getting away from
the spot with the utmost speed.
It was now about five o'clock in the afternoon, but it was the eve of
the Fourth of July, and the days were among the longest in the year. It
would not be dark for three hours, and who could tell what might take
place in that brief period?
Extremely good fortune had attended our friends thus far, but it was not
reasonable to expect it to continue without break.
The Tory was scarcely out of sight when Gravity started on a trot down
the bank, with the others close behind him.
"Bus'ness hab got to be pushed on de jump," he said, by way of
explanation; "we ain't done wid dat chap yet."
It was scarcely a minute later when he uttered an exclamation of
thankfulness, and those directly behind saw him stoop down and, grasping
the prow of a small flat-boat or scow, draw it from beneath the
undergrowth and push it into the water.
Such craft are not managed by oars, and Gimp handed a long pole to
Maggie, saying:
"Use dat de best ye kin, and don't lose no time gittin' to de oder
shore."
"But what are _you_ going to do, Gravity?"
"I'se gwine wid you, but I'm afeard de boat won't hold us all, and I'll
hab to ride on de outside."
The Susquehanna is generally quite shallow along shore, and it was
necessary to push the scow several yards before the water was found deep
enough to float it with its load.
Gravity laid the two guns within the boat, and then, picking up the
_petite_ Maggie, hastily carried her the short distance and placed her
dry-shod within, where she immediately assumed control by means of the
pole, which was a dozen feet in length.
Aunt Peggy and Eva were deposited beside her, by which time the scow was
sunk within a few inches of the gunwales: had the African followed them,
it would have been swamped.
As it was, the faithful negro was assuming great risk, for, as have
stated, he could not swim a stroke; but the circumstances compelled such
a course, and he did not hesitate.
"You see, folks," said he, as he began shoving the craft out into the
river; "dat dis wessel won't carry any more passengers."
Just then he stepped into a hole, which threw him forward on his face
with a loud splash, his head going under and nearly strangling him. He
was thoughtful enough to let go the boat, and recovered himself with
considerable effort, after causing a slight scream from Eva, who was
afraid he was going to drown.
The freedom from immediate danger ended when the fugitives put out from
the shore.
The suddenness of the defeat, pursuit, and massacre at Wyoming prevented
anything like the use of boats by the fleeing patriots, who were beset
by a merciless foe.
Had the scow been near where the main stream of fugitives were rushing
into the river and striving to reach the opposite bank, the boat would
not have kept afloat for a minute. It not only would have been grasped
by a score of the fugitives, but it would have become the target for
a number of rifles, which could hardly have failed to kill all the
occupants.
The stream rapidly deepened, and by and by Gimp was up to his neck and
moving rather gingerly, with his two broad hands resting on the stern of
the boat.
Maggie Brainerd stood erect in the craft, pole in hand, and, bending
slightly as she pressed the support against the river bottom, held on
until it was almost beyond her reach, when she withdrew it, and,
reaching forward, placed the lower end against the bottom again, shoving
the awkward vessel with as much skill as the negro himself could have
shown.
Aunt Peggy, as trim and erect as ever, was seated near the prow, while
Eva nestled at her feet with her head in her lap. When they observed how
deep the scow sank in the water, naturally enough their fears were
withdrawn from the great calamity, and centered upon the one of
drowning.
The ancient lady glanced askance at the turbid current, while Eva turned
pale and shivered more than once, as she looked affrightedly at the
hungry river that seemed to be climbing slowly up the frail partition
which kept it away from the fugitives.
Suddenly the feet of Gravity failed to reach bottom, and, sinking down
until his ears and mouth were scarcely above the surface, he bore
slightly upon the support and began threshing the water with his feet,
so that at a distance the scow looked as if it had a steam screw at the
stern driving it forward.
This rather cumbersome means of propulsion really accomplished more than
would be supposed. Despite the fact that the African could not float
himself, he managed his pedal extremities with skill, and the boat was
quick to respond.
CHAPTER VII.
Meanwhile, Lieutenant Fred Godfrey found himself mixed up in some events
of a stirring character.
It will be recalled that while hunting for his friends he was told that
they had taken to a flat-boat, or scow, and were probably across the
Susquehanna.
If such were the fact, the true course for Fred was to follow them
without a second's delay.
His informant no doubt meant to tell the truth, but he had given a wrong
impression.
It was true, as has been shown, that the female members of the Brainerd
family had started across the river under charge of the herculean
Gravity Gimp, but Mr. Brainerd himself was still on the side where the
battle took place, though his son believed he was with the others that
had taken to the boat.
Fred was making his way as best he could to the river side, when he
became aware that he had attracted the notice of several Indians, who
made for him. In the general flurry he did not notice the alarming fact
till the party was almost upon him. Then he turned and fired among them,
threw away his gun, and made for the river at the top of his speed.
He was remarkably fleet of foot, and in a fair race would have held his
own with any Iroquois in Wyoming Valley; but there was no telling when
or where some more of the dusky foes would leap up and join in the
pursuit.
It was fortunate, perhaps, that the Susquehanna was so near, for the
pursuit was no more than fairly begun when it was reached. Knowing he
would be compelled to swim for life, he ran as far out in the water as
he could, and then took what may be called a tremendous "header,"
throwing himself horizontally through the air, but with his head a
little lower than the rest of the body, and with his arms extended and
hands pressed palm to palm in front.
He struck the water at a point beyond his depth, and drawing in one
deep inspiration as he went beneath, he swam with might and main until
he could hold his breath no longer.
When he rose to the surface it was a long way beyond where he went
under, and much farther than where the Indians were looking for him to
reappear.
But they were ready with cocked guns, and the moment the head came to
view they opened fire; but Fred expected that, and waiting only long
enough to catch a mouthful of air, he went under and sped along like a
loon beneath the surface.
Every rod thus gained increased his chances, but it did not by any means
remove the danger, for it takes no very skillful marksman to pick off a
man across the Susquehanna, and many a fugitive on that fateful day fell
after reaching the eastern shore.
Working with his usual energy, Fred Godfrey soon found himself close to
Monocacy Island, covered as it was with driftwood and undergrowth, and
upon which many of the settlers had taken refuge.
Almost the first person whom he recognized was the middle-aged friend,
who told him about the escape of the Brainerd family in the scow that
Maggie and the servant had propelled across the Susquehanna.
This friend was now able to add that he had seen them crossing at a
point considerably below the island. He saw them fired at by the Indians
and Tories on shore, but he was satisfied that no one of the little
company was struck.
To the dismay of the youth, the neighbor assured him that Mr. Brainerd,
his father, was not with the company.
This made another change in the plans of the son. Quite hopeful that
those who had crossed the river were beyond danger, his whole solicitude
was now for his beloved parent. Despite the danger involved, he resolved
to return to the western shore, and to stay there until he learned about
his parent.
Fred was too experienced, however, to act rashly. He carefully watched
his chance and swam down the stream until he was well below the swarm of
fugitives, and so managed to reach the shore without detection, or
rather without recognition, since it was impossible that he should
escape observation.
Finally, he stepped out of the water and went up the bank, without, as
he believed, attracting attention, and, suppressing all haste, walked in
the direction of Forty Fort.
The battle-field, whereon the famous monument was afterwards erected,
was about two miles above Forty Fort, where a feeble garrison was left
when Colonel Zebulon Butler marched up the river bank, and met the
Tories and Indians on that July afternoon.
Fred had landed at a point near the battle-ground, and he was in doubt
whether to make search through the surrounding wood and marsh, or to
steal down the river to the fort in the hope of finding his father
there.
Many of the fugitives in their wild flight had thrown away their weapons
(as indeed Fred Godfrey himself had done), so that it was an easy matter
for him to find a gun to take the place of the one from which he had
parted.
The youth made up his mind to visit the fort, and he had taken a dozen
steps in that direction, when with whom should he come face to face but
his beloved father himself?
The meeting was a happy one indeed, the two embracing with delight.
The father had no thought that his son had reached Wyoming, though he
knew that Washington had been asked to send them re-enforcements.
Fred told the good news about the rest of the family: it was joy indeed
to the parent, who was on his way to the river bank to look for them at
the time he met his son.
Mr. Brainerd said that he had fought as long as there was any hope, when
he turned and fled with the rest. It was the same aimless effort to get
away, without any thought of the right course to take; but he was more
fortunate than most of the others, for he succeeded in reaching the
cover of the woods without harm.
"The best thing for us to do," said the parent, "is to go up the river
so as to get above the point where, it seems, the most danger
threatens."
"You mean toward Fort Wintermoot--that is, where it stood, for I see
that it has been burned."
"Yes, but we needn't go the whole distance; night isn't far off, and it
will be a hard task to find the folks after we get across."
Accordingly, father and son moved to the north, that is up the western
bank of the river. This took them toward Fort Wintermoot, which was
still smoking, and toward Fort Jenkins, just above. At the same time
they were leaving the scene of the struggle a short time before.
Mr. Brainerd had no weapon, while his son carried the newly-found rifle
and his two pistols. He had drawn the charges of these and reloaded
them, so that they were ready for use.
"There's one thing that ought to be understood," said Mr. Brainerd,
after they had walked a short distance; "and that is what is to be done
by the survivor in case one of us falls."
"If I should be shot or captured," said Fred, impressively, "don't waste
any time in trying to help me, but do all you can to get across the
river, rejoin the family, and push on toward Stroudsburg; for I don't
believe you'll be safe at any point this side."
"I promise you to do my utmost in that direction; and, if it should be
my misfortune to fall into their hands, you must not imperil your life
for me."
"I shall be careful of what I do," said Fred, refusing to make any more
definite pledge, after having secured that of his companion not to step
aside to befriend him in the event of misfortune.
Little did either dream that the test was so close at hand.
CHAPTER VIII.
The two were compelled to pick their way with extreme care, for there
was no saying when some of the wandering Indians would come upon them.
It was necessary, as our friends thought, to go considerably farther up,
before it would be at all safe to cross the river.
They were yet some distance from the point, when a slight disturbance
was heard in a patch of woods in front, and they stopped.
"Wait a minute or two, until I find out what it means," said Fred; "it
will save time to go through there, but it won't do to undertake it if
it isn't safe."
And before Mr. Brainerd could protest, his son moved forward, as
stealthily as an Indian scout, while the former concealed himself until
the issue of the reconnoissance should become known.
The old gentleman realized too vividly the horrors of the massacre
still going on around them to permit himself to run any unnecessary
risk, now that there was a prospect of rejoining his family; and he
regretted that his courageous child had gone forward so impulsively,
instead of carefully flanking what seemed to be a dangerous spot.
But it was too late now to recall him, for he was beyond sight, and Mr.
Brainerd could only wait and hope for the best, while, it may be truly
said, he feared the worst.
It was not long before Fred Godfrey began strongly to suspect he had
committed an error, from which it required all the skill at his command
to extricate himself.
The wood that he had entered covered something less than an acre, and
was simply a denser portion of the wilderness through which they had
been making their way. He had scarcely entered it when the murmur of
voices told him that others were in advance, and he knew enough of the
Indians to recognize the sounds as made by them.
It was at that very moment he ought to have withdrawn, and, rejoining
Mr. Brainerd, left the neighborhood as silently as possible, but his
curiosity led him on.
That curiosity was gratified by the sight of six of his own people held
prisoners by a group of twice as many Indians, who, beyond question,
were making preparations for putting their victims to death.
As seems to be the rule, these prisoners, all of whom were able-bodied
men, most of them young, were in a state of despair and collapse; they
were standing up unbound and unarmed, and looking stolidly at their
captors, who were also on their feet, but were talking and gesticulating
with much earnestness.
The most remarkable figure in the group was a woman. She was doing the
principal part of the talking, and in a voice so loud, and accompanied
by such energetic gestures, that there could be no doubt that she was
the leader.
She was attired in Indian costume, and was evidently a half-breed,
though it has been claimed by many that she was of pure Indian blood.
She was beyond middle life, her hair being plentifully sprinkled with
gray, but she still possessed great strength and activity, and was well
fitted to command the Indians, as she did when they marched into and
took possession of Forty Fort on the succeeding day.
A son of this strange woman had been killed a short time before, and she
was roused to the highest point of fury. She demanded not only the blood
of those already captured, but that others should be brought in; and she
had established a camp in the place named, until a sufficient number
could be secured to satisfy, to a partial extent, her vengeful mood.
She is known in history as Queen Esther and as Katharine Montour. She
was queen of the Seneca tribe of Indians--one of the Iroquois or Six
Nations--the most powerful confederation of aborigines ever known on
this continent.
Her home was in central New York, where the Six Nations had been ruled
by Sir William Johnson, the British superintendent, and, among all the
furies who entered Wyoming Valley on that day in July, there was none
who excelled this being in the ferocity displayed toward the prisoners.
"That must be Queen Esther," thought Fred Godfrey, as he cautiously
surveyed the scene; "I have heard of the hecate--"
At that instant a slight rustling behind caused him to turn his head,
just in time to catch sight of a shadowy body that came down upon him
like an avalanche.
He struggled fiercely, but other Indians joined in, and in a twinkling
the lieutenant was disarmed and helpless, and was conducted triumphantly
into the presence of Katharine Montour, whose small, black eyes sparkled
as she surveyed this addition to her roll of victims, for whose torture
she was arranging at that moment.
CHAPTER IX.
Gravity Gimp bore as lightly as he could on the stern of the boat, which
was already so heavily laden that a little more weight would have sunk
it below the surface.
But steady progress was made, and everything was going along
"swimmingly," as may be said, when the craft and its occupants began to
receive alarming attention from the shore.
The reports of guns, and the shouting and whooping were so continuous
that the fugitives had become used to them. The whistling of the bullets
about their ears, and the call of Gimp, notified the ladies of their
danger, and caused an outcry from Aunt Peggy.
"They're shooting at us, as sure as you live; stoop down, Maggie!"
The elderly lady and little Eva got down so low that they were quite
safe. Maggie, however, kept her feet a few moments. Looking back toward
the shore, she saw six or eight Indians standing close to the water and
deliberately firing at them.
"Stoop down," said Gravity, in a low voice. "I'll take care ob de boat
and you see what you can do wid de gun."
The plucky girl acted upon the suggestion. Picking up the weapon of the
African (with which she had shot more than one deer), she sank upon her
knee, and took careful aim at the group on the shore.
Gravity stopped threshing the water, and twisted around so as to watch
the result, while Aunt Peggy and Eva fixed their eyes on the group with
painful interest.
When the whip-like crack of the gun broke upon their ears, the
spectators saw one of the Iroquois leap in the air and stagger backward,
though he did not fall.
"You hit him!" exclaimed the delighted Gravity; "dey'll larn dat some
oder folks can fire off a gun as well as dey."
The shot of the girl caused consternation for a minute or two among the
group. They had evidently no thought of any one "striking back," now
that the panic was everywhere. They could be seen gathering around the
warrior, who was helped a few steps and allowed to sit on the ground.
Dropping the rifle, Maggie Brainerd caught up the pole once more and
applied it with all the strength at her command, while Gravity threshed
the water with renewed vigor.
Hope was now re-awakened that the river might be crossed in safety.
In the nature of things, the dismay among the Iroquois could not last
long. They were joined by several new arrivals, among whom was at least
one white man.
They saw that the boat was getting farther away, and the fugitives were
likely to escape.
Gravity, who continually glanced over his shoulder, warned Maggie and
the rest (who, however, were equally alert), so that when the boat was
again struck by the whistling bullets no one was harmed.
"Miss Maggie," whispered Gravity, peering over the gunwale, his round
face rising like the moon under a full eclipse, "you know dere's another
loaded gun; try it agin."
"I musn't miss," she said to herself, sighting the weapon, "for if ever
there was a case of self-defense this is one."
All remained quiet while she carefully drew a bead at the foremost
figure. Before her aim was sure, she recognized her target as Jake
Golcher.
She was startled, and for an instant undecided; but she could not shoot
him, even though he deserved it. She slightly swerved the point of her
piece, hoping to strike one of the Indians, with the result, however,
that she missed altogether.
"Maggie," said Aunt Peggy, with rasping severity, "I've a mind to box
your ears; you missed that Tory on purpose; you ought to be ashamed of
yourself; I'll tell your father what a perjurer you are."
"I could not do it," replied Maggie, smiling in spite of herself at the
spiteful earnestness of her relative.
"Then load up and try it again."
"Time is too precious to delay for loading guns and shooting at our old
acquaintances, even if they are Tories."
Aunt Peggy was wise enough to see that Maggie could not be dictated to
under such circumstances. She, therefore, held her peace, and watched
the young lady, who applied the pole with a vigor hardly second to that
of Gravity in his efforts of another kind to force the scow through the
water.
Under their joint labors the clumsy craft advanced with considerable
speed, every minute taking it farther from the shots that still came
from the enemies they were leaving behind.
By and by, the African, while kicking, struck bottom with one foot. With
the leverage thus obtained, he shoved the boat faster than before.
By this time those in the rear had ceased firing, and the interest of
the occupants of the craft centered on the shore they were approaching.
The water shallowed rapidly, and soon the head and shoulders of Gravity
Gimp rose above the gunwale of the scow. He was now enabled to look
beyond the boat and scrutinize the point where they were about to land.
He had hardly taken the first glance, when he checked the vessel with
such suddenness that Maggie nearly lost her balance. Looking inquiringly
at him, she asked, with alarm.
"What's the matter, Gravity?"
"It's no use, Miss Maggie," was the despairing reply; "we may as well
give up; don't you see we're cotched? The Tories hab got us _dis_ time,
suah!"
CHAPTER X.
The scow containing the three fugitives was nearing the eastern shore of
the Susquehanna, when the negro servant, Gravity Gimp, stopped, checking
the craft by grasping the stern.
At that moment the water scarcely reached his waist, and was shoaling at
every step, so that the boat was entirely under his control.
He had good cause for his alarm, for, only an instant before, he had
looked behind him at the group of Tories and Indians on the western
shore, who had stopped firing, and he saw that several had entered the
river with the intention of pushing the pursuit through the desolate
wilderness already spoken of as the "Shades of Death."
The distance between the pursuer and pursued was slight, for the
Susquehanna is not a very broad river where it meanders through the
Wyoming Valley, and there remained so much of daylight that the danger
of a collision with their enemies was threatening indeed.
Still the sight increased the efforts to avoid them, and Gravity had not
lost his heart by any means, when he looked over the heads of his
friends to decide where they were to land.
It will be recalled that they had started below where most of the
fugitives were pushing for the other bank, and the action of the current
had carried them still lower, so there was reason for hoping they were
outside of immediate peril.
But the African had no more than fixed his eye on the point, where there
was much wood and undergrowth, than he noticed an agitation of the
bushes, and, to his dismay, a tall figure clad in paint and feathers
stepped forth to view.
He had a long rifle in one hand, and was daubed in the hideous fashion
of the wild Indian on the war-path.
The fact that he advanced thus openly in front of the fugitives, who had
been exchanging shots with their foes behind them, was proof to Gravity
that he was only one of a large party hidden in the bushes, and into
whose hands he and his friends were about to throw themselves.
Thus it was that the little group was caught between two fires.
Worse than all, the two guns in the scow, with which something like a
fight might have been made, were empty, and it was out of the question
to reload them at this critical moment.
No wonder, therefore, when the faithful negro discovered the trap into
which they had run, that he straightened up, checked the boat, and
uttered the exclamation I have quoted.
The ladies, with blanched faces glanced from one shore to the other,
wondering to which party it was best to surrender themselves.
At this time, the warrior in front stood calmly contemplating them, as
if sure there was no escape, and nothing could be added to the terror of
the patriots.
"Let us turn down the river," said the brave-hearted Maggie, thrusting
the pole into the water again; "they have not captured us yet, and it
is better we should all be shot than fall into----"
Just then the four were struck dumb by hearing the savage in front call
out:
"What have you stopped work for? Don't turn down the river; hurry over,
or those consarned Iroquois will overhaul you!"
Unquestionably that was not the voice of an Indian!
And yet the words were spoken by the painted individual who confronted
them, and whom they held in such terror.
He must have suspected their perplexity, for, noticing that they still
hesitated, his mouth expanded into a broad grin, as he added:
"Don't you know me? I'm Habakkuk McEwen, and I'm ready to do all I can
for you. Hurry up, Gravity; use that pole in the right direction,
Maggie; cheer up, Eva, and how are you, Aunt Peggy?"
No words can picture the relief of the little party, on learning that he
whom they mistook for an Indian was a white man and a friend.
Habakkuk McEwen was a neighbor, as he had called himself, and came from
the same section in Connecticut which furnished the Brainerds and most
of the settlers in the Wyoming Valley.
He had enlisted but a few months before, and, though not very brilliant
mentally, yet he was well liked in the settlement.
Excepting two individuals--whose identity the reader knows--it may be
safely said there was no one whom the patriots could have been more
pleased to see than Habakkuk, for he added so much strength to the
company that was sorely in need of it, but it may as well be admitted,
that the honest fellow, although a volunteer in the defense of his
country against the British invaders, was sometimes lacking in the
courage so necessary to the successful soldier. However, there he was,
and the words were scarcely out of his mouth when the scow ran plump
against the bank, the depth of the water just permitting it, and
Habakkuk cordially shook hands with each as he helped them out, winding
up with a fervid grip of the African's huge palm.
His tongue was busy while thus engaged.
"You took me for an Injin, did you? Well, I'm pleased to hear that, for
it is complimentary to my skill, for that's what I got up this rig for.
I knowed what the danger was, and it struck me that if I was going to
sarcumvent Injins it was a good idea to start out like one."
"Have you just arrived, Habakkuk?" asked Maggie.
"Not more than half an hour ago--you see--but let's get away from this
spot, for some of them loose bullets may hit us."
This was prudent advice, for their pursuers were at that moment forcing
their way through the river in pursuit.
"Gravity, you know this neighborhood better than I do--so take the
lead," said the disguised patriot: "and move lively, for I begin to feel
nervous."
"I kin move lively when dere's need ob it," replied the servant, "and it
looks to me as if there couldn't be a better time for hurryin' dan dis
identical one."
Gimp was familiar with the valley and mountains for miles around, and he
threw himself at once in the advance, the rest following with rapid
footsteps.
As they hastened toward the "Shades of Death" (and the name was never
more appropriate than on that eventful night), Habakkuk McEwen explained
how it was he arrived as he did.
"We fit the battle of Monmouth on the 28th of June, so you kin see I've
had to travel fast to git here even as late as I did. But a lot of us
heard that trouble was coming for Wyoming, and we've been uneasy for a
fortnight. Three of us went to Gineral Washington and argufied the
matter with him; he seemed to be worried and anxious to do all he could,
and he said that Connecticut orter lend a hand, as we were her colony,
but he was after the Britishers just then, and he wouldn't 'low us to go
till arter the battle.
"Wal, we had a first-class battle down there at Monmouth in Jersey, and
we and Molly Pitcher made the redcoats dance to the tune of 'Yankee
Doodle' as they haven't danced since Saratoga and Trenton. Whew! But
wasn't the day hot, and didn't the dust fly along that road! Well, I
jus' felt when we had 'em on the run, that if the Susquehanna could be
turned down my throat
|
,
for a moment, how miraculous it all was to a boy of seventeen, just
escaped from a narrow valley: I willed and lo! my people came dancing
about me,--riotous in color, gay in laughter, full of sympathy, need,
and pleading; darkly delicious girls--"colored" girls--sat beside me and
actually talked to me while I gazed in tongue-tied silence or babbled in
boastful dreams. Boys with my own experiences and out of my own world,
who knew and understood, wrought out with me great remedies. I studied
eagerly under teachers who bent in subtle sympathy, feeling themselves
some shadow of the Veil and lifting it gently that we darker souls might
peer through to other worlds.
I willed and lo! I was walking beneath the elms of Harvard,--the name of
allurement, the college of my youngest, wildest visions! I needed money;
scholarships and prizes fell into my lap,--not all I wanted or strove
for, but all I needed to keep in school. Commencement came and standing
before governor, president, and grave, gowned men, I told them certain
astonishing truths, waving my arms and breathing fast! They applauded
with what now seems to me uncalled-for fervor, but then! I walked home
on pink clouds of glory! I asked for a fellowship and got it. I
announced my plan of studying in Germany, but Harvard had no more
fellowships for me. A friend, however, told me of the Slater Fund and
how the Board was looking for colored men worth educating. No thought of
modest hesitation occurred to me. I rushed at the chance.
The trustees of the Slater Fund excused themselves politely. They
acknowledged that they had in the past looked for colored boys of
ability to educate, but, being unsuccessful, they had stopped searching.
I went at them hammer and tongs! I plied them with testimonials and
mid-year and final marks. I intimated plainly, impudently, that they
were "stalling"! In vain did the chairman, Ex-President Hayes, explain
and excuse. I took no excuses and brushed explanations aside. I wonder
now that he did not brush me aside, too, as a conceited meddler, but
instead he smiled and surrendered.
I crossed the ocean in a trance. Always I seemed to be saying, "It is
not real; I must be dreaming!" I can live it again--the little, Dutch
ship--the blue waters--the smell of new-mown hay--Holland and the Rhine.
I saw the Wartburg and Berlin; I made the Harzreise and climbed the
Brocken; I saw the Hansa towns and the cities and dorfs of South
Germany; I saw the Alps at Berne, the Cathedral at Milan, Florence,
Rome, Venice, Vienna, and Pesth; I looked on the boundaries of Russia;
and I sat in Paris and London.
On mountain and valley, in home and school, I met men and women as I had
never met them before. Slowly they became, not white folks, but folks.
The unity beneath all life clutched me. I was not less fanatically a
Negro, but "Negro" meant a greater, broader sense of humanity and
world-fellowship. I felt myself standing, not against the world, but
simply against American narrowness and color prejudice, with the
greater, finer world at my back urging me on.
I builded great castles in Spain and lived therein. I dreamed and loved
and wandered and sang; then, after two long years, I dropped suddenly
back into "nigger"-hating America!
My Days of Disillusion were not disappointing enough to discourage me. I
was still upheld by that fund of infinite faith, although dimly about me
I saw the shadow of disaster. I began to realize how much of what I had
called Will and Ability was sheer Luck! _Suppose_ my good mother had
preferred a steady income from my child labor rather than bank on the
precarious dividend of my higher training? _Suppose_ that pompous old
village judge, whose dignity we often ruffled and whose apples we stole,
had had his way and sent me while a child to a "reform" school to learn
a "trade"? _Suppose_ Principal Hosmer had been born with no faith in
"darkies," and instead of giving me Greek and Latin had taught me
carpentry and the making of tin pans? _Suppose_ I had missed a Harvard
scholarship? _Suppose_ the Slater Board had then, as now, distinct ideas
as to where the education of Negroes should stop? Suppose _and_ suppose!
As I sat down calmly on flat earth and looked at my life a certain great
fear seized me. Was I the masterful captain or the pawn of laughing
sprites? Who was I to fight a world of color prejudice? I raise my hat
to myself when I remember that, even with these thoughts, I did not
hesitate or waver; but just went doggedly to work, and therein lay
whatever salvation I have achieved.
First came the task of earning a living. I was not nice or hard to
please. I just got down on my knees and begged for work, anything and
anywhere. I wrote to Hampton, Tuskegee, and a dozen other places. They
politely declined, with many regrets. The trustees of a backwoods
Tennessee town considered me, but were eventually afraid. Then,
suddenly, Wilberforce offered to let me teach Latin and Greek at $750 a
year. I was overjoyed!
I did not know anything about Latin and Greek, but I did know of
Wilberforce. The breath of that great name had swept the water and
dropped into southern Ohio, where Southerners had taken their cure at
Tawawa Springs and where white Methodists had planted a school; then
came the little bishop, Daniel Payne, who made it a school of the
African Methodists. This was the school that called me, and when
re-considered offers from Tuskegee and Jefferson City followed, I
refused; I was so thankful for that first offer.
I went to Wilberforce with high ideals. I wanted to help to build a
great university. I was willing to work night as well as day. I taught
Latin, Greek, English, and German. I helped in the discipline, took part
in the social life, begged to be allowed to lecture on sociology, and
began to write books. But I found myself against a stone wall. Nothing
stirred before my impatient pounding! Or if it stirred, it soon slept
again.
Of course, I was too impatient! The snarl of years was not to be undone
in days. I set at solving the problem before I knew it. Wilberforce was
a colored church-school. In it were mingled the problems of
poorly-prepared pupils, an inadequately-equipped plant, the natural
politics of bishoprics, and the provincial reactions of a country town
loaded with traditions. It was my first introduction to a Negro world,
and I was at once marvelously inspired and deeply depressed. I was
inspired with the children,--had I not rubbed against the children of
the world and did I not find here the same eagerness, the same joy of
life, the same brains as in New England, France, and Germany? But, on
the other hand, the ropes and myths and knots and hindrances; the
thundering waves of the white world beyond beating us back; the scalding
breakers of this inner world,--its currents and back eddies--its
meanness and smallness--its sorrow and tragedy--its screaming farce!
In all this I was as one bound hand and foot. Struggle, work, fight as I
would, I seemed to get nowhere and accomplish nothing. I had all the
wild intolerance of youth, and no experience in human tangles. For the
first time in my life I realized that there were limits to my will to
do. The Day of Miracles was past, and a long, gray road of dogged work
lay ahead.
I had, naturally, my triumphs here and there. I defied the bishops in
the matter of public extemporaneous prayer and they yielded. I bearded
the poor, hunted president in his den, and yet was re-elected to my
position. I was slowly winning a way, but quickly losing faith in the
value of the way won. Was this the place to begin my life work? Was this
the work which I was best fitted to do? What business had I, anyhow, to
teach Greek when I had studied men? I grew sure that I had made a
mistake. So I determined to leave Wilberforce and try elsewhere. Thus,
the third period of my life began.
First, in 1896, I married--a slip of a girl, beautifully dark-eyed
and thorough and good as a German housewife. Then I accepted a job to
make a study of Negroes in Philadelphia for the University of
Pennsylvania,--one year at six hundred dollars. How did I dare these
two things? I do not know. Yet they spelled salvation. To remain at
Wilberforce without doing my ideals meant spiritual death. Both my
wife and I were homeless. I dared a home and a temporary job. But it
was a different daring from the days of my first youth. I was ready
to admit that the best of men might fail. I meant still to be captain
of my soul, but I realized that even captains are not omnipotent in
uncharted and angry seas.
I essayed a thorough piece of work in Philadelphia. I labored morning,
noon, and night. Nobody ever reads that fat volume on "The Philadelphia
Negro," but they treat it with respect, and that consoles me. The
colored people of Philadelphia received me with no open arms. They had a
natural dislike to being studied like a strange species. I met again and
in different guise those curious cross-currents and inner social
whirlings of my own people. They set me to groping. I concluded that I
did not know so much as I might about my own people, and when President
Bumstead invited me to Atlanta University the next year to teach
sociology and study the American Negro, I accepted gladly, at a salary
of twelve hundred dollars.
My real life work was done at Atlanta for thirteen years, from my
twenty-ninth to my forty-second birthday. They were years of great
spiritual upturning, of the making and unmaking of ideals, of hard work
and hard play. Here I found myself. I lost most of my mannerisms. I grew
more broadly human, made my closest and most holy friendships, and
studied human beings. I became widely-acquainted with the real condition
of my people. I realized the terrific odds which faced them. At
Wilberforce I was their captious critic. In Philadelphia I was their
cold and scientific investigator, with microscope and probe. It took but
a few years of Atlanta to bring me to hot and indignant defense. I saw
the race-hatred of the whites as I had never dreamed of it
before,--naked and unashamed! The faint discrimination of my hopes and
intangible dislikes paled into nothing before this great, red monster
of cruel oppression. I held back with more difficulty each day my
mounting indignation against injustice and misrepresentation.
With all this came the strengthening and hardening of my own character.
The billows of birth, love, and death swept over me. I saw life through
all its paradox and contradiction of streaming eyes and mad merriment. I
emerged into full manhood, with the ruins of some ideals about me, but
with others planted above the stars; scarred and a bit grim, but hugging
to my soul the divine gift of laughter and withal determined, even unto
stubbornness, to fight the good fight.
At last, forbear and waver as I would, I faced the great Decision. My
life's last and greatest door stood ajar. What with all my dreaming,
studying, and teaching was I going to _do_ in this fierce fight? Despite
all my youthful conceit and bumptiousness, I found developed beneath it
all a reticence and new fear of forwardness, which sprang from searching
criticisms of motive and high ideals of efficiency; but contrary to my
dream of racial solidarity and notwithstanding my deep desire to serve
and follow and think, rather than to lead and inspire and decide, I
found myself suddenly the leader of a great wing of people fighting
against another and greater wing.
Nor could any effort of mine keep this fight from sinking to the
personal plane. Heaven knows I tried. That first meeting of a knot of
enthusiasts, at Niagara Falls, had all the earnestness of self-devotion.
At the second meeting, at Harper's Ferry, it arose to the solemnity of a
holy crusade and yet without and to the cold, hard stare of the world it
seemed merely the envy of fools against a great man, Booker Washington.
Of the movement I was willy-nilly leader. I hated the role. For the
first time I faced criticism and _cared_. Every ideal and habit of my
life was cruelly misjudged. I who had always overstriven to give credit
for good work, who had never consciously stooped to envy was accused by
honest colored people of every sort of small and petty jealousy, while
white people said I was ashamed of my race and wanted to be white! And
this of me, whose one life fanaticism had been belief in my Negro blood!
Away back in the little years of my boyhood I had sold the Springfield
_Republican_ and written for Mr. Fortune's _Globe_. I dreamed of being
an editor myself some day. I am an editor. In the great, slashing days
of college life I dreamed of a strong organization to fight the battles
of the Negro race. The National Association for the Advancement of
Colored People is such a body, and it grows daily. In the dark days at
Wilberforce I planned a time when I could speak freely to my people and
of them, interpreting between two worlds. I am speaking now. In the
study at Atlanta I grew to fear lest my radical beliefs should so hurt
the college that either my silence or the institution's ruin would
result. Powers and principalities have not yet curbed my tongue and
Atlanta still lives.
It all came--this new Age of Miracles--because a few persons in 1909
determined to celebrate Lincoln's Birthday properly by calling for the
final emancipation of the American Negro. I came at their call. My
salary even for a year was not assured, but it was the "Voice without
reply." The result has been the National Association for the Advancement
of Colored People and _The Crisis_ and this book, which I am finishing
on my Fiftieth Birthday.
Last year I looked death in the face and found its lineaments not
unkind. But it was not my time. Yet in nature some time soon and in the
fullness of days I shall die, quietly, I trust, with my face turned
South and eastward; and, dreaming or dreamless, I shall, I am sure,
enjoy death as I have enjoyed life.
_A Litany at Atlanta_
O Silent God, Thou whose voice afar in mist and mystery hath left our
ears an-hungered in these fearful days--
_Hear us, good Lord!_
Listen to us, Thy children: our faces dark with doubt are made a mockery
in Thy Sanctuary. With uplifted hands we front Thy Heaven, O God,
crying:
_We beseech Thee to hear us, good Lord!_
We are not better than our fellows, Lord; we are but weak and human men.
When our devils do deviltry, curse Thou the doer and the deed,--curse
them as we curse them, do to them all and more than ever they have done
to innocence and weakness, to womanhood and home.
_Have mercy upon us, miserable sinners!_
And yet, whose is the deeper guilt? Who made these devils? Who nursed
them in crime and fed them on injustice? Who ravished and debauched
their mothers and their grandmothers? Who bought and sold their crime
and waxed fat and rich on public iniquity?
_Thou knowest, good God!_
Is this Thy Justice, O Father, that guile be easier than innocence and
the innocent be crucified for the guilt of the untouched guilty?
_Justice, O Judge of men!_
Wherefore do we pray? Is not the God of the Fathers dead? Have not seers
seen in Heaven's halls Thine hearsed and lifeless form stark amidst the
black and rolling smoke of sin, where all along bow bitter forms of
endless dead?
_Awake, Thou that sleepest!_
Thou art not dead, but flown afar, up hills of endless light, through
blazing corridors of suns, where worlds do swing of good and gentle men,
of women strong and free--far from the cozenage, black hypocrisy, and
chaste prostitution of this shameful speck of dust!
_Turn again, O Lord; leave us not to perish in our sin!_
From lust of body and lust of blood,--
_Great God, deliver us!_
From lust of power and lust of gold,--
_Great God, deliver us!_
From the leagued lying of despot and of brute,--
_Great God, deliver us!_
A city lay in travail, God our Lord, and from her loins sprang twin
Murder and Black Hate. Red was the midnight; clang, crack, and cry of
death and fury filled the air and trembled underneath the stars where
church spires pointed silently to Thee. And all this was to sate the
greed of greedy men who hide behind the veil of vengeance!
_Bend us Thine ear, O Lord!_
In the pale, still morning we looked upon the deed. We stopped our ears
and held our leaping hands, but they--did they not wag their heads and
leer and cry with bloody jaws: _Cease from Crime!_ The word was mockery,
for thus they train a hundred crimes while we do cure one.
_Turn again our captivity, O Lord!_
Behold this maimed and broken thing, dear God; it was an humble black
man, who toiled and sweat to save a bit from the pittance paid him. They
told him: _Work and Rise!_ He worked. Did this man sin? Nay, but someone
told how someone said another did--one whom he had never seen nor known.
Yet for that man's crime this man lieth maimed and murdered, his wife
naked to shame, his children to poverty and evil.
_Hear us, O heavenly Father!_
Doth not this justice of hell stink in Thy nostrils, O God? How long
shall the mounting flood of innocent blood roar in Thine ears and pound
in our hearts for vengeance? Pile the pale frenzy of blood-crazed
brutes, who do such deeds, high on Thine Altar, Jehovah Jireh, and burn
it in hell forever and forever!
_Forgive us, good Lord; we know not what we say!_
Bewildered we are and passion-tossed, mad with the madness of a mobbed
and mocked and murdered people; straining at the armposts of Thy throne,
we raise our shackled hands and charge Thee, God, by the bones of our
stolen fathers, by the tears of our dead mothers, by the very blood of
Thy crucified Christ: What meaneth this? Tell us the plan; give us the
sign!
_Keep not Thou silent, O God!_
Sit not longer blind, Lord God, deaf to our prayer and dumb to our dumb
suffering. Surely Thou, too, art not white, O Lord, a pale, bloodless,
heartless thing!
_Ah! Christ of all the Pities!_
Forgive the thought! Forgive these wild, blasphemous words! Thou art
still the God of our black fathers and in Thy Soul's Soul sit some soft
darkenings of the evening, some shadowings of the velvet night.
But whisper--speak--call, great God, for Thy silence is white terror to
our hearts! The way, O God, show us the way and point us the path!
Whither? North is greed and South is blood; within, the coward, and
without, the liar. Whither? To death?
_Amen! Welcome, dark sleep!_
Whither? To life? But not this life, dear God, not this. Let the cup
pass from us, tempt us not beyond our strength, for there is that
clamoring and clawing within, to whose voice we would not listen, yet
shudder lest we must,--and it is red. Ah! God! It is a red and awful
shape.
_Selah!_
In yonder East trembles a star.
_Vengeance is Mine; I will repay, saith the Lord!_
Thy Will, O Lord, be done!
_Kyrie Eleison!_
Lord, we have done these pleading, wavering words.
_We beseech Thee to hear us, good Lord!_
We bow our heads and hearken soft to the sobbing of women and little
children.
_We beseech Thee to hear us, good Lord!_
Our voices sink in silence and in night.
_Hear us, good Lord!_
In night, O God of a godless land!
_Amen!_
In silence, O Silent God.
_Selah!_
II
THE SOULS OF WHITE FOLK
High in the tower, where I sit above the loud complaining of the human
sea, I know many souls that toss and whirl and pass, but none there are
that intrigue me more than the Souls of White Folk.
Of them I am singularly clairvoyant. I see in and through them. I view
them from unusual points of vantage. Not as a foreigner do I come, for I
am native, not foreign, bone of their thought and flesh of their
language. Mine is not the knowledge of the traveler or the colonial
composite of dear memories, words and wonder. Nor yet is my knowledge
that which servants have of masters, or mass of class, or capitalist of
artisan. Rather I see these souls undressed and from the back and side.
I see the working of their entrails. I know their thoughts and they know
that I know. This knowledge makes them now embarrassed, now furious.
They deny my right to live and be and call me misbirth! My word is to
them mere bitterness and my soul, pessimism. And yet as they preach and
strut and shout and threaten, crouching as they clutch at rags of facts
and fancies to hide their nakedness, they go twisting, flying by my
tired eyes and I see them ever stripped,--ugly, human.
The discovery of personal whiteness among the world's peoples is a very
modern thing,--a nineteenth and twentieth century matter, indeed. The
ancient world would have laughed at such a distinction. The Middle Age
regarded skin color with mild curiosity; and even up into the eighteenth
century we were hammering our national manikins into one, great,
Universal Man, with fine frenzy which ignored color and race even more
than birth. Today we have changed all that, and the world in a sudden,
emotional conversion has discovered that it is white and by that token,
wonderful!
This assumption that of all the hues of God whiteness alone is
inherently and obviously better than brownness or tan leads to curious
acts; even the sweeter souls of the dominant world as they discourse
with me on weather, weal, and woe are continually playing above their
actual words an obligato of tune and tone, saying:
"My poor, un-white thing! Weep not nor rage. I know, too well, that the
curse of God lies heavy on you. Why? That is not for me to say, but be
brave! Do your work in your lowly sphere, praying the good Lord that
into heaven above, where all is love, you may, one day, be born--white!"
I do not laugh. I am quite straight-faced as I ask soberly:
"But what on earth is whiteness that one should so desire it?" Then
always, somehow, some way, silently but clearly, I am given to
understand that whiteness is the ownership of the earth forever and
ever, Amen!
Now what is the effect on a man or a nation when it comes passionately
to believe such an extraordinary dictum as this? That nations are coming
to believe it is manifest daily. Wave on wave, each with increasing
virulence, is dashing this new religion of whiteness on the shores of
our time. Its first effects are funny: the strut of the Southerner, the
arrogance of the Englishman amuck, the whoop of the hoodlum who
vicariously leads your mob. Next it appears dampening generous
enthusiasm in what we once counted glorious; to free the slave is
discovered to be tolerable only in so far as it freed his master! Do we
sense somnolent writhings in black Africa or angry groans in India or
triumphant banzais in Japan? "To your tents, O Israel!" These nations
are not white!
After the more comic manifestations and the chilling of generous
enthusiasm come subtler, darker deeds. Everything considered, the title
to the universe claimed by White Folk is faulty. It ought, at least, to
look plausible. How easy, then, by emphasis and omission to make
children believe that every great soul the world ever saw was a white
man's soul; that every great thought the world ever knew was a white
man's thought; that every great deed the world ever did was a white
man's deed; that every great dream the world ever sang was a white man's
dream. In fine, that if from the world were dropped everything that
could not fairly be attributed to White Folk, the world would, if
anything, be even greater, truer, better than now. And if all this be a
lie, is it not a lie in a great cause?
Here it is that the comedy verges to tragedy. The first minor note is
struck, all unconsciously, by those worthy souls in whom consciousness
of high descent brings burning desire to spread the gift abroad,--the
obligation of nobility to the ignoble. Such sense of duty assumes two
things: a real possession of the heritage and its frank appreciation by
the humble-born. So long, then, as humble black folk, voluble with
thanks, receive barrels of old clothes from lordly and generous whites,
there is much mental peace and moral satisfaction. But when the black
man begins to dispute the white man's title to certain alleged bequests
of the Fathers in wage and position, authority and training; and when
his attitude toward charity is sullen anger rather than humble jollity;
when he insists on his human right to swagger and swear and waste,--then
the spell is suddenly broken and the philanthropist is ready to believe
that Negroes are impudent, that the South is right, and that Japan wants
to fight America.
After this the descent to Hell is easy. On the pale, white faces which
the great billows whirl upward to my tower I see again and again, often
and still more often, a writing of human hatred, a deep and passionate
hatred, vast by the very vagueness of its expressions. Down through the
green waters, on the bottom of the world, where men move to and fro, I
have seen a man--an educated gentleman--grow livid with anger because a
little, silent, black woman was sitting by herself in a Pullman car. He
was a white man. I have seen a great, grown man curse a little child,
who had wandered into the wrong waiting-room, searching for its mother:
"Here, you damned black--" He was white. In Central Park I have seen the
upper lip of a quiet, peaceful man curl back in a tigerish snarl of rage
because black folk rode by in a motor car. He was a white man. We have
seen, you and I, city after city drunk and furious with ungovernable
lust of blood; mad with murder, destroying, killing, and cursing;
torturing human victims because somebody accused of crime happened to be
of the same color as the mob's innocent victims and because that color
was not white! We have seen,--Merciful God! in these wild days and in
the name of Civilization, Justice, and Motherhood,--what have we not
seen, right here in America, of orgy, cruelty, barbarism, and murder
done to men and women of Negro descent.
Up through the foam of green and weltering waters wells this great mass
of hatred, in wilder, fiercer violence, until I look down and know that
today to the millions of my people no misfortune could happen,--of death
and pestilence, failure and defeat--that would not make the hearts of
millions of their fellows beat with fierce, vindictive joy! Do you doubt
it? Ask your own soul what it would say if the next census were to
report that half of black America was dead and the other half dying.
Unfortunate? Unfortunate. But where is the misfortune? Mine? Am I, in my
blackness, the sole sufferer? I suffer. And yet, somehow, above the
suffering, above the shackled anger that beats the bars, above the hurt
that crazes there surges in me a vast pity,--pity for a people
imprisoned and enthralled, hampered and made miserable for such a cause,
for such a phantasy!
Conceive this nation, of all human peoples, engaged in a crusade to
make the "World Safe for Democracy"! Can you imagine the United States
protesting against Turkish atrocities in Armenia, while the Turks are
silent about mobs in Chicago and St. Louis; what is Louvain compared
with Memphis, Waco, Washington, Dyersburg, and Estill Springs? In short,
what is the black man but America's Belgium, and how could America
condemn in Germany that which she commits, just as brutally, within her
own borders?
A true and worthy ideal frees and uplifts a people; a false ideal
imprisons and lowers. Say to men, earnestly and repeatedly: "Honesty is
best, knowledge is power; do unto others as you would be done by." Say
this and act it and the nation must move toward it, if not to it. But
say to a people: "The one virtue is to be white," and the people rush to
the inevitable conclusion, "Kill the 'nigger'!"
Is not this the record of present America? Is not this its headlong
progress? Are we not coming more and more, day by day, to making the
statement "I am white," the one fundamental tenet of our practical
morality? Only when this basic, iron rule is involved is our defense of
right nation-wide and prompt. Murder may swagger, theft may rule and
prostitution may flourish and the nation gives but spasmodic,
intermittent and lukewarm attention. But let the murderer be black or
the thief brown or the violator of womanhood have a drop of Negro blood,
and the righteousness of the indignation sweeps the world. Nor would
this fact make the indignation less justifiable did not we all know that
it was blackness that was condemned and not crime.
In the awful cataclysm of World War, where from beating, slandering, and
murdering us the white world turned temporarily aside to kill each
other, we of the Darker Peoples looked on in mild amaze.
Among some of us, I doubt not, this sudden descent of Europe into hell
brought unbounded surprise; to others, over wide area, it brought the
_Schaden Freude_ of the bitterly hurt; but most of us, I judge, looked
on silently and sorrowfully, in sober thought, seeing sadly the prophecy
of our own souls.
Here is a civilization that has boasted much. Neither Roman nor Arab,
Greek nor Egyptian, Persian nor Mongol ever took himself and his own
perfectness with such disconcerting seriousness as the modern white man.
We whose shame, humiliation, and deep insult his aggrandizement so often
involved were never deceived. We looked at him clearly, with world-old
eyes, and saw simply a human thing, weak and pitiable and cruel, even as
we are and were.
These super-men and world-mastering demi-gods listened, however, to no
low tongues of ours, even when we pointed silently to their feet of
clay. Perhaps we, as folk of simpler soul and more primitive type, have
been most struck in the welter of recent years by the utter failure of
white religion. We have curled our lips in something like contempt as we
have witnessed glib apology and weary explanation. Nothing of the sort
deceived us. A nation's religion is its life, and as such white
Christianity is a miserable failure.
Nor would we be unfair in this criticism: We know that we, too, have
failed, as you have, and have rejected many a Buddha, even as you have
denied Christ; but we acknowledge our human frailty, while you, claiming
super-humanity, scoff endlessly at our shortcomings.
The number of white individuals who are practising with even reasonable
approximation the democracy and unselfishness of Jesus Christ is so
small and unimportant as to be fit subject for jest in Sunday
supplements and in _Punch_, _Life_, _Le Rire_, and _Fliegende Blätter_.
In her foreign mission work the extraordinary self-deception of white
religion is epitomized: solemnly the white world sends five million
dollars worth of missionary propaganda to Africa each year and in the
same twelve months adds twenty-five million dollars worth of the vilest
gin manufactured. Peace to the augurs of Rome!
We may, however, grant without argument that religious ideals have
always far outrun their very human devotees. Let us, then, turn to more
mundane matters of honor and fairness. The world today is trade. The
world has turned shopkeeper; history is economic history; living is
earning a living. Is it necessary to ask how much of high emprise and
honorable conduct has been found here? Something, to be sure. The
establishment of world credit systems is built on splendid and
realizable faith in fellow-men. But it is, after all, so low and
elementary a step that sometimes it looks merely like honor among
thieves, for the revelations of highway robbery and low cheating in the
business world and in all its great modern centers have raised in the
hearts of all true men in our day an exceeding great cry for revolution
in our basic methods and conceptions of industry and commerce.
We do not, for a moment, forget the robbery of other times and races
when trade was a most uncertain gamble; but was there not a certain
honesty and frankness in the evil that argued a saner morality? There
are more merchants today, surer deliveries, and wider well-being, but
are there not, also, bigger thieves, deeper injustice, and more
calloused selfishness in well-being? Be that as it may,--certainly the
nicer sense of honor that has risen ever and again in groups of
forward-thinking men has been curiously and broadly blunted. Consider
our chiefest industry,--fighting. Laboriously the Middle Ages built its
rules of fairness--equal armament, equal notice, equal conditions. What
do we see today? Machine-guns against assegais; conquest sugared with
religion; mutilation and rape masquerading as culture,--all this, with
vast applause at the superiority of white over black soldiers!
War is horrible! This the dark world knows to its awful cost. But has
it just become horrible, in these last days, when under essentially
equal conditions, equal armament, and equal waste of wealth white men
are fighting white men, with surgeons and nurses hovering near?
Think of the wars through which we have lived in the last decade: in
German Africa, in British Nigeria, in French and Spanish Morocco, in
China, in Persia, in the Balkans, in Tripoli, in Mexico, and in a dozen
lesser places--were not these horrible, too? Mind you, there were for
most of these wars no Red Cross funds.
Behold little Belgium and her pitiable plight, but has the world
forgotten Congo? What Belgium now suffers is not half, not even a tenth,
of what she has done to black Congo since Stanley's great dream of 1880.
Down the dark forests of inmost Africa sailed this modern Sir Galahad,
in the name of "the noble-minded men of several nations," to introduce
commerce and civilization. What came of it? "Rubber and murder, slavery
in its worst form," wrote Glave in 1895.
Harris declares that King Leopold's régime meant the death of twelve
million natives, "but what we who were behind the scenes felt most
keenly was the fact that the real catastrophe in the
|
baptized rendered much more easy their amalgamation with
the English; but it was not so in Ireland, where the Round Towers
still stand to show (as some authorities hold) how the terrified
native Irish sheltered from the Danish fury which nearly destroyed the
whole fabric of Irish Christianity. The legends of Ireland, too, are
full of the terror of the men of "Lochlann," which is generally taken
to mean Norway; and the great coast cities of Ireland--Dublin, Cork,
Waterford, Wexford, and others--were so entirely Danish that only the
decisive battle of Clontarf, in which the saintly and victorious Brian
Boru was slain, saved Ireland to Christendom and curbed the power of
the heathen invaders.
A second wave of Norse invasion swept over England at the Norman
Conquest, and for a time submerged the native English population. The
chivalrous Norman knights who followed William of Normandy's sacred
banner, whether from religious zeal or desire of plunder, were as
truly Vikings by race as were the Danes who settled in the Danelagh.
The days when Rolf (Rollo, or Rou), the Viking chief, won Normandy
were not yet so long gone by that the fierce piratical instincts of
his followers had ceased to influence their descendants: piety and
learning, feudal law and custom, had made some impression upon the
character of the Norman, but at heart he was still a Northman. The
Norman barons fought for their independence against Duke William with
all the determination of those Norse chiefs who would not acknowledge
the overlordship of Harold Fairhair, but fled to colonise Iceland when
he made himself King of Norway. The seafaring instincts which drove
the Vikings to harry other lands in like manner drove the Normans to
piratical plundering up and down the English Channel, and, when they
had settled in England, led to continual sea-fights in the Channel
between English and French, hardy Kentish and Norman, or Cornish and
Breton, sailors, with a common strain of fighting blood, and a common
love of the sea.
The Norman Conquest of England was but one instance of Norman
activity: Sicily, Italy, Constantinople, even Antioch, and the Holy
Land itself, showed in time Norman states, Norman laws, Norman
civilisation, and all alike felt the impulse of Norman energy and
inspiration. England lay ready to hand for Norman invasion--the hope
of peaceable succession to the saintly Edward the Confessor had to be
abandoned by William; the gradual permeation of sluggish England with
Norman earls, churchmen, courtiers, had been comprehended and checked
by Earl Godwin and his sons (themselves of Danish race); but there
still remained the way of open war and an appeal to religious zeal;
and this way William took. There was genius as well as statesmanship
in the idea of combining a personal claim to the throne held by Harold
the usurper with a crusading summons against the schismatic and
heretical English, who refused obedience to the true successor of St.
Peter. The success of the idea was its justification: the success of
the expedition proved the need that England had of some new leaven to
energise the sluggish temperament of her sons. The Norman Conquest not
only revived and quickened, but unified and solidified the English
nation. The tyranny of the Norman nobles, held in check at first only
by the tyranny of the Norman king, was the factor in mediæval English
life that made for a national consciousness; it also helped the
appreciation of the heroism of revolt against tyranny which is seen in
Hereward the Wake, in Robin Hood, in William of Cloudeslee, and in
many other English hero-rebels; but it gradually led men to a
realization of their own rights as Englishmen. When all men alike felt
themselves sons of England, the days were past when Norman and Saxon
were aliens to each other, and Norman robber soon became as truly
English as Danish viking, Anglo-Saxon seafarer, or Celtic settler.
Then the full value of the Norman infusion was seen in quicker
intellectual apprehension, nimbler wit, a keener sense of reverence, a
more spiritual piety, a more refined courtesy, and a more enlightened
perception of the value of law. The materialism of the original Saxon
race was successively modified by many influences, and not least of
these was the Norman Conquest.
From the Norman Conquest onward England has welcomed men of many
nations--French, Flemings, Germans, Dutch: men brought by war, by
trade, by love of adventure, by religion; traders, refugees, exiles,
all have found in her a hospitable shelter and a second home, and all
have come to love the "grey old mother" that counted them among her
sons and grew to think them her own in very truth.
Geographically, also, we must recognise the admixture of races in our
islands. The farthest western borders show most strongly the type of
man whom we can imagine the Iberian to have been: Western Ireland, the
Hebrides, Central and South Wales, and Cornwall are still inhabited by
folk of Iberian descent. The blue-eyed Celt yet dwells in the
Highlands and the greater part of Wales and the Marches--Hereford and
Shropshire, and as far as Worcestershire and Cheshire; still the
Dales of Cumberland, the Fen Country, East Anglia, and the Isle of Man
show traces of Danish blood, speech, manners, and customs; still the
slow, stolid Saxon inhabits the lands south of the Thames from Sussex
to Hampshire and Dorset. The Angle has settled permanently over the
Lowlands of Scotland, with the Celt along the western fringe, and
Flemish blood shows its traces in Pembroke on the one side ("Little
England beyond Wales") and in Norfolk on the other.
With all these nations, all these natures, amalgamated in our own, it
is no wonder that the literature of our isles contains many different
ideals of heroism, changing according to nationality and epoch. Thus
the physical valour of Beowulf is not the same quality as the valour
of Havelok the Dane, though both are heroes of the strong arm; and the
chivalry of Diarmit is not the same as the chivalry of Roland. Again,
religion has its share in changing the ideals of a nation, and
Constantine, the warrior of the Early English poem of "Elene," is far
from being the same in character as the tender-hearted Constantine of
"moral Gower's" apocryphal tale. The law-abiding nature of the
earliest heroes, whose obedience to their king and their priest was
absolute, differs almost entirely from the lawlessness of Gamelyn and
Robin Hood, both of whom set church and king at defiance, and even
account it a merit to revolt from the rule of both. It follows from
this that we shall find our chosen heroes of very different types and
characters; but we shall recognise that each represented to his own
age an ideal of heroism, which that age loved sufficiently to put into
literature, and perpetuate by the best means in its power. Of many
another hero besides Arthur--of Barbarossa, of Hiawatha, even of
Napoleon--has the tradition grown that he is not dead, but has passed
away into the deathless land, whence he shall come again in his own
time. As Tennyson has sung,
"Great bards of him will sing
Hereafter; and dark sayings from of old
Ranging and ringing through the minds of men,
And echoed by old folk beside their fires
For comfort after their wage-work is done,
Speak of the King."
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Lightfoot.
[2] Swinburne.
[3] Gerald Massey.
[4] J. R. Denning.
[5] W. W. Campbell.
[6] _Ibid._
[7] C. Roberts.
[8] T. Darcy McGee.
[9] Tennyson.
[10] Shakespeare, _Julius Cæsar_.
[11] Tennyson.
CHAPTER I: BEOWULF
Introduction
The figure which meets us as we enter on the study of Heroes of the
British Race is one which appeals to us in a very special way, since
he is the one hero in whose legend we may see the ideals of our
English forefathers before they left their Continental home to settle
in this island. Opinions may differ as to the date at which the poem
of "Beowulf" was written, the place in which it was localised, and the
religion of the poet who combined the floating legends into one epic
whole, but all must accept the poem as embodying the life and feelings
of our Forefathers who dwelt in North Germany on the shores of the
North Sea and of the Baltic. The life depicted, the characters
portrayed, the events described, are such as a simple warrior race
would cherish in tradition and legend as relics of the life lived by
their ancestors in what doubtless seemed to them the Golden Age.
Perhaps stories of a divine Beowa, hero and ancestor of the English,
became merged in other myths of sun-hero and marsh-demon, but in any
case the stories are now crystallized around one central human figure,
who may even be considered an historical hero, Beowulf, the thane of
Hygelac, King of the Geats. It is this grand primitive hero who
embodies the ideal of English heroism. Bold to rashness for himself,
prudent for his comrades, daring, resourceful, knowing no fear, loyal
to his king and his kinsmen, generous in war and in peace,
self-sacrificing, Beowulf stands for all that is best in manhood in an
age of strife. It is fitting that our first British hero should be
physically and mentally strong, brave to seek danger and brave to look
on death and Fate undaunted, one whose life is a struggle against
evil forces, and whose death comes in a glorious victory over the
powers of evil, a victory gained for the sake of others to whom
Beowulf feels that he owes protection and devotion.
The Story. The Coming and Passing of Scyld
Once, long ago, the Danish land owned the sway of a mighty monarch,
Scyld Scefing, the founder of a great dynasty, the Scyldings. This
great king Scyld had come to Denmark in a mysterious manner, since no
man knew whence he sprang. As a babe he drifted to the Danish shore in
a vessel loaded with treasures; but no man was with him, and there was
no token to show his kindred and race. When Scyld grew up he increased
the power of Denmark and enlarged her borders; his fame spread far and
wide among men, and his glory shone undimmed until the day when, full
of years and honours, he died, leaving the throne securely established
in his family. Then the sorrowing Danes restored him to the mysterious
ocean from which he had come to them. Choosing their goodliest ship,
they laid within it the corpse of their departed king, and heaped
around him all their best and choicest treasures, until the venerable
countenance of Scyld looked to heaven from a bed of gold and jewels;
then they set up, high above his head, his glorious gold-wrought
banner, and left him alone in state. The vessel was loosed from the
shore where the mourning Danes bewailed their departing king, and
drifted slowly away to the unknown west from which Scyld had sailed to
his now sorrowing people; they watched until it was lost in the
shadows of night and distance, but no man under heaven knoweth what
shore now holds the vanished Scyld. The descendants of Scyld ruled and
prospered till the days of his great-grandson Hrothgar, one of a
family of four, who can all be identified historically with various
Danish kings and princes.
Hrothgar's Hall
Hrothgar was a mighty warrior and conqueror, who won glory in battle,
and whose fame spread wide among men, so that nobly born warriors, his
kinsmen, were glad to serve as his bodyguard and to fight for him
loyally in strife. So great was Hrothgar's power that he longed for
some outward sign of the magnificence of his sway; he determined to
build a great hall, in which he could hold feasts and banquets, and
could entertain his warriors and thanes, and visitors from afar. The
hall rose speedily, vast, gloriously adorned, a great meeting-place
for men; for Hrothgar had summoned all his people to the work, and the
walls towered up high and majestic, ending in pinnacles and gables
resembling the antlers of a stag. At the great feast which Hrothgar
gave first in his new home the minstrels chanted the glory of the
hall, "Heorot," "The Hart," as the king named it; Hrothgar's desire
was well fulfilled, that he should build the most magnificent of
banquet-halls. Proud were the mighty warriors who feasted within it,
and proud the heart of the king, who from his high seat on the daïs
saw his brave thanes carousing at the long tables below him, and the
lofty rafters of the hall rising black into the darkness.
Grendel
Day by day the feasting continued, until its noise and the festal joy
of its revellers aroused a mighty enemy, Grendel, the loathsome
fen-monster. This monstrous being, half-man, half-fiend, dwelt in the
fens near the hill on which Heorot stood. Terrible was he, dangerous
to men, of extraordinary strength, human in shape but gigantic of
stature, covered with a green horny skin, on which the sword would not
bite. His race, all sea-monsters, giants, goblins, and evil demons,
were offspring of Cain, outcasts from the mercy of the Most High,
hostile to the human race; and Grendel was one of mankind's most
bitter enemies; hence his hatred of the joyous shouts from Heorot, and
his determination to stop the feasting.
"This the dire mighty fiend, he who in darkness dwelt,
Suffered with hatred fierce, that every day and night
He heard the festal shouts loud in the lofty hall;
Sound of harp echoed there, and gleeman's sweet song.
Thus they lived joyously, fearing no angry foe
Until the hellish fiend wrought them great woe.
Grendel that ghost was called, grisly and terrible,
Who, hateful wanderer, dwelt in the moorlands,
The fens and wild fastnesses; the wretch for a while abode
In homes of the giant-race, since God had cast him out.
When night on the earth fell, Grendel departed
To visit the lofty hall, now that the warlike Danes
After the gladsome feast nightly slept in it.
A fair troop of warrior-thanes guarding it found he;
Heedlessly sleeping, they recked not of sorrow.
The demon of evil, the grim wight unholy,
With his fierce ravening, greedily grasped them,
Seized in their slumbering thirty right manly thanes;
Thence he withdrew again, proud of his lifeless prey,
Home to his hiding-place, bearing his booty,
In peace to devour it."
[Illustration: "The demon of evil, with his fierce ravening, greedily
grasped them"]
When dawn broke, and the Danes from their dwellings around the hall
entered Heorot, great was the lamentation, and dire the dismay, for
thirty noble champions had vanished, and the blood-stained tracks of
the monster showed but too well the fate that had overtaken them.
Hrothgar's grief was profound, for he had lost thirty of his dearly
loved bodyguard, and he himself was too old to wage a conflict against
the foe--a foe who repeated night by night his awful deeds, in
spite of all that valour could do to save the Danes from his terrible
enmity. At last no champion would face the monster, and the Danes, in
despair, deserted the glorious hall of which they had been so proud.
Useless stood the best of dwellings, for none dared remain in it, but
every evening the Danes left it after their feast, and slept
elsewhere. This affliction endured for twelve years, and all that time
the beautiful hall of Heorot stood empty when darkness was upon it. By
night the dire fiend visited it in search of prey, and in the morning
his footsteps showed that his deadly enmity was not yet appeased, but
that any effort to use the hall at night would bring down his fatal
wrath on the careless sleepers.
Far and wide spread the tidings of this terrible oppression, and many
champions came from afar to offer King Hrothgar their aid, but none
was heroic enough to conquer the monster, and many a mighty warrior
lost his life in a vain struggle against Grendel. At length even these
bold adventurers ceased to come; Grendel remained master of Heorot,
and the Danes settled down in misery under the bondage of a perpetual
nightly terror, while Hrothgar grew old in helpless longing for
strength to rescue his people from their foe.
Beowulf
Meanwhile there had come to manhood and full strength a hero destined
to make his name famous for mighty deeds of valour throughout the
whole of the Teutonic North. In the realm of the Geats (Götaland, in
the south of Sweden) ruled King Hygelac, a mighty ruler who was
ambitious enough to aim at conquering his neighbours on the mainland
of Germany. His only sister, daughter of the dead king Hrethel, had
married a great noble, Ecgtheow, and they had one son, Beowulf, who
from the age of seven was brought up at the Geatish court. The boy was
a lad of great stature and handsome appearance, with fair locks and
gallant bearing; but he greatly disappointed his grandfather, King
Hrethel, by his sluggish character. Beowulf as a youth had been
despised by all for his sloth and his unwarlike disposition; his
good-nature and his rarely stirred wrath made others look upon him
with scorn, and the mighty stature to which he grew brought him
nothing but scoffs and sneers and insults in the banquet-hall when the
royal feasts were held. Yet wise men might have seen the promise of
great strength in his powerful sinews and his mighty hands, and the
signs of great force of character in the glance of his clear blue eyes
and the fierceness of his anger when he was once aroused. At least
once already Beowulf had distinguished himself in a great feat--a
swimming-match with a famous champion, Breca, who had been beaten in
the contest. For this and other victories, and for the bodily strength
which gave Beowulf's hand-grip the force of thirty men, the hero was
already famed when the news of Grendel's ravages reached Geatland.
Beowulf, eager to try his strength against the monster, and burning to
add to his fame, asked and obtained permission from his uncle, King
Hygelac, to seek the stricken Danish king and offer his help against
Grendel; then, choosing fourteen loyal comrades and kinsfolk, he took
a cheerful farewell of the Geatish royal family and sailed for
Denmark.
Thus it happened that one day the Warden of the Coast, riding on his
round along the Danish shores, saw from the white cliffs a strange
war-vessel running in to shore. Her banners were unknown to him, her
crew were strangers and all in war-array, and as the Warden watched
them they ran the ship into a small creek among the mountainous
cliffs, made her fast to a rock with stout cables, and then landed and
put themselves in readiness for a march. Though there were fifteen of
the strangers and the Warden was alone, he showed no hesitation, but,
riding boldly down into their midst, loudly demanded:
"What are ye warlike men wielding bright weapons,
Wearing grey corslets and boar-adorned helmets,
Who o'er the water-paths come with your foaming keel
Ploughing the ocean surge? I was appointed
Warden of Denmark's shores; watch hold I by the wave
That on this Danish coast no deadly enemy
Leading troops over sea should land to injure.
None have here landed yet more frankly coming
Than this fair company: and yet ye answer not
The password of warriors, and customs of kinsmen.
Ne'er have mine eyes beheld a mightier warrior,
An earl more lordly, than is he, the chief of you;
He is no common man; if looks belie him not,
He is a hero bold, worthily weaponed.
Anon must I know of you kindred and country,
Lest ye as spies should go free on our Danish soil.
Now ye men from afar, sailing the surging sea,
Have heard my earnest thought: best is a quick reply,
That I may swiftly know whence ye have hither come."
So the aged Warden sat on his horse, gazing attentively on the faces
of the fifteen strangers, but watching most carefully the countenance
of the leader; for the mighty stature, the clear glance of command,
the goodly armour, and the lordly air of Beowulf left no doubt as to
who was the chieftain of that little band. When the questions had been
asked the leader of the new-comers moved forward till his mighty
figure stood beside the Warden's horse, and as he gazed up into the
old man's eyes he answered: "We are warriors of the Geats, members of
King Hygelac's bodyguard. My father, well known among men of wisdom,
was named Ecgtheow, a wise counsellor who died full of years and
famous for his wisdom, leaving a memory dear to all good men."
"We come to seek thy king Healfdene's glorious son,
Thy nation's noble lord, with friendly mind.
Be thou a guardian good to us strangers here!
We have an errand grave to the great Danish king,
Nor will I hidden hold what I intend!
Thou canst tell if it is truth (as we lately heard)
That some dire enemy, deadly in evil deed,
Cometh in dark of night, sateth his secret hate,
Worketh through fearsome awe, slaughter and shame.
I can give Hrothgar bold counsel to conquer him,
How he with valiant mind Grendel may vanquish,
If he would ever lose torment of burning care,
If bliss shall bloom again and woe shall vanish."
The aged Warden replied: "Every bold warrior of noble mind must
recognise the distinction between words and deeds. I judge by thy
speech that you are all friends to our Danish king; therefore I bid
you go forward, in warlike array, and I myself will guide you to King
Hrothgar; I will also bid my men draw your vessel up the beach, and
make her fast with a barricade of oars against any high tide. Safe she
shall be until again she bears you to your own land. May your
expedition prove successful."
Thus speaking, he turned his horse's head and led the way up the steep
cliff paths, while the Geats followed him, resplendent in shining
armour, with boar-crests on their helmets, shields and spears in their
hands, and mighty swords hanging in their belts: a goodly band were
they, as they strode boldly after the Warden. Anon there appeared a
roughly trodden path, which soon became a stone-paved road, and the
way led on to where the great hall, Heorot, towered aloft, gleaming
white in the sun; very glorious it seemed, with its pinnacled gables
and its carved beams and rafters, and the Geats gazed at it with
admiration as the Warden of the Coast said: "Yonder stands our
monarch's hall, and your way lies clear before you. May the All-Father
keep you safe in the conflict! Now it is time for me to return; I go
to guard our shores from every foe."
Hrothgar and Beowulf
The little band of Geats, in their shining war-gear, strode along the
stone-paved street, their ring-mail sounding as they went, until they
reached the door of Heorot; and there, setting down their broad
shields and their keen spears against the wall, they prepared to enter
as peaceful guests the great hall of King Hrothgar. Wulfgar, one of
Hrothgar's nobles, met them at the door and asked whence such a
splendid band of warlike strangers, so well armed and so worthily
equipped, had come. Their heroic bearing betokened some noble
enterprise. Beowulf answered: "We are Hygelac's chosen friends and
companions, and I am Beowulf. To King Hrothgar, thy master, will I
tell mine errand, if the son of Healfdene will allow us to approach
him."
Wulfgar, impressed by the words and bearing of the hero, replied: "I
will announce thy coming to my lord, and bring back his answer"; and
then made his way up the hall to the high seat where Hrothgar sat on
the daïs amidst his bodyguard of picked champions. Bowing
respectfully, he said:
"Here are come travelling over the sea-expanse,
Journeying from afar, heroes of Geatland.
Beowulf is the name of their chief warrior.
This is their prayer, my lord, that they may speak with thee;
Do not thou give them a hasty refusal!
Do not deny them the gladness of converse!
They in their war-gear seem worthy of men's respect.
Noble their chieftain seems, he who the warriors
Hither has guided."
At these words the aged king aroused himself from the sad reverie into
which he had fallen and answered: "I knew him as a boy. Beowulf is the
son of Ecgtheow, who wedded the daughter of the Geat King Hrethel. His
fame has come hither before him; seafarers have told me that he has
the might of thirty men in his hand-grip. Great joy it is to know of
his coming, for he may save us from the terror of Grendel. If he
succeeds in this, great treasures will I bestow upon him. Hasten;
bring in hither Beowulf and his kindred thanes, and bid them welcome
to the Danish folk!"
Wulfgar hurried down the hall to the place where Beowulf stood with
his little band; he led them gladly to the high seat, so that they
stood opposite to Hrothgar, who looked keenly at the well-equipped
troop, and kindly at its leader. A striking figure was Beowulf as he
stood there in his gleaming ring-mail, with the mighty sword by his
side. It was, however, but a minute that Hrothgar looked in silence,
for with respectful greeting Beowulf spoke:
"Hail to thee, Hrothgar King! Beowulf am I,
Hygelac's kinsman and loyal companion.
Great deeds of valour wrought I in my youth.
To me in my native land Grendel's ill-doing
Came as an oft-heard tale told by our sailors.
They say that this bright hall, noblest of buildings,
Standeth to every man idle and useless
After the evening-light fails in the heavens.
Thus, Hrothgar, ancient king, all my friends urged me,
Warriors and prudent thanes, that I should seek thee,
Since they themselves had known my might in battle.
Now I will beg of thee, lord of the glorious Danes,
Prince of the Scylding race, Folk-lord most friendly,
Warden of warriors, only one boon.
Do not deny it me, since I have come from far;
I with my men alone, this troop of heroes good,
Would without help from thee cleanse thy great hall!
Oft have I also heard that the fierce monster
Through his mad recklessness scorns to use weapons;
Therefore will I forego (so may King Hygelac,
My friendly lord and king, find in me pleasure)
That I should bear my sword and my broad yellow shield
Into the conflict: with my hand-grip alone
I 'gainst the foe will strive, and struggle for my life--
He shall endure God's doom whom death shall bear away.
I know that he thinketh in this hall of conflict
Fearless to eat me, if he can compass it,
As he has oft devoured heroes of Denmark.
Then thou wilt not need my head to hide away,
Grendel will have me all mangled and gory;
Away will he carry, if death then shall take me,
My body with gore stained will he think to feast on,
On his lone track will bear it and joyously eat it,
And mark with my life-blood his lair in the moorland;
Nor more for my welfare wilt thou need to care then.
Send thou to Hygelac, if strife shall take me,
That best of byrnies which my breast guardeth,
Brightest of war-weeds, the work of Smith Weland,
Left me by Hrethel. Ever Wyrd has her way."
The aged King Hrothgar, who had listened attentively while the hero
spoke of his plans and of his possible fate, now greeted him saying:
"Thou hast sought my court for honour and for friendship's sake, O
Beowulf: thou hast remembered the ancient alliance between Ecgtheow,
thy father, and myself, when I shielded him, a fugitive, from the
wrath of the Wilfings, paid them the due wergild for his crime, and
took his oath of loyalty to myself. Long ago that time is; Ecgtheow is
dead, and I am old and in misery. It were too long now to tell of all
the woe that Grendel has wrought, but this I may say, that many a
hero has boasted of the great valour he would display in strife with
the monster, and has awaited his coming in this hall; in the morning
there has been no trace of each hero but the dark blood-stains on
benches and tables. How many times has that happened! But sit down now
to the banquet and tell thy plans, if such be thy will."
Thereupon room was made for the Geat warriors on the long benches, and
Beowulf sat in the place of honour opposite to the king: great respect
was shown to him, and all men looked with wonder on this mighty hero,
whose courage led him to hazard this terrible combat. Great carved
horns of ale were borne to Beowulf and his men, savoury meat was
placed before them, and while they ate and drank the minstrels played
and sang to the harp the deeds of men of old. The mirth of the feast
was redoubled now men hoped that a deliverer had come indeed.
The Quarrel
Among all the Danes who were rejoicing over Beowulf's coming there was
one whose heart was sad and his brow gloomy--one thane whom jealousy
urged to hate any man more distinguished than himself. Hunferth, King
Hrothgar's orator and speech-maker, from his official post at
Hrothgar's feet watched Beowulf with scornful and jealous eyes. He
waited until a pause came in the clamour of the feast, and suddenly
spoke, coldly and contemptuously: "Art thou that Beowulf who strove
against Breca, the son of Beanstan, when ye two held a swimming
contest in the ocean and risked your lives in the deep waters? In vain
all your friends urged you to forbear--ye would go on the hazardous
journey; ye plunged in, buffeting the wintry waves through the
rising storm. Seven days and nights ye toiled, but Breca overcame
thee: he had greater strength and courage. Him the ocean bore to
shore, and thence he sought his native land, and the fair city where
he ruled as lord and chieftain. Fully he performed his boast against
thee. So I now look for a worse issue for thee, for thou wilt find
Grendel fiercer in battle than was Breca, if thou darest await him
this night."
Beowulf's brow flushed with anger as he replied haughtily: "Much hast
thou spoken, friend Hunferth, concerning Breca and our swimming
contest; but belike thou art drunken, for wrongly hast thou told the
tale. A youthful folly of ours it was, when we two boasted and
challenged each other to risk our lives in the ocean; that indeed we
did. Naked swords we bore in our hands as we swam, to defend ourselves
against the sea-monsters, and we floated together, neither
outdistancing the other, for five days, when a storm drove us apart.
Cold were the surging waves, bitter the north wind, rough was the
swelling flood, under the darkening shades of night. Yet this was not
the worst: the sea-monsters, excited by the raging tempest, rushed at
me with their deadly tusks and bore me to the abyss. Well was it then
for me that I wore my well-woven ring-mail, and had my keen sword in
hand; with point and edge I fought the deadly beasts, and killed them.
Many a time the hosts of monsters bore me to the ocean-bottom, but I
slew numbers among them, and thus we battled all the night, until in
the morning came light from the east, and I could see the windy cliffs
along the shore, and the bodies of the slain sea-beasts floating on
the surge. Nine there were of them, for Wyrd is gracious to the man
who is valiant and unafraid. Never have I heard of a sterner
conflict, nor a more unhappy warrior lost in the waters; yet I saved
my life, and landed on the shores of Finland. Breca wrought not so
mightily as I, nor have I heard of such warlike deeds on thy part,
even though thou, O Hunferth, didst murder thy brothers and nearest
kinsmen.
"Truly I say to thee, O son of Ecglaf bold,
Grendel the grisly fiend ne'er dared have wrought
So many miseries, such shame and anguish dire,
To thy lord, Hrothgar old, in his bright Heorot,
Hadst thou shown valiant mood, sturdy and battle-fierce,
As thou now boastest."
[Illustration: Beowulf replies haughtily to Hunferth]
Very wroth was Hunferth over the reminder of his former wrongdoing and
the implied accusation of cowardice, but he had brought it on himself
by his unwise belittling of Beowulf's feat, and the applause of both
Danes and Geats showed him that he dared no further attack the
champion; he had to endure in silence Beowulf's boast that he and his
Geats would that night await Grendel in the hall, and surprise him
terribly, since the fiend had ceased to expect any resistance from the
warlike Danes. The feast continued, with laughter and melody, with
song and boast, until the door from the women's bower, in the upper
end of the hall, opened suddenly, and Hrothgar's wife, the fair and
gracious Queen Wealhtheow, entered. The tumult lulled for a short
space, and the queen, pouring mead into a goblet, presented it to her
husband; joyfully he received and drank it. Then she poured mead or
ale for each man, and in due course came to Beowulf,
|
in possession of the same sites for countless generations, that the
primitive character of heathen traditions is most pronounced and has most
directly determined and influenced the cult and the legends of
women-saints.
Besides the reminiscences of the early period which have survived in saint
legend, traditions and customs of the same period have lived on in the
worship of the Virgin Mary. The worship of the Virgin Mary was but
slightly developed in Romanised Gaul and Keltic Britain, but from the
beginning of the sixth century it is a marked feature in the popular creed
in those countries where the German element prevailed.
As Mrs Jameson says in her book on the legends of the Madonna: ‘It is
curious to observe, as the worship of the Virgin mother expanded and
gathered in itself the relics of many an ancient faith, how the new and
the old elements, some of them apparently most heterogeneous, became
amalgamated and were combined into the earlier forms of art...[12].’
Indeed the prominence given to the Virgin is out of all proportion to the
meagre mention of her in the gospels. During the early Christian period
she was largely worshipped as a patron saint in France, England and
Germany, and her fame continued steadily increasing with the centuries
till its climax was reached in the Middle Ages, which witnessed the
greatest concessions made by the Church to the demands of popular faith.
According to Rhys[13] many churches dedicated to Mary were built on spots
where tradition speaks of the discovery of a wooden image, probably a
heathen statue which was connected with her.
In the seventh century Pope Sergius (687-701) expressly ordered that the
festivals of the Virgin Mary were to take place on heathen holy days in
order that heathen celebrations might become associated with her[14]. The
festivals of the Virgin to this day are associated with pilgrimages, the
taste for which to the Frenchman of the Middle Ages appeared peculiarly
German. The chronicler Froissart, writing about 1390, remarks ‘for the
Germans are fond of performing pilgrimages and it is one of their
customs[15].’
Mary then, under her own name, or under the vaguer appellation of _Our
Lady_ (Unser liebe frau, Notre Dame, de heilige maagd), assimilated
surviving traditions of the heathen faith which were largely reminiscences
of the mother-age; so that Mary became the heiress of mother-divinities,
and her worship was associated with cave, and tree, and fountain, and
hill-top, all sites of the primitive cult.
‘Often,’ says Menzel[16], ‘a wonder-working picture of the Madonna is
found hung on a tree or inside a tree; hence numerous appellations like
“Our dear Lady of the Oak,” “Our dear Lady of the Linden-tree,” etc. Often
at the foot of the tree, upon which such a picture is hung, a fountain
flows to which miraculous power is ascribed.’
In the Tyrol we hear of pictures which have been discovered floating in a
fountain or which were borne to the bank by a river[17].
As proof of the Virgin Mary’s connection with festivals, we find her name
associated in Belgium with many pageants held on the first of May.
Throughout German lands the Assumption of the Virgin comes at the harvest
festival, and furnishes an occasion for some pilgrimage or fair which
preserves many peculiar and perplexing traits of an earlier civilization.
The harvest festival is coupled in some parts of Germany with customs
that are of extreme antiquity. In Bavaria the festival sometimes goes by
the name of the ‘day of sacred herbs,’ _kräuterweihtag_; near Würzburg it
is called the ‘day of sacred roots,’ _würzelweihtag_, or ‘day of
bunch-gathering,’ _büschelfrauentag_[18]. In the Tyrol the 15th of August
is the great day of the Virgin, _grosse frauentag_, when a collection of
herbs for medicinal purposes is made. A number of days, _frauentage_, come
in July and August and are now connected with the Virgin, on which herbs
are collected and offered as sacred bunches either on the altar of Our
Lady in church and chapel, or on hill-tops which throughout Germany are
the sites of ancient woman-worship[19]. This collecting and offering of
herbs points to a stage even more primitive than that represented by
offerings of grain at the harvest festival.
In a few instances the worship of Mary is directly coupled with that of
some heathen divinity. In Antwerp to this day an ancient idol of peculiar
appearance is preserved, which women, who are desirous of becoming
mothers, decorate with flowers at certain times of the year. Its heathen
appellation is lost, but above it now stands a figure of the Virgin[20].
Again we find the name of Mary joined to that of the heathen goddess Sif.
In the Eiffel district, extending between the rivers Rhine, Meuse and
Mosel, a church stands dedicated to Mariasif, the name of Mary being
coupled with that of Sif, a woman-divinity of the German heathen pantheon,
whom Grimm characterizes as a giver of rain[21]. The name Mariahilf, a
similar combination, is frequently found in south Germany, the name of
Mary as we hope to show further down being joined to that of a goddess who
has survived in the Christian saint Hilp[22].
These examples will suffice to show the close connection between the
conceptions of heathendom and popular Christianity, and how the cloak of
heathen association has fallen on the shoulders of the saints of the
Christian Church. The authorities at Rome saw no occasion to take
exception to its doing so. Pope Gregorius II. (590-604) in a letter
addressed to Melitus of Canterbury expressly urged that the days of
heathen festival should receive solemnity through dedication to some holy
martyr[23]. The Christian saint whose name was substituted for that of
some heathen divinity readily assimilated associations of the early
period. Scriptural characters and Christian teachers were given the
emblems of older divinities and assumed their characteristics. But the
varying nature of the same saint in different countries has hardly
received due attention. St Peter of the early British Church was very
different from St Peter who in Bavaria walked the earth like clumsy
good-natured Thor, or from St Peter who in Rome took the place of Mars as
protector of the city. Similarly the legends currently told of the same
saint in different countries exhibit markedly different traits.
For the transition from heathendom to Christianity was the work not of
years but of centuries; the claims made by religion changed, but the
underlying conceptions for a long time remained unaltered. Customs which
had once taken a divine sanction continued to be viewed under a religious
aspect, though they were often at variance with the newly-introduced
faith. The craving for local divinities in itself was heathen; in course
of time the cult of the saints altogether re-moulded the Christianity of
Christ. But the Church of Rome, far from opposing the multitude of those
through whom the folk sought intercession with the Godhead, opened her
arms wide to all.
At the outset it lay with the local dignitary to recognise or reject the
names which the folk held in veneration. Religious settlements and Church
centres regulated days and seasons according to the calendar of the chief
festivals of the year, as accepted by the Church at Rome; but the local
dignitary was at liberty to add further names to the list at his
discretion. For centuries there was no need of canonisation to elevate an
individual to the rank of saint; the inscribing of his name on a local
calendar was sufficient. Local calendars went on indefinitely swelling the
list of saintly names till the Papal See felt called upon to
interfere[24]. Since the year 1153 the right to declare a person a saint
has lain altogether with the authorities at Rome[25].
Considering the circumstances under which the peoples of German race
first came into contact with Christianity, it is well to recall the fact
that a busy Church life had grown up in many of the cities north of the
Alps, which were centres of the Roman system of administration previous to
the upheaval and migration of German heathen tribes, which began in the
fourth century. Legend has preserved stories of the apostles and their
disciples wandering northwards and founding early bishoprics along the
Rhine, in Gaul and in Britain[26]. The massacres of Christians in the
reign of Diocletian cannot be altogether fabulous; but after the year 313,
when Constantine at Rome officially accepted the new faith, until the
German invasion, the position of Christianity was well secured.
A certain development of monastic life had accompanied its spread. In
western Gaul we hear of Martin of Tours († 400) who, after years of
military service and religious persecution, settled near Poitiers and drew
about him many who joined him in a round of devotion and work. The
monastic, or rather cœnobite, settlement of his time consisted of a number
of wattled cells or huts, surrounded by a trench or a wall of earth. The
distinction between the earlier word, _coenobium_, and the later word,
_monasterium_, as used in western Europe, lies in this, that the
_coenobium_ designates the assembled worshippers alone, while the
monastery presupposes the possession of a definite site of land[27]. In
this sense the word monastery is as fitly applied to settlements ruled by
women as to those ruled by men, especially during the early period when
these settlements frequently include members of both sexes. St Martin of
Tours is also credited with having founded congregations of religious
women[28], but I have found nothing definite concerning them.
Our knowledge of the Christian life of the British is very limited;
presumably the religious settlement was a school both of theology and of
learning, and no line of distinction divided the settlements of priests
from those of monks. From Gildas, a British writer, who at the time of the
Anglo-Saxon invasion (c. 560) wrote a stern invective against the
irreligious ways of his countrymen, we gather that women lived under the
direction of priests, but it is not clear whether they were vowed to
continence[29]. But as far as I am aware, there is no evidence
forthcoming that before the Saxon invasion women lived in separate
religious establishments, the rule of which was in the hands of one of
their own sex[30].
The convent is of later date. During the early centuries of established
Christianity the woman who takes the vow of continence secures the
protection of the Church but does not necessarily leave her
home-surroundings.
Thus Ambrosius, archbishop of Milan († 397), one of the most influential
supporters of early Christianity, greatly inflamed women’s zeal for a
celibate life. But in the writings of Ambrosius, which treat of virginity,
there is no suggestion that the widow or the maiden who vows continence
shall seek seclusion or solitude[31]. Women vowed to continence moved
about freely, secure through their connection with the Church from
distasteful unions which their relatives might otherwise force upon them.
Their only distinctive mark was the use of a veil.
Similarly we find Hilarius († 369), bishop of Poitiers, addressing a
letter to his daughter Abra on the beauties of the unmarried state. In
this he assures her, that if she be strong enough to renounce an earthly
bridegroom, together with gay and splendid apparel, a priceless pearl
shall fall to her share[32]. But in this letter also there is no
suggestion that the woman who embraces religion should dwell apart from
her family. It is well to bear this in mind, for after the acceptance of
Christianity by the peoples of German race, we occasionally hear of women
who, though vowed to religion, move about freely among their fellows; but
Church councils and synods began to urge more and more emphatically that
this was productive of evil, and that a woman who had taken the religious
vow must be a member of a convent.
To sum up;--the peoples of German race, at the time of their contact with
Christianity, were in a state of social development which directly
affected the form in which they accepted the new faith and the
institutions to which such acceptance gave rise. Some branches of the
race, deserting the land of their birth, came into contact with peoples
of Latin origin, and embraced Christianity under a form which excluded
monasticism, and soon lost their identity as Germans. Others, as the
Franks and Anglo-Saxons, giving up the worship of their heathen gods,
accepted orthodox Christianity, and favoured the mode of life of those who
followed peaceful pursuits in the monastery, pursuits which their wives
especially were eager to embrace. Again, those peoples who remained in
possession of their earlier homes largely preserved usages dating from a
primitive period of tribal organization, usages which affected the
position of their women and determined the character of their
women-saints. It is to Germany proper that we must go for the
woman-priestess who lives on longest as the witch, and for the loose women
who most markedly retain special rights and privileges. And it is also in
Germany proper that we find the woman-saint who is direct successor to the
tribal mother-goddess.
§ 2. The Tribal Goddess as a Christian Saint.
Before considering the beginnings of convent life as the work of women
whose existence rests on a firm historic basis, we must enquire into the
nature of women-saints. From the earliest times of established
Christianity the lives of men and women who were credited with special
holiness have formed a favourite theme of religious narratives, which were
intended to keep their memory green and to impress the devout with
thoughts of their saintliness.
The Acts of the Saints, the comprehensive collection of which is now in
course of publication under the auspices of the Bollandists, form a most
important branch of literature. They include some of the most valuable
material for a history of the first ten centuries of our era, and give a
most instructive insight into the drift of Christianity in different
epochs. The aims, experiences and sufferings of Christian heroes and
heroines inspired the student and fired the imagination of the poet. Prose
narrative told of their lives, poems were written in their praise, and
hymns were composed to be sung at the celebration of their office. The
godly gained confidence from the perusal of such compositions, and the
people hearing them read or sung were impressed in favour of Christian
doctrine.
The number of men and women whom posterity has glorified as saints is
legion. Besides the characters of the accepted and the apocryphal gospels,
there are the numerous early converts to Christianity who suffered for
their faith, and all those who during early Christian times turned their
energies to practising and preaching the tenets of the new religion, and
to whose memory a loving recollection paid the tribute of superstitious
reverence. Their successors in the work of Christianity accepted them as
patron saints and added their names to the list of those to whose memory
special days were dedicated. Many of them are individuals whose activity
in the cause of Christianity is well authenticated. Friends have enlarged
on their work, contemporary history refers to their existence, and often
they have themselves left writings, which give an insight into their
lives. They are the early and true saints of history, on whose shoulders
in some cases the cloak of heathen association has fallen, but without
interfering with their great and lasting worth.
But besides those who were canonised for their enthusiasm in the cause of
early Christianity, the Acts of the Saints mention a number of men and
women who enjoy local reverence, but of whose actual existence during
Christian times evidence is wanting. Among them are a certain number of
women with whom the present chapter purposes to deal, women who are
locally worshipped as saints, and whose claims to holiness are generally
recognised, but whose existence during Christian times is hypothetical.
Their legends contain a small, in some cases a scarcely sensible, basis of
historic fact, and their cult preserves traits which are pre-Christian,
often anti-Christian, in character.
The traveller Blunt, during a stay in Italy in the beginning of this
century, was struck with the many points which modern saints and ancient
gods have in common. He gives a description of the festival of St Agatha
at Catania, of which he was an eye-witness, and which to this day, as I
have been told, continues little changed. The festival, as Blunt describes
it, opened with a horse-race, which he knew from Ovid was one of the
spectacles of the festival of the goddess Ceres; and further he witnessed
a mummery and the carrying about of huge torches, both of which he also
knew formed part of the old pagan festival. But more remarkable than this
was a great procession which began in the evening and lasted into the
night; hundreds of citizens crowded to draw through the town a ponderous
car, on which were placed the image of the saint and her relics, which the
priests exhibited to the ringing of bells. Among these relics were the
veil of Agatha, to which is ascribed the power of staying the eruption of
Mount Aetna, and the breasts of the saint, which were torn off during her
martyrdom[33]. Catania, Blunt knew, had always been famous for the worship
of Ceres, and the ringing of bells and a veil were marked features of her
festivals, the greater and the lesser Eleusinia. Menzel tells us that huge
breasts were carried about on the occasion[34]. Further, Blunt heard that
two festivals took place yearly in Catania in honour of Agatha; one early
in the spring, the other in the autumn, exactly corresponding to the time
when the greater and lesser Eleusinia were celebrated. Even the name
Agatha seemed but a taking over into the new religion of a name sacred to
the old. Ceres was popularly addressed as _Bona Dea_, and the name Agatha,
which does not occur as a proper name during ancient times, seemed but a
translation of the Latin epithet into Greek.
The legend of Agatha as contained in the _Acta Sanctorum_ places her
existence in the third century and gives full details concerning her
parentage, her trials and her martyrdom; but I have not been able to
ascertain when it was written. Agatha is the chief saint of the district
all about Catania, and we are told that her fame penetrated at an early
date into Italy and Greece[35].
It is of course impossible actually to disprove the existence of a
Christian maiden Agatha in Catania in the third century. Some may incline
to the view that such a maiden did exist, and that a strange likeness
between her experiences and name on the one hand, and the cult of and
epithet applied to Ceres on the other, led to the popular worship of her
instead of the ancient goddess. The question of her existence as a
Christian maiden during Christian times can only be answered by a balance
of probabilities. Our opinion of the truth or falsehood of the traditions
concerning her rests on inference, and the conclusion at which we arrive
upon the evidence must largely depend on the attitude of mind in which we
approach the subject.
The late Professor Robertson Smith has insisted that myths are latter-day
inventions which profess to explain surviving peculiarities of ritual. If
this be so, we hold in the Eleusinia a clue to the incidents of the Agatha
legend. The story for example of her veil, which remained untouched by the
flames when she was burnt, may be a popular myth which tries to account
for the presence of the veil at the festival. The incident of the breasts
torn off during martyrdom was invented to account for the presence of
these strange symbols.
Instances of this kind could be indefinitely multiplied. Let the reader,
who wishes to pursue the subject on classic soil, examine the name, the
legend and the emblem of St Agnes, virgin martyr of Rome, who is reputed
to have lived in the third century and whose cult is well established in
the fourth; let him enquire into the name, legend and associations of St
Rosalia of Palermo, invoked as a protectress from the plague, of whom no
mention occurs till four centuries after her reputed existence[36].
I have chosen Agatha as a starting point for the present enquiry, because
there is much evidence to hand of the prevalence of mother-deities in
pre-Christian Sicily, and because the examination of German saint-legend
and saint-worship leads to analogous results. In Germany too the mother
divinity of heathendom seems to survive in the virgin saint; and in
Germany virgin saints, in attributes, cult and name, exhibit peculiarities
which it seems impossible to explain save on the hypothesis that
traditions of the heathen past survive in them. So much is associated with
them which is pre-Christian, even anti-Christian in character, that it
seems legitimate to speak of them as pseudo-saints.
I own it is not always possible to distinguish between the historical
saint and the pseudo-saint. Sometimes data are wanting to disprove the
statements made by the legend-writer about time and place; sometimes
information is not forthcoming about local traditions and customs, which
might make a suggestive trait in saint-legend stand out in its full
meaning. In some cases also, owing to a coincidence of name, fictitious
associations have become attached to a real personage. But these cases I
believe are comparatively few. As a general rule it holds good that a
historical saint will be readily associated with miraculous powers, but
not with profane and anti-Christian usages. Where the latter occur it is
probable that no evidence will be forthcoming of the saint’s actual
existence during Christian times. If she represents a person who ever
existed at all, such a person must have lived in a far-distant heathen
past, at a time which had nothing in common with Christian teaching and
with Christian tenets.
There is this further peculiarity about the woman pseudo-saint of Germany,
that she is especially the saint of the peasantry; so that we rarely hear
more of her than perhaps her name till centuries after her reputed
existence. Early writers of history and biography have failed to chronicle
her doings. Indeed we do not hear of her at all till we hear of her cult
as one of long standing or of great importance.
It is only when the worship of such saints, who in the eyes of the common
folk are the chief glory of their respective districts, attracts the
attention of the Church, that the legend-writer sets to work to write
their legends. He begins by ascribing to the holder of a venerated name
human parentage and human experiences, he collects and he blends the local
traditions associated with the saint on a would-be historical background,
and makes a story which frequently offers a curious mixture of the
Christian and the profane. Usually he places the saint’s existence in the
earliest period of Christianity; sometimes at a time when Christianity was
unknown in the neighbourhood where she is the object of reverence.
Moreover all these saints are patronesses of women in their times of
special trial. Their cult generally centres round a cave, a fountain of
peculiar power, a tree, or some other site of primitive woman-worship.
Frequently they are connected with some peculiar local custom which
supplies the clue to incidents introduced by the legend-writer. And even
when the clue is wanting, it is sometimes possible to understand one
legend by reading it in the light of another. Obscure as the parallels are
in some cases, in others they are strikingly clear.
The recognised holiness of the woman pseudo-saint is in no way determined
by the limit of bishopric and diocese; she is worshipped within
geographical limits, but within limits which have not been marked out by
the Church. It was mentioned above that separate districts of Germany, or
rather tribes occupying such districts, clung to a belief in protective
mother-goddesses (Gaumütter). Possibly, where the name of a pseudo-saint
is found localised in contiguous districts, this may afford a clue to the
migration of tribes.
The _Acta Sanctorum_ give information concerning a large number of
pseudo-saints, but this information to be read in its true light needs to
be supplemented by further details of local veneration and cult. Such
details are found in older books of devotion, and in modern books on
mythology and folk-lore. Modern religious writers, who treat of these
saints, are in the habit of leaving out or of slurring over all details
which suggest profanity. Compared with older legends, modern accounts of
the saints are limp and colourless, and share the weak sentimentality,
which during the last few centuries has come to pervade the conceptions
of Catholic Christianity as represented in pictorial art.
The names of a number of women whom the people hold in veneration have
escaped the attention of the compilers of the _Acta Sanctorum_, or else
they have been purposely passed over because their possessors were held
unworthy of the rank of saint. But the stories locally told of them are
worth attention, and the more so because they throw an additional light on
the stories of recognised saints.
The larger number of recognised pseudo-saints are found in the districts
into which Christianity spread as a religion of peace, or in remoter
districts where the power of the Church was less immediately felt. They
are found most often north of the Danube and east of the Rhine, especially
in the lake districts of Bavaria and Switzerland, in the marshy wilds of
the Low Countries, and in the remote forest regions of the Ardennes, the
Black Forest, the Spessart or the Vosges. Where Christianity was
established as the result of political subjection, as for example among
the Saxons, the woman pseudo-saint is hardly found at all. Perhaps the
heathenism of the Saxons differed from the heathenism of other German
folk; perhaps, like the Anglo-Saxons in England, the Saxons were
conquerors of the land they inhabited and by moving out of their old homes
had lost their local associations and their primitive cult. But, however
this may be, it is not where Christianity advanced at the point of the
lance, but in the districts where its spread was due to detached efforts
of missionaries, that the woman pseudo-saint is most frequently met with.
Wandering away into forest wilds, where scattered clearings lay like
islets in an ocean, the missionary sought a retreat remote from the
interference of government, remote also from the interference of the
episcopate, where he could realise his hope of living a worthier life.
Naturally his success largely depended on his securing the goodwill of the
people in whose neighbourhood he settled. He was obliged to adapt himself
to their mode of thought if he would win favour for his faith, and to
realise their views if he wished to modify them in the direction of his
own. To bridge over the abyss which separated his standard of life from
theirs, he was bound to defer whenever he could to their sentiments and to
their conceptions of holiness.
How far these holy men ignored, how far they countenanced, the worship of
local divinities, necessarily remains an open question. Rightly or
wrongly popular tradition readily coupled the names of these early
Christians with those of its favourite women-saints.
Thus Willibrord, the Anglo-Saxon missionary who settled abroad in the
eighth century, is said to have taken up and translated relics of the
woman-saint Cunera and to have recognised her claim to veneration; her
cult is localised in various places near Utrecht. The life of Willibrord
(† 739), written by Alcuin († 804), contains no mention of Cunera, for the
information we have concerning Willibrord’s interest in her is to be found
in the account of her life written centuries later[37]. This account
offers such a picturesque medley of chronological impossibilities that the
commentators of the _Acta Sanctorum_ have entirely recast it.
The gist of the legend as told in the beginning of the 14th century is as
follows[38]. Cunera was among the virgin companions of St Ursula, and the
date of her murder, near Cöln, is given as 387, or as 449. Before the
murder Cunera was borne away from Cöln by King Radbod of Friesland, who
covered her with his cloak, an ancient symbolic form of appropriation.
Arrived at Renen he entrusted her with the keys of his kingdom, which
incensed his wedded wife to such an extent that she caused Cunera to be
strangled and the body hidden away. But the site where the saint lay was
miraculously pointed out, and the wicked queen went mad and destroyed
herself. In vain we ask why a king of the Frisians, who persistently clung
to their heathendom, should be interested in a Christian virgin and carry
her off to preside over his household, and in vain we look for the
assertion or for the proof that Cunera was a Christian at all. The _Acta
Sanctorum_ reject the connection between Cunera and St Ursula of Cöln, but
the writer Kist, who considers her to have been a real Christian
individual, argues in favour of it. In the 12th century we find a certain
Adelheid swearing to the rightfulness of her cause on the relics of St
Cunera at Renen[39].
Similarly the story goes that Agilfrid, abbot of the monastery of St Bavon
in Flanders, afterwards bishop of Liège (765-787), about the year 754
acquired the relics of the woman-saint Pharaildis and brought them to
Ghent[40]. When the Northmen ravaged Flanders in 846 the bones of
Pharaildis were among those carried away to St Omer by the Christians as
their most valued possession, and in 939 they were brought back to
Ghent[41].
The legend of Pharaildis gives no clue to the Christian interest in her,
nor to the veneration of her, which is localised at Ghent, Hamm,
Steenockerzeel, and Loo. We hear that she was married against her
inclination, that she cured her husband who was a huntsman of a wound, and
that after his death she dwelt in solitude to an advanced age, and that
occasionally she wrought miracles. Further, in popular belief, she crossed
the water dryshod, she chased away geese from the corn, and she struck the
ground and the holy fountain at Bruay welled up for the benefit of the
harvesters--incidents which are not peculiar to her legend. The festival
of Pharaildis is kept on different dates at Ghent, Cambray, Maastricht and
Breda. At Ghent it is associated with a celebrated fair, the occasion for
great rejoicings among the populace. At the church of Steenockerzeel
stones of conical shape are kept which are carried round the altar on her
festival[42], in the same way as stones are kept elsewhere and considered
by some writers to be symbols of an ancient phallic cult. The legend
explains the presence of these stones by telling how the saint one day was
surreptitiously giving loaves to the poor, when her act would have been
discovered but that by intercession the loaves were transformed into
stones. This incident, the transformation of gifts secretly given to the
poor, is introduced into the legends of other women-saints, but only in
this case have I found it mentioned that the transformed food was
preserved. We shall have occasion to return to Pharaildis, whose legend
and cult offer nothing to support the view that she was an early
Christian.
There are numerous instances of a like connection between holy missionary
and woman pseudo-saint. A fair example is yielded by Leodgar (St Léger)
bishop of Autun († 678), a well-defined historical personality[43], whom
tradition makes into a near relative of Odilia, a saint widely venerated,
but whose reputed foundation of the monastery on the Hohenburg modern
criticism utterly discards[44].
But it is not only Christian missionaries who are associated with these
women-saints. Quite a number of saints have been brought into connection
with the house of the Karlings, and frequently Karl the Great himself
figures in the stories told of them. I do not presume to decide whether
the legendary accounts of these women are pure invention; some historic
truth may be embodied in the stories told of them. But judging by the
material at hand we are justified in disputing the existence of St Ida,
who is said to have been the wife of Pippin of Landen and ancestress of
the Karlings on the sole authority of the life of St Gertrud, her
daughter. This work was long held to be contemporary, but its earliest
date is now admitted to be the 11th century[45]. It is less easy to cast
discredit on the existence of the saints Amalberga, the one a virgin
saint, the other a widow, whom hagiologists find great difficulty in
distinguishing. Pharaildis, mentioned above, and the saints Ermelindis,
Reinildis and Gudila, are said to be Amalberga’s daughters, but together
with other saints of Hainault and Brabant they are very obviously
pseudo-saints. The idea of bringing Karl the Great into some relation with
them may have arisen from a twofold desire to justify traditions
concerning them and to magnify the Emperor’s importance.
In this connection it seems worth while to quote the passage in which
Grimm[46] describes the characteristic traits of the German goddess in his
German Mythology, and to consider how these traits are more or less
pronounced in the women we have called pseudo-saints.
‘It seems well,’ he says, in the opening of his chapter on goddesses, ‘to
treat of goddesses collectively as well as individually, since a common
conception underlies them all, which will thus stand out the more clearly.
They are conceived essentially as divine mothers, _travelling about_ and
_visiting mortals_, from whom mankind learn the ways and arts of
housekeeping and tilth: _spinning_, _weaving_, _guarding the hearth_,
_sowing_ and _reaping_’ (the italics are his).
The tendency of the goddess to wander from place to place is reflected in
many women pseudo-saints who are represented in their legends as
inhabiting at various periods of their lives different parts of the
district in which they are the object of veneration. Verena of northern
Switzerland dwelt first at Solothurn, where a cave, which was her
dwelling-place, is now transformed into a chapel. Later she took boat to
the place where the Aar, Reuss and Limmat meet, where she dwelt in
solitude, and her memory is preserved at a spot called the cell of Verena
(Verenazell). Later still she went to dwell at Zurzach, a place which was
celebrated for a fair, called Verena’s fair, of which more anon. All these
places are on or near the river Aar, at no inconsiderable distance from
each other. The legend, as told by Stadler, takes them all into account,
explaining how Verena came to be connected with each[47].
Similarly the legend of the saint Odilia[48], referred to above in
connection with the Hohenburg, explains how the saint comes to be
worshipped on both sides of the Rhine, a cruel father having driven her
away from home. On the eastern side of the river there is a hill of St
Odilia, Odilienberg, where there is a fountain which for its healing
powers is visited twice a year and the site of which is guarded by a
hermit. At Scherweiler there is also a site hallowed to her worship, and
local tradition explains that she stayed there as a child; according to
another version she was discovered floating in a wooden chest on the
water[49]. Finally she is said to have settled on the Hohenburg west of
the Rhine and to have founded a monastery. The critic Roth has written an
admirable article on Odilia and the monastery of Hohenburg. He shows that
the monastery was ancient and that at first it was dedicated to Christ and
St Peter, though afterwards their names were supplanted by that of St
Odilia[50]. Here, as on the other side of the Rhine, the folk celebrate
her festival by pilgrimages to a fountain which has miraculous healing
power, and by giving reverence to a sacred stone, on which Odilia is said
to have knelt so long in prayer for
|
, 'Matter, Exel! There's a devil of a business!
For mercy's sake, come up!'”
“Well?”
“Mr. Exel thereupon joined us at the door of this flat.”
“Was it open?”
“Yes. Mr. Leroux had rushed up to me, leaving the door open behind him.
The light was out, both in the lobby and in the study, a fact upon which
I commented at the time. It was all the more curious as Mr. Leroux had
left both lights on!”...
“Did he say so?”
“He did. The circumstances surprised him to a marked degree. We came in
and I turned up the light in the lobby. Then Leroux, entering the
study, turned up the light there, too. I entered next, followed by Mr.
Exel--and we saw the body lying where you see it now.”
“Who saw it first?”
“Mr. Leroux; he drew my attention to it, saying that he had left her
lying on the chesterfield and NOT upon the floor.”
“You examined her?”
“I did. She was dead, but still warm. She exhibited signs of recent
illness, and of being addicted to some drug habit; probably morphine.
This, beyond doubt, contributed to her death, but the direct cause was
asphyxiation. She had been strangled!”
“My God!” groaned Leroux, dropping his face into his hands.
“You found marks on her throat?”
“The marks were very slight. No great pressure was required in her weak
condition.”
“You did not move the body?”
“Certainly not; a more complete examination must be made, of course. But
I extracted a piece of torn paper from her clenched right hand.”
Inspector Dunbar lowered his tufted brows.
“I'm not glad to know you did that,” he said. “It should have been
left.”
“It was done on the spur of the moment, but without altering the
position of the hand or arm. The paper lies upon the table, yonder.”
Inspector Dunbar took a long drink. Thus far he had made no attempt
to examine the victim. Pulling out a bulging note-case from the inside
pocket of his blue serge coat, he unscrewed a fountain-pen, carefully
tested the nib upon his thumb nail, and made three or four brief
entries. Then, stretching out one long arm, he laid the wallet and
the pen beside his glass upon the top of a bookcase, without otherwise
changing his position, and glancing aside at Exel, said:--
“Now, Mr. Exel, what help can you give us?”
“I have little to add to Dr. Cumberly's account,” answered Exel,
offhandedly. “The whole thing seemed to me”...
“What it seemed,” interrupted Dunbar, “does not interest Scotland Yard,
Mr. Exel, and won't interest the jury.”
Leroux glanced up for a moment, then set his teeth hard, so that his jaw
muscles stood out prominently under the pallid skin.
“What do you want to know, then?” asked Exel.
“I will be wanting to know,” said Dunbar, “where you were coming from,
to-night?”
“From the House of Commons.”
“You came direct?”
“I left Sir Brian Malpas at the corner of Victoria Street at four
minutes to twelve by Big Ben, and walked straight home, actually
entering here, from the street, as the clock was chiming the last stroke
of midnight.”
“Then you would have walked up the street from an easterly direction?”
“Certainly.”
“Did you meet any one or anything?”
“A taxi-cab, empty--for the hood was lowered--passed me as I turned the
corner. There was no other vehicle in the street, and no person.”
“You don't know from which door the cab came?”
“As I turned the corner,” replied Exel, “I heard the man starting his
engine, although when I actually saw the cab, it was in motion; but
judging by the sound to which I refer, the cab had been stationary,
if not at the door of Palace Mansions, certainly at that of the next
block--St. Andrew's Mansions.”
“Did you hear, or see anything else?”
“I saw nothing whatever. But just as I approached the street door, I
heard a peculiar whistle, apparently proceeding from the gardens in the
center of the square. I attached no importance to it at the time.”
“What kind of whistle?”
“I have forgotten the actual notes, but the effect was very odd in some
way.”
“In what way?”
“An impression of this sort is not entirely reliable, Inspector; but it
struck me as Oriental.”
“Ah!” said Dunbar, and reached out the long arm for his notebook.
“Can I be of any further assistance?” said Exel, glancing at his watch.
“You had entered the hall-way and were about to enter your own flat when
the voices of Dr. Cumberly and Mr. Leroux attracted your attention?”
“I actually had the key in my hand,” replied Exel.
“Did you actually have the key in the lock?”
“Let me think,” mused Exel, and he took out a bunch of keys and dangled
them, reflectively, before his eyes. “No! I was fumbling for the right
key when I heard the voices above me.”
“But were you facing your door?”
“No,” averred Exel, perceiving the drift of the inspector's inquiries;
“I was facing the stairway the whole time, and although it was in
darkness, there is a street lamp immediately outside on the pavement,
and I can swear, positively, that no one descended; that there was no
one in the hall nor on the stair, except Mr. Leroux and Dr. Cumberly.”
“Ah!” said Dunbar again, and made further entries in his book. “I need
not trouble you further, sir. Good night!”
Exel, despite his earlier attitude of boredom, now ignored this official
dismissal, and, tossing the stump of his cigar into the grate, lighted a
cigarette, and with both hands thrust deep in his pockets, stood leaning
back against the mantelpiece. The detective turned to Leroux.
“Have a brandy-and-soda?” suggested Dr. Cumberly, his eyes turned upon
the pathetic face of the novelist.
But Leroux shook his head, wearily.
“Go ahead, Inspector!” he said. “I am anxious to tell you all I know.
God knows I am anxious to tell you.”
A sound was heard of a key being inserted in the lock of a door.
Four pairs of curious eyes were turned toward the entrance lobby, when
the door opened, and a sleek man of medium height, clean shaven, but
with his hair cut low upon the cheek bones, so as to give the impression
of short side-whiskers, entered in a manner at once furtive and servile.
He wore a black overcoat and a bowler hat. Reclosing the door, he
turned, perceived the group in the study, and fell back as though
someone had struck him a fierce blow.
Abject terror was written upon his features, and, for a moment, the idea
of flight appeared to suggest itself urgently to him; but finally, he
took a step forward toward the study.
“Who's this?” snapped Dunbar, without removing his leonine eyes from the
newcomer.
“It is Soames,” came the weary voice of Leroux.
“Butler?”
“Yes.”
“Where's he been?”
“I don't know. He remained out without my permission.”
“He did, eh?”
Inspector Dunbar thrust forth a long finger at the shrinking form in the
doorway.
“Mr. Soames,” he said, “you will be going to your own room and waiting
there until I ring for you.”
“Yes, sir,” said Soames, holding his hat in both bands, and speaking
huskily. “Yes, sir: certainly, sir.”
He crossed the lobby and disappeared.
“There is no other way out, is there?” inquired the detective, glancing
at Dr. Cumberly.
“There is no other way,” was the reply; “but surely you don't
suspect”...
“I would suspect the Archbishop of Westminster,” snapped Dunbar, “if
he came in like that! Now, sir,”--he turned to Leroux--“you were alone,
here, to-night?”
“Quite alone, Inspector. The truth is, I fear, that my servants take
liberties in the absence of my wife.”
“In the absence of your wife? Where is your wife?”
“She is in Paris.”
“Is she a Frenchwoman?”
“No! oh, no! But my wife is a painter, you understand, and--er--I met
her in Paris--er--... Must you insist upon these--domestic particulars,
Inspector?”
“If Mr. Exel is anxious to turn in,” replied the inspector, “after his
no doubt exhausting duties at the House, and if Dr. Cumberly--”
“I have no secrets from Cumberly!” interjected Leroux. “The doctor
has known me almost from boyhood, but--er--” turning to the
politician--“don't you know, Exel--no offense, no offense”...
“My dear Leroux,” responded Exel hastily, “I am the offender! Permit me
to wish you all good night.”
He crossed the study, and, at the door, paused and turned.
“Rely upon me, Leroux,” he said, “to help in any way within my power.”
He crossed the lobby, opened the outer door, and departed.
“Now, Mr. Leroux,” resumed Dunbar, “about this matter of your wife's
absence.”
IV
A WINDOW IS OPENED
Whilst Henry Leroux collected his thoughts, Dr. Cumberly glanced across
at the writing-table where lay the fragment of paper which had been
clutched in the dead woman's hand, then turned his head again toward the
inspector, staring at him curiously. Since Dunbar had not yet attempted
even to glance at the strange message, he wondered what had prompted the
present line of inquiry.
“My wife,” began Leroux, “shared a studio in Paris, at the time that I
met her, with an American lady a very talented portrait painter--er--a
Miss Denise Ryland. You may know her name?--but of course, you don't,
no! Well, my wife is, herself, quite clever with her brush; in fact she
has exhibited more than once at the Paris Salon. We agreed at--er--the
time of our--of our--engagement, that she should be free to visit her
old artistic friends in Paris at any time. You understand? There was to
be no let or hindrance.... Is this really necessary, Inspector?”
“Pray go on, Mr. Leroux.”
“Well, you understand, it was a give-and-take arrangement; because I
am afraid that I, myself, demand certain--sacrifices from my
wife--and--er--I did not feel entitled to--interfere”...
“You see, Inspector,” interrupted Dr. Cumberly, “they are a Bohemian
pair, and Bohemians, inevitably, bore one another at times! This little
arrangement was intended as a safety-valve. Whenever ennui attacked Mrs.
Leroux, she was at liberty to depart for a week to her own friends in
Paris, leaving Leroux to the bachelor's existence which is really his
proper state; to go unshaven and unshorn, to dine upon bread and cheese
and onions, to work until all hours of the morning, and generally to
enjoy himself!”
“Does she usually stay long?” inquired Dunbar.
“Not more than a week, as a rule,” answered Leroux.
“You must excuse me,” continued the detective, “if I seem to pry into
intimate matters; but on these occasions, how does Mrs. Leroux get on
for money?”
“I have opened a credit for her,” explained the novelist, wearily, “at
the Credit Lyonnais, in Paris.”
Dunbar scribbled busily in his notebook.
“Does she take her maid with her?” he jerked, suddenly.
“She has no maid at the moment,” replied Leroux; “she has been without
one for twelve months or more, now.”
“When did you last hear from her?”
“Three days ago.”
“Did you answer the letter?”
“Yes; my answer was amongst the mail which Soames took to the post,
to-night.”
“You said, though, if I remember rightly, that he was out without
permission?”
Leroux ran his fingers through his hair.
“I meant that he should only have been absent five minutes or so; whilst
he remained out for more than an hour.”
Inspector Dunbar nodded, comprehendingly, tapping his teeth with the
head of the fountain-pen.
“And the other servants?”
“There are only two: a cook and a maid. I released them for the
evening--glad to get rid of them--wanted to work.”
“They are late?”
“They take liberties, damnable liberties, because I am easy-going.”
“I see,” said Dunbar. “So that you were quite alone this evening,
when”--he nodded in the direction of the writing-table--“your visitor
came?”
“Quite alone.”
“Was her arrival the first interruption?”
“No--er--not exactly. Miss Cumberly...”
“My daughter,” explained Dr. Cumberly, “knowing that Mr. Leroux, at
these times, was very neglectful in regard to meals, prepared him an
omelette, and brought it down in a chafing-dish.”
“How long did she remain?” asked the inspector of Leroux.
“I--er--did not exactly open the door. We chatted, through--er--through
the letter-box, and she left the omelette outside on the landing.”
“What time would that be?”
“It was a quarter to twelve,” declared Cumberly. “I had been supping
with some friends, and returned to find Helen, my daughter, engaged
in preparing the omelette. I congratulated her upon the happy thought,
knowing that Leroux was probably starving himself.”
“I see. The omelette, though, seems to be upset here on the floor?” said
the inspector.
Cumberly briefly explained how it came to be there, Leroux punctuating
his friend's story with affirmative nods.
“Then the door of the flat was open all the time?” cried Dunbar.
“Yes,” replied Cumberly; “but whilst Exel and I searched the other
rooms--and our search was exhaustive--Mr. Leroux remained here in the
study, and in full view of the lobby--as you see for yourself.”
“No living thing,” said Leroux, monotonously, “left this flat from the
time that the three of us, Exel, Cumberly, and I, entered, up to the
time that Miss Cumberly came, and, with the doctor, went out again.”
“H'm!” said the inspector, making notes; “it appears so, certainly. I
will ask you then, for your own account, Mr. Leroux, of the arrival of
the woman in the civet furs. Pay special attention”--he pointed with his
fountain-pen--“to the TIME at which the various incidents occurred.”
Leroux, growing calmer as he proceeded with the strange story, complied
with the inspector's request. He had practically completed his account
when the door-bell rang.
“It's the servants,” said Dr. Cumberly. “Soames will open the door.”
But Soames did not appear.
The ringing being repeated:--
“I told him to remain in his room,” said Dunbar, “until I rang for him,
I remember--”
“I will open the door,” said Cumberly.
“And tell the servants to stay in the kitchen,” snapped Dunbar.
Dr. Cumberly opened the door, admitting the cook and housemaid.
“There has been an unfortunate accident,” he said--“but not to your
master; you need not be afraid. But be good enough to remain in the
kitchen for the present.”
Peeping in furtively as they passed, the two women crossed the lobby and
went to their own quarters.
“Mr. Soames next,” muttered Dunbar, and, glancing at Cumberly as he
returned from the lobby:--“Will you ring for him?” he requested.
Dr. Cumberly nodded, and pressed a bell beside the mantelpiece. An
interval followed, in which the inspector made notes and Cumberly stood
looking at Leroux, who was beating his palms upon his knees, and staring
unseeingly before him.
Cumberly rang again; and in response to the second ring, the housemaid
appeared at the door.
“I rang for Soames,” said Dr. Cumberly.
“He is not in, sir,” answered the girl.
Inspector Dunbar started as though he had been bitten.
“What!” he cried; “not in?”
“No, sir,” said the girl, with wide-open, frightened eyes.
Dunbar turned to Cumberly.
“You said there was no other way out!”
“There IS no other way, to my knowledge.”
“Where's his room?”
Cumberly led the way to a room at the end of a short corridor, and
Inspector Dunbar, entering, and turning up the light, glanced about
the little apartment. It was a very neat servants' bedroom; with
comfortable, quite simple, furniture; but the chest-of-drawers had
been hastily ransacked, and the contents of a trunk--or some of its
contents--lay strewn about the floor.
“He has packed his grip!” came Leroux's voice from the doorway. “It's
gone!”
The window was wide open. Dunbar sprang forward and leaned out over the
ledge, looking to right and left, above and below.
A sort of square courtyard was beneath, and for the convenience of
tradesmen, a hand-lift was constructed outside the kitchens of the three
flats comprising the house; i. e.:--Mr. Exel's, ground floor, Henry
Leroux's second floor, and Dr. Cumberly's, top. It worked in a skeleton
shaft which passed close to the left of Soames' window.
For an active man, this was a good enough ladder, and the inspector
withdrew his head shrugging his square shoulders, irritably.
“My fault entirely!” he muttered, biting his wiry mustache. “I should
have come and seen for myself if there was another way out.”
Leroux, in a new flutter of excitement, now craned from the window.
“It might be possible to climb down the shaft,” he cried, after a brief
survey, “but not if one were carrying a heavy grip, such as that which
he has taken!”
“H'm!” said Dunbar. “You are a writing gentleman, I understand, and yet
it does not occur to you that he could have lowered the bag on a cord,
if he wanted to avoid the noise of dropping it!”
“Yes--er--of course!” muttered Leroux. “But really--but really--oh, good
God! I am bewildered! What in Heaven's name does it all mean!”
“It means trouble,” replied Dunbar, grimly; “bad trouble.”
They returned to the study, and Inspector Dunbar, for the first time
since his arrival, walked across and examined the fragmentary message,
raising his eyebrows when he discovered that it was written upon the
same paper as Leroux's MSS. He glanced, too, at the pen lying on a page
of “Martin Zeda” near the lamp and at the inky splash which told how
hastily the pen had been dropped.
Then--his brows drawn together--he stooped to the body of the murdered
woman. Partially raising the fur cloak, he suppressed a gasp of
astonishment.
“Why! she only wears a silk night-dress, and a pair of suede slippers!”
He glanced back over his shoulder.
“I had noted that,” said Cumberly. “The whole business is utterly
extraordinary.”
“Extraordinary is no word for it!” growled the inspector, pursuing his
examination.... “Marks of pressure at the throat--yes; and generally
unhealthy appearance.”
“Due to the drug habit,” interjected Dr. Cumberly.
“What drug?”
“I should not like to say out of hand; possibly morphine.”
“No jewelry,” continued the detective, musingly; “wedding ring--not a
new one. Finger nails well cared for, but recently neglected. Hair dyed
to hide gray patches; dye wanted renewing. Shoes, French. Night-robe,
silk; good lace; probably French, also. Faint perfume--don't know what
it is--apparently proceeding from civet fur. Furs, magnificent; very
costly.”...
He slightly moved the table-lamp in order to direct its light upon
the white face. The bloodless lips were parted and the detective bent,
closely peering at the teeth thus revealed.
“Her teeth were oddly discolored, doctor,” he said, taking out a
magnifying glass and examining them closely. “They had been recently
scaled, too; so that she was not in the habit of neglecting them.”
Dr. Cumberly nodded.
“The drug habit, again,” he said guardedly; “a proper examination will
establish the full facts.”
The inspector added brief notes to those already made, ere he rose from
beside the body. Then:--
“You are absolutely certain,” he said, deliberately, facing Leroux,
“that you had never set eyes on this woman prior to her coming here,
to-night?”
“I can swear it!” said Leroux.
“Good!” replied the detective, and closed his notebook with a snap.
“Usual formalities will have to be gone through, but I don't think I
need trouble you, gentlemen, any further, to-night.”
V
DOCTORS DIFFER
Dr. Cumberly walked slowly upstairs to his own flat, a picture etched
indelibly upon his mind, of Henry Leroux, with a face of despair,
sitting below in his dining-room and listening to the ominous sounds
proceeding from the study, where the police were now busily engaged. In
the lobby he met his daughter Helen, who was waiting for him in a state
of nervous suspense.
“Father!” she began, whilst rebuke died upon the doctor's lips--“tell me
quickly what has happened.”
Perceiving that an explanation was unavoidable, Dr. Cumberly outlined
the story of the night's gruesome happenings, whilst Big Ben began to
chime the hour of one.
Helen, eager-eyed, and with her charming face rather pale, hung upon
every word of the narrative.
“And now,” concluded her father, “you must go to bed. I insist.”
“But father!” cried the girl--“there is some thing”...
She hesitated, uneasily.
“Well, Helen, go on,” said the doctor.
“I am afraid you will refuse.”
“At least give me the opportunity.”
“Well--in the glimpse, the half-glimpse, which I had of her, I
seemed”...
Dr. Cumberly rested his hands upon his daughter's shoulders
characteristically, looking into the troubled gray eyes.
“You don't mean,” he began...
“I thought I recognized her!” whispered the girl.
“Good God! can it be possible?”
“I have been trying, ever since, to recall where we had met, but without
result. It might mean so much”...
Dr. Cumberly regarded her, fixedly.
“It might mean so much to--Mr. Leroux. But I suppose you will say it is
impossible?”
“It IS impossible,” said Dr. Cumberly firmly; “dismiss the idea, Helen.”
“But father,” pleaded the girl, placing her hands over his own,
“consider what is at stake”...
“I am anxious that you should not become involved in this morbid
business.”
“But you surely know me better than to expect me to faint or become
hysterical, or anything silly like that! I was certainly shocked when
I came down to-night, because--well, it was all so frightfully
unexpected”...
Dr. Cumberly shook his head. Helen put her arms about his neck and
raised her eyes to his.
“You have no right to refuse,” she said, softly: “don't you see that?”
Dr. Cumberly frowned. Then:--
“You are right, Helen,” he agreed. “I should know your pluck well
enough. But if Inspector Dunbar is gone, the police may refuse to admit
us”...
“Then let us hurry!” cried Helen. “I am afraid they will take away”...
Side by side they descended to Henry Leroux's flat, ringing the bell,
which, an hour earlier, the lady of the civet furs had rung.
A sergeant in uniform opened the door.
“Is Detective-Inspector Dunbar here?” inquired the physician.
“Yes, sir.”
“Say that Dr. Cumberly wishes to speak to him. And”--as the man was
about to depart--“request him not to arouse Mr. Leroux.”
Almost immediately the inspector appeared, a look of surprise upon his
face, which increased on perceiving the girl beside her father.
“This is my daughter, Inspector,” explained Cumberly; “she is a
contributor to the Planet, and to various magazines, and in this
journalistic capacity, meets many people in many walks of life. She
thinks she may be of use to you in preparing your case.”
Dunbar bowed rather awkwardly.
“Glad to meet you, Miss Cumberly,” came the inevitable formula.
“Entirely at your service.”
“I had an idea, Inspector,” said the girl, laying her hand
confidentially upon Dunbar's arm, “that I recognized, when I entered Mr.
Leroux's study, tonight”--Dunbar nodded--“that I recognized--the--the
victim!”
“Good!” said the inspector, rubbing his palms briskly together. His
tawny eyes sparkled. “And you would wish to see her again before we
take her away. Very plucky of you, Miss Cumberly! But then, you are a
doctor's daughter.”
They entered, and the inspector closed the door behind them.
“Don't arouse poor Leroux,” whispered Cumberly to the detective. “I left
him on a couch in the dining-room.”...
“He is still there,” replied Dunbar; “poor chap! It is”...
He met Helen's glance, and broke off shortly.
In the study two uniformed constables, and an officer in plain clothes,
were apparently engaged in making an inventory--or such was the
impression conveyed. The clock ticked merrily on; its ticking a
desecration, where all else was hushed in deference to the grim visitor.
The body of the murdered woman had been laid upon the chesterfield, and
a little, dark, bearded man was conducting an elaborate examination;
when, seeing the trio enter, he hastily threw the coat of civet fur over
the body, and stood up, facing the intruders.
“It's all right, doctor,” said the inspector; “and we shan't detain you
a moment.” He glanced over his shoulder. “Mr. Hilton, M. R. C. S.” he
said, indicating the dark man--“Dr. Cumberly and Miss Cumberly.”
The divisional surgeon bowed to Helen and eagerly grasped the hand of
the celebrated physician.
“I am fortunate in being able to ask your opinion,” he began....
Dr. Cumberly nodded shortly, and with upraised hand, cut him short.
“I shall willingly give you any assistance in my power,” he said;
“but my daughter has voluntarily committed herself to a rather painful
ordeal, and I am anxious to get it over.”
He stooped and raised the fur from the ghastly face.
Helen, her hand resting upon her father's shoulder, ventured one rapid
glance and then looked away, shuddering slightly. Dr. Cumberly replaced
the coat and gazed anxiously at his daughter. But Helen, with admirable
courage, having closed her eyes for a moment, reopened them, and smiled
at her father's anxiety. She was pale, but perfectly composed.
“Well, Miss Cumberly?” inquired the inspector, eagerly; whilst all in
the room watched this slim girl in her charming deshabille, this dainty
figure so utterly out of place in that scene of morbid crime.
She raised her gray eyes to the detective.
“I still believe that I have seen the face, somewhere, before. But I
shall have to reflect a while--I meet so many folks, you know, in a
casual way--before I can commit myself to any statement.”
In the leonine eyes looking into hers gleamed the light of admiration
and approval. The canny Scotsman admired this girl for her beauty, as
a matter of course, for her courage, because courage was a quality
standing high in his estimation, but, above all, for her admirable
discretion.
“Very proper, Miss Cumberly,” he said; “very proper and wise on your
part. I don't wish to hurry you in any way, but”--he hesitated, glancing
at the man in plain clothes, who had now resumed a careful perusal of a
newspaper--“but her name doesn't happen to be Vernon--”
“Vernon!” cried the girl, her eyes lighting up at sound of the name.
“Mrs. Vernon! it is! it is! She was pointed out to me at the last Arts
Ball--where she appeared in a most monstrous Chinese costume--”
“Chinese?” inquired Dunbar, producing the bulky notebook.
“Yes. Oh! poor, poor soul!”
“You know nothing further about her, Miss Cumberly?”
“Nothing, Inspector. She was merely pointed out to me as one of the
strangest figures in the hall. Her husband, I understand, is an art
expert--”
“He WAS!” said Dunbar, closing the book sharply. “He died this
afternoon; and a paragraph announcing his death appears in the newspaper
which we found in the victim's fur coat!”
“But how--”
“It was the only paragraph on the half-page folded outwards which was in
any sense PERSONAL. I am greatly indebted to you, Miss Cumberly; every
hour wasted on a case like this means a fresh plait in the rope around
the neck of the wrong man!”
Helen Cumberly grew slowly quite pallid.
“Good night,” she said; and bowing to the detective and to the surgeon,
she prepared to depart.
Mr. Hilton touched Dr. Cumberly's arm, as he, too, was about to retire.
“May I hope,” he whispered, “that you will return and give me the
benefit of your opinion in making out my report?”
Dr. Cumberly glanced at his daughter; and seeing her to be perfectly
composed:--“For the moment, I have formed no opinion, Mr. Hilton,”
he said, quietly, “not having had an opportunity to conduct a proper
examination.”
Hilton bent and whispered, confidentially, in the other's ear:--
“She was drugged!”
The innuendo underlying the words struck Dr. Cumberly forcibly, and he
started back with his brows drawn together in a frown.
“Do you mean that she was addicted to the use of drugs?” he asked,
sharply; “or that the drugging took place to-night.”
“The drugging DID take place to-night!” whispered the other. “An
injection was made in the left shoulder with a hypodermic syringe; the
mark is quite fresh.”
Dr. Cumberly glared at his fellow practitioner, angrily.
“Are there no other marks of injection?” he asked.
“On the left forearm, yes. Obviously self-administered. Oh, I don't deny
the habit! But my point is this: the injection in the shoulder was NOT
self-administered.”
“Come, Helen,” said Cumberly, taking his daughter's arm; for she had
drawn near, during the colloquy--“you must get to bed.”
His face was very stern when he turned again to Mr. Hilton.
“I shall return in a few minutes,” he said, and escorted his daughter
from the room.
VI
AT SCOTLAND YARD
Matters of vital importance to some people whom already we have met, and
to others whom thus far we have not met, were transacted in a lofty and
rather bleak looking room at Scotland Yard between the hours of nine and
ten A. M.; that is, later in the morning of the fateful day whose advent
we have heard acclaimed from the Tower of Westminster.
The room, which was lighted by a large French window opening upon a
balcony, commanded an excellent view of the Thames Embankment. The floor
was polished to a degree of brightness, almost painful. The distempered
walls, save for a severe and solitary etching of a former Commissioner,
were nude in all their unloveliness. A heavy deal table (upon which
rested a blotting-pad, a pewter ink-pot, several newspapers and two
pens) together with three deal chairs, built rather as monuments of
durability than as examples of art, constituted the only furniture, if
we except an electric lamp with a green glass shade, above the table.
This was the room of Detective-Inspector Dunbar; and Detective-Inspector
Dunbar, at the hour of our entrance, will be found seated in the chair,
placed behind the table, his elbows resting upon the blotting-pad.
At ten minutes past nine, exactly, the door opened, and a thick-set,
florid man, buttoned up in a fawn colored raincoat and wearing a bowler
hat of obsolete build, entered. He possessed a black mustache, a breezy,
bustling manner, and humorous blue eyes; furthermore, when he took
off his hat, he revealed the possession of a head of very bristly,
upstanding, black hair. This was Detective-Sergeant Sowerby, and the
same who was engaged in examining a newspaper in the study of Henry
Leroux when Dr. Cumberly and his daughter had paid their second visit to
that scene of an unhappy soul's dismissal.
“Well?” said Dunbar, glancing up at his subordinate, inquiringly.
“I have done all the cab depots,” reported Sergeant Sowerby, “and a good
many of the private owners; but so far the man seen by Mr. Exel has not
turned up.”
“The word will be passed round now, though,” said Dunbar, “and we shall
probably have him here during the day.”
“I hope so,” said the other good-humoredly, seating himself upon one of
the two chairs ranged beside the wall. “If he doesn't show up.”...
“Well?” jerked Dunbar--“if he doesn't?”
“It will look very black against Leroux.”
Dunbar drummed upon the blotting-pad with the fingers of his left hand.
“It beats anything of the kind that has ever come my way,” he confessed.
“You get pretty cautious at weighing people up, in this business; but I
certainly don't think--mind you, I go no further--but I certainly
don't think Mr. Henry Leroux would willingly kill a fly; yet there is
circumstantial evidence enough to hang him.”
Sergeant Sowerby nodded, gazing speculatively at the floor.
“I wonder,” he said, slowly, “why the girl--Miss Cumberly--hesitated
about telling us the woman's name?”
“I am not wondering about that at all,” replied Dunbar, bluntly. “She
must meet thousands in the same way. The wonder to me is that she
remembered at all. I am open to bet half-a-crown that YOU couldn't
remember the name of every woman you happened to have pointed out to you
at an Arts Ball?”
“Maybe not,” agreed Sowerby; “she's a smart girl, I'll allow. I see you
have last night's papers there?”
“I have,” replied Dunbar; “and I'm wondering”...
“If there's any connection?”
“Well,” continued the inspector, “it looks on the face of it as though
the news of her husband's death had something to do with Mrs. Vernon's
presence at Leroux's flat. It's not a natural thing for a woman, on the
evening of her husband's death, to rush straight away to another man's
place”...
“It's strange we couldn't find her clothes”...
“It's not strange at all! You're simply obsessed with the idea that this
was a love intrigue! Think, man! the most abandoned woman wouldn't run
to keep an appointment with a lover at a time like that! And remember
she had the news in her pocket! She came to that flat dressed--or
undressed--just as we found her; I'm sure of it. And a point like that
sometimes means the difference between hanging and acquittal.”
Sergeant Sowerby digested these words, composing his jovial countenance
in an expression of unnatural profundity. Then:--
“THE point to my mind,” he said, “is the one raised by Mr. Hilton. By
gum! didn't Dr. Cumberly tell him off!”
“Dr. Cumberly,” replied Dunbar, “is entitled to his opinion, that the
injection in the woman's shoulder was at least eight hours old; whilst
Mr. Hilton is equally entitled to maintain that it was less than ONE
hour old. Neither of them can hope to prove his case.”
“If either of them could?”...
“It might make a difference to the evidence--but I'm not sure.”
“What time
|
air came out, took
possession of my bag, and led me through a small vestibule into a long
hall, with a fire burning in a great open fireplace. There was a gallery at
one end, with a big organ in it. The hall was paved with black and white
stone, and there were some comfortable chairs, a cabinet or two, and some
dim paintings on the walls. Tea was spread at a small table by the fire,
and four or five men, two of them quite young, the others rather older,
were sitting about on chairs and sofas, or helping themselves to tea at the
table. On the hearth, with his back to the fire, stood a great, burly man
with a short, grizzled beard and tumbled gray hair, rather bald, dressed in
a rough suit of light-brown homespun, with huge shooting boots, whom I saw
at once to be my host. The talk stopped as I entered, and I was aware that
I was being scrutinised with some curiosity. Father Payne did not move, but
extended a hand, which I advanced and shook, and said: "Very glad to see
you, Mr. Duncan--you are just in time for tea." He mentioned the names of
the men present, who came and shook hands very cordially. Barthrop gave me
some tea, and I was inducted into a chair by the fire. I thought for a
moment that I was taking Father Payne's place, and feebly murmured
something about taking his chair. "They're all mine, thanks!" he said with
a smile, "but I claim no privileges." Someone gave a faint whistle at this,
and Father Payne, turning his eyes but not his head towards the young man
who had uttered the sound, said: "All right, Pollard, if you are going to
be mutinous, we shall have a little business to transact together, as Mr.
Squeers said." "Oh, I'm not mutinous, sir," said the young man--"I'm quite
submissive--I was just betrayed into it by amazement!" "You shouldn't get
into the habit of thinking aloud," said Father Payne; "at least not among
bachelors--when you are married you can do as you like!--I hope you are
polite?" he went on, looking round at me. "I think so," I said, feeling
rather shy, "That's right," he said. "It's the first and only form of
virtue! If you are only polite, there is nothing that you may not do. This
is a school of manners, you know!" One of the men, Rose by name, laughed--a
pleasant musical laugh. "I remember," he said, "that when I was a boy at
Eton, my excellent but very bluff and rough old tutor called upon us, and
was so much taken up with being hearty, that he knocked over the
coal-scuttle, and didn't let anyone get a word in; and when he went off in
a sort of whirlwind, my old aunt, who was an incisive lady, said in a
meditative tone: 'How strange it is that the only thing that the Eton
masters seem able to teach their boys is the only thing they don't
themselves possess!'"
Father Payne uttered a short, loud laugh at this, and said: "Is there any
chance of meeting your aunt?" "No, sir, she is long since dead!" "Blew off
too much steam, perhaps," said Father Payne. "That woman must have had the
steam up! I should have liked to have known her--a remarkable woman! Have
you any more stories of the same sort about her?"
"Not to-day," said Rose, smiling.
"Quite right," said Father Payne. "You keep them for an acceptable time.
Never tell strings of stories--and, by the way, my young friends, that's
the art of writing. Don't cram in good things--space them out, Barthrop!"
"I think I can spread the butter as thin as anyone," said Barthrop,
smiling.
"So you can, so you can!" said Father Payne enthusiastically, "and very
thin slices too! I give you full credit for that!"
The men had begun to drift away, and I was presently left alone with Father
Payne. "Now you come along of me!" he said to me; and when I got up, he
took my arm in a pleasant fashion, led me to a big curtained archway at the
far end of the hall, under the gallery, and along a flagged passage to the
right. As we went he pointed to the doors--"Smoking-room--Library"--and at
the end of the passage he opened a door, and led me into a small panelled
room with a big window, closely curtained. It was a solid and stately
place, wholly bare of ornament. It had a writing-table, a bookcase, two
armchairs of leather, a fine fireplace with marble pillars, and an old
painting let into the panelling above it. There was a bright, unshaded lamp
on the table. "This is my room," he said, "and there's nothing in it that I
don't use, except those pillars; and when I haul on them, like Samson, the
house comes down. Now you sit down there, and we'll have a talk. Do you
mind the light? No? Well, that's all right, as I want to have a good look
at you, you know! You can get a smoke afterwards--this is business!"
He sate down in the chair opposite me, and stirred the fire. He had fine,
large, solid hands, the softness of which, like silk, had struck me when I
shook hands with him; and, though he was both elderly and bulky, he moved
with a certain grace and alertness. "Tell me your tale from the beginning,"
he said, "Don't leave out any details--I like details. Let's have your life
and death and Christian sufferings, as the tracts say."
He heard me with much patience, sometimes smiling, sometimes nodding, when
I had finished, he said: "Now I must ask you a few questions--you don't
mind if they are plain questions--rather unpleasant questions?" He bent his
brows upon me and smiled. "No," I said, "not at all." "Well, then," he
said, "where's the vocation in all this? This place, to be brief, is for
men who have a real vocation for writing, and yet never would otherwise
have the time or the leisure to train for it. You see, in England, people
think that you needn't train for writing--that you have just got to begin,
and there you are. Very few people have the money to wait a few years--they
have to write, not what they want to write, but what other people want to
read. And so it comes about that by the time that they have earned the
money and the leisure, the spring is gone, the freshness is gone, there's
no invention and no zest. Writing can't be done in a little corner of life.
You have to give up your life to it--and then that means giving up your
life to a great deal of what looks like pure laziness--loafing about,
looking about, travelling, talking, mooning; that is the only way to learn
proportion; and it is the only way, too, of learning what not to write
about--a great many things that are written about are not really material
for writing at all. And all this can't be done in a drivelling mood--you
must pick your way if you are going to write. That's a long preface; but I
mean this place to be a place to give men the right sort of start. I happen
to be able to teach people, more or less, how to write, if they have got
the stuff in them--and to be frank, I'm not sure that you have! You think
this would be a pleasant sort of experience--so it can be; but it isn't
done on slack and chattering lines. It is just meant to save people from
hanging about at the start, a thing which spoils a lot of good writers. But
it's deadly serious, and it isn't a dilettante life at all. Do you grasp
all that?"
"Yes," I said, "and I believe I can work! I know I have wasted my time, but
it was not because I wanted to waste time, but because the sort of things I
have always had to do--the classics--always seemed to me so absolutely
pointless. No one who taught me ever distinguished between what was good
and what was bad. Whatever it was--a Greek play, Homer, Livy, Tacitus--it
was always supposed to be the best thing of the kind. I was always sure
that much of it was rot, and some of it was excellent; but I didn't know
why, and no one ever told me why."
"You thought all that?" said he. "Well, that's more hopeful! Have you ever
done any essay work?"
"Yes," I said, "and that was the worst of all--no one ever showed me how to
do it in my own way, but always in some one else's way."
He sate a little in silence. Then he said: "But mind you, that's not all! I
don't think writing is the end of life. The real point is to feel the
things, to understand the business, to have ideas about life. I don't want
people to learn how to write interestingly about things in which they are
not interested--but to be interested first, and then to write if they can.
I like to turn out a good writer, who can say what he feels and believes.
But I'm just as pleased when a man tells me that writing is rubbish, and
that he is going away to do something real. The real--that's what I care
about! I don't want men to come and pick up grains of truth and reality,
and work them into their stuff. I have turned out a few men like that, and
those are my worst failures. You have got to care about ideas, if you come
here, and to get the ideas into shape. You have got to learn what is
beautiful and what is not, because the only business of a real writer is
with beauty--not a sickly exotic sort of beauty, but the beauty of health
and strength and generous feeling. I can't have any humbugs here, though I
have sent out some humbugs. It's a hard life this, and a tiring life;
though if you are the right sort of fellow, you will get plenty of fun out
of it. But we don't waste time here; and if a man wastes time, out he
goes."
"I believe I can work as hard as anyone," I said, "though I have shown no
signs of it--and anyhow, I should like to try. And I do really want to
learn how to distinguish between things, how to know what matters. No one
has ever shown me how to do that!"
"That's all right!" he said, "But are you sure you don't want simply to
make a bit of a name--to be known as a clever man? It's very convenient,
you know, in England, to have a label. Because I want you clearly to
understand that this place of mine has nothing whatever to do with that. I
take no stock in what is called success. This is a sort of monastery, you
know; and the worst of some monasteries is that they cultivate dreams.
That's a beautiful thing in its way, but it isn't what I aim at. I don't
want men to drug themselves with dreams. The great dreamers don't do that.
Shelley, for instance--his dreams were all made out of real feeling, real
beauty. He wanted to put things right in his own way. He was enraged with
life because he was fine, while Byron was enraged with life because he was
vulgar. Vulgarity--that's the one fatal complaint; it goes down deep to the
bottom of the mind. And I may as well say plainly that that is what I fight
against here."
"I don't honestly think I am vulgar," I said.
"Not on the surface, perhaps," he said, "but present-day education is a
snare. We are a vulgar nation, you know. That is what is really the matter
with us--our ambitions are vulgar, our pride is vulgar. We want to fit into
the world and get the most we can out of it; we don't, most of us, just
want to give it our best. That's what I mean by vulgarity, wanting to take
and not wanting to give."
He was silent for a minute, and then he said: "Do you believe in God?"
"I hardly know," I said. "Not very much, I am afraid, in the kind of God
that I have heard preached about."
"What do you mean?" he said.
"Well," I said, "it's rather a large question--but I used to think, both at
school and at Oxford, that many of the men who were rather disapproved of,
that did quite bad things, and tried experiments, and knocked up against
nastiness of various kinds, but who were brave in their way and kind, and
not mean or spiteful or fault-finding, were more the sort of people that
the force--or whatever it is, behind the world--was trying to produce than
many of the virtuous people. What was called virtue and piety had something
stifling and choking about it, I used to think. I had a tutor at school who
was a parson, and he was a good sort of man, too, in a way. But I used to
feel suddenly dreary with him, as if there were a whole lot of real things
and interesting things which he was afraid of. I couldn't say what I
thought to him--only what I felt he wanted me to think. That's a bad
answer," I went on, "but I haven't really considered it."
"No, it isn't a bad answer," he said, "It's all right! The moment you feel
stifled with anyone, whatever the subject is--art, books, religion,
life--there is something wrong. Do you say any prayers?"
"No," I said, "to be honest, I don't."
"You must take to it again," he said. "You can't get on without prayer. And
if you come here," he said, "you may expect to hear about God. I talk a
good deal about God. I don't believe in things being too sacred to talk
about--it's the bad things that ought not to be mentioned. I am interested
in God, more than I am interested in anything else. I can't make Him
out--and yet I believe that He needs me, in a way, as much as I need Him.
Does that sound profane to you?"
"No," I said, "it's new to me. No one ever spoke about God to me like that
before."
"We have to suffer with Him!" he said in a curious tone, his face lighting
up. "That is the point of Christianity, that God suffers, because He wants
to remake the world, and cannot do it all at once. That is the secret of
all life and hope, that if we believe in God, we must suffer with Him. It's
a fight, a hard fight; and He needs us on His side: But I won't talk about
that now; yet if you don't want to believe in God, and to be friends with
Him, and to fight and suffer with Him, you needn't think of coming here.
That's behind all I do. And to come here is simply that you may find out
where He needs you. Why writing is important is, because the world needs
freer and plainer talk about God--about beauty and health and happiness and
energy, and all the things which He stands for. Half the evil comes from
silence, and the end of all my experiments is the word in the New
Testament, Ephphatha--Be opened! That is what I try for, to give men the
power of opening their hearts and minds to others, without fear and yet
without offence. I don't want men to attack things or to criticise things,
but just to speak plainly about what is beautiful and wholesome and true.
So you see this isn't a place for lazy and fanciful people--not a fortress
of quiet, and still less a place for asses to slake their thirst! We don't
set out to amuse ourselves, but to perceive things, and to say them if we
can. My men must be sound and serious, and they must be civil and amusing
too. They have got to learn how to get on with each other, and with me, and
with the village people--and with God! If you want just to dangle about,
this isn't the place for you; but if you want to work hard and be knocked
into shape, I'll consider it."
There was something tremendous about Father Payne! I looked at him with a
sense of terror. His face dissolved in a smile. "You needn't look at me
like that!" he said. "I only want you to know exactly what you are in for!"
"I would like to try," I said.
"Well, we'll see!" he said. "And now you must be off!" he added. "We shall
dine in an hour--you needn't dress. Here, you don't know which your room
is, I suppose?"
He rang the bell, and I went off with the old butler, who was amiable and
communicative. "So, you think of becoming one of the gentlemen, sir?" he
said. "If you'll have me," I replied. "Oh, that will be all right, sir," he
said. "I could see that the Father took to you at first sight!"
He showed me my room--a big bare place. It had a small bed and accessories,
but it was also fitted as a sitting-room, with a writing-table, an
armchair, and a bookcase full of books. The house was warmed, I saw, with
hot water to a comfortable temperature. "Would you like a fire?" he said. I
declined, and he went on: "Now if you lived here, sir, you would have to do
that yourself!" He gave a little laugh. "Anyone may have a fire, but they
have to lay it, and fetch the coal, and clean the grate. Very few of the
gentlemen do it. Anything else, sir? I have put out your things, and you
will find hot water laid on."
He left me, and I flung myself into the chair. I had a good deal to think
about.
III
THE SOCIETY
A very quiet evening followed. A bell rang out above the roof at 8.15. I
went down to the hall, where the men assembled. Father Payne came in. He
had changed his clothes, and was wearing a dark, loose-fitting suit, which
became him well--he always looked at home in his clothes. The others wore
similar suits or smoking jackets. Father Payne appeared abstracted, and
only gave me a nod. A gong sounded, and he marched straight out through a
door by the fireplace into the dining-room.
The dining-room was a rather grand place, panelled in dark wood, and with a
few portraits. At each end of the room was a section cut off from the
central portion by an oak column on each side. Three windows on one side
looked into the garden. It was lighted by candles only. We were seven in
all, and I sate by Father Payne. Dinner was very plain. There was soup, a
joint with vegetables, and a great apple-tart. The things were mostly
passed about from hand to hand, but the old butler kept a benignant eye
upon the proceedings, and saw that I was well supplied. There was a good
and simple claret in large flat-bottomed decanters, which most of the men
drank. There was a good deal of talk of a lively kind. Father Payne was
rather silent, though he struck in now and then, but his silence imposed no
constraint on the party. He was pressed to tell a story for my benefit,
which he did with much relish, but briefly. I was pleased at the simplicity
of it all. There was only one man who seemed a little out of tune--a
clerical-looking, handsome fellow of about thirty, called Lestrange, with
an air of some solemnity. He made remarks of rather an earnest type, and
was ironically assailed once or twice. Father Payne intervened once, and
said: "Lestrange is perfectly right, and you would think so too, if only he
could give what he said a more secular twist. 'Be soople in things
immaterial,' Lestrange, as the minister says in _Kidnapped_." "But who
is to judge if it _is_ immaterial?" said Lestrange rather
pertinaciously. "It mostly is," said Father Payne. "Anything is better than
being shocked! It's better to be ashamed afterwards of not speaking up than
to feel you have made a circle uncomfortable. You must not rebuke people
unless you really hate doing it. If you like doing it, you may be pretty
sure that it is vanity; a Christian ought not to feel out of place in a
smoking-room!"
The whole thing did not take more than three-quarters of an hour. Coffee
was brought in, very strong and good. Some of the party went off, and
Father Payne disappeared. I went to the smoking-room with two of the men,
and we talked a little. Finally I went away to my room, and tried to commit
my impressions of the whole thing to my diary before I went to bed. It
certainly seemed a happy life, and I was struck with the curious mixture of
freedom, frankness, and yet courtesy about the whole. There was no
roughness or wrangling or stupidity, nor had I any sense either of
exclusion, or of being elaborately included in the life of the circle. I
would call the atmosphere brotherly, if brotherliness did not often mean
the sort of frankness which is so unpleasant to strangers. There certainly
was an atmosphere about it, and I felt too that Father Payne, for all his
easiness, had somehow got the reins in his hands.
The next morning I went down to breakfast, which was, I found, like
breakfast at a club, as Vincent had said. It was a plain meal--cold bacon,
a vast dish of scrambled eggs kept hot by a spirit lamp and a hot-water
arrangement. You could make toast for yourself if you wished, and there was
a big fresh loaf, with excellent butter, marmalade, and jam--not an ascetic
breakfast at all. There were daily papers on the table, and no one talked.
I did not see Father Payne, who must have come in later.
After breakfast, Barthrop showed me the rooms of the house. The library was
fitted up with bookshelves and easy-chairs for reading, with a big round
oak table in the centre. The floor was of stained oak boards and covered
with rugs. There was also a capacious smoking-room, and I learned that
smoking was not allowed elsewhere. It was, in fact, a solid old family
mansion of some dignity. There were three or four oil paintings in all the
rooms, portraits and landscapes. The general tone of decoration was
dark--red wall-papers and fittings stained brown. It was all clean and
simple, and there was a total absence of ornament, I went and walked in the
garden, which was of the same very straightforward kind--plain grass,
shrubberies, winding paths, with comfortable wooden seats in sheltered
places; one or two big beds, evidently of old-fashioned perennials, and
some trellises for ramblers. The garden was adjoined by a sort of
wilderness, with big trees and ground-ivy, and open spaces in which
aconites and snowdrops were beginning to show themselves. Father Payne, I
gathered, was fond of the garden and often worked there; but there were no
curiosities--it was all very simple. Beyond that were pasture-fields, with
a good many clumps and hedgerow trees, running down to a stream, which had
been enlarged into a deep pool at one place, where there was a timbered
bathing-shed. The stream fed, through little sluices, a big, square pond,
full, I was told, in summer of bulrushes and water-lilies. I noticed a
couple of lawn-tennis courts, and there was a bowling-green by the house.
Then there was a large kitchen-garden, with standards and espaliers, and
box-edged beds. The stables, which were spacious, contained only a pony and
the little cart I had driven up in, and a few bicycles. I liked the solid
air of the big house, which had two wings at the back, corresponding to the
wings in front; the long row of stone pedimented windows, with heavy white
casements, was plain and stately, and there were some fine magnolias and
wisterias trained upon the walls. It all looked stately, and yet home-like;
there was nothing neglected about it, and yet it looked wholesomely left
alone; everything was neat, but nothing was smart.
I was strolling about, enjoying the gleams of bright sunshine and the cold
air, when I saw Father Payne coming down the garden towards me. He gave me
a pleasant nod: I said something about the beauty of the place; he smiled,
and said "Yes, it is the kind of thing I like--but I am so used to it that
I can hardly even see it! That's the worst of habit; but there is nothing
about the place to get on your nerves. It's a well-bred old house, I think,
and knows how to hold its tongue, without making you uncomfortable," Then
he went on presently: "You know how I came by it? It's an odd story. It had
been in my family, till my grandfather left it to his second wife, and cut
my father out. There was a son by the second wife, who was meant to have
it; but he died, and it went to a brother of the second wife, and his widow
left it back to me. It was an entire surprise, because I did not know her,
and the only time I had ever seen the house was once when I came down on
the sly, just to look at the old place, little thinking I should ever come
here. She had some superstition about it, I fancy! Anyhow, while I was
grubbing away in town, fifteen years ago, and hardly able to make two ends
meet, I suddenly found myself put in possession of it; and though I am
poor, as squires go, the farms and cottages bring me in quite enough to rub
along. At any rate it enabled me to try some experiments, and I have been
doing so ever since. Leisure and solitude! Those are the only two things
worth having that money can buy. Perhaps you don't think there's much
solitude about our life? But solitude only means the power to think your
own thoughts, without having other people's thoughts trailed across the
track. Loneliness is quite a different thing, and that's not wholesome."
He strolled on, looking about him. "Do you ever garden?" he said. "It's the
best fun in the world--making plants do as _you_ like, while all the
time they think they are doing as _they_ like. That's the secret of
it! You can't bully these wild things, but they are very obedient, as long
as they believe they are free. They are like children; they will take any
amount of trouble as long as you don't call it work."
Presently we heard the clatter of hoofs in the stable-yard. "That's for
you!" he said. "Will you go and see that they have brought your things
down? I'll meet you at the door." I went up and found my things had been
packed by the old butler. I gave him a little tip, and he said
confidentially: "I daresay we shall be seeing you back here, sir, one of
these days." "I hope so," I said, to which he replied with a mysterious
wink and nod.
Father Payne shook hands. "Well, good-bye!" he said. "It's good of you to
have come down, and I'm glad to have made acquaintance, whatever
happens--I'll drop you a line." I drove away, and he stood at the door
looking after me, till the little cart drove out of the gate.
IV
THE SUMMONS
I must confess that I was much excited about my visit; the whole thing
seemed to me to be almost too good to be true, and I hardly dared hope that
I should be allowed to return. I went back to town and rejoined Vincent,
and we talked much about the delights of Aveley.
The following morning we each received a letter in Father Payne's firm
hand. That to Vincent was very short. It ran as follows:
DEAR VINCENT,--_I shall be glad to take you in if you wish to
join us, for three months. At the end of that time, we shall both
be entirely free to choose. I hope you will be happy here. You
can come as soon as you like; and if Duncan, after reading my
letter, decides to come too, you had better arrange to arrive
together. It will save me the trouble of describing our way of
life to each separately. Please let me have a line, and I will
see that your room is ready for you.--Sincerely yours,_
C. PAYNE.
"That's all right!" said Vincent, with an air of relief. "Now what does he
say to you?" My letter was a longer one. It ran:
MY DEAR YOUNG MAN,--_I am going to be very frank with you, and
to say that, though I liked you very much, I nearly decided that
I could not ask you to join us. I will tell you why. I am not
sure that you are not too easy-going and impulsive. We should all
find you agreeable, and I am sure you would find the whole thing
great fun at first; but I rather think you would get bored. It
does not seem to me as if you had ever had the smallest
discipline, and I doubt if you have ever disciplined yourself;
and discipline is a tiresome thing, unless you like it. I think
you are quick, receptive, and polite--all that is to the good.
But are you serious? I found in you a very quick perception, and
you held up a flattering mirror with great spontaneity to my mind
and heart--that was probably why I liked you so much. But I don't
want people here to reflect me or anyone else. The whole point of
my scheme is independence, with just enough discipline to keep
things together, like the hem on a handkerchief._
_But you may have a try, if you wish; and in any case, I think
you will have a pleasant three months here, and make us all sorry
to lose you if you do not return. I have told your friend Vincent
he can come, and I think he is more likely to stay than you are,
because he is more himself. I don't suppose that he took in the
whole place and the idea of it as quickly as you did. I expect
you could write a very interesting description of it, and I don't
expect he could._
_Still, I will say that I shall be truly sorry if, after this
letter, you decide not to come to us. I like your company; and I
shall not get tired of it. But to be more frank still, I think
you are one of those charming and sympathetic people who is tough
inside, with a toughness which is based on the determination to
find things amusing and interesting--and that is not the sort of
toughness I can do anything with. People like yourself are
incapable as a rule of suffering, whatever happens to them. It's
a very happy disposition, but it does not grow. You are sensitive
enough, but I don't want sensitiveness, I want men who are not
sensitive, and who yet can suffer at not getting nearer and more
quickly than they can to the purpose ahead of them, whatever that
may be. It is a stiff sort of thing that I want. I can help to
make a stiff nature pliable; I'm not very good at making a
pliable nature stiff. That's the truth._
_So I shall be delighted--more than you think--if you say
"Yes." but in a way more hopeful about you if you say "No."_
_Come with Vincent, if you come; and as soon as you like.--Ever
yours truly,_
C. PAYNE.
"Does he want me to go, or does he not?" I said. "Is he letting me down
with a compliment?"
"Oh no," said Vincent, "it's all right. He only thinks that you are a
butterfly which will flutter by, and he would rather like you to do a
little fluttering down there."
"But I'm not going to go there," I said, "to wear a cap and bells for a
bit, and then to be spun when I have left my golden store, like the radiant
morn; he puts me on my mettle. I _will_ go, and he _shall_ keep
me! I don't want to fool about any more."
"All right!" said Vincent. "It's a bargain, then! Will you be ready to go
the day after to-morrow? There are some things I want to buy, now that I'm
going to school again. But I'm awfully relieved--it's just what I want. I
was getting into a mess with all my work, and becoming a muddled loafer."
"And I an elegant trifler, it appears," I said.
V
THE SYSTEM
We went off together on the Saturday, and I think we were both decidedly
nervous. What were we in for? I had a feeling that I had plunged headlong
into rather a foolish adventure.
We did not talk much on the way down; it was all rather solemn. We were
going to put the bit in our mouths again, and Father Payne was an unknown
quantity. We both felt that there was something decidedly big and strong
there to be reckoned with.
We arrived, as before, at tea-time, and we both received a cordial
greeting. After tea Father Payne took us away, and told us the rules of the
house. They were simple enough; he described the day. Breakfast was from
8.30 to 9.15, and was a silent meal. "It's a bad thing to begin the day by
chattering and arguing," said Father Payne. Then we were supposed to work
in our own rooms or the library till one. We might stroll about, if we
wished, but there was to be no talking to anyone else, unless he himself
gave leave for any special reason. Luncheon was a cold meal, quite
informal, and was on the table for an hour. There was to be no talk then
either. From two to five we could do as we liked, and it was expected that
we should take at least an hour's exercise, and if possible two. Tea at
five, and work afterwards. At 8.15, dinner, and we could do as we wished
afterwards, but we were not to congregate in anyone's room, and it was
understood that no one was to go to another man's bedroom, which was also
his study, at any time, unless he was definitely invited, or just to ask a
question. The smoking-room was always free for general talk, but Father
Payne said that on the whole he discouraged any gatherings or cliques. The
point of the whole was solitary work, with enough company to keep things
fresh and comfortable.
He said that we were expected to valet ourselves entirely, and that if we
wanted a fire, we must lay it and clean it up afterwards. If we wanted to
get anything, or have anything done, we could ask him or the butler. "But I
rather expect everyone to look after himself," he said. We were not to
absent ourselves without his leave, and we were to go away if he told us to
do so. "Sometimes a man wants a little change and does not know it," he
said.
Then he also said that he would ask us, from time to time, what we were
doing--hear it read, and criticise it; and that one of the most definite
conditions of our remaining was that he must be satisfied that we really
were at work. If we wanted any special books, he said, we
|
’ pictures, etc., so as to be cured of
some illness, or to obtain some benefit which his ascetic religion does
not afford him.
If the Turkish Government by its misrule had not provoked the driving
out of the Mussulman populations of Europe (a course which has
gradually reduced the territory of the Ottoman Empire), the uprisings
experienced periodically would not have been so frequent. These
numerous fanatics who had lived since the time of the conquest by
exploiting the Christian populations, transported their methods to Asia
Minor, and, seconded by a government whose materialism knew no limits,
they undertook the extermination of the Christian populations of Asia
Minor in order to rob them of their property.
When one realizes that, under an administration which existed only to
mulct the worker by taxation, these populations have succeeded, in
spite of numberless persecutions, in making so formidable an effort
in order to secure their spiritual needs, it is easy to imagine what
progress in civilization and wealth awaits this country, when an
era of liberty and security shall be introduced under a paternal
administration.
The Anatolian Mussulmans will be the first to profit by this. Patient
workers, loving the land, and living in harmony with their Christian
compatriots, they will be happy to secure the product of their labor,
of which the Turkish functionary constantly robbed them, so that he
finally made them dislike all labor, and urged them on into the path of
crime.
This living together as friends, on a footing of equality, will perhaps
make Christianity flourish anew in this land which was the first to be
saved from paganism, and whose fruits, transplanted to the rest of the
world, have caused the springing forth of that glorious civilization
which Prussian megalomania is now staining with blood.
II. HELLENISM IN ASIA MINOR
By KARL DIETERICH
Translated from the German
By CARROLL N. BROWN, PH.D.,
The College of the City of New York
PREFACE
By THEODORE P. ION, D.C.L.
The German dream of dominion from Hamburg to the Persian Gulf has
naturally attracted the attention of the world to Asia Minor, a country
which has been for centuries in a dormant condition on account of its
subjection to a moribund state. Conquered and reconquered by Asiatic
hordes, its wealth ravaged and pillaged many and many times, its
cities, towns and villages razed to the ground more than once, and
its inhabitants having been subjected again and again to massacres
_en masse_, Asia Minor has been and will naturally continue to be the
reservoir, so to speak, of European civilization for the Great East.
From ancient times the rays of civilization which shone on this
peninsula were not Asiatic but European, that is Hellenic, the
civilizing influences of the language of Homer and Plato having been
kept alive even during the rule of the Mohammedan Arabs.
As is well known, the Arabian Caliphs of Bagdad were always surrounded
by Hellenists and considered the books of the Greek sages more valuable
than gold.[2]
Hence came the great impetus given to Arabian philosophy and positive
science through the translation of the writings of the Greeks, which
were subsequently transplanted to Europe by the Moors even before the
time of the renaissance.
The darkest epoch of Asia Minor began undoubtedly with the advent
of the followers of Osman, who, ever since their irruption into
that country, have wrought havoc among its people, and within a
comparatively short space of time have reduced that fair land to
barbarity and desolation. The ancient seats of learning, the theaters,
the stadia, the treasures of art and other tokens of Hellenic
civilization are now nothing but heaps of ruins, inarticulate witnesses
to the ancient glory of Hellenism.
It is a remarkable phenomenon that beneath these smoldering ruins
civilization was not entirely destroyed, for in spite of the slowly
burning fire Hellenism continued to exist, and toward the close of the
18th century began to show clear signs of that vitality and vigor which
blossomed forth so quickly in the following century, and, in our own
time, have produced such far-reaching results.
Hence the apprehension shown by the Turkish conquerors during the
tyrannical régime of Abdul Hamid. Hence the great efforts made by that
potentate to bring from the confines of Russia Mohammedan hordes such
as Circassians and other unruly tribes and freebooters in order that
they might roam about or settle there according to their fancy, with
the view to offsetting the ever-increasing Greek population of Asia
Minor. Hence the inrush to that country of Mohammedan emigrants from
the territories which have been wrested from the Turk ever since the
events of 1878, it being immaterial whether these Mussulman fanatics
gave themselves to robbery, murder and massacres of the Christians in
the land, or settled there in order to develop the great possibilities
of agriculture in the country.
The diplomacy of Europe, having been satisfied with the platitudes
embodied in the Treaty of Berlin of 1878 as to the introduction
of reforms by the Sublime Porte, both in its European and Asiatic
provinces, has let things take their natural course, the first outcome
being the Armenian horrors of the Hamidian era, which were continued
under the “constitutional régime of the Young Turks” and culminated
in the scientific extermination, by starvation, of that highly gifted
Armenian nation, carried out under the high patronage and guidance
of the Germano-Turanians, whose diabolical activities during the
present world war have overwhelmed in a like catastrophe the Hellenic
population of the Ottoman Empire and particularly of Asia Minor.[3]
From the time that the present German emperor resolved to make the Near
and perhaps the Far East the great market for Teutonic trade, German
scientists of all kinds have been dispatched to Asia Minor to study the
country from every point of view, so that the German Government may, at
the opportune moment, be ready to seize the “golden fleece.”
As a result there have appeared various essays dealing with Asia Minor
from different points of view, and in particular the one with which we
are here concerned, by Dr. Karl Dieterich, forming the principal part
of the present publication of the American-Hellenic Society.[4]
It is worth noticing that the German essayist describes in a vivid
manner the vitality and the potentialities of the Hellenic population
of Asia Minor, and, unlike the ruling class of Germany and many of his
compatriots, he speaks favorably of the Greek populations of Anatolia.
Dr. Dieterich, referring to the persecution of the Greeks, says
erroneously that these “systematic persecutions,” as he admits them to
be, began with the spring of 1914 (see p. 19), while, as a matter of
fact, they commenced on the very day that the Young Turks consolidated
their power (1908-1909), when, in spite of their much heralded formula
of “equality, justice and fraternity,” they designed and instituted
a well-organized method for the annihilation of the Christian
populations, the Adana massacres of the Armenians in April, 1909, being
the precursors of all the subsequent horrors.
Nor did these would-be “reformers,” or “constitutionalists,” conceal
their plans for the Turkification of the Christians in the Ottoman
Empire, for they openly resorted either to forced conversions to
Mohammedanism or to the annihilation of those who seemed unlikely to
submit to be “Ottomanized.” Thus, as early as September, 1908, one of
the moving spirits of the Committee of Union and Progress, namely, Dr.
Nazim, during his visit to Smyrna, at a social gathering held in the
house of a British subject, spoke freely about this matter.[5]
The Young Turks having thus initiated, under the very eyes of Europe,
a systematic extermination of the Armenians,—whom the bloody hand of
Abdul Hamid had not completely destroyed,—turned their attention to the
“more dangerous Greeks.”
It was this plan for the destruction of the Christian nations that,
in 1912, brought together the Balkan States, who saw that under the
new régime in Turkey the peoples of these various nationalities
would gradually be annihilated, if they did not take some preventive
steps. The result was the war of these States against Turkey, the
complete defeat of the latter and the freeing from the Turkish yoke of
hundreds of thousands of people. As a further consequence of this war,
there began on the part of Turkey a wholesale expulsion of the Greek
population from the coast of Asia Minor simply because the neighboring
islands of the Ægean had been incorporated with the Greek Kingdom.
Up to the declaration of the present world war hundreds of thousands
of Greeks were expelled from Turkey, having been, at the same time,
deprived by the Turks of all their movable and immovable property.
All these unfortunate people took refuge in Greece and gave no little
embarrassment to the Greek Government.[6]
It is therefore incorrect to say, as the German writer alleges, that
the persecutions of the Greeks began with the outbreak of the present
war (p. 19).
The difference, however, between the _ante-bellum_ persecutions and
those perpetrated subsequently is this, that while in the former cases
the Greeks were expelled from their native country and were deprived
only of their wealth and their property generally, in the latter not
only were they compelled to abandon everything they owned, but they
also perished through untold hardships and starvation. (See details
about the tragical condition of the Greeks in Publication No. 3 of the
American-Hellenic Society cited above.)
Nor did the Turks in carrying out this cruel work care whether Greece
was friendly or unfriendly to Turkey. As a matter of fact, these
persecutions were in full swing during the “régime of Constantine”
(see dates in _Persecutions of the Greeks_, etc.) when that potentate
was in close relationship not only with the Germans, but also with
the Bulgarians and the Turks, and consequently the persecutions of
the Greeks had nothing to do with the alleged projected territorial
compensations to Greece; besides, Turkey was assured by Germany that
Constantine, who then had the upper hand in Greece, would under no
circumstances attack Turkey.
Therefore it is not correct to say, as the German writer asserts, that
one of the reasons for these persecutions was the promise made to
Greece by the Entente Powers in 1915 of territorial concessions in Asia
Minor (see p. 19).
An indication that even such an evidently impartial writer as Dr.
Dieterich cannot divest himself of the German point of view is his
statement that in the struggle for life the Greeks were on the
offensive, while the Turks were on the defensive (see p. 19). This, in
plain words, means that it suffices for a nation to be intelligent,
active, frugal, moral (as he too acknowledges the Greeks to be, p. 50),
in order to acquire the odium of carrying on an offensive struggle
if another nation living side by side with it happens to be stupid,
fatalist, immoral and incapable of holding its ground in the struggle
for life.
The writer’s theory of the existence of a Greek propaganda in
Asia Minor, “forwarded by every possible means,” is a gratuitous
supposition. Dr. Dieterich evidently misunderstands the conditions in
which the Greek populations have been living in Asia Minor and trying
to promote or revive their national ideals. As a matter of fact, all
the existing Greek schools in Asia Minor,—which is also the case with
the Greek educational institutions in every part of Turkey,—have been
established and supported by the Greek communities themselves, and if,
at times, they have received outside financial aid, this was due to
the generosity of persons who were natives of the country, who had
emigrated to foreign lands and acquired wealth abroad. The many names
of these benefactors appearing on the Greek school buildings attest
the accuracy of this statement.[7] Therefore the allegation of the
writer that a Greek propaganda is carried out in Asia Minor is totally
incorrect.
Another supposition of the German author that the Greeks of Anatolia
intermarried with the “Seljuk Conquerors” is not a historical fact.
On the contrary, judging from the general character of the people and
their attachment to the Christian religion, it is certain that the
Greeks did not intermarry with the Seljuks, since they invaded Asia
Minor after their conversion to Mohammedanism.
That many Greeks, abandoning the faith of their forefathers, embraced
Mohammedanism, is an incontrovertible and historical fact, but that
Turks or other adherents of Islam could not become Christians and
consequently could not intermarry with the Greeks is also a truism.
For, according to Mohammedan Law, a “true believer” who abandons
Islam is liable to be put to death. Therefore, although many Greeks
by becoming Mohammedans lost their nationality, no Turks or other
Mussulmans could become Christians and, consequently, Greeks. That has
been the strongest shield of Hellenism for the preservation of the
Greek nationality.
In the same way his allegation that, as the language of the Greeks in
the interior of Asia Minor was Turkish, they “did not share in the
national and racial consciousness of their kinsmen on the coast” (p.
52) is equally erroneous. Anyone who has lived in that country and
intermingled with these people could not have helped noticing their
intense patriotic spirit and their attachment to Greek ideals, the best
evidence of these being the creation of schools for the study of the
language of their forefathers, namely Greek. Nor is the other statement
of this writer that the Greeks “succeeded in introducing the Greek
language in their schools alongside of the Turkish” correct, because,
as a matter of fact, these schools were established for the study of
the Greek and not the Turkish language, the latter tongue being taught
as a foreign language, occupying the same place in the curriculum of
the Greek schools as foreign languages hold in European or American
schools.
The observation of the author that Germany will have to come to terms
with the Greek peasant of Asia Minor, because “he is on a higher moral
plane,” is worthy of especial notice, and his further remark that “it
would be just as perverse as it would be foolish to depend on the
Turk to the exclusion of the Greek, who has the controlling hand in
trade and traffic, as well as in the cultivation of the soil” (p. 50),
confirms the favorable opinion of both German and other writers and
travelers as to the vitality of the Hellenic element of Asia Minor.
Thus, a distinguished French geographer,—whose statistics, however,
on the populations of Asia Minor are not accurate, since they are
presumably based principally on Turkish sources,—referring to the
Greeks of the Province of Smyrna, says that “among all the Christian
communities of the Province of Smyrna that of the Orthodox Greeks is
the most considerable and that it is, in a general way, better educated
and more prosperous. It is among them,—apart from the merchants who are
best fitted for handling large enterprises,—that are found the most
clever mechanics, often excelling in their various callings, and the
best agriculturists, their well-known characteristics being industry
and activity.” (See Vital Cuinet, _La Turquie d’Asie, Géographie
Administrative_, etc., vol. III., p. 355.)
So, too, the famous English historian of the Crimean War, Kinglake,
writing in 1845, refers to Smyrna, which the Turks call, as he says,
“infidel Smyrna,” in the following terms: “I think that Smyrna may be
called the chief town and capital of the Grecian race. For myself, I
love the race, in spite of all their vices.”[8] (See _Eothen, or Traces
of Travel brought Home from the East_, by Alexander William Kinglake,
p. 41, ed. 1876).
Another English traveler, who made the tour of Asia Minor on foot,
describing the American College in the city of Marsovan and referring
to the Greek students there, says: “Like all Greeks, whether of Europe
or of Asia, they have a quality which always compels interest. In
general intelligence, in quickness of perception, in the power of
acquiring knowledge, they are said, as a race, to have no equals among
their fellow-students—nor in their capacity for opposing each other and
making mountains of difference out of nothing. Watching them, it grows
upon the observer that traditional Greek characteristics have survived
strongly in the race, and that Asia Minor Greeks of today are probably
not different from the Greeks of twenty centuries ago.” (See W. J.
Childs, _Across Asia Minor on Foot_, p. 55, 1917.)
An English general, who during the administration of Lord Beaconsfield
was sent to Asia Minor on a special mission after the conclusion of the
Cyprus Convention of 1878, after referring to some of the well-known
characteristics of the Greeks of Anatolia as an enterprising,
keen-witted people, well gifted with a rare commercial instinct, goes
on to say:
“Profuse expenditure on education is a national characteristic, and
to acquire a sufficient fortune to found a school or hospital in his
native town is the honorable ambition of every Greek merchant....
The Anatolian Greeks generally are active and intelligent, laborious
and devoted to commercial pursuits. They learn quickly and well, and
become doctors, lawyers, bankers, innkeepers, etc., filling most of
the professions. They are good miners and masons, and villages are
generally found near old lead and copper mines. They have much of the
versatility, the love of adventure and intrigue, which distinguished
the ancient Greeks, and a certain restlessness in their commercial
speculations which sometimes leads to disaster. The democratic feeling
is strong; the sole aristocracy is that of wealth, and ancient lineage
confers no distinction. The children of rich and poor go to the same
schools and receive the same free education” (Sir Charles W. Wilson,
_Murray’s Hand-book for Travellers in Asia Minor_, 1905, pp. 70-71).
A brilliant French Hellenist and scholar, in referring to the Greeks
of Smyrna, gives the following picturesque description of them. “They
are,” he says, “so numerous in that city, that they consider it as
part of their domain. Wide-awake, lively, playfully sly and always
interesting, they are here the tavern-keepers, the grocers, the
boatmen. These are the three trades that most of the Greeks of the poor
class prefer, just as the profession of lawyer and that of physician
are particularly popular among the Greeks of the well-to-do class. As
tavern-keepers they talk all day long; they keep up with the news, they
discuss politics, they run down the Turks, they are always stirring,
bustling and struggling, in their way, for the ‘grand idea.’”
“As grocers they sell a little of everything. They do business as money
changers, an infinite happiness for a Hellene. As boatmen they have the
sea, this old friend of the descendants of Ulysses, as their constant
companion; they go right and left in the hustling of the port, they see
new faces; they question the travelers who come from afar; they dispute
with them about the boatfare, which is yet another rare pleasure for
the Greeks. An amusing race, sympathetic, on the whole, notwithstanding
its faults; patriotic, persistent, sober, mildly obstinate in its
indomitable hope.”
“Because of their constant activity and their wit, the Greeks have
supplanted the Turks in many places in Turkey.”[9]
The vivid description of Hellenism in Asia Minor given by the German
author, and corroborated by numerous other writers and travelers, shows
the important rôle that the Hellenic element is destined to play if
that unfortunate country is ever favored with the blessings of good
government.
The Hellenic State should undoubtedly be the natural inheritor or at
any rate the executor of the estate of the Sick Man of the East; if
not of all of Asia Minor, at any rate of a great part of it, _i.e._,
western Anatolia. But if the Ottoman sway in Anatolia is prolonged,
it is to be hoped that the country will, at least, be under the joint
tutelage of some civilized states which will take into consideration
the wishes and aspirations of the Hellenic people.
HELLENISM IN ASIA MINOR[10]
By KARL DIETERICH,
Privatdocent in Mediæval and Modern Greek Literature in the University
of Leipzig.
The political unrest in the Near East which preceded the present world
war and accompanied its beginnings has turned attention once more to
the existence of the Greek element in the population of Asia Minor.
Two factors in particular have entered into this feeling of unrest:
first, the systematic persecutions of the Greeks by the Young Turks,
which have been going on ever since the spring of 1914, and secondly,
the recent communications in the press dealing with alleged promises on
the part of the Triple Entente to indemnify Greece through extensive
territorial concessions in Asia Minor—the talk was of an extent of
100,000 to 120,000 sq. km.—in order to repay her for her intervention
in the war. However one may feel as to both these points and their
justification, this much is clear, that the Turks believed that they
were in the presence of a Greek peril.[11]
There was thus started, in Asia Minor, a defensive struggle on the
part of the Turks that was just as sharply defined as the offensive
which this Greek element had for a long time been actually carrying on
against the Turks of this region; with this difference, however, that
the Turkish defensive has only recently acquired sufficient strength to
make its action felt, while the Greek offensive has for decades
been quietly at work getting the upper hand economically, culturally
and nationally in that land where they once ruled for a period of
more than a thousand years. Granted that the Greek propaganda, which
has, for a considerable time, been forwarded in Asia Minor by every
possible means, has in many particulars been carried on too bitterly,
and has injured the sensibilities of the Ottomans, the fact remains
that the Greeks in Asia Minor economically and culturally have control
of Asia Minor even now, not as an outside or foreign element in the
population, though the movement has been forwarded from the outside,
but as something that has developed from within on the very soil of
the country itself, something that has in centuries of growth become
a historic fact and that is only to be understood when one has fully
grasped what has gone before.
To do this one must go back into times which are long since past,
though their resultant forces, far from having ceased to operate, seem
just now, as a matter of fact, to be renewing their strength.
Asia Minor was in prehistoric times a field for Greek colonization.
Long after its littoral had, in early Hellenic times (dating back,
in fact, to the 10th century B.C.), been bordered with a fringe of
Greek settlements, which were the basis of the old Ionic and Æolic
civilizations, this coast colonization had, in later Greek times, been
extended and developed through the victorious eastern expeditions of
Alexander the Great into a real colonization of the interior.
Just as had been the case in the whole of the western regions of Asia
Minor, there arose in the 4th to 2nd centuries B.C., in the interior
of the country as well, a whole series of new Greek cities, which from
that time on have constituted firmly fixed centers for the Hellenizing
and civilizing of the land. This began with Byzantine and Turkish times
and has extended up to the present, forming a sure testimony to the
stubborn endurance of this late Greek civilization. One needs only to
think of towns like Nicæa, Nicomedia, Prusa, Pergamon, Philadelphia,
Thyatira, Laodicea, etc., which were all founded in the 3rd and 2nd
centuries B.C. and were named after the Diadochi[12] or their wives.
After the fall of the states founded by the Diadochi, the Romans came
in and conquered Asia Minor. Without having succeeded in permanently
Romanizing it, they gave it a solidity which enabled the Byzantine
emperors, after the later Hellenizing of the Eastern Roman Empire, to
advance farther and farther into the interior and toward the east,
accompanying the victorious advance of Christianity: in Cappadocia, the
home of Greek monastic life in the East, there was firmly established
in Cæsarea, in the 6th century, a new outpost of Greek civilization.
Thus, throughout the centuries, by a process of colonization that
was forwarded now by peaceful means and again by war, Hellenism
forced its way steadily eastward, and on the basis of the older
indigenous population a new sphere for Greek colonization was opened
up which developed its own peculiar cultural strength only after the
passing away of the ancient Greek civilization, in Christian, that
is, and Byzantine times. Up to the end of the first millennium of
the Christian Era, at a time when the Balkan Peninsula, including
Ancient Greece, had long since lost its ancient city-life and culture
beneath the inroads and devastations of Goths, Avars and Slavs, Asia
Minor was still a populous and blooming land with countless large
cities, whose inhabitants combined Hellenistic culture with Christian
fervor. Intellectual traditions, associated with the names of Arrian,
Dio Cassius, Strabo, Galen and Epictetus, were still living and
were perpetuated in the writings of the Byzantine historians of the
10th-14th centuries, the most famous of whom came from Asia Minor.[13]
At that time the strongly ascetic ideals of Greek monastic life were
still in full vigor, as they had been first preached and practiced by
the three great Church Fathers, Basil of Cæsarea, the Cappadocian,
and the two Gregories of Nyssa and Nazianzus, and as they had assumed
controversial form in the monastic castles of Asia Minor (the
forerunners of the monasteries of Mount Athos), built on the Bithynian
Olympus, which is still called by the Turks Keshish-Dagh, _i.e._,
Monks’ Mount, on the Auxentios (also in Bithynia), on Mounts Sipylus,
in Lydia, and Latmos, in Caria. In ecclesiastical architecture, too,
Asia Minor was an originator: the so-called “Domed” Basilika, which
reached its greatest perfection in St. Sophia in Constantinople and its
most perfect reproduction in St. Mark’s in Venice, owes its development
to Asia Minor.[14]
Finally there arose in Asia Minor a new folk-poetry that dealt with the
deeds of heroes. What the Nibelungen is to the Germans, the Chanson de
Roland to the French, and Beowulf to the English, that, to the Greeks
of the Middle Ages, was the romantic epic of Akritas (_i.e._, Count)
Basilios. Discovered only a few decades ago, though scattered widely,
wherever Greek is spoken, in countless fragments of folk-poetry, it
is a sort of crystal precipitate in verse of those struggles which
the Byzantine Counts were forced to wage against the Saracens on the
eastern confines of their realm, in Cappadocia. The poem has for us a
double value: first, as proving that the national center of gravity of
Hellenism lay then in Asia Minor, and second, as enlightening us as to
the ethnological relations of the country, for its hero is the son of a
Greek woman by an Arab Emir (hence his surname Digenis, that is, born
of two races).[15]
From a political as well as a cultural point of view, Asia Minor
formed a center of Hellenism. From here sprang all the great ruling
families, which from the 8th century to the 13th constantly renewed the
kingdom: the Isaurians (717-867), the Armenians (867-1057), the Comneni
(1057-1185), the Laskarides (1204-1261), the Palæologi (1261-1453).
They are all rooted in the feudal nobility of Asia Minor, which is
comparable with our east Elbe colonial nobility. If it had not been
for these powerful and energetic noble families the Byzantine Empire,
and with it Hellenism as well, would long ago have been destroyed, and
if the Greeks in Asia Minor had not succeeded in these struggles, that
lasted 300 years, in stemming the advance of the Turks, their hordes
would have poured over the Balkan Peninsula and Hungary centuries
earlier than they did. We must briefly review these wars, for in no
other way can the present ethnical and cultural constitution of the
country and the position of Hellenism in it be fully understood. The
annihilation of Hellenism and the coincident erection, one after the
other, of two Turkish empires came in two great phases: the first, at
the end of the 11th century, in the conquest by the Seljuks, and the
second, at the beginning of the 14th century, in that by the Ottomans.
The geographical situation of the capitals of these two kingdoms,
Iconium (Konia) and Prusa (Brussa), is in itself an indication of the
swinging of the Turkish center of gravity from the east toward the
northwest.
Although the Seljuk kingdom did not embrace the whole peninsula within
its boundaries, it threatened, at first, with that terrific thrusting
strength of the Mongolian conquerors, to reach out far beyond its
boundaries, and to wrest from the Greeks that northwestern part of
Asia Minor that was so greatly coveted. In 1080 the Seljuks were
already in the extreme northwest in Bithynia, and in possession of
Nicæa and Nicomedia, and were ranging the whole coast regions from
Smyrna to Attalia (Adalia) as pirates. The Greeks, who were at first
purely on the defensive, joined in with the Crusaders, and succeeded,
after twenty years of stubborn fighting, in thrusting the Turkish
conquerors back of a line which corresponds pretty closely to that
of the Eskishehr-Karahissar-Akshehr railroad line of today. This was
in the early part of the 12th century (1117). A second thrust by
the Greeks (1139) drove them back upon their old base and center,
Iconium. Western Asia Minor was thus again rescued to the Greeks and
nearly forty years of quiet followed. This time was utilized by the
Greek emperors to build a strong line of fortresses against possible
further attacks; all strategically important points were defended by
strong forts, especially the valley of the Sangarios, which formed the
corridor of attack against Constantinople. Even today, as one travels
over the railroad from Ismid-Eskishehr, he sees numerous, fairly
well preserved ruins of these Byzantine forts which served the same
purpose of border-defense as those of today in the valley of the Saal
in our own land.[16] They bear Turkish names, but he who has studied
into these things knows that these are only literal translations of
old Greek names: Inegeul, shortened from Angelokome = Angelstown;
Kupruhissar, from the Greek Gephyrokastron = Bridgefort; Karadjahissar
= Greek Melangeia (Turkish, karadja = blackish). They mark, therefore,
the boundary between Byzantine and Turkish history.
Thanks to these fortresses, the Greeks succeeded in repulsing the
Turkish assaults, so vehemently renewed in 1177, until, by the Latin
conquest of 1204, the Byzantine Empire was entirely restricted to Asia
Minor, where, in the so-called Nicæan Empire, it experienced such a
promising rebirth that it soon embraced the whole northern half of
western Asia Minor. This new kingdom secured to the Greeks the mastery
in Asia Minor for 125 years more, and it would have secured it to
them for an even longer period if the Mongol invasion of 1241 and the
consequent weakening of the Seljuks had not tempted the ambitious
Greek emperors to stretch out their hands once more toward that fatal
Constantinople, instead of using their whole strength in maintaining
their hold on Asia Minor; for the Greek Empire of that time was no
longer strong enough to hold control over two continents that were so
seriously threatened, especially since a new avalanche was already
rolling in from the east, the mighty Ottomans, who rose up in the
strength of youth among the ruins of the fallen empire of the Seljuks.
What the Seljuks in 240 years had failed to accomplish, the Ottomans
were destined to bring about in a single generation, the ruination of
Hellenism in Asia Minor.
It was in 1299 that the petty Turkish feudal prince, Osman, broke
through the fortified region of the Sangarios, and after sixteen
years of desperate fighting succeeded in forcing his way through to
Nicæa, the chief defensive point of the Greeks, in order to lay the
foundations of that great Ottoman Empire that was to be the mighty
successor to the Byzantine Empire. He still met with almost invincible
resistance; Nicæa with its mighty walls could not be forced, and it
was only in 1326, the year of his death, that Prusa, after a ten-year
siege, fell, and under the name of Brussa became the first Ottoman
capital. In 1330, and after a siege of fifteen years, came the fall of
Nicæa, and later that of Nicomedia. The hardest part of the task had
thus been done, the first great breach had been made in the stronghold
of the Greek Empire, and the conquerors now turned to the south.
Pergamon fell in 1335, Sardis in 1369, and Philadelphia (Alashehr),
the last of the Greek cities of the interior, which, according to the
expression of a Greek chronicler, stands like a star in a clouded sky,
was captured in 1391. Smyrna, the old Greek acropolis, had already
fallen a prey early in the 14th century to the Seljuks, who had found
in Aïdin, the ancient Tralles, a last support for their sinking
power. Apart from Trebizond in the extreme northeast, which up to
1461 maintained itself as the capital of the little coast state which
was also called Trebizond, all Asia Minor was now in the hands of the
Turks. The Greeks, as a political factor, had ceased to play any part.
The question as to whether they had ceased to be of any importance as a
civilizing and cultural factor we must now attempt to investigate.
Byzantine sources show clearly enough that Asia Minor, even in the
11th century, was suffering from decrease in its population. This
was caused partly by the endless levies of troops, necessitated by
the struggles against the Bulgarians in the Balkans, and partly by
agrarian conditions in Asia Minor, of which I have yet to speak. The
consequences of this systematic depopulation first became evident
when the country collapsed under the inroads of Seljuks, Mongols and
Ottomans; for the defensive military strength that was for a while
maintained could not disguise the fact that the national strength of
the Greeks was already broken when the inroads of these peoples began.
Furthermore, there was no longer any means at hand to renew this
strength which had been for centuries so systematically drained. On
the contrary, the depopulation went on from bad to worse, and it took
place in different ways according to the varying character of the three
conquering peoples.
The Seljuks, who were bent chiefly on gaining new pasturing grounds,
seem to have drawn the Greek population closer to themselves and to
have made them of some service, instead of attempting to drive them
out by force. This is proven by the accounts of voluntary or forced
submission to the conquerors, into which the inhabitants were driven by
the unsound agrarian conditions in Asia Minor, which were characterized
by an ever-growing tendency toward larger and larger estates, a
tendency against which, even in the 10th century, the clear-sighted
emperors had vainly enacted the strictest laws. The consequences
appeared at the time of the inroads of the Seljuks; evidently with full
knowledge of these conditions, they promised the oppressed peasants in
the conquered regions complete freedom in return for the payment of a
head tax, if they would yield to their control. Thus great masses of
the Greek population went over to the Turks and were lost to Hellenism.
Emperor John Comnenos
|
was silence for a minute as all thought of the tragic message which
had fallen into the camp.
“You should worry about the name,” said Roy.
“I don’t suppose there’s anything we can do,” said Mr. Ellsworth, voicing
the thought which held all silent, “but sit here and wait, and if we’re
sensible we won’t hope for too much. Come, Roy, let our new friends hear
about you boys coming up in the _Good Turn_.”
“It isn’t that big cruiser down at Catskill Landing, is it?” Arnold
inquired. “We saw that as we got off the train.”
“No, that’s the kind of a yacht boys have in twenty-five cent stories,”
said Roy; “I saw that one; it’s a pippin, isn’t it? Guess it belongs to a
millionaire, hey? No, ours is just a little cabin launch—poor, but
honest, tangoes along at about six miles an hour and isn’t ashamed. Do
you want the full story?”
“If there aren’t any stockings and stone-walls in it,” someone suggested.
“All right, here goes,” said Roy, settling, himself into his favorite
posture before the fire, with his hands clasped about his drawn-up knees
and the bright blaze lighting up his face.
“You see, it was this way. Pee-wee Harris is the what’d you say his name
is—Lord? Pee-wee Harris over there is the Gordon Lord of our troop. And
Tom Slade is our famous detective—Sherlock Nobody Holmes.
“Well, Tom and Pee-wee and I started ahead of the others last summer to
hike it up here. Pee-wee got very tired (here he dodged a missile from
Pee-wee) and so we were all glad when we got a little above Nyack and
things began to happen. They happened in large chunks.
“On the way up Pee-wee captured a pet bird that belonged to a little girl
(oh, he’s a regular gallant little lad, he is); he got the bird down out
of a tree for her and to show how happy she was she began to cry.”
“Gee, they’re awful funny, ain’t they?” commented Gordon Lord.
“Well, we beat it along till we hit the Hudson, then we started north.
The shadows of night were falling.”
“You read that in a book,” interrupted Pee-wee.
Little Raymond was greatly amused. So was Mr. Ellsworth who poked up the
fire and resumed his seat on the old bench beside Jeb Rushmore.
“Team work,” someone suggested, slyly, indicating Gordon and Pee-wee.
“The kindergarten class will please be quiet,” said Roy. “I repeat, the
shadows of night were tumbling. It began to rain. And it rained, and it
rained—and it rained.
“Suddenly, we saw this boat—we thought it was a shanty at first—in the
middle of a big marsh. So we plowed our way through the muck and crawled
into it. Pity the poor sailors on a night like that!
“Well, believe me, it was too sweet for anything in that old cabin.
Pee-wee wasn’t homesick any more (here Roy dodged again) and we settled
down for the night. The rain came down in sheets and pillowcases and
things and the cruel wind played havoc—I mean it blew—and shook the old
boat just as if she’d been in the water. But what cared we—yo, ho, my
lads—we cared naught!
“Well, in the morning along came an old codger with a badge and said he
was a sheriff. He was looking for an escaped convict and we didn’t suit.
He told us the boat was owned by an old grouch in Nyack and said if we
didn’t want to be arrested for trespassing and destroying property we’d
better beat it. He told us some more about the old grouch, and I guess
Pee-wee and I thought the best thing to do was to hike it right along for
Haverstraw and not wait for trouble. We had chopped up a couple of old
stanchions for firewood—worth about two Canadian dimes, they were, but
our friend said old What’s-his-name would be only too glad to call that
stealing and send us to jail. Honest, that old hulk was a _sight_. You
wouldn’t have thought anybody would want to admit that he owned such a
ramshackle old pile of junk and that’s why we made so free with it.
“Well, zip goes the fillum! Here’s where Tom comes on the scene. He said
that if that was the kind of a gink Old Crusty was we’d have to go and
see him and tell him what we’d done. He just blurted it out in that sober
way of his and Pee-wee was scared out of his——”
This time Pee-wee landed a wad of uprooted grass in Roy’s face.
“Pee-wee, as I said, was—with us (dodging again). The sheriff must have
thought Tom was crazy. He gave us a—some kind of a scope—what d’you call
it—when they read your fortune?”
“Horoscope?” suggested Arnold, smiling.
“Correct—I thank you. He told us that we’d be in jail by night. You ought
to have seen Pee-wee stare. I told him _he_ ought not to kick—he’d been
shouting for adventures and here was a good one. So we trotted back to
Nyack behind Tom and strode boldly up to Old Crusty’s office and—here’s
where the film changes—”
“Go ahead,” said Arnold. “You’ve got me started now.”
“Well, who do you think Old Crusty was?”
“Not the escaped convict!”
“Not on your life! He turned out to be the father of the little girl
whose pet bird Pee-wee had captured the day before.”
“The plot grows thinner,” said someone.
“Well, he had all the signs of an old grouch, hair ruffled up, spectacles
half-way down his nose—but he fell for Pee-wee, you can bet.
“When he found out who we were (the girl must have told him about us, I
suppose) he got kind of interested and when Pee-wee started to explain
things he couldn’t keep from laughing. Well, in the end he said the only
way we could square ourselves was to take the boat away; he said it
belonged to his son who was dead, and that he didn’t want it and we were
welcome to it and he’d send us a couple of men to help us launch it. He
seemed to feel pretty bad when he mentioned his son and we were so
surprised and excited at getting the boat that we just stood there
gaping. Gee, how can you thank a man when he gives you a cabin launch?”
Arnold shook his head.
“Well, we spent a couple of days and eight dollars and fifty-two cents
fixing the boat up and then, sure enough, along came two men and Mr.
Stanton’s chauffeur to jack the boat over and launch her for us. The girl
came along, too, in their auto, and oh, wasn’t she tickled! Brought us a
lot of eats and a flag she’d made, and stayed to wish us—what do you call
it?”
“Bon voyage?”
“Correct—I thank you. Understand, I’m only giving you the facts. We had
more fun those three days and that night launching the boat than you
could shake a stick at. Well, when we got her in the water I noticed the
girl had gone off a little way and kept staring at it. Gee, the boat did
look pretty nice when she got in the water. I thought maybe she was kind
of thinking about her brother, you know, and it put it into my head to
ask one of the men how he died. She didn’t come near us while we talked,
but stood off there by herself staring at the launch. You see, it was the
first time she’d seen it in the water since he was lost, and she was
almost crying—I could tell that.
“Well, this is what the man told me. They said this Harry Stanton and
another fellow named Benty Willis were out in the launch on a stormy
night. There was a skiff belonging to the launch, and people thought they
must have been in that, fishing. Anyway, the next morning, they found the
skiff broken and swamped to her gunwale and right near it the body of the
other fellow. The launch was riding on her anchor same as the night
before. The men said Mr. Stanton was so broken up that he had the boat
hauled ashore and a flood carried her up on the marsh where she was going
to pieces when we found her. He would never look at her again. They said
Harry Stanton could swim and that made some people think that maybe they
were run down by one of the big night boats on the Hudson and that Harry
was injured—killed that way, maybe.
“Anyway, when the girl got in the auto and said good-bye to us I could
see she’d been crying all right, and she said we must be careful and not
run at night on account of the big liners.”
“Hmph,” said Arnold, thoughtfully.
“Gee, I’ll never forget that night, with her sitting in the auto ready to
start home and the boat rocking in the water and waiting for us. I can’t
stand seeing a girl cry, can you? I guess we all felt kind of sober when
we said good-bye and she told us to be careful. Tom told her we’d try to
do a _real_ good turn some day to pay her back, because we really owed it
to her, you know, and there was something in the way he said it—you know
how Tom blurts things out—that made me think he had an idea up his
sleeve.
“Well, it was about an hour later, while we were sitting on the cabin
roof, that Tom sprung it on us. We were going to start up river in the
morning; we were just loafing—gee, it was nice in the moonlight!—when he
said it would be a great thing for us to find Harry Stanton! Go-o-d
ni-i-ght! I was kind of sore at him because I didn’t like to hear him
joking, sort of, about a fellow that was dead, especially after what the
fellow’s father and sister had done for us, but he came right back at me
by pointing to the board we had the oil stove on. What do you think he
did? He showed us the letters N Y M P H under the fresh paint and said
that board was part of the launch’s old skiff and wanted to know how it
got back to the launch. What do you know about that? You see, we had run
short of paint and it was thin on that board because we’d mixed gasoline
with it. We ought to have mixed it with cod liver oil, hey?
“So there you are,” concluded Roy; “Pee-wee and I just stared like a
couple of gumps. Those fellows had been out in the skiff and they
couldn’t have used it with that side plank ripped off. And how did it get
back to the launch?”
“Sounds as if the man might have been right about the skiff being smashed
by a big boat,” said Arnold. “Maybe Harry Stanton was injured and clung
to that board. But why should he have pulled it aboard the launch? And
what I can’t understand is that nobody should have noticed it except you
fellows. Was it in the launch all the time?”
“Yup—right under one of the lockers. Pee-wee and I had hauled it out to
make a shelf for the oil stove.”
“But how do you suppose it was no one had noticed it till you fellows got
busy with the boat?”
“A scout is observant,” said Roy, laughingly.
“Hmph—it’s mighty interesting, anyway,” mused Arnold. He drummed on a log
with his fingers, and for a few moments no one spoke.
“Some mystery, hey?” said Roy, adding a log to the fire.
CHAPTER IV
THE OLD TRAIL
Several things more or less firmly fixed in his mind had impelled Tom
Slade to challenge that wooded hill the dense summit of which was visible
by day from Temple Camp.
He knew that high land is always selected for despatching carrier
pigeons; a certain book on stalking which he had read contained a chapter
on this fascinating and often useful sport and he knew that in a general
sort of way there was a connection between carrier pigeons and stalking;
one suggested the other—to him, at least. He knew for a certainty that
the message had been written on the unprinted part of a stalking blank
and he knew also that on the slope of the hill he had seen chalk marks on
the trees the previous summer. Tom seldom forgot anything.
All these facts, whether significant or not, were indelibly impressed
upon his serious mind, and to him they seemed to bear relation to each
other. He believed that the pigeon had been flying homeward, to some town
or city not far distant, where the sender perhaps lived and he believed
that the pigeon’s use in this emergency had been the happy thought of
some person who had taken the bird to the hill only to use for sport. He
had no doubt that somewhere in the wilderness of these Catskill hills was
a camp where the victim of accident lay, but the weak point was that he
was seeking a needle in a haystack.
“I wish we’d brought along the fog horn from the boat,” he said, as they
made their way across the open country below the hill; “we could have
made a lot of noise with it up there; you can hear a long way in the
woods, and it might have helped us to find the place.”
“If the place is up there,” said Doc Carson.
“There’s a trail,” said Tom, “that runs about halfway up but it peters
out at a brook and you can’t find any from there on.”
“If we could find the trees where you saw the marks last summer,” said
Connie Bennet, “we might get next to some clue there.”
“I can usually find a place where I’ve been before,” said Tom.
“What’s the matter with following the brook when we get to it?” said
Garry. “If there’s anyone camping there they’d have to be near water.”
“Good idea,” said Doc.
“That settles one thing I was trying to dope out,” said Tom. “Why should
people come as far as that just to stalk?”
“Maybe they’re scouts, camping.”
“They’d have smudged up the whole sky with signals,” said Tom.
“Maybe it’s someone up there hunting.”
“Only it isn’t the season,” laughed Garry. “No sooner said than stung, as
Roy would say. Gee, I wish he was along!”
“Same here,” said Doc.
“They’re probably there fishing,” said Tom. “The stalking business is a
side issue, most likely.”
“That’s what the little brook whispers to us,” said Doc.
They all laughed except Tom. He was not much on laughing, though Roy
could usually reach him.
The woods began abruptly at the foot of the hill and they skirted its
edge for a little way holding their lantern to the ground so as to find
the trail. But no sign of path revealed itself. Twice they fancied they
could see, or _sense_, as Jeb would have said, an opening into the dense
woods and the faintest suggestion of a trail but it petered out in both
cases—or perhaps it was imaginary.
“Let’s try what Jeb calls lassooing it,” said Garry.
He retreated through the open field to a lone tree which stood gaunt and
spectral in the night like a sentinel on guard before that vast woodland
army. Climbing up the tree, he called to Tom:
“Walk along the edge now and hold your lantern low.”
Tom skirted the wood’s edge, swinging his light this way and that as
Garry called to him. The idea of trying to discover the trail by taking a
distant and elevated view was a good one, but the tree was either too
near or too far or the light was too dim, and the four scouts knew not
what to do next.
“Climb up a little higher,” called Doc. “They say that when you’re up in
an aeroplane you can see all sorts of paths that people below never knew
about. I read that in an aviation magazine.”
“_The Fly-paper_, hey?” ventured Connie. “Look out for rotten branches,
Garry.”
Garry wriggled his way up among the small branches, as far as he dared,
while Tom moved about at the wood’s edge holding the lantern here and
there.
“Nothing doing,” said Garry, coming down.
“We’re up against it, for a fact,” said Doc.
“That’s just what we’re not,” retorted Connie. “It seems we’re nowhere
near it.”
“Gee-whillager!” cried Garry as he scrambled down the tree trunk. “Sling
me over the peroxide, will you!”
“What’s the matter?” asked Doc, interested at once.
“I’ve got a scratch. What Pee-wee would call an artificial abrasion.”
“Superficial?” laughed Doc, pouring peroxide on a pretty deep scratch on
Garry’s wrist.
“See there?” said Garry. “Feel. It’s sticking out from the trunk.”
As Tom held his lantern a small, rusty projection of iron was visible on
the trunk of the tree about five feet from the ground.
“Is it a nail?” asked Connie.
“Well-what-do-you-know-about-that?” said Garry. “It’s what’s left of a
hook; the tree has grown out all around it, don’t you see?”
It was indeed the rusty remnant of what had once been a hook but the
growing trunk had encased all except the end of it and the screws and
plate that fastened it were hidden somewhere within the tree.
“That tree has grown about an inch and a half thicker all the way around
since the hook was fastened to it,” said Doc.
“It’s an elm, isn’t it?” Garry said.
Tom thought a minute. “Elms, oaks,” he mused, “that means about ten or
twelve years ago.”
“There are only two reasons why people put hooks into trees,” said
Connie, after a moment’s silence; “for hammocks and to fasten horses to.
Nix on the hammocks here,” he added.
“What I was thinking about,” said Tom, “is that if somebody used to tie a
horse here it must have been so’s they could go into the woods. The trail
goes as far up as the brook. Maybe they used to tie their horses here and
go fishing. There ought to be a trail from this tree to where the trail
begins in the woods.”
“Probably there was—twelve years ago,” said Doc, dryly.
“The ground where a trail was is never just the same as where one
wasn’t,” said Tom, with a clumsy phraseology that was characteristic of
him. “It leaves a scar—like. When they started the Panama Canal they
found a trail that was used in the Fifteenth Century—an aviator found
it.”
“Well, then,” said Garry, cheerfully, “I’ll aviate to the top of this
tree again and take a squint straight down.”
“Shut your eyes and keep them shut,” Tom called up to him; “keep them
shut till I tell you.”
“Wait till Tom says peek-a-boo!” called Connie.
Tom gathered some twigs that were none too dry, and pouring a little
kerosene over them, kindled a small fire about six feet from the tree.
“Can you see down here all right?”
“Not with my eyes shut,” Garry answered.
“Well, open them,” said Tom, “and see if the leaves keep you from
seeing.”
“What he means,” called Doc, “is, have you an unobstructed view?”
There was always this tendency to make fun of Tom’s soberness.
“Wait till I look in my pocket,” called Garry. “Sure, I’ve got one.”
“Shut your eyes again and keep them shut,” commanded Tom.
“I have did it,” came from above.
With a couple of sticks which he manipulated like Chinese chopsticks, Tom
moved the fire a little to a spot which seemed to suit him better, then
retreated with his lantern to the wood’s edge.
“Now,” he called; “quick, what do you see? Quick!” he shouted. “You can’t
do it at all unless you do it quick!”
“To your left!” shouted Garry. “Down that way—farther—farther still—go
on—more. Hurry up! Just a—there you are!”
The boys ran to the spot where Tom stood and a few swings of the lantern
showed an unmistakable something—certainly not a path—hardly a trail—but
a way of lesser resistance, as one might say, into the dense wood
interior.
“Come on!” said Tom. “I hope the kerosene holds out—I dumped out a lot of
it.”
Instinctively, they fell back for him to lead the way and scarcely a tree
but he paused to consider whether he should pass to the left or the right
of it.
“What did you see?” Connie asked of Garry.
“I couldn’t tell you,” said Garry, still amazed at his own experience, “I
don’t know as I saw anything; I suppose I sensed it, as Jeb would say. It
was kind of like a little dirty green line from the tree and it kept
fading away the longer I had my eyes open. It wasn’t exactly a line,
either,” he corrected; “it was—oh, I don’t know what it was.”
“It was a ghost,” said Tom.
“That’s a good name for it,” conceded Garry.
“It’s the right name for it,” said Tom, with that blunt outspokenness
which had a savor of reprimand but which the boys usually took in good
part.
“That’s just about what I’d say it was,” Garry agreed.
“That’s what you ought to say it was,” said Tom, “because that’s what it
was.”
Doc winked at Garry, and Connie smiled.
“We get you, Steven,” he said to Tom.
“Even before there were any flying machines, scouts in Africa knew about
trail ghosts,” Tom said. “They’re all over, only you can’t see
them—except in special ways—like this. You can only see them for about
twenty seconds when you open your eyes. If I’d have told you to look
cross-eyed you could have seen it better.”
“Wouldn’t that have been a sight for mother’s boy!” said Garry. “Swinging
on a thin branch on the top of a tree and looking cross-eyed at a ghost!
I’d have had that Cheshire cat in _Alice in Wonderland_ beaten a mile.”
“Captain Crawford who died,” said Tom, “picked up a lot of them. The
higher up you are the better. In an aeroplane you needn’t even shut your
eyes.”
“Well, truth is stranger than friction, as Roy says,” said Connie; “this
trail we’re on now is no ghost, anyway—hey, Tomasso?”
Tom did not answer.
“I got a splinter in my finger, too,” said Garry.
“Must have been scratching your head,” said Connie.
“That’s what I get from seein’ things,” said Garry.
“We’ll string the life out of Pee-wee, hey?” said Doc. “Tell him we saw a
ghost——”
“We did,” Tom insisted.
“You mean Garry did,” said Doc. “Of course, we have to take his word for
it.”
“Buffalo Bill saw them, too,” said Tom, plodding on.
“Not Bill Cody!” ejaculated Doc, winking at Garry.
“Yes,” said Tom.
“Is it _possible_?” said Doc, “Where’d you read that—in the _Fly-paper_?”
“There’s a trail ghost a hundred miles long out in Utah that nobody on
the ground ever saw. Curtis followed it in his biplane,” said Tom.
“Fancy that!” said Doc.
Tom plodded on ahead of them, in his usual stolid manner. “I don’t say
you can always do it,” he said; “it’s kind of—something—there’s a long
word—sike——”
“Psychological?” said Doc. “We get you, Tomasso.”
CHAPTER V
ADVENTURE OF THE RESCUE PARTY
“I bet there are real ghosts in here,” said Garry, as they climbed the
slope which became more difficult as they went along.
“Regular ones, hey?” said Doc.
“Sure, the good old-fashioned kind.”
“No peek-a-boo ghosts,” said Garry.
“Well, you can knock ghosts all you want to,” said Connie, “but I always
found them white.”
“Slap him on the wrist, will you!” called Doc. “Believe _me_, this is
some impenetrable wilderness!”
“How?”
“Impenetrable wilderness—reduced to a common denominator, thick woods.”
Withal their bantering talk, it seemed indeed as if the woods might be
haunted, for with almost every step they took some crackling or rustling
sound could be heard, emphasized by the stillness. Now and again they
paused to listen to a light patter growing fainter and fainter, or a
sudden noise as of some startled denizen of the wood seeking a new
shelter. Ghostly shadows flitted here and there in the moonlight; and the
night breeze, soughing among the tree tops, wafted to the boys a
murmuring as of some living thing whose elusive tones now and again
counterfeited the human voice in seeming pain or fear.
The voices of the boys sounded crystal clear in the solemn stillness.
Once they paused, trying to locate an owl which seemed to be shrieking
its complaint at this intrusion of its domain. Again they stopped to
listen to the distant sound of falling water.
“That’s the brook, I guess,” said Tom.
Their approach to it seemed to sober the others, realizing as they did
that effort and resourcefulness were now imperative, and mindful, too,
though scarcely hopeful, that these might bring them face to face with a
tragic scene.
“Pretty tough, being up here all alone with somebody dying,” said Doc.
“You said something,” answered Garry.
They were entering an area of underbrush, where the trail ceased or was
completely obscured, so that there wasn’t even a ghost of it, as Doc
remarked. But the sound of the water guided them now and they worked
their way through such a dense maze of jungle as they had never expected
to encounter outside the tropics.
Tom, going ahead, tore the tangled growth away, or parted it enough to
squeeze through, the others following and carrying the stretcher and
first-aid case with greatest difficulty.
“How long is this surging thoroughfare, I wonder,” asked Garry.
“Don’t know,” said Tom. “I don’t seem to have my bearings at all.”
After a little while they emerged, scratched and dishevelled, at the
brook which tumbled over its pebbly bed in its devious path downward.
“We’re pretty high up, do you know that?” Doc observed.
“I don’t see as there’s much use hunting for marked trees,” Tom said. “I
must have come another way before. I don’t know where we’re at. What
d’you say we all shout together?”
This they did and the sound of their upraised voices reverberated in the
dense woods and shocked the still night, but no answering sound could be
heard save only the rippling of the brook.
“We stand about as much chance as a snowball in a blast furnace,” said
Garry.
“The thing to do,” said Tom, ignoring him, “is to follow this brook,
somebody on each side, and look for a trail. If there’s anybody here
they’ll be upstream; it’s too steep from here down. And one thing
sure—they’d have to have water. Lucky the moon’s out, but I wish we had
two lanterns.”
“We’ll be lucky if the oil in this one lasts,” Doc put in.
Following the stream was difficult enough, but it was easier than the
forest they had just come through and they picked their way along its
edge, Tom and Garry on one bank and Doc and Connie on the other.
“I don’t believe anyone’s been in this place in a thousand years; that’s
the way it looks to me,” said Doc.
“I’d say at least three thousand,” said Garry.
Tom paid no attention. He had paused and was holding his lantern over the
stream.
“Those four stones are in a pretty straight line,” he said. “Would you
say that was a ford?”
“Looks more like a Buick to me,” said Garry, but he added, “They _are_ in
a pretty straight line. I guess it’s a flivver, all right.”
“Look on that side,” said Tom, to the others. “Do you see anything over
there?”
He was looking carefully along the edge; of the water when Doc called
suddenly,
“Come over here with your light, quick!”
Tom and Garry crossed, stepping from stone to stone, and presently all
four were kneeling and examining in the lantern light one of those
commonplace things which sometimes send a thrill over the discoverer—a
human footprint. There upon that lonesome mountain, surrounded by the all
but impenetrable forest, was that simple, half-obliterated but
unmistakable token of a human presence. Tom thought he knew now how
Robinson Crusoe felt when he found the footprint in the sand.
The exposed roots of a tree formed ridges in the hard bank, where
footprints seemed quite impossible of detection, and it was in vain that
the boys sought for others. Yet here was this one, and so plain as to
show the criss-cross markings of a new sole.
“It’s from a rubber boot,” said Garry.
“There ought to be _some_ signs of others even if they’re not as clear as
this one,” said Tom. “Maybe whoever was wearing that boot slipped off one
of those stones and got it wet. That’s why it printed, probably. Anyway,
somebody crossed here and they were going up that way, that’s sure.”
They stood staring at the footprint, thoroughly sobered by its discovery.
They had penetrated into this rugged mountain in the hope of finding some
one, but the remoteness and wildness of the place had grown upon them and
the whole chaotic scene seemed so ill-associated with the presence of a
human being that now that they had actually found this silent token it
almost shocked them.
“Maybe the wind was wrong before,” said Tom. “What d’you say we call
again—all together? There don’t seem to be any path leading anywhere.”
They formed their hands into megaphones, calling loud and long, but there
was no answer save a long drawn out echo.
“Again,” said Tom, “and louder.”
Once more their voices rose in such stentorian chorus that it left them
breathless and Connie’s head was throbbing as from a blow.
“Hark!” said Doc. “Shhh.”
From somewhere far off came a sound, thin and spent with the distance,
which died away and seemed to mingle with the voice of the breeze; then
absolute silence.
“Did you hear that?”
“Nothing but a tree-toad,” said Garry.
They waited a minute to give the answering call a rest, if indeed it came
from human lips, then raised their voices once again in a long _Helloo_.
“Hear it?” whispered Connie. “It’s over there to the east. That’s no
tree-toad.”
Whatever the sound was, the distance was far too great for the sense of
any call to be understood. The voice was impersonal, vague, having scarce
more substance than a dream, but it thrilled the four boys and made them
feel as if the living spirit of that footprint at their feet was calling
to them out of the darkness.
“Even still I think it must be near the stream though it sounds way off
there,” Tom pointed; “we might head straight for the sound or we might
follow the stream up. It may go in that direction up a ways.”
They decided to trust to the brook’s guidance and to the probability of
its verging in the direction of the sound. It wound its way through
intertwined and over-arching thickets where they were forced to use their
belt-axes to chop their way through. Now and again they called as they
made their difficult way, challenged almost at every step by
obstructions. But they heard no answering voice.
After a while the path became less difficult; the very stream seemed to
breathe easier as it flowed through a comparatively open stretch, and the
four boys, torn and panting, plodded along, grateful for the relief.
“What’s that?” said Garry. “Look, do you see a streak of white way
ahead—just between those trees?”
“Yes,” panted Connie. “It’s a tent, I guess—thank goodness.”
“Let’s call again,” said Tom.
There was no answer and they plodded on, stooping under low-hanging or
broken branches, stepping cautiously over wet stones and picking their
way over great masses of jagged rock. Never before had they beheld a
scene of such wild confusion and desolation.
“Wait a minute,” said Tom, turning back where he stood upon a great rock
and holding his lantern above a crevice. “I thought I saw something white
down there.”
They gathered about him and looked down into a fissure at a sight which
unnerved them all, scouts though they were. For there, wedged between the
two converging walls of rock and plainly visible in the moonlight was a
skeleton, the few brown stringing remnants depending from it
unrecognizable as clothing.
Tom reached down and touched it with his belt-axe, and it collapsed and
fell rattling into the bed of the cleft. He held his lantern low for a
moment and gazed down into the crevice.
“This is some spooky place, believe _me_,” shivered Connie. “Who do you
suppose it was?”
A little farther on they came upon something which apparently explained
the presence of the skeleton. As they neared the spot where they had seen
what they thought to be a tent among the trees, they stopped aghast at
seeing among the branches of several elms that most pathetic and complete
of all wrecks, the tattered, twisted remnants of a great aeroplane. A few
silken shreds were blowing about the broken frame and beating against the
network of disordered wires and splintered wood.
CHAPTER VI
THE MOUNTAIN SHELTER
For a few moments they stared at the wreck and said nothing.
“Maybe it was Kinney,” suggested Doc, at last. “Do you remember about
Kinney?”
“Come on,” urged Tom.
Half reluctantly the others followed him, glancing back now and again
till the tattered mass became a shadowy speck and faded away in the
darkness.
“He started from somewhere above Albany,” said Doc, “and he was never
heard of again. I often heard my father speak about it and I read about
it in that aviation book that Roy loaned me.”
“He’s going to loan it to me when he gets it back from you,” said Connie;
“he says you’re a good bookkeeper.”
“Put away your little hammer,” laughed Garry.
“Some people in Poughkeepsie thought they heard the humming of the engine
at night,” said Doc, “and that’s what made people think he had got past
that point—but that’s all they ever knew. Some thought he must have gone
down in the river.”
“How long ago was it?” Garry asked.
Tom plodded on silently. It was well known of Tom that he could not think
of two things at once.
“Five or six years, I think,” said Doc.
“That would be too long a time for the wreck, seeing the condition it’s
in,” said Garry, “but anything less than that would be too short a time
for the skeleton.”
“Do you mean they were lost here at different times?” Connie asked.
“Looks that way to me.”
“If there are buzzards up here a skeleton might look like that in a month
or so,” Connie suggested.
“There aren’t any buzzards around here.”
“Sure there are,” said Doc. “Look at Buzzard’s Bay—it’s named for ’em.”
“It’s named for a man who had it wished on him,” said Garry. “You might
as well say that Pike’s Peak was named after the pikers that go there.”
“How long do you suppose that aeroplane’s been there?”
“Five or six years, maybe,” Doc said. “The frame’ll be as good as that
for ten years more. There’s nothing more to rot.”
“Well,” said Garry, “it looks to my keen scout eye as if that wreck had
been there for about six months and the skeleton for about six years.”
“Maybe if you had tried shutting your keen scout eye and opening it in a
hurry—— Hey, Tomasso?” teased Doc.
“Maybe they got here at the same time but the man lived for a while,” Tom
condescended
|
My first doth have, yet tiny.
My second is a vowel plain;
My third an exclamation,
Upon the music scale again
It holdeth goodly station.
My whole, ah, look in yonder sky,
And you will see it gleaming,
Less clear, perchance, because more shy,
Than stars so brilliant beaming.
The telescope will make how bright
Its timid, shrinking beauties!
And bring to mortal ken, the light
Of its revolving duties.
6
Awake, idle sleeper. Up! up! and arise,
Already my first hath made vocal the skies.
Arouse thee! arouse thee! mount horse, and away;
For long is the journey before thee to-day.
Forget not my second, when weary thy steed,
By that shalt thou urge on his lingering speed
For many a forest and ford must be passed,
Before thou shalt reach thine own cottage, at last.
And ere though thine own cottage garden thou’lt tread,
The dews of the night on my whole shall be shed,
On my beautiful whole, yet less blue and less bright,
Than the eyes which will meet thee with glistening delight.
7
My _first_ in kingdoms you will find
Where sovereigns great have reign;
My _second_ on the Atlantic see,
When brave hearts cross the main.
My _whole_, an ally strong and bold
Of a United State,
If on the map you think to find,
Some time you’ll have to wait.
[Illustration]
8
When night-winds whistle o’er the plain,
And howls the storm in many a burst,
How cheering to the way-worn swain
To seek the shelter of my first!
With cunning shining in his face,
From eyes so watchful, keen, and dark,
The scion of a remnant race--
My artful second you may mark.
My third in bearded front arrayed,
With Autumn’s golden stores is found;
Yet torn, and bruised, and lowly laid,
Its head must rest upon the ground.
My whole you always must forgive,
As you expect to be forgiven;
Nor must it in your memory live,
Though multiplied to seven times seven.
9
I stand on my first, on my second I sit,
On my whole I do either just as I think fit.
10
_First._
Mantling the ruined wall
With my green, yielding pall;
You know me well.
Covering the river’s brink,
’Neath your soft tread I sink.
My name pray tell.
_Second._
Fairest of earthly flowers,
Queen of your garden bowers,
Flora’s delight,
Twined o’er the cottage door,
My showers of incense pour
On the still nights.
_Whole._
See, when the blushing bride
Casts her rich vail aside,
I’m nestled there,
Near some soft, waving tress,
Or on her bridal dress,
Shining so fair.
Oft on the mourner’s tomb
Drooping and sad I bloom,
Token of love
Left by the orphaned child,
Calling in accents wild
For those above.
11
My first is a short sleep. My second is a relation. My whole is an
article in daily use.
[Illustration]
12
My first belongs, in pairs, to man and beast,
And of the gifts of harvest not the least;
The treasures of my next no boy of feeling
Will e’er disgrace his heart or name by stealing;
My first and third the time, my whole the way,
To undertake the duties of each day.
13
My first is a body of water.
My second is a fish.
My third is a preposition.
My fourth is a name for the head.
My whole was a bone of contention.
14
Did’st ever go to singing-school,
And hear the master try
To sound the notes upon the scale,
From lowest to most high?
Then have you heard my first, the best,
Fall sweetly on your ear,
’Tis strange that with such company
My second should appear.
My second ne’er in gentle mood,
Is full of ire and hate,
Oh, let none who shall glance this o’er,
Be found in such a state.
’Tis only for the lunatic,
Bereft of reason’s light,
Thus to profane his nature by
So sorrowful a sight.
My whole is an illusion vain,
Yet perfect as untrue;
It doth the real object seem,
But double on the view.
By its strange spell the water seems
As if ’twere hung in air,
The desert traveler knows full well
Its vision false as fair.
15
My first is one, ’tis even you,
My whole by many have been reckoned,
But only He who numbers all
Can ever rightly count my second.
16
My first is an article in daily use.
My second spells the twentieth letter of the alphabet.
My third, if you prefix the letters, will name a declivity.
My whole is an animal.
[Illustration]
17
My first is a part of the human face.
My second is an unpleasant sensation.
My third is an article.
My whole is a small animal.
18
My first is found in every bog,
In every pool and pond,
Without me not a single frog
Or toad could e’er be found.
My next is _always_ to be found
Wherever men exist;
I build their houses, plow their ground,
And help them to subsist.
With dread the superstitious soul
Will speculate upon my whole.
19
Entire, I’m water, earth, or air,
I’m food, or clothes, or light,
Always provided, lady fair,
That these are used aright.
And though in fifty things I stay,
This you will surely find,
Come in whatever form I may,
I benefit mankind.
Two syllables I do possess,
But what is very droll,
Although a _part_ my second is,
My first one is the _whole_.
20
My first is always on a par
With every earthly thing;
With reptile, brute, bird, fish, and man,
With beggar, priest, and king.
My second is a title--
A foreign one, ’tis true--
But none the less familiar
To every one of you.
My whole--a glorious revenge!
And Heaven’s kindest boon:
I dare not tell you plainer, lest
You find me out too soon.
21
My first is what young ladies aim at in their movements, and what
Christians pray for.
My second is what in winter we see little of, and what no young man
likes to be considered.
My third is what every woman should be before she is won, and what we
should be badly off without during this cold weather.
My whole is the name of an authoress, highly popular with both old and
young.
[Illustration]
22
My _first_, from the frozen North comes down
In snowy mantle dressed;
And the smiling earth grows bare and brown,
Where’er his steps have pressed,
The flowers close up each sparkling eye,
And hide in the earth till he passes by.
But when bleak winds and frosts are gone,
’Mid April’s smiles and tears,
My _second’s_ hue the earth puts on,
And summer beauty wears;
And tuneful birds and opening flowers
Invite you to the forest bowers.
On moss-grown banks, half hidden there,
My whole may oft be seen;
My fragrant leaves perfume the air,
And shine in emerald green;
And there my crimson berry glows,
Ripened beneath New England snows.
23
_My first._
The boy who, trusting in his father’s word,
Sprang from the towering mast to meet the wave,
Possessed in me the pledge that risk incurred,
Was equaled by that father’s power to save.
_My second._
The nation scourged, dispersed through every land,
For many ages, wanderers without home,
In me waits patiently the guiding hand
Will lead its pilgrims back no more to roam.
_My third._
The mother standing at the judgment seat,
When wisdom’s voice to death her babe did give,
Resigned to me her claim--willing to meet
Her loss, so that her precious child might live.
Through me the tongue of slander lulls its voice,
Through me the poor have full provision given;
I lift the fallen one, bid hearts rejoice;
I bid the poor of earth seek wealth in heaven.
_My whole._
A jeweled diadem of priceless worth,
I quench the luster of all crowns on earth.
24
My first in gardens oft is seen,
And oft adorns the bride;
In early spring its leaves are green--
It is the maiden’s pride.
My second thou repeatest
Full oft in fireside games:
As sweet, if not the sweetest,
Of all familiar names.
A flow’ring shrub, in a distant clime,
My whole in beauty grows;
It grew by the sea in olden time,
And thus its name arose.
25
Awake, my first, with thy inspiring tone,
Behold an instrument joy calls his own,
And with responsive foot, on dewy meads,
The sylvan dance of fawn and wood nymph leads.
My next adorns the noble Latin tongue,
Whose numbers flow sonorous, smooth, and strong;
There, should you fail to find the word, perchance
’Twill greet you in the livelier tones of France.
My whole, a fragrant flower--’tis not for me
To eulogize its grace and modesty;
Full oft the poet’s reed hath breathed its fame,
In loftier measures--can’st thou tell its name?
[Illustration]
26
In stillness of midnight, the cry of my first
On ear of the sleeper affrighted will burst;
The bells peal their loudest each moment of time,
As if life depended on even one chime.
Oh, then is my first in his terror arrayed,
When anger burns fiercely, he may not be stayed.
Again round the hearth-stone are happy hearts met,
From gray-headed sire to the lisping young pet.
The flame doth grow warmer, and brighter the light;
How cheering it maketh the winter’s cold night!
So changeth my first, as the hawk to the dove,
His aspect is here one of comfort and love.
My second, bound neither to inland or coast,
Is one ’mong the many, a numberless host;
Full transient his being; he cometh in spring,
And chill winds of autumn his requiem sing.
Though said to be useful, I frankly confess,
My wish has been often his music were less.
Though peaceful his temper, I can not deny
That rarely by nature he’s suffered to die.
A foe doth he find in the duster and brush,
E’en flowerets allure, his existence to crush;
Like warfare with bodkin Domitian begun,
Hence gathering much of the fame which he won.
My whole doth love best to be out in the night,
And flatters himself on his furnishing light;
Dear Luna is nothing of comfort to him,
For brighter his glory when hers is most dim.
Two lamps he doth carry, and brilliant they are,
As beams which were stolen from eye of a star.
His joy is to frisk from the sunset to dawn;
When morn comes, the pride of his beauty is gone!
In tropical climates he oft’nest doth dwell,
He lighteth the savage--hast never heard tell?
’Tis growing quite dark; oh, I wish he were nigh;
Perchance he would give me his lamps to see by.
27
My first is equality, my second inferiority, and my whole superiority.
28
I am composed of nine letters.
My first is a name appropriated to a certain class of foreigners. It is
also a nickname.
My second is an article.
My third implies motion.
My fourth in sound implies proximity.
My fifth is a vowel.
My whole is a part of the Western hemisphere.
29
When round the weary traveler
The stormy evening closes,
When tangled wood or swelling stream
His toilsome way opposes;
If through the trees his eager steps
To rest and warmth are beckoned,
How gladly will he hail my first,
That leads him to my second!
When from some hill’s commanding brow
The gloomy prospect viewing,
He hears the distant ocean rage,
Waves, frightened waves pursuing,
How gladly turns he to my whole,
In watch serene abiding,
And fears no more to think of those
Who trust my faithful guiding.
30
Till winter takes his stormy seat,
In fragrant meads and gardens sweet
Evolves my viscid _first_;
When stilly night, with fleecy cloud
Flings round the earth a darksome shroud,
My _second_ often beams;--
O would you each enjoy my _whole_,
And have true bliss pervade your soul
And from your eyes outburst--
Some loving one make haste to find,
Let Hymen close your spirits bind,
And learn just how it seems!
[Illustration]
31
My first is a timid and gentle creature,
Restless and bright her glancing eye,
Quick to discern the approach of danger,
Swift from her covert to spring and fly.
Oft in the cool of the dewy morning,
Startled amid her calm retreat,
She heareth the shrill-toned sound of warning,
And bounds away on frantic feet,
While close her fierce pursuers follow,
Through brush and brake, o’er hill and hollow.
My second telleth of holy seasons,
And calleth the multitude to prayers;
On festivals speaketh right joyously,
When all a face of gladness wears;
Having at times, too, a voice of sorrow,
Speaking in deep and solemn tone,
Telling how faithless is false to-morrow,
To those who weep for the dear ones gone;
Yet feeling itself nor grief nor gladness,
Responsive ever to mirth or sadness.
My whole is a beautiful, modest flower,
Shaking its bells to the summer wind,
Peeping out coyly from lonely places,
Which footsteps of children love to find,
Dreaming they hear in the purple blossoms
Fairy-like tones of the olden time:
Fondly thinking the sweet bells are ringing,
With a soft, low, musical chime,
Their golden curls and innocent bosoms,
They fill with the graceful, drooping blossoms.
[Illustration]
32
My first is seen in all its pride
On summer nights when bright and clear,
O’er hill and dale I beauty throw;
Night owes me much throughout the year;
Some say my whole no substance has,
However plain it may appear;
I shall not give you further clue,
No need to one as smart as you;
Enough, my whole is written here.
[Illustration: LABYRINTH NO. 2.
This Labyrinth must be entered at the front gate, and a way traced to
the centre (A), without climbing the walls.]
RIDDLES.
1
I have three feet, dear friends,
And you must know:
I’ve sixteen nails,
But not a single toe!
2
I am originally a descendant of rags, but, in spite of my mean origin, I
boast one of the most numerous families in the world. I wear the
countenance of a man, varying in complexion from crimson to azure; and
twice two stars are my companions. But, although of such dignity,
besides having my face disfigured, I am continually spit upon, and
trodden under foot by all mankind, who seem to value me only for my good
looks--without them, I am despised. I am diminutive in size, and my days
are few, but I am well known, and constantly sought after.
3
Who are we? When in the morning you rise
We let the sunshine down into your eyes.
Then we go playing before you all day,
Dark things we brighten, and soften the gay.
Oh! we make half the world’s beauty for you.
Little blue-eyed one, who are we? guess who?
Who are we? When the night shadows grow deep,
We draw around you the curtains of sleep.
When into dream-land we’ve locked you up tight,
Until the morn brings her bright keys of light,
Guess who like sentinels guarding you lie,--
Look--we’re before you now--black and gray eye.
4
I am born of a moment, as every one knows,
And rival the tints of the loveliest rose;
There are many who think me the offspring of shame,
But I’m oftener found in sweet modesty’s train;
E’en poets have made me the theme of their muse,
And painters have studied my delicate hues:
Yet, would you believe it! I cause much vexation
To those who possess me, and some irritation;
For I’ve often betrayed what they would have concealed,
And some of their most-cherished secrets revealed:
So be truthful, dear girls, or in spite of your tact,
I’ll fly in your faces and tell the whole fact.
5
Of metal I can make a heart;
I put a stop to ease;
And with a tradesman I can talk
As glibly as you please.
With a building in New York I’ll make
A covering for your head;
And with the rust upon your knife
I’ll make a piece of bread.
I’ll make a prison with old time,
And with a measure, too:
Now, Cousins all, say what I am,
For I belong to you.
6
I was pure, unsullied, white as snow,
But a little while ago,
When, by a tremendous squeeze,
I was spotted as you please.
Now, if you but look at me,
Something funny you will see,
That I am striped, spotted, white,
Yet that I am _red_ to-night.
[Illustration]
7
In Eden first, nigh the forbidden tree,
Found I my germ, as man his destiny;
Down in the depths of hell I had my birth;
I tortures there invented spread o’er Earth.
The man who strives for Fame’s approving nod,
I strike him on the face, he lies a clod.
I walk the public halls, and cheeks turn pale;
The speaker hears me, and his heart doth fail.
The young debutant on histrionic boards
Hath grace or ruin as my mood accords.
When two great powers (both vital friends of man
And both his enemies) in battle stand,
When over, under in their rage they roll;
Nor ever cease the fight, without control
Then am I found, and in the expiring sigh
The vanquished wrestler utters, then I die.
8
I am always seen in sugar,
And always seen in salt.
I am never seen in hops or beer,
But always seen in malt.
I’m never seen when it is light,
Yet, strange, I’m seen in day.
If you will look right sharp, I’m sure
You will find me when you stray.
I am never seen in coffee,
But always seen in tea.
I’m never found with mother,
With father I must be.
I’m always found with any thing,
Yet, strange as it may seem,
I’m never found in buttermilk,
But always found in cream.
I’m never found in good or sweet,
And never in your mind,
If you will study this right close,
My name you’ll surely find.
9
What force or strength can not get through,
I with a gentle touch can do;
And many in the street would stand,
Were I not as a friend at hand.
[Illustration]
10
There is a certain natural production neither animal, vegetable, nor
mineral. It generally exists from two to six feet above the surface of
the earth. It has neither length, breadth, nor substance. It is neither
male nor female, but commonly exists between both. It is often spoken of
in the Old Testament, and strongly recommended in the New; and serves
equally the purposes of treachery and fidelity.
11
I am a word in very common use. You will find me more than once upon
almost or quite every page, whether a monosyllable, or dissyllable, or a
polysyllable is to be found out; but this much is told: my first and
last letter is the same; and my first three and my last three spell the
same word. A useful article this of personal decoration. My interior is
remarkable. Viewed one way, you laugh; viewed another, you sigh. I am an
etymological stumble, and a novice hardly ever knows where to find me.
To a Frenchman and a German I am an abhorrence. They never learn me so
as even to call my name.
12
In vain you struggle to regain me,
When lost, you never can obtain me;
And yet, what’s odd, you sigh and fret,
Deplore my loss, and have me yet.
And often using me quite ill,
And seeking ways your slave to kill--
Then promising in future you
Will give to me the homage due.
Thus we go on from year to year;
My name pray let the party hear.
13
I’m swift as a shadow; I’m slow as a snail;
I fly like the storm-cloud impelled by the gale;
I sail with the mariner o’er the wide sea,
And traverse the shore with the bird and the bee.
I travel by day, and I travel by night,
And rarely from mortals I pass out of sight.
I dwell in the palace of nobles and kings,
But scorn not the cot where the poor mother sings;
But though I abide with the lowliest poor,
I ne’er have been turned from the rich man’s door.
I’m seen in the moon, when it waxes and wanes,
In the sun, too, at times when nature complains.
I’m courted much under shady bowers,
And welcomed at midnight or noonday hours.
I fly round the world each passing day,
And yet I’m as idle as a boy at play;
Nor do I repose at the set of the sun,
But wing my way by the light of the moon.
By day and by night I enter the door
Of high and of low, of rich and of poor;
And yet with a step so noiseless I come,
I’m not an intruder abroad or at home.
All deeds of darkness I ever eschew,
Though many such deeds I am forced to view
And now, since so often my features are seen,
Unless you can guess me, you surely are green.
[Illustration]
14
I was born in the fields; taken from thence at an early age, I was made
to assume my present form, and sold as a slave into the family of a
wealthy merchant. While I was young, and comely, my life was
comparatively easy; the modest Lucy would take me by the hand, and with
her I would roam over the richly-carpeted mansion; and many a service I
have rendered her. One morning, quite early, before the rest of the
family were up, Lucy was standing by the window; I was leaning against
her shoulder, when she uttered a slight scream. I jumped, and came near
falling, but she caught hold of me, and pointing towards the window,
showed me the cause of her terror. One well-aimed blow of mine felled
the intruder to the earth, and the footman coming in just then, gave him
the finishing touch. But, alas! my days of pleasant servitude were
drawing near a close. Lucy became dissatisfied with me, and in a fit of
pique, handed me over to the cook, by whom I was hustled hither and
thither, wherever her fancy dictated. She was a careless woman, and one
day, while I was doing all I could to serve her, she actually pushed me
into the fire! Snatching me out as quickly as possible, she plunged me
into a bucket of cold water; but I was disfigured and crippled for life,
and disabled from further service. The cook at length declared she would
no longer give me house-room, and one bitter cold night, turned me out
into the street, without a stitch of clothing. I have never murmured
when called upon to work; yet here I lie, neglected, unheeded, and
uncared for.
But why should I complain? am I the only one shunned and forsaken, when
no longer able to minister to the wants or pleasures of the world?
[Illustration]
15
Among the snakes, I reck of one,
Not born of earthly breed,
And with this serpent vieth none,
In terror or in speed.
It darts upon its helpless prey
With roar both loud and high;
In one destruction borne away,
Rider and steed must die.
In highest place it loves to bide,
No door may bar its path,
And scaly armor’s iron pride
Will but attract its wrath.
The firmest earth it plows amain,
How tough soe’er it be--
As brittle reeds are snapt in twain
’Twill rend the mightiest tree.
Yet hath this monster, grim and fierce,
Ne’er twice with prey been fed,
But once its fiery tooth can pierce--
It slayeth--and is dead.
REBUSES.
1
A letter prefix to the tyrant’s delight,
You’ll see a kind friend on a cold winter’s night.
2
My first may be divided into three parts. It may belong to one of the
senses; it may be almost a lake; or it may represent 100.
My second may likewise be divided into three parts. It may have
something to do with myself; it may be a part of myself; or it may
represent 1.
My third may be divided into two parts. It may be either a river, or
represent 500.
Then 100, 1, and 500 make the answer.
The whole was the title of one who surprised Europe by the brilliancy of
his military exploits.
3
A fragment, an article of dress, a noise, an animal, a fruit, and a part
of the body. The initials of these spell my whole, out of which I hope
you will always keep.
4
Find me a word which will express the name
Of feathered biped, found both wild and tame:
Then take away one letter, and it will
Express the name of feathered biped still.
5
Find me a word which shows us at a glance
A foreign country, farther off than France;
Then take away one letter, and it will
Express the name of a foreign country still.
[Illustration]
6
In an every-day word (with but six letters in it)
You will find a few things which are worthy attention;
I will give you a clue, and I think in a minute
You’ll not find it much trouble those few things to mention.
Take four of the letters, and if they’re placed rightly,
They one drop of liquid will bring to your view;
Cut off the last letter, and then see what nightly
Is drank by the many, and not by the few.
Now mix up the letters, and four more take out;
To make what all animals always possess.
Many more I could name; but I haven’t a doubt
You are ready this moment my riddle to guess.
So the name of the whole, now, is all I require--
It’s what every woman should always have by her.
[Illustration]
7
Entire I’m a useful quadruped; remove my first, and I become a species
of grain; replace my first, and remove my last, and I am a city famed
for its inquisition.
8
How can you take something from nothing, and leave a number?
9
Entire I am very useful in machines; take away my first letter, and I am
a part of the body; take away my first and second, and I am a species of
snake.
10
Add to an article, in every-day use, a letter, and it becomes another
useful article; with a third letter it becomes a girl’s name, and with a
fourth letter another name; with a fifth letter it becomes an historical
record, and with a sixth letter it is much the same thing, only more
so.
[Illustration]
11
My first and my second are each like the other,
(When transposed they have oft proved a curse;)
My whole sounds most sweetly by sea or by river,
But at home it is quite the reverse.
12
I am composed of five letters.
My first is the same as my last.
My second is the initial of the name of a very old gardener.
My third you will find in the centre of the largest city in America.
My fourth is the initial of the name of a man that King David used
rather badly.
My fifth is the same as my first.
My whole is two monosyllables that publishers often say to their
subscribers, and like to have them respond to.
13
Prefix a letter to a Christian name,
’Twill spell an attribute that few would claim.
[Illustration]
14
Entire, I am a reptile. Behead me, and I become an article much used by
carpenters. Take away another letter, and I shall not be well.
15
A part of the hand you transpose right,
You’ll find it’s what you use at night.
16
Entire I am a vegetable. Cut off my tail, and I am a small insect. Put
on my tail, and take away my third letter, and I am what gamblers often
do.
17
Forwards, backwards, read my name,
In sound and meaning I’m the same.
Infants, on their mother’s knee,
Often smile at sight of me.
Add a letter, strange, but true,
A man I then appear in view.
18
What eight words of four letters will resolve themselves into four
different words each?
19
I am the name of something felt, but never seen. Take away my third
letter, and you have an utensil much used in pastry-cooking. Reverse it,
and you have something quite refreshing on summer afternoons. Take away
my second, and you have a very important article in a lady’s toilet.
Take away my first and third, and you have a rather indefinite article.
20
The name of a great city in Europe.
Transpose, I am an adjective of the comparative degree.
Cut off my last two letters, and reverse, I am a preposition.
Drop my first two letters, I am a pronoun.
Leave out my second letter, and transpose, I am a French word signifying
_sea_.
Drop the first and last two letters, I am an interjection.
Drop my third letter and transpose, I am unrefined metal.
21
Entire I am polite. My fifth multiplied by the sum of my second and
fourth, produces my first. My second and third multiplied by my fifth,
is twice my first.
22
It is a compound word, and belongs to the mineral, and sometimes
vegetable kingdom. The whole word is used to contain the first. There
are six letters in the first, and two vowels. The last word spelled
backward, is a toy that boys play with. The first two letters of the
last word is the name of a river in Europe. The first word spelled
differently, but pronounced the same, is a substance of which an
important article of food is made.
[Illustration]
23
Entire I am a bird. Take away my last two, and I am a bird. Behead me
and cut off my tail, and I signify perpetuity. Cut off my first two, and
I am an exclamation!
24
Complete, I form a rapid view;
Behead--a weapon next appears;
Behead again--transpose--and lo!
I now excite the truant’s fears.
’Tis something strange, and though there be
Three letters left, but one you see.
25
What city is there, whose name, if transposed, will give you a name
considered very disgraceful in the time of the revolutionary war;
transposed again, you have a term applied to one not very proficient.
[Illustration]
26
A nice place to stroll in when evenings are fair,
My letters will make, if arranged with due care;
But when they’re transposed--Oh! pray, be discreet,
Nor be reckless in daring my presence to meet.
27
I am a proper name of two syllables.
My first syllable is a place where wild beasts may often be found.
My first syllable backward is a boy’s nickname.
My second syllable backward is the worst thing in the world.
28
I am but small, yet when entire,
Enough to set the world on fire.
Leave out a letter, and ’tis clear
I can maintain a herd of deer.
Leave out another, and you’ll find
I once have saved all human kind.
29
In full dress, I am considered finished; take off my cap, and I am a
number; put on my cap and take off my shoes, and I am a title.
30
I’m seven letters; and I name
A man, who does high office claim.
Decapitate me, and I still
Survive, you’ll find, a tale to tell;
Again behead, I tell of gladness;
Again--I oft am cause of sadness;
Once more, and still I live to say
What you, no doubt, did yesterday;
Beheaded yet once more, I name
Yourself, in tongue of classic fame;
At last, of all but one bereft,
That one a Latin word is left.
31
Without me man is incomplete,
A friend I am to you;
But for my aid I’m very sure
That little work you’d do.
But if to what I now possess,
One letter you should add,
You’ll see what mischief I can do
Whene’er my master’s mad.
And now if you to me should add
Another letter still,
’Twill show what pretty ladies oft
Can do with me at will.
32
I am something which fishermen use. Behead me, and I become food for
horses. Put on my head and cut off my tail, and I am a large serpent.
33
Entire, I am one drop of liquid; behead me, and I become a part of the
human frame; put on my head and cut off my tail, and I am a plant.
[Illustration]
34
My whole is what animals always will be
When tamed by the power of man;
Transpose me, and then with the farmer I’ll be,
When plowing the field with his span.
Again if transposed, on the table I’m placed,
When at supper he goes home at night;
And (if he is married) transpose me again,
I’m sitting, perhaps, on his right.
35
I am a pronominal adjective; behead me and I am personal pronoun; again
behead me and I am a verb.
36
Three letters there are which may be so arranged,
That three things they can spell you with care,
A nickname quite common,--what all things must have,--
And the home of the lion or bear.
37
My whole is a name that belongs to some men,
And is short, if ’tis not very sweet;
Transpose me, and now on the fair sex I’m seen,
When they’re taking a walk in the street.
Transpose me again, and a verb I become,
Which boys must all do to be men;
A third time transpose me, ah! shun me, and run,
For wretched and sinful I’m then.
38
Pray, discover a part of the human frame,
Which divided, another will make
|
and also cover my cheapness. Listen,
I beg, to what I ask, and it will seem small and very easy to you.
Since I am cheated of your presence, at least put vows in words, of
which you have a store, and so keep before me the sweetness of thine
image. I shall vainly expect you to be bountiful in acts if I find you
a miser in words. Truly I thought that I merited much from you, when I
had done all for your sake and still continue in obedience. When
little more than a girl I took the hard vows of a nun, not from piety
but at your command. If I merit nothing from thee, how vain I deem my
labour! I can expect no reward from God, as I have done nothing from
love of Him. Thee hurrying to God I followed, or rather went before.
For, as you remembered how Lot’s wife turned back, you first delivered
me to God bound with the vow, and then yourself. That single act of
distrust, I confess, grieved me and made me blush. God knows, at your
command I would have followed or preceded you to fiery places. For my
heart is not with me, but with thee; and now more than ever, if not
with thee it is nowhere, for it cannot exist without thee. That my
heart may be well with thee, see to it, I beg; and it will be well if
it finds thee kind, rendering grace for grace--a little for much.
Beloved, would that thy love were less sure of me so that it might be
more solicitous; I have made you so secure that you are negligent.
Remember all I have done and think what you owe. While I enjoyed
carnal joy with you, many people were uncertain whether I acted from
love or lust. Now the end makes clear the beginning; I have cut myself
off from pleasure to obey thy will. I have kept nothing, save to be
more than ever thine. Think how wicked it were in thee where all the
more is due to render less, nothing almost; especially when little is
asked, and that so easy for you. In the name of God to whom you have
vowed yourself, give me that of thee which is possible, the
consolation of a letter. I promise, thus refreshed, to serve God more
readily. When of old you would call me to pleasures, you sought me
with frequent letters, and never failed with thy songs to keep thy
Heloïse on every tongue; the streets, the houses re-echoed me. How
much fitter that you should now incite me to God than then to lust?
Bethink thee what thou owest; heed what I ask; and a long letter I
will conclude with a brief ending: farewell only one!”
Remarks upon this letter would seem to profane a shrine--had the man
profaned that shrine? He had not always worshipped there. Heloïse knew
this, for all her love. She said it too, writing in phraseology which had
been brutalized through the denouncing spirit of Latin monasticism. How
truly she puts the situation and how clearly she thinks withal, discerning
as it were the beautiful and true in love and marriage. The whole letter
is well arranged, and written in a style showing the writer’s training in
Latin mediaeval rhetoric. It was not the less deeply felt because composed
with care and skill. Evidently the writer is of the Middle Ages; her
occasional prolixity was not of her sex but of her time; and she quotes
the ancients so naturally; what they say should be convincing. How the
letter bares the motives of her own conduct: not for God’s sake, or the
kingdom of heaven’s sake, but for Abaelard’s sake she became a nun. She
had no inclination thereto; her letters do not indicate that she ever
became really and spontaneously devoted to her calling. Abaelard was her
God, and as her God she held him to the end; though she applied herself to
the consideration of religious topics, as we shall see. Moreover, her
position as nun and abbess could not fail to force such topics on her
consideration.
Is there another such love-letter, setting forth a situation so
triple-barred and hopeless? And the love which fills the letter, which
throbs and burns in it, which speaks and argues in it, how absolute is
this love. It is love carried out to its full conclusions; it includes the
whole woman and the whole of her life; whatever lies beyond its ken and
care is scorned and rejected. This love is extreme in its humility, and
yet realizes its own purity and worth; it is grieved at the thought of
rousing a feeling baser than itself. Heloïse had been and still was
Heloïse, devoted and self-sacrificing in her love. But the situation has
become torture; her heart is filled with all manner of pain, old and new,
till it is driven to assert its right at least to consolation. Thus
Heloïse’s love becomes insistent and requiring. Was it possibly burdensome
to the man who now might wish to think no more of passion? who might wish
no longer to be loved in that way? In his reply Abaelard does not unveil
himself; he seems to take an attitude which may have been the most
faithful expression that he could devise of his changed self.
“To Heloïse his beloved sister in Christ, Abaelard her brother in the
Same.”
This superscription was a gentle reminder of their present
relationship--in Christ. The writer begins: his not having written since
their conversion was to be ascribed not to his negligence, but to his
confidence in her wisdom; he did not think that she who, so full of grace,
had consoled her sister nuns when prioress, could as abbess need teaching
or exhortation for the guidance of her daughters; but if, in her humility,
she felt the need of his instruction in matters pertaining to God, she
might write, and he would answer, as the Lord should grant. Thanks be to
God who had filled their hearts--hers and her nuns--with solicitude for
his perils, and had made them participators in his afflictions; through
their prayers the divine pity had protected him. He had hastened to send
the Psalter, requested by his sister, formerly dear to him in the world
and now most dear in Christ, to assist their prayers. The potency of
prayer, with God and the saints, and especially the prayer of women for
those dear to them, is frequently declared in Scripture; he cites a number
of passages to prove it. May these move her to pray for him. He refers
with affectionate gratitude to the prayers which the nuns had been
offering for him, and encloses a short prayer for his safety, which he
begs and implores may be used in their daily canonical hours. If the Lord,
however, delivers him into the hands of his enemies to kill him, or if he
meet his death in any way, he begs that his body may be brought to the
Paraclete for burial, so that the sight of his sepulchre may move his
daughters and sisters in Christ to pray for him; no place could be so safe
and salutary for the soul of one bitterly repenting of his sins, as that
consecrated to the true Paraclete--the Comforter; nor could fitter
Christian burial be found than among women devoted by their vows to
Christ. He begs that the great solicitude which they now have for his
bodily safety, they will then have for the salvation of his soul, and by
the suffrage of their prayer for the dead man show how they had loved him
when alive. The letter closes, not with a personal word to Heloïse, but
with this distich:
“Vive, vale, vivantque tuae valeantque sorores,
Vivite, sed Christo, quaeso, mei memores.”
Thus as against Heloïse’s beseeching love, Abaelard lifted his hands,
palms out, repelling it. His letter ignored all that filled the soul and
the letter of Heloïse. His reply did not lack words of spiritual
affection, and its tone was not as formal then as it now seems. When
Abaelard asked for the prayers of Heloïse and her nuns, he meant it; he
desired the efficacy of their prayers. Then he wished to be buried among
them. We are touched by this; but, again, Abaelard meant it, as he said,
for his soul’s welfare; it was no love sentiment. The letter stirred the
heart of Heloïse to a rebellious outcry against the cruelty of God, if not
of Abaelard, a soul’s cry against life and the calm attitude of one who no
longer was--or at least meant to be no longer--what he had been to her.
“To her only one, next to Christ, his only one in Christ.
“I wonder, my only one, that contrary to epistolary custom and the
natural order of things, in the salutation of your letter you have
placed me before you, a woman before a man, a wife before a husband, a
servant before her lord, a nun before a monk and priest, a deaconess
before an abbot. The proper order is for one writing to a superior to
put his own name last, but when writing to an inferior, the writer’s
name should precede. We also marvelled, that where you should have
afforded us consolation, you added to our desolation, and excited the
tears you should have quieted. How could we restrain our tears when
reading what you wrote towards the end: ‘If the Lord shall deliver me
into the hand of my enemies to slay me’! Dearest, how couldst thou
think or say that? May God never forget His handmaids, to leave them
living when you are no more! May He never allot to us that life, which
would be harder than any death! It is for you to perform our obsequies
and commend our souls to God, and send before to God those whom you
have gathered for Him--that you may have no further anxiety, and
follow us the more gladly because assured of our safety. Refrain, my
lord, I beg, from making the miserable most miserable with such words;
destroy not our life before we die. ‘Sufficient unto the day is the
evil thereof’--and that day will come to all with bitterness enough.
‘What need,’ says Seneca, ‘to add to evil, and destroy life before
death?’
“Thou askest, only one, that, in the event of thy death when absent
from us, we should have thy body brought to our cemetery, in order
that, being always in our memory, thou shouldst obtain greater benefit
from our prayers. Did you think that your memory could slip from us?
How could we pray, with distracted minds? What use of tongue or reason
would be left to us? When the mind is crazed against God it will not
placate Him with prayer so much as irritate Him with complaints. We
could only weep, pressing to follow rather than bury you. How could we
live after we had lost our life in you? The thought of your death is
death to us; what would be the actuality? God grant we shall not have
to pay those rites to one from whom we look for them; may we go before
and not follow! A heart crushed with grief is not calm, nor is a mind
tossed by troubles open to God. Do not, I beg, hinder the divine
service to which we are dedicated.
“What remains of hope for me when thou art gone? Or what reason to
continue in this pilgrimage, where I have no solace save thee? and of
thee I have but the bare knowledge that thou dost live, since thy
restoring presence is not granted me. Oh!--if it is right to say
it--how cruel has God been to me! Inclement Clemency! Fortune has
emptied her quiver against me, so that others have nothing to fear! If
indeed a single dart were left, no place could be found in me for a
new wound. Fortune fears only lest I escape her tortures by death.
Wretched and unhappy! in thee I was lifted above all women; in thee am
I the more fatally thrown down. What glory did I have in thee! what
ruin have I now! Fortune made me the happiest of women that she might
make me the most miserable. The injury was the more outrageous in that
all ways of right were broken. While we were abandoned to love’s
delights, the divine severity spared us. When we made the forbidden
lawful and by marriage wiped out fornication’s stains, the Lord’s
wrath broke on us, impatient of an unsullied bed when it long had
borne with one defiled. A man taken in adultery would have been amply
punished by what came to you. What others deserved for adultery, that
you got from the marriage which you thought had made amends for
everything. Adulteresses bring their paramours what your own wife
brought you. Not when we lived for pleasure, but when, separated, we
lived in chastity, you presiding at the Paris schools, I at thy
command dwelling with the nuns at Argenteuil; you devoted to study, I
to prayer and holy reading; it was then that you alone paid the
penalty for what we had done together. Alone you bore the punishment,
which you deserved less than I. When you had humiliated yourself and
elevated me and all my kin, you little merited that punishment either
from God or from those traitors. Miserable me, begotten to cause such
a crime! O womankind ever the ruin of the noblest men![4]
“Well the Tempter knows how easy is man’s overthrow through a wife. He
cast his malice over us, and the man whom he could not throw down
through fornication, he tried with marriage, using a good to bring
about an evil where evil means had failed. I thank God at least for
this, that the Tempter did not draw me to assent to that which became
the cause of the evil deed. Yet, although in this my mind absolves me,
too many sins had gone before to leave me guiltless of that crime. For
long a servant of forbidden joys, I earned the punishment which I now
suffer of past sins. Let the evil end be attributed to ill beginnings!
May my penitence be meet for what I have done, and may long remorse in
some way compensate for the penalty you suffered! What once you
suffered in the body, may I through contrition bear to the end of
life, that so I may make satisfaction to thee if not to God. To
confess the infirmities of my most wretched soul, I can find no
penitence to offer God, whom I never cease to accuse of utter cruelty
towards you. Rebellious to His rule, I offend Him with indignation
more than I placate Him with penitence. For that cannot be called the
sinner’s penitence where, whatever be the body’s suffering, the mind
retains the will to sin and still burns with the same desires. It is
easy in confession to accuse oneself of sins, and also to do penance
with the body; but hard indeed to turn the heart from the desire of
its greatest joys![5] Love’s pleasures, which we knew together, cannot
be made displeasing to me nor driven from my memory. Wherever I turn,
they press upon me, nor do they spare my dreams. Even in the solemn
moments of the Mass, when prayer should be the purest, their phantoms
catch my soul. When I should groan for what I have done, I sigh for
what I have lost. Not only our acts, but times and places stick fast
in my mind, and my body quivers. O truly wretched me, fit only to
utter this cry of the soul: ‘Wretched that I am, who shall deliver me
from the body of this death?’ Would I could add with truth what
follows:--‘I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord.’ Such
thanksgiving, dearest, may be thine, by one bodily ill cured of many
tortures of the soul, and God may have been merciful where He seemed
against you; like a good physician who does not spare the pain needed
to save life. But I am tortured with passion and the fires of memory.
They call me chaste, who do not know me for a hypocrite. They look
upon purity of the flesh as virtue--which is of the soul, not of the
body. Having some praise from men, I merit none from God, who knows
the heart. I am called religious at a time when most religion is
hypocrisy, and when whoever keeps from offence against human law is
praised. Perhaps it seems praiseworthy and acceptable to God, through
decent conduct,--whatever the intent--to avoid scandalizing the Church
or causing the Lord’s name to be blasphemed or the religious Order
discredited. Perhaps it may be of grace just to abstain from evil. But
the Scripture says, ‘Refrain from evil and do good’; and vainly he
attempts either who does not act from love of God. God knows that I
have always feared to offend thee more than I feared to offend Him;
and have desired to please thee rather than Him. Thy command, not the
divine love, put on me this garb of religion. What a wretched life I
lead if I vainly endure all this here and am to have no reward
hereafter. My hypocrisy has long deceived you, as it has others, and
therefore you desire my prayers. Have no such confidence; I need your
prayers; do not withdraw their aid. Do not take away the medicine,
thinking me whole. Do not cease to think me needy; do not think me
strong; do not delay your help. Cease from praising me, I beg. No one
versed in medicine will judge of inner disease from outward view. Thy
praise is the more perilous because I love it, and desire to please
thee always. Be fearful rather than confident regarding me, so that I
may have the help of your care. Do not seek to spur me on, by quoting,
‘For strength is made perfect in weakness,’ or ‘He is not crowned
unless he have contended lawfully.’ I am not looking for the crown of
victory; enough for me to escape peril;--safer to shun peril than to
wage war! In whatever little corner of heaven God puts me, that will
satisfy me. Hear what Saint Jerome says: ‘I confess my weakness; I do
not wish to fight for the hope of victory, lest I lose.’ Why give up
certainties to follow the uncertain?”
This letter gives a view of Heloïse’s mind, its strong grasp and its
capacity for reasoning, though its reasoning is here distraught with
passion. Scathingly, half-blinded by her pain, she declares the
perversities of Providence, as they glared upon her. Such a disclosure of
the woman’s mind suggests how broadly based in thought and largely reared
was that great love into which her whole soul had been poured, the mind as
well as heart. Her love was great, unique, not only from its force of
feeling, but from the power and scope of thought by which passion and
feeling were carried out so far and fully to the last conclusions of
devotion. The letter also shows a woman driven by stress of misery to
utter cries and clutch at remedies that her calmer self would have put
by. It is not hypocrisy to conceal the desires or imaginings which one
would never act upon. To tell these is not true disclosure of oneself, but
slander. Torn by pain, Heloïse makes herself more vile and needy than in
other moments she knew herself to be. Yet the letter also uncovers her,
and in nakedness there is some truth. Doubtless her nun’s garb did clothe
a hypocrite. Whatever she felt--and here we see the worst she felt--before
the world she had to act the nun. We shall soon see how she forced herself
to act, or be, the nun toward Abaelard.
Abaelard replied in a letter filled with religious argument and
consolation. It was self-controlled, firm, authoritative, and strong in
those arguments regarding God’s mercy which have stood the test of time.
If they sometimes fail to satisfy the embittered soul, at least they are
the best that man has known. And withal, the letter is calmly and nobly
affectionate--what place was there for love’s protestations? They would
have increased the evil, adding fuel to Heloïse’s passionate misery.
The master-note is struck in the address: “To the spouse of Christ, His
servant.” The letter seeks to turn Heloïse’s thoughts to her nun’s calling
and her soul’s salvation. It divides her expressions of complaint under
four heads. First, he had put her name first, because she had become his
superior from the moment of her bridal with his master Christ. Jerome
writing to Eustochium called her Lady, when she had become the spouse of
Jerome’s Lord. Abaelard shows, with citations from the Song of Songs, the
glory of the spouse, and how her prayers should be sought by one who was
the servant of her Husband. Second, as to the terrors roused in her by his
mention of his peril and possible death, he points out that in her first
letter she had bidden him write of those perils; if they brought him
death, she should deem that a kind release. She should not wish to see his
miseries drawn out, even for her sake. Third, he shows that his praise of
her was justified even by her disclaimer of merit--as it is written, Who
humbles himself shall be exalted. He warns her against false modesty which
may be vanity.
He turns at last to the old and ceaseless plaint which she makes against
God for cruelty, when she should rather glorify Him; he had thought that
that bitterness had departed, so dangerous for her, so painful to him. If
she wished to please him, let her lay it aside; retaining it, she could
not please him or advance with him to blessedness; let her have this much
religion, not to separate herself from him hastening to God; let her take
comfort in their journeying to the same goal. He then shows her that his
punishment was just as well as merciful; he had deserved it from God and
also from Fulbert. If she will consider, she will see in it God’s justice
and His mercy; God had saved them from shipwreck; had raised a barrier
against shame and lust. For himself the punishment was purification, not
privation; will not she, as his inseparable comrade, participate in the
workings of this grace, even as she shared the guilt and its pardon? Once
he had thought of binding her to him in wedlock; but God found a means to
turn them both to Him; and the Lord was continuing His mercy towards her,
causing her to bring forth spiritual daughters, when otherwise she would
only have borne children in the flesh; in her the curse of Eve is turned
to the blessing of Mary. God had purified them both; whom God loveth He
correcteth. Oh! let her thoughts dwell with the Son of God, seized,
dragged, beaten, spit upon, crowned with thorns, hung on a vile cross. Let
her think of Him as her spouse, and for Him let her make lament; He bought
her with himself, He loved her. In comparison with His love, his own
(Abaelard’s) was lust, seeking the pleasure it could get from her. If he,
Abaelard, had suffered for her, it was not willingly nor for her sake, as
Christ had suffered, and for her salvation. Let her weep for Him who made
her whole, not for her corrupter; for her Redeemer, not for her defiler;
for the Lord who died for her, not for the living servant, himself just
freed from the death. Let his sister accept with patience what came to her
in mercy from Him who wounded the body to save the soul.
“We are one in Christ, as through marriage we were one flesh. Whatever
is thine is not alien to me. Christ is thine, because thou art His
spouse. And now thou hast me for a servant, who formerly was thy
master--a servant united to thee by spiritual love. I trust in thy
pleading with Him for such defence as my own prayers may not obtain.
That nothing may hinder this petition I have composed this prayer,
which I send thee: ‘O God, who formed woman from the side of man and
didst sanction the sacrament of marriage; who didst bestow upon my
frailty a cure for its incontinence; do not despise the prayers of thy
handmaid, and the prayers which I pour out for my sins and those of my
dear one. Pardon our great crimes, and may the enormity of our faults
find the greatness of thy ineffable mercy. Punish the culprits in the
present; spare, in the future. Thou hast joined us, Lord, and hast
divided us, as it pleased thee. Now complete most mercifully what thou
hast begun in mercy; and those whom thou hast divided in this world,
join eternally in heaven, thou who art our hope, our portion, our
expectation, our consolation, Lord blessed forever. Amen.’
“Farewell in Christ, spouse of Christ; in Christ farewell and in
Christ live. Amen.”
In her next letter Heloïse obeys, and turns her pen if not her thoughts to
the topics suggested by Abaelard’s admonitions. The short scholastically
phrased address cannot be rendered in any modern fashion: “Domino
specialiter sua singulariter.”
“That you may have no further reason to call me disobedient, your
command shall bridle the words of unrestrained grief; in writing I
will moderate my language, which I might be unable to do in speech.
Nothing is less in our power than our heart; which compels us to obey
more often than it obeys us. When our affections goad us, we cannot
keep the sudden impulse from breaking out in words; as it is written,
‘From the fulness of the heart the mouth speaketh.’ So I will withhold
my hand from writing whenever I am unable to control my words. Would
that the sorrowing heart were as ready to obey as the hand that
writes! You can afford some remedy to grief, even when unable to
dispel it quite. As one nail driven in drives out another, a new
thought pushes away its predecessor, and the mind is freed for a time.
A thought, moreover, takes the mind up and leads it from others more
effectually, if the subject of the thought is excellent and of great
importance.”
The rest of this long letter shows Heloïse putting her principles in
practice. She is forcing her mind to consider and her pen to discourse
upon topics which might properly occupy an abbess’s thoughts--topics,
moreover, which would satisfy Abaelard and call forth long letters in
reply. Whether she cared really for these matters or ever came to care
for them; or whether she turned to them to distract her mind and keep up
some poor makeshift of intercourse with one who would and could no longer
be her lover; or whether all these motives mingled, and in what
proportion, perhaps may best be left to Him who tries the heart.
The abbess writes:
“All of us here, servants of Christ and thy daughters, make two
requests of thy fathership which we deem most needful. The one is,
that you would instruct us concerning the origins of the order of nuns
and the authority for our calling. The other is, that you would draw
up a written _regula_, suitable for women, which shall prescribe and
set the order and usages of our convent. We do not find any adequate
_regula_ for women among the works of the holy Fathers. It is a
manifest defect in monastic institutions that the same rules should be
imposed upon both monks and nuns, and that the weaker sex should bear
the same monastic yoke as the stronger.”
Heloïse, having set this task for Abaelard, proceeds to show how the
various monastic _regulae_, from Benedict’s downward, failed to make
suitable provision for the habits and requirements and weaknesses of
women, the _regulae_ hitherto having been concerned with the weaknesses of
men. She enters upon matters of clothing and diet, and everything
concerning the lives of nuns. She writes as one learned in Scripture and
the writings of the Fathers, and sets the whole matter forth, in its
details, with admirable understanding of its intricacies. She concludes,
reminding Abaelard that it is for him in his lifetime to set a _regula_
for them to follow forever; after God, he is their founder. They might
thereafter have some teacher who would build in alien fashion; such a one
might have less care and understanding, and might not be as readily obeyed
as himself; it is for him to speak, and they will listen. _Vale._
The first of Heloïse’s letters is a great expression of a great love; in
the second, anguish drives the writer’s hand; in the third, she has gained
self-control; she suppresses her heart, and writes a letter which is
discursive and impersonal from the beginning to the little _Vale_ at the
end.
Abaelard returned a long epistle upon the Scriptural origin of the order
of nuns, and soon followed it with another, still longer, containing
instruction, advice, and rules for the nuns of the Paraclete. He also
wrote them a letter upon the study of Scripture. From this time forth he
proved his devotion to Heloïse and her nuns by the large body of writings
which he composed for their edification. Heloïse sent him a long list of
questions upon obscure phrases and knotty points of Scripture, which he
answered diligently in detail.[6] He then sent her a collection of hymns
written or “rearranged” by himself for the use of the nuns, accompanied by
a prefatory letter: “At thy prayers, my sister Heloïse, once dear to me in
the world, now most dear in Christ, I have composed what in Greek are
called hymns, and in Hebrew _tillim_.” He then explains why, yielding to
the requests of the nuns, he had written hymns, of which the Church had
such a store.
Next he composed for them a large volume of sermons, which he also sent
with a letter to Heloïse: “Having completed the book of hymns and
sequences, revered in Christ and loved sister Heloïse, I have hastened to
compose some sermons for your congregation; I have paid more attention to
the meaning than the language. But perhaps an unstudied style is well
suited to simple auditors. In composing and arranging these sermons I have
followed the order of Church festivals. Farewell in the Lord, servant of
His, once dear to me in the world, now most dear in Christ: in the flesh
then my wife, now my sister in the spirit and partner in our sacred
calling.”
At a subsequent period, when his opinions were condemned by the Council of
Sens, he sent to Heloïse a confession of faith. Shortly afterward his
stormy life found a last refuge in the monastery of Cluny. His closing
years (of peace?) are described in a letter to Heloïse from the good and
revered abbot, Peter the Venerable. He writes that he had received with
joy the letter which her affection had dictated,[7] and now took the first
opportunity to express his recognition of her affection and his reverence
for herself. He refers to her keenly prosecuted studies (so rare for
women) before taking the veil, and then to the glorious example of her
sage and holy life in the nun’s sacred calling--her victory over the proud
Prince of this World. His admiration for her was deep; his expression of
it was extreme. A learned, wise, and holy woman could not be praised more
ardently than Heloïse is praised by this good man. He had spoken of the
advantages his monastery would have derived from her presence, and then
continued:
“But although God’s providence denied us this, it was granted us to
enjoy the presence of him--who was yours--Master Peter Abaelard, a man
always to be spoken of with honour as a true servant of Christ and a
philosopher. The divine dispensation placed him in Cluny for his last
years, and through him enriched our monastery with treasure richer
than gold. No brief writing could do justice to his holy, humble, and
devoted life among us. I have not seen his equal in humility of garb
and manner. When in the crowd of our brethren I forced him to take a
first place, in meanness of clothing he appeared as the last of all.
Often I marvelled, as the monks walked past me, to see a man so great
and famous thus despise and abase himself. He was abstemious in food
and drink, refusing and condemning everything beyond the bare
necessities. He was assiduous in study, frequent in prayer, always
silent unless compelled to answer the question of some brother or
expound sacred themes before us. He partook of the sacrament as often
as possible. Truly his mind, his tongue, his act, taught and
exemplified religion, philosophy, and learning. So he dwelt with us, a
man simple and righteous, fearing God, turning from evil, consecrating
to God the latter days of his life. At last, because of his bodily
infirmities, I sent him to a quiet and salubrious retreat on the banks
of the Saone. There he bent over his books, as long as his strength
lasted, always praying, reading, writing, or dictating. In these
sacred exercises, not sleeping but watching, he was found by the
heavenly Visitor; who summoned him to the eternal wedding-feast not as
a foolish but as a wise virgin, bearing his lamp filled with oil--the
consciousness of a holy life. When he came to pay humanity’s last
debt, his illness was brief. With holy devotion he made confession of
the Catholic Faith, then of his sins. The brothers who were with him
can testify how devoutly he received the viaticum of that last
journey, and with what fervent faith he commended his body and soul to
his Redeemer. Thus this master, Peter, completed his days. He who was
known throughout the world by the fame of his teaching, entered the
school of Him who said, ‘Learn of me, for I am meek and lowly of
heart’; and continuing meek and lowly he passed to Him, as we may
believe.
“Venerable and dearest sister in the Lord, the man who was once joined
to thee in the flesh, and then by the stronger chain of divine love,
him in thy stead, or as another thee, the Lord holds in His bosom; and
at the day of His coming, His grace will restore him to thee.”
The abbot afterwards visited the Paraclete, and on returning to Cluny
received this letter from the abbess:
“God’s mercy visiting us, we have been visited by the favour of your
graciousness. We are glad, kindest father, and we glory that your
greatness condescended to our insignificance. A visit from you is an
honour even to the great. The others may know the great benefit they
received from the presence of your highness. I cannot tell in words,
or even comprehend in thought, how beneficial and how sweet your
coming was to me. You, our abbot and our lord, celebrated mass with us
|
chapter in life. Had he
required to earn his living, no doubt the energy which necessity would
have given to his quest for employment might have found him something to
do; but he had not that stimulus--and he had not the stimulus of
aptitude for, or knowledge of, any special kind of occupation. He would
have “done anything.” Was that but another way of saying that he was
good for nothing? he asked himself sometimes, in partial despair.
And then putting all these new fancies aside, he had really so much to
do in the early Summer. He had to look after his sick horse, to see a
great number of friends, to answer invitations, to make some ordinary
necessary preparations for the Derby and Ascot, and all sorts of other
engagements. He had quite enough to fill his life with this ordinary
round of trivial occupation, as it had been filled for all these years;
and when he had returned to the usual circle of that life, it must be
allowed that it was not disagreeable to him. It felt natural; and yet it
was nothing--no good to him, no good to those among whom it was lived.
No progress, either internal or external, was possible, so long as he
continued in it. But what was he to do? What even did he want to do?
Something, certainly--something that would restore him to the credit he
had lost in his own eyes, that would make him worthy in Marjory’s, that
would improve his position, and help him to that natural growth and
increase and elevation in life which had become so essential; but yet
nothing that he knew of--nothing that he saw other people doing. Poor
good-for-nothing! He wanted to “better himself,” to be of some sort of
use, to double his means, to make what was called establishment in life
possible, to change himself, in short, from a nobody and nothing, into a
man of some importance and consideration--a man fit to be trusted with
the life and welfare of others. This was what he wanted; but he had not
the smallest inkling of how it was to be brought about.
One thing however he did, and at once--he availed himself of the
permission which Marjory had so unhesitatingly accorded to him, and
wrote to her. He did this only a few days after he left Pitcomlie;
indeed, he began his letter on the very morning of the day on which he
left, when he was no further off than Edinburgh--but destroyed that
first letter and various others before he produced the following, which
at last, after many doubts, he sent. How to begin it was a puzzle to
him. The only thing he had any right to say was “Dear Miss Heriot;” but,
somehow, that sober and correct address did not seem to suit the
circumstances. This cost him a great deal of thought; he could think
deeply, connectedly on such a subject, though he could not think to any
purpose, in respect to the occupation which he was so anxious for. His
letter kept running through his mind during all the interval--four
days--which elapsed before he made up his mind to send it; and at last,
as will be seen, he began abruptly, with no formal start at all, which
seemed to him, somehow, more congenial than “Dear Miss Heriot.” The
letter was finished at midnight, but he left it open and read it over,
and added something to it next morning before he sent it off; and after
he had fastened up the envelope, was in a dozen minds whether or not to
open it again and revise it once more. No new beginner in literature was
ever half so careful and anxious for the success of his first work.
“I avail myself very eagerly of the permission you gave me to
recall myself to your recollection. It is not that I am worth your
recollection, but because I cannot bear the idea of falling out of
it. How can I sufficiently tell you what it has been to me to have
felt myself one of the household of Pitcomlie, to have grown into
its ways, to have been part of its life at so sad a moment? I feel
almost as if you must think me unfeeling, unsympathetic in your
sorrows, when I say that I am glad I was there at this time, rather
than at another. I wonder if you will know what I mean? I grieve
for you to the bottom of my heart, and yet I am glad that I was
there. Life outside, life here in London, where, people say, and I
suppose believe, there is so much movement and excitement, seems to
me very tame and vacant. I can’t think how my old friends can
endure the mill-horse round of engagements, all so null, so
monotonous, and like each other;--because they have not been in
Fife, I suppose. And yet Pitcomlie is very quiet, you will tell me?
I wonder if you are there; or if the recent events have made it
insupportable to you; or what you are doing? I keep thinking and
wondering over this, and whether you will remember me again, or be
so good, so very good as to tell me all I want to know, and answer
me half of the flood of questions which are ready to be poured out
upon you. May I ask them? I am sure at heart you are too good not
to say yes or no. I want to know about Mr. Charles; whether he has
left his tower, and his papers, and all those treasures which he
was so kind as to show me; and about dear little Milly, whom I can
no longer tempt to laugh at an unbecoming moment. How I should like
to try! and to see her look of fright, which is her own, at her
wickedness; and then that delightful gravity, which is yours,
settling over her small face. I want to know everything about her,
and about your uncle;--and anything you will tell me; any little
scrap or crumb from your table--about you.
“There are a great many things I should like to tell you about
myself, if it did not seem abominable impertinence to hope that you
would take any interest in such an indifferent personage. Nobody
can be more thoroughly aware than I am how little there is to say
about me, that would be pleasant to your ear. I have had one kind
of dubious good quality in my past life, and that has been content;
now I have lost that even. What a poor sort of affair is the life
we live without thinking of it, we wretched fellows who are, I
suppose, the scum, and float on the surface of the stream, going
wherever it carries us, in a helpless, hopeless sort of way, that
must appal and disgust any one who has ever known better. Having
had a glimpse of the better, I am disgusted too, and begin to make
a fuss among the other atoms, and long to cling to something, to
oppose the power of the tide, and get some kind of independent
action into me. I wonder if you will know what I mean? How often I
find myself wondering this--asking myself if it would be
comprehensible to you; or if you would simply scorn the poorer sort
of being whose existence has been so long without plan, or purpose,
or pilot? This would be very natural; but I like to think that you
would rather try to understand, knowing what a great thing it would
be for me if you would take so much trouble. I am no theologian,
and dare not pretend to speak on such subjects; but yet, if the
angels would take the trouble to enter a little into our mortal
concerns, how much good it would do us! Do not you think so too? or
do you think I am talking nonsense? which very likely is the case,
since I want to talk the best of sense, and mean a great deal,
which I am not clever enough to say.
“May I write again soon? and will you give me a line--just a
line--three or four words, if no more, to tell me that you still
remember the existence of one who is always
“Your faithful servant,
“E. F.”
This letter Marjory read at the breakfast-table, seated between Aunt
Jean and Uncle Charles, with little Milly opposite to her, and all the
commonplaces of ordinary talk going on. How bewildered would those good
folks have been could they have read it over her shoulder! How
bewildered did she feel reading it, moved to an interest which made her
half indignant with herself, and feeling impatient with the writer for
that restrained glow of feeling, which notwithstanding communicated to
her a sympathetic thrill. “Ridiculous!” she said, and felt her cheeks
glow, and her heart move a little, notwithstanding all she did to
control it.
“That’s a long letter, May,” said Mr. Charles, looking at it with some
curiosity as she put it carefully back into its envelope.
“It is from Mr. Fanshawe,” she said, with a consciousness for which she
could have taken instant vengeance on herself; “he has gone to London.
He said he would let me know where he had gone.”
“Oh!” said Mr. Charles; and Miss Jean’s eyes lighted up.
Marjory let the letter lie by her plate as if it was of no importance,
but felt her cheeks grow hotter and hotter. Ridiculous! She determined
to write him a most matter-of-fact reply, which should make an end of
this discursive nonsense. If he thought she had leisure for a
sentimental correspondence, she must convince him to the contrary; how
absurd it was! And yet to be thus put upon a pedestal of absolute
superiority, and worshipped in this covert way, is not in itself
disagreeable. A little weakness stole about her heart; insensibly it
occurred to her during the forenoon that there were several things she
would like to consult him about. She slid the letter quietly into her
pocket before she left the table. It happened to her to look at it again
during the course of the day, just “to see what he had said” about his
present occupations. As it happened he had not said anything. But how
was Marjory to recollect that?
CHAPTER III.
Mr. Charles Heriot had not come to the High Street without an object. He
had left Pitcomlie on the morning after Marjory left it, and had
proceeded straight to his house in Edinburgh to review the capabilities
of George Square; and he had not been very well satisfied with those
capabilities. The house had not been inhabited since it had been in his
possession. It was an excellent old-fashioned house, worth a dozen of
the ordinary habitations which fall to your lot and mine, dear reader;
but it was furnished with mere chairs and tables, bookcases and
side-boards, not with any associations or kindly customs of use and
wont. There was some old spindle-legged furniture, which had belonged to
some Leddy Pitcomlie in the beginning of last century, with which
Marjory could have made a quaint corner to live in, in one part, at
least, of the chilly, uninhabited drawing-room, converting it all at
once into such a chamber as some Jacobite lady might have received the
Chevalier in, or where Mrs. Anne Keith might have discoursed to young
Walter Scott. But Mr. Charles’s imagination was dulled by the vexations
and embarrassments that possessed him, and he could not realize this;
and his decision about George Square was that it would not do. The chain
of habit was very hard to break with Mr. Charles; but when once broken,
he was impatient, and almost lawless, rushing into any novelty that
presented itself. The novelty in this case, however, was not
extravagant. What he did was simply to take a house in St. Andrew’s for
the summer; and it was this which he had come to intimate to the
household in the High Street.
“Not but what Marjory would be very happy with you, poor thing,” he said
to Aunt Jean; “perhaps more happy than I can hope to see her; but still
it will be more of a change. After griefs like hers, and all that has
happened, I have always heard that a change was the best thing; and as
she’s used to me and my ways--”
“You need not apologize, Chairles Heriot,” said the old lady. “If I ever
deluded myself I was to get a companion, it’s best to undeceive me; but
I did not delude myself. I’m used to live alone, and no doubt after the
first I would have gone back to my crabbed ways. But there’s one thing I
must say. I’m fond of the girl, though she maybe does not give me credit
for it, and she shall have all I’ve got to leave; I said in my haste she
was my natural heir, and too natural, and a Miss Heriot doomed, all her
days, like me. But mind this, if you take May away, I’ll no have her
back. I give her to you on one condition, and that is, that you’ll marry
her well. Marry that girrl, and marry her well, and you’ll have my
blessing, and I’ll think better of ye, Chairles, than I’ve ever thought
all your days.”
“Marry her, and marry her well!” cried Mr. Charles, in dismay; “and how
am I to do that? I have never married myself, and neither have you.”
“That has nothing to do with it,” said Miss Jean, promptly. “The more
reason that Marjory should; there’s enough of us poor dry trees, with
nothing to leave behind. If you have any respect for the past
generation, of which I’m the last representative, Charlie Heriot, you’ll
do what I say. Marry her well; she’s worthy the trouble. She’ll make
such a man’s wife as few men deserve, that’s my opinion. Mind, I’m not
saying but what she might be mended; but marry her, and marry her well,
Charlie, or you’ll get nothing from me.”
“Perhaps you would tell me how I’m to do it?” said Mr. Charles, with
sarcastic seriousness.
“If you cannot find that out for yourself, you’ll never do it by my
teaching,” said Miss Jean. “Well I know ye have but little sense, you
useless men; but ye know other men, if you do nothing else. If it was a
wife, now, that I wanted for a likely lad, do ye think I could not lay
my hand on one? aye, and bring it to pass, too, if there was not
something sore against me. Keep your eyes open, and when ye see a man
that’s worth the trouble, take him to your house--since ye are to have a
house; and meddle no more, Charlie Heriot, after ye have done that;
meddle no more. The first step is in your power; but the rest they must
do themselves, or it will never be done. That’s my advice. Friends can
do a great deal, but there’s a leemit which they must never pass. Once
let May see what you have in your head, and there’s an end of it all.
Without judgment, ye’ll never succeed in that, nor, indeed, in anything
else, as ye might have learned from the family letters ye are so fond
of. But the Heriots have never minded their daughters; they have left
the poor things to themselves. There’s me, for example; not that I’m
regretting my lot. A man would have been a terrible trouble to me; I
could not have been fashed with a creature aye on my hands. But
Marjory’s young enough to accustom herself to her fate, whatever that
may be.”
“I hope so,” said Mr. Charles, with some impatience; “but if you think
that I am going to take home every man about the Links to see whether
our May is good enough for him--”
“That’s just like one of your interpretations,” said Miss Jean, with
quiet scorn. “‘Any man that’s worth the trouble,’ said I; ‘every man
upon the Links,’ says he; it’s just what a woman has to expect. And
Marjory may have settled for herself, so far as I know. There was that
English lad, that you and poor Thomas, like two wise men, had so much
about the house--”
“Fanshawe? I don’t think he has a penny,” said Mr. Charles.
“Most likely no, or ye would not have taken such pains to throw him in
the girrl’s way. He was not ill-looking, and he had a taking manner, and
when the heart’s soft it’s easy to make an impression; she has a kind of
absent look at times. And there’s Johnnie Hepburn, not a great match,
but well off, that would give his two e’en if she would but look at
him--”
“Johnnie Hepburn is not an ill lad,” said Mr. Charles, inclining for the
moment, if Marjory’s marriage was to be brought into the foreground, to
seize on the easiest way of deciding it; “but in the meantime,” he
added, recalling his thoughts, “neither marrying nor giving in marriage
is in her head--or mine either--with three deaths in the family.”
“Oh aye!” said Miss Jean; “ye need not tell me the importance of what’s
happened. Both to us now living and to all the race, it’s a terrible
thing to think of, that both sons should be swept away, and a poor
little bairn with a strange woman of a mother, a mindless creature that
kens none of our ways, should be all that’s left to succeed. Never since
I mind has anything happened like it. However, we must all die; but
there’s no the same necessity in marriage, and that’s why I’m speaking.
I’m old, older than all them that’s gone. Before ye see me again, I may
be on the road to Comlie kirkyard, beside the rest--which is one good
thing,” Miss Jean added, with her sharp eyes twinkling, “of a maiden
state like yours and mine, Charlie. No other family has any share in us.
We are sure, at least, to lie with our own at the last.”
“Ay, to be sure,” said Mr. Charles, who was not thinking of any such
consolation, and who was glad to recur to his original subject. “We’ll
live very quietly, and see no company. St. Andrews is one of the places
where you can see many people, or few, according to your inclination;
and I’ll have my quiet game, and May will have her sister to take up
her mind. For the time being, Aunt Jean, I cannot see that we could do
better; and I will always be at hand in case of that foolish young woman
at Pitcomlie going wrong altogether.”
“I would let her go as wrong as she likes,” said Miss Jean. “It’s aye
shortest in the end to leave folks free to their own devices. When she’s
done all the harm she can to herself and other folk, she will yield to
them that knows better. But I must go and look after your dinners.
You’ll miss your grand cook with all her made dishes, Charlie. I hear it
was you that settled yon woman at Pitcomlie, and they tell me she’s to
be married upon Fleming (the auld fool) and they’re to set up in some
way of business. I cannot abide waste for my part, and when a woman that
can cook--which she could do, I say it to your credit, though I hate a
man that’s aye thinking of what he puts into him--goes and gives up her
profession and marries a poor man that wants nothing but broth, or maybe
a stoved potatoe----”
“They should take up a tavern--they should take up a tavern,” said Mr.
Charles, with some excitement. “Bless me! her collops are just
excellent; and I know nobody that can serve you up a dish of fish and
sauce, or salmon steak, or a tender young trout stewed in wine, followed
with a delicate dish of friar’s chicken----”
“The Lord preserve us from these greedy men!” said Miss Jean. “The
water’s in his e’en over his friar’s chicken; which is as wasteful a
dish and as extravagant as any I know. You must try to put up with my
poor Jess’s plain roast and boiled. It will be a trial, no doubt; but I
must go and give her her orders,” said the old lady, marching downstairs
with her cane tapping on every step. She went to the kitchen, and
stirred up the artist there, whose powers were anything but
contemptible, by sarcastic descriptions of her nephew’s tastes. “You
would think to hear him that nobody could dress a decent dish but yon
woman at Pitcomlie,” Miss Jean said, artfully, “and he’s very great on
fish, and thinks none of us know how to put a haddie on the table. It’s
not pleasant for an honest woman like you that have been born among
haddies, so to speak, Jess; but you must not mind what an epicure like
that may say. For my part, I’m always very well pleased with your simple
dishes.”
“Simple dishes! my certy!” said Jess to herself, when her mistress had
withdrawn; and being thus pitted against her important rival at
Pitcomlie, the _cordon-bleu_ of the High Street went to work with such a
will, that Mr. Charles was smitten with wonderment and humiliation.
“It is wonderful the talent that is hidden in out-of-the-way places,” he
said afterwards, when describing this feast; and when you reflect that
he did not know what sort of cook was awaiting him in St. Andrews, and
did know that the good woman in George Square was good for nothing
beyond an occasional chop, it may be supposed that his pretensions in
presence of Miss Jean were considerably lessened. This gave Mr. Charles
more thought than that other matter of the necessity of marrying
Marjory. Now that Marjory belonged as it were to himself, forming indeed
the very first of his conditions of existence, he did not see the
necessity of any change. He said to himself, as her father had once
said, “No husband would be so considerate of her as I am. She will never
get so much of her own way again,” and felt that the suggestion that
Marjory should be married was an impertinence especially offensive to
himself. That could be dismissed, however, with little ceremony. It was
a more serious matter about the cook.
Some weeks, however, elapsed before the removal to St. Andrews was
effected, and in those weeks things went very badly with the household
at Pitcomlie. Fleming, being further aggravated after Mr. Charles’s
departure, decided upon leaving at once instead of waiting for the term,
which had been his first intention.
“A man may argufy with a man,” he said, when he announced his final
decision to Mrs. Simpson, “but to put up with a wheen woman is mair than
I’m equal to. Stay you, my dear, if you think proper; but I’m auld
enough to take my ain way, and I’ll no stay to be driven about by these
new leddies. If it had been Miss Marjory, it would have been another
kind of thing; but, by George, to put up with all their tantrums, me an
auldish man, and used to my ain way and very little contradiction, and a
man engaged to be married into the bargain! I’ll no do’t.”
This was a serious blow to the house. The footman, who had been
thereupon elevated by Matilda to Fleming’s place, was elated by his
advancement, and conducted himself towards the maids in a way which
produced notice of resignation from several of the women. And Mrs.
Simpson, when it came to her turn to bear, unsupported by her Fleming,
the daily burden of the “new leddy’s” unsatisfactory manners, struck
work too, and decided that it was not worth her while to struggle on
even for the short time that remained.
“I’m weel aware, mem,” she said to Verna, who had attempted a private
remonstrance, “that we should act, no as ithers act to us, but as we
would that they should do. That’s awfu’ true; but I canna but think He
would have made a difference Himself, if it had been put to Him, in the
case of a servant. You see, naturally we look up to them that are above
us for an example; we dinna set up to give them an example, which would
be terrible conceited. And a woman like me, with a’ the care of the
house on her head, and slaving over the fire, dressing dishes that I
have no heart to touch by the time they come to me--Na, na! it’s no from
the like of me that a Christian example should be expectit. And then you
must mind it’s said in the Bible as weel, ‘I will be good to him that is
good, and froward to him that is froward.’ I humbly hope I’m a Christian
woman, but I canna go beyond Scripture. And what is a month’s wages to
me? I’ve been long in good service, and I’ve put by some siller, and I
dinna doubt but you’ve heard, mem, that though I’m no so young as I once
was, I have--ither prospects; and ane that will no see me want. So as
for the month’s wages, I’ve made mair sacrifices than that.”
“The money is not much,” said Verna; “but the character, Mrs. Simpson.
My sister will be very much put out, and she forms very strong opinions,
and she might say----”
“Your sister, mem!” the housekeeper answered in a blaze of passion; but
then feeling her superiority, paused and controlled herself. “When
Mistress Chairles is as well kent in the countryside as I am, it will be
time to speak about characters,” she said. “Characters, Lord preserve
us! am I like a young lass wanting a character? You’re a stranger, Miss
Bassett, and a weel meaning young leddie, that has nae intention to give
offence, I ken that; and I think no worse of you for judging according
to your lights; but when it’s said that Mrs. Simpson, housekeeper for
ten years at Pitcomlie, has left her situation, who do you think will
stand most in need of an explanation--Mistress Chairles, or me? If I
wanted a new place, it would not be to her I would come to recommend me.
And as it happens,” said the housekeeper with modest pride, “I’m no
wanting a new place; I’m going home to my ain house.”
“But, dear Mrs. Simpson, it will be so very, very inconvenient for us;
what shall we do?” cried Verna, driven to her last standing-ground.
“I’m no blaming you, mem,” said Mrs. Simpson, with dignity; “but
Mistress Chairles should have taken mair thought what she was saying to
a decent woman--that has never been used to ill language. If she wanted
me to consider her, she should have shown me a good example and
considered me.”
“This is what you have made of it in one month,” cried Verna, rushing
into the room in which her sister sat. “She’s going to-morrow; she will
not stay an hour longer. By coaxing, I got her to consent not to go
to-night. This is what your management has come to. Every servant in the
house is leaving at this horrid term, as they call it; and you, who
don’t know anything of English housekeeping, nor the customs of the
place, nor what you ought to do--”
“Oh, Verna; but _you_ know!” cried Matilda, frightened at last by the
universal desertion, and taking refuge--as was her wont--in tears.
“I know! you have refused my advice, and laughed at all my
remonstrances; you have never listened to a single word I have said
since that day when the will was read. I have made up my mind to give
up, like the rest.”
“Oh, Verna, don’t! oh don’t forsake me; what shall I do? If I am a
little quick-tempered, is that my fault? I am always sorry, and beg your
pardon. I will beg your pardon on my knees. Oh, Verna! and the Ayah
going, and everybody. I shall get no sleep with baby, and no rest with
all these worries. If you go and forsake me, I shall die!”
“You treat me just like one of the servants,” said Verna; “except that
I have no wages. I don’t know why I should stay to be bullied and made
miserable. I will go too. I can have the Ayah to take care of me, and
poor papa will be glad enough to see me again.”
“Oh, Verna, for heaven’s sake! for pity’s sake, for the sake of my poor,
poor unfortunate babies! You shall have everything you can think of;
everything you would like--”
“Yes, all that is unpleasant!” said Verna; “the kicks, but not the
halfpence; the battles with the servants, and everything that is
disagreeable--”
“Verna! if I promise never to do anything but what you like, never to
say anything you don’t approve of--to do always what you advise me? Oh,
Verna! if I say I will be your slave!” cried Matilda, throwing herself
upon her sister’s neck.
Then Verna allowed herself to be softened.
“I didn’t want to come,” she said. “I came for your sake, and poor
Charlie’s. I don’t want to stay; it’s cold and wretched here; I like
India a great deal better; but if I should try a little while longer,
and make an attempt to keep you straight, will you promise to take my
advice, and do what I tell you? It is of no use my staying otherwise. I
am quite ready to pack up and go back to India; make up your mind what
you will do.”
“I will do whatever you please,” said Matilda, dissolved in tears.
“For you know you are a fool,” said Verna calmly; “you always were; when
you came out a girl, and gave us all that trouble about the cadets in
the ship--when you married poor Charlie, and led him such a life--when
you came back here and insulted Miss Heriot, and made the house
miserable; you have always been a fool, and I suppose you cannot be
different; but, at least, you ought to know.”
“Oh, Verna, I will!” cried the penitent; and it was thus with her blue
eyes running over with tears, with her lips quivering, and her pretty
face melting into its most piteous aspect, that Mr. Hepburn found the
young mistress of the house when he went to Pitcomlie, charged with a
message, which Marjory, wearied by his importunate desire to serve her,
had invented for the purpose. He had not been thinking of Mrs. Charles.
She was Marjory’s supplanter to him, and a thoroughly objectionable
personage. But when he came suddenly into the room, and saw this weeping
creature with her fair hair ruffled by her emotion, tears hanging on her
eyelashes, her piteous little pretty mouth trembling and quivering, the
sight went to the young man’s susceptible heart. No secondary trouble,
such as quarrels with her servants, or the desolation consequent upon
that amusement occurred to him as the possible cause for the state in
which he found her; no doubt crossed his mind that it was the woe of her
widowhood that was overwhelming her. He stopped short at the door out of
respect for the sorrow into which he had intruded unawares. He explained
with perturbation that he was the bearer of a message; he begged pardon
metaphorically upon his knees. “Pray, pray assure your sister that I
would not have intruded for the world; that I feel for her most
deeply,” he said, the sympathetic tears coming to his own eyes.
“She will be better presently,” said wise Verna; “and it will do her
good to see some one. She indulges her feelings too much. Poor child!
perhaps it is not wonderful in her circumstances--”
“How could she do otherwise? I remember Charlie so well; may I speak of
him to her?” said this sympathetic visitor.
Verna received this prayer very graciously; she said, “It will do her
good;” and now she will have something to amuse her, she added, in her
heart.
CHAPTER IV.
Hepburn amused Mrs. Charles very much, though that was not considered
one of his capabilities in Comlie. He roused her gradually from her
depressed state into general conversation. After he had delivered
Marjory’s message, he stayed and talked, feeling a quite novel
excitement and exhilaration in the fact of this social success, which
was unprecedented in his experience. To be appreciated is doubly
delightful to a man who is not used to much applause from his friends.
Matilda was the first pretty woman who had “understood” him, who had
permitted herself to be beguiled out of her private sorrows by his
agreeable society. He was not the less faithful to Marjory, who had
possessed all his thoughts as long as he could remember; but still it
was pleasant to be able to comfort the afflicted, and to feel that his
efforts for that end were successful. After a while, when the tears had
been cleared away, when a gentle smile had stolen upon the fair
countenance before him; when she had yielded to his fascination so far
as to talk a little, and to listen eagerly, and to look up to him with
those blue eyes, Hepburn could not but feel that Miss Heriot must have
been deceived somehow, and that so gentle a creature must be easy “to
get on with,” to those who would be good to her. For the first time in
his life, he felt that there was something to excuse in the idol of his
youth. Not a fault, indeed, but a failure of comprehension; and Marjory
had never failed before in any particular, so far as her adorer knew.
Perhaps the reason was that this gentle little widow was a totally
different kind of woman. Various things he had heard on this subject
occurred to Hepburn’s mind to account for Marjory’s failure. Women, even
the best and cleverest, did sometimes fail to understand each other, he
believed, upon points which offered no difficulty to an impartial
masculine intellect. This was not at all a disagreeable thought; it
raised him vaguely into a pleasant atmosphere of superiority which
elated him, and could not hurt anybody. He even seemed to himself to be
fonder of Marjory from the sense of elevation over her. Yes, no doubt
this was the explanation. Mrs. Charles had done or said something which
a man probably would never have noticed, but which had affected the more
delicate and sensitive, but less broad and liberal nature of the
sweetest of women; and Marjory, on her side, as he knew by experience,
uttered words now and then which were not destitute of the power to
sting. Hepburn thought that to bring these two together again would be a
very fine piece of work for the man who could accomplish it. A loving
blue-eyed creature like this could not but cling to Marjory’s strength,
and Marjory would derive beauty, too, from the fair being whom she
supported. Yes, he thought, as he looked at her, Matilda was the kind of
woman described in all the poets, the lovely parasite, the climbing
woodbine, a thing made up of tendrils, which would hang upon a man, and
hold him fast with dependent arms. Marjory was not of that nature. To be
sure, Marjory was the first of women; but there was a great deal to be
said for the other, who was, no doubt, inferior, but yet had her charm.
Hepburn felt that in the abstract it would be sweet to feel that some
one was dependent upon him. Somehow the idea cre
|
, and can be easily got at on
dewy mornings without wetting the feet. Fantastic shapes are not
advisable, unless =carpet-bedding=[1] is the style aimed at. Rose-trees
look best in round or oblong beds, and do not lend themselves to filling
up stars, though a crescent-shaped bed suits the low-growing kinds very
well. As a rule only one or two different kinds of flowers should be used
in the same bed, and if a good display of blossom is required these must
be frequently changed. =Cuttings a year old= make the best bedding-plants
in a general way, for, though the quantity of bloom may not be quite so
great the habit is more bushy, the individual flower far finer, and the
period of blossoming greatly prolonged. It has been found that many of the
old-fashioned flowers bloom much better if they also are =divided= and
=new soil added=. This is particularly noticeable in such flowers as
_delphiniums_, _campanulas_, and _japonica_ anemones. Once every two or
three years, however, is often enough for these hardy denizens of our
gardens.
[1] See Glossary, p. 7.
=MAKING THE MOST OF THE LAND.= A new style of bedding has cropped up
lately, or rather a lesson that Nature has always been teaching us has at
last been taken to heart, for the idea is really as old as the hills. Two
=plants flowering at different seasons= are placed together where formerly
each would have had a separate piece of ground; thus, a tall, autumn phlox
will be seen rearing its panicles of flowers from a carpet of _aubrietia_,
_alyssum_, or forget-me-not, which all flower in spring. In this way each
foot of ground has something to interest us at all seasons of the year.
Lilies have been planted amongst rhododendrons and azaleas for some time
past, and now the system has been extended. When once we have made up our
minds to have =no bare soil=, various schemes will present themselves to
us. Bulbs can be treated so, to the great improvement of the garden, as
when they grow out of some hardy herbaceous plant, their dying leaves
which present such an untidy appearance are nearly hidden. This double
system of planting is especially necessary in beds which are in full view
of the house, as these must never look empty.
=WANTED--AN EYE FOR COLOUR.= Borders are not so much trouble in this way,
as, if the wall or fence at the back is well covered with a succession of
flowering shrubs, this makes =a very good back-ground=, and, as every
artist knows, that is half the battle. The colours, however, must be
carefully chosen, so that the plants in front blend with the creepers on
the wall. The inconsistency of people in this matter is very noticeable,
for they will mix shades in their borders which they would not dream of
allowing on their dinner-tables. Who has not had his teeth set on edge by
the sight of a pinkish-mauve everlasting pea in juxtaposition with a
flaming red geranium! it is repeated every year in scores of gardens, to
the great offence of every artistic eye. =Colours that quarrel= so
violently with each other should never be visible from the same point of
view, but kept rigorously apart.
It is important that =the soil of the border= be of fairly good quality;
if the staple be poor and rocky, plenty of loam must be incorporated with
a small proportion of manure. On the other hand, if it is heavy, cold, and
clayey, sand must be added to make it porous, and thus improve the
drainage. Where the soil is not improved, some trouble should be taken to
choose only those plants which will do really well in the particular soil
the garden possesses.
CHAPTER III
On the Duty of Making Experiments
_Description of a small yet lovely garden--Colour schemes--The spring
dell--A novel way of growing flowers--Variety in flower-gardens._
="Be original!"= is a motto that every amateur gardener should adopt. Far
too few experiments are made by the average owner of a garden; he jogs
along on the same old lines, without a thought of the delightful
opportunities he misses. Each garden, however small, should possess an
=individuality= of its own--some feature that stamps it as out of the
common run.
I remember seeing a tiny strip in a large town quite fairy-like in its
loveliness, and it has always been a lesson to me on what enthusiasm can
do. The old lady to whom it belonged was not rich, but an ardent lover of
all that is beautiful in nature and art; moreover, she did nearly all the
work herself. Though it was situated amid smoke and dirt, it almost
invariably looked bright and pretty, reminding one somehow, from its
quaintness, of the "days of long ago," for there were no geraniums, no
calceolarias, no lobelias, and not a single Portugal laurel in the whole
place. =Gardeners of the red, white, and blue school=, if any read this
book, will open their eyes at all this, and wonder, maybe, how a proper
garden could manage to exist without these indispensable plants. But then
it was not a proper garden in their sense of the term; paths were winding
instead of straight, flowers grew so well, and bloomed so abundantly that
they even ran into the walks occasionally, and, what was yet more
reprehensible, there was not a shadow of a box edging to =restrain= their
mad flight! Roses and jasmine threw their long flower-laden shoots over
the arches in wild luxuriance, and were a pretty sight, as viewed from the
seat hidden in a bower near by.
There was a small fernery, too, containing some of the choicest specimens
that can be grown in this country. Altogether it was a most charming
little garden, and gave infinite pleasure to the owner and her friends;
indeed, I for one have often been much less pleased with formal ground of
several acres in extent, though the latter might cost a mint of money to
keep up.
Experiments in the way of colour-schemes are most interesting, and should
appeal to ladies, who may gain ideas for their costumes from the blending
of shades in their garden, or _vice-versâ_. Here a word of warning will
not be out of place; do not rely too much on the =coloured descriptions in
the catalogues=, for, as they are usually drawn up by men, they are
frequently inaccurate; so many men are =partially colour-blind=, and will
describe a crushed strawberry as a carmine! Frequently a flower will
change its colour, however, when in different soil and position, even in
the same district.
=THE DELL AT CHERTSEY.= A novel way of growing plants is to open up a
spring dell. I wonder if any of my readers have ever seen the one on St.
Ann's Hill, Chertsey? I will try to picture it here. A large basin is
scooped out of the hill, and on the slopes of this basin are grown masses
of rhododendrons and azaleas. Round the rim at the top is some light
rustic fencing, partially covered with climbing plants, and there was also
a narrow bridge of the same material. This dell could not be copied in
very small gardens, because it should be so placed as to come upon one
rather in the way of a surprise, but where there are any corners not quite
in view of all the windows, a little ingenuity will make a lovely thing of
it. The shrubs used need not be identical; less expensive plants may be
grown in just the same way. Those on the slope of the dell will do best;
the plants for the bottom must be carefully chosen, as, of course, they
will get =much moisture and little sun=. Wall-flowers would run to leaf in
that position; and so, I am afraid, would forget-me-not; daisies (double
ones) would revel there, however, particularly if the soil were made
fairly rich; they are extremely reasonable in price, and easily obtained.
Bluebells, wood anemones, _doronicums_, _hepaticas_, narcissus, snowdrops,
all like such a situation, but perhaps the queen of them all is _dicentra
spectabilis_, or "lady's locket," as it is sometimes called; it has pink
drooping racemes and finely-cut foliage, and is generally found under
glass, though it is never seen to such advantage as when well grown out of
doors. This dell is the very place for it, as, when out in the open
ground, rough winds injure its precocious blooms. The =hardy cyclamen=
would do admirably, too, but these must be planted on the slope of the
dell, as they need perfect drainage. In summer it should be a mass of
filmy ferns, foxgloves, and hardy orchids; the best of the orchids is
_cypripedium spectabile_, and it should be planted in peat and leaf-mould,
and in such a way that it is fairly dry in winter and well watered in
summer. Experiments in the way of growing uncommon plants are always
interesting; in the next chapter, therefore, I will mention a few
unreasonably neglected plants, including some novelties which I can
personally testify to as well worth obtaining.
CHAPTER IV
Some Neglected but Handsome Plants
_The sweet old columbine--BOCCONIA CORDATA at Hampton Court--
CAMPANULAS as continuous bloomers--The heavenly larkspurs--Christmas
roses--The tall and brilliant lobelias--The Chinese-lantern
plants--Tufted pansies._
We will begin alphabetically, therefore I will first say a few words
regarding the =pink-flowered anemone japonica=. Though the white variety
(_alba_) is to be seen in every garden, the older kind is not grown half
enough; perhaps this is owing to the peculiar pinkish shade of the petals,
a colour that will harmonize with few others, and might be termed
æsthetic; it should be grown in a large clump by itself or mixed with
white; it flowers at the same time as _A. j. alba_, and equally approves
of a rich and rather heavy soil, and also likes a shady place. Both kinds
spread rapidly.
=Aquilegias, or columbines, are most elegant plants=, generally left to
the cottage garden, though their delicate beauty fits them for the best
positions; they do well on borders, and generally flower about the end of
May; in a light soil they seed freely, and spring up all round the parent
plant. =Asters=, the botanical name for Michaelmas daisies, are beautiful
flowers for a small garden if the right sort are chosen; those that take
up a great deal of room should be discarded where space is an object, and
such kinds as _A. amellus bessaribicus_, planted instead; this is perhaps
the finest of the genus, and is =first-rate for cutting=. It is only two
feet high, of neat habit, and bears large, bright mauve flowers with
golden centres very freely, from the beginning of August right into
October. =A. ericoides= is another one of neat habit, and is only half a
foot taller than the last; it bears long sprays, covered the whole way up
the stem with tiny white flowers and mossy foliage. Some of the
_novi-belgii_ asters are also very good and easy to grow. One of the most
=effective and beautiful= plants in the summer months is _bocconia
cordata_; it has delicate, heart-shaped foliage of a clear apple-green,
silvered beneath, and creamy flower-spikes which measure from three to
five feet in height; though so tall, it is eminently =fitted for the town
garden=, for it is not a straggling plant and rarely requires staking. At
Hampton Court Palace it is one of the most striking things in the
herbaceous border during July.
The hardy =campanulas= are good things to have, and in their own shade of
blue are not to be beaten; of the taller varieties, the blue and white
peach-leaved kinds are the handsomest, and come in very usefully for
cutting. _C. carpatica_ and _C. c. alba_ are shorter, being only one foot
high; they =flower continuously=, and look very well in a bed with the
double _potentillas_, which are described further on.
=Coreopsis grandiflora= is handsomer than the old _lanceolata_, and bears
large bright yellow flowers, which are very handsome when cut and =bloom
for a long period=.
It is difficult to imagine what we should do without =delphiniums=
(larkspurs) in the hardy flower-border; they are absolutely invaluable,
and seem to have almost =every good quality=, neither are they at all
difficult to grow; some of their blossoms are of an azure blue, a rare
colour in nature; then they can be had of a Cambridge blue, purple, white,
rose, and even red; the last, however, is a fickle grower and not to be
recommended, save for the rockery. Though one may give 21s. and even more
per dozen for them, beautiful kinds can be had for 10s.; these plants run
from two to five feet high in good soil, but need plenty of manure to do
them really well, as they belong to the tribe of "=gross-feeders=."
The =erigerons= are useful plants to grow, very much like the
large-flowered Michaelmas daisies, except that they come in earlier and
are of a dwarfer habit; they may be had in orange as well as blue shades.
The =funkias= are grand plants, grown chiefly for their =foliage=, which
is sometimes green margined with white, or green mixed with gold, and in
one kind the leaves are marbled blue and green; they =set off the flowers
near them= to great advantage. In the early spring slugs attack them;
these must be trapped and killed (see Chap. VIII.).
Why are the old =Christmas roses= seen so little, I wonder? Grown in heavy
soil and cold aspect they do beautifully, and bring us their pure white
flowers =when little else is obtainable outside=. One thing against them
in this hurry-skurry age is the fact that they increase so slowly; this
makes them rather expensive too. Good plants of _helleborus niger maximus_
may, however, be bought for half-a-crown; this variety has =very handsome
leaves=, and is all the better for a little manure.
=A flower that everybody admires= is the =heuchera sanguinea=, a rare and
lovely species; it has graceful sprays of coral-red flowers, borne on
stems from one to two feet high, which generally appear in June, and are
first-rate for cutting. =Lobelia fulgens= is a brilliantly beautiful
species, not to be confounded with the dwarf blue kinds; these tall
varieties have quaintly-shaped red flowers, and narrow leaves of the
darkest crimson; the roots are rather tender, and much dislike damp during
the autumn and winter.
=Lychnis chalcedonica= is one of the unreasonably neglected plants; it has
=bright scarlet flowers=, a good habit, and grows from two to three feet
high; it must have a sunny position and prefers a sandy soil.
Some of the new hardy =penstemons= are lovely, and =flower during the
whole summer=; they look very well in a round bed by themselves, and do
not require much looking after; they are rather too tender to withstand
our damp winters without protection, therefore the old plants should be
mulched, after having had cuttings taken from them, to be kept secure from
frost in a frame.
The =winter cherry=, or =Cape gooseberry (physalis alkekengi)= is a most
fascinating plant; =its fruit is the attraction=, and resembles
Chinese-lanterns; they appear early in September, and make quite a good
show in the garden. When bad weather comes, the stalks should be cut, hung
up to dry for about a week, and then mixed in vases with dried grasses and
the effect is very pretty. Care must be taken when asking for this plant
under the English name, as there is a greenhouse plant so termed which is
quite different, and, of course, will not stand frost. A dozen plants cost
about 5s.; do not be persuaded to get the newer sort--_franchetti_--the
berries are larger, but coarse and flabby, and not nearly so decorative.
=Polemonium richardsoni= is a very pretty plant, its English name being
=Jacob's ladder=. The flowers are borne in clusters, and are pale sky-blue
in colour with a yellow eye: the foliage is fernlike in character and very
abundant. This plant =likes a shady nook=, which must not be under trees,
however, and if well watered after its first bloom is over in June, it
will flower again in autumn. The double =potentillas= are glorious things
for bedding, and are most uncommon looking. Their flowers are =like small
double roses= in shape: generally orange, scarlet, or a mixture of both:
the leaves, greyish-green in colour, resemble those of the strawberry.
Unfortunately, these plants require a good deal of staking, but they are
well worth the trouble.
The large-leaved =saxifrages=, sometimes called _megaseas_, merit a good
deal more attention than they receive. For one thing they begin flowering
very early, holding up their close pink umbels of flowers so bravely in
cold winds: then their foliage is quite distinct, and turns to such =a
rich red in September= that this fact, added to their easy cultivation,
makes it wonderful that they are not more grown. I remember, on a dreary
day in mid-February, being perfectly charmed by the sight of a large bed
of this _saxifraga ligulata_, completely filling up the front garden of a
workman's cottage in one of the poorest roads of a large town. The flowers
are particularly =clean and fresh-looking=, and having shiny leaves they
of course resist dust and dirt well.
=Tradescantias= and =trollius= are two good families of plants for growing
on north borders; the first have curious blue or reddish-purple flowers,
rising on stiff stalks clothed with long pointed leaves, and they continue
in =flower from May till September=. The =trollius= has bright orange or
lemon-yellow cup-shaped blossoms and luxuriant foliage. It flowers from
the end of May for some weeks. Both these plants grow about two feet high.
=Violas= or =tufted pansies= are very pretty, and extremely =suitable for
the ground work of beds=, especially where these are in shade, though they
will not do under trees. Cuttings must constantly be taken, as
one-year-old plants flower more continuously, and have larger blooms and a
more compact habit than older plants, besides which they are apt to die
out altogether, if left to themselves.
These are but a few of the wealth of good things to be made use of, for,
when once real enthusiasm is awakened, the amateur who wishes to have a
thoroughly interesting garden will only be too eager to avail himself of
all that is best in the horticultural world.
CHAPTER V
The Conservatory and Greenhouse
_Mistakes in staging--Some suitable climbers--Economical
heating--Aspect, shading, etc.--The storing of plants--No waste
space--Frames._
=A well-kept conservatory= adds much to the charm of a drawing-room, but
requires careful management. Potting and the like cannot very well go on
in a place which must always look presentable. A conservatory, of course,
is tiled, and therefore every dead leaf and any soil that may be spilled
show very much; it is therefore advisable to have a greenhouse as well,
or, failing that, some frames. A greenhouse, though it may be only just
large enough to turn round in, is a great help towards a nice garden, and
a boon in winter; it also allows of =a change of plants= for the
dwelling-house and conservatory, greatly to their advantage. =Staging
generally takes up far too much room=; the middle part of a conservatory
should be left free, so that there is space to walk about; stands for
plants are easily arranged, and give a more natural appearance than fixed
staging, which always looks rather stiff. Being a good deal more liable to
visits from guests than an ordinary greenhouse, the conservatory must be
kept scrupulously clean and neat; the floor, walls, and woodwork must be
washed very often, and the glass kept beautifully bright. Cobwebs must
never be allowed to settle anywhere, and all the shelves must be kept free
of dirt and well painted; curtains should be hung near the entrance to the
drawing-room, so that they may be pulled across the opening at any time,
to hide work of this sort.
=Hanging plants= are great adjuncts where the structure is lofty, and
open-work iron pillars, when draped with some graceful climbing plant, are
a great improvement. Where there is but little fire heat, considerable
care will be needed to choose something which will look well all the year
round. We will suppose that the frost is merely kept out; in the summer,
such a house can be bright with _plumbago_, _pelargoniums_, _salvias_, and
indeed all the regular greenhouse flowering plants, as, except in
hot-houses, no artificial heat is then necessary anywhere. In winter,
there is more difficulty, for all the climbing plants which are in
conspicuous positions must be nearly hardy; of these, the trumpet flower
(_bignonia_), _swainsonia_, passion-flower, _choisya ternata_, myrtle and
camellia, are the best; these are nearly evergreen, and consequently look
ornamental even when out of flower.
=Plants suitable for hanging baskets= are the trailing _tradescantias_,
the white _campanula_, lobelia, pelargonium, and many ferns. For the pot
plants there are hosts of things; _freesias_, _cyclamen_,
marguerite-carnations, _primulas_, Christmas roses, arums, azaleas,
_kalmias_, _spireas_, chrysanthemums, narcissus, roman hyacinths, and so
on. Many late-flowering hardy plants, will, if potted up, continue in
bloom long after the cold has cut them off outside.
=Cactus plants=, too, ordinarily grown in a warm green-house, will even
withstand one or two degrees of frost when kept perfectly dry, dust-dry,
in fact. During winter in England =it is the damp that kills=, not the
cold; bearing that in mind, we shall be able to grow many things that
hitherto have puzzled us. All those delicate iris, half-hardy ferns, and
tiresome plants that would put off flowering till too late, why, a cold
conservatory or greenhouse is the very place for them!
=Green-houses are altogether easier to manage than conservatories=, and
therefore are the best for amateurs. There cuttings may be struck, plants
repotted, fuchsias, geraniums, etc., stored, and tender annuals reared. A
=lean-to greenhouse= should face south preferably, and the door should be
placed at the warm end, that is, the west, so that when opened no biting
wind rushes in. When the summer comes, a temporary shading will be
necessary; twopennyworth of whitening and a little water mixed into a
paste will do this. About the middle of September it should be washed off,
if the rain has not already done so; for if it remains on too long the
plants will grow pale and lanky.
=ARTIFICIAL HEAT.= The Rippingille stove before referred to must be placed
at the coldest end, and only sufficient warmth should emanate from it just
to keep out the frost, unless it is intended to use it all day. It is well
to remember that =the colder the atmosphere outside, the cooler in
proportion must the interior be=. Even a hot-house is allowed by a good
gardener to go down to 60° or even 55° on a bitterly cold night, as a
great amount of fire-heat at such times is inimical to plant life, though
it will stand a tremendous amount of sun-power. Several mats or lengths of
woollen material, canvas, etc., stretched along outside will save expense,
and be a more natural way of preserving the plants.
=One great advantage that a greenhouse has= over a conservatory is this:
that any climbers can be planted out, whereas tubs have to be used where
the floor is tiled. =Cucumbers and tomatoes= do very well in a small
house, and an abundance of these is sure to please the housekeeper. Seeds
of the cucumber should be sown about the first week in March on a hot-bed;
if in small pots all the better, as their roots suffer less when
transferred to where they are to fruit. Do not let the shoots become
crowded, or insects and mildew will attack them. In the summer, "damp
down" pretty frequently and give plenty of air, avoiding anything like a
draught, however. "=Telegraph=," though not new, is a reliable cucumber of
good flavour and a first-rate cropper. =Tomato seed= should be sown about
the same time and the plants treated similarly, giving plenty of water but
no stimulant in the way of guano till they have set their fruit, which can
be assisted by passing a camel's hair brush over the flowers, and thus
fertilising them. Of course, out of doors the bees do this; their
"busyness" materially aiding the gardener.
As to =storing plants=, a box of sand placed in a dry corner where no drip
can reach it, is best for this, burying the roots of dahlias, etc., fairly
deep in it, and withholding water till the spring, when they may be taken
out, each root examined, decayed parts removed, and every healthy plant
repotted. The pots should be placed under the shelves till they shoot
forth, when they can be gradually brought forward to the light. This
reminds me that =the dark parts of a greenhouse= should never be wasted,
as, besides their use in bringing up bulbs, ferns can be grown for
cutting, and such things as rhubarb, may be readily forced there. =Frames=
are very useful and fairly cheap, though it is best to get them set with
21-oz. glass, or they will not last long. Seedlings may be brought up in
them with greater success than if in a greenhouse, and a supply of violets
may be kept up in them during the coldest weather. The mats they are
covered with during the night must never be removed till the frost is well
off the grass, say about 11 a.m., as a sudden thaw makes terrible havoc.
=The great point to remember= when about to indulge in a greenhouse is
this: unless sufficient time and trouble can be given to make it worth
while, it is better to spend the money on the outdoor department, which to
a certain extent takes care of itself. Where there is leisure to attend to
a greenhouse, however, few things will give more return for the care spent
on it.
CHAPTER VI
The Tool Shed and Summer-House
_Spades and the Bishop--Weeding without back-ache--The indispensable
thermometer--Well-made tools a necessity--Summer-houses and their
adornment._
Though it is true enough that the best workmen need little mechanical aid,
yet =a well-stocked tool-shed= is not to be despised. Sometimes it may
only be a portion of a bicycle-shed which can be set apart for our
implements, or the greenhouse may have to find room for a good many of
them, but certain it is that a few nicely-finished tools are an absolute
necessity to the would-be gardener. Of course a good many of them can be
hired; it is not everyone, for instance, who possesses a =lawn-mower=, but
if the owner of a garden is ambitious enough to wish to do without a
gardener altogether, a lawn-mower will be one of the first things he will
wish to possess himself of. In that case he cannot do better than invest
is one of Ransome's or Green's machines. Their work is always of a high
standard and the firms are constantly making improvements in them. The
newest ones are almost perfection, but it is better to get a second-hand
one of either of these firms than a new one of an inferior make. A
=roller= is useful too, but, as these large implements run into a good
deal of money, it may be as well to state that, on payment of 2d. or so,
any of them may be borrowed for an hour or two. Ladders can be had in this
way; also shears, fret-saws--anything that is only wanted occasionally.
A =spade= is a daily necessity, however. Has not one of our most learned
divines exalted the art of digging by his commendation thereof, and who
shall say him nay? It is expedient to wear =thick boots=, however, during
this operation, not only on account of the earth's moisture, but also
because otherwise it is ruinous to our soles. To preserve the latter, a
spade with a sharp edge should never be chosen, but one which has a flat
piece of iron welded on to the body of it. Digging is good because it
breaks up the earth, and exposes it to the sun and also to the frost,
which sweetens and purifies it; care must be taken however, in doing it,
as so many things die down in the winter and are not easily seen. The
ordinary hired gardener is very clever at =burying things so deep that
they never come up again=!
Most people abhor =weeding=, yet if done with a Dutch hoe it is rather
=pleasant work=, as no stooping is required. After a few showers of rain
the hoe runs along very easily, and the good it does is so patent that I
always think it very satisfactory labour indeed. These hoes cost about 1s.
6d. each.
=Raking= is easy work, and very useful for smoothing beds or covering
seeds over with soil. English made, with about eight or ten teeth, their
cost is from two to three shillings. One of the most necessary implements
is a =trowel=, in particular for a lady, as its use does not need so much
muscle as a spade; their price is from 1s. 6d. to 2s. 6d. each.
Where there are many climbers =a hammer= is wanted, not a toy one of
German make; these are sometimes chosen by amateurs under the mistaken
idea that the lighter the hammer the lighter the work. One of English
make, strong and durable, is the kind of thing required, and costs about
2s. or 2s. 6d. =Wall-nails=, one inch long (the most useful size), are 2d.
a pound, and may be had at any ironmongers. The =shreds of cloth= may be
bought too, but anyone who deals at a tailor's can procure a mixed bundle
of cloth pieces for nothing, when there is the light labour of cutting
them into shreds, work of a few minutes only.
In choosing =watering-cans=, see that they are thoroughly good tin, as a
strong can will last for years; moreover, when it begins to leak it will
bear mending; they cost from 3s. upwards, the roses should be made to take
off as a rule, and a special place assigned to them on the shelf of the
tool-shed, as they readily get lost. =Syringes=, much used for washing off
insects, are rather expensive, consequently are not to be found in many
small gardens; a more fortunate friend will sometimes lend one, as there
is a good deal of freemasonry amongst people who indulge in the hobby of
gardening.
A thing everyone must have is =a thermometer=, in greenhouses they are
indispensable; the minimum kind are the most useful, telling one as they
do exactly the degree of frost experienced during the preceding night.
They may be bought at a chemist's for 1s. each, and must be re-set every
day; the aforesaid chemist will show any purchaser the way to do this--it
is quite simple.
=Raffia=, or =bass=, for tying flower-sticks, and =labels= are minor
necessities which cost little, though sticks may run into a good deal if
bought prepared for staking. Personally, I dislike both the coloured kinds
(never Nature's green) and the white. Both show far more than the
=unobtrusive sticks= obtained by cutting down the stalks of Michaelmas
daisies, for instance. =Galvanised iron stakes last practically for ever=,
and if they are of the twisted kind, no tying is required, greatly
lessening labour. It is a curious fact that though =arches made of iron
set up electrical disturbance= and injure the climbers, these stakes seem
to have no bad effect whatever. At the end of the autumn they should be
collected, and stored in a safe place till summer comes round again. Thin
ones suitable for carnations, etc., may be procured from A. Porter,
Storehouse, Maidstone, for 1s. a dozen, carriage paid. The thicker ones
can be made to order at small cost at any ironmonger's.
A handy man can often make =frames= himself, especially if they are not
required to be portable, and really these home-made ones answer almost as
well as those that are bought. Good frames can sometimes be had at sales
for an old song, and only require a coat of paint to make them as good as
new.
Here I will end my list, only reiterating that, however few tools you may
have, it is foolish to get any but the best.
A =summer-house= need not necessarily be bought ready-made. I have seen
many a pretty bower put together in the spare hours of the carpenter of
the family. There is one advantage in these =home-made summer-houses=,
that they are generally more roomy than those which are bought, and can be
made to suit individual requirements.
=HOW TO COVER A SUMMER-HOUSE.= Of course, it is more necessary to cover
these amateur and therefore somewhat clumsy structures with creepers, but
that is not difficult. Even the first summer they can be made to look
quite presentable by planting the =Japanese hop=. The leaves are
variegated, and in shape like the Virginia creeper. Messrs. Barr, of Long
Ditton, Surrey, told me it grew 25 feet in one season. It can be had from
them in pots, about the first week in May, for 3s. 6d. a dozen. Then there
are the =nasturtiums=, always so effective when =trained up lengths of
string=, with the dark back-ground of the summer-house to show up their
beautiful flowers. If the soil in which they grow is poor and gravelly,
the blossoms will be more numerous. The =canary creeper= is another plant,
which is so =airy and graceful= that one never seems to tire of it. Get
the seeds up in good time, so that when planted out they are of a fair
height, else so much of the summer is lost.
There are so many =uncommon climbing plants= which should be tried,
notably _eccremocarpus scaber_, _cobea scandens_, and _mina lobata_. The
last two are annual, and the first can be grown as such, though in mild
winters and in sunny positions it is a perennial. It =flowers whenever the
weather will let it=, and its blossoms are orange-yellow in colour, very
curious and invariably noticed by visitors. Reliable seeds of all three
can be had from Messrs. Barr, at 6d. a packet. The _cobea_ bears pale
purple bell-shaped flowers, and
|
Captain
Molesworth, to whom English golf was to owe a big debt, lived at a house
called North Down, just at the entry into Bideford, and it was in this
house that Charles Kingsley was living while writing _Westward Ho!_ That
is the story of how the name came to be given to the place, and Borough
House, by Northam, was about half a mile from our Wellesbourne. This
Borough House, since restored, is where Mrs. Leigh, with her sons Frank
and Amyas, were placed by the novelist.
[Illustration: Borough House, Northam, in 1855,
where Mrs. Leigh and her sons Frank and Amyas, the heroes of Kingsley's
_Westward Ho!_ lived. (It has since been entirely reconstructed.)]
[Illustration: Mr. Peter Steel driving the Gravel Pit at Blackheath,
with forecaddie in distance.]
The Reverend I.H. Gossett was Vicar of Northam, and related to the large
family of Moncrieffes, of whom there were several resident then at St.
Andrews. About that time one of its members, General Moncrieffe, came on
a visit to his relative, the vicar of Northam, and from that chance
visit great events grew. For Mr. Gossett, as it was likely he should,
led out General Moncrieffe for a walk across that stretch of low-lying
common ground known as the Northam, or Appledore, Burrows, to the famous
Pebble Ridge and the shores of Bideford Bay; and as they went along and
reached the vicinity of those noble sandhills later to be known to
golfing fame and to be execrated by golfing tongues as "the Alps," the
General observed: "Providence obviously designed this for a golf links."
To a man coming from St. Andrews it was a fact that jumped to the eyes.
It was not for a clergyman to stand in the way of a design so
providential. Mr. Gossett was a very capable, effective man: he had a
family including some athletic sons for whom a game such as described by
General Moncrieffe seemed likely to provide just the outlet which their
holiday energies would need. He threw himself heartily into the work of
getting a few to join together to make the nucleus of a club; but that
first of English Golf Clubs, next after--very long after--the fearful
antiquity of Blackheath, and absolutely first to play on a seaside
links, did not involve all the outlay on green and club-house without
which no golf club can respect itself to-day.
Clubs and balls--"gutty" balls, for the feather-cored leather-cased ones
had already been superseded--would be sent, as needed, on General
Moncrieffe's order, from Tom Morris' shop at St. Andrews, and when that
was done all was done that was needed for these little beginnings of the
seaside golf of England. The turf grew naturally short, and the
commoners' sheep helped to check any exuberance. The course, as designed
by those primitive constructors, acting under the advice of General
Moncrieffe, started out near the Pebble Ridge, by what is now the tee to
the third hole. Those pioneers of the game did not even go to the
expense, in the first instance, of a hole cutter. They excised the holes
with pocket knives. The putting greens were entirely _au naturel_, as
Nature and the sheep made them. Assuredly there was no need for the
making of artificial bunkers. Nature had provided them, and of the best.
Besides, were there not always the great sea rushes? It may be
remembered that the old golf rules have the significant regulation that
the ball shall not be teed "nearer than four club-lengths" to the hole.
That indicates both a less sanctity ascribed to putting greens of old
and also a less degree of care lavished on teeing grounds. There were no
flags, to mark the holes; but the mode was for the first party that went
out on any day to indicate, if they could discover it, the position of
the hole, for those coming after them, by sticking in a feather of gull
or rook picked up by the way. If, as might happen, the hole was not to
be discovered, being stamped out or damaged by sheep beyond all
recognition as a respectable golf hole, this first party would dig
another hole with a knife, and set up the signal feather beside that. In
this period of the simple golfing life it goes without the saying that
no apology, or substitute even, for a club-house gave shelter to these
hardy primitive golfers. The way was to throw down coat, umbrella, or
other superfluity beside the last hole. They were safe, for two good
reasons--that they were not worth stealing and that there was no one to
steal them. And it is to be supposed that in those good old days there
was none of the modern "congestion," of which we hear so much. Golfers
and their needs, in England at all events, were alike few and simple.
The Club was instituted in 1864; therefore it has now passed its
jubilee; but I, unhappily, have to look back upon many of those early
years as so many periods of wasted opportunity. That same Uncle Fred who
had condemned the club of the cannibal, gave me my first true golf club.
Years afterwards an anxious mother asked him, "At what age do you think
my little boy should begin golf: I want him to be a very good player?"
"How old is the boy now?" my uncle asked.
"Seven," the mother replied.
"Seven!" he repeated sadly. "Oh, then he has lost three years already!"
I was given a club long before I was seven, but our house was two long
miles from the course, and miles are very long for the short legs of
seven. There were the fields, but though it is reported of Queen Mary
Stuart that she found agreeable solace in playing at golf in "the fields
around Seaton house," I did not find golf exhilarating in the fields
around Wellesbourne House. But the atmosphere of golf was about the
house. The Golf Club prospered, as golfing prosperity was rated in that
day of small things. The extraordinary news went abroad that it was now
possible to play the game of Scotland on real links turf in this corner
of Devon. Men of renown, such as Mr. George Glennie, Mr. Buskin, and
many besides came from the ancient club at Blackheath, and stayed for
golf at the hotel recently built at that place which had now received
its name from Kingsley's book. Sir Robert Hay and Sir Hope Grant, the
former one of the finest amateurs of a past day and the latter more
distinguished as a soldier than a golfer, came as guests, for golfing
purposes, to my father's house. My two brothers, both in the Army and
from twelve to nineteen years older than myself, played a few games when
home on leave. I was too young to take any part in a match, but not too
young to listen to much talk about the game and to look with profound
veneration on its great players.
[Illustration: At Pau: the oldest of non-Scottish Golf Clubs.
Sir Victor Brooke (driving). Colonel Hegan Kennard.]
[Illustration: Captain's Medal of the Royal North Devon Golf Club,
showing the old approved way of driving with the right elbow up.]
CHAPTER II
HOW GOLF IN ENGLAND GREW
There are two outstanding events in golfing history--the bringing of
golf to Westward Ho! by General Moncrieffe in 1863, and the bringing of
golf to Blackheath by James VI. of Scotland and I. of England some three
centuries earlier. When golf was started at Westward Ho! it was the
worthies of the Blackheath Club that gave it a reputation which went
growing like a snowball. The North Devon Club began to wax fat and so
exceeding proud that at meeting times--for challenge medals were
presented and meetings in spring and autumn were held to compete for
them, after the model of St. Andrews--a bathing machine was dragged out
by coastguards to the tee to the first hole, and therein sandwiches and
liquid refreshment were kept during the morning round and actually
consumed if the weather were wet. In fine weather the entertainment was
_al fresco_. Then the Club acquired a tent; and an ancient mariner,
Brian Andrews, of Northam village, father of the Philip Andrews who is
now steward of the Golf Club, used to hoist this and care for it, and at
length, as of natural process of evolution, came the crowning glory of a
permanent structure of corrugated iron, built beside and even among the
grey boulders of the Pebble Ridge.
This permanent object of care entailed the permanency of Brian Andrews
as caretaker. Enormous was the career of extravagance on which the Club
now embarked, engaging a resident professional all the way from St.
Andrews--John Allan. He was the first Scot ever to come to England as a
resident golf professional, and there never came a kinder-hearted or
better fellow. He established himself in a lodging, with his shop and
bench on the ground floor, in Northam village, which stands high on a
hill above the level of the links, and was best part of a mile and a
half from the present third, and then first, tee. A few years before, in
the earliest days of the Club's history, old Tom Morris had been down to
advise about the green, and when I came to my teens and therewith to
some interest in golf, and to a friendship, very quickly formed, with
poor Johnnie Allan, he told me that when he had asked old Tom for
information about this new course in the new country that he was going
to, he found that the old man (though he was not of any great age then)
could tell him little enough about the course, but that all he seemed to
remember was that there was a terrible steep hill to climb, after the
day's work was done, on the way home.
So there is--Bone Hill, on which the village stands, so called from the
bones of Danes killed in a great battle there, and of which bones, as we
piously believed, the hill, save for a thin coat of soil over their
graves, was wholly made--but it is quaint and characteristic of the old
man that this steep place should have stuck in his mind and that all the
salient features of the new course should have slipped out. It seems as
if not even any of the points of the big rushes could have stuck and
gone back to Scotland with him.
Soon after there came South from Scotland to the Wimbledon Club another
most perfect of Nature's gentlemen, in Tom Dunn, of a great golfing
family and father of several fine professional players.
And now, with a club-house, though it was but an iron hut, a resident
professional and appointed times of meeting, the Club was a live thing,
and the complete and final act of its lavish expenditure was to engage a
permanent green man--only one, but he had what seemed the essential
qualification of an education as a miner in the Western States of
America--an excellent and entertaining fellow, Sowden by name, a North
Devonian by birth, with a considerable gift of narrative and just about
as much inclination to work on the course and knowledge of his duties as
these antecedents would be likely to inspire in him.
While the Club was thus growing, my small body was growing too; but the
way of my growth, all through life, has been rather that of an erratic
powerful player, falling continually into very bad bunkers of
ill-health, but making brilliant recoveries in the interims. My father
tried two schools for me, but I was invalided home from both, and I
expect it would have ended in my escape from all education whatever if
it had not been that the United Services College was started at Westward
Ho! only two miles from our house. But that was not till I reached the
august age of fifteen or thereabouts, by which time English golf had
developed largely. The first really fine English golfer that we produced
in the West of England was George Gossett, son of the vicar of Northam.
When the big men came down from Scotland and from Blackheath, to the
meetings, they found a local golfer able to make a match with the best
of them. And hard after him came Arthur Molesworth, a very fine player
even as a boy. I remember that while he was still a Radley schoolboy,
his father, the Captain, begged a holiday for him to enable him to come
and play for the medal--I think he would have been about sixteen at the
time--and he came and won it, in a field which included Sir Robert Hay
and other well-known players. There were three brothers of the
Molesworths, good golfers all, but Arthur, the youngest, the best of the
three. The two elder have been dead for many years, but the father[2]
and the youngest son still live at Westward Ho!
At this time I had an elder brother at home, invalided from his regiment
in India. I was also assigned an almost more valuable possession, in the
shape of an Exmoor pony which could jump like a grasshopper and climb
like a cat any of the big Devonshire banks that it was unable to jump.
So, in company with this big brother and this small pony, I used to
follow the hounds over a country that seems specially designed for the
riding of a small boy on a pony; and in company with the brother, the
pony being left behind, I used to go badger digging--my brother had a
kennel of terriers for the purpose--all over the countryside.
Of course it was a misspent youth. Of course I was neglecting great
opportunities, for to tell the truth I greatly preferred the chase of
the fox and the badger at that period of life to the chase of the golf
ball. This sad fact should have been brought home to me by a severe
comment of my Uncle Fred on the occasion of our playing for some prizes
kindly given for the juveniles by some of the elder golfers. As I hit
off from the first tee--all along the ground, if I remember right--he
observed sadly, "There's too much fox and badger about his golf."
[Illustration: The Ladies' Course at Pau, in the Days of the
Crinoline.]
[Illustration: Miss Cecil Leitch.]
And so there was, but, for all that, I won a prize in that competition.
I think it was in the under twelve class, for which I was just eligible
by age, whereas my only rival in the same class was a child of nine.
Therefore I returned in triumph with a brand-new driver as a reward of
merit--my first prize--and I think it made me regard golf as a better
game than I had supposed it to be, for, after all, a driver is of more
practical use than a fox's brush, and this was the highest award that
the most daring riding could gain for you. A boy's property is usually
so limited that any addition to it is of very large importance.
About a year later I began to take my golf with gravity. The ball began
to consent to allow itself to be hit cleanly. A very great day came for
me when I beat my big brother on level terms. You see, he had only
played occasionally, at intervals in soldiering, nor had he begun as a
boy, whereas I had played, even then, more than he, and had begun, in
spite of the wasted years, fairly early. I know I felt I had done rather
an appalling thing when I beat him; I could not feel that it was right.
But doubtless it increased my self-respect as a golfer and my interest
in the game. The Blackheath visitors were very kind to me, and used to
take me into their games. Of course I could not expect to be in such
high company as that of the George Glennies and the Buskins, but Mr.
Frank Gilbert, brother of Sir Frederick, the artist, Mr. Peter Steel and
many others invited me now and then to play with them. I began to think
myself something of a player. The most dreadful event, most evil, no
doubt, in its effect on my self-conceit, happened when Mr. Dingwall
Fordyce, who was a player of the class that we might to-day describe as
"an indifferent scratch," asked me to play with him. He offered--I had
made no demand for odds--to give me four strokes, and asked at what
holes I would have them. At that date, be it remembered, there were no
handicaps fixed by the card, nor were the holes determined at which
strokes were to be taken. It was always at the option of the receiver of
strokes to name, before starting, the holes at which he would take his
strokes. I told Mr. Fordyce I would take the four he offered at the four
last holes. He said nothing, though likely enough he thought a good
deal. What he ought to have done was to thrash me, for an impertinent
puppy, with his niblick; but what he did, far too good-naturedly, was to
come out and play me at those strange terms, with the result that I beat
him by five up and four to play without using any of the strokes at all!
It was precisely what had been in my mind to do when I took the strokes
at those last four holes, but I expect the reason I won was that he was
a little thrown off his balance by my cheek.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 2: While writing the later pages of these reminiscences I
heard, to my great sorrow, that Captain Molesworth had died, at Westward
Ho! of pneumonia, at nearly ninety years of age.--H.G.H.]
CHAPTER III
OF YOUNG TOMMY MORRIS AND OTHER GREAT MEN
My way down to the links, from our house, led right through the village
of Northam, wherein Johnnie Allan, the professional, had set up his
shop. Now if there is anyone who, being a golfer, has not appreciated
the delight of the compound smell of the club-maker's shop--the pitch,
the shavings, the glue, the leather and all the rest of the
ingredients--if anywhere there lives a golfer with nose so dead, then I
am very far indeed from thinking that words of mine can excite him to a
right appreciation of this savour. But if not, if the reader has the
truly appreciative nose, then he will realize what a delight it was to
me to look in each morning on the way down to golf to enjoy this, to
exchange a word with Johnnie Allan, to get something quite superfluous
done to a club, and if possible get my friend to come down to the links
with me. Often I would find him sitting on his bench with a golf ball
moulded, but not yet nicked, turning it about with his fingers in the
cup designed for its holding, and hammering it with the broad chisel end
of his hammer made for the purpose. This was in the days of
hand-hammered balls, before the mode had been invented of having the
marking engraved on the mould so as to turn them out what we then
called "machine hammered."
In course of the walk down to the links, if I could persuade him to be
my companion, he used to tell me tales of the great men in the North, of
Old Tom and Young Tommy, of Davie Strath and the rest of them. He was a
Prestwick man, and had come from there to work in Old Tom's shop at St.
Andrews before he journeyed South. He had never done as well as he would
have liked in the championship, but had twice won the first prize given
by way of consolation for those to play for who had not gained a place
in the prize-list in the championship proper. That will indicate his
class as a golfer as more than respectably high. It was about this time
that arrangements were made for bringing down Young Tommy and Bob Kirk
to Westward Ho! (the place was now thoroughly baptised with its new
name), and they played, with Johnnie Allan, a kind of triangular duel.
I well remember the immense excitement with which I followed those
matches. They did not play a three ball match for the prizes offered,
but a species of American tournament in singles, and my delight was huge
when our local friend defeated the renowned Tommy Morris. Then Tommy
defeated Bob Kirk. Now if our Johnnie could only beat Bob Kirk (as he
certainly would, we said, seeing that he had beaten Morris who had
beaten Kirk), why then he would prove himself beyond denial best man of
the three. Unhappily the propositions of golf do not work themselves out
as logically as those of Euclid, though often arriving at his conclusion
"which is absurd," and Bob Kirk had the better of our local hero most of
the way round. He was dormy one. Then, at the last hole, came a great
incident of golf which made on me so deep an impression that in my
mind's eye I can see the whole scene even now. Coming to that last
hole--mark this, that our favourite hero was one down, so that feeling
ran high--Bob Kirk got his ball on one of the high plateaux, with steep
sand cliffs, which at that date jutted out into the big bunker. His ball
lay just at the edge of the plateau, and on its left verge, as we looked
towards the hole, so that to play it in the direction that he wanted to
go it seemed that he would have to stand eight feet below it, in the
bunker. And, he being a little round man, we chuckled in glee and said
to one another, "He's done now." But what do you suppose that pernicious
little Scot did then? He went to his bag and selected a club--a
left-handed spoon! He had a couple of practice swings with it. Then he,
a right-handed man, addressed himself to that ball left-handedly, and
drove it, if not any immense distance, at all events as far as he needed
in order to make morally sure of his half of the hole, which was all
that he, being dormy, required. It was a great _tour de force_. It
exacted our grudging applause. We admired, but at the same time we
admired with suspicion. It was scarcely, as we thought in the
circumstances, a fair golf stroke. It savoured of the conjuring trick if
not of sheer black magic.
Really, considered after this lapse of years which allows cool
reflection, it was a good piece of golf. There are not many right-handed
men who trouble themselves to carry a left-handed club, even if they
have the ambidexterity to use it. In fact it is the only stroke of its
kind, played with a full swing in the crisis of a match, that I have
ever seen.
Young Tommy paid us another visit in the West not long after, and this
time in company with his own dearest foe at St. Andrews, Davie Strath.
So, even in the far West we were not without our great examples, and
Johnnie Allan himself was a golfer well worth following. As the course
then started, out by the Pebble Ridge and at the present third tee, we,
coming from Northam, had to walk out over the flatter part of the
Burrows which the first and second, and, again, the seventeenth and
eighteenth holes occupy now. That meant, of course, that we would take a
club with us and practise shots as we went along; and since I so often
had Johnnie Allan as my companion on those walks, it would be very hard
for me to say how much of golfing skill and wisdom I did not
unconsciously pick up as we went along and he watched me play the shots
and criticised them. I have never in my life been through the solemn
process of a set lesson with a professional, but have no doubt that I
assimilated wisdom in the best, because the unconscious and the
imitative, way, in those walks and talks, varied by occasional precept
and example, with Johnnie Allan.
And by the same route came Captain Molesworth and his three sons, but
they, having further to go, used to drive, the Captain generally
manipulating the reins in strictly professional style--as a sailor
clutches the rudder lines--and their carriage, going at full speed of
the horse, making very heavy weather of it over the ruts and bumps, and
only the sailor's special providence ever bringing them safe to port
before the Iron Hut. There the Captain would tie his horse, by a halter,
to the wheel of the cart and leave all to get itself into a tangle that
only a nautical hand could unravel, while all the world played golf.
Sometimes we too would ride or drive, and I have in mind a great
occasion on which my brother, home from India, and I were driving down
in my sister's donkey-cart. The cart broke down in Northam village, so
we left it there, in charge of the blacksmith, to repair, while we
proceeded on, both mounted on the donkey. Now my brother was very much
of what at that time was called a "dandy"--since "masher," and at the
present moment "nut." He was arrayed in Solomon-like glory of white
flannel trousers and red coat--for men did play golf in red coats in
those days. Now the donkey was a good donkey and strong, but he knew
how to kick, and he thought no occasion could be better than when he had
two on his back and the central and fashionable high street of Northam
village for the arena. Therefore he set to and quickly kicked us both
off, I being involved in my brother's débacle, and he, though a very
good man on a horse, not being accustomed to a saddleless donkey. The
glory of Solomon disposed on the village streets was a splendid
spectacle. But we rose, nothing daunted, though with the glory a little
sullied, and, my brother then excogitating the great thought that if we
put his, the greater, weight behind, with mine in front--it had been the
other way at our first essay--the donkey would then find it the harder
to lift its hindquarters for the act of kicking, we disposed ourselves
in that manner, and the donkey, whether for mechanical reasons or
because he perceived that we were not going to let him off the double
burden, proceeded with the proverbial patience of his kind and we
reached the links without further accident.
[Illustration: Westward Ho!
The Molesworths, father and three sons, returning from the Iron Hut,
with Major Hopkins, the golfing artist, in the forefront.]
[Illustration: An Old Hoylake Group.
The names, reading from left to right are: Milligan (Captain, 1875),
Alex. Brown (Captain, 1880), Major Hopkins, James Rodger, James Tweedle
(Secretary, 1873-81), F.P. Crowther, Jack Morris, ----, Robert Wilson
(the "Chieftain"), Rev. T.P. Williamson, Dr. Argyll Robertson, Colonel
E.H. Kennard (Captain, 1871-73), John Ball, sen., ----, J.F. Raimes, H.
Grierson (Captain, 1876), John Dunn (Captain, 1873-75), J.B. Amey,
Theophilus Turpin, ----, T.O. Potter (Secretary, 1882-94), A. Sinclair
(Captain, 1887), Mat Langlands, Robert ("Pendulum") Brown, A.F. Macfie.
The Royal Hotel at that time had the Club rooms adjoining it.]
Mr. Gossett and his sons would be coming from the other direction, from
Westward Ho! for he gave up the cure of Northam about this time and went
to live at Westward Ho! and with others coming on the same line there
would be a great re-union at the Iron Hut before starting out on
matches--a great match-making too, for in those days we did not make our
matches very long beforehand, and such things as handicap competitions
were not known among us. They were soon evolved, but the idea of any
fixed handicap, by which each man should know his value, was not so much
as thought of. Matches were made by a process of stiff bargaining
between the parties concerned. "How much will you give me?" "A third."
"Oh, my dear fellow, I couldn't possibly play you at less than a half!"
The humility that was displayed was most edifying. We had twice the fun
over our matches then, just because of this bargaining and all the
talents of Uriah Heap that it brought into sharp prominence. One of the
best of the match makers, and one of the bravest, though very far from
the best of the golfers, was Captain Molesworth, familiarly known to all
and sundry as "the old Mole."
CHAPTER IV
THE SPREAD OF GOLFING IN ENGLAND
It seems to me that the establishment of the Club at Westward Ho! and
the discovery that it was possible to play golf, and the very best of
golf, in England, even as in Scotland, sent a new thrill of life into
all the dormant golfing energies of the country. It stirred up the
Blackheathens; then it led to the institution of the Golf Club
associated with the London Scottish Volunteers, which was later to
develop a schism, of which one division became the Royal Wimbledon Golf
Club. The great man of the volunteers was the still present Lord
Wemyss,[3] then Lord Elcho, and he was as keen a golfer as rifle shot.
To us at Westward Ho! the Wimbledon Club sent down Henry Lamb, Dr.
Purves and many more; but these two were perhaps their strongest. Of the
Blackheathens I have spoken, but I want to give a special word to Mr.
Frank Gilbert, both because he was especially kind, of all the others,
to me as a boy and also because his gift of nomenclature survives in the
popular name still often ascribed to one of the Westward Ho! holes. At
times of excitement his aspirates used to fly. He was perfectly aware of
it and did not in the least mind gentle chaff on the subject. I even
think he often sent them flying purposely, for sake of effect. After
all, he used just as many aspirates as anyone else, only that he used
them in rather different places: that was all. The hole that his genius
named was that which is now the ninth, and its naming was on this wise:
after hacking his ball out of first one bunker, thence into another, and
from that into a third, he exclaimed in accents of inspiration and
despair, "I call this 'ole the halligator 'ole, because it's full of
gaping jaws waiting to devour you." Therefore the "halligator 'ole" it
remained for many a year afterwards and is so known to some even to this
day. I remember another exclamation of his that gave us purest joy at
the time, when, having made what he believed to be a lovely shot over a
brow to a "blind" hole in a hollow he ran up to the top of the brae in
exultation, only to turn back with tragic dismay on his face and on his
lips the eloquent expostulation, "Oh, 'ell, they've haltered the 'ole."
I used to play him for a ball--a shilling gutta-percha ball--on the
match, and for a long while, when I was a boy, we were fairly equal, and
how often, towards the end of the match, he would miss a short putt in
order that he might pay me the shilling, and not I him, I should be
sorry to say. I know it was pretty frequently.
And then this thrill of new golfing life started at Westward Ho!
communicated itself to the many Scots established in Liverpool, so that
in 1869 they so far organised themselves as to institute that which is
now the Royal Liverpool Golf Club, playing at Hoylake. What that meant
for us at Westward Ho! was that men of Hoylake came down to play matches
with our local heroes and to take part in our medal competitions. There
were Mr. John Dunn and Mr. John Ball, the father of our many times
champion. Colonel Hegan Kennard was another who was associated with the
Hoylake club, though his association with Blackheath was closer--of that
venerable Club he was Field Marshal for very many years. But some of the
first of the big matches, matches with sums of money depending on their
result which seemed to me fabulous in days when a sixpence in the pocket
was a rare coin, were those which were planned by the enterprise of
Captain Molesworth--himself and Johnnie Allan in partnership against Mr.
John Dunn and Jack Morris, who had come as professional to Hoylake. Now
John Dunn made very much more show as a player than the old Mole. "The
mole--an animal that keeps to the ground" was a definition which we used
to be fond of quoting as we grew out of the years of veneration to those
of impertinence. He had an absolute inability to drive the ball any
height in the air. No other man ever played golf so cheaply as the old
Mole: he had but three clubs, sometimes profanely stigmatized as Faith,
Hope and Charity, a driving weapon of sorts, an iron and a putter, which
he carried himself, never taking a caddie, and his ball was generally of
the colour of a coal from long and ill usage. But he would bet you £50
on a match if you cared about it, and would play you with fine pluck to
the very finish. He was in fact a miserable driver; nor was there any
"class" or science at all about his iron play. But he would shovel the
ball along, and up to the green somehow or other with his iron: he had a
knack of getting there; and when once on the green there was not nor
ever has been a better putter.
Now the man who has his wits about him, to perceive what this
description implies, will see that it is the description of an uncommon
good partner in a foursome. And he was all the better partner on account
of the way in which the chances of any match in prospect were likely to
be reckoned; for John Dunn might argue it out, "I can give Molesworth a
third," which he probably could, "and John Allan cannot give Jack Morris
a third," which he surely could not, "therefore we have the best of it."
That looks logical, but it leaves out the important fact that the
Molesworth qualities were just those of most value to a strong driver
like Johnnie Allan, while his short game and his pluck were clear assets
to the good. In fact he and Johnnie Allan used to get round the course
in scores that Allan himself would not think amiss, and they had all the
better of these matches against the men of Hoylake.
The Hoylake men came to Westward Ho! and Captain Molesworth took himself
and his sons to Hoylake. Arthur Molesworth won the medal there when he
was only a boy at school, and I remember with awe and admiration hearing
his father describe how the boy had to sit beside the Mayor of Liverpool
at the Club dinner and of all the mighty honour done him. And the
present-day golfer should make no mistake about it nor doubt that this
Arthur Molesworth was a very fine golfer. George Gossett beat him, in a
set match that they played, but I think that Molesworth, who was several
years younger, was really the finer golfer. Certainly he had greater
power. He played in an ugly style, with a short swing, but his driving
was long and he could play all his clubs. There were several years
during which he was certainly the best amateur golfer that England had
then produced, and I think he was better than any in Scotland. A few
years later he went far towards proving it; but I will come to that
story in its place.
[Illustration: An Old Westward Ho! Group.
From left to right: Mr. P. Wilmot, Mr. T. Oliphant (of Rossie), Major
Hopkins, Hon C. Carnegie, J. Allan, Admiral Thrupp, General Maclean, Sir
R. Hay, General Sir Hope Grant, Mr. T. MacCandlish (putting), Rev. T.
Gosset, Colonel Hutchinson
|
brother, while he fondly
anticipated a joyful reunion with Fahune, when they could relate their
several exploits and dangers. But how were these hopes about to be
realised?
The vessels neared each other, and greetings were exchanged. A boat was
now lowered from the side of Niall’s galley, and he went on board that
of his brother. After some inquiries and salutations, Fahune questioned
Niall concerning his voyages and adventures. This Niall commenced, and
Fahune seemed to rejoice, and a smile, as if of triumph, crossed his
features when he learnt that Corgeana was safe; but when Niall proceeded,
and told of the nuptials, the countenance of Fahune became as pale as
death.
“Miserable man,” said he, “prepare to die! You have broken through our
solemn vow; you have taken this step without having consulted me; this
alone would have condemned you, but to this dreadful dereliction you have
added a still greater insult--you have supplanted me in the affections
of one to whom I was engaged. But she”----he could utter no more; he
was convulsed with passion. Niall was now about to reply, but Fahune
shouted, “Let him be gagged! Let me not hear a word from him whom once I
loved; for the sound of his voice might tempt me to relent. Executioners,
at once bind him to the mast.” It was done; and in another moment, by
Fahune’s directions, his sides were deeply pierced by the fatal daggers!
When the dreadful tale was related to the bereaved Corgeana, she lay for
some hours insensible; but when at length she awoke, it was but to be
compelled to endure still greater miseries. The sentence of Fahune was at
once put in execution, namely, that Corgeana should be turned adrift in a
small open boat, with a scanty supply of food, and left to perish, while
the body of her husband should also be cast along with her into the boat.
But whilst the implacable Fahune was sailing towards the shores of
Kylestafeen, and even now repented of his cruelty and rashness to those
who were once beloved by him, Corgeana was wafted over the trackless
ocean in her frail bark, alone, and wretched; yet still that bark was
guided by myriads of fairy beings, who were even then conducting her to a
haven of safety.
When the seventh weary night had passed, and daylight appeared, Corgeana
found herself quite close to shore, but in what part of the world she
was, she knew not. Her little boat was quietly drifted to the beach. She
landed, and walking forth, soon found herself in view of a palace of
magnificent appearance, to which she bent her steps.
Now, on entering this beautiful structure, which appeared to be
ornamented with the utmost splendour, she was surprised exceedingly
when she heard sounds of lamentation and loud wailing issuing from the
apartments and halls. Advancing, she discovered an immense multitude
of chieftains of noble mien, together with a number of youths and
attendants, who, wearied, exhausted, and covered with wounds, reclined on
couches; many, who seemed more severely hurt, uttering piercing shrieks,
while others appeared binding up their wounds, and administering the
comforts of medicine.
She watched these proceedings, unnoticed, for some time, and her
attention was more particularly attracted to one venerable personage,
who, going round to all, and bathing their wounds, at once relieved them
from their agony; and, strange to say, she remarked many who appeared to
possess but few signs even of existence, at once restored to the use of
their faculties.
At length she was perceived by him who was apparently a king or chief,
who demanded her history, and an account of her adventures. This she
commenced. Her great beauty, the violence of her grief, as well as the
interest which the relation of her sufferings occasioned, caused the
emperor (for so he was) to take compassion on her, and he listened
intently to her narrative. But when Corgeana came to that part of
her mournful tale in which she spoke of the cruelty of Fahune, and
how her husband had been, as she supposed, inhumanly murdered, the
emperor manifested signs of extreme impatience, and summoning his
attendants--“Hasten,” said he, “to the beach, and bring hither, without
delay, the body of the prince.” This was at once done, and they returned,
bearing Niall in their arms.
“And now,” said the emperor, “we will leave him with our venerable
physician, whose skill was never known to fail, and whom we have
remembered often to recall to existence many who have been considered for
ever as lost to us.”
When the physician was taken to the apartment in which the body of Niall
lay, a smile of hope might have been seen upon his countenance, and he
proceeded to exert his utmost skill. After he had himself applied his
far-famed remedies, he left for a moment, to deliver his opinion to the
emperor his master.
But in that moment had Niall recovered! Faintly and slowly his eyes
opened, and he looked around. But what were then his thoughts?
Remembering the dreadful scene in the galley of his brother, even _then_
he saw the executioners plunging the daggers into his side, and the words
of Fahune still rang in his ears: again he looked, and thought he was in
another world--that region, where he had often heard the spirits of the
brave would congregate. And then of Corgeana!--but was this her voice he
heard? Was she too murdered?
The physician now entered, and all was soon explained; his great skill
had indeed been successful. Who can picture the joy experienced by Niall
and Corgeana when they found themselves so unexpectedly re-united!
The recovery of Niall was exceedingly rapid; he frequently expressed his
gratitude to his benefactors, and on one particular day, being engaged
in conversation with the emperor, he ventured to address him thus. “How
comes it, oh king, that you, the undisputed sovereign of this magnificent
and powerful empire, are so frequently dejected, and that the nobles of
your court give way to melancholy in your presence? Your very musicians
appear to have forgotten the strains of gladness, and the raven of
despondency seems to overshadow the royal court with its foreboding
wings! Is it thus, oh king? No; it must be my own gloomy thoughts which
possess me, and render me insensible to happiness!”
“That which you now remark is but too true,” said the emperor; “how can
we be otherwise, when our dominions though extensive, and our army though
possessed of courage, are each moment assailed by a cruel and still more
powerful enemy, who live in an adjoining island, and against whom we
have never been able to obtain any decided victory? If we attack them,
we are repulsed with disgrace and shame, while they are continually
making inroads, and devastating our beautiful country. Even the day which
brought you in so extraordinary a manner to our shores, was the last of
our encounters with them, and on which most of our bravest commanders
were dreadfully mangled by our cruel opponents, and I myself was wounded;
to-morrow, however, we intend to renew our armaments against them; but,
alas! all will be unavailing, for ever since I came to this throne, and
even in the reign of my father, have we been thus oppressed. It is true,
we possess an elixir of inestimable value, the effect of which is almost
immediately to heal the most dreadful wound, and to which, applied by our
chief physician, you doubtless owe the preservation of your life; but on
the other hand, our enemies have on their side auxiliaries still more
powerful; so that, while we are all but invulnerable, they are completely
invincible; and though our commanders are preparing with all possible
alacrity, and seem confident of success, I for one already too well know
the result!”
“Nay, speak not thus, oh king!” said Niall; “I myself, for I am now
recovered, will accompany you; I perhaps was accounted brave in my own
country, and will not spare my blood, if occasion require, in your
service; allow me then a number of men under my command, and, with the
help of the gods, we will certainly cause these formidable foes to yield
to our superior prowess.”
“Niall,” answered the emperor, “your words are as those of the brave;
but did you know, or could you catch a single glance of our enemy,
your utterance would be frozen with dread; horror would be on your
countenance; and if you were not immediately overwhelmed, you would turn
and fly as we do.”
“And wherefore, oh king?” said Niall.
“Listen!” said the emperor. “These giants, for they far exceed us in
ordinary stature, are commanded by one who excels them in even a greater
degree in height, in strength, and in the awfulness of his appearance:
he marches at the head of the army to the accompaniment of music--oh,
accursed music!--the first sound of which, though at a distance, has
the dreadful effect of at once stupifying us, and causing an unnatural
drowsiness to come over us; we fall, and he, marching up with his men,
cuts us to pieces like sheep. But, oh Niall! how can I describe or
give you the slightest idea of the horrid hag, this giant’s wife? One
sight of her is sufficient to unnerve the most courageous mortal; afar
off she is seen; her eyes are as glowing coals; her feet like enormous
plough-shares, tearing up the earth before her as she walks; whilst her
hair, trailing far behind her, is like as many harrows following in her
track; lurid flames issue from her nostrils! Frightful indeed is she to
behold; but should a glance of her accursed eye meet yours, no earthly
power could for an instant save you from immediate death! She is followed
by a horde of demons, who I hear are her children, imps that spare no
life, but revel in slaughter and mischief. Such are our enemies!”
“Your description horrifies me,” said Niall; “nevertheless, let us summon
all our energies to the encounter, and I trust I may bear my part in the
struggle with fortitude.”
And now the day arrived when this resolution was to be tested. The
emperor himself took Niall into his armoury, and bade him choose any
kind of weapon which that place could afford; but of all the implements
of war collected there, none seemed to suit his purpose but one small
sword with a sharp point, with which having equipped himself, he prepared
for the engagement. They embarked, and soon reached the hostile island,
where immediately the giants collected, headed by the chief and his
wife, who now seemed invested with double their usual horrors. As they
advanced, his friend the emperor frequently called on Niall to retrace
his steps, but this he firmly refused. The fatal languor was now fast
overcoming him, but, drawing his small sword, he continued pricking
himself in various places, which prevented his sinking altogether to
sleep. Meantime the giant came on, trusting as usual for conquest to the
power of the music; however, he was for once mistaken. Feigning sleep,
Niall lay still, in the best position for his purpose; and when the
giant, confidently marching on, had come up, and stooped over to kill
him, he seized his opportunity, and at one blow severed his head from his
shoulders.
Fortunately this brave act was not witnessed by the old hag his wife, who
had delayed by the way; it is enough for us to know that the same success
here also attended him, and she fell a sacrifice also to his valour. Nor
was this all: the emperor came up with his army, and an easy conquest
soon decided the long-continued hostilities. Niall was immediately given
by the emperor the sovereignty of the island, and took possession of the
giant’s palaces, where he and Corgeana long lived in mutual love, and,
crowned with the enjoyment of all happiness, dwelt in perfect amity with
the emperor their benefactor. He built an immense number of the most
beautiful galleys, and maintained an army disciplined and instructed
completely in all the arts of war.
But we must now hasten to the conclusion of our legend, though volumes
might be filled by a recital of the well-remembered acts of Niall the
good, and Corgeana his queen.
They held, then, frequent conversations about Fahune, and were accustomed
to recount the many dangers they had experienced, when on a certain day
Niall appeared to be engaged in the deliberation of some affair of more
than ordinary importance. His brows were bent as in earnest thought, and
even tears were observed on his cheek. This was remarked by Corgeana, who
gently demanded what new design he was arranging.
To this Niall answered, “Oh, Corgeana, my awful parting from Fahune
my brother frequently recurs to me; I begin to fear his life is most
unhappy; he thinks me dead, and the injustice of his mad decree must
certainly be fearfully apparent to him also; it is therefore my
intention, shouldst thou approve of it, to prepare an expedition to
revisit the land of my birth, my beloved Kylestafeen; and wouldst thou
not also wish to see again the lovely O’Brassil? I am now powerful, and
would go attended by a large fleet; so that if Fahune should still be
vindictive, I might be supported; nor should I dread his power, or that
of any other monarch.”
To this Corgeana most willingly assented, and resolved herself
to accompany the squadron, which having been made ready in an
extraordinarily short space of time, put to sea.
Niall well remembered the direction that dreadful tempest had taken which
had conveyed him to Fahune, and accordingly sailed onwards. Not many
days elapsed ere the men reported with joy that land was in sight. It
was true; and all assembled on the decks of their galleys, hailing with
shouts their near approach.
But lo! what is that which now rivets their attention, and causes them to
stand like men bereft of reason, gazing on the mountains of Kylestafeen?
And nearer and nearer they approached, and fixed their eyes in silent
wonder on the awful scene; those hills, the shapes of which were at
once recognized by Niall and Corgeana, were too apparently sinking into
the ocean! Still nearer they sailed, and the noble bay at the head of
which was the city, lay before them. They came close to the shore, and
now was their astonishment intense. That beautiful valley through which
the gentle stream took its course was quickly enlarging its boundaries;
and while it sank, the waters from the ocean were madly rushing in,
causing devastation to all. Hundreds of human forms were wildly rushing
to and fro, and those who were able to reach the shore screamed loudly
for assistance, or for boats to carry them away; while all who could
not profit by this mode of escape climbed the summits of the highest
mountains, and escaped immediate death, only to endure a protraction of
their sufferings.
In the midst of this confusion and these dreadful scenes, many galleys,
densely crowded with beings, put off from shore. Niall anxiously looked
for his brother; nor was he destined to be disappointed, for Fahune,
observing the strange ships, immediately directed his course to the
galley of his brother, where a reconciliation having at once taken place,
all re-assembled to witness the consummation of this most dreadful
catastrophe.
Gradually, yet continually, did the waves close round thousands of the
helpless inhabitants, and innumerable multitudes of animals were buried
beneath them, while all who could avail themselves of boats took to the
sea, though these could hardly tell in what direction to proceed, and
hundreds miserably perished.
Soon did night veil the awful vision from the eyes of the fleet; and
next morning, a wild waste of turbulent waters was all that could be
perceived where once was the glorious and happy land of Kylestafeen, and
a long dark line of frowning cliffs was the only boundary visible in the
direction of that lovely country.
We may add the general belief, that a remnant of those saved were cast on
shore, and from their descendants we still can learn even the modes of
government once practised in Kylestafeen.
But where _now_ is Kylestafeen?
It remains under a spell--its inhabitants are still employed in
constructing fleets and armaments; even now,
“In the wave beneath you shining,”
the “towers of other days” may yet be seen. Every seven years, “this
delightful land” may be seen in all its primeval beauty, as it appeared
before it sank; and if, reader, at that critical moment when all smileth
before thee, thou canst drop but one particle of earth on any portion of
it, it will be for ever re-established.
And this, reader, is the legend of Kylestafeen, from which thou canst
draw thine own moral.
ORIGIN AND MEANINGS OF IRISH FAMILY NAMES.
BY JOHN O’DONOVAN.
Third Article.
SURNAMES AND FAMILY NAMES.
Dr Keating and his cotemporary Gratianus Lucius have asserted, on the
authority of the ancient Irish MSS, that family names or surnames first
became hereditary in Ireland in the reign of Brian Boru, in the beginning
of the eleventh century. “He [King Brian] was the first who ordained that
a certain surname should be imposed on every tribe, in order that it
might be the more easily known from what stock each family was descended;
for previous to his time surnames were unfixed, and were discoverable
only by tracing a long line of ancestors.”[2]
This assertion has been repeated by all the subsequent Irish writers, but
none of them have attempted either to question or prove it. It seems,
however, generally true, and also that in the formation of surnames at
this period, the several families adopted the names of their fathers
or grandfathers. It would appear, however, from some pedigrees of
acknowledged authenticity, that in a few instances the surnames were
assumed from remoter ancestors, as in the families of the O’Dowds and
O’Kevans in Tireragh, in which the chiefs from whom the names were taken
were cotemporary with St Gerald of Mayo, who flourished in the seventh
century, and in the family of O’Neill, who took their surname from Niall
Glunduv, monarch of Ireland, who was killed by the Danes in the year
919. It is obvious also from the authentic Irish annals, that there
are many Irish surnames now in use which were called after ancestors
who flourished long subsequent to the reign of Brian. But it is a fact
that the greater number of the more distinguished Irish family names
were assumed from ancestors who were cotemporary with this monarch; and
though we have as yet discovered no older authority than Dr Keating for
showing that surnames were first established in Ireland in his time,
I am satisfied that authorities which would prove it, existed in the
time of Keating, for that writer, though a very injudicious critic, was
nevertheless a faithful compiler. Until, however, we discover a genuine
copy of the edict published by the monarch Brian, commanding that the
surnames to be borne should be taken from the chieftains who flourished
in his own time,--if such edict were ever promulgated, we must be content
to relinquish the prospect of a final decision of this question. At
the same time it must be conceded that the evidences furnished by the
authentic annals and pedigrees in behalf of it are very strong, and may
in themselves be regarded as almost sufficient to settle the question.
It appears, then, from the most authentic annals and pedigrees, that the
O’Briens of Thomond took their name from the monarch Brian Boru himself,
who was killed in the battle of Clontarf in the year 1014, and that
family names were formed either from the names of the chieftains who
fought in that battle, or from those of their sons or fathers:--thus,
the O’Mahonys of Desmond are named from Mahon, the son of Kian, King of
Desmond, who fought in this battle; the O’Donohoes from Donogh, whose
father Donnell was the second in command over the Eugenian forces in the
same battle; the O’Donovans from Donovan, whose son Cathal commanded
the Hy-Cairbre in the same battle; the O’Dugans of Fermoy from Dugan,
whose son Gevenagh commanded the race of the Druid Mogh Roth in the same
battle; the O’Faelans or Phelans of the Desies from Faolan, whose son
Mothla commanded the Desii of Munster in the same memorable battle, as
were the Mac Murroghs of Leinster from Murrogh, whose son Maelmordha,
King of Leinster, assisted the Danes against the Irish monarch.
The Mac Carthys of Desmond are named from Carrthach (the son of
Saerbhreathach), who is mentioned in the Irish annals as having fought
the battle of Maelkenny, on the river Suir, in the year 1043; the
O’Conors of Connaught from Conor or Concovar, who died in the year 971;
the O’Molaghlins of Meath, the chiefs of the southern Hy-Niall race, from
Maelseachlainn or Malachy II, monarch of Ireland, who died in the year
1022; the Magillapatricks or Fitzpatricks of Ossory from Gillapatrick,
chief of Ossory, who was killed in the year 995, &c. &c.
From these and other evidences furnished by the Irish annals, it appears
certain then that the most distinguished surnames in Ireland were taken
from the names of progenitors who flourished in the tenth or beginning of
the eleventh century. But there are instances to be met with of surnames
which had been established in the tenth century having been changed to
others which were called after progenitors who flourished at a later
period, as O’Malroni of Moylurg, to Mac Dermot, and O’Laughlin, head
of the northern Hy-Niall, to Mac Laughlin. There are also instances of
minor branches of great families having changed the original prefix O
to Mac and Mac O, or Mac I, when they had acquired new territories and
become independent families, as O’Brien to Mac I-Brien, and Mac Brien
in the instances of Mac I-Brien Arra, Mac Brien Coonagh, and Mac Brien
Aharlagh, all off-shoots from the great family of Thomond; and O’Neill to
Mac I-Neill Boy, in the instance of the branch of the great Tyrone family
who settled in the fourteenth century eastward of the river Bann, in the
counties of Down and Antrim.
This is all that we know of the origin of Irish surnames. Sir James Ware
agrees with Keating and Gratianus Lucius that surnames became hereditary
in Ireland in the tenth or beginning of the eleventh century; and adds,
that they became hereditary in England and France about the same period.
Irish family names or surnames then are formed from the genitive case
of names of ancestors who flourished in the tenth century, and at later
periods, by prefixing O, or Mac, as O’Neill, Mac Carthy, &c. O literally
signifies grandson, in which sense it is still spoken in the province
of Ulster; and in a more enlarged sense any male descendant, like the
Latin _nepos_: and Mac literally signifies son, and in a more extended
sense any male descendant. The former word is translated _nepos_ by all
the writers of Irish history in the Latin language, from Adamnan to Dr
O’Conor, and the latter, _filius_; from which it is clear that it is
synonymous with the Welsh prefix _Map_ (abbreviated to _Ap_), and with
the Anglo-Norman _Fitz_, which Horne Tooke has proved to be a corruption
of the Latin _filius_. Giraldus Cambrensis latinizes the name of the King
of Leinster, Dermot Mac Murchadh, _Dermitius Murchardides_, from which it
may be clearly perceived that he regarded the prefix Mac as equivalent to
the Greek patronymic termination _ides_. The only difference therefore
to be observed between O and Mac in surnames is, that the family who
took the prefix of Mac called themselves after their father, and those
who took the prefix O formed their surname from the name of their
grandfather. Ni, meaning daughter, was always prefixed to names of women,
as O and Mac meant male descendants; but this usage is now obsolete.
It is not perhaps an unlikely conjecture that at the period when surnames
were first ordered to be made hereditary, some families went back
several generations to select an illustrious ancestor on whom to build
themselves a name. A most extraordinary instance of this mode of forming
names occurred in our own time in Connaught, where John Mageoghegan,
Esq. of Bunowen Castle, in the west of the county of Galway, applied
to his Majesty King George IV. for licence to reject the name which
his ancestors had borne for eight hundred years from their ancestor
Eochagan, chief of Kinel Fiacha, in the now county of Westmeath, in the
tenth century, and to take a new name from his more ancient and more
illustrious ancestor Niall of the Nine Hostages, monarch of Ireland
in the fourth century. His majesty granted this licence, and the son
of John Mageoghegan now called John Augustus O’Neill, that is, John
Augustus, DESCENDANT of Niall of the Nine Hostages. The other branches of
the family of Mageoghegan, however, still retain the surname which was
established in the reign of Brian Boru as the distinguishing appellative
of the race of Fiacha, the son of Niall of the Nine Hostages, and the
ancestor from whom the Mageoghegans had taken their _tribe_ name.
From the similarity and almost complete identity of the meanings affixed
to the words O and Mac in surnames, it might be expected that they should
be popularly considered as conferring each the same respectability on the
bearer; yet this is far from being the case, for it is popularly believed
in every part of Ireland that the prefix O was a kind of title among
the Irish, while Mac is a mark of no distinction whatever, and that any
common Irishman may bear the prefix Mac, while he must have some claims
to gentility of birth before he can presume to prefix O to his name. This
is universally the feeling in the province of Connaught, where the gentry
of Milesian descent are called O’Conor, O’Flahertie, O’Malley, &c.; and
the peasantry, their collateral relatives, Connor, Flaherty, Malley.
All this, however, is a popular error, for the prefix O is in no wise
whatever more respectable than Mac, nor is either the one or the other
an index to any respectability whatever, inasmuch as every single family
of Firbolgic, Milesian, or Danish origin in Ireland, is entitled to bear
either O or Mac as the first part of their surname. It is popularly known
that O’Neill was King of Ulster, and O’Conor King of Connaught, and hence
it is assumed that the prefix O is a title of great distinction; but it
is never taken into consideration that O’Hallion was the name of the
Irish Geocach or beggar who murdered O’Mulloy of Feara-Keall in the year
1110, or that _Mac_ Carthy was King of Desmond or Mac Murrough was King
of Leinster! It is therefore a positive fact that the prefixes O and Mac
are of equal import, both meaning male descendant, and that neither is
an indication of any respectability whatever, except where the pedigree
is proved and the history of the family known. To illustrate this by an
example: The O prefixed to my own name is an index of my descent from
Donovan, the son of Cathal, Chief of the Hy-Figeinte, who was killed
by Brian Boru in the year 977; but the Mac prefixed in the surname Mac
Carthy is an indication of higher descent, namely, from Carrthach, the
great-grandson of Callaghan Cashel, King of Munster, whose descendants
held the highest rank in Desmond till the civil wars of 1641.
It would be now difficult to show how this popular error originated, as
the meanings of the two prefixes O and Mac are so nearly alike. It may,
however, have originated in a custom which prevailed among the _ancient_
Irish, namely, that, for some reason which we cannot now discover, the O
was never prefixed in any surname derived from art, trade, or science,
O’Gowan only excepted, the prefix Mac having been always used in such
instances, for we never meet O’Saoir, O’Baird; and surnames thus formed,
of course never ranked as high among the Irish as those which were formed
from the names of chieftains.
It may be here also remarked, that the O was never prefixed to names
beginning with the word _Giolla_. I see no reason for this either, but
I am positive that it is a fact, for throughout the Annals of the Four
Masters only one O’Giolla, namely, O’Giolla Phadruig, occurs, and that
only in one instance, and I have no doubt that this is a mere error of
transcription.
Another strange error prevails in the north of Ireland respecting O and
Mac, viz. that every name in the north of Ireland of which Mac forms the
first part, is of Scotch origin, while those to which the O is prefixed
is of Irish origin; for example, that O’Neill and O’Kane are of Irish
origin, but Mac Loughlin and Mac Closkey of Scotch origin. But it happens
in these instances that Mac Loughlin is the senior branch of the family
of O’Neill, and Mac Closkey a most distinguished offshoot from that of
O’Kane. This error had its origin in the fact that the Scotch families
very rarely prefixed the O (there being only three instances of their
having used it at all on record), while the Irish used O tenfold more
than the Mac. This appears from an index to the genealogical books of
Lecan, and of Duald Mac Firbis, in the MS. library of the Royal Irish
Academy, in which mention is made of only three Scotch surnames beginning
with O, while there are upwards of two thousand distinct Irish surnames
beginning with O, and only two hundred beginning with Mac.
Another strange error is popular among the Irish, and those not of the
lowest class, namely, that only five Irish families are entitled to have
the O prefixed; but what names these five are is by no means agreed upon,
some asserting that they are O’Neill, O’Donnell, O’Conor, O’Brien, and
O’Flaherty; others that they are O’Neill, O’Donnell, O’Kane, O’Dowd,
and O’Kelly; a third party insisting that they are O’Brien, O’Sullivan,
O’Connell, O’Mahony, and O’Driscoll; while others make up the list in
quite a different manner from all these, and this according to the part
of Ireland in which they are located; and each party is positive that
no family but the five of their own list has any title to the O. None
of them would acknowledge that even the O’Melaghlins, the heads of the
southern Hy Niall race, have any claims to this prefix, nor other very
distinguished families, who invariably bore it down to a comparatively
late period. On the other hand, it is universally admitted that any Irish
family from Mac Carthy and Mac Murrough, down to Mac Gucken and Mac
Phaudeen, has full title to the prefix Mac; and for no other reason than
because it is believed to have been a mark of no distinction whatever
among the ancient Irish. This error originated in the fact that five
families of Irish blood were excepted by the English laws from being held
as mere Irishmen. But of this hereafter.
There is another error prevalent among the Irish gentry of Milesian
blood in Ireland (which is the less to be excused, as they have ample
opportunities of correcting it), namely, that the chief or head of the
family only was entitled to have the O prefixed to his name. This is the
grossest error of all, for there is not a single passage in the authentic
annals or genealogical books which even suggests that such a custom
ever existed amongst the ancient Irish chieftain families, for it is
an indubitable fact that every member of the family had the O prefixed
to his surname, as well as the chief himself. But a distinction was
made between the chief and the members of his family, in the following
manner:--In all official documents the chief used the surname only, as
O’Neill, O’Donnell, &c. In conversation also the surname only was used,
but the definite article was frequently prefixed, as _the_ O’Neill, _the_
O’Brien, &c., while in annals and other historical documents in which
it was found necessary to distinguish a chief from his predecessors or
successors, the chief of a family was designated by giving him the family
name first, and the christian or baptism name after it in parenthesis.
But the different members of the chief’s family had their christian names
always prefixed as at the present day.
I have thus dwelt upon the errors respecting surnames in Ireland, from
an anxious wish that they should be removed, and I trust that it will
be believed henceforward that the Mac in Irish surnames is fully as
respectable as the O, and that, instead of five, there are at least two
thousand Irish families who have _full title_ to have the O prefixed to
their surnames.
[2] Translation from original Latin MS.
* * * * *
Many men would have more wisdom if they had less wit.
* * * * *
Women are like gold, which is tender in proportion to its purity.
* * * * *
Excessive sensibility is the foppery of modern refinement.
IRELAND’S WEALTH.
Oh do not call our country poor,
Though Commerce shuns her coast;
For still the isle hath treasures more
Than other lands can boast.
She hath glorious hills and mighty streams,
With wealth of wave and mine,
And fields that pour their riches forth
Like Plenty’s chosen shrine.
She hath hands that never shrink from toil,
And hearts that never yield,
Who reap the harvests of the world
In corn or battle field.
She hath blessings from her far dispersed
O’er all the earth and seas,
Whose love can never leave her--yet
Our land hath more than these.
Her’s is the light of genius bright,
Among her children still;
It shines on all her darkest homes,
Or wildest heath and hill.
For there the Isle’s immortal lyre
Sent forth its mightiest tone;
And starry names arose that far
On distant ages shone.
And want among her huts hath been;
But never from them past
The stranger’s welcome, or the hearts
That freely gave their last.
She hath mountains of eternal green,
And vales for love and health,
And the beautiful and true of heart--
Oh these are Ireland’s wealth!
And she is rich in hope, which blest
Her gifted ones and brave,
Who loved her well
|
illermo Martinez,
Ambassador."
He was the Spanish ambassador to France.
Señor Martinez's greeting was most cordial, but the ambassador lost no
time in stating the object of his visit.
"You have two young men here, I believe, Monsieur--young men who are
said to have robbed or attempted to rob two women in the Bois de
Boulogne last evening?"
"Two young men were arrested," he replied.
"They were sailors?"
"I believe they are."
"English sailors?"
"No; American."
"Ah! It is well. I have come here, with the permission of the premier,
to request that those young men be liberated at once."
"I have but now received a message from the Ministry of Justice,
requesting that I receive you. I am honored, señor. May I inquire your
interest in this matter?" questioned the prefect, shrewdly suspecting
the truth.
"Because I have reason to believe that a serious error has been
committed."
"Indeed, señor! On whose part, may I ask?"
"I should say that it was on the part of your department, Monsieur
Prefect--that a great injustice has been done to two very brave young
men, who risked their lives to serve two women in dire distress."
The prefect smiled.
"If these men whom you have in custody are American or English sailors,
I beg that you may quickly convince yourself of their innocence and
liberate them. I ask this in my official capacity."
"The foreign governments appear to be taking a deep interest in the case
of these young men, señor."
"Why say you that, Monsieur le Prefect?"
"Because you are the second official who has been here this morning
demanding that they be set free," answered the police officer,
smilingly. "It is most surprising."
"Indeed."
"They may not be, and probably are not, guilty of the robbery charge,
but at least the men assaulted my officers."
"I am sure that feature of the case could be easily explained."
"You would have difficulty in convincing the officers who were assaulted
of that," laughed the chief.
"Will you release the men?"
"It will give me great pleasure to serve you, señor, in any manner in my
power. Do you know the women who had such a narrow escape last evening,
may I ask, señor?"
"Certainly."
"Would it be proper for me to ask their names!"
"They are my wife and daughter," announced the ambassador. "Both ladies
were positive of the facts as I have stated them----"
"That the men were sailors?"
"Yes. And when they read this morning that two sailors had been
arrested, accused of the attempted robbery, the ladies were greatly
disturbed. They insisted that justice be done, that I spare no efforts
to obtain the release of the brave young sailors."
"Disturb yourself no more, Señor Ambassador."
"You mean?"
"That the men have been discharged. They are free."
CHAPTER IV
ICE CREAM COMES HIGH
"Ice cream! Ice cream! Ice cream! Can't you understand that much
English?" demanded Sam Hickey.
The Battleship Boys had entered the first restaurant they found. This
proved to be none other than the Café de la Paix, one of the fashionable
resorts of Paris. The waiter who attended their table was unable to
speak a word of English, nor could either lad make his wants known, but
the waiter quickly brought an employé to whom the boys stated their
wishes.
"Four dishes of ice cream, and in a hurry," commanded Sam Hickey. "What
are those things in the basket there?"
"I do not know," answered Dan. "They are some kind of cake. I see them
on each of the tables."
"I'm going to help myself. They don't look very nourishing for a good,
healthy appetite like mine, but they are better than nothing at all."
Sam helped himself liberally. The cakes tasted so good that he ate ten
of them; then, motioning a waiter, he ordered another basketful. By this
time the ice cream was served. Ice cream was a luxury that the
Battleship Boys did not get on shipboard, so they ordered another plate
each.
"There, I guess that will keep me going until supper time," decided Sam.
"I wonder how much we owe him?"
"I should say about a dollar," answered Dan, motioning for the garçon
and asking for their check.
Dan's eyes grew large as he examined the bill that had been laid beside
him.
"I'm hungry yet. I could eat another round of the same thing," announced
Sam. "How much does he say it amounts to?"
"I'm trying to figure it out. Six ice creams, thirty francs. Twenty-five
biscuit at a franc apiece, twenty-five francs. Fifty-five francs
altogether."
"Fifty-five francs!" exclaimed Sam. "Wha--wha--how much is that--how
many cents is that in plain United States? I never could figure this
heathen money."
"Five francs make a dollar," figured Dan, talking to himself. "Five goes
into fifty-five eleven times. That's eleven dollars' worth of ice cream
and cakes we have eaten."
"Eleven dollars?" gasped the red-haired boy.
"Yes, that's it," answered Dan ruefully, gazing at his companion in a
dazed sort of way.
"But we didn't order any cakes, Dan."
"It's those round cakes that were in the basket. They were put here so
we would eat them. That's a trick we didn't know anything about."
"Eleven dollars," groaned Sam. "It's highway robbery. I wish we had held
up the women and----"
"Sam!"
Dan's tone was sharp.
"Don't let me hear you speak like that again."
"No; I'm to be the easy mark. I'm to be frisked eleven dollars' worth,
and----"
"Don't grumble; let's pay and get out, or they----"
"Yes, they'll be charging us rent for the chairs we are sitting in,
first thing we know. Can't we steal some spoons to get even?"
Dan was handing the waiter the money, which he did without comment, Sam,
meanwhile, slowly counting out his share of the check, which he passed
over to his companion.
"What do they call this place, Dan?" questioned the red-haired boy as
they started away.
"Café de la Paix."
"That's it. We should have known better. I see it all now. Why didn't we
look at the sign over the place before we went in?"
"What do you mean?"
"Café de la Pay. That's it; that's the place."
"Sam Hickey, have you gone crazy?"
"Café de la Pay--that's the place where you pay. And we did pay. I never
knew a place that was so well named," continued Sam with a sickly grin.
"We paid, didn't we?"
"'Leven dollars' worth," answered Dan sheepishly. "Are you still
hungry?"
"Hungry? No; I've lost my appetite; I've changed my mind. I shan't dare
get another appetite while I am in Paris. Say, it's lucky they locked us
up in the brig over at police headquarters, isn't it?"
"Why?"
"Because we'd be about a million dollars in debt by this time. Whew, but
they've got the original get-rich-quick scheme in this burg. Come on;
let's go out in the park where we will not see things to eat. They
excite me too much. I'm liable to lose control of myself and eat again.
If I change my mind again we're lost."
As they stepped out a group of men made a sudden rush toward them.
"Guide, guide, guide, sir--guide? Have a guide? Show you all the sights
of Paris----"
"We do not wish a guide, thank you," answered Dan.
"Guide, guide, guide, guide----"
"Say, why didn't you fellows come around, last night?" demanded Sam. "We
needed a guide then. We don't now. We've been guided up against pretty
nearly everything that ever happened, as it is."
By this time others of the same sort had hurried to the scene. All were
shouting at once. It seemed as if all the guides in Paris had
congregated in front of the Café de la Paix for the sole purpose of
waylaying the unsuspecting Battleship Boys.
Several guides grabbed Dan by one arm, while as many more caught hold of
Sam. Now others took a hand, pulling this way and that.
"Show you everything for five dollars, that's all. Show you----"
"See here, you fellows!" demanded Hickey, whose color was rising with
his temper. "I cleaned out a bunch of Apaches last night and I licked
half a dozen policemen to rest myself. If you want the same kind of a
hand-out just keep right on. Leggo my arms!" he roared. "Shove off!"
For an instant the men did let go.
"Give them the flying wedge, Dan!"
The boys bolted through the throng of guides, bowling two or three of
them over, sprang out into the street, then ran across to the opposite
side.
"Let's get out of this confounded town," grumbled Sam. "First thing you
know I'll be getting into a fight. I shouldn't like to get mixed up in
one, 'cause I promised the captain I'd behave myself while I was over
here."
"Come along," said Dan, taking his companion by the arm. "We will go to
see the sights by ourselves. I guess we shall see as much without a
guide as with one. No telling what sort of trouble these fellows would
get us into. I don't like their looks at all."
"They'll look worse if they ever grab hold of me that way again."
The boys hurried around a corner and down the Avenue de L'Opera. They
looked very neat and well groomed in their new suits. They strolled
along after getting out of sight of the guides, visiting some of the
smaller parks of the city. Chancing to come across a tourist agency they
bought seats on a "Seeing Paris" car, and were driven about the city
with a lot of other tourists, most of whom were Americans. With some of
these they got quite well acquainted.
The visitors inspected the Cathedral of Notre Dame, erected in the
twelfth century; stood within the portals of the Madeleine, the famous
little edifice occupied by the insurgents during the Commune, and in
which building three hundred of them were shot down.
The Battleship Boys also visited many other famous churches and noted
public buildings. The other Americans, having learned who the lads were,
made it their business to explain to them all about the places visited,
relating many interesting historical stories, some of which were already
familiar to Dan Davis, who had read widely for his age.
The day that had begun so unhappily for the boys came to a close all too
soon, and they decided to return to their boarding house, which was not
far from where the tourist automobile stopped to discharge its
passengers.
They had paid for their accommodations at the pension for the full time
they expected to be in Paris, so they had no fear of being overcharged
for their meals there.
The table looked most inviting as they entered the dining room, taking
the places assigned to them.
The boys had just begun their dinner when they were summoned to the
drawing room, where they found a foreign-looking man in livery awaiting
them.
"Are you Monsieur Dan Davis?" he asked in English, but with a strong
foreign accent.
"Yes, sir."
"You are to go with me, you and your friend."
"Go with you?"
"Yes, sir."
"Look out," whispered Sam. "I'll bet this is another pay-as-you-enter
game; then they won't give you anything to eat after you get in."
"I do not understand you, sir. Why should we go with you?"
"The carriage awaits you at the door."
"'The carriage awaits you, sir,'" mimicked Sam, with a grimace at his
companion.
"Be still, Sam. I do not understand at all what you mean, sir. Have you
not made a mistake? We know no one in Paris--no one would send a
carriage for us."
For answer the servant extended an envelope, bearing a coat of arms. Dan
opened it wonderingly.
"Mr. Daniel Davis and Mr. Samuel Hickey are requested to dine with
the Spanish ambassador, Señor Guillermo Martinez, this evening at
8.30 o'clock."
Dan opened his eyes wide when he read this, then passed the invitation
to his chum. Sam perused it, cocked one eye up and winked at Dan.
"We seem to be getting quite popular. What are you going to do?"
"I do not know what it all means, but I'm going to accept the
invitation, though I am not sure I am right in doing so. What do you
think about it, Sam?"
"I don't think. I've gotten past thinking. Things are moving too fast
for me. I'm out of commission."
"Do you know why the ambassador wishes to see us?" he asked of the
servant.
"No, sir. He did not say, sir. He said he would tell you when you
arrive. Will you be ready soon?"
"We are ready now. We will be with you as soon as we get our hats."
It took the lads but a few moments to make themselves ready, after which
they hurried down to the street. There they found a handsome carriage,
with a coachman on the box, awaiting them.
Entering, they were driven rapidly away.
"This is different," laughed Dan, settling back among the soft cushions.
"Yes; it's somewhat different from last evening," answered Sam. "We
didn't have any soft things like these to sit on then."
"No; and we knew little more about what was going to happen then than we
do now."
"I'm willing to take a lot of chances on this, just the same," retorted
Sam, with an audible chuckle.
The carriage drove up in front of a handsome residence on the Champs
Elysées, almost directly opposite the Elysée Palace Hotel, the door of
the vehicle was opened and the Battleship Boys stepped out.
CHAPTER V
A PLUNGE INTO SOCIETY
"Welcome, my lads!" greeted the Spanish ambassador, grasping the lads
warmly by the hand. They had been led into a broad hall by a footman and
then on into a drawing room brilliantly lighted.
The boys had never gazed upon such a brilliant scene; for a moment they
were too dazed to speak. Suddenly they realized that the ambassador was
introducing his wife, Madame Martinez. Then a beautiful, dark-eyed girl
was led forward.
"This, young gentlemen, is my daughter, Señorita Inez Martinez, to whom
we hoped you might owe your liberty. Happily, however, for you, your own
consul succeeded in getting you released before the matter was brought
to my attention. I trust you have suffered no ill effects from your
unjust imprisonment?"
"No; thank you," answered Dan.
"On the contrary, it was a mighty good thing for us," spoke up Hickey.
"How so?" asked the ambassador.
Dan nudged his companion, but there was no stopping Sam when he once got
started.
"Why, sir, these get-rich-quick people would have had all our money by
this time. I never saw anything like it."
"You do not mean that you have been robbed?"
"Oh, no," interrupted Dan. "You see, we do not know the ways of the
country. We thought we had paid too much for some things. It is all good
experience, however, and we are not finding fault."
"Ah! I hope you like Paris? I take it, this is your first visit here?"
suggested the ambassador's wife.
"Is it not a glorious city?" added the daughter.
"Yes," agreed Dan, "it is a wonderful city."
"I don't think so," objected Sam. "I've had a hard time of it ever since
I came here--that is--until--until to-night," as he noted the eyes of
the beautiful señorita fixed upon him.
Somehow her voice had a strangely familiar ring to him. He felt sure
that he had heard it before, but the more he thought about it the more
perplexed did he grow. The young woman seemed to divine what was passing
through the red-headed boy's mind. She smiled teasingly, then began
talking as if to give him further opportunity to make up his mind where
he had seen her before.
Dan, too, was puzzled, but he concealed his perplexity better than Sam
had. Davis was growing quite at his ease. It seemed to him as though he
had always been with people of this sort, and he found himself talking
easily and well, discussing many subjects with which the average sailor
is not expected to be familiar.
"I take it that you lads hope to be petty officers one of these days,"
said Señor Martinez.
"We have already won our ratings in that class, sir."
"Indeed. What is your rating, if I may ask?"
"I am a gunner's mate on the Battleship 'Long Island.' My friend is a
coxswain connected with the same ship."
"Do you--do you shoot the big guns?" questioned Señorita Inez, with a
brilliant smile.
"I hope to do so, some day--that is, I hope to do so at target practice,
though I trust the time may never come when I shall have to train a gun
on the ship of another government."
"I am with you in that, my lad. I hope it may never be your lot to do
so. Of course you have ambitions to rise in your profession?"
"Yes, sir; it is our hope to become officers of the line at some time in
the distant future."
The ambassador nodded thoughtfully.
"It is a splendid career that your Navy offers. Any man who has it in
him to advance himself may do so. The opportunities are unlimited."
"Yes, sir; but the way is hard."
"All things worth having are difficult of attainment. Were they not,
there would not be rooms for those at the top," smiled the Señor.
The dinner was the most elaborate that the Battleship Boys had ever sat
down to. Their host was in uniform and the ladies were in evening gowns,
while behind the chairs of each stood a servant in livery.
The Battleship Boys were filled with wonder over what had befallen them.
Strangely enough, their host seemed quite familiar with their records,
and all about their experiences with the Paris Apaches and gendarmes.
Señor Martinez appeared to take a keen enjoyment in their perplexity,
though he was forced to admit that Gunner's Mate Davis was sufficiently
well-bred to hide his curiosity.
At last the dinner came to an end, whereupon the party withdrew to the
drawing room.
"Shall I sing for you?" asked the señorita, with a flash of her black
eyes.
"I should be most happy to hear you," replied Dan courteously.
"Yes; I like singing," added Sam. "The singing we hear on board ship,
sometimes, makes you wish you could jump overboard."
A well-bred laugh greeted his announcement.
"Do you sing?" questioned the young woman.
"I thought I did once."
"When was that?"
"At a Sunday-school picnic that I attended at home in Piedmont."
"Oh! And did you sing?"
"They all said I didn't. They said my voice was a poor imitation of a
steam calliope."
The well-bred laughter of the little company was lost in a roar. A
glance at Hickey's twinkling eyes told them that he was far from dull,
and that he was enjoying the fun he was creating fully as much as the
rest were.
"So, you didn't sing after all?"
"No, I didn't sing. I just made a noise that might have been singing--if
it had been."
Thus the evening passed, full of song, of laughter and brightness.
Dan, after a time, glanced at a French clock on the mantle. He gave a
start when he noted that it lacked but fifteen minutes of midnight.
"Oh, we must be going, sir. I did not know it was so late," he said,
half rising.
"In a moment, my lad. I presume you are somewhat curious as to why I
invited you to my home this evening?" questioned Señor Martinez
quizzically.
"We are, indeed, sir. I have been wondering why you should do such a
thing. We are just plain American sailors, sir, serving our country as
best we know how. We are not used to being received in the splendid way
you have received us to-night."
"My lad, that was well said. It has been an honor to have you here. We
have felt the keenest pleasure in being able to ask you. As for your
being plain American sailors, let me say that such men as you and your
friend would be a credit to any Navy. I congratulate yours in possessing
you. Can you not guess why you have been invited here this evening?"
"I have not the slightest idea, sir."
"No, we're all at sea, and I guess that's the proper place for sailor
lads," added Sam.
"I had very good reasons. You have done myself and family a very great
service."
"A service?" exclaimed Hickey wonderingly.
"Yes. And let me say here that perhaps I never should have known of you,
had not my wife and daughter insisted that I look you up and ask you to
come here. They have purchased a little gift for each of you, which you
will find at your pension upon your return. I have had it sent there so
that you may have a little surprise when you reach your lodgings."
The boys did not answer. There was nothing they could think of to say.
"Have you not noted anything that struck you as familiar about my wife
and daughter?"
"Mr. Hickey has," interjected the young woman, with a merry twinkle in
her eyes, "He has been wondering all the evening where he has seen me or
heard my voice."
"That's the time you hit the target right in the center," answered the
red-headed boy. "If I'd been a ship, and that had been a projectile you
had fired at me, I'd been headed for Davy Jones's Locker by this time."
The girl laughed merrily.
"I'll tell you, my lads; you saw my wife and daughter last evening."
"Last night!" exclaimed the boys.
"Yes."
"Where, may I ask?"
"On the Bois de Boulogne. It was they whom you saved from the terrible
Apaches, who no doubt would have put them to death after having robbed
them. You see, my lads, myself and family have reason for feeling that
we owe you a deep debt of gratitude."
"Is it possible?" muttered Dan Davis, looking from one to the other of
the smiling faces.
"Well, all I've got to say is that it was worth going to jail for,"
added Sam Hickey, with an admiring glance at the señorita.
CHAPTER VI
STRANDED IN A STRANGE CITY
"Dan, I've been touched!"
"What's that?"
"Touched, I tell you! Touched," persisted Sam Hickey, raising his voice
with each word.
"You--you don't mean you've lost your money?" demanded Dan Davis
incredulously.
"No; I mean I've been touched for it."
"Nonsense! You have lost it, if you haven't it. Look through your
pockets again. You have put it in some other pocket; that's all."
The boys were strolling slowly toward the pension where they were
staying. They had insisted on walking back to their lodgings, after
having left the residence of the Spanish ambassador, and this despite
his warnings that it was not safe for them to do so at that hour of the
night.
"Have you found it?"
"I have not. And that's not the worst of it."
"What do you mean?"
"I never shall find it."
A troubled expression appeared on Davis' face.
"How much, did you have with you?"
"You mean how much did I have left?"
"Yes."
"I don't know. I never can learn to count this foreign money. I had
quite a bunch of it. Maybe twenty dollars or something like that."
"I am surprised, Sam. You are so careless. It's a wonder you did not
lose your money before this. I take care of my money. You never heard of
my losing any, did you?"
"How about the café where you pay?"
"That was different. That money was not lost."
"Not lost?" exclaimed the red-headed boy. "Well, if it wasn't lost, will
you tell me where it is? Will you tell me that?"
"I spent it."
"You bet you did. And I've spent mine, only I didn't get anything for
it. This town is the limit. I don't wonder they had a revolution here.
They will have another, too--you mark me! Now, you've had so much to say
about my being careless with money, suppose you examine your own
pockets. Maybe you've been touched, too."
Dan laughed.
"No danger of that. No one could go through my pockets without my
knowing it."
"Couldn't, eh? Why these Frenchmen could touch you through a stone
wall, and never move a stone. Just for the fun of the thing, shell out
and let's see what you have in your pockets."
"All right; if it will please you. My money is safe."
Dan thrust a confident hand into his trousers' pocket; then he went into
the other pocket.
An expression of surprise appeared on his face, as he drew forth a
handful of small silver from a vest pocket.
"Well, what about it?" demanded Sam. "Got it?"
"I've--I've lost my money, too; almost every cent of it."
Hickey uttered an uproarious laugh.
"How much have you there?"
"About five hundred centimes, that's all."
"Five hundred centimes! You don't mean it?"
"Yes; that's all."
"All? Good gracious, isn't that enough? Why, man, it's a fortune. We're
all right, even if I have lost mine."
"Wait a minute. Do you know how much five hundred centimes is?"
"No; ask me something easier."
"Well, it is about the equivalent of a dollar in American money."
Sam groaned.
"Broke!"
Dan nodded.
"I don't understand it at all. Where could we have lost our money?"
"Lose it, nothing! I tell you we have been touched--touched good and
properly. It's a wonder they didn't take our clothes while they were
about it. By gracious, they even got my jack-knife. I'll fight somebody
in a minute."
Dan did not answer. He was too amazed and upset to talk just then.
"So no one can touch you without your knowing it!" jeered Hickey. "You
are an easy mark. I am not in the same class with you. Hold me up while
I laugh."
"Don't laugh, Sam; this is serious."
"Of course it is. I wouldn't laugh at it if it weren't. Most of the
funny things aren't worth laughing at. The serious things are, most
always."
"Very well; laugh if you wish. I shan't. I am wondering what we are
going to do. We certainly are in a fix."
"You've got five hundred what-do-you-call-thems, haven't you?"
"Five hundred centimes, yes. They will not go far. A dollar will not
purchase much in France."
"But the five hundred sounds big enough to buy a house and lot with. I
could put up a pretty good bluff on five hundred of anything."
"We had better go home. The hour is late. We can talk there, though
talking will not help us out of this trouble at all."
"Yes; that's a good idea. These Paris folks will have the shirts off our
back if we stay out here much longer. What time is it?"
"I don't know."
The boys wandered on, finding their pension without difficulty. Once in
their own room, they sat down facing each other.
"This is a nice mess we're in, Sam."
"We've been in worse," answered the red-headed boy wisely.
"It is fortunate for us that we have paid our board."
"How about the return tickets? Have you lost those, too?"
Dan went through his pockets again. The more he searched, the more
excited he grew.
"I--I----"
"Stung again?" jeered Sam Hickey. "Maybe I got touched for my money, but
I didn't lose my tickets. You lost them both. But have you lost them?"
Dan nodded helplessly.
"Oh, this is too bad!"
"Yes; I wish I'd changed my mind and stayed aboard ship. Let's get back
there right away."
"How?"
Sam reflected.
"That's so," he said, with a grin.
"There is no other way for it, but to walk."
"How far is it to Boulogne?"
"It must be all of a hundred miles."
"Not for me," declared the red-headed boy, with an emphatic shake of the
head. "Hello, what's that on the table there?" he demanded, suddenly
espying a neatly wrapped package.
Dan rose and took up the package. It was addressed to Daniel Davis and
Samuel Hickey.
"Open it."
Davis was already doing so. He tore off the wrapping, disclosing a neat
plush box underneath.
"This must be the package that the ambassador referred to, Sam."
"Yes, that's it. Hurry up and open it. I hope there's some money in it."
"No; we could not accept it if there was. Ah!"
"Well, what do you think of that!" muttered Sam.
The ease upon being opened disclosed, to their amazement, two handsome
gold Swiss watches, with solid gold chains attached. On the back of the
first case Dan found his initials engraved. Opening the case, he read
the inscription, "Presented to Gunner's Mate Daniel Davis for heroic
conduct in saving two women from the Paris Apaches." Sam's case bore a
similar inscription.
"Beautiful!" breathed the Battleship Boys in one voice.
"We're all right now," exclaimed Hickey.
"How so?"
"We can borrow some money on the watches."
"I guess not," answered Dan firmly. "We'll walk first!"
CHAPTER VII
UNDER THE FLAG ONCE MORE
"I'm going to see the consul," announced Dan Davis next morning as they
were dressing for breakfast.
"Better wait until he gets out of bed," suggested Hickey.
"Yes; we will walk about until ten o'clock; then I will go over. He will
no doubt loan us enough money to pay our fares to Boulogne."
"Sure thing. What's a consul for, if it isn't to help a
fellow-countryman who is in trouble?"
To their disappointment, they found the consul out. The boys called
several times that day. At last, late in the afternoon, they found him
at his office, when they quickly made known their predicament.
"Certainly I will help you, my lads. I will send over and have your
tickets bought for you. That will save you all trouble in the matter. I
do not think you will be able to get a train until late this evening,
however."
"You are very kind, sir," said Dan. "As soon as possible after reaching
the ship we will send you the money you have advanced to us."
"Never mind that. It is but a trifle."
"Oh, no, sir; that will not do. We shall return it."
"If you wish to remain in Paris longer I will loan you more money."
"Thank you, but we think it best to get back to the ship. Our leave has
not quite expired, but we shall feel better to be back."
The tickets were brought to them in due time. Late that evening the boys
presented themselves at the Gare du Nord, the station from which they
were to take a train for Boulogne. It was not yet train time, however,
so the boys strolled about watching the people.
"Guide, sir? Show you all about the city, young gentlemen?" questioned a
man in fairly good English.
Sam fixed him with a stern eye.
"Get out!" he commanded.
"Guide, sir?"
"No, sir; we do not need a guide," spoke up Dan.
"How much do you charge?" questioned Sam.
"Two dollars for two hours."
"Humph! I'll tell you what I'll do. If you'll stand up before me for two
minutes I'll send you two dollars as soon as I get back to the ship."
"Stand up before you?"
"Yes."
"For what?"
"So I can knock your head off! I owe you fellows a thrashing."
"And so do I," broke in Dan. "You go away from here and let us alone, or
I'm liable to forget myself and give you a thumping that you won't
forget for the rest of the season. Now, beat it!"
"Yes, scat!" added Sam.
The guide gazed at them for one apprehensive moment.
The Battleship Boys made a threatening move in his direction, whereat
the guide turned and beat a hasty retreat.
Half an hour later, after much difficulty, the young sailors managed to
find their way to a second-class carriage on the Boulogne train.
At last they were on their way to their ship. The boys breathed a sigh
of relief.
"It has been a great experiment," said Dan.
"Fine!" laughed Sam.
"And we've seen a lot."
"And got 'done' a whole lot more," added the red-headed boy. "If there
is anything we haven't bumped up against I should like to know about
it."
Dan nodded reflectively.
"Let me see; we have visited pretty nearly every point of interest in
the French capital; we have had a battle with the Paris Apaches, got
arrested and locked up; got our names in the Paris papers; had two
government officials working on our behalf, and have been dined by the
ambassador of a foreign power. That's going some, isn't it, Sam?"
"Yes; but you have forgotten the most important part of it all."
"What have I forgotten?"
"That we got touched for our rolls, and went broke in Paree."
Dan laughed happily.
"The next question is, where are we going to sleep?"
"We shall have to sleep sitting up."
"Yes; these railway carriages, as they call them, are built on the bias.
I'd like to see a fellow try to sleep on these seats, divided off by
arms, without being crippled for life."
Dan was looking about the carriage. Sam observed that his companion's
face had suddenly lighted up.
"Made a discovery, eh?"
"Yes, and I have an idea."
"Good! Get it off your mind before you lose it. What's the idea?"
"I'm going to sleep in the upper berth."
"The upper berth?" wondered Hickey.
"Yes."
"I don't see any upper berth."
"Then watch me."
Dan proceeded to remove his coat and vest, collar and tie. Next he took
off his shoes, Hickey in the meantime watching his companion with
suspicious eyes.
Along either end of the compartment, over their heads, was a luggage
rack extending the entire length, or rather, width, of the compartment.
Dan grasped the rack, pulled himself up to it and lay down as snug as if
he were in reality in the upper berth of a sleeping car.
"Hooray!" shouted Sam.
"Can you beat it?"
"Not this trip. You're a wonder, Dan. That's almost as good as the
hammock on shipboard. Will the thing hold you?"
"I hope so. It seems secure. You try the other one."
"I don't know whether I want to trust myself in that spider web or not."
"It's made of woven leather strands. It holds me all right. Try it."
Hickey pulled himself up to the rack, lay down, then peered over the
edge, grinning.
"This isn't so bad, after all. But I dread to think what will happen to
me if I should have the bad luck to walk in my sleep."
"Don't do it. You must get used to it, for to-morrow night we shall be
sleeping in our hammocks again."
A few minutes later the boys were sound asleep, unmindful of the swaying
of the rapidly moving carriage, which was almost like the roll of the
ship. They did not awaken until daylight. The carriage had stopped and
they could hear talking outside.
"Breakfast time; get up!" shouted Hickey.
A guard opened the door and peered in.
"Hello, down there!" called Dan.
"Yes; is that the way you bolt into a gentleman's bedroom without
knocking?" demanded Hickey.
The guard glanced up with a puzzled expression on his face, then slammed
the door shut.
"We'd better get out of here, Sam, or they will have the police after us
again," muttered Dan, scrambling to the floor.
Hastily pulling on their clothes, they got out to the platform, having
recognized the station as Boulogne.
"We've got to go without our breakfast this morning, Sam."
"I suppose so," replied the red-headed boy ruefully. "My, but I've got
an appetite!"
"So have I, but it will keep."
"I guess it will have to."
Half an hour later the boys were standing on the quay. Off just outside
the breakwater lay the battleship "Long Island."
"Doesn't she look good?" breathed Dan. "I'm really happy to get back."
"I'd be happier if I knew there was a square meal awaiting me," answered
Sam. "How are we going to get aboard?"
"I'll show you."
Dan pulled out his
|
ers of despotick monarchies, and the legislators of the free states
of antiquity. In the former, that absurd and impious doctrine of
millions created for the sole use and pleasure of one individual, seems
to have been the first position in their politicks, and the general rule
of their conduct. The latter fixed the basis of their respective states
upon this just and benevolent plan, "that the safety and happiness of
the whole community was the only end of all government." The former
treated mankind as brutes, and lorded it over them by force. The latter
received them as their fellow-creatures, and governed them by reason:
hence whilst we detest the former as the enemies and destroyers; we
cannot help admiring and revering the latter, as the lovers and
benefactors of mankind.
The histories which I considered with the greatest attention, gave me
the highest entertainment, and affected me most, were those of the free
states of Greece, Carthage, and Rome. I saw with admiration the profound
wisdom and sagacity, the unwearied labour and disinterested spirit of
those amiable and generous men, who contributed most towards forming
those states, and settling them upon the firmest foundations. I traced
with pleasure their gradual progress towards that height of power, to
which in process of time they arrived; and I remarked the various steps
and degrees by which they again declined, and at last sunk gradually
into their final dissolution, not without a just mixture of sorrow and
indignation.
It would be a labour of more curiosity, than of real use at this time,
to give a long detail of the original formation of those states, and the
wise laws and institutions by which they were raised to that envied
degree of perfection; yet a concise account of the primitive
constitution of each state may be so far necessary, as it will render
the deviations from that constitution more intelligible, and more fully
illustrate the causes of their final subversion. But to point out and
expose the principal causes, which contributed gradually to weaken, and
at length demolish and level with the ground, those beautiful fabricks
raised by the publick virtue, and cemented by the blood of so many
illustrious patriots, will, in my opinion, be more interesting and more
instructive.
When I consider the constitution of our own country, I cannot but think
it the best calculated for promoting the happiness, and preserving the
lives, liberty, and property of mankind, of any yet recorded in profane
history. I am persuaded too, that our wise ancestors, who first formed
it, adopted whatever they judged most excellent and valuable in those
states when in their greatest perfection; and did all that human wisdom
could do for rendering it durable, and transmitting it pure and entire
to future generations. But as all things under the sun are subject to
change, and children are too apt to forget and degenerate from the
virtues of their fathers, there seems great reason to fear, that what
has happened to those free states may at length prove the melancholy
fate of our own country; especially when we reflect, that the same
causes, which contributed to their ruin, operate at this time so very
strongly amongst us. As I thought therefore that it might be of some use
to my country at this dangerous crisis, I have selected the interesting
examples of those once free and powerful nations, who by totally
deviating from those principles upon which they were originally founded,
lost first their liberty, and at last their very existence, so far as to
leave no other vestiges remaining of them as a people, but what are to
be found in the records of history.
It is an undoubted truth, that our own constitution has at different
times suffered very severe shocks, and been reduced more than once to
the very point of ruin: but because it has hitherto providentially
escaped, we are not to flatter ourselves that opportunities of recovery
will always offer. To me therefore the method of proof drawn from
example, seemed more striking, as well as more level to every capacity,
than all speculative reasoning: for as the same causes will, by the
stated laws of sublunary affairs, sooner or later invariably produce
the same effects, so whenever we see the same maxims of government
prevail, the same measures pursued, and the same coincidences of
circumstances happen in our own country, which brought on, and attend
the subversion of those states, we may plainly read our own fate in
their catastrophe, unless we apply speedy and effectual remedies, before
our case is past recovery. It is the best way to learn wisdom in time
from the fate of others; and if examples will not instruct and make us
wiser, I confess myself utterly at a loss to know what will.
In my reflections, which naturally arose in the course of these
researches, truth and impartiality have been my only guides. I have
endeavoured to show the principal causes of that degeneracy of manners,
which reduced those once brave and free people into the most abject
slavery. I have marked the alarming progress which the same evils have
already made, and still continue to make amongst us, with that honest
freedom which is the birthright of every Englishman. My sole aim is to
excite those who have the welfare of their country at heart, to unite
their endeavours in opposing the fatal tendency of those evils, whilst
they are within the power of remedy. With this view, and this only, I
have marked out the remote as well as immediate causes of the ruin of
those states, as so many beacons warning us to avoid the same rocks upon
which they struck, and at last suffered shipwreck.
Truth will ever be unpalatable to those who are determined not to
relinquish error, but can never give offence to the honest and
well-meaning amongst my countrymen. For the plain-dealing remonstrances
of a friend differ as widely from the rancour of an enemy, as the
friendly probe of the physician from the dagger of the assassin.
REFLECTIONS ON THE RISE AND FALL OF THE ANCIENT REPUBLICKS.
CHAPTER I.
OF THE REPUBLICK OF SPARTA.
All the free states of Greece were at first monarchical,[5] and seem to
owe their liberty rather to the injudicious oppressions of their
respective kings, than to any natural propensity in the people to alter
their form of government. But as they had smarted so severely under an
excess of power lodged in the hands of one man, they were too apt to run
into the other extreme, democracy; a state of government the most
subject of all others to disunion and faction.
Of all the Grecian states, that of Sparta seems to have been the most
unhappy, before their government was new modelled by Lycurgus. The
authority of their kings and their laws (as Plutarch informs us) were
alike trampled upon and despised. Nothing could restrain the insolence
of the headstrong encroaching populace; and the whole government sunk
into anarchy and confusion. From this deplorable situation the wisdom
and virtue of one great man raised his country to that height of power,
which was the envy and the terror of her neighbours. A convincing proof
how far the influence of one great and good man will operate towards
reforming the most bold licentious people, when he has once thoroughly
acquired their esteem and confidence! Upon this principle Lycurgus
founded his plan of totally altering and new moulding the constitution
of his country. A design, all circumstances considered, the most daring,
and the most happily executed, of any yet immortalized in history.[6]
Lycurgus succeeded to the moiety of the crown of Sparta at the death of
his elder brother; but his brother's widow declaring herself with child,
and that child proving to be a son, he immediately resigned the regal
dignity to the new born infant, and governed as protector and guardian
of the young prince during his minority. The generous and disinterested
behaviour of Lycurgus upon this occasion endeared him greatly to the
people; who had already experienced the happy effect of his wise and
equitable administration. But to avoid the malice of the queen-mother
and her faction, who accused him of designs upon the crown, he prudently
quitted both the government and his country. In his travels during this
voluntary exile, he drew up and thoroughly digested his great scheme of
reformation. He visited all those states which at that time were most
eminent for the wisdom of their laws, or the form of their constitution.
He carefully observed all the different institutions, and the good or
bad effects which they respectively produced on the manners of each
people. He took care to avoid what he judged to be defects; but selected
whatever he found calculated to promote the happiness of a people; and
with these materials he formed his so much celebrated plan of
legislation, which he very soon had an opportunity of reducing to
practice. For the Spartans, thoroughly sensible of the difference
between the administration of Lycurgus and that of their kings, not only
earnestly wished for his presence, but sent repeated deputations to
entreat him to return, and free them from those numerous disorders under
which their country at that time laboured. As the request of the people
was unanimous, and the kings no ways opposed his return, he judged it
the critical time for the execution of his scheme. For he found affairs
at home in the distracted situation they had been represented, and the
whole body of the people in a disposition proper for his purpose.
Lycurgus began his reform with a change in the constitution, which at
that time consisted of a confused medley of hereditary monarchy divided
between two families, and a disorderly democracy, utterly destitute of
the balance of a third intermediate power, a circumstance so essential
to the duration of all mixed governments. To remedy this evil, he
established a senate with such a degree of power, as might fix them the
inexpugnable barrier of the constitution against the encroachments
either of kings or people. The crown of Sparta had been long divided
between two families descended originally from the same ancestor, who
jointly enjoyed the succession. But though Lycurgus was sensible that
all the mischiefs which had happened to the state, arose from this
absurd division of the regal power, yet he made no alteration as to the
succession of the two families. Any innovation in so nice a point might
have proved an endless source of civil commotions, from the pretensions
of that line which should happen to be excluded. He therefore left them
the title and the ensignia of royalty, but limited their authority,
which he confined to the business of war and religion. To the people he
gave the privilege of electing the senators, and giving their sanction
to those laws which the kings and senate should approve.
When Lycurgus had regulated the government, he undertook a task more
arduous than any of the fabled labours of Hercules. This was to new
mould his countrymen, by extirpating all the destructive passions, and
raising them above every weakness and infirmity of human nature. A
scheme which all the great philosophers had taught in theory, but none
except Lycurgus was ever able to reduce to practice.
As he found the two extremes, of great wealth and great indigence, were
the source of infinite mischiefs in a free state, he divided the lands
of the whole territory into equal lots proportioned to the number of the
inhabitants. He appointed publick tables, at which he enjoined all the
citizens to eat together without distinction; and he subjected every
man, even the kings themselves, to a fine if they should violate this
law by eating at their own houses.[7] Their diet was plain, simple, and
regulated by the law, and distributed amongst the guests in equal
portions. Every member was obliged monthly to contribute his quota for
the provision of his respective table. The conversation allowed at these
publick repasts, turned wholly upon such subjects as tended most to
improve the minds of the younger sort in the principles of wisdom and
virtue. Hence, as Xenophon observes, they were schools not only for
temperance and sobriety, but also for instruction. Thus Lycurgus
introduced a perfect equality amongst his countrymen. The highest and
the lowest fared alike as to diet, were all lodged and clothed alike,
without the least variation either in fashion or materials.
When by these means he had exterminated every species of luxury, he next
removed all temptation to the acquisition of wealth, that fatal source
of the innumerable evils which prevailed in every other country. He
effected this with his usual policy, by forbidding the currency of gold
and silver money, and substituting an iron coinage of great weight and
little value, which continued the only current coin through the whole
Spartan dominions for several ages.
To bar up the entrance of wealth, and guard his citizens against the
contagion of corruption, he absolutely prohibited navigation and
commerce, though his country contained a large extent of sea coast
furnished with excellent harbours. He allowed as little intercourse as
possible with foreigners, nor suffered any of his countrymen to visit
the neighbouring states, unless when the publick business required it,
lest they should be infected with their vices. Agriculture, and such
mechanick trades as were absolutely necessary for their subsistence, he
confined to their slaves the Helots; but he banished all those arts
which tended either to debase the mind, or enervate the body. Musick he
encouraged, and poetry he admitted, but both subject to the inspection
of the magistrates.[8] Thus by the equal partition of the lands, and the
abolition of gold and silver money, he at once preserved his country
from luxury, avarice, and all those evils which arise from an irregular
indulgence of the passions, as well as all contentions about property,
with their consequence, vexatious lawsuits.
To ensure the observance of his laws to the latest posterity, he next
formed proper regulations for the education of their children, which he
esteemed one of the greatest duties of a legislator. His grand maxim was
"that children were the property of the state, to whom alone their
education was to be intrusted." In their first infancy, the nurses were
instructed to indulge them neither in their diet, nor in those little
froward humours which are so peculiar to that age; to inure them to bear
cold and fasting; to conquer their first fears by accustoming them to
solitude and darkness; and to prepare them for that stricter state of
discipline, to which they were soon to be initiated.
When arrived at the age of seven years, they were taken from the nurses,
and placed in their proper classes. The diet and clothing of all were
the same, just sufficient to support nature, and defend them from the
inclemency of the seasons; and they all lodged alike in the same
dormitory on beds of reeds, to which for the sake of warmth they were
all allowed in winter to add the down of thistles. Their sports and
exercises were such as contributed to render their limbs supple, and
their bodies compact and firm. They were accustomed to run up the
steepest rocks barefoot; and swimming, dancing, hunting, boxing, and
wrestling, were their constant diversions. Lycurgus was equally
solicitous in training up the youth to a habit of passive courage as
well as active. They were taught to despise pain no less than danger,
and to bear the severest scourgings with the most invincible constancy
and resolution. For to flinch under the strokes, or to exhibit the least
sign of any sense of pain, was deemed highly infamous.
Nor were the minds of the Spartan youth cultivated with less care. Their
learning, as Plutarch informs us, was sufficient for their occasions,
for Lycurgus admitted nothing but what was truly useful. They carefully
instilled into their tender minds the great duties of religion, and the
sacred indispensable obligation of an oath, and trained them up in the
best of sciences, the principles of wisdom and virtue. The love of
their country seemed to be almost innate; and this leading maxim, "that
every Spartan was the property of his country, and had no right over
himself," was by the force of education incorporated into their very
nature.
When they arrived to manhood they were enrolled in their militia, and
allowed to be present in their publick assemblies: privileges which only
subjected them to a different discipline. For the employments and way of
living of the citizens of Sparta were fixed, and settled by as strict
regulations as in an army upon actual service. When they took the field,
indeed, the rigour of their discipline with respect to diet and the
ornament of their persons was much softened, so that the Spartans were
the only people in the universe, to whom the toils of war afforded ease
and relaxation. In fact, Lycurgus's plan of civil government was
evidently designed to preserve his country free and independent, and to
form the minds of his citizens for the enjoyment of that rational and
manly happiness, which can find no place in a breast enslaved by the
pleasures of the senses, or ruffled by the passions; and the military
regulations which he established, were as plainly calculated for the
protection of his country from the encroachments of her ambitious
neighbours.[9] For he left no alternative to his people, but death or
victory; and he laid them under a necessity of observing those
regulations, by substituting the valour of the inhabitants in the place
of walls and fortifications for the defence of their city.
If we reflect that human nature is at all times and in all places the
same, it seems to the last degree astonishing, how Lycurgus could be
able to introduce such a self-denying plan of discipline amongst a
disorderly licentious people: a scheme, which not only levelled at once
all distinction, as to property, between the richest and the poorest
individual, but compelled the greatest persons in the state to submit to
a regimen which allowed only the bare necessaries of life, excluding
every thing which in the opinion of mankind seems essential to its
comforts and enjoyments. I observed before that he had secured the
esteem and confidence of his countrymen, and there was, besides, at that
time a very lucky concurrence of circumstances in his favour. The two
kings were men of little spirit, and less abilities, and the people were
glad to exchange their disorderly state for any settled form of
government. By his establishment of a senate consisting of thirty
persons who held their seats for life, and to whom he committed the
supreme power in civil affairs, he brought the principal nobility into
his scheme, as they naturally expected a share in a government which
they plainly saw inclined so much to an aristocracy. Even the two kings
very readily accepted seats in his senate, to secure some degree of
authority. He awed the people into obedience by the sanction he procured
for his scheme from the oracle at Delphos, whose decisions were, at that
time, revered by all Greece as divine and infallible. But the greatest
difficulty he had to encounter was to procure the equal partition of the
lands. The very first proposal met with so violent an opposition from
the men of fortune, that a fray ensued, in which Lycurgus lost one of
his eyes. But the people, struck with the sight of the blood of this
admired legislator, seized the offender, one Alcander, a young man of a
hot, but not disingenuous disposition, and gave him up to Lycurgus to be
punished at discretion. But the humane and generous behaviour of
Lycurgus quickly made a convert of Alcander, and wrought such a change,
that from an enemy he became his greatest admirer and advocate with the
people.
Plutarch and the rest of the Greek historians leave us greatly in the
dark as to the means by which Lycurgus was able to make so bitter a
pill, as the division of property, go down with the wealthy part of his
countrymen. They tell us indeed, that he carried his point by the gentle
method of reasoning and persuasion, joined to that religious awe which
the divine sanction of the oracle impressed so deeply on the minds of
the citizens. But the cause, in my opinion, does not seem equal to the
effect. For the furious opposition which the rich made to the very
first motion for such a distribution of property, evinces plainly, that
they looked upon the responses of the oracle as mere priestcraft, and
treated it as the _esprits-forts_ have done religion in modern times; I
mean as a state engine fit only to be played off upon the common people.
It seems most probable, in my opinion, that as he effected the change in
the constitution by the distribution of the supreme power amongst the
principal persons, when he formed his senate; so the equal partition of
property was the bait thrown out to bring over the body of the people
entirely to his interest. I should rather think that he compelled the
rich to submit to so grating a measure, by the assistance of the poorer
citizens, who were vastly the majority.
As soon as Lycurgus had thoroughly settled his new polity, and by his
care and assiduity imprinted his laws so deeply in the minds and manners
of his countrymen, that he judged the constitution able to support
itself, and stand upon its own bottom, his last scheme was to fix, and
perpetuate its duration down to latest posterity, as far as human
prudence and human means could effect it. To bring his scheme to bear,
he had again recourse to the same pious artifice which had succeeded so
well in the beginning. He told the people in a general assembly, that he
could not possibly put the finishing stroke to his new establishment,
which was the most essential point, until he had again consulted the
oracle. As they all expressed the greatest eagerness for his undertaking
the journey, he laid hold of so fair an opportunity to bind the kings,
senate, and people, by the most solemn oaths, to the strict observance
of his new form of government, and not to attempt the least alteration
in any one particular until his return from Delphos. He had now
completed the great design which he had long in view, and bid an eternal
adieu to his country. The question he put to the oracle was "whether the
laws he had already established, were rightly formed to make and
preserve his countrymen virtuous and happy?" The answer he received was
just as favourable as he desired. It was "that his laws were excellently
well calculated for that purpose; and that Sparta should continue to be
the most renowned city in the world, as long as her citizens persisted
in the observance of the laws of Lycurgus." He transmitted both the
question and the answer home to Sparta in writing, and devoted the
remainder of his life to voluntary banishment. The accounts in history
of the end of this great man are very uncertain. Plutarch affirms, that
as his resolution was never to release his countrymen from the
obligation of the oath he had laid them under, he put a voluntary end to
his life at Delphos by fasting. Plutarch extols the death of Lycurgus in
very pompous terms, as a most unexampled instance of heroic patriotism,
since he bequeathed, as he terms it, his death to his country, as the
perpetual guardian to that happiness, which he had procured for them
during his lifetime. Yet the same historian acknowledges another
tradition, that Lycurgus ended his days in the island of Crete, and
desired, as his last request, that his body should be burnt, and his
ashes thrown into the sea;[10] lest, if his remains should at any time
be carried back to Sparta, his countrymen might look upon themselves as
released from their oath as much as if he had returned alive, and be
induced to alter his form of government. I own, I prefer this latter
account, as more agreeable to the genius and policy of that wise and
truly disinterested legislator.
The Spartans, as Plutarch asserts, held the first rank in Greece for
discipline and reputation full five hundred years, by strictly adhering
to the laws of Lycurgus; which not one of their kings ever infringed for
fourteen successions quite down to the reign of the first Agis. For he
will not allow the creation of those magistrates called the ephori, to
be any innovation in the constitution, since he affirms it to have been,
"not a relaxation, but an extension, of the civil polity."[11] But
notwithstanding the gloss thrown over the institution of the ephori by
this nice distinction of Plutarch's, it certainly induced as fatal a
change into the Spartan constitution, as the tribuneship of the people,
which was formed upon that model, did afterwards into the Roman. For
instead of enlarging and strengthening the aristocratical power, as
Plutarch asserts, they gradually usurped the whole government, and
formed themselves into a most tyrannical oligarchy.
The ephori (a Greek word signifying inspectors or overseers) were five
in number, and elected annually by the people out of their own body. The
exact time of the origin of this institution and of the authority
annexed to their office, is quite uncertain. Herodotus ascribes it to
Lycurgus; Xenophon to Lycurgus jointly with the principal citizens of
Sparta. Aristotle and Plutarch fix it under the reign of Theopompus and
Polydorus, and attribute the institution expressly to the former of
those princes about one hundred and thirty years after the death of
Lycurgus. I cannot but subscribe to this opinion as the most probable,
because the first political contest we meet with at Sparta happened
under the reign of those princes, when the people endeavoured to extend
their privileges beyond the limits prescribed by Lycurgus. But as the
joint opposition of the kings and senate was equally warm, the creation
of this magistracy out of the body of the people, seems to have been the
step taken at that time to compromise the affair, and restore the
publick tranquility: a measure which the Roman senate copied afterwards,
in the erection of the tribuneship, when their people mutinied, and made
that memorable secession to the _mons sacer_. I am confirmed in this
opinion by the relation which Aristotle gives us of a remarkable dispute
between Theopompus and his wife upon that occasion.[12] The queen much
dissatisfied with the institution of the ephori, reproached her husband
greatly for submitting to such a diminution of the regal authority, and
asked him if he was not ashamed to transmit the crown to his posterity
so much weaker and worse circumstanced, than he received it from his
father. His answer, which is recorded amongst the laconick _bons mots_,
was, "no, for I transmit it more lasting."[13] But the event showed that
the lady was a better politician, as well as truer prophet, than her
husband. Indeed the nature of their office, the circumstances of their
election, and the authority they assumed, are convincing proofs that
their office was first extorted, and their power afterwards gradually
extended, by the violence of the people, irritated too probably by the
oppressive behaviour of the kings and senate. For whether their power
extended no farther than to decide, when the two kings differed in
opinion, and to overrule in favour of him whose sentiments should be
most conducive to the publick interest, as we are told by Plutarch in
the life of Agis; or whether they were at first only select friends,
whom the kings appointed as deputies in their absence, when they were
both compelled to take the field together in their long wars with the
Messenians, as the same author tells us by the mouth of his hero
Cleomenes, is a point, which history does not afford us light enough to
determine. This however is certain, from the concurrent voice of all the
ancient historians, that at last they not only seized upon every branch
of the administration, but assumed the power of imprisoning, deposing,
and even putting their kings to death by their own authority. The kings
too, in return, sometimes bribed, sometimes deposed or murdered the
ephori, and employed their whole interest to procure such persons to be
elected, as they judged would be most tractable. I look therefore on the
creation of the ephori as a breach in the Spartan constitution, which
proved the first inlet to faction and corruption. For that these evils
took rise from the institution of the ephori is evident from the
testimony of Aristotle, "who thought it extremely impolitick to elect
magistrates, vested with the supreme power in the state, out of the body
of the people;[14] because it often happened, that men extremely
indigent were raised in this manner to the helm, whom their very poverty
tempted to become venal. For the ephori, as he affirms, had not only
been frequently guilty of bribery before his time, but, even at the very
time he wrote, some of those magistrates, corrupted by money, used their
utmost endeavours, at the publick repasts, to accomplish the destruction
of the whole city. He adds too, that as their power was so great as to
amount to a perfect tyranny, the kings themselves were necessitated to
court their favour by such methods as greatly hurt the constitution,
which from an aristocracy degenerated into an absolute democracy. For
that magistracy alone had engrossed the whole government."
From these remarks of the judicious Aristotle, it is evident that the
ephori had totally destroyed the balance of power established by
Lycurgus. From the tyranny therefore of this magistracy proceeded those
convulsions which so frequently shook the state of Sparta, and at last
gradually brought on its total subversion. But though this fatal
alteration in the Spartan constitution must be imputed to the intrigues
of the ephori and their faction, yet it could never, in my opinion, have
been effected without a previous degeneracy in their manners; which must
have been the consequence of some deviation from the maxims of Lycurgus.
It appears evidently from the testimony of Polybius and Plutarch, that
the great scheme of the Spartan legislator was, to provide for the
lasting security of his country against all foreign invasions, and to
perpetuate the blessings of liberty and independency to the people. By
the generous plan of discipline which he established, he rendered his
countrymen invincible at home. By banishing gold and silver, and
prohibiting commerce and the use of shipping, he proposed to confine
the Spartans within the limits of their own territories; and by taking
away the means, to repress all desires of making conquests upon their
neighbours. But the same love of glory and of their country which made
them so terrible in the field, quickly produced ambition and a lust of
domination; and ambition as naturally opened the way for avarice and
corruption. For Polybius truly observes, that as long as they extended
their views no farther than the dominion over their neighbouring states,
the produce of their own country was sufficient for what supplies they
had occasion for in such short excursions.[15] But when, in direct
violation of the laws of Lycurgus, they began to undertake more distant
expeditions both by sea and land, they quickly felt the want of a
publick fund to defray their extraordinary expenses. For they found by
experience, that neither their iron money, nor their method of trucking
the annual produce of their own lands for such commodities as they
wanted (which was the only traffick allowed by the laws of Lycurgus)
could possibly answer their demands upon those occasions. Hence their
ambition, as the same historian remarks, laid them under the scandalous
necessity of paying servile court to the Persian monarchs for pecuniary
supplies and subsidies, to impose heavy tributes upon the conquered
islands, and to exact money from the other Grecian states, as occasions
required.
Historians unanimously agree, that wealth with its attendants, luxury
and corruption, gained admission at Sparta in the reign of the first
Agis. Lysander, alike a hero and a politician; a man of the greatest
abilities and the greatest dishonesty that Sparta ever produced;
rapacious after money, which at the same time he despised, and a slave
only to ambition, was the author of an innovation so fatal to the
manners of his countrymen. After he had enabled his country to give law
to all Greece by his conquest of Athens, he sent home that immense mass
of wealth, which the plunder of so many states had put into his
possession. The most sensible men amongst the Spartans, dreading the
fatal consequences of this capital breach of the institutions of their
legislator, protested strongly before the ephori against the
introduction of gold and silver, as pests destructive to the publick.
The ephori referred it to the decision of the senate, who, dazzled with
the lustre of that money, to which until that time they had been utter
strangers, decreed "that gold and silver money might be admitted for the
service of the state; but made it death, if any should ever be found in
the possession of a private person." This decision Plutarch censures as
weak and sophistical.[16] As if Lycurgus was only afraid simply of
money, and not of that dangerous love of money which is generally its
concomitant; a passion which was so far from being rooted out by the
restraint laid upon private persons, that it was rather inflamed by the
esteem and value which was set upon money by the publick. Thus, as he
justly remarks, whilst they barred up the houses of private citizens
against the entrance of wealth by the terror and safeguard of the law,
they left their minds more exposed to the love of money and the
influence of corruption, by raising an universal admiration and desire
of it, as something great and respectable. The truth of this remark
appears by the instance given us by Plutarch, of one Thorax, a great
friend of Lysander's, who was put to death by the ephori, upon proof
that a quantity of silver had been actually found in his possession.
From that time Sparta became venal, and grew extremely fond of subsidies
from foreign powers. Agesilaus, who succeeded Agis, and was one of the
greatest of their kings, behaved in the latter part of his life more
like the captain of a band of mercenaries, than a king of Sparta. He
received a large subsidy from Tachos, at that time king of Egypt, and
entered into his service with a body of troops which he had raised for
that purpose. But when Nectanabis, who had rebelled against his uncle
Tachos, offered him more advantageous terms, he quitted the unfortunate
monarch and went over to his rebellious nephew, pleading the interest of
his country in excuse for so treacherous and infamous an action.[17] So
great a change had the introduction of money already made in the
manners of the leading Spartans!
Plutarch dates the first origin of corruption, that disease of the body
politick, and consequently the decline of Sparta, from that memorable
period, when the Spartans having subverted the domination of Athens,
glutted themselves (as he terms it) with gold and silver.[18] For when
once the love of money had crept into their city, and avarice and the
most sordid meanness grew up with the possession, as luxury, effeminacy
and dissipation did with the enjoyment of wealth, Sparta was deprived of
many of her ancient glories and advantages, and sunk greatly both in
power and reputation, until the reign of Agis and Leonidas.[19] But as
the original allotments of land were yet preserved (the number of which
Lycurgus had fixed and decreed to be kept by a particular law) and were
transmitted down from father to son by hereditary succession, the same
constitutional order and equality still remaining, raised up the state
again, however, from other political lapses.
Under the reign of those two kings happened the mortal blow, which
subverted the very foundation of their constitution. Epitadeus, one of
the ephori, upon a quarrel with his son, carried his resentment so far
as to procure a law which permitted every one to alienate their
hereditary lands, either by gift or sale, during their lifetime, or by
will at their decease. This law produced a fatal alteration in the
landed property. For as Leonidas, one of their kings, who had lived a
long time at the court of Seleucus, and married a lady of
|
while he stirred the
meal with a wooden spoon, with all his might and main. Oh, how good it
smelt! Phil almost wished he was a chicken.
They went out, and Essie called, “Chick, chick: here, chick, chick.” In
a moment there was such a scuttling, and clucking, and running! Up they
rushed by dozens; and as Phil threw great spoonfuls of the meal, how
they did scratch, and snatch, and give each other sudden sly pecks! It
was very funny, Phil thought, and he and Essie laughed merrily; but only
funny, I am sure they would say, for _chickens_. I do not think any one
will ever try to teach chickens or pigs to eat with knives and forks, and
say, “If you please,” and “Thank you,” for what they get; but you will
all agree that neatness and politeness at the table are expected as a
matter of course from well-bred _children_.
And now the sun had set, like a king gone to repose, with his crimson and
gold curtains closing round him. In the gorgeous light little Essie stood
looking at the west, the red clouds tinging her pale cheeks with a faint
blush, and shedding a warm glow over her yellow curling hair.
“Oh, Phil,” she murmured, “how kind God is to make us such a beautiful
world. Thank you, dear Father in heaven,” she continued, folding her
small hands reverently, and looking upwards; then turning to Philip,
“_You_ say your prayers. _You_ love Jesus, don’t you?”
The color rushed into his face, and every nerve in him thrilled, as he
looked at the lovely child and heard her words. In a hoarse, broken
voice, he answered—
“I haven’t said prayers for a long time.”
“Oh, Phil, how dreadful! when our Saviour loves you so much, and begs you
to bring all your troubles to Him. What made you? Did you forget?”
“I don’t know. I suppose so,” said Phil, looking down.
She went close up to him, and leaning on her crutches, curled her arms
round his neck, and whispered—
“Pray to-night, dear Phil, will you?”
A great sob rose in his throat. With a terribly painful effort, he choked
it down, for he was too proud to cry before a girl, and he managed to
say, “I’ll try,” to Essie, whom God seemed to have chosen as His little
minister to lead Phil back to Him.
Just then a lumbering farm wagon came in sight. In it was just the
pleasantest-looking old man that ever was seen, with long snow-white hair
and blue eyes, still, clear, and bright.
“Well, little bonny bird,” he said to Essie, “do you know I have promised
to catch you up, and carry you off?”
“Do you mean to lock me up in a fairy palace?” asked Essie, laughing.
“I am to take you to a great big man, who will snap you up, put you in
his wagon, and hold you fast, so that you cannot escape.”
“Did the big man call me his ‘Little Essie?’”
“This is what he said: ‘Farmer Hardy, I’ve got to turn off about two
miles from home, on some business. You’ll be going past my house; won’t
you stop and bring my little Essie, on your way home? I will be at
the cross-roads and meet you, and get my white lamb, and take her back
again.’”
[Illustration: Little Essie going to meet her father.]
“It’s _dear_ father,” said Essie, and she laid down her crutches, and was
tenderly lifted into the wagon, and bidding Phil “good-by” for an hour,
drove off with good old Farmer Hardy, talking pleasantly with him.
And poor Phil was left behind lamenting; for it seemed as if it grew
suddenly dark, as the sound of the wheels got faint and fainter, and at
last died quite away. Then he went to the end of the crooked lane, and
climbed into the fork of a tree to watch for Essie’s return.
You may be sure, when the dear little child was met by her father, and
lovingly placed close beside him for the pleasant ride home, she told him
how good Phil had been all day, at which Farmer Goodfellow looked very
much pleased; and when he and Essie got to where the tree was in which
Phil had perched himself, he was told to jump into the wagon, and they
all came down the crooked lane, just as the stars were peeping out, three
very happy people.
I don’t think you would have known Phil for the same boy, had you seen
how he flew round, giving the horses their supper, putting them in their
comfortable stalls, and dragging at the wagon, with, the help of the farm
man, to get it safely housed. The boys at the school would certainly
have declared that it could not be “Philip Badboy,” but a sensible,
industrious fellow called Philip Wiseman.
And the farmer showed how much he was gratified, by giving him a
seat next his own at the table, and letting Essie help him twice to
apple-sauce.
“I dare say,” said the farmer, “you will like farming better than Greek
and Latin; while my son John is all for books. Learning suits _him_ to a
T.”
Phil blushed deeply, and hung down his head.
“Never mind,” said the farmer; “you’ve got your good points too.
To-morrow is Sunday. After you have done your stable-work, you can go to
church, and if you listen to our good parson, you can’t help improving.”
That night Philip knelt down in his lonely garret, and asked God to
forgive his many sins, for Jesus’ sake. His face was wet with penitent
tears when he rose, and God heard his prayer, and saw the tears.
* * * * *
Let us go back to the school. You would have thought that Johnny
Goodfellow, who was left in place of Philip Badboy, wore a fairy talisman
outside of his heart, which made everybody love him, so great a favorite
did he become almost immediately. Yes, he wore a charm; but it was
_inside_ his heart, and it was called LOVE. Do you know, darling little
reader, whom _I_ love with all my heart—that in that sublime chapter
in Corinthians which tells about Charity, it is _Love_ which is meant?
The word in the original is “Love;” but for good reasons, and so as not
to be misunderstood—because this word “love” has not always a divine
meaning—the translator chose the word “Charity.” And now, whenever you
read the beautiful chapter, which I hope you do very often, and, what is
more, _practise its heaven-sent lessons_, always think that “Charity”
means the purest “Love.”
How the little fellow did study! It seemed as if he could not say his
lessons wrong if he tried; and in play hours, he frolicked at such a
rate with his particular friend Kriss Luff, who clung to him from the
very first day, that he did not lose his bright rosy cheeks, as his good
mother had feared. He wrote her a long letter once a week, sending
many loving messages to his father and darling sister Essie, and not
forgetting Phil. And once, when a travelling photographic gallery came up
to the school, he had himself taken with his arm round his friend Kriss’s
neck; and he particularly requested that Kriss should be looking at his
watch at the moment, as it would seem such a grand thing, he said, for a
boy to have one.
Johnny learned to construe Latin in such a surprisingly short time, that
Dr. Gradus forgot one morning to be as pompous as usual, and tapping his
new scholar on the back, told him he was an honor to the school, and said
he was quite a “multum in parvo,” which, I am certain, meant a great
compliment, for Johnny colored deeply, while an expression of delight
illumined his features. It is a very majestic thing to praise people in
Latin; but for my part, I wish Dr. Gradus had talked English, don’t you?
If you can find out what “multum in parvo” means, just write it to me in
a dear little letter, directed to the care of Mr. Sheldon.
Of course Johnny told Kriss all about his sister Essie; how pretty and
good she was, and how she had to walk with crutches, because she had
hurt her knee when she was a little bit of a thing, and the leg that was
injured never grew any more, at which Kriss was dreadfully sorry, and
sent his love to her, and a funny little picture, in an envelope, of
a boy who was pulling out the nose of his sister’s india-rubber doll,
and making it at least half a yard long. And Essie, in return, sent him
a great gingerbread cake, which she helped to make herself, and Kriss
had what he called “a public dinner” off of it, and made a fine speech,
standing on top of the pump in the play-ground; after which he cut a
slice of cake for every boy, all elegantly arranged on cabbage leaves for
plates, upon receiving which they gave him three perfectly tremendous
cheers, and in five minutes more every single crumb had disappeared.
And Johnny kept rosy and fat, although he really seemed to live on
geography, the multiplication table, and the Latin grammar; but he could
play too; for Kriss declared that he could run faster, jump higher, swim
longer, and shout louder than any other fellow in the school, which was
very remarkable, for some of the boys could run like lamplighters, jump
like kangaroos, swim dog-fashion and crab-fashion, dive like stones,
float like feathers, stand on their heads under water and bow, to you
with their feet, and as to shouting, I only wish you could hear them
once—that’s all.
* * * * *
All the boys agreed that Johnny made the very best back of them all at
leap-frog,—so strong and square, with his hands firmly planted on his
knees, and looking between his legs with his round face upside down.
Then he was a capital hand at mending broken-down drums, toy-carts,
horses, and all manner of playthings. The little boys in the school would
bring them to him, and, first hugging him, would coax him to “make them
as good as new,” until he declared that the little closet in his room
was a perfect hospital, of which he was the doctor, and a jack-knife and
Spalding’s glue the medicines.
And such wonderful kites as he could make! They quite astonished the
whole neighborhood, birds and all. A famous one which he made was, as he
declared, a genuine portrait of a round-shouldered, bullet-headed member
of Congress he had seen, whose brains being made of feathers, were just
the very ones to go off in a high wind, at a tangent, and never touch any
sensible thing, or cut even a curve in the air, much less a difficult
question. So the member of Congress was painted on an immense sheet of
tissue paper, and furnished with an exceedingly long tail, made of scraps
of cotton-wadding tied on a string at intervals of four inches, and so
light that it balanced his brains to perfection. When he was finished,
he was dubbed “The Honorable Mr. Kite;” and many a fine day did the
honorable gentleman air his feather-brains over the broad fields, and
look down with his stupid fat face at the delighted boys, who all took
turns in giving him a “flier.”
[Illustration: The Hon. Mr. Kite.]
But perhaps the very best of Johnny’s social accomplishments came out
on rainy days, when he told stories without end, so excellent was his
memory of what he had read or heard; and the bright play of his features
added so much to the interest, that the boys declared, when they came to
read the very same stories in books, as sometimes happened, they did not
seem one quarter as good. I really feel tempted to tell you one of them,
though, like the boys, you will lose three-quarters of the interest
because you do not get it direct from him. Shall I.
Aunt Fanny had read thus far in her manuscript, when she paused, looked
up, and repeated, “Shall I?”
“Oh, yes! yes! if you please,” cried all the children.
“But it won’t seem more than a quarter as entertaining.”
“Oh, you funny Aunt Fanny! you know we shall like it just as well—better.
But tell us, did _you_ hear that jolly Johnny Goodfellow tell a story?”
“Of course I did,” she answered, “and this is the way he did it. First,
let’s all sit down on the carpet.”
You would have thought that each of the children had been presented with
a fine present, they received this proposition with such delight and
so many chuckles. Down they all got in a bunch, with Aunt Fanny in the
midst. Then she clasped her hands over her knees, made her mouth into
a button-hole, and looked up at a corner of the ceiling, pretending to
think. She looked so long, that Fred, full of Johnny Goodfellow and his
story, quite forgot he was speaking to Aunt Fanny, and shouted—
“Come, old fellow! we’re all waiting; why don’t you begin?”
Then suddenly remembering himself, he turned as red as scarlet, and
stammered out—
“Oh, I didn’t mean—— I beg your pardon.”
The button-hole mouth broke loose, and Aunt Fanny burst out laughing, as
she said—
“That was just what I wanted. Now, attention, squad! Aunt Fanny has
jumped over the moon, and Johnny Goodfellow is here in her place to tell
you the wonderful tale, a good deal altered, which he read in an English
magazine, called
“BROTHER BOB’S BEAR.”
Once upon a time, a Yankee farmer found he had such a lot of children,
that they cost him more than they were worth. So he concluded to emigrate
out West, where the old ones could shoot game and plant corn and keep out
of mischief, and the young ones could laugh and grow fat by rolling on
the prairies and eating hasty-pudding.
He found that he was well enough off, when he got to his new home, to
build a very aristocratic log-house. Very few, you know, have more than
one room, while his had three—all elegantly ceiled with hemlock-bark,
with the smooth side out—quite gorgeous, you may believe.
It was in May that he moved, and the whole summer was before the children
to frolic in, and have a grand good time; and the eldest brother, Bob,
began the game by shooting a bear who wanted to hug him. You know a
bear’s hug is a remarkably tight squeeze, and generally takes your breath
away for good. So Bob declined the honor, and popped a bullet in the
bear’s cranium, and carried home in his arms a perfect little darling of
a cub, for the poor bear was a mother.
Oh, what a welcome the little cub got! It was hugged and kissed all
round; and Bob, congratulating himself that it was too young to mourn
long for the loss of its mother, solemnly declared that he intended to be
a mother to it for the rest of its life. And he kept his word.
The cub, who was named Moses, slept with Bob, always laying his nose in
a sentimental manner over Bob’s shoulder. He grew very fast; you could
almost see him grow; and there really seemed no end to the bread and milk
and mush and butter he would eat.
The first winter he was kind of numb and stupid, and spent a great deal
of time in sleeping and sucking his paws. But when the warm weather came
on, he was the happiest little bear in the world, following Brother Bob
about like a dog, and only miserable when he lost sight of his master. He
always woke him in the morning; and as the bear liked to get up early,
you see he was quite a blessing to Bob in this respect, as getting up
early, according to the proverb, is one of the sure and certain ways of
becoming healthy, wealthy, and wise. I always feel the wisdom sprouting
out all over me when I get up very early in the morning; but I’m afraid
I should spend all the extra money I made by early rising in buying an
extra breakfast, for it also makes me so tremendously hungry.
Well, one day Brother Bob had to go a long journey to buy material for
building a frame house, of a man who had a saw-mill. Moses could not
accompany him; and this was a dreadful affliction. Bob had to steal away;
and when the bear found he had gone, he commenced a search for him. He
went to Bob’s bed, and, beginning at the head, poked his nose under the
sheets and blankets, and gravely travelled down till he came out at the
foot; then he turned and slowly marched up again. He kept this up by
the hour, never stopping till he was shut out of the room. He then took
possession of all Bob’s clothes he could find, and got as far as he could
push into the legs of the trousers and arms of the coats, still hoping
that his beloved master would be found in some of the dark corners; and
Bob’s mother, half distracted at seeing the clothes tearing with such
rough usage, got them away with great difficulty, and locked them up in a
wardrobe.
Then Moses, with tears in his eyes, and grunting with grief, managed to
climb to the top of the wardrobe, and seized a large Bible which rested
there, and, curling himself up into a round ball, dropped on the floor,
hugging the Bible fast. Bob’s mother tried to get this away, but the bear
showed fight for the first time, and kicked out his hind legs, and gave
sly dabs at the broomstick with which she was beating him; but he held
the book tight, and Bob’s mother had to give up, and come off second
best; and what’s more, the bear knew it, and made use of his triumph
afterward.
When Bob came back, the bear fairly danced for joy, dropping the Bible,
and showing his contempt for Bob’s mother by taking the butter from the
tea-table and eating it before her eyes. His master gave him a good
drubbing for stealing, and he submitted to it with perfect indifference,
for his dear master might do as he pleased; but when he was not present,
butter and honey, and sugar and molasses, were all taken with the utmost
coolness; and the poor old lady could not help herself, for he had now
grown so large and strong that she was afraid of him.
“Oh, Bob,” she said, one day, “your bear is the plague of my life.”
“Now, mother,” he answered, “you have only got to be resolute, and show
that you are not afraid of him.”
“But I _am_ afraid of him, and he will do me some dreadful harm yet.”
“Give him a taste of hot poker, mother, and he’ll never bother you again.”
“Oh, Bob!” she exclaimed, “I would not do that for the world!”
And so the bear had his own way, and became a very tyrannical member of
the family, till something happened which did more than even a mother’s
remonstrances.
For Brother Bob fell in love. Just at this time the Yankee farmer got
a neighbor—a very near one for the West, only five miles off—and this
neighbor had a pretty daughter, seventeen years old; so what does Bob,
who, I forgot to tell you, was nineteen years old—what does he do but
fall so head over ears in love, that he declared she was the prettiest
and best girl in the whole universe, which _I_ think was saying a great
deal.
But Susan (that was her name) treated Brother Bob shamefully. She played
tricks upon him; she made fun of him before his face, and kept him
perfectly miserable; and declared, moreover, that she did not care half
an ear of corn for him. Here was a pretty state of things! for even the
bear could not comfort the poor fellow.
But one day Susan and a younger sister came to take tea with Bob’s
mother. They had never seen Moses, and did not know of his existence.
Bob shut the bear up in his room, in compliment to the guests, and the
afternoon passed off very pleasantly; that is, to all but Moses, who was
highly disgusted at being locked in.
When the time came for Susan and her sister to leave, Bob prepared to see
them home through the path in the woods. He ran into his room for his
hat, never thinking of Moses, and left the door open, and came quickly
out of the house, as Susan, with her teazing ways, had already started.
Down rushed the bear after him, out of the door, up to Bob, seized him
in his arms, and hugged him, in his joy, in a way frightful to behold;
and Susan, turning, saw Bob in this terrible embrace. She screamed; oh,
how she screamed! and instead of running away, _she rushed right up to
the bear_, and tried to pull him off, crying and sobbing, “Oh, Bob! dear,
dear Bob! you will be killed!” and then fell fainting to the ground.
Ha! ha! Miss Susan, you were found out! But Bob behaved very well; for he
caught her in his arms, and said—
“Dear Susan, he is a tame bear; do not be afraid.”
The poor girl looked like a broken white lily, trembling at the bear, and
ashamed that she had showed Brother Bob how much she cared for him; and
when she had recovered her wits, she cried out piteously—
“Oh, I will never come here again!”
“Yes, you will!” said Bob, “now that I know you like me. I’ll banish the
bear, or put him in prison, or do any thing you wish.”
It was wonderful how many faults Bob discovered that the poor bear had
after this; and one day when he snatched a pudding from the plate in the
very hands of Bob’s mother, as she was taking it to the table, he made up
his mind that Moses must be chained.
So the bear was fastened to a surveyor’s chain, made tight to a stake in
the ground. He immediately began walking in a circle round the stake,
at the extreme length of the chain, always turning a somerset at one
particular point, and only stopping to eat, or look reproachfully at Bob
when he came that way. Why he wanted to exercise in this very peculiar
fashion, tumbling head over heels at one spot every time he went around,
is a good deal more than I know; but I believe all bears who are chained
act in this comical way, though it can’t be much fun to them.
This was all very well in the daytime, but sure as night came, Moses
broke his chain, and did his best to get back into his master’s bedroom.
Poor fellow! he so wanted to lie at the foot of Bob’s bed, hugging an old
vest. And at last they had to build a prison for him of logs, with a roof
of boards kept on by heavy stones.
The very first night the poor bear was put in this den, he raised the
boards off the roof in his desperate struggle to get out and see his
beloved master. He got his head out, and then, oh! ah! alas! hung by his
neck, and was choked to death—a martyr to his great love for Brother Bob.
You may be sure, Bob’s mother was rather glad, but, old as he was, Bob
could not help shedding a few tears for his clumsy, ugly pet. He got a
new and pretty pet before long; and so it came to pass that the farmer
and all his family soon gave up bewailing the tragical end of
BROTHER BOB’S BEAR.
* * * * *
“There!” said Aunt Fanny; “what do you think of Johnny’s story?”
“Grand!” cried the children. “We know more about bears now than we ever
did before.”
“I wish I could have a bear,” said Peter.
“Come here and I will give you a bear’s hug,” cried Fred.
He jumped upon Peter and squeezed him till both were perfectly red in
the face, and breathed in puffs. Then Fred kindly offered to give Aunt
Fanny a hug; but she, jumping up and laughing, said she had no breath to
spare. And after a good deal of skirmishing around, and making believe to
punch each other with their elbows, dancing and singing—
“There was an old woman,
Who had but one spoon,
And all she wanted
Was elbow room,
Elbow room, elbow room,—
All she wanted
Was ELBOW ROOM”—
they consented to sit down quietly to hear once more about their friend
Philip.
* * * * *
At the farm, all this time, Phil had been improving. Not steadily, for
no one becomes good all at once. He would have his fits of laziness and
sulkiness; but the ministering love and sweet example of little Essie
soon made him ashamed of himself, and try to conquer the enemy, praying
to his Father in Heaven for help. You know very well, darling children,
that our worst enemies are our evil passions and bad habits, and when
we gain a victory over them, all the angels in heaven rejoice, and then
God’s Holy Spirit descends into our hearts, sending a glow and thrill of
happiness all through us.
As Phil grew good-tempered and industrious he began bitterly to regret
the advantages he had neglected and lost while at school, and when
Johnny’s letters were read aloud, his heart would beat violently, and he
would say to himself—“Shall I ever be so smart? What a miserable foolish
fellow I have proved myself!”
One Saturday evening he went softly up to Mr. Goodfellow, and
asked—“Won’t you please tell me something about my dear father and
mother?” and then burst into tears.
“Why, Phil!” cried the farmer, “what’s the matter? Your parents are well,
and know that you are trying to be a better boy. Don’t cry. The time will
soon pass; and a little farm learning will not hurt you. If you go on as
you have done this two or three weeks past, you’ll come out all right, my
boy.”
The next morning, after his work, Phil washed and dressed himself
carefully, and went to church. His history, by this time, was pretty well
known, and the good minister, who had become quite interested in him, had
not only been to see him, but had always spoken to him kindly when he
waited in the churchyard after the service, while the farmer and his wife
talked awhile to their neighbors.
On this day, Phil went up to the good clergyman, and, blushing deeply,
stammered out, “I should like to speak to you, sir.”
“Well, my dear boy,” he answered kindly, “don’t be afraid; tell me what
I can do for you.”
“Oh, sir, if—if—you would only ask Mr. Goodfellow to let me go to evening
school. I want to learn—I do indeed.”
“Well, that is quite right; but you were at an excellent school. Why did
you not study there?”
Phil blushed more deeply than before, but he said, truthfully and
manfully, “I neglected my opportunities, sir: I would not learn; and all
the boys hated me—because I tormented them; and I did not want to do any
thing harder than to walk about with my hands in my pockets—or else to be
eating.”
“But, my child, did this kind of life make you _happy_?”
“No, sir. I grew tired of every thing, and gaped till I sometimes thought
the top of my head would crack off; and I used to wish I could sleep
all day as well as all night; but now, oh! how I wish I could go back
and study diligently—although the farmer and his wife are very kind,
and I could hardly bear to leave dear little Essie. And I want to see
my parents, and beg them to forgive me”—and here Phil’s lip quivered
painfully.
“Well, my son, I will speak to the farmer, and if he consents, you
shall come to _me_ for an hour every week-day evening and continue your
studies.”
Phil could hardly believe his ears.
“You, sir! come to you!” he exclaimed, his whole face radiant with joy.
“Oh, thank you, thank you; how can I ever thank you enough!”
He flew to the good farmer, the minister coming slower, and told him the
precious good news, ending with, “Now I shan’t grow up a dunce!”—and I am
afraid I must add that he took one or two great joyful jumps in the air,
at which the minister looked a little grave, as it was Sunday, but did
not say one word of reproof, because he knew that “boys would be boys,”
and sometimes jumped when they ought to stand as still as a mouse.
It was all settled, and the next evening, just as the stars were peeping
out, Phil shouldered his books, which, you will remember, were sent away
from the school with him, and almost ran all the way to the parsonage.
It is perfectly astonishing how easy a lesson becomes, if you resolutely
drive all other thoughts out of your mind, collect your five wits, and
set to work at your book. Phil found it so, to his great delight. The
good minister smoothed away some of the difficulties which required a
little explanation, and excited his ambition to conquer others; and not
being near so pompous as the great Dr. Gradus, though knowing quite as
much, he and Phil got on capitally together. He did not learn Greek,
Latin, and all manner of hard things, like a flash of lightning, mind
you. If I should be so absurd as to tell you this, you would know I
was writing about an impossible boy. But his mind gradually cleared up,
because he no longer ate like a glutton, and he slept like a top, and
took plenty of healthy exercise, and this has every thing to do with
intellect and brain. You know, if you have a terrible headache, or eat a
great many buckwheat cakes for breakfast, you can’t do your sums. So, if
you want to grow up a wise man or woman, try to be a healthy child, full
of good-nature, good-temper, activity, and courage. They will greatly
increase your ability to learn.
About a mile from Mr. Goodfellow’s farm was a beautiful country place,
which had lately been offered for sale, and one day, when Phil had been
almost three months in his new home, the farmer, as he drew in his chair
at the tea-table, said—
“Wife, Woodlawn is bought, and the owner is coming to take possession
next week.”
He gave his wife a peculiarly comical look as he said this, and a smile
broke over her face, but she did not ask any questions.
Phil did not care who was coming; he was so engaged with his books, and
so happy working out in the fields all day, that if he could only have
heard from his parents, he would have had nothing left to wish for.
Just at this time, also, there was a public examination at Dr. Gradus’s
school, where anybody in the company was invited to put the most puzzling
questions to the scholars. You may be sure, Johnny was always ready
with an answer, except once, when he and the whole school, and all the
company, burst out laughing, because a queer old wag of a gentleman,
seeing that Johnny was so quick and bright, came out suddenly with this—
“Look here, my fine fellow. Suppose a canal-boat heads east-nor’-west for
the horse’s tail, and has the wind abeam, with a flaw coming up in the
south, and cats’-paws showing themselves, would the captain be justified
in taking a reef in the stove-pipe, without first asking the cook?”
I said everybody burst out laughing; but I made a mistake; for Dr. Gradus
rose up majestically, and made a speech stuffed full of Latin, in which
he observed that “problems like that the gentleman had just given were
not to be found in any of _his_ books;” at which everybody nearly laughed
again—he was so solemn and pompous about a joke. I forgot to mention that
Dr. Gradus was an old bachelor, and that accounts for it.
Of course, Johnny’s father and mother were present at the examination,
with little Essie; and oh! what three proud and happy people they were,
when, at the end of it, Dr. Gradus got up to present the prizes, and
among the very first names called was Master Johannes Goodfellow. At
first they did not quite understand that it was _their_ Johnny, because
Dr. Gradus turned his Christian name into Latin, which, you know, made
it grander; and as Johannes’s face,—as he walked up, bowed, and took the
splendid book presented to him,—was perfectly radiant with happiness, I
don’t know but what the Latin had something to do with it. But when he
saw his dear father holding out his hand to him, his mother’s eyes full
of joyful tears, and Essie’s rosy lips trembling with excitement and
pride in her darling brother, he very nearly burst into tears himself;
but controlling his feelings with a strong effort, he grasped his
father’s hand for a moment, and then went back to his seat.
Kriss, Johnny’s particular friend, obtained a prize too; and after
they were all distributed, the company were invited to partake of
refreshments in the parlors, which consisted of very sour lemonade, and
such thin slices of cake, that they were all weak in the back, and fell
over double when they were taken up. Of course, nobody ought to be hungry
after such a “feast of reason” on Latin grammars, geology, mathematics,
chemistry, and I don’t know what besides—the very names of which made Dr.
Gradus smack his lips with delight. He, no doubt, would have preferred
to have dined off of Greek lexicons, with chemical sauce, instead of
plum-cake, with _comical_ sauce (that is, plenty of fun and laughing),
which you and I would much rather have, wouldn’t we?
Then Johnny introduced Kriss to his sister with great pride and delight;
and Essie’s sweet smile and soft pleasant voice won his heart, and he
immediately told Johnny, in a whisper, that his sister was _such_ a
dear little girl, and a great deal prettier than he expected, and her
lameness ought to make everybody as kind and tender as possible; and
moreover, that when he grew up to be a man, he meant to marry Essie, and
watch over her, and make her as happy as the day was long.
“Oh, delightful!” cried Johnny; “just fancy! then you’ll be my brother. I
always wished I had a brother. I don’t like the thought of finding that
cross Phil at home; it will half spoil my holidays. But we must write to
each other, Kriss; and you shall have Essie when you grow up; and then we
shall live together all our lives.”
So they parted; for after the examination there was to be a month’s
holidays; and Johnny had as much as he could do to shake hands and bid
good-by to the crowd of noisy, merry boys, every one of whom loved him.
All the teachers also shook hands, and hoped he would come back; and
Dr. Gradus, pushing up his spectacles, and clearing his throat with a
tremendous “hem,” said that Master Goodfellow quite fulfilled the promise
of his name; at which heavy joke everybody nearly died of laughter, and
all because it was the great Dr. Gradus who said it.
It was beautiful autumn weather. The leaves were just beginning to turn;
the dark green woods were flushing into gorgeous tropical beauty; and
four happy people were riding home, their hearts full of gratitude and
peace, beyond all price.
But when they drove into the crooked lane, didn’t the little brown dog
bark himself more sideways than ever before, in his frantic joy at
hearing Johnny’s voice, for it was now quite dark; and didn’t Hannah, and
the farm man, and Phil, rush out and cry
|
it, I had wondered where through this
wilderness-tangle of bush and brush the children came from to fill
it--walking through winter-snows, through summer-muds, for two,
three, four miles or more to get their meagre share of the accumulated
knowledge of the world. And the teacher! Was it the money? Could it
be when there were plenty of schools in the thickly settled districts
waiting for them? I knew of one who had come to this very school in a
car and turned right back when she saw that she was expected to live as
a boarder on a comfortless homestead and walk quite a distance and
teach mostly foreign-born children. It had been the money with her!
Unfortunately it is not the woman--nor the man either, for that
matter--who drives around in a car, that will buckle down and do this
nation’s work! I also knew there were others like myself who think this
backwoods bushland God’s own earth and second only to Paradise--but few!
And these young girls that quake at their loneliness and yet go for a
pittance and fill a mission! But was not my wife of their very number?
I started up. Peter was walking along. But here, somewhere, there led a
trail off the grade, down through the ditch, and to the northeast into
the bush which swallows it up and closes behind it. This trail needs
to be looked for even in daytime, and I was to find it at night! But by
this time starlight began to aid. Vega stood nearly straight overhead,
and Deneb and Altair, the great autumnal triangle in our skies. The
Bear, too, stood out boldly, and Cassiopeia opposite.
I drew in and got out of the buggy; and walking up to the horse’s head,
got ahold of the bridle and led him, meanwhile scrutinizing the ground
over which I stepped. At that I came near missing the trail. It was just
a darkening of the ground, a suggestion of black on the brown of the
grade, at the point where poles and logs had been pulled across with the
logging chain. I sprang down into the ditch and climbed up beyond and
felt with my foot for the dent worn into the edge of the slope, to make
sure that I was where I should be. It was right, so I led the horse
across. At once he stood on three legs again, left hindleg drawn up, and
rested.
“Well, Peter,” I said, “I suppose I have made it easy enough for you:
We have another twelve miles to make. You’ll have to get up.” But Peter
this time did not stir till I touched him a flick with my whip.
The trail winds around, for it is a logging trail, leading up to the
best bluffs, which are ruthlessly cut down by the fuel-hunters. Only
dead and half decayed trees are spared. But still young boles spring up
in astonishing numbers. Aspen and Balm predominate, though there is some
ash and oak left here and there, with a conifer as the rarest treat for
the lover of trees. It is a pitiful thing to see a Nation’s heritage
go into the discard. In France or in England it would be tended as
something infinitely precious. The face of our country as yet shows the
youth of infancy, but we make it prematurely old. The settler who should
regard the trees as his greatest pride, to be cut into as sparingly as
is compatible with the exigencies of his struggle for life--he regards
them as a nuisance to be burned down by setting wholesale fires to them.
Already there is a scarcity of fuel-wood in these parts.
Where the fires as yet have not penetrated too badly, the cutting, which
leaves only what is worthless, determines the impression the forest
makes. At night this impression is distinctly uncanny. Like gigantic
brooms, with their handles stuck into the ground, the dead wood stands
up; the underbrush crowds against it, so dense that it lies like huge
black cushions under the stars. The inner recesses form an almost
impenetrable mass of young boles of shivering aspen and scented balm.
This mass slopes down to thickets of alder, red dogwood, haw, highbush
cranberry, and honeysuckle, with wide beds of goldenrod or purple asters
shading off into the spangled meadows wherever the copses open up into
grassy glades.
Through this bush, and skirting its meadows, I drove for an hour. There
was another fork in the trail, and again I had to get out and walk on
the side, to feel with my foot for the rut where it branched to the
north. And then, after a while, the landscape opened up, the brush
receded. At last I became conscious of a succession of posts to the
right, and a few minutes later I emerged on the second east-west grade.
Another mile to the east along this grade, and I should come to the
last, homeward stretch.
Again I began to talk to the horse. “Only five miles now, Peter, and
then the night’s rest. A good drink, a good feed of oats and wild hay,
and the birds will waken you in the morning.”
The northern lights leaped into the sky just as I turned from this
east-west grade, north again, across a high bridge, to the last road
that led home. To the right I saw a friendly light, and a dog’s barking
voice rang over from the still, distant farmstead. I knew the place. An
American settler with a French sounding name had squatted down there a
few years ago.
The road I followed was, properly speaking, not a road at all, though
used for one. A deep master ditch had been cut from ten or twelve miles
north of here; it angled, for engineering reasons, so that I was going
northwest again. The ground removed from the ditch had been dumped along
its east side, and though it formed only a narrow, high, and steep dam,
rough with stones and overgrown with weeds, it was used by whoever had
to go north or south here. The next east-west grade which I was aiming
to reach, four miles north, was the second correction line that I had
to use, twenty-four miles distant from the first; and only a few hundred
yards from its corner I should be at home!
At home! All my thoughts were bent on getting home now. Five or six
hours of driving will make the strongest back tired, I am told. Mine is
not of the strongest. This road lifted me above the things that I liked
to watch. Invariably, on all these drives, I was to lose interest here
unless the stars were particularly bright and brilliant. This night I
watched the lights, it is true: how they streamed across the sky, like
driving rain that is blown into wavy streaks by impetuous wind. And they
leaped and receded, and leaped and receded again. But while I watched, I
stretched my limbs and was bent on speed. There were a few particularly
bad spots in the road, where I could not do anything but walk the
horse. So, where the going was fair, I urged him to redoubled effort. I
remember how I reflected that the horse as yet did not know we were so
near home, this being his first trip out; and I also remember, that
my wife afterwards told me that she had heard me a long while before I
came--had heard me talking to the horse, urging him on and encouraging
him.
Now I came to a slight bend in the road. Only half a mile! And sure
enough: there was the signal put out for me. A lamp in one of the
windows of the school--placed so that after I turned in on the yard, I
could not see it--it might have blinded my eye, and the going is rough
there with stumps and stones. I could not see the cottage, it stood
behind the school. But the school I saw clearly outlined against the
dark blue, star-spangled sky, for it stands on a high gravel ridge. And
in the most friendly and welcoming way it looked with its single eye
across at the nocturnal guest.
I could not see the cottage, but I knew that my little girl lay sleeping
in her cosy bed, and that a young woman was sitting there in the dark,
her face glued to the windowpane, to be ready with a lantern which
burned in the kitchen whenever I might pull up between school and house.
And there, no doubt, she had been sitting for a long while already; and
there she was destined to sit during the winter that came, on
Friday nights--full often for many and many an hour--full often till
midnight--and sometimes longer...
TWO. Fog
Peter took me north, alone, on six successive trips. We had rain, we had
snow, we had mud, and hard-frozen ground. It took us four, it took us
six, it took us on one occasion--after a heavy October snowfall--nearly
eleven hours to make the trip. That last adventure decided me. It was
unavoidable that I should buy a second horse. The roads were getting
too heavy for single driving over such a distance. This time I wanted a
horse that I could sell in the spring to a farmer for any kind of work
on the land. I looked around for a while. Then I found Dan. He was a
sorrel, with some Clyde blood in him. He looked a veritable skate of a
horse. You could lay your fingers between his ribs, and he played out
on the first trip I ever made with this newly-assembled, strange-looking
team. But when I look back at that winter, I cannot but say that again
I chose well. After I had fed him up, he did the work in a thoroughly
satisfactory manner, and he learnt to know the road far better than
Peter. Several times I should have been lost without his unerring road
sense. In the spring I sold him for exactly what I had paid; the farmer
who bought him has him to this very day [Footnote: Spring, 1919.] and
says he never had a better horse.
I also had found that on moonless nights it was indispensable for me to
have lights along. Now maybe the reader has already noticed that I am
rather a thorough-going person. For a week I worked every day after four
at my buggy and finally had a blacksmith put on the finishing touches.
What I rigged up, was as follows: On the front springs I fastened with
clamps two upright iron supports; between them with thumbscrews the
searchlight of a wrecked steam tractor which I got for a “Thank-you”
from a junk-pile. Into the buggy box I laid a borrowed acetylene
gas tank, strapped down with two bands of galvanized tin. I made the
connection by a stout rubber tube, “guaranteed not to harden in the
severest weather.” To the side of the box I attached a short piece of
bandiron, bent at an angle, so that a bicycle lamp could be slipped over
it. Against the case that I should need a handlight, I carried besides
a so-called dashboard coal-oil lantern with me. With all lamps going, it
must have been a strange outfit to look at from a distance in the dark.
I travelled by this time in fur coat and cap, and I carried a robe for
myself and blankets for the horses, for I now fed them on the road soon
after crossing the creek.
Now on the second Friday of November there had been a smell of smoke in
the air from the early morning. The marsh up north was afire--as it had
been off and on for a matter of twenty-odd years. The fire consumes
on the surface everything that will burn; the ground cools down, a new
vegetation springs up, and nobody would suspect--as there is nothing to
indicate--that only a few feet below the heat lingers, ready to leap up
again if given the opportunity In this case I was told that a man had
started to dig a well on a newly filed claim, and that suddenly he found
himself wrapped about in smoke and flames. I cannot vouch for the truth
of this, but I can vouch for the fact that the smoke of the fire was
smelt for forty miles north and that in the afternoon a combination
of this smoke (probably furnishing “condensation nuclei”) and of the
moisture in the air, somewhere along or above the lake brought about
the densest fog I had ever seen on the prairies. How it spread, I shall
discuss later on. To give an idea of its density I will mention right
here that on the well travelled road between two important towns a man
abandoned his car during the early part of the night because he lost his
nerve when his lights could no longer penetrate the fog sufficiently to
reach the road.
I was warned at noon. “You surely do not intend to go out to-night?”
remarked a lawyer-acquaintance to me at the dinner table in the hotel;
for by telephone from lake-points reports of the fog had already reached
the town. “I intend to leave word at the stable right now,” I replied,
“to have team and buggy in front of the school at four o’clock.” “Well,”
said the lawyer in getting up, “I would not; you’ll run into fog.”
And into fog I did run. At this time of the year I had at best only a
little over an hour’s start in my race against darkness. I always drove
my horses hard now while daylight lasted; I demanded from them their
very best strength at the start. Then, till we reached the last clear
road over the dam, I spared them as much as I could. I had met up with a
few things in the dark by now, and I had learned, if a difficulty arose,
how much easier it is to cope with it even in failing twilight than by
the gleam of lantern or headlight; for the latter never illumine more
than a limited spot.
So I had turned Bell’s corner by the time I hit the fog. I saw it in
front and to the right. It drew a slanting line across the road. There
it stood like a wall. Not a breath seemed to be stirring. The fog,
from a distance, appeared to rise like a cliff, quite smoothly, and it
blotted out the world beyond. When I approached it, I saw that its face
was not so smooth as it had appeared from half a mile back; nor was it
motionless. In fact, it was rolling south and west like a wave of great
viscosity. Though my senses failed to perceive the slightest breath of a
breeze, the fog was brewing and whirling, and huge spheres seemed to be
forming in it, and to roll forward, slowly, and sometimes to recede, as
if they had encountered an obstacle and rebounded clumsily. I had seen
a tidal wave, fifty or more feet high, sweep up the “bore” of a river
at the head of the Bay of Fundy. I was reminded of the sight; but here
everything seemed to proceed in a strangely, weirdly leisurely
way. There was none of that rush, of that hurry about this fog that
characterizes water. Besides there seemed to be no end to the wave
above; it reached up as far as your eye could see--now bulging in, now
out, but always advancing. It was not so slow however, as for the moment
I judged it to be; for I was later on told that it reached the town at
about six o’clock. And here I was, at five, six and a half miles from
its limits as the crow flies.
I had hardly time to take in the details that I have described before I
was enveloped in the folds of the fog. I mean this quite literally, for
I am firmly convinced that an onlooker from behind would have seen the
grey masses fold in like a sheet when I drove against them. It must have
looked as if a driver were driving against a canvas moving in a slight
breeze--canvas light and loose enough to be held in place by the
resistance of the air so as to enclose him. Or maybe I should say
“veiling” instead of canvas--or something still lighter and airier.
Have you ever seen milk poured carefully down the side of a glass vessel
filled with water? Well, clear air and fog seemed to behave towards
each other pretty much the same way as milk in that case behaves towards
water.
I am rather emphatic about this because I have made a study of just such
mists on a very much smaller scale. In that northern country where my
wife taught her school and where I was to live for nearly two years as
a convalescent, the hollows of the ground on clear cold summer nights,
when the mercury dipped down close to the freezing point, would
sometimes fill with a white mist of extraordinary density. Occasionally
this mist would go on forming in higher and higher layers by
condensation; mostly however, it seemed rather to come from below.
But always, when it was really dense, there was a definite plane of
demarcation. In fact, that was the criterion by which I recognised this
peculiar mist. Mostly there is, even in the north, a layer of lesser
density over the pools, gradually shading off into the clear air above.
Nothing of what I am going to describe can be observed in that case.
One summer, when I was living not over two miles from the lakeshore, I
used to go down to these pools whenever they formed in the right way;
and when I approached them slowly and carefully, I could dip my hand
into the mist as into water, and I could feel the coolness of the
misty layers. It was not because my hand got moist, for it did not. No
evaporation was going on there, nor any condensation either. Nor did
noticeable bubbles form because there was no motion in the mass which
might have caused the infinitesimal droplets to collide and to coalesce
into something perceivable to my senses.
Once, of a full-moon night, I spent an hour getting into a pool like
that, and when I looked down at my feet, I could not see them. But after
I had been standing in it for a while, ten minutes maybe, a clear space
had formed around my body, and I could see the ground. The heat of my
body helped the air to redissolve the mist into steam. And as I watched,
I noticed that a current was set up. The mist was continually flowing
in towards my feet and legs where the body-heat was least. And where
evaporation proceeded fastest, that is at the height of my waist, little
wisps of mist would detach themselves from the side of the funnel of
clear air in which I stood, and they would, in a slow, graceful motion,
accelerated somewhat towards the last, describe a downward and inward
curve towards the lower part of my body before they dissolved. I thought
of that elusive and yet clearly defined layer of mist that forms in
the plane of contact between the cold air flowing from Mammoth Cave
in Kentucky and the ambient air of a sultry summer day. [Footnote: See
Burroughs’ wonderful description of this phenomenon in “Riverby.”]
On another of the rare occasions when the mists had formed in the
necessary density I went out again, put a stone in my pocket and took a
dog along. I approached a shallow mist pool with the greatest caution.
The dog crouched low, apparently thinking that I was stalking some game.
Then, when I had arrived within about ten or fifteen yards from the edge
of the pool, I took the stone from my pocket, showed it to the dog, and
threw it across the pool as fast and as far as I could. The dog dashed
in and tore through the sheet. Where the impact of his body came, the
mist bulged in, then broke. For a while there were two sheets, separated
by a more or less clearly defined, vertical layer of transparency
or maybe blackness rather. The two sheets were in violent commotion,
approaching, impinging upon each other, swinging back again to complete
separation, and so on. But the violence of the motion consisted by
no means in speed: it suggested a very much retarded rolling off of a
motion picture reel. There was at first an element of disillusion in the
impression. I felt tempted to shout and to spur the mist into greater
activity. On the surface, to both sides of the tear, waves ran out, and
at the edges of the pool they rose in that same leisurely, stately
way which struck me as one of the most characteristic features of that
November mist; and at last it seemed as if they reared and reached up,
very slowly as a dying man may stand up once more before he falls. And
only after an interval that seemed unconscionably long to me the whole
pool settled back to comparative smoothness, though without its definite
plane of demarcation now. Strange to say, the dog had actually started
something, a rabbit maybe or a jumping deer, and did not return.
When fogs spread, as a rule they do so in air already saturated with
moisture. What really spreads, is the cold air which by mixing with,
and thereby cooling, the warmer, moisture-laden atmosphere causes
the condensation. That is why our fall mists mostly are formed in an
exceedingly slight but still noticeable breeze. But in the case of these
northern mist pools, whenever the conditions are favourable for their
formation, the moisture of the upper air seems to be pretty well
condensed as dew It is only in the hollows of the ground that it remains
suspended in this curious way. I cannot, so far, say whether it is due
to the fact that where radiation is largely thrown back upon the walls
of the hollow, the fall in temperature at first is very much slower
than in the open, thus enabling the moisture to remain in suspension; or
whether the hollows serve as collecting reservoirs for the cold air
from the surrounding territory--the air carrying the already condensed
moisture with it; or whether, lastly, it is simply due to a greater
saturation of the atmosphere in these cavities, consequent upon the
greater approach of their bottom to the level of the ground water. I
have seen a “waterfall” of this mist overflow from a dent in the edge of
ground that contained a pool. That seems to argue for an origin similar
to that of a spring; as if strongly moisture-laden air welled up from
underground, condensing its steam as it got chilled. It is these strange
phenomena that are familiar, too, in the northern plains of Europe which
must have given rise to the belief in elves and other weird creations of
the brain--“the earth has bubbles as the water has”--not half as weird,
though, as some realities are in the land which I love.
Now this great, memorable fog of that November Friday shared the nature
of the mist pools of the north in as much as to a certain extent it
refused to mingle with the drier and slightly warmer air into which it
travelled. It was different from them in as much as it fairly dripped
and oozed with a very palpable wetness. Just how it displaced the air in
its path, is something which I cannot with certainty say. Was it formed
as a low layer somewhere over the lake and slowly pushed along by a
gentle, imperceptible, fan-shaped current of air? Fan-shaped, I say;
for, as we shall see, it travelled simultaneously south and north; and
I must infer that in exactly the same way it travelled west. Or was it
formed originally like a tremendous column which flattened out by and
by, through its own greater gravity slowly displacing the lighter air in
the lower strata? I do not know, but I am inclined to accept the latter
explanation. I do know that it travelled at the rate of about six miles
an hour; and its coming was observed somewhat in detail by two other
observers besides myself--two people who lived twenty-five miles apart,
one to the north, one to the south of where I hit it. Neither one was as
much interested in things meteorological as I am, but both were struck
by the unusual density of the fog, and while one saw it coming from the
north, the other one saw it approaching from the south.
I have no doubt that at last it began to mingle with the clearer air and
to thin out; in fact, I have good testimony to that effect. And early
next morning it was blown by a wind like an ordinary fog-cloud all over
Portage Plains.
I also know that further north, at my home, for instance, it had the
smell of the smoke which could not have proceeded from anywhere but the
marsh; and the marsh lay to the south of it. That seemed to prove that
actually the mist was spreading from a common centre in at least two
directions. These points, which I gathered later, strongly confirmed my
own observations, which will be set down further on. It must, then,
have been formed as a layer of a very considerable height, to be able to
spread over so many square miles.
As I said, I was reminded of those mist pools in the north when I
approached the cliff of the fog, especially of that “waterfall” of mist
of which I spoke. But besides the difference in composition--the fog,
as we shall see, was not homogeneous, this being the cause of its
wetness--there was another important point of distinction. For, while
the mist of the pools is of the whitest white, this fog showed from the
outside and in the mass--the single wreaths seemed white enough--rather
the colour of that “wet, unbleached linen” of which Burroughs speaks in
connection with rain-clouds.
Now, as soon as I was well engulfed in the fog, I had a few surprises.
I could no longer see the road ahead; I could not see the fence along
which I had been driving; I saw the horses’ rumps, but I did not see
their heads. I bent forward over the dashboard: I could not even see
the ground below It was a series of negatives. I stopped the horses. I
listened--then looked at my watch. The stillness of the grave enveloped
me. It was a little past five o’clock. The silence was oppressive--the
misty impenetrability of the atmosphere was appalling. I do not say
“darkness,” for as yet it was not really dark. I could still see the
dial of my watch clearly enough to read the time. But darkness was
falling fast--“falling,” for it seemed to come from above: mostly it
rises--from out of the shadows under the trees--advancing, fighting back
the powers of light above.
One of the horses, I think it was Peter, coughed. It was plain they felt
chilly. I thought of my lights and started with stiffening fingers
to fumble at the valves of my gas tank. When reaching into my trouser
pockets for matches, I was struck with the astonishing degree to which
my furs had been soaked in these few minutes. As for wetness, the fog
was like a sponge. At last, kneeling in the buggy box, I got things
ready. I smelt the gas escaping from the burner of my bicycle lantern
and heard it hissing in the headlight. The problem arose of how to light
a match. I tried various places--without success. Even the seat of my
trousers proved disappointing. I got a sizzling and sputtering flame, it
is true, but it went out before I could apply it to the gas. The water
began to drip from the backs of my hands. It was no rain because it did
not fall. It merely floated along; but the droplets, though smaller,
were infinitely more numerous than in a rain--there were more of them
in a given space. At last I lifted the seat cushion under which I had a
tool box filled with ropes, leather straps and all manner of things that
I might ever be in need of during my nights in the open. There I found
a dry spot where to strike the needed match. I got the bicycle lantern
started. It burned quite well, and I rather admired it: unreasoningly
I seemed to have expected that it would not burn in so strange an
atmosphere. So I carefully rolled a sheet of letter paper into a fairly
tight roll, working with my back to the fog and under the shelter of my
big raccoon coat. I took a flame from the bicycle light and sheltered
and nursed it along till I thought it would stand the drizzle. Then I
turned and thrust the improvised torch into the bulky reflector case of
the searchlight. The result was startling. A flame eighteen inches high
leaped up with a crackling and hissing sound.
The horses bolted, and the buggy jumped. I was lucky, for inertia
carried me right back on the seat, and as soon as I had the lines in
my hands again, I felt that the horses did not really mean it. I do not
think we had gone more than two or three hundred yards before the team
was under control. I stopped and adjusted the overturned valves. When
I succeeded, I found to my disappointment that the heat of that first
flame had partly spoiled the reflector. Still, my range of vision now
extended to the belly-band in the horses’ harness. The light that used
to show me the road for about fifty feet in front of the horses’ heads
gave a short truncated cone of great luminosity, which was interesting
and looked reassuring; but it failed to reach the ground, for it was so
adjusted that the focus of the converging light rays lay ahead and not
below. Before, therefore, the point of greatest luminosity was reached,
the light was completely absorbed by the fog.
I got out of the buggy, went to the horses’ heads and patted their noses
which were dripping with wetness. But now that I faced the headlight,
I could see it though I had failed to see the horses’ heads when seated
behind it. This, too, was quite reassuring, for it meant that the horses
probably could see the ground even though I did not.
But where was I? I soon found out that we had shot off the trail. And to
which side? I looked at my watch again. Already the incident had cost me
half an hour. It was really dark by now, even outside the fog, for there
was no moon. I tried out how far I could get away from the buggy without
losing sight of the light. It was only a very few steps, not more than a
dozen. I tried to visualize where I had been when I struck the fog. And
fortunately my habit of observing the smallest details, even, if only
subconsciously, helped me out. I concluded that the horses had bolted
straight ahead, thus missing an s-shaped curve to the right.
At this moment I heard Peter paw the ground impatiently; so I quickly
returned to the horses, for I did not relish the idea of being left
alone. There was an air of impatience and nervousness about both of
them.
I took my bicycle lantern and reached for the lines. Then, standing
clear of the buggy, I turned the horses at right angles, to the north,
as I imagined it to be. When we started, I walked alongside the team
through dripping underbrush and held the lantern with my free hand close
down to the ground.
Two or three times I stopped during the next half hour, trying, since we
still did not strike the trail, to reason out a different course. I was
now wet through and through up to my knees; and I had repeatedly run
into willow-clumps, which did not tend to make me any drier either. At
last I became convinced that in bolting the horses must have swerved
a little to the south, so that in starting up again we had struck a
tangent to the big bend north, just beyond Bell’s farm. If that was
the case, we should have to make another turn to the right in order to
strike the road again, for at best we were then simply going parallel
to it. The trouble was that I had nothing to tell me the directions, not
even a tree the bark or moss of which might have vouchsafed information.
Suddenly I had an inspiration. Yes, the fog was coming from the
northeast! So, by observing the drift of the droplets I could find at
least an approximate meridian line. I went to the headlight, and an
observation immediately confirmed my conjecture. I was now convinced
that I was on that wild land where two months ago I had watched the
goldfinches disporting themselves in the evening sun. But so as not to
turn back to the south, I struck out at an angle of only about sixty
degrees to my former direction. I tried not to swerve, which involved
rough going, and I had many a stumble. Thus I walked for another half
hour or thereabout.
Then, certainly! This was the road! The horses turned into it of their
own accord. That was the most reassuring thing of all. There was one
strange doubt left. Somehow I was not absolutely clear about it whether
north might not after all be behind. I stopped. Even a new observation
of the fog did not remove the last vestige of a doubt. I had to take a
chance, some landmark might help after a while.
I believe in getting ready before I start. So I took my coal-oil
lantern, lighted and suspended it under the rear springs of the buggy
in such a way that it would throw its light back on the road. Having the
light away down, I expected to be able to see at least whether I was
on a road or not. In this I was only partly successful; for on the
rut-trails nothing showed except the blades of grass and the tops of
weeds; while on the grades where indeed I could make out the ground, I
did not need a light, for, as I found out, I could more confidently rely
on my ear.
I got back to my seat and proceeded to make myself as comfortable as
I could. I took off my shoes and socks keeping well under the
robe--extracted a pair of heavy woollens from my suitcase under the
seat, rubbed my feet dry and then wrapped up, without putting my shoes
on again, as carefully and scientifically as only a man who has had
pneumonia and is a chronic sufferer from pleuritis knows how to do.
At last I proceeded. After listening again with great care for any sound
I touched the horses with my whip, and they fell into a quiet trot. It
was nearly seven now, and I had probably not yet made eight miles. We
swung along. If I was right in my calculations and the horses kept
to the road, I should strike the “twelve-mile bridge” in about
three-quarters of an hour. That was the bridge leading through the
cottonwood gate to the grade past the “hovel.” I kept the watch in the
mitt of my left hand.
Not for a moment did it occur to me to turn back. Way up north there was
a young woman preparing supper for me. The fog might not be there--she
would expect me--I could not disappoint her. And then there was the
little girl, who usually would wake up and in her “nightie” come out of
bed and sleepily smile at me and climb on to my knee and nod off again.
I thought of them, to be sure, of the hours and hours in wait for them,
and a great tenderness came over me, and gratitude for the belated home
they gave an aging man...
And slowly my mind reverted to the things at hand. And this is what was
the most striking feature about them: I was shut in, closed off from
the world around. Apart from that cone of visibility in front of the
headlight, and another much smaller one from the bicycle lamp, there was
not a thing I could see. If the road was the right one, I was passing
now through some square miles of wild land. Right and left there were
poplar thickets, and ahead there was that line of stately cottonwoods.
But no suggestion of a landmark--nothing except a cone of light which
was filled with fog and cut into on both sides by two steaming and
rhythmically moving horseflanks. It was like a very small room, this
space of light--the buggy itself, in darkness, forming an alcove to it,
in which my hand knew every well-appointed detail. Gradually, while
I was warming up, a sense of infinite comfort came, and with it the
enjoyment of the elvish aspect.
I began to watch the fog. By bending over towards the dashboard and
looking into the soon arrested glare I could make out the component
parts of the fog. It was like the mixture of two immiscible
liquids--oil, for instance, shaken up with water. A fine, impalpable,
yet very dense mist formed the ground mass. But in it there floated
myriads of droplets, like the droplets of oil in water. These droplets
would sometimes sparkle in a mild,
|
“He would make worse of your brother's sister, you fool,” the man
muttered, with brutal emphasis. “Come now, no nonsense with that fellow;
he's as good as married already, I tell you; he is to be married in two
months.”
“Oh, it is not true!” was the fiery answer. “You lie!” And then, with
feminine inconsequence, “Who is she? Who does he marry?”
“The Senorita Abert--a lovely girl, too, and rich--in San Francisco.”
“Yes, it is a lie, Staines, and you know it!” came in cool and measured
tones, and Mr. Adriance suddenly stepped from the corner of the wall.
Staines dropped the captive's hand and recoiled a pace or two with a
stifled exclamation, half amaze, half dismay; then with sudden effort
strove to recover himself. “Well,” he exclaimed, with a nervous laugh;
“talk of angels and you hear the rustle, etc. Indeed, lieutenant, I
beg your pardon, though; I was merely joking with our little Mexican
friend.”
“That will do, Mr. Staines; I know a joke when I hear one. Wait here
a moment, if you please, for I want a word with you. Pardon me for
startling you, senorita. Will you take my arm?”
The girl was trembling violently. With bowed head and fluttering heart
she leaned upon the trooper's arm and was slowly led away toward the
rancho, never seeming to note that the little brown hand that had been
so firmly taken and drawn within by his was still tightly clasped
by that cavalry gauntlet. The moment they were out of the earshot of
Staines the lieutenant bent down.
“It was to see you I came here, Isabel; I had hoped to find you at the
summer house. Come to me there in ten minutes, will you? I must see you
before I go. First, though, I have to investigate that fellow Staines.”
“Oh, I cannot! I dare not! I slipped away from my room because of Leon.
They will lead him into trouble again. Indeed, I must go back. I must
go, Senor Felipe.”
“You remember my name, then, little one!” he laughed, delightedly. “I
have been to Tucson since I saw you that blessed night, and I heard all
about you.”
“Hush, senor! It is my mother who calls. List! Let me go, sefior!”
for his arm had suddenly stolen about her waist. “Promise you will
come--promise!”
“I dare not! O Felipe, no!” she cried, for he had with quick impulse
folded her tightly in his strong embrace and his lips were seeking hers.
Struggling to avoid them she had hidden her face upon his breast.
“Promise--quick!” he whispered.
“Ah, if I can--yes. Now let me go.” His firm hand turned her glowing
face to his; his eager lips pressed one lingering kiss just at the
corner of her pretty mouth. She hurled herself from him then and bounded
into the darkness. An instant more and he heard the latch of the rear
door click; a stream of light shot out toward the corral and she was
gone. Then slowly he returned to the corner of the wall, fully expecting
that Staines had left. To his surprise, there was the clerk composedly
awaiting him.
“Where have you sent Leon Ruiz?” was the stern question.
“I do not recognize your right to speak to me in that tone, Mr.
Adriance. If you have nothing else to ask me--good night!”
“By God, sir! I heard your whispered talk with him and I know there is
mischief afoot,” said the lieutenant, as he strode after the retreating
form. “This thing has got to be explained, and in the major's presence.”
Staines halted, and lifting his hat with Castilian grace of manner bowed
profoundly to the angry officer. “Permit me, sir, to conduct you to
him.”
An hour later, baffled, puzzled, balked in his precious hopes, Mr.
Adriance returned to the bivouac of his little command. Major Sherrick
had promptly and fully confirmed the statement of his clerk. It was he
who told Mr. Staines to employ a ranchman to ride by night to Captain
Rawlins, and the mysterious caution that surrounded the proceedings was
explained by the fact that Pedro had refused his permission and that
Leon had to be bribed to disobey the paternal order. Adriance was
dissatisfied and suspicious, but what was there left for him to say?
Then he had hastened to the summer house, and waited a whole hour, but
there came no Isabel. It was nearly 10 o'clock when he turned his horse
over to the care of the guard in a little clump of cottonwoods near the
Gila.
“We remain here to-morrow,” he briefly told the sergeant. “No need
to wake the men before 6.” With that he went to the little wall tent,
pitched for his use some yards away.
How long he slumbered Adriance could not tell. Ill at ease as to the
strange conduct of Staines, he had not slept well. Conscience, too, was
smiting him. Something in the tones of that girlish voice thrilled and
quivered through his memory. What right had he even to ask her to meet
him? What wrong had he not wrought in that one kiss?
Somebody was fumbling at the fastening of the tent flap.
“What is wanted, sergeant?” he quickly hailed.
“Open, quick!” was the low-toned answer. “Come to the door. No, no,
bring no light,” was the breathless caution, as he struck a match.
“Who is this?” he demanded, with strange thrill at heart--something in
those tones he well knew--yet it could not be. A dim figure in shrouding
_serape_ was crouching at the front tent pole as he threw open the flap.
“Good God! Isabel!”
“Si---- Yes. Hush, senor, no one must hear, no one must know 'twas I.
Quick! Wake your men! Saddle! Ride hard till you catch the paymaster!
Never leave him till you are beyond Canyon del Muerto, and then never
come to the rancho again--never!”
[Illustration: 5039]
SECOND CHAPTER
[Illustration: 0040]
[Illustration: 9040]
HAT off mule of the paymaster's ambulance been a quadruped of wonderful
recuperative powers. She had gone nearly dead lame all the previous day,
and now at 5 o'clock on this breezy morning was trotting along as though
she had never known a twinge in her life. Mr. Staines was apparently
nonplussed. Acting on his advice, the paymaster had decided to break
camp soon after 2 o'clock, make coffee, and then start for Rawlins' camp
at once. He confidently expected to have to drag along at a slow walk,
and his idea was to get well through the Canyon del Muerto before the
heat of the day. The unexpected recovery of Jenny, however, enabled
them to go bowling ahead over the level flat, and at sunrise they were
already in sight of the northern entrance to the gorge. It was odd how
early Mr. Staines began to develop lively interest in the condition of
that mule. First he suggested to the driver that he was going too fast,
and would bring on that lameness again; but the driver replied that it
was Jenny herself who was doing most of the pulling. Then Staines became
fearful lest the cavalry escort should get exhausted by such steady
trotting, and ventured to say to Major Sherrick that they ought to rein
up on their account. Sherrick was eager to push ahead, and, like most
other men not to the manner born, never for a moment thought of such a
thing as a horse's getting used up by simply carrying a man-at-arms six
hours at ceaseless trot or lope. However, he knew that Staines was far
more experienced in such matters than he, and so could not disregard his
advice.
[Illustration: 8041]
“How is it, sergeant, are we going too fast for you?” he asked.
“Not a bit of it, sir,” was the cheery answer.
“We're glad enough to go lively now and rest all day in the shade.”
“You see how it is, Staines; they don't want to slack up speed. We'll
get to Rawlins' in time for breakfast at this rate,” and again Staines
was silent. Presently the team began the ascent of a rolling wave of
foothill, around which the roadway twisted as only Arizona roadways can,
and at the crest the driver reined in to give his mules a “breather.”
Staines leaped from the ambulance for a stretch. The troopers promptly
dismounted and loosened saddle girths.
“Yonder is the mouth of the Canyon, sir,” said the sergeant, pointing
to a rift in the range to the south, now gorgeously lighted up by the
morning sunshine.
“How long is the defile, sergeant?”
“Not more than four miles, sir--that is, the Canyon itself--but it is
crooked as a ram's horn, and the approach on the other side is a long,
winding valley.”
“When were you there last?” asked Staines.
“About six months ago, just after Dins-more was murdered.”
Staines turned quickly away and strolled back a few yards along the
road.
“You knew Dinsmore, then?” asked the paymaster.
“I knew him well, sir. We had served together during the war. They said
he fell in love with a pretty Mexican girl at Tucson, and she would
not listen to him. Some of the men heard that she was a daughter of old
Pedro who keeps that ranch, and that it was hoping to see her that he
went there.”
“I know. I remember hearing about it all then,” said the paymaster. “Did
you ever see anything of the man who was said to have killed him?”
“Sonora Bill? No, sir; and I don't know anyone who ever did. He was
always spoken of as the chief of a gang of cutthroats and stage robbers
down around Tucson. They used to masquerade as Apaches sometimes--that's
the way they were never caught. The time they robbed Colonel Wood and
killed his clerk 'I' troop was scouting not ten miles away, and blessed
if some of the very gang didn't gallop to Lieutenant Breese and swear
the Apaches had attacked their camp here in Canyon del Muerto, so that
when the lieutenant was wanted to chase the thieves his troop couldn't
be found anywhere--he was 'way up here hunting for Apaches in the
Maricopa range. The queer thing about that gang was that they always
knew just when a paymaster's outfit or a Government officer with funds
would be along. It was those fellows that robbed Major Rounds, the
quartermaster, and jumped the stage when Lieutenant Spaulding and his
wife were aboard. She had beautiful diamonds that they were after,
but the lieutenant fooled them--he had them sent by express two days
afterward.”
Mr. Staines came back toward the ambulance at this moment, took a field
glass from its case, and retraced his steps along the road some twenty
yards. Here he adjusted the glass and looked long toward the northeast.
“All ready to start, sir,” said the driver.
The major swung himself up to his seat; the troopers quietly “sinched”
their saddles and mounted, and still the clerk stood there absorbed.
“Come, Staines!” shouted the paymaster, impatiently, “we're waiting for
you.” And still he did not move. The sergeant whirled his horse about
and clattered back to where he stood.
“Come, sir, the major's waiting.” Staines turned abruptly and, silent as
ever, hurried to the wagon.
“What were you staring at so long?” said the paymaster, pettishly, as
his assistant clambered in. “I shouted two or three times.”
Staines' face was pale, yet there were drops of sweat upon his brow.
“I thought I saw a party of horsemen out there on the flats.”
“The devil!” said the paymaster, with sudden interest. “Where? Let me
look.”
“You can't see now, sir. Even the dust cloud is gone. They are behind
that low ridge some eight or ten miles out there in the valley.”
“Go on, driver, it's only cattle from the ranch or something of that
kind. I didn't know, by the way you looked and spoke, but that it might
be some of Sonora Bill's gang.”
“Hardly, sir; they haven't been heard of for a year, and once away from
Pedro's we are safe enough anyhow.”
Half an hour later the four-mule team was winding slowly up a rocky
path. On both sides the heights were steep, covered with a thick
undergrowth of scrub oak and juniper. Here and there rocky cliffs
jutted out from the hillside and stood like sentinels along the way.
The sergeant, with one trooper, rode some distance ahead, their carbines
“advanced” and ready for use, for Edwards was an old campaigner, and,
though he thought it far from probable that any outlaws would be fools
enough to attempt to “get away with” a paymaster's bank when he and his
five men were the guardians and Captain Rawlins with his whole troop
was but a short distance away, he had learned the lesson of precaution.
Major Sherrick, with his iron safe under his own seat, grasped a rifle
in both hands. The driver was whistling softly to himself and glancing
attentively ahead, for there was a continuous outcrop of boulders all
along the road. The remaining troopers, four in number, rode close
behind or alongside the wagon.
Presently they reached a point where, after turning a precipitous ledge
of rock, glistening in the morning sunshine, they saw before them a
somewhat steep incline. Here, without a word, Staines swung lightly
from the vehicle and trudged for a moment alongside; then he stooped to
adjust his boot lace, and when Sherrick looked back the clerk was coming
jauntily after them, only a dozen paces in rear. In this order they
pushed ahead perhaps a hundred yards farther, moving slowly up the
defile, and Staines could easily have regained his distance, but for
some reason failed to do so. Suddenly, and for no apparent cause, Jenny
and her mate shied violently, swerved completely around and were tangled
up with the wheel team before the driver could use the lash. Even his
ready blasphemy failed to straighten things out.
“Look out for those rocks up there on the right!” he shouted. “Grab
their heads, Billy!”
Even as he spoke the rocky walls of the Canyon resounded with the crash
of a score of firearms. The driver, with a convulsive gasp, toppled
forward out of his seat, his hand still clinching the reins. One of the
troopers clapped his hand to his forehead, his reins falling useless
upon his horse's neck, and reeled in the saddle as his charger whirled
about and rushed, snorting with fright, down the narrow road. At the
instant of the firing the sound of a dozen “spats” told where
the leaden missiles had torn through the stiff canvas cover of the
ambulance; and Sherrick, with blanched face, leaped from the riddled
vehicle and plunged heavily forward upon his hands and knees. Two of
the troopers sprang from their saddles, and, crouching behind a boulder
across the road, opened fire up the opposite hillside. The sergeant and
his comrade, bending low over their horses' necks, came thundering back
down the Canyon, just in time to see the mules whirl about so suddenly
as to throw the ambulance on its side. The iron safe was hurled into the
shallow ditch; the wagon bed dragged across the prostrate form of the
paymaster, rolling him over and over half a dozen times, and then, with
a wreck of canvas, splinters, chains and traces clattering at their
heels, the four mules went rattling away down the gorge.
[Illustration: 0047]
“Jump for shelter, men!” shouted Sergeant Edwards, as he dragged the
senseless form of the major under the great ledge to the right. “Stand
them off as long as you can! Come out of your holes, you cowardly
hounds!” he roared, shaking his fist at the smoke-wreathed rocks up the
heights. “Come out and fight fair! There's only five of us left!”
Here in the road lay the major, bleeding from cuts and bruises, with
every breath knocked out of his battered body; yonder, his hands
'clinched in the death agony, the stiffening form of the driver--plucky
to the last. Twenty yards away down the road, all in a heap, lay one
poor soldier shot through the head, and now past praying for. One of
the others was bleeding from a gash along the cheek where a bullet had
zipped its way, and Edwards shouted in vain for Staines to join them;
the clerk had disappeared. For full five minutes the desperate combat
was maintained; the sergeant and his little squad crouching behind the
nearest rocks and firing whenever head or sombrero showed itself along
the heights. Then came shots from the rear, and another poor fellow was
laid low, and Edwards realized, to his despair, that the bandits were on
every side, and the result only a question of time.
And then--then, there came a thunder of hoof beats, a storm of ringing
cheers, a rush and whirl of panting, foaming steeds and a score of
sunburnt, stalwart troopers racing in the lead of a tall young soldier,
whose voice rang clear above the tumult: “Dismount! Up the rocks, men!
Lively now!” And, springing from his own steed, leaping catlike from
rock to rock, Phil Adriance went tearing up the heights, his soldiers at
his heels. Edwards and his unwounded men seized and held the trembling
horses; Sherrick feebly crawled to his precious safe and fell across it,
his arms clasping about his iron charge. For five minutes more there was
a clamor of shots and shouts, once in a while a wild Mexican shriek
for mercy, all the tumult gradually receding in the distance, and at
last--silence. Then two men came down the bluffs, half bearing between
them the limp form of their young leader. The lieutenant was shot
through both thighs and was faint from loss of blood.
“Has no one a little whiskey?” asked Corporal Watts.
“Here you are” was the answer. And Mr. Staines, with very white face,
stepped down from behind the ledge and held out his flask.
A week later the lieutenant lay convalescing at Rawlins' camp. A
vigorous constitution and the healthful, bracing, open-air life he
had led for several years, either in the saddle or tramping over the
mountains, had enabled him to triumph speedily over such minor ills as
flesh wounds, even though the loss of blood had been very great. The
young soldier was soon able to give full particulars of his chase, and
to one man alone, Rawlins, the secret of its inspiration.
Most important had been the results. It was evident to everyone who
examined the ground--and Rawlins had scoured the range with one platoon
of his troop that very afternoon after the fight, while his lieutenant,
Mr. Lane, was chasing the fugitives with another--that a band of at
least twenty outlaws had been concealed among the rocks of Canyon del
Muerto for two or three days, evidently for the purpose of waylaying
the escort of the paymaster when he came along. Their horses had been
concealed half a mile away in a deep ravine, and it was in trying to
escape to them that they had sustained their losses. Five of their
number were shot down in full flight by Adri-ance's men, and, could they
have caught the others, no quarter would have been given, for the men
were infuriated by the sight of the havoc the robbers had wrought, and
by the shooting of their favorite officer.
[Illustration: 0052]
No papers had been found on the bodies; nothing, in fact, to identify
them with any band. All, with one exception, were Mexicans; he was a
white man whom none of the troopers could identify, though Corporal
Watts, of Troop B, declared he had seen him at “Cutthroat Crossing” the
last time he went through there on escort duty. The others, whoever they
were, rode in a body until they got around the range to the southward,
then seemed to scatter over the face of the earth. Some odd things had
transpired, over which Rawlins pondered not a little. It was Corporal
Watts who brought to his camp at 11 o'clock the news of the desperate
attempt to murder and rob the paymaster, and as they rode back together
the corporal gave the captain such information as lay in his power.
Lieutenant Adriance had “routed out” the detachment just at daybreak,
when it was still dark, and saddling with the utmost haste had led away
across country for the canyon, leaving the pack mules and a small guard
at camp. “We rode like the wind,” said Watts, “after the first few
miles, and every man seemed to know just what to expect when at last we
struck the road and saw the trail of the ambulance and escort. We got
there just in the nick of time.”
When Sherrick--who though severely battered and bruised had no bones
broken--was able to talk at all, he never could say enough in praise of
Adriance and his men; but what he wanted to know was how they came to
learn of the threatened danger. Captain Rawlins protested that it was
“past finding out.” The major questioned the men, but without
success, and as for Staines, it was remarked that his pertinacity in
cross-examination was simply wonderful. For some reason, however, the
men of B troop did not like the fellow and would have little to do with
him. But up to the time that Major Sherrick was able to push ahead for
Tucson it is certain that he had discovered nothing as to the source of
the lieutenant's information; neither had they heard of Leon Ruiz, the
night messenger. Staines opined that he must have been intercepted by
the bandits, perhaps killed by them, when it was found that he was the
bearer of a message to Captain Rawlins. After a brief chat with the
lieutenant himself, one which the doctor did not interdict, the old
troop commander sent a trusty sergeant with six men to scout the
neighborhood of the rancho.
Lieutenant Lane was detached to take command of Adriance's troop,
which was sent on its way forthwith, leaving the gloomy rancho alone to
sentinel the Gila crossing. But the moment Sherrick and his silent clerk
drove on toward Tucson the old captain said a few words of farewell to
the invalid, left him in the doctor's charge and rode away northward
on the trail of his sergeant. That night he rapped for admission and
ordered supper at Rancho Ruiz, while his men, strolling about the
premises, took careful note of the three or four scowling “greasers” who
infested the corral.
Adriance was sitting up and beginning to hobble around when Rawlins
returned to camp during the week that followed, and was all eagerness
to hear what tidings the captain had to tell. But Rawlins had little to
say; he had seen Pedro and had had one glimpse of Senora Dolores,
but not so much as a word with the senorita; she was kept carefully
concealed. Within the month Adriance was quite well enough to travel to
his station, but refused. He would remain here, he said, until able to
relieve Lane of the command of his troop and continue the scouting work.
He did not wish to go to the fort. Sherrick and his clerk had come back
in the course of a fortnight, and Mr. Staines asked to see Lieutenant
Adriance, but that gentleman refused--a matter which caused the clerk
to “bite his lips and look queer,” reported the soldier who took the
message, but he said nothing at all.
Ten days afterward a Prescott paper mentioned the fact that Mr. Albert
G. Staines, so long and favorably known in this Territory, had dropped
in to look over valuable mining properties in the Big Bug and Hassayampa
districts; and this Rawlins silently showed to Adriance.
“Then you may be sure he'll come down to the rancho, and in less than no
time,” said Adriance, “and I must go.” Rawlins made no reply at first,
then he rose and nervously paced the floor a moment and turned upon his
junior.
“Philip, I say no!”
The color mounted to the lieutenant's
“Why not?”
“Ask yourself; ask your conscience, Adriance. You have told her that he,
Staines, was a liar. You have virtually told her that you were engaged
to no woman. You have inspired a sentiment, perhaps a passion, in that
young girl's heart, and you're going there to defend her--a thing that I
can do much better than you, now that you are a cripple. Then, think, my
boy, I have known you six years; I have never known you to say or do a
mean or unmanly thing. I'm an old fogy--an old fool perhaps--but I
like to think most women pure and some men honest. You are one of them,
Phil.” There was a moment's silence.
“And yet you think I mean her harm.”
“Not yet, Philip, but would you marry that old scoundrel's daughter?”
Adriance had no answer.
“Philip, if you look into that girl's eyes again, unless it be to ask
her to be your wife, I shall lose my faith in manly honor.”
Two days afterward Rawlins rode away on duty. A strange unrest had
possessed the lieutenant since that brief talk with this old Puritan of
a captain. Not another word had been said upon the subject, but every
syllable that Rawlins spoke had struck home. Adriance respected
and honored the grim, duty-loving troop commander whom some of the
youngsters openly laughed at and referred to as “Praise the Lord
Barebones” and “Captain Roundhead,” but the lieutenant well knew that no
braver soldier, no “squar-er” captain drew sabre in the whole regiment
than this faithful friend, who had long since singled him out for many
an unusual kindness. He knew more--that in his high standard of honor
and rectitude old Rawlins had said nothing which was not just and true.
Adriance knew well that he ought not to again seek that young girl's
presence, and the blood rushed hotly to his cheek as he recalled the
kiss his eager lips had stolen. Marry that old scoundrel's daughter? No,
he could not; and yet how his pulses bounded at the thought of her--the
sweet, shy gladness in her eyes, the soft, thrilling tones in her voice
when she spoke his name, the heroism of her conduct in daring to
seek his camp in the darkness of night and bring him warning of that
diabolical scheme of robbery and murder; the refinement of her manner,
and then, too, her knowledge of the English tongue. Where had she
acquired these? What would she not be justified in thinking of him if he
never came to seek and thank her?
“Hello! what's that?” was the sudden cry among the men. Two or three
soldiers sat up in the shade and curiously inspected the coming object;
others shouted laughing challenge. Riding solemnly forward, a little
Mexican boy came straight to where Adriance was lying and handed him a
note which he eagerly opened and read:
_They suspect me, and they send me away tomorrow. To-night I go for the
last time to the summer house alone. Isabel._
Gone was every resolution at the instant; gone all hesitancy. Adriance
had not even time to wonder at the fact that she had written to him in
English. Leaving the note for Rawlins to read when he returned, in one
hour Phil was rolling from the camp in the ambulance. Soon after dark,
leaving Private Regan and another man half a mile back from the walls
of the corral, Mr. Adriance, all alone, slowly made his way afoot toward
the dim lights at the rancho. Making wide circuit so as not to alarm the
dogs, he never sought to draw near the little summer house until, from
the east, he could see the brighter lights that gleamed in the bar and
card room. Then he cautiously approached, his heart beating quickly and
his knees trembling a little, perhaps from weakness. Hark! Faint, soft
and clear, there rose upon the evening air the liquid notes of a guitar.
It was she then--it was Isabel awaiting his coming, aye, signaling
softly to call him to her. What could it mean but that she loved and
longed to see him? A moment more and he was at the doorway, the
very spot where he had surprised her that well-remembered night. The
plaintive tinkle of the guitar continued, and there in the dark corner
was the dim, white-robed form. He could almost distinguish the folds of
the graceful _rebosa_.
“Isabel!” he whispered. Three more steps and he would be at her side.
Suddenly two stalwart arms were thrown about him, a broad hand was on
his mouth, stifling the utterance of a sound; the white-robed form in
front leaped toward him, the _rebosa_ falling to the ground. It was a
man's voice--a Mexican's--that hissed the word's: “Quick! the pistol.”
Another hand was at his holster. He realized instantly that he was
lured, trapped; that his life was threatened. He was struggling
violently, but, weakened by his wound, even his superb physique was well
nigh powerless in the grasp of two or three men. Suddenly there came
a whisper: “The sponge, the sponge!” and then the subtle odor of
chloroform on the night air. And now he nerved himself for one supreme
effort. A quick twist of his head and the hand was dislodged, a finger
slipping between his teeth. With all his strength he crushed it to the
very bone, and there was a yell of pain and terror. Then his own brave
young voice rang out in one startling, rallying cry.
“Help! Regan, help!” Then crash and blows, the gleam of a knife, a
rolling, rough-and-tumble struggle on the ground; then a woman's scream,
a light, and Isabel had bounded into their midst, her mother at her
back.
“Leon, my brother! In God's name, what do you mean?”
Even as she spoke her startled eyes fell on Adriance, staggering to his
feet, pale, bleeding, faint. Another instant and he went crashing back
against the guitar that, like siren's song, had lured him. One brave
leap and she was at his side, her arms about his neck, his pallid face
pillowed on her bosom.
Senora Dolores flew to her aid; then turning, holding her lantern on
high, her shrill voice rang out in fury:
“Look at the monstrous work your son has wrought, Pedro Ruiz! Look! Tear
off that mantle, senor!” she said, whirling upon another form now slowly
rising from the earth. “Coward! murderer that you are! It is you who
have ruined this boy and made him what he is!”
“Hush! You fool! there lies your daughter's betrayer. Leon would have
been coward indeed if he had not punished him.”
“Oh, you lie! She never saw him alone in her life!”
“Ask your son,” was the sneering answer. “Ask José, too.”
“She was with him--in his tent--the last night he was here; I swear it!”
cried José.
“Mother,” cried the girl, “listen, it was but to warn him--I heard the
plot--I heard all. I rushed to him only to tell him of the danger.
Mother, believe me. And I dare not tell it even to you, for fear--for
fear of him.” And she pointed to the fierce, scowling face of the old
Mexican, now striding forward, knife in hand.
“No, Pedro--back! You shall not harm her! No!” and the mother hurled
herself before her husband.
“Out of the way!” was the hissing answer, “or you, too, feel my knife.
Ah, traitress!”
“O my God! help! There will be murder here! Pedro, husband! O, villain,
she is not your child! You shall not kill!” And then a piercing shriek
rang out upon the night. But at the same instant there came the rush of
hoofs without--a rush of panting men; a brawny trooper sprang into
the summer house and with one blow of his revolver butt sent Pedro
staggering into a corner, his knife falling from his nerveless hand. A
dark, agile figure leaped for the doorway, with muttered curse. And then
in came old Rawlins, somewhat “blown,” but preternaturally cool, and the
doctor close behind.
“Bring another light here, one of you men!” And a trooper ran to the
card room. “Lie still there, Pedro! Blow his brains out if he moves!
Doctor, you look to the women and Adriance. Now, where's that man
Staines?”
“Some fellow ran in through here, captain,” said a trooper. “Corporal
Watts is after him with Royce.”
“Who was it, you greaser? Speak, damn you! You were here with him!”
“Sonora Bill,” said José, shaking from head to foot.
Then there came the sound of pistol shots out toward the corral, and
then the louder bang of a cavalry carbine.
“What is it?” asked Rawlins of a soldier who came running back.
[Illustration: 0061]
“Can we have the doctor, sir? It was Mr. Staines. He shot the corporal,
who was chasing him, but he got a carbine bullet through the heart.”
Four days afterward, lying in a little white room, Mr. Adriance listened
to the story of Leon's confession. It was brief enough. Staines had
acquired an ascendency over him in Tucson, and it was not difficult to
induce him to become a confederate in every plot. It was Staines
who sent him to Manuel and Garcia to warn them that the paymaster's
ambulance would not reach Canyon del Muerto until morning. It was
Staines who murdered Sergeant Dinsmore after a quarrel and then had had
his throat cut and the body thrown into the Gila near the ranch. Staines
had fallen in love with Isabel when she first came from Sonora, but the
girl shrank from him; neither would she listen to Sergeant Dinsmore.
After it was safe for Leon to return to the ranch, he found that his
mother and Isabel were practically prisoners. His father was furious at
the failure of the plan, and daily accused his wife of having, in some
way, given warning to Adriance, and swore that he would have the blood
of the man or woman who had betrayed the scheme; and then Staines
himself came back and wrung from José that he had seen Isabel scurrying
from Adri-ance's tent at daybreak, and so denounced her to Leon as the
mistress of an accursed Gringo. Staines wrote the note that was to lure
Adriance to the bower, where Leon was to take the guitar and _rebosa_
and the two, with José's help, were to overpower him. It was his life or
theirs said Staines. Pedro was not in the project, for he had prohibited
bloodshed about the place--“It would ruin his business” he said. But
both Pedro and Leon were now in irons, and Rawlins' troop was in camp
around gloomy old Rancho Ruiz.
[Illustration: 0063]
A day or two later he heard another story, this time from the lips of
Senora Dolores herself: Isabel was not the daughter of Pedro Ruiz.
With sobs and tears the poor, broken woman told her tale. She had
been married when quite a young girl to Senor Moreno, an officer of
distinction in the Mexican army. Her brave husband made her life a happy
one, and the birth of the little daughter strengthened the ties
that bound them. Alas! Moreno
|
cascade waiting
for us; and I see Thomas, too, with the croquet boxes."
"Well, my dear, we are going to them; don't be impatient."
This injunction was given in vain. Helena had already darted off to her
friends at the cascade. They consisted of Mr. and Mrs. Penton,--both
young; the lady, tall, slight, and dark,--very elegant, but apparently
haughty, and evidently accustomed to be admired; the gentleman, a
large and rather an unwieldy figure, with a sandy complexion, and a
heavy, although good expression of countenance; Mary Elton, Helena's
sister, and somewhat like her, but in manner as grave and sedate as the
other was gay and thoughtless; Mr. Mainwaring, and Mr. Caulfield,--the
latter, a good-looking, bright, laughing Irishman; the former, an
Englishman, and particularly grave and solemn.
Helena was received with marked pleasure. Her great liveliness made
her a general favourite. She was soon in deep conversation with Mary
and the gentlemen about the selection of the croquet ground, while the
Pentons turned to greet the others who had just come up.
Mrs. Elton announced, in a delighted tone, that they had been fortunate
enough to meet and capture Mr. Earnscliffe. "What an addition to our
party, is it not, Mary?" turning to her eldest daughter.
"Yes," Mary replied, quickly; "we are all, I am sure, very happy to see
Mr. Earnscliffe. Does he condescend to play croquet?"
"I have never played," said he; "but I have seen people knocking
balls about with things like long-handled mallets. That is croquet, I
believe?"
"Oh, Mr. Earnscliffe," exclaimed Helena, "what a description to give of
playing croquet! But whatever you may think of it, I find it very jolly
fun, and mean to lose no time before setting to work."
"To play, you mean, Miss Elton!" said a voice behind her; and on
turning round she found that Mr. Caulfield was the corrector, whereupon
she at once gaily attacked him.
"I never heard of such audacity, Mr. Caulfield; you, a Hibernian, to
venture to correct me, a true Briton, in the use of my own language!
Take care that you don't get a defeat at croquet for this!"
"I am sure it will not be _your_ fault, Miss Elton, if I do not"--in
an aside, meant only for her ear--"But have you not conquered already,
though not, perhaps, at croquet?"
She got a little red, and said quickly, "This is all waste of time!
Mary, you said you had seen a place that would do beautifully for us;
so, lead on. I will go and see that Thomas has all the things right."
Mary did as she was desired, while her sprightly sister, followed by
Mr. Caulfield, ran back to the servant to see that all was in order.
Helena and her companion were enjoying themselves greatly, if
loud laughter is a sign of enjoyment. At length they came running
after the others to a broad grassy alley, bordered and overhung by
wide-spreading trees. This was the place which Mary had spoken of, and,
fortunately, it met with Helena's approval. "Oh, yes, Mary, this will
do, capitally," she said; "and there is shade, too, under these trees.
Mark out the ground, place the arches and the balls, and give me a
croquet-stick!"
"Yes, miss," replied Thomas, who seemed quite an adept at arranging the
playground. Having done this to his young mistress's satisfaction, he
approached Mrs. Elton and asked where the dinner was to be laid.
"It is true, we have not chosen where we shall dine. Caroline," to Mrs.
Adair, "will you come with me and seek a nice place for our repast,
while the young people begin their game? We can trust them to Mrs.
Penton's chaperoning for a few moments, although she is too young and
too pretty for such a post."
Mrs. Penton laughed, and said, "You may very safely trust them to me,
and I will give you a good account of my stewardship when you return.
So you may go in peace."
Mr. Caulfield, who helped Helena to arrange the game, now struck his
"mallet," as Mr. Earnscliffe had named it, three times on one of the
balls in order to attract attention; and called out, "Who will play?
Will you, Mrs. Penton?"
"Not just yet. I will sit down and look on for the present; later,
perhaps, I may take a turn."
"Then the players are, the Misses Elton, Miss Adair, Penton,
Mainwaring, Elton?"
"Nay," interrupted Charles, "I am quite unable to play to-day."
"Mr. Earnscliffe?" continued Mr. Caulfield, inquiringly.
"I know nothing of the game, and I should not like to make my first
essay among such proficients as, I presume, you all are."
"Then there only remains my humble self to make up the party. Now for
the division; you ladies should draw lots for choosing sides."
"I dare say Flora is as willing as I am to yield this to Helena," said
Mary. "If so, we need not take the trouble of drawing lots."
Flora smiled assent, when Helena exclaimed, "Very green of you both.
However, it is your affair, not mine; and as I am decidedly the gainer
by it, I ought not to object. First, then, I choose Flora; secondly,
Mr. Mainwaring. I leave Mary to manage Mr. Penton and Mr. Caulfield; no
easy matter, I can answer for it, with regard to the latter gentleman."
"How cruel not to choose me as one of your subjects," he said in a
light tone, yet looking a little annoyed.
"Choose you for a subject! Not for worlds. I shall delight in
croqueting you; and this, of course, I could not do if you were on my
side. But as my enemy, you shall be well croqueted!" and as her foot
rested upon one of the balls near her, she looked laughingly at him,
and struck the ball lightly with her "mallet."
The elder ladies now returned; the gentlemen placed stools for them
near to Mrs. Penton; and, after some jesting about the conduct of her
charge during their absence, the game commenced.
For a considerable time the contest continued with varied success,
Helena and Mr. Caulfield seeming to think more of croqueting each other
than of anything else, so that they were frequently called to order by
their respective sides. Flora had become quite animated, and intent on
victory, if only to disappoint Mr. Penton, who said, when they were
beginning, "Oh! our party is certain to win, two gentlemen and a lady
against two ladies and one gentleman. I really think we might give
them odds!" a suggestion which was indignantly spurned by the players
of the opposite side, who declared that skill and not strength was the
thing required, and, therefore, they had not the slightest fear of
losing. Flora devoted all her energies to making good the boast, and
she was well seconded by Mr. Mainwaring, whose steady, cautious game
counteracted Helena's wild, though at times brilliant, play.
Towards the end of the game the excitement grew very great; four had
gained the goal, and all now turned on Mr. Caulfield and Helena; she
had only the last arch to make, and he had two arches, but it was his
turn to play; so, if he could manage to send his ball straight through
the two arches, and on to the starting-point, the game would be his.
His ball was badly placed, however, in a diagonal line from the first
arch, so that it would require great skill to make it pass through
that and go straight to the other; yet he sometimes made very skilful
hits, and it was a moment of intense interest to his adversaries. He
struck the ball; but, instead of sending it through the first arch,
it grazed the side of it and stopped short. This gave Helena a fair
opportunity for trying to croquet him; the safe play was not to do it,
but to make the last arch at once and ensure the game, yet it was a
strong temptation--how charming for Helena to send his ball far away
and distance him! On the other hand, it was of course possible that she
might not croquet him well, and then the chances were that he would
win. She looked at her partners as if to ask permission to risk the
game.
"Very well," said Flora, smiling; "on your head be it if we lose!"
"How can you give your sanction to such recklessness, Miss Adair?"
exclaimed Mr. Mainwaring. "Pray, Miss Elton, consider for a moment; if
you will play rationally we are sure to win, but if you persist in
croqueting we shall probably lose--at least we should deserve it."
"Just the contrary! 'Nothing venture nothing win.' Oh! how can a _man_
be so cautious? It is a blessing for you, Mr. Mainwaring, that you are
not a lover of mine, or I should play such pranks to rouse you into
something like rashness as would'make the angels weep.' Hurrah, then,
for daring and a good croquet! Now, Mr. Caulfield!" and with an ominous
shake of the head she raised her "mallet" to strike, amidst much
laughter at her attack upon poor Mr. Mainwaring, who, although he did
his best to join in the merriment at his own expense, evidently winced
under it. Down came the mallet with a sharp ring upon her own ball, on
which her foot was firmly planted, and away bounded the other to the
very end of the last line of arches.
"Bravo! bravo, Miss Elton!" arose from all sides, as she stood looking
triumphantly at Mr. Mainwaring, and saying, "Now, Mr. Caution, I shall
not only win the game for you, but distance one of our adversaries!"
"Not so fast, if you please, Miss Helena," interposed Mr. Caulfield. "I
might save my distance yet."
"Might! but you are not equal to it, fair sir; only _do_ play quickly,
I am all impatience to hear our side proclaimed victorious, after Mr.
Penton's contemptuous boast that _his_ side could afford to give us
odds, because, forsooth, it numbers two of the precious male sex, and
ours has only one of them! But, to the proof; we are losing time!"
Mr. Caulfield made a good attempt at saving his distance, but he
failed; so Helena came in in full triumph, amidst loud acclamations.
Mrs. Elton immediately proposed that they should take a stroll before
their repast, which was ordered for two o'clock. If they were to drive
back by Grotto Ferrata, she said, they must start, at latest, by four.
"But," objected Helena, "we have had but one game of croquet; and Mrs.
Penton and Mr. Earnscliffe have not played at all! Poor Charles cannot;
so it is not a matter of any interest for him."
"As for me, Helena, foregoing a game will not render me _tout à fait
desolée_; and I think I may answer too for Mr. Earnscliffe." He bowed,
and Mrs. Penton continued, "So it would be a pity to lose the beautiful
drive by Grotto Ferrata for the sake of another round of croquet. It is
much better to follow Mrs. Elton's suggestion."
The young lady saw that there was nothing to be done but to submit,
whilst her mother said, "Come, Helena, let Thomas carry away those
things. We are going to walk." And they all went on, excepting Helena,
Flora, and Mr. Caulfield; the two latter waiting for Helena, as she
lingered, looking, with an expression of comic resignation, at Thomas
"bagging the balls," as she expressed it; then, turning away, she said
with a sigh, "It is too bad not to give poor crestfallen Mr. Caulfield
a chance of revenge!"
"Shure and niver mind, cushla machree," he answered, imitating the
brogue of the Irish peasantry. "I'll have it some other time. Whin did
you iver know an Irishman be bate in ginerosity?"
"May I ask, Mr. Caulfield, if you Irish call revenge 'ginerosity?'" she
exclaimed in a mocking tone; then she added, more seriously, "Please
to let us get on quickly, or we shall lose our friends; and oh, Flora,
what a lecture we should get for separating ourselves from the rest!"
The party was soon overtaken; and Flora observed, to her great
amusement, that Mrs. Elton had succeeded in getting Mary and Mr.
Earnscliffe together.
For about half-an-hour they wandered about the grounds, when Mrs. Elton
led the way to their _al fresco_ banqueting-hall--a grassy plateau, so
surrounded by trees as to be shaded from the afternoon sun; and here
the servants had laid out the dinner.
They had spread a tablecloth, fastened down by pegs; in the centre were
baskets of flowers and fruits, surrounded by tempting sweet dishes, and
next by the more substantial delicacies. Mrs. Elton had planned this
pic-nic, priding herself justly on her catering for these occasions.
In this case her task was comparatively an easy one, as Spillman--the
Gunter of Rome--had a branch establishment at Frascati, whence the
feast was supplied.
"Really this is quite a banquet of pleasure!" said Mrs. Penton; "all
the delicacies of a grand dinner, without its heat, boredom, and
ceremony. We certainly owe you a vote of thanks, Mrs. Elton!"
"Well," replied Mrs. Elton, with a complacent smile, "I do think that
Spillman has carried out my orders very fairly; and the most acceptable
vote of thanks you can award me is to let me see you do justice to the
repast; so let us begin at once; the ground must serve for seats. I
told Thomas to bring all the shawls from the carriages in case any one
should like to make cushions of them."
For some time the principal sound to be heard was the clatter of
knives and forks. Gradually this grew fainter, and was succeeded by
the clatter of tongues. Champagne was freely quaffed, healths were
drunk, and much laughter was excited by Mr. Caulfield, who rose and
made a speech,--such as only an Irishman could make, with credit to
himself--concluding it by asserting that his highest ambition was to
be permitted the honour of proposing a toast to Miss Helena Elton, as
the queen of croquet players, and by expressing a hope that she would
return thanks for the toast herself. He remained standing, with his
glass in his hand; and when the laughter had subsided a little, Helena,
looking round the table, said, "I appeal to you all: can a gentleman
refuse to act as a lady's deputy in returning thanks, if she requests
him to do so for her?"
The answer was unanimous: "Certainly not?"
"Then, Mr. Caulfield," said she, with a graceful bow to him, "I hope
you will do me the favour to return thanks for the toast which is about
to be drunk in my honour!"
With one accord the gentlemen rose, applauding her, and claiming
the toast. Mr. Caulfield made a profound inclination to Helena, and
after a few more flowery words, proposed the toast, proclaiming her
"the queen of croquet players and repartee." It was drunk with great
enthusiasm; and all sat down, not excepting Mr. Caulfield, who seemed
quite unconscious of the wondering looks directed towards him. After a
few moments, however, he stood up again, and commenced with the utmost
gravity:--
"Ladies and gentlemen,--I rise to return thanks to the gentleman who
gave the last toast, which we all drank with such unusual pleasure.
Miss Helena Elton has done me the honour of calling upon me to act as
her deputy on this occasion, an honour I so highly appreciate that I
consider myself more favoured by fortune than any gentleman in this
worshipful company, save the one who had the happiness of proposing a
toast so admirably adapted to my fair client." He was interrupted by
calls of "hear, hear," "bravo," and much laughter; and after continuing
for some time in an amusing strain, he sat down "amidst loud applause."
To Mrs. Elton it seemed as if the hilarity would never end. At length
she said, "I am very sorry to interrupt your enjoyment, but we must
think of getting home. And see how the day has changed! I do not think
it will be wise to extend our drive by Grotto Ferrata."
But the younger portion of the company would not hear of any danger
from change of weather; true, there was a black cloud in the direction
of the town, but it would probably drift away, they said, and, at all
events, there would only be a shower, which, as Helena (who was in wild
spirits) declared, would but add to the beauty of their drive through
the fine old wood of Grotto Ferrata. The green of the trees would look
so bright and fresh, sparkling with rain-drops. She could not conceive
any necessity for haste, or for shortening their drive home. Mrs. Elton
persisted in thinking that there was immediate danger of rain, and
suggested that they should seek refuge in the cascade steps, where, at
least, they would find shelter. In this, too, she was over-ruled; all
consented, however, to have the carriages ordered. There was a little
more drinking of wine, eating of fruit, laughing, and merry talk, when,
suddenly, a large drop of rain fell upon the table-cloth, followed by
another and another, dropping slowly and heavily,
"One by one,
Like the first of a thunder-shower."
The gentlemen started to their feet, helped up the ladies, urging them
to run quickly to the cascade steps, as it was evident that there was
heavy rain approaching.
Helena looked a little discomfited as she caught her mother's
reproachful glance fixed upon her; but she carried it off with a laugh,
and "Well! it will only be a shower. You'll see that I shall be right
after all!"
"Come, come," called out Mr. Penton; "you ladies must wrap yourselves
up in whatever shawls there are, and get to shelter as fast as
possible, or you will be drenched with rain. In the meantime, I will go
to the hotel and send any other wrappings that I can find. You will be
sure to take cold if you sit there upon those damp steps."
"Why can't you send one of Spillman's men, George?" said his wife.
"My dear, don't you see that they have already as much as they can
possibly do to get those things away before the storm comes on?"
"Oh, as you like, my dear George; I only wished to save you trouble,"
languidly replied Mrs. Penton.
As they hastened to the cascade, the large drops fell faster
and faster; then they suddenly ceased. The quickness with which
thunder-storms come on in southern climes is proverbial. Less than an
hour before, the sun was shining brightly in an azure sky, and a light
breeze gave freshness to the air. Now, that azure sky was all overcast;
the air was heavy and sultry; there was a dead stillness all around;
and the very leaves of the trees seemed to be weighed down, drooping
under some unseen pressure. It was indeed the lull before the storm.
Hardly had they got into shelter, and Mr. Penton, accompanied by
Charles Elton, had started for the hotel, when there arose a hurricane
of wind,--whistling, tearing through the trees, waving the largest and
strongest of them in its wild grasp, like the merest reeds; whirling
into clouds the gravel of the walks, and rushing with unchecked fury
through the covered passages wherein our party had taken refuge. Then,
back again it came with unabated vigour; and across the black, lowering
sky darted a vivid flash of lightning, followed almost instantaneously
by a clap of thunder which seemed to burst over the cascade.
It is curious to watch how differently a violent thunder-storm affects
people, and ladies in particular. Many make themselves quite foolish on
such occasions, indulging in the most silly demonstrations of terror,
clinging to each other, hiding their faces, uttering little shrieks
to manifest their fears; others, although evidently frightened, have
the good sense to remain quiet, and, if they are pious, begin to pray;
others, again, seem to take delight in it,--it excites them,--they
watch its course with riveted attention, and become lost, so to say,
in admiration of its grand yet awful beauty; looking as if they would
fain say, with the poet,
"Let me be
A sharer in thy fierce and far delight,
A portion of the tempest and of thee!"
Among our friends there were examples of the three classes. Mrs. Penton
and Helena were of the first; Mrs. Elton, Mrs. Adair, and Mary, of the
second; and Flora, of the third. She left the rest, and mounted to the
opening at the top, where she stood leaning against the wall, watching
the storm. The lightning flashed, the thunder rolled and burst over
her, and there she stood alone for some time, until she was startled by
a voice close behind her, saying--
"Miss Adair is, I see, not only an apostle, but also a braver of
storms; quite free from feminine weakness both in speech and action."
She looked round and saw Mr. Earnscliffe, whose words seemed to jar
upon her ear; yet there was nothing in them at which she could take
offence, so she answered--
"I do not think I am a coward in any sense of the word, and I would
brave the storm were there any reason for doing so; but now there is
none, and standing here is not braving it. Why you say 'braver of
storms,' I know not. I merely came here because it is pleasanter to
feel the wind blowing against one and see the vivid lightning than
to sit below on a damp step in a dark passage, listening to senseless
exclamations of fear."
"In which you do not share?"
"Certainly not."
"Well then, was I not right in calling you a braver of storms?"
At this moment the sky opened and sent forth a bright forked streak of
light, which darted in a serpent-like form through the air, and struck
straight into the ground beneath them; with it came the deafening
thunder, and, as it died away rumbling in the distance, he said,
looking fixedly at her--
"Are you still quite free from fear?"
"From fear--yes; but it was a grand, a solemn sight,--one that none
could witness without feeling their own littleness and helplessness;
yet we know that no harm can reach us without the consent of Him who
rules the storms."
"Yet these storms are very dangerous!" he replied.
"Visible danger does but bring the idea of death more forcibly
before us, therefore it always seems to me that all should preserve
their calmness in moments like these; not Christians only, but even
fatalists,--those because they know that they must submit to the will
of God and should make the only preparation then in their power; these,
because they think it vain to cry out against fate. It is said that
every one finds it difficult to part with life, but I do not believe
it. I am sure it is often more difficult to be resigned to live than to
be resigned to die!"
"It is!" was the emphatic answer; but as Flora turned to look at him,
she saw his lip curling with the same contemptuous smile which she had
seen in the morning, and, getting very red, she said--
"Now you are ridiculing me; how foolish it was of me to speak in this
way, and to a man! We never know when you are talking seriously, or
only drawing us out in order to laugh at us."
"This is not half so difficult for you as it is for us to know when
women are true or false," he retorted quickly; but, seeing her look of
wonder, he at once added--
"Pardon me. I did not mean to offend you; experience teaches us hard
lessons! Still I will try to believe with Byron,
"That two, or one, are almost what they seem,
That goodness is no dream, and happiness no name."
"We have got into rather a gloomy train of conversation," said Flora.
"Let us change it to something else, or to silence if you prefer it."
He _did_ remain silent, but the expression of his face was so changed,
so softened, that Flora wondered why she had ever thought it stern.
The storm appeared to be abating; the rain had almost ceased, but there
were still occasional flashes of lightning, and the thunder murmured
in the distance; it was evident that the weather was not settled. Mary
came up to say that they were to go at once, as the carriages were
ready and it was thought better to make no delay, for heavy rain would
probably come on again.
Mr. Earnscliffe awoke from his fit of abstraction and said--
"Quite right, the sooner we start the better; but first come out and
look at the cascade; all is so bright and fresh. It is very delightful
after the oppressive sultriness which preceded the storm. We can cross
over and go down by the opposite flight of steps."
The girls followed him and stood for a moment looking at the waters
falling into the basin underneath. As they were turning away Flora's
foot slipped upon the wet moss, and she would have fallen had she not
caught hold of Mary's arm, who exclaimed--
"I hope you are not hurt, Flora!"
"What is it?" asked Mr. Earnscliffe, turning back quickly.
"I slipped," replied Flora, "and my ankle pains me slightly. I dare say
it will be over in a moment."
"Not a sprain, I hope, Miss Adair," he said, looking anxiously at her;
"if so, how shall I forgive myself for being the cause of it? I see you
are in pain; pray take my arm, it will give you more support than Miss
Elton's."
"There is nothing to forgive or to be annoyed about" (taking his arm);
"even if my ankle should be sprained, it is not your fault. I might
have slipped anywhere else!"
"Nay, had it not been for me you would not have walked upon stones
covered with wet moss; I cannot avoid blaming myself!"
Helena's voice was now heard calling, "Mary! Flora! what can you be
about? Mamma is so impatient to be off; we are going, come on quickly!"
Mary turned to Flora: "Can you get down? or will you wait a little, and
I or Mr. Earnscliffe will go and tell them?"
"I would rather go at once; and, with Mr. Earnscliffe's kind help, I
shall get down the steps very well."
"Then let me really be of some assistance to you; lean heavily on me."
And with the greatest care he helped her down the steps.
"Thank you," she said, as they reached the flat ground below; "it was
so kind of you to let me lean on you as I did; now, I think, I can get
on alone, and need not encumber you any longer." She drew away her arm
from his.
"It was anything but an encumbrance, Miss Adair," and he smiled as she
had scarcely thought he could smile; "to help you was a most pleasing
reparation for the mischief I have caused. Do take my arm again!"
"Yes, I will do so, though not to give you a means of making
reparation, since there is nothing to do that for, but because I find
that I cannot walk as well as I thought I could. And now let us try to
overtake the others."
As soon as they reached the party Helena exclaimed, "Flora, what is the
matter? You look so pale!"
"I have sprained my ankle, I believe, and it hurts me a little."
"_Quel malheur!_ Then you will not be able to dance to-night. A loss
to you gentlemen, I can tell you. Flora was pronounced to be the best
dancer at the Wiltons' ball!"
"We are all aware of Miss Adair's superior dancing," rejoined Mr.
Caulfield, "except perhaps Mr. Earnscliffe; and, being her countryman,
as the painter before a celebrated masterpiece said, '_anch' io son
pittore!_' I can say, 'I, too, am Irish!'"
"But," said Flora, laughing, "there is a slight difference between the
two arts. One of my mistresses at school remarked, on hearing dancing
praised, 'Yes, dancing is certainly a great accomplishment; dogs can be
taught to do it so well!' We have yet to learn that dogs can be taught
to paint."
To poor Flora's great comfort, the gate and the carriages beyond it
now came in sight. Mrs. Adair and Mrs. Elton were already seated. As
the former saw Flora limping and leaning on Mr. Earnscliffe's arm,
she said, "My child, what has happened?" Flora answered that she had
hurt her ankle a little, and then she got into the carriage, kindly
and skilfully helped by Mr. Earnscliffe, who, as he shook hands with
Mrs. Adair, asked permission to call on the next day to inquire after
the invalid, which request was of course granted. Mrs. Elton pressed
him to come to them in the evening; he refused politely, but firmly;
accepting, however, Mrs. Penton's offer of a seat in their carriage
back to Rome.
And so ended the croquet party at Frascati.
CHAPTER II.
Easter Tuesday had arrived, and all the excitement of Easter in Rome
was over. Our friends had joined in the grand ceremonies of Holy Week;
they had heard the silver trumpets sound forth the Alleluias on Easter
morn, and on the evening of the same great day they had looked upon the
glorious illumination of _San Pietro_; on the next day they had seen
the _girandola_, or fireworks, on the Pincio; and Easter, with all its
festivities, had become bygone things.
Before we proceed we surely ought to ask how Flora Adair had got over
her accident at Frascati. On the day after it happened Mr. Earnscliffe
called, as he had said, to inquire for her; and, considering himself in
some degree as the cause of the mishap, he was quite distressed to find
that it was so serious as to give her a good deal of pain, and keep her
from walking for some time. It was so tiresome, he said, to be obliged
to lie upon a sofa in such lovely weather--and in Rome, too! Would
that he could do anything to make amends for the mischief he had caused!
He exerted himself to the utmost to amuse and interest her during the
time of his visit; and so well did he succeed, that before he left
her she had become quite animated, and seemed to have forgotten her
ailment. When he stood up to take leave, he said, "I hope, Mrs. Adair,
that you will allow me to call again to see how the invalid progresses?"
"Certainly, we shall always be happy to see you, and, now that Flora
cannot go out, society is particularly desirable for her. The interest
of conversation will make her forget her suffering--for a time, at
least."
"Thank you! Then I shall indeed avail myself of your permission; I
shall be _so_ glad to think that I can in any degree lessen, even for
half an hour, the weariness of that imprisonment of which, I must
repeat, I feel I am the remote cause."
Thus he went constantly, and Flora found a charm in conversing with him
which she had never known before. They often disagreed and looked at
things each from a different point of view, yet their _way_ of thinking
seemed the same; there was sympathy even where they least appeared to
agree. As she recovered, and when the excitement of Easter was over,
she began to feel the blank caused by the cessation of those long
and looked-for visits. There remained nothing to expect from day to
day with hope and pleasure. She enjoyed his society as she had never
enjoyed that of any other person, and did not at all like the prospect
of being obliged to do without it, or indeed without much of it, for
the future.
There are women who centre every delight in the object of their
affections, and this, to a certain degree, even in friendship; but
in love alone is it fully shown. To love, for such, is to centre
everything in the beloved; they have no fits of great ardour followed
by calmness--theirs is one unbroken act of love. Should there be no
obstacles to their love, it is to them a source of happiness undreamed
of by many, for their world is full. They have attained happiness, as
far as it can be attained on earth from earthly things--for the human
heart is made for the Infinite, and nothing finite can ever _fully_
satisfy it. These do not stop to calculate whether loving another will
be for their own advantage; they call that, egotism--the very opposite
of love. "_Non amate Dio per voi_" is for them the expression of
perfect love; and is not the love of God the model, ay, and the motor
too, of all true human love? When love is pure and disinterested it
wants not its due reward, but it obtains so much the greater recompense
the less it seeks.
But should such obstacles arise, should they be separated from the
object of their love, their misery is correspondingly great. Like
a native of some sunny clime banished in the noonday of life to a
northern land, clouded in chilly mists, it is vain to surround him with
all that should cheer his heart; vain to strive--how tenderly soever
it may be--to beguile his weariness; he pines for the beloved sun of
other days, and sighs hopelessly for the glowing brightness of his
home. So is the sun of _their_ life beclouded,--he who was their sun,
he who threw a halo over all, is gone; the chilly mist is ever upon
their hearts, and they know in this life something of that terrible
torture--the pain of loss.
But another pang is often reserved for them, and it is of all the most
bitter; it comes when they have to choose between love and conscience,
and when, in obeying the dictates of the latter, they have to bear the
reproach of not loving truly, whilst, as they know but too well, they
love so fully that few understand or realise it. To feel all this, and
yet to be powerless to prove their love, is torture so great that they
must indeed be watched over from above if they get safely through the
ordeal.
Flora Adair thought and dreamed of the truest love to be found on
earth, and without it life seemed to her but a sunless sojourn.
Could she but have soared high enough so to love God, without the
intervention of any creature, how great would have been her happiness!
No struggle, no doubting, no separation possible! To this, however, she
felt unequal,--she rested on a less lofty height, yet it was still a
_height_, since all love, in order, is homage to God!
Was this great enjoyment of Mr. Earnscliffe's society the dawning of
her dream of day? We can only answer that she herself did not so think
about it; she only felt that he pleased her more than any other had
ever done, and that she wished her ankle had not got well so quickly,
that she might still have had the pleasure of meeting him frequently.
To dissipate the weariness which she felt to be stealing upon her, she
proposed to her mother and Lucy to go to the Blakes, as Mina Blake had
said something
|
passivity; Child labor; The finest life on earth.
RURAL LIFE AND THE RURAL SCHOOL
CHAPTER I
RURAL LIFE
It is only within the past decade that rural life and the rural school
have been recognized as genuine problems for the consideration of the
American people. Not many years ago, a president of the United States,
acting upon his own initiative, appointed a Rural School Commission to
investigate country life and to suggest a solution for some of its
problems. That Commission itself and its report were both the effect and
the cause of an awakening of the public mind upon this most important
problem. Within the past few years the cry "Back to the country" has
been heard on every hand, and means are now constantly being proposed
for reversing the urban trend, or at least for minimizing it.
=A Generation Ago.=--Rural life, as it existed a quarter of a century or
more ago, was extremely severe and indeed to our mind quite repellent.
In those days--and no doubt they are so even yet in many places--the
conditions were too often forbidding and deterrent. Otherwise how can
we explain the very general tendency among the younger people to move
from the country to the city?
=Chores and Work.=--The country youth, a mere boy in his teens, was, and
still is, compelled to rise early in the morning--often at four
o'clock--and to go through the round of chores and of work for a long
day of twelve to fifteen hours. First, after rising, he had his team to
care for, the stables were to be cleaned, cows to be milked, and hogs
and calves to be fed.
After the chores were done the boy or the young man had to work all day
at manual labor, usually close to the soil; he was allowed about one
hour's rest at dinner time; in the evening after a day's hard labor, he
had to perform the same round of chores as in the morning so that there
was but a short time for play and recreation, if he had any surplus
energy left. He usually retired early, for he was fatigued and needed
sleep and rest in order to be refreshed for the following day, when he
very likely would be required to repeat the same dull round.
=Value of Work.=--Of course work is a good thing. A moderate and
reasonable amount of labor is usually the salvation of any individual.
No nation or race has come up from savagery to civilization without the
stimulating influence of labor. It is likewise true that no individual
can advance from the savagery of childhood to the civilization of adult
life except through work of some kind. Work in a reasonable amount is a
blessing and not a curse. It is probably due to this fact that so many
men in our history have become distinguished in professional life, in
the forum, on the bench, and in the national Congress; in childhood and
youth they were inured to habits of work. This kept them from
temptation, and endowed them with habits of industry, of concentration,
and of purpose. The old adage that "Satan finds some mischief still for
idle hands to do," found little application in the rural life of a
quarter of a century ago.
=Extremes.=--Even with all its unrecognized advantages, the fact remains
that farm life has been quite generally uninteresting to the average
human being. There are individuals who become so accustomed to hard work
that the habit really grows to be pleasant. This, no doubt, often
happens. Habit accustoms the individual to accommodate himself to
existing conditions, no matter how severe they may be. A very old man
who was shocking wheat under the hot sun of a harvest day was once told
that it must be hard work for him. He replied, "Yes, but I like it when
the bundles are my own." So the few who are interested and accustomed by
habit to this kind of life may enjoy it, but to the great majority of
people the conditions would be decidedly unattractive.
=Yearly Routine.=--The yearly routine on the farm used to be about as
follows: In early spring, before seeding time had come, all the seed
wheat had to be put through the fanning mill. The seed was sown by
hand. A man carried a heavy load of grain upon his back and walked from
one end of the field to the other, sowing it broadcast as he went. After
the wheat had been sown, plowing for the corn and potatoes was begun and
continued. These were all planted by hand, and when they came above
ground they were hoed by hand and cultivated repeatedly by walking and
holding the plow.
=Disliked in Comparison.=--All of this work implies, of course, that the
person doing it was close to the soil; in fact, he was _in_ the soil. He
wore, necessarily, old clothes somewhat begrimed by dirt and dust. His
shoes or boots were heavy and his step became habitually long and slow.
Manual labor too frequently carries with it a neglect of cleanliness.
The laborer on the farm necessarily has about him the odor of horses, of
cows, and of barns. Such conditions are not bad, but they are
nevertheless objectionable, when compared with the neatness and
cleanliness of the clerk in the bank or behind the counter. We do not
write these words in any spirit of disparagement, but merely from the
point of view at which many young people in the country view them. We
are trying to face the truth in order to understand the problem to be
solved. It is essential to look at the situation squarely and to view it
steadily and honestly. Hiding our heads in the sand will not clarify our
vision.
=Other Hard Jobs.=--The next step in the yearly round was haymaking.
Frequently, the grass was cut with scythes. In any event the work of
raking, curing, and stacking the hay, or the hauling it and pitching it
into the barns was heavy work. There was no hayfork operated by
machinery in those days. When not haying, the youth was usually put to
summer-fallowing or to breaking new ground, to fencing or splitting
rails,--all heavy work. No wonder that he always welcomed a rainy day!
=Harvesting.=--Then came the wheat-harvest time. Within the memory of
the author some of the grain was cut with cradles; later, simple reaping
machines of various kinds were used; but with them went the binding,
shocking, and stacking, all performed by hand and all arduous pieces of
work. These operations were interspersed with plowing and threshing.
Then came corn cutting, potato digging, and corn husking.
=Threshing.=--In those days most of the work around a threshing machine
was also done by hand. There was no self-feeding apparatus and no
band-cutting device; there was no straw-blower and no measuring and
weighing attachments. It usually required about a dozen "hands" to do
all the work. These men worked strenuously and usually in dusty places.
The only redeeming feature of the business was the opportunity given for
social intercourse which accompanied the work. Men, being social by
instinct, always work more willingly and more strenuously when others
are with them.
=Welcome Events.=--It is quite natural, as we have said, that under such
conditions as these the youth longed for a rainy day. A trip to the city
was always a delightful break in the monotony of his life, and a short
respite from severe toil. Sunday was usually the only social occasion in
rural life. It was always welcome, and the boys, even though tired
physically from work during the week, usually played ball, or went
swimming, or engaged in other sports on Sunday afternoons. Living in
isolation all the week and engaged in hard labor, they instinctively
craved companionship and society.
=Winter Work.=--When the fall work was done, winter came with its own
occupations. There were usually about four months of school in the rural
district, but even during this season there was much manual labor to be
done. Trees were to be cut down and wood was to be chopped, sawed, and
split for the coming summer. Land frequently had to be cleared to make
new fields; the breaking of colts and of steers constituted part of the
sport as well as of the labor of that season of the year.
=What the Old Days Lacked.=--There was little or no machinery as a
factor in the rural life of days gone by. In these modern times, of
course, many things have made country life more attractive than
formerly. Twenty-five years ago there was no rural delivery, no motor
cycle, no automobile; even horses and buggies were somewhat of a luxury,
for in the remote country districts the ox team or "Shanks' mares"
formed the usual mode of travel.
=The Result.=--It is little wonder that under such circumstances
discontent arose and that people who by nature are sociable longed to go
where life was, in their opinion, more agreeable. Even with all the
later conveniences and improvements, the trend cityward still continues
and may continue indefinitely in the future. The American people may as
well face the facts as they are. It is difficult if not impossible to
make the country as attractive to young people as is the city; and
consequently to reverse or even stop the urban trend will be most
difficult. Indeed, some of the things which make rural life pleasant,
like the automobile, favor this trend, which probably will continue
until economic pressure puts on the brakes. Even now, with all our
improvements, the social factors in rural life are comparatively small.
Here is one of our greatest problems: How to increase the fullness of
social life in rural communities so as to make country life and living
everywhere more attractive.
=The Backward Rural School.=--Although the material conditions and
facilities for work have improved by reason of various inventions in
recent years, the rural school of former days was frequently as good as,
if not better in some respects than, the school of to-day. Formerly
there were many able men engaged in teaching who could earn as much in
the schoolroom as they could earn elsewhere. There were consequently in
the rural schools many strong personalities, both men and women. Since
that time new opportunities and callings have developed so rapidly that
some of the most capable people have been enticed into other and more
profitable callings, and the schools are left in a weakened condition by
reason of their absence.
=Women's Condition Unrelieved.=--With all our improvements and
conveniences, the work of women in country communities has been relieved
but little. Farm life has always been and still is a hard one for women.
It has been, in many instances, a veritable state of slavery; for women
in the country have always been compelled to do not only their own
proper work, but the work of two or three persons. The working hours for
women are even longer than those for men; for breakfast must be prepared
for the workmen, and household work must be done after the evening meal
is eaten. It is little to be wondered at that women as a rule wish to
leave the drudgery of rural life. Under the improved conditions of the
present day, with all kinds of machinery, the work of women is lightened
least.[1]
[Footnote 1: There is an illuminating article, entitled "The Farmer and
His Wife," by Martha Bensley Bruère in _Good Housekeeping Magazine_, for
June, 1914, p. 820.]
=The Rural Problem Must Be Met.=--I have given a short description of
rural life in order to have a setting for the rural school. The school
is, without doubt, the center of the rural life problem, and we are
face to face with it for a solution of some kind. The problems of both
have been too long neglected. Now forced upon our attention, they should
receive the thoughtful consideration of all persons interested in the
welfare of society. They are difficult of solution, probably the most
difficult of all those which our generation has to face. They involve
the reduction of the repellent forces in rural life and the increase of
such forces and agencies as will be attractive, especially to the young.
The great problem is, how can the trend cityward be checked or reversed?
What attractions are possible and feasible in the rural communities? In
each there should be some recognized center to provide these various
attractions. There should be lectures and debates, plays of a serious
character, musical entertainments, and social functions; even the moving
picture might be made of great educational value. There is no reason why
the people in the country are not entitled to all the satisfying mental
food which the people of the city enjoy. These things can be secured,
too, if the people will only awake to a realization of their value, and
will show their willingness to pay for them. Something cannot be secured
for nothing. In the last resort the solution of most problems, as well
as the accomplishment of most aims, involves the expenditure of money.
Wherever the people of rural communities have come to value the finer
educational, cultural, civilizing, and intangible things more than they
value money, the problem is already being solved. It is certainly a
question of values--in aims and means.
=Facilities.=--Many inventions might be utilized on the farm to better
advantage than they are at present. But people live somewhat isolated
lives in rural communities and there is not the active comparison or
competition that one finds in the city; improvements of all kinds are
therefore slower of realization. Values are not forced home by every-day
discussion and comparison. People continue to do as they have been
accustomed to do, and there are men who own large farms and have large
bank accounts who continue to live without the modern improvements, and
hence with but few comforts in life. A greater interest in the best
things pertaining to country life needs to be awakened, and to this end
rural communities should be better organized, socially, economically,
and educationally.
CHAPTER II
THE URBAN TREND
In the preceding chapter we discussed those forces at work in rural life
which tend to drive people from the farm to the city. It was shown that,
on the whole, up to the present at least, farm life has not been as
pleasant as it should or could be made. Some aspects of it are
uncomfortable, if not painful. Hard manual labor, long hours of toil,
and partial isolation from one's fellows usually and generally
characterize it. Of course, there are many who by nature or habit, or
who by their ingenuity and thrift, have made it serve them, and who
therefore have come to love the life of the country; but we are speaking
with reference to the average men and women who have not mastered the
forces at hand, which can be turned to their service only by thought and
thrift.
=Cityward.=--The trend toward the cities is unmistakable. So alarming
has it become that it has aroused the American people to a realization
that something must be done to reverse it or at least to minimize it. At
the close of the Revolutionary War only three per cent of the total
population of our country lived in what could be termed cities. In 1810
only about five per cent of the whole population was urban; while in
1910 forty-six per cent of our people lived in cities. This means that,
relatively, our forces producing raw materials are not keeping pace with
the growth and demands of consumption. In some of the older Atlantic
states, as one rides through the country, vast areas of uncultivated
land meet the view. The people have gone to the city. Large cities
absorb smaller ones, and the small towns absorb the inhabitants of the
rural districts. Every city and town is making strenuous efforts to
build itself up, if need be at the expense of the smaller towns and the
rural communities. To "boom" its own city is assumed to be a large and
legitimate part of the business of every commercial club. This must
mean, of course, that smaller cities and towns and the rural communities
suffer accordingly in business, in population, and in life.
=Attractive Forces.=--The attractive forces of the city are quite as
numerous and powerful as the repellent forces of the country. The city
is attractive from many points of view. It sets the pace, the standard,
the ideals; even the styles of clothing and dress originate there. It is
where all sorts of people are seen and met with in large numbers; its
varied scenes are always magnetic. Both old and young are attracted by
activities of all kinds; the "white way" in every city is a constant bid
for numbers. In the city there is always more liveliness if not more
life than in the country. Activity is apparent everywhere. Everything
_seems_ better to the young person from the country; there is more to
see and more to hear; the show windows and the display of lighting are a
constant lure; there is an endless variety of experiences. Life seems
great because it is cosmopolitan and not provincial or local. In any
event, it _draws_ the youth of the country. Things, they say, are
_doing_, and they long to be a part of it all. There is no doubt that
the mind and heart are motivated in this way.
=Conveniences in Cities.=--In the city there are more conveniences than
in the country. There are sidewalks and paved streets instead of muddy
roads; there are private telephones, and the telegraph is at hand in
time of need; there are street cars which afford comfortable and rapid
transportation. There are libraries, museums, and art galleries; there
are free lectures and entertainments of various kinds; and the churches
are larger and more attractive than those in the country. As in the case
of teachers, the cities secure their pick of preachers. Doctors are at
hand in time of need, and all the professions are centered there. Is it
any wonder that people, when they have an opportunity, migrate to the
city? There is a social instinct moving the human heart. All people are
gregarious. Adults as well as children like to be where others are, and
so where some people congregate others tend to do likewise. Country life
as at present organized does not afford the best opportunity for the
satisfaction of this social instinct. The great variety of social
attractions constitutes the lure of the city--it is the powerful social
magnet.
=Urbanized Literature.=--Most books, magazines, and papers are published
in cities, hence most of them have the flavor of city life about them.
They are made and written by people who know the city, and the city
doings are usually the subject matter of the literary output of the day.
Children acquire from these, even in their primary school days, a
longing for the city. The idea of seeing and possibly of living in the
city becomes "set," and it tends sooner or later to realize itself in
act and in life.
=City Schools.=--The city, as a rule, maintains excellent schools; and
the most modern and serviceable buildings for school purposes are found
there. Urban people seem willing to tax themselves to a greater extent;
and so in the cities will be found comparatively better buildings,
better teachers, more and better supervision, more fullness of life in
the schools. Usually in the cities the leading and most enterprising men
and women are elected to the school board, and the people, as we have
said, acquiesce in such taxation as the board deems necessary. Cities
endeavor to secure the choice of the output of normal schools,
regardless of the demands of rural districts. Every city has a
superintendent, and every building a principal; while, in the country,
one county superintendent has to supervise a hundred or more schools,
situated too, as they are, long distances apart.
=City Churches.=--Something similar may be said with respect to the
churches. In every city there are several, and people can usually go to
the church of their choice. In many parts of the country the church is
decadent, and in some places it is becoming extinct. Even the automobile
contributes its influence against the country church as a rural
institution, and in favor of the city; for people who are sufficiently
well-to-do often like to take an automobile ride to the city on Sunday.
=City Work Preferred.=--Workingmen and servant girls also prefer the
city. They dislike the long irregular hours of the country; they prefer
to work where the hours are regular, where they do not come into such
close touch with the soil, and where they do not have to battle with the
elements. In the city they work under shelter and in accordance with
definite regulations. Hence it is that the problem of securing
workingmen and servant girls in the country is every day becoming more
and more perplexing.
=Retired Farmers.=--Farmers themselves, when they have become reasonably
well-to-do, frequently retire to the city, either to enjoy life the rest
of their days or to educate their children. Individuals are not to be
blamed. The lack of equivalent attractions and conveniences in the
country is responsible.
=Educational Centers.=--As yet, it is seldom that good high schools are
found in the country. To secure a high school education country people
frequently have to avail themselves of the city schools. Many colleges
and universities are located in the cities and, consequently, much of
the educational trend is in that direction.
=Face the Problem.=--The rural problem is a difficult one and we may as
well face the situation honestly and earnestly. There has been too much
mere oratory on problems of rural life. We have often, ostrich-like,
kept our heads under the sand and have not seen or admitted the real
conditions, which must be changed if rural life is to become attractive.
Say what we will, people will go where their needs are best satisfied
and where the attractions are greatest. People cannot be _driven_--they
must be attracted and won. If "God made the country and man made the
town," God's people must be neglecting to give God's country "such a
face and such a mien as to be loved needs only to be seen." Where the
element of nature is largest there should be a more truly and deeply
attractive life than where the element of art predominates, however
alluring that may be. How can country life and the country itself be
made to attract?
=Educational Value Not Realized.=--People generally have never been able
to estimate education fairly. The value of lands, horses, and money can
easily be measured, for these are tangible things; but education is very
difficult of appraisal, for it is intangible. Yet it is true that
intangible things are frequently of greater worth than are tangible
things. There are men who pay more to a jockey to train their horses
than they are willing to pay to a teacher to train their children. This
is because the services of the jockey are more easily reckoned. The
effects or results of the horse training are measured by the proceeds in
dollars and cents on the racetrack, and so are easily realized; while
the growth in education, refinement, and culture on the part of the
child is difficult indeed to measure or estimate. And yet how much more
valuable it is! The jockey gives the one, the teacher the other.
=Wrong Standard in the Social Mind.=--In some rural communities the idea
exists that a teacher is worth about fifty dollars a month--perhaps not
so much. This idea has been encouraged until it has been too generally
accepted; and in many places the notion prevails that if a teacher is
receiving more than that amount, she is being overpaid, and the school
board is accused of extravagance. The rural school problem will never be
solved until the standard of compensation is readjusted. There are many
persons in the cities, who, for the performance of socially unimportant
things, are receiving larger salaries than are usually paid to
university professors and college presidents. Thus, the relative values
of services are misjudged and the recompense of labor is not properly
graded and proportioned. Unless there is, quite generally, a saner
perspective in the social mind and until values are reëstimated, the
solution of the rural school problem and indeed of many problems of
rural life is well-nigh hopeless. Before a solution is effected
sufficient inducement must be held out to more strong persons to come
into the rural life and into the rural schools. These persons would and
could be leaders of strength among the people.
=Rural Organization.=--Until recently there has been little or no
organization of rural life. Communities have been chaotic, socially,
economically, and educationally. Real leaders have been wanting--men and
women of strong and winning personality. The rural teacher, if he were a
man of power and initiative, often proved to be a real savior and
redeemer of social life in his community. But leaders of this type
cannot now be secured without a reasonable incentive. Such men will
seldom sacrifice themselves for the organization and uplift of a
community except for proper compensation. If teachers--or at least the
strong ones--were paid two or three times as much as they are to-day,
and if the standards were raised accordingly, so as to secure really
strong personalities as teachers, country life might be organized in
different directions and made so much more attractive than at present,
that the urban trend would be arrested or greatly minimized.
=Playing with the Problem.=--The possibilities of the organization of
rural life and rural schools have not yet been realized; as a people we
have really played with this problem. It has taken care of itself; it
has been allowed to drift. Rural life at present is a kind of easy
social adjustment on the basis of the minimum of expense and of
exertion toward a solution. We have not realized the value of genuine
social, economic, and educational organization with all the activities
in these lines which the terms imply. We have not grappled with the
problem in an earnest, scientific way; we have never thought out
systematically what is needed, and then decided to employ the necessary
means to bring about the desired end. It may be that the problem will
remain unsolved for generations to come; but if country life and country
schools are to be made as attractive and pleasant as city life and city
schools, the people will have to face the problem without flinching and
use the only means which will bring about the desired result. The
problem could be easily solved if the people realized the true value of
rural life and of _good_ rural schools. Where there is a will there is a
way; but where there is no will there is no possible way. Country life
can be made fully as pleasant as city life, and the rural schools can be
made fully as good as the city schools. Of course some things will be
lacking in the country which are found in the city; but, conversely,
many things and probably better things will be found in the country than
could be found in the city.
CHAPTER III
THE REAL AND THE IDEAL SCHOOL
This chapter will have reference to the one-room rural school as it has
existed in the past and as it still exists in many places; it will also
discuss the rural school as it ought to be. It is assumed that, although
consolidation is spreading rapidly, the one-room rural school as an
institution will continue to exist for an indefinite time. Under
favorable conditions it probably should continue to exist; for, as we
shall see, it has many excellent features which are real advantages.
=The Building.=--The old-fashioned country schoolhouse was in many
respects a pitiable object. The "little red schoolhouse" in story and
song has been the object of much praise. As an ideal creation it may be
deserving of admiration, but this cannot be asserted of it as a reality.
The common type was an ordinary box-shaped building without
architecture, without a plan, and, as a rule, without care or repair.
Frequently it stood for years without being repainted, and in the midst
of chaotic and ill-cared-for surroundings. The contract for building it
was usually awarded to some carpenter who was also given _carte blanche_
to do as he pleased in regard to its construction, the only provision
being that he keep within the amount of money allowed--probably eight
hundred or a thousand dollars. The usual result was the plainest kind of
building, without conveniences of any kind. If a blackboard were
provided in the specifications (which were often oral rather than
written), it was perhaps placed in such a position as to be useless. In
the course of my experience as county superintendent of schools, I once
visited a rural school in which the blackboard began at the height of a
man's head and extended to the ceiling, the carpenter probably thinking
that its one purpose was to display permanently the teacher's program.
=No System of Ventilation.=--No system of ventilation was provided in
former days, and in some schoolhouses such is the condition to-day.
Nevertheless, within the past fifteen years, there has been a gratifying
improvement in this direction. It used to be necessary to secure fresh
air, if at all, by opening windows. In some sections, where the climate
is mild, this is the best method of ventilation; but certainly, in
northern latitudes where the winters are long and cold, some system of
forced or automatic ventilation should be provided. It may not be amiss
to assert that it would be an excellent plan to decide first upon a good
system of ventilation and then to build the schoolhouse around it.
Without involving great expense there are simple systems of ventilation
and heating combined which are very efficient for such houses. In
former times, and in some places even yet, the usual method of heating
was by an unjacketed stove which made the pupils who sat nearest it
uncomfortably warm, while those in the farther corners were shivering
with cold. With new systems of ventilation there is an insulating jacket
which equalizes the temperature of the room by heating the fresh air and
distributing it evenly.
It is strange how slowly people change their habits and even their
opinions. Many are ignorant of the fact that in an unventilated
schoolroom each child is breathing over and over again an atmosphere
vitiated by the air exhaled from the lungs of every child in the room.
The fact that twenty to forty pupils are often housed in
poorly-ventilated schools accounts for much sickness and disease among
country children. Whatever it is that makes air "fresh," and healthful,
that factor is not found under the conditions described. Changes in the
temperature and movement of the air are, no doubt, important in securing
a healthful physiological reaction, but air contaminated and befouled by
bodies and lungs has stupefying effects which cannot be ignored.
Frequent change of air is essential.
=The Surroundings.=--The typical country schoolhouse, as it existed in
the past, and as it frequently exists to-day, has not sufficient land to
form a good yard and a playground appropriate for its needs. The farmer
who sold or donated the small tract of land often plows almost to the
very foundation walls. There are usually no trees near by to afford
shelter or to give the place a homelike and attractive appearance. Some
trees may have been planted, but owing to neglect they have all died
out, and nothing remains but a few dead and unsightly trunks. There is
usually no fence around the school yard, and the outbuildings are
frequently a disgrace, if not a positive menace to the children's
morals. If a choice had to be made it would be better to allow children
to grow up in their native liberty and wildness without a school
"education" than to have them subjected to mental and moral degradation
by the vicious suggestions received in some of these places. Weak
teachers have a false modesty in regard to such conditions and school
boards are often thoughtless or negligent.
=The Interior.=--Within the building there is frequently no adequate
equipment in the way of apparatus, supplementary reading, or reference
books of any kind. There are no decorations on the walls except such as
are put there by mischievous children. The whole situation both inside
and out brings upon one a feeling of desolation. Men and women who live
in reasonably comfortable homes near by allow the school home of their
precious children to remain for years unattractive and uninspiring in
every particular. Again this is the result of ignorance,
thoughtlessness, or negligence--a negligence that comes alarmingly close
to guilt.
=Small, Dead School.=--In many a lone rural schoolhouse may be found
ten to twenty small children; and behind the desk a teacher holding only
a second or third grade elementary or county certificate. The whole
institution is rather tame and weak, if not dead; it is anything but
stimulating (and if education means anything it means stimulation). It
is this kind of situation which has led in recent years to a discussion
of the rural school as one of the problems most urgently demanding the
attention of society.
=That Picture and This.=--Let us now consider, after looking upon that
picture, what the situation ought to be. In the first place, there
should be a large school ground, or yard--not less than two acres. The
schoolhouse should be properly located in this tract. The ground as a
whole should be platted by a landscape architect, or at least by a
person of experience and taste. Trees of various kinds should be planted
in appropriate places, and groups of shrubbery should help to form an
attractive setting. The school grounds should have a serviceable fence
and gate and there should be a playground and a school garden.
=Architecture of Building.=--No school building should be erected that
has not first been planned or passed upon by an architect; this is now
required by law in some states. A building with handsome appearance and
with appropriate appointments is but a trifle, if any, more costly than
one that has none. Art of all kinds is a valuable factor in the
education of children and of people generally; and a building, beautiful
in construction, is no exception to the rule. Every person is educated
by what impresses him. It is only within the last few years that much
attention has been given to the necessity of special architecture in
schoolhouses.
Men of intelligence sometimes draw up their own plans for a building and
then, having become enamored of them, proceed to construct a residence
or a schoolhouse along those lines. If they had shown their plans to an
architect of experience he would probably have pointed out numerous
defects which would have been admitted as soon as observed. Neither the
individual nor the district school boards can afford, in justice to
themselves and the community they represent, to ignore the wide and
varied knowledge of the expert.
=Get Expert Opinion.=--Expert opinion should govern in the matter of
heating and ventilating, in the kind of seating, in the arrangement of
blackboards, in the decorations, and in all such technical and
professional matters. Every rural school should have a carefully
selected library, suited to its needs, including a sufficient number of
reference books. The pupils should have textbooks without delay so that
no time may be wasted in getting started after the opening of school.
The walls should be adorned with a few appropriate and beautiful
pictures.
=Other Surroundings.=--On this school ground there should be a shop of
some kind. The resourceful teacher would find a hundred uses for some
such center of work. The closets should be so placed and so devised as
to be easily supervised. This would prevent them from being moral plague
spots, as is too often the case, as we have already said. There should
be stables for sheltering horses, if the school is, as it should be, a
social center for the community. There should be a flagpole in front of
the schoolhouse, from the top of which the stars and stripes should be
often unfurled to the breeze.
=Number of Pupils.=--In this architecturally attractive building, amid
beautiful surroundings both inside and out, there should be, in order to
have a good rural school, not less than eighteen or twenty pupils. Where
there are fewer the school should be consolidated with a neighboring
school. Twenty pupils would give an assurance of educational and social
life, instead of the dead monotony which often prevails in the smaller
rural school. There should be, during the year, at least eight, and
preferably nine, months of school work.
=It Will Not Teach Alone.=--But with all of these conditions the school
may still be far from effective. All the material equipment--the total
environment of the pupils, both inside and outside the building--may be
excellent, and still we may fail to find there a good school. Garfield
said of his old teacher that Mark Hopkins on one end of a log and a
pupil on the other made the best kind of college. This indicates an
essential factor other than the physical equipment.
I remember being once in a store when a man who had bought a saw a few
days previously returned it in a wrathful mood. He was angry through and
through and declared that the saw was utterly worthless. He had brought
it back to reclaim his money. The merchant had a rich vein of humor in
his nature and he listened smilingly to the outburst of angry language.
Then
|
Messerschmitt 110's, and
Stuka dive bombers. Winged messengers of doom howling down upon the road
choked with wagons and carts, and countless numbers of helpless
refugees.
Even as Dave saw them the leading ships opened fire. Tongues of jetting
red flame spat downward, and the savage yammer of the aerial machine
guns echoed above the blood chilling thunder of the engines. Tearing his
eyes from that horrible sight Dave glanced back at the road. It was
still filled with frantic men, women, and children, and at the spot
directly under the diving planes bullets were cutting down human lives
as swiftly as a keen edged scythe cuts down wheat.
His feet rooted to the ground, Dave stared in horror. Then suddenly one
of the diving Stukas released its deadly bomb. The bomb struck the
ground no more than twenty feet from the edge of the road. Red, orange,
and yellow flame shot high into the air. A billowing cloud of smoke
filled with dirt, and dust, and stones fountained upward. Then a mighty
roar akin to the sound of worlds colliding seemed to hammer straight
into his face. The next thing he realized he was flat on his back on the
ground gasping and panting for air while from every direction came the
screams of the wounded and the dying.
The screams seemed to release a hidden spring inside of him and make it
possible for him to set himself into action. He scrambled to his feet,
stared wild eyed up at the diving planes and shook his fist in white
heat anger.
"You'll pay for this!" he shouted. "You'll pay for this if it takes the
Allies a thousand years. And I'll do my share in helping them too!"
As the last left his lips he suddenly saw an old woman, almost bowed
down by bundles, trying feebly to get away from the road and out from
under the roaring armada of diving death. She took a few faltering steps
and then stumbled to her knees. One withered hand was stretched out in
mute appeal to the others to help her up, but no one paused to give her
aid. Stark fear had them all in its grasp and none could be bothered
about the misfortunes of the other.
The old woman was only one in thousands and thousands, but Dave had
witnessed her sad plight and so his movements were instinctive. He
leaped forward and went dashing to her side. With one hand he grabbed
her bundles and the other hand he put under her arm.
"I'll help you, Madam," he said. "Just lean on me. I'll get you to a
safe place. Don't worry."
He had spoken in English and of course the old woman didn't understand
his words. She understood his actions, however, and there was deep
gratitude in the lined and tired face she turned toward him.
"_Merci, Monsieur, merci_," she whispered and started forward leaning
heavily on Dave's arm.
And then down out of the blue it came! Dave heard the eerie sound above
the general din but of course he didn't see the dropping bomb. He didn't
even taken the time to glance upward. He simply acted quickly. He
grabbed the old woman about the waist and hauled her to the scanty
protection of a standing wagon. There he pushed her down and bent over
her so that his body served as partial protection against what he knew
was coming.
It came! A terrific crash of sound that seemed to split the very earth
wide open. Every bone in Dave's body seemed to turn to jelly. The entire
universe became one huge ocean of flashing light and fire. The ground
rocked and trembled under his feet. Unseen hands seemed to grab hold of
him and lift him straight upward to hover motionless in a cloud of
licking tongues of colored flame. Then suddenly all became as dark as
the night, and as silent as a tomb, and he knew no more.
CHAPTER THREE
_Dave Meets Freddy Farmer_
When Dave again opened his eyes it was night. He was lying on his back
under some trees and staring up through bomb shattered branches at the
canopy of glittering and twinkling stars high overhead. For several
seconds he remained perfectly still, not moving a muscle. What had
happened? Where was he? Why was he out here under some trees in the
dark?
Those and countless other questions crowded through his brain. Then, as
though somebody had pulled a curtain aside, memory came back to him and
he knew all the answers. Of course! A Stuka bomb. It had dropped close.
He had been trying to shelter that old woman. Yet, that had been on the
road by a cart, and here he was under some trees. How come? Had the
exploding bomb blown him under the trees? Was he wounded but still too
dazed to feel any pain? Good gosh, it was night now, so he must have
been here for hours!
Thought and action became one. He put out his hands and pushed himself
up to a sitting position. Almost instantly he regretted the effort. A
hundred trip-hammers started going to work on the inside of his head.
The night and the stars began to whirl madly about him. He closed his
eyes tight, and clenched his teeth until things stopped spinning so
fast. That helped the pounding in his head, too. It simmered down to a
dull throbbing ache that he could stand without flinching.
For a few moments he sat there on the grass feeling over his body and
searching for broken bones or any wounds he might have received. There
was nothing broken, however, and his only wound was a nice big goose egg
on the left side of his head. Thankful for the miracle wrought, he got
slowly to his feet, braved a hand against a tree trunk and peered about
him in the darkness.
It was then one more little surprise came to him. He was in a field and
as far as he could tell there wasn't a road any place. No unending
stream of refugees, no wagons, no carts, and no road. It was as though
he had dropped down into the very middle of nowhere. Completely puzzled
by the strangeness of his surroundings, he glanced at the sky, found the
North Star and started walking northward. Way off in the distance there
was a faint rumbling, like thunder far far away, but he knew at once it
was the roar of heavy guns. If he needed any proof he had only to stare
toward the northeast. There the faint glow of flames made a horizon line
between the night sky and the earth.
"But where _am_ I?" he asked himself aloud. "I couldn't have just been
blown away. I haven't even got a sprained ankle. Gosh! I wonder where
the Lieutenant is? And those poor refugees. I sure hope French planes
caught those Germans and gave them some of their own medicine. And...."
He choked off the rest and started running. In the distance off to his
left he had suddenly seen a pair of moving lights. One look told him
that it must be some kind of a car on a road. He would stop it and at
least find out where he was. Perhaps he might even get a ride back to
Paris. He would be crazy to try and reach Calais, now. The best thing
for him to do was to get back to Paris as fast as he could and send word
to his father.
"But how can I?" he gasped as sudden truth dawned on him. "I don't even
know where Dad's staying in London. He was to meet me at the station. I
didn't bother to ask Lieutenant Defoe where Dad was staying!"
The seriousness of his plight added wings to his feet. He raced at top
speed toward the pair of moving dim lights. And with every step he took,
fear that he would not get to the road in time mounted in his breast.
But he had been the star half miler on the Boston Latin High School
track team, and finally he reached the edge of the road a good fifty or
sixty yards in front of the advancing pair of lights. Disregarding the
danger of being run down in the dark he stepped to the center of the
road and waved both his arms and shouted at the top of his voice. The
sound of the car's engine died down, brakes complained, and the car came
to a halt.
"I say there, what's up?" shouted a voice from behind the lights. "I
jolly well came close to running you down, you know. Just spotted you in
the nick of time."
Dave gulped with relief at the sound of an English speaking voice. He
trotted toward the lights and then around them to the driver's seat. It
was then he saw that the car was an ambulance. It was a nice brand new
one, and only a little dusty. Painted under the red cross on the side
were the words... British Volunteer Ambulance Service.
"I say, do you speak English?" the driver asked as Dave came close.
Dave looked at him. The driver wasn't in uniform. He wore civilian
clothes, and he was about Dave's age. Perhaps a few months younger. In
the faint glow of the dashboard light his face held a sort of cherubic
expression. He wore no hat and sandy hair fell down over his forehead.
His eyes were clear blue, and he had nice strong looking teeth. One look
and Dave knew instantly that he could like this friendly English boy a
lot.
"You bet I speak English," he said. "I'm an American. My name is Dave
Dawson."
"Mine's Freddy Farmer," said the English boy. "I'm very glad to meet
you, America, but what in the world are you doing here? Good grief, look
at your clothes! Did a bomb fall on you?"
"One came mighty close," Dave said with a grin. "I just came to a few
minutes ago, and saw your lights. I'm trying to get back to Paris. Is it
far?"
"Paris?" young Freddy Farmer exclaimed. "Why, it's over a hundred miles
back. This is a part of Belgium. Didn't you know that? What happened
anyway? You say you were bombed? A nasty business, bombing."
For a moment or so Dave was too surprised to speak. This was Belgium?
But it couldn't be! Freddy Farmer must be wrong. He was sure Defoe and
he had not been seventy miles from Paris when they'd met those
refugees. Belgium? Good gosh! Did that exploding bomb blow him over
thirty miles away? But that was crazy.
"Come, get in and ride with me," the English lad broke into his
thoughts. "I can't take you back to Paris but Courtrai is just up ahead.
That's where I'm delivering this ambulance. Perhaps you can get
something there to take you back to Paris. Right you are, America. Now,
tell me all about it."
As gears were shifted and the car moved forward Dave told of his
thrilling experiences since leaving Paris that morning. Young Freddy
Farmer didn't interrupt, but every now and then he took his eyes off the
road ahead to look at Dave in frank admiration.
"Say, you did have a bit of a go, didn't you?" Freddy Farmer said when
Dave had finished. "That was mighty decent of you to try and help that
old woman. I hope she got through, all right. We heard that the Germans
were shooting and bombing the refugees. A very nasty business, but
that's the way Hitler wages war."
"I hope he gets a good licking!" Dave exclaimed. "Those poor people
didn't have a chance. They were helpless. I don't see how he thinks he
can win the war that way."
"Hitler won't win the war," the English boy said quietly. "He may have
us on the run for a bit, but in the end we'll win. Just like we did the
last time. That's part of his plan, shooting civilians on the road. I
heard a major and a colonel talking about it. You see, if his airplanes
can get the civilians to leave their homes and clog up the roads, why
then our troops have a hard time passing through. I saw some of that
sort of thing myself, today. It was awful, I can tell you. I couldn't
make any more than five miles in six hours. And it was all I could do to
stop them from taking my ambulance and using it for a bus. I wouldn't
let them, though."
Dave looked sidewise and saw how tired the English lad was. His cheeks
were slightly pale from fatigue, and his eyelids were heavy. Dave
reached out and touched the wheel.
"I've just had a pretty good sleep," he said with a laugh, "and you look
pretty much all in, Freddy. Want me to take the wheel for a spell? You
can tell me which way to go."
The English boy turned his head and smiled at him, and somehow both
suddenly knew that a deep friendship between them had been cemented.
"Thanks, awfully much, Dave," Freddy Farmer said, "but I'm not really
tired at all. Besides, there isn't far to go now. Only a few more miles,
I fancy. It's nice of you to ask, though."
"It'll still be okay if you change your mind," Dave said. "Have you been
driving an ambulance long? Do you go out and help pick up the wounded,
and stuff? I guess you've seen a lot of battles, haven't you?"
"Oh, No, I'm not really an ambulance driver, Dave. You have to be
eighteen to get in this volunteer service, and I won't be seventeen
until next month. You see, I've been going to school just outside Paris
and my family decided I'd better come home to England. Well, yesterday
several of these ambulances arrived at the Paris headquarters of the
Service. They had been shipped clear to Paris through a mistake. The
French do funny things sometimes, you know. Anyway, they were needed in
Belgium and there were no regular drivers in Paris. Not enough, anyway.
I thought it would be good fun to drive one and then carry on to the
Channel and on home to England. We left Paris at midnight last night,
and soon lost track of each other. It's been fun, though. I'll be sorry
to have the trip end."
"Jeepers, you've been driving since midnight?" Dave exclaimed. "You sure
can take it, Freddy, and how!"
"Take it?" the English boy murmured with a puzzled frown. "I don't think
I know what you mean."
Dave laughed. "That's American slang, Freddy," he said. "It means that
you've got a lot of courage, and stuff. It means that you're okay."
"Thanks, Dave," Freddy Farmer said. "But it really doesn't take any
courage. I'm very glad to do my bit, if it helps the troops any. We've
got to beat the Germans, you know. And we jolly well will, I can tell
you!"
The two boys lapsed into silence and for the next two or three miles
neither of them spoke. During that time Dave stared at the dim red glow
of burning buildings in the distance and thought his thoughts about the
war that had apparently begun in earnest. He was an American and America
was neutral, of course. Yet after what he'd seen this day he was filled
with a burning desire to do something to help beat back Hitler and
defeat him. He knew that there had been a lot of boys his age who had
taken part in the last World War. He was big for his age, too, and
strong as an ox. He decided that when he got to London and found his
father he would ask Dad if there wasn't something he could do to help.
Nothing else seemed important, now. The important thing was to help stop
all this business that was taking place in Europe.
At that moment Freddy Farmer suddenly slipped the car out of gear and
braked it to a stop.
"Yes, Freddy?"
"I'm afraid I've got us into a bit of a mess, Dave," he said. "To be
truthful, we are lost. I really haven't the faintest where we are. You
must think me a fine mug for this. I'm frightfully sorry, really."
"Wait a minute!" Dave cried out. "Here comes a car. It sounds like a
truck. Gee, what a racket!"
A pair of headlights was rapidly approaching along the road that led off
to the right. They bounced up and down because of the uneven surface,
and the banging noise of the engine made Dave think of a threshing
machine. On impulse he and Freddy Farmer moved out into the glow of the
ambulance's lights and began waving their arms. The truck or car, or
whatever it was, bore down upon them and finally came to a halt with the
grinding and clashing of gears.
"Come on, Dave, we'll find out, now!" Freddy said and trotted into the
twin beams of light.
Dave dropped into step at his side, and they had traveled but a few
yards when a harsh voice suddenly stopped them in their tracks.
"Halt!"
The two boys stood motionless, their eyes blinking into the light. Dave
heard Freddy Farmer catch his breath in a sharp gasp. He suddenly
realized that for some unknown reason his own heart was pounding
furiously, and there was a peculiar dryness in his throat. At that
moment he heard hobnailed boots strike the surface of the road. The
figure of a soldier came into the light. On his head was a bucket shaped
helmet, and in his hands was a wicked looking portable machine gun. He
moved forward in a cautious way, and then Dave was able to see his
uniform. His heart seemed to turn to ice in his chest, and his hands
suddenly felt very cold and damp.
He was looking straight at a German soldier!
CHAPTER FOUR
_Prisoners Of War!_
"Good Grief, a German!"
Freddy Farmer's whispered exclamation served to jerk Dave out of his
stunned trance. He blinked and swallowed hard and tried to stop the
pounding of his heart.
"Hey, there, we're lost!" he suddenly called out. "Where are we anyway?"
The advancing German soldier pulled up short and stopped. He stuck his
head forward and stared hard. There was a sharp exclamation behind him
and then a second figure came into the light. The second figure was a
German infantry officer. He kept one hand on his holstered Luger
automatic and came up to Dave and Freddy.
"You are English?" he asked in a heavy nasal voice. "What are you doing
here? Ah, an ambulance, eh? So, you are trying to sneak back through our
advanced lines? It is good that I have found you just in time. Keep your
hands up, both of you! I will see if you have guns, yes!"
"We're not armed, Captain!" Dave exclaimed. "We're not soldiers. We're
just lost."
"I am not a captain, I am a lieutenant!" the German snapped and searched
Dave for a gun. "You will address me as such. Not soldiers, you tell me?
Then, why this ambulance? And why are you here?"
"As you were just told," Freddy Farmer spoke up in a calm voice,
"because we are lost. Now, if you will be good enough to tell us the way
to Courtrai we will be off."
The German officer snapped his head around.
"Ah, so _you_ are English, yes?" he demanded.
"And proud of it!" Freddy said stiffly. "And this chap, if you must
know, is an American friend of mine. Now, will you tell us the way to
Courtrai?"
The German said nothing for a moment or two. There was a look of
disappointment on his sharp featured face. It was as though he was very
sad he had not found a pistol or an automatic on either of them. He
moved back a step and stood straddle legged with his bunched fists
resting on his hips.
"American and English?" he finally muttered. "This is all very strange,
very unusual. You say you don't know where you are?"
"That's right, Lieutenant," Dave said and choked back a hot retort.
"Where are we anyway? And what are you doing here? My gosh! Is this
Germany?"
The German smiled and showed ugly teeth.
"It is now," he said. "But that is all you need to know. I think you
have lied to me. Yes, I am sure of it. I will take you to the
_Kommandant_. He will get you to talk, I'm sure. _Himmel!_ Our enemies
send out little boys to spy on us! The grown men must be too afraid.
But, you cannot fool us with your tricks!"
"Tricks, nothing!" Dave blurted out in a burst of anger. "We told you
the truth. I was on my way to join my father in London...."
"Don't waste your breath, Dave," Freddy Farmer said quietly. "I'm sure
he wouldn't understand, anyway."
"Silence, you Englisher!" the German snarled and whirled on the boy.
"You will make no slurs at a German officer. Come! We will go to see the
_Kommandant_ at once!"
"We'd better do as he orders, Freddy," Dave said swiftly. "After we've
told our story to his commanding officer they'll let us go. They can't
keep us very long. If they do, I'll appeal to the nearest American
Consul. He'll straighten things out for us."
"So?" the German muttered and gave Dave a piercing look. "Well, we shall
see. If you are spies it will go very hard with you, yes. Now, march
back to the car in front of me."
The officer half turned his head and snapped something at the soldier
who had been standing in back of him. The soldier immediately sprang
into action. He hurried past and climbed into the front seat of the
ambulance. Dave impulsively took hold of Freddy's arm again.
"Don't worry, Freddy!" he whispered. "Everything, will come out all
right. You wait and see. Don't let these fellows even guess that we're
worried."
"What's that?" the German suddenly thundered. "What's that you are
saying to him?"
The officer had half drawn his Luger and the movement chilled Dave's
heart. He forced himself, though, to look the German straight in the
eye.
"I was simply telling him the American Consul would fix things up for
us," he said evenly.
The German snorted.
"Perhaps," he growled. "We shall see."
Walking straight with their heads up and their shoulders back, the two
boys permitted themselves to be herded back to the car. When they passed
beyond the glow of the headlights they were plunged into darkness and
for a moment Dave could see nothing. Then his eyes became used to the
change and he saw that the car was a combination car and truck. It was
actually an armored troop transport. Steel sheets protected the back and
the driver's seat, and instead of heavy duty tires on the rear wheels
there were tractor treads instead so that the army vehicle could travel
across country and through mud as well as along a paved road.
In the back were some fifteen or twenty German soldiers each armed with
a small machine gun and completely fitted out for scouting work. They
peered down at Dave and Freddy as the officer motioned them to get into
the transport, but none of them spoke. They either did not understand
English, or else they were too afraid of the officer to speak. And so
Dave and Freddy climbed aboard in silence and sank down on the hard
plank that served as a seat. The officer got in beside the driver and
growled a short order.
The engine roared up, gears clanked and crashed, and the transport
lunged forward. It traveled a few yards and swung off the road and
around in the direction from which it had obviously come. That direction
was to the east, and that caused Dave to swallow hard and press his knee
against Freddy's. The pressure that was returned told him that the
English boy had a good hold on himself, and wasn't going to do anything
foolish.
Glad of that, Dave stared ahead over the shoulder of the driver at the
road. At various points the pavement had been torn up by a bomb or by a
shell and the transport's driver was forced to detour around such spots.
Presently, wrecked ammunition wagons, and light field artillery pieces
were to be seen, strewn along the side of the road. They were all
smashed almost beyond recognition, and close by them were the death
stilled figures of Belgian soldiers, and refugees who had been unable to
escape the swiftly advancing German hordes.
Suddenly the sound of airplane engines lifted Dave's eyes up to the
skies. He could not see the planes, they were too high. However the
pulsating beat of the engines told him they were Hitler's night bombers
out on patrol. Impulsively he clenched his two fists and wished very
much he was up there in a swift, deadly pursuit or fighter plane. He had
taken flying lessons back home, and had even made his first solo. But he
had not been granted his private pilot's license yet because of his age.
"But I'd like to be up there in a Curtis P-Forty!" he spoke aloud. "I
bet I could do something, or at least try!"
His words stiffened Freddy Farmer at his side. The English boy leaned
close.
"Are you a pilot, Dave?" he whispered. "Do you fly?"
"Some," Dave said. "I've gone solo, anyway. I hope some day to get
accepted for the Army Air Corps. I think flying is the best thing yet.
There's nothing like it. Hear those planes up there? Boy!"
"They're German," Freddy said. "Heinkel bombers, I think. Or perhaps
they are Dorniers, I can't tell by the sound. I'm crazy about flying,
too. I joined an aero club back in England. I've got a few hours solo to
my credit. When war broke out I tried to enlist in the Royal Air Force,
but they found out about my age and it was no go, worse luck. But, some
day I'm going to wear R.A.F. wings. At least, I hope and pray so. I...."
"Silence!" the German officer's harsh voice grated against their
eardrums once more. "You will not speak!"
"A rum chap, isn't he?" Freddy breathed out the corner of his mouth.
"Sure thinks he's a big shot," Dave breathed.
And then as the transport continued to rumble and roll eastward Nature
took charge of things as far as the boys were concerned. Strong and
healthy though they were, they had been through a lot since dawn. It had
been more than enough to wear down a full grown man. And soon they fell
sound asleep.
The rasping and clanging of gears and the shouting of voices in German
eventually dragged Dave out of his sound slumber. It was still dark but
he could see the first faint light of a new dawn low down in the east.
The motorized transport had come to a stop in the center of a small
village. Dave could see that here, too, shells and bombs had been at
work, but lots of the buildings remained untouched. There were German
soldiers in all kinds of uniforms all over the place. A hand was slapped
against his shoulder and he looked up to stare into the small bright
eyes of the German lieutenant.
"Wake up your friend!" the German snapped, "We are here. Get out, both
of you!"
"Where are we?" Dave asked and gently shook Freddy Farmer who was fast
asleep on his shoulder. "What town is this, Lieutenant?"
The German smiled slyly. Then annoyance flashed through his eyes. He
whipped out a hand and took a steel grip on Freddy's shoulder and shook
viciously.
"Wake up, Englander!" he barked. "You have had enough sleep for the
present. Wake up, I say!"
A smart slap across the cheek emphasized the last. The English lad woke
up instantly, and he would have lunged out with a clenched fist if Dave
had not caught hold of his arm.
"Take it easy, Freddy!" he exclaimed. "This is the end of the line.
Here's where we get off. How do you feel?"
Freddy shook his head and dug knuckles into his sleep filled eyes. That
seemed to do the trick. He was fully awake in an instant.
"Oh yes, I remember, now," he said. "Where are we, though? What's this
place?"
The German threw back his head and laughed.
"I will tell you," he said and waggled a finger in front of their faces.
"This is the Headquarters of the German Army Intelligence in the field.
I am taking you before the _Kommandant_. And now we shall learn all
about you two. Yes, you will be very wise to answer truthfully all the
questions _Herr Kommandant_ asks."
With a curt nod to show that he meant what he said the German climbed
down onto the street, and then motioned for Dave and Freddy to climb
down, too.
"That building, there," he said and pointed. "March! And do not be so
foolish as to try and run away. I warn you!"
Dave and Freddy simply shrugged and walked across the street to the
doorway of a solidly built stone building. A guard standing in front
clicked his heels and held his rifle at salute at the approach of the
officer.
"My compliments to _Herr Kommandant_," the officer said sharply.
"_Leutnant_ Mueller reporting with two prisoners for questioning."
The guard saluted again, then executed a smart about face and went in
through the door. Dave caught a flash glimpse of desks, and chairs, and
the part of a wall covered by a huge map, before the door was closed in
his face. He looked at Freddy and grinned, and then glanced up into the
small eyes of the German officer. Those small eyes seemed to bore right
back into his brain.
"You will do well to tell the whole truth!" the German said without
hardly moving his lips. "Remember that!"
At that moment the door was reopened and the guard was nodding at the
lieutenant.
"_Herr Kommandant_ will see you at once, _Herr Leutnant_," he said.
"Good!" the officer grunted, and pushed Dave and Freddy in the back.
"Inside, at once!"
CHAPTER FIVE
_In the Enemy's Camp_
The first thing Dave saw as the Lieutenant pushed him through the open
doorway was a desk bigger than any other desk he had ever seen. It was a
good nine feet long and at least five feet wide. It took up almost one
whole side of the room and upon it were piled books, official papers, a
couple of portable short-wave radio sets, and at least a dozen
telephones. And seated at the desk was a huge red faced, bull necked
German in the uniform of a staff colonel.
"My prisoners, _Herr Kommandant_ Stohl," the Lieutenant said. "_Heil
Hitler!_"
The big German Colonel lifted his gaze from some papers in front of him,
looked at Dave Dawson and Freddy Farmer and started violently. His eyes
widened and his jaw dropped in amazement. He got control of himself
almost instantly and whipped his eyes to the Lieutenant's face.
"Is this a joke, _Herr Leutnant_?" he demanded in a booming voice that
shook the thick walls of the room. "What is the charge against these two
peasant urchins? Look, the clothes of that one, there, are in rags!"
The high ranking officer lifted a finger the size of a banana and jabbed
it at Dave. The lieutenant flushed and made gurgling sounds in his
throat.
"They are not urchins, not peasants, _Herr Kommandant_," he explained
hastily. "This one of the brown hair claims he is an American. And this
one of the light hair is an Englisher. I caught them trying to sneak
past our advance units with an ambulance. They stated that they were
lost, and wanted to know the way to Courtrai. When I caught them they
were a good forty miles southeast of that city. I did not believe their
stories so I escorted them here at once."
"And the ambulance?" the German asked slowly. "There were wounded
soldiers in it, perhaps?"
"No, _Herr Kommandant_," the Lieutenant said with a shake of his head.
"There was nothing. It was completely empty. It has never been used.
That, also, added to my suspicions of these two. I shall give it a
better examination at your orders, sir."
"Do so at once, now," the senior officer said and made a wave of
dismissal with one hand.
"At once, _Herr Kommandant_," the Lieutenant said in a magpie voice.
"_Heil Hitler!_"
The German Colonel waited until he had left, then focussed his eyes on
Dave and Freddy, and smiled faintly.
"And now, boys," he said in a kindly voice, "what is all this about? How
did you happen to get so far behind our lines?"
"We told the lieutenant the truth, sir," Freddy Farmer spoke up. "I was
lost. It was all my fault. I had no idea where I was. You have no right
to hold us as prisoners. We have done nothing except get lost, and it
was all my fault."
The German's smile broadened and his shoulders shook.
"So, I have no right, eh?" he chuckled. "You are not in your England
now, my boy. But suppose you tell me all about it?"
"Very well, sir," Freddy said in a quiet dignified voice. "And you can
take my word for its being the truth, too."
The English youth paused a moment and then told the story of leaving the
Paris headquarters of the British Volunteer Ambulance Service, becoming
separated from the others, and after many hours picking up Dave Dawson.
"And so there you are, sir," he finished up. "A very unfortunate
incident, but I've already told you it was my fault."
The big German, shrugged, started to speak but checked himself and
swiveled around in his chair to peer at the well marked map that took up
most of the wall in back of him. Presently he turned front again and
fixed his eyes on Dave.
"And you?" he grunted. "Where were you forced to leave your car? And
where is this French Army lieutenant your friend mentioned?"
"I don't know where he is," Dave said. "When the German planes started
shooting and bombing those refugees I...."
"One moment!" the Colonel grated harshly. "Our pilots do not shoot or
bomb helpless civilians. Those were undoubtedly French planes, or
British ones, made to look like German planes. Go on."
Anger rose up in Dave Dawson. He had seen those planes with his own
eyes. And he knew enough about foreign planes to know that they were
neither French nor British. They were German, and there were no two ways
about that. He opened his mouth to hurl the lie back in the German's
face, but suddenly thought better of it.
"The spot was about seventy miles north of Paris, I think," he said. "I
know that a few minutes before, we had passed through a small village
named Roye. And I remember looking at my watch. It was a little after
one this afternoon."
"I see," murmured the German, and an odd look seeped into his eyes. "And
when you awoke it was night? You saw the ambulance of this English
boy's, and he picked you up?"
"That's right, sir," Dave said with a nod.
"And so?" the German said in the same murmuring tone. "So from a little
after one this afternoon until your friend picked you up you traveled
over thirty miles... _while unconscious_? You expect me to believe
that?"
"I'm not telling a lie!" Dave said hotly. "You can believe what you darn
well like. It's still the truth, just the same. I don't know how I got
there. Maybe some passing car picked me up, and then dumped me out
thinking that I was dead. Maybe somebody took me along to rob me because
of my American clothes. They might have thought I had some money,
and...."
Dave slopped short at the sudden thought and started searching the
pockets of his torn clothes. All he could find was a handkerchief, a
broken pencil, and a bent American Lincoln penny that he carried as a
lucky piece. Everything else was gone. His wallet, his money, his
passport... everything. He looked at the Colonel in angry triumph.
"That's what happened!" he cried. "Somebody picked me up and robbed me,
and then left me in that field under the trees. Good gosh! I'm broke,
and I'll need money to get to England. I...."
Dave stopped short again as he saw the smile on the Colonel's face. This
time it was a different kind of smile. There was nothing pleasant or
fatherly about it. It was a cold, tight lipped smile, and Dave shivered
a bit in spite of himself.
"You are not going to England...
|
serious doubts in their own minds. As an illustration of this,
we have but to call attention to two things. First, on each Lord’s day,
so-called, thousands of congregations—after devoutly listening to the
reading of the fourth commandment of the decalogue, word for word,
syllable for syllable, letter for letter, precisely as it was written
upon the table of stone by the finger of God—are in the habit of
responding with solemn cadence to the utterances of the preacher, “O
Lord, incline our hearts to keep this law.” Now this prayer means
something, or nothing. It is either an expression of desire, on the part
of those employing it, for grace to enable them rightly to observe the
commandment as it reads—seventh day and all—or else it is a solemn
mockery, which must inevitably provoke the wrath of Heaven. These
people, therefore, judging from the most charitable stand-point, are
witnesses—unconscious though they may be of the fact—of a generally
pervading opinion that the verbiage of the fourth commandment has not
been changed, and that it is as a whole as binding as ever. Second, nor
is it simply true that those only who have a liturgy have committed
themselves to this idea. It is astonishing to what extent it has crept
into creeds, confessions of faith, church disciplines, and documents of
a like nature. But among the most striking of all evidences of its
universality, when properly understood, is the practice of nearly all
religious denominations of printing, for general distribution among the
Sunday-school scholars, verbatim copies of the decalogue, as given in
the twentieth chapter of Exodus. Yet this practice would be a pernicious
one, and worthy of the most severe censure, as calculated to lead astray
and deceive the minds of the young, if it were really true that this
code, in at least one very important particular, failed to meet the
facts in the case, as it regards present duty.
In view of these considerations, a change of the base of operations
becomes indispensable. A commandment, altered in its expressions so as
to vary its import, and yet no one acquainted with the exact terms in
which it is at present couched—and all, in reality, being so skeptical
upon the point that even its most ardent advocates reason as if it had
never occurred—would certainly furnish a foundation altogether
insufficient for the mighty superstructure of a great reform, which
proposes, ere the accomplishment of its mission, to revolutionize the
State.
ARTICLE III.
Where, then, shall we turn for relief? There is one, and but one, more
chance.
Acknowledging that the law, as originally given, will not answer the
purpose, and that its amendment cannot be made out with sufficient
clearness to warrant the taking of a stand upon it, we turn, for the
last time, to examine a position quite generally advanced; namely, that
of Sunday observance inaugurated, justified, and enforced, by the
resurrection and example of Christ. Is it true, then, that such is the
fact? Have we, at last, found relief from all our difficulties in the
life and career of no less a personage than the divine Son of God? Let
us see.
The point of the argument is briefly this:—
Our Lord—by rising from the dead, and by his practice of meeting with
his disciples on that day—both introduced, and made obligatory upon his
followers, the necessity of distinguishing between the first and the
remaining days of the week, as we would between the sacred and the
profane. Now, if this be a case which can be clearly made out, then we
are immediately relieved in one particular; that is, we have found
authority for the observance of the Sunday. But how is it as it regards
the seventh day? This, we have seen, was commanded by God the Father.
The obligation of that command is still recognized. Now, consequently,
if Christ the Son has, upon his own authority, introduced another day
immediately following the seventh, and clothed it with divine honors, is
it a necessary inference that the former is therefore set aside? To our
mind, it is far from being such. If God has a law for the observance of
a given day, and Christ has furnished us with an example for that of
another also, then the necessary conclusion is, that the first must be
kept out of respect for God the Father, and the last through reverence
to Christ the Son. Three facts, therefore, must be clearly made out, or
our situation is indeed one of perplexity.
First, it must be shown, authoritatively, that the resurrection effected
the change which is urged, and that the practice of Christ was what it
is claimed to have been.
Second, that that practice was designed to be exemplary; in other words,
that what he did in these particulars was of a nature such that we are
required to imitate it.
Third, it must also be shown that he not only sanctified the first, but,
also, that he secularized the seventh day of the week.
But can this be done? Let us see. First, then, we will consider the
matter of the resurrection. Now, that it was an event of surpassing
glory, and one ever to be held in grateful remembrance, there is no room
for dispute among Christians. But shall we, therefore, decide that it
must of necessity be commemorated by a day of rest? This would be
assuming a great deal. It seems to us that it would be better, far
better, to leave decisions of such importance as this entirely with the
Holy Spirit. Protestants, at least, warned by the example of Roman
Catholics, should avoid the danger of attempting to administer in the
matter of designating holy days; since, manifestly, this is alone the
province of God. Hence, we inquire, Has the Holy Ghost ever said that
the resurrection of Christ imparted a holy character to the day upon
which it occurred? The answer must, undeniably, be in the negative. No
such declaration is found in the Holy Word. Nor is this all; even from
the stand-point of human reason, every analogy is against it. It were
fitting that, when God had closed the work of creation, and ceased to
labor, he should appoint a day in commemoration of that rest. The
propriety of such a course, all can see. But, on the contrary, is it not
equally manifest that to have remained inactive on that glorious
morning, when the Son of God had burst the bands of death, and the news
was flying through all parts of the great city of Jerusalem, “Jesus has
risen to life again,” would have been a condition of things wholly out
of the question? Both the enemies and the friends of Christ—the one
class stimulated by hate, and the other released by the mighty power of
God from the overwhelming gloom and crushing despondency of three
terrible days—were, by the very necessities of the case, moved to action
by an energy which would cause them to overleap every barrier and to
break away from every restraint. Everything, everywhere, animated by the
new aspect which affairs had suddenly assumed, demanded immediate,
ceaseless, and untiring activity. And such it had. From the early
morning, until far into the hours of the succeeding night, scribe and
Pharisee, priest and Levite, believer and unbeliever, were hearing,
gathering, and distributing, all that could be learned of this most
mysterious event. We say, consequently, that so far is it from being
true that the day of the resurrection is one which should be hallowed,
either exactly or substantially as that of the decalogue, the very
opposite is the fact; and, if it were to be celebrated at all, every
consideration of fitness demands that it should be done by excessive
demonstrations of outward and uncontrolled joy, rather than by quietude
and restraint.
Passing now to the other branches of the subject, we inquire, finally,
What was there in the _example_ of Christ and the apostles which in any
way affects the question? If they are to be quoted at all upon this
subject, it is but reasonable that their history should be examined with
reference both to the seventh and the first day; for, if precedent, and
not positive enactment, is to be the rule by which our faith is to be
decided, in a point of this significance, it is at least presumable that
the historic transactions by which this question is to be determined
will be ample in number, and of a nature to meet and explain all the
phases of the subject. That is, the Gospels and the Acts of the
Apostles—covering, as their history does, a period of about thirty
years—will afford numerous and conclusive evidences that both Christ and
the apostles did actually dishonor the old, and invest with peculiar
dignity and authority the new, Sabbath. First, we inquire then, Is
there, in all the New Testament, the record of a single instance in
which Jesus or his followers transacted, upon the seventh day of the
week, matters incompatible with the notion of its original and continued
sanctity? The answer is, of necessity, in the negative. The most careful
and protracted search has failed to produce a single case in which the
son of Joseph and Mary departed in this particular from the usages of
his nation, or in which his immediate representatives, during the period
of their canonical history, failed to follow, in the most scrupulous
manner, the example of Him of whom it is said that, “as his custom was,
he went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and stood up for to
read.” (Luke 4:16.) Nor is this all; it is a remarkable fact, and one
well calculated to stagger the investigator at the very threshold of his
researches into the data for the modern view, that, whereas the Sabbath
is mentioned fifty-six times in the New Testament, it is in every
instance, save one (where it refers to the annual Sabbaths of the Jews),
applied to the last day of the week. So far, therefore, as the negative
argument is concerned, which was based upon the presumption that the
claims of the old day were constructively annulled by the appointment of
a new one, its force is entirely broken by the record, which, as we have
seen, instead of proving such an abolition, is rather suggestive of the
perpetuity of the old order of things. Hence, we turn to the positive
side of the subject.
How do we know that Christ ever designed that his example should produce
in our minds the conviction that he had withdrawn his regard from the
day of his Father’s rest, and placed it upon that of his own
resurrection? Did he, in laying the foundation for the new
institution—as in the case of the Lord’s supper—inaugurate the same by
his own action, and then say to his disciples, As oft as ye do this, do
it in remembrance of me? Did he ever explain to any individual that his
especial object in meeting with his followers on the evenings of the
first and second Sundays (?) after his return from the dead was designed
to inspire in the minds of future believers the conviction that those
hours, from that time forward, had been consecrated to a religious use?
If so, the record is very imperfect, in that it failed to hand down to
us a most significant fact. I say significant, because, without such a
declaration, the minds of common men, such as made up the rank and file
of the immediate followers of Christ, were hardly competent to the
subtile task of drawing, unaided, such nice distinctions. How natural,
how easy, by a single word, to have put all doubt to rest, and to have
given to future ages a foundation, broad and deep, upon which to ground
the argument for the change.
But this, as we have already seen, was not done! and after the lapse of
eighteen hundred years, men—in the stress of a situation which renders
it necessary that they should obtain divine sanction, in order to the
perpetuity of a favored institution—are ringing the changes of an
endless variety of conjectures drawn from transactions, which, in the
record itself, were mentioned as possessing no peculiar characteristics,
which should in any way affect the _mere time_ upon which they occurred.
Let us, therefore, with a proper sense of the modesty with which we
should ever enter upon the task of deciding upon the institutions of the
church, when there is no divine precept for the guidance of our
judgment, examine for ourselves. As we do this, it will be well, also,
to bear in mind the fact that our prejudices will be very likely to lie
entirely upon the side of life-long practice and traditionary
inheritance. In fact, nearly every consideration, political, financial,
and social, will be found, if not guarded with the strictest care,
wooing us to a decision which—though it might dishonor God, and do
violence to the principles of a clear, natural logic—would exempt us,
individually, from personal sacrifice and pecuniary loss.
ARTICLE IV.
First, then, we suggest that it would be well to collate all the texts
in the New Testament in which the first day of the week is mentioned.
They are as follows: “In the end of the Sabbath, as it began to dawn
toward the first day of the week, came Mary Magdalene and the other Mary
to see the sepulcher.” Matt. 28:1.
“And when the Sabbath was past, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of
James, and Salome, had bought sweet spices, that they might come and
anoint Him. And very early in the morning, the first day of the week,
they came unto the sepulcher at the rising of the sun.” Mark 16:1, 2.
“Now when Jesus was risen early the first day of the week, he appeared
first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom he had cast seven devils.” Mark
16:9.
“And they returned, and prepared spices and ointments; and rested the
Sabbath day, according to the commandment. Now upon the first day of the
week, very early in the morning, they came unto the sepulcher, bringing
the spices which they had prepared, and certain others with them.” Luke
23:56, and 24:1.
“The first day of the week cometh Mary Magdalene early, when it was yet
dark, unto the sepulcher, and seeth the stone taken away from the
sepulcher.” John 20:1.
“Then the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the
doors were shut where the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews,
came Jesus and stood in the midst, and saith unto them, Peace be unto
you.” John 20:19.
“Upon the first day of the week let every one of you lay by him in
store, as God hath prospered him, that there be no gatherings when I
come.” 1 Cor. 16:2.
“And upon the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to
break bread, Paul preached unto them, ready to depart on the morrow; and
continued his speech until midnight.” Acts 20:7.
Doubtless the reader is not a little surprised, provided he has never
given his attention to the subject before, at discovering the
meagerness, so far as numbers at least are concerned, of the passages
alluded to above. Nevertheless, let us take the data, thus furnished,
and from them endeavor to derive all the information which they can
legitimately be made to afford. At first glance, it will be discovered
that six of the passages of Scripture under consideration relate to one
and the same day, which was that of the resurrection. Written as they
were from five to sixty-two years this side of that occurrence, and
penned by men who were profoundly interested in everything which was
calculated to throw light upon matters of duty and doctrine, we would
naturally expect that they would seize these most favorable
opportunities for instructing those whom they were endeavoring to
enlighten in regard to the time of, and circumstances connected with,
the change of the Sabbath. Let us observe, therefore, how they discharge
this most important responsibility. It will not be urged by any that
John 20:1, and Mark 16:9, furnish anything which in any way strengthens
the Sunday argument. The statements which they contain are merely to the
effect that Mary Magdalene was the one to whom Christ first presented
himself, and that she visited the tomb very early in the morning.
Neither will it be insisted that the declaration found in Matt. 28:1,
and Mark 16:1, 2, and Luke 23:56, and 24:1, afford any positive
testimony for the sanctity of the first day of the week. On the
contrary, we think that every candid person will concede that the
bearing which they have upon the subject is rather against, than
favorable to, the case which our friends are so anxious to make out. To
illustrate: In Matt. 28:1, we read that “in the end of the Sabbath, as
it began to dawn toward the first day of the week, came Mary Magdalene,
and the other Mary, to see the sepulcher.” Again, in Mark 16:1, 2, the
same general fact is stated, with the simple variation that, instead of
the expression, “in the end of the Sabbath,” are substituted the words,
“when the Sabbath was passed,” while in Luke 23:56, and 24:1, it is
declared that these things transpired on the first day of the week, the
context carefully setting forth the fact that the women had “rested upon
the Sabbath, according to the commandment,” and that it being past, they
came to the sepulcher, bringing with them the spices which they had
prepared.
Now, putting all these things together, what have we learned?
Manifestly, the following facts: First; when the events transpired which
are set forth in these scriptures, there was a Sabbath; since it is
stated, by way of locating them in point of time, that the Sabbath had
ended before the affairs spoken of were transacted. Secondly; that the
Sabbath, to which reference was made, was the seventh day of the week,
since it preceded the first, and was that of the commandment. Thirdly;
that, if the first day of the week was a Sabbath, as is now claimed, the
women were ignorant of it, since it is clear that they did not go to the
tomb on the seventh day to embalm the body, because of its being holy
time; whereas, upon the first day of the week their scruples were gone,
and they came to the sepulcher, bearing their spices with them, to
accomplish a work which they would not have regarded as legitimate on
the Sabbath. Fourthly; that the seventh day was not only the Sabbath at
the time mentioned, but also that, according to the convictions of the
historians, it was the Sabbath at the time of their writing—since they
apply to it the definite article “_the_;” whereas, if there had been a
change of Sabbaths, it would have been natural to distinguish between
them in the use of explanatory words and phrases, such as are now
applied, as, for instance, “the Jewish Sabbath,” “the Christian
Sabbath,” &c., &c. Fifthly; that, while Matthew, Mark, and Luke do, in
every instance cited above, honor the seventh day of the week in the
most scrupulous manner, by applying to it the Bible title of the
Sabbath, they do, nevertheless, make mention of the day of the
resurrection in each case, in the same connection, in the use of its
secular name, “the first day of the week.” A slight which is utterly
inexplicable, provided the latter had really put on a sacred character;
since, that being true, it was much more important that its new claims
should be recognized and inculcated by those who could speak with
authority, than it was that they should perpetuate the distinction of a
day whose honors had become obsolete. Having now examined five of the
six texts under consideration, there remains but one more to occupy our
attention. This reads as follows: “Then the same day at evening, being
the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples
were assembled for fear of the Jews, came Jesus and stood in the midst,
and saith unto them, Peace be unto you.” John 20:19. Here, again, we are
struck with the manifest disposition on the part of John, in common with
the other evangelists, to avoid the application of any sacred title to
the first day of the week. Twice, in this chapter, he makes mention of
that which is now regarded as the “Queen of days,” but in both
instances, he avoids, as if with studied care, attaching to it any
denomination by which its superiority over other days should be
indicated. How perfectly in keeping, for instance, it would have been
with the facts as they are now claimed to have existed—as well as with
the interests and desires of millions who have since lived—had he in the
text before us so varied the phraseology of the first clause that it
would read as follows: “And the same day at evening, being the
_Christian Sabbath_, when the disciples were assembled,” &c. This,
however, he did not do, and we inquire of the reader, right here,
concerning his _motive_ in omitting that which now appears to us so
desirable, and which would have been perfectly legitimate were the views
of our friends correct. Did he intentionally omit an important fact? Was
it left out because of an oversight on his part? Or, would it be safer
to conclude that perhaps, after all, the difficulty lies, not with the
apostle, or with the Holy Spirit, which dictated his language, but with
the theory, which seems to be out of joint with his utterances?
Nevertheless, as it is still urged that, in the absence of a positive
declaration, this, the only remaining text, does furnish abundant
evidence of the sacred regard in which the day of the resurrection was
held—since it gives an account of a religious meeting held upon it,
manifestly for the purpose of recognizing its heavenly character—let us
examine more critically into the nature of the claims which are based
upon its record. That those with whom we differ should be tenacious in
their efforts to rest their cause very largely upon the account found in
John 20:19, is not at all surprising. It is the only chance, as we have
seen, which is left them of basing their argument upon a passage of
Scripture which relates to the day of the resurrection. So far as 1 Cor.
16:2, and Acts 20:7, are concerned, it will not be disputed by any that
their testimony is merely collateral evidence. If Sunday has become the
Sabbath, it was by virtue of transactions which occurred immediately in
connection with the rising of Christ. In other words, it was on the
third day after the crucifixion that Christ, if at all, began to impress
upon the minds of his disciples the Sabbatic character which had already
attached to, and was henceforth to continue in, the day which saw him a
conqueror over death and the grave.
Nay, more; if the change occurred at all, it must have dated from the
very moment that the angel descended, the guard was stricken down, and
the Son of God, glorified, came forth. This being the case, from that
time forward it would naturally be the effort of Christ to produce in
the minds of his followers the conviction of this most momentous fact.
Every action of his would necessarily be—if not directly for the purpose
of imprinting the peculiar sacredness of the hours upon those by whom he
was surrounded—at least of a character such as to impart no sanction
either to a deliberate, or even an unintentional disregard, on the part
of any, of their hallowed nature. Hence, our friends, seizing upon the
fact that he met with them while assembled together in the after part of
the day, have endeavored to clothe the incident with great interest, and
have largely elaborated their arguments to show that this was not an
accidental occurrence, but rather partook of the nature of a religious
meeting, Christ himself honoring these instinctive efforts on the part
of the disciples to act in harmony with the spirit of the hour, by his
own personal presence.
Before we sanction this view of the subject, however, let us give our
attention for a moment to the manner in which the previous portion of
the day, then closing, had up to that point been spent. Certain it is,
that Jesus had not, during its declining hours, been suddenly moved by a
newly created impulse for the accomplishment of an object which had been
just as desirable for twelve hours as it was at that moment. Sunday
sanctity had already become a fixed fact, and its knowledge as essential
to the well-being of the disciples in the morning, as at the evening. We
naturally conclude, therefore, that the very first opportunity for its
disclosure would have been the one which Christ would embrace. This was
afforded in his conversation with Mary. But, while there is no evidence
that it was imparted, it is at least presumable that she was left
entirely ignorant of it.
The second occasion was presented in that of the journey of the two
disciples from Jerusalem to Emmaus, a distance of seven and a half
miles. Jesus walked with them and talked with them by the way, reasoned
with them about the resurrection, made as though he would have gone
farther, discovered himself to them in the breaking of bread, and
disappeared, leaving them to retrace the seven and a half miles to the
city, with no word of caution against it on his part. Nay, more; his
marked approval of the propriety of the act might properly have been
inferred from the fact that he himself accompanied them in the first
instance, in the garb of a wayfaring man; at the same time acting the
part of one who was so far convinced of the rectitude of his own and of
their action, that he was ready to continue his journey until night
should render it impracticable. (Luke 24:28.) Following these men now,
as they retrace their steps to the city from which they had departed,
and to which they were now returning—manifestly all unconscious that
they were trespassing upon time which had been rescued from that which
might properly be devoted to secular pursuits—let us observe them, as
they mingle once more with their former companions in grief. How does it
happen that they are congregated at this precise point of time? Is it
because they have at last discovered the fact that it has been made in
the special sense a proper day for religious assemblies? If so, whence
have they derived their conviction? Certainly not from Mary, or the two
disciples just returning from Emmaus. Assuredly, also, not from Christ
himself.
But, again, is it not really from an induction on their own part, by
which they have themselves discovered the fitness of making the day of
resurrection also that of worship? Listen a moment. Hear their excited
remarks as, at this juncture, they are joined by the two. Do you catch
these words, “The Lord is risen indeed, and hath appeared to Simon”?
(Luke 24:34.) Does not this establish the fact of their confidence in
the previous report? Unfortunately, the historian adds, “Neither
believed they them.” Here they are, then, manifestly still doubting the
very fact which some have thought they were convened to celebrate.
But, again, what is the _place_ of their convocation? Unquestionably,
neither the temple nor the synagogue. The record states that where they
were assembled, “the doors were closed for fear of the Jews.” Evidently,
they were in some place of retirement and comparative safety, hiding
away from the fury of a people who, in their madness and cruel hate, had
crucified even the Lord of glory. We ask again, Where were they? Let
Mark explain. Certainly he is competent to the task. When describing the
very transaction we are considering, he says: “Afterward he appeared to
the eleven as they sat at meat, and upbraided them with their unbelief
and hardness of heart, because they believed not them which had seen him
after he was risen.” Mark 16:14. Here, then, is the clue to the whole
matter. It was not a religious meeting, because they were in a frame of
mind to be censured, rather than applauded, because of unbelief. It was
merely the body of the apostles, gathered in their own quarters for the
purpose of partaking of an evening meal, where they were in the habit of
eating, and drinking, and sleeping—and where, at this time, they kept
particularly close, because of the perils which surrounded them on every
hand. That this is true, is further sustained by two additional
considerations.
First; it was a place where Christ expected to find meat, and where he
requested such for his own use, and was supplied from their bounty with
broiled fish and an honeycomb, which, the record states, “he took and
did eat before them.” (Luke 24:41-43.)
Secondly; that they were in possession of just such a rendezvous, is
clearly stated in John 20:10, where, speaking of Peter and John when
going from the sepulcher, it says, “They went away unto their own home.”
A few days later, Luke declares (Acts 1:13,) that when they came in from
the ascension, they “went up into an upper room, where abode both Peter,
and James, and John, and Andrew, Philip, and Thomas; Bartholomew, and
Matthew, James the son of Alpheus, and Simon Zelotes, and Judas the
brother of James.”
Thus, by a natural and easy combination of the facts brought to view by
the inspired penman, the whole matter has been reduced to a simple
transaction, such as might have been repeated many times during the
forty days, and such as—in and of itself—fails to disclose any evidence
that the occurrences narrated, either necessarily or presumptively,
afford the slightest justification for the supposition that Christ
himself either designed, or that the apostles might legitimately
conclude that he intended, by joining them under these familiar
circumstances, to authorize one of the mightiest innovations upon the
practice of ages which the world has ever seen.
ARTICLE V.
Nor is this matter at all relieved by the statement found in John 20:26,
that after eight days, Thomas being present, he appeared unto them a
second time under similar circumstances. For even should we grant that
this was on the next Sunday evening—a matter in which there is, at
least, room for a difference of opinion—the subject is merely
complicated the more, so far as the view of our friends is concerned,
since here a second opportunity, and that a most excellent one, for
calling the attention of the disciples to the new character which a once
secular day had assumed, was entirely neglected. In this also, as in the
first instance, the conversation was of a nature to show that the object
of the interview was to give additional evidence (because of the
presence of Thomas) of the re-animation of the body of Christ, without
any reference to its effect upon the character of the day upon which it
occurred. But such silence, under _such_ circumstances, in regard to so
important a matter, is in itself conclusive evidence that the change
claimed had not really taken place. Furthermore, it will not be urged
that more than two out of the five first-days which occurred between the
resurrection and the ascension were days of assembly. Had they been—as
it had been decided, according to the view of those urging the
transition, that the Sunday should not be hallowed by positive
declaration, but simply inaugurated by quiet precedent, then the
presumption is, that this precedent, instead of being left upon the
insufficient support of two Sabbaths out of five, would have been
carefully placed upon the whole number. Nor would the precaution have
ended here. In a matter vital in its nature, certain it is that the
honest seeker after truth would not be left to grope his way through a
metaphysical labyrinth of philosophic speculation in regard to the
effect of certain transactions upon the character of the time upon which
they occurred; or the bearing of certain meetings of Christ and the
apostles upon the question as to whether Sunday had assumed a sacred
character, when at the same time his perplexity was rendered
insupportable by the fact, that the historian states, that like meetings
occurred on days for which no one will claim any particular honor.
Take, for instance, the meeting of Jesus with the apostles at the sea of
Galilee (John 21), while they were engaged in a fishing excursion.
Assuredly, this did not take place on Sunday; else, according to the
view of our friends, they would not have been engaged in such an
employment. Just what day it was, no one is able to decide; but all
agree that its character was in no way affected by the profoundly
interesting interview which occurred upon it between the Master and his
disciples. If it were, then there is at least one holy day in the week
which we cannot place in the calendar, since no one can decide whether
it was the first, second, third, fourth, fifth, or sixth.
If, however, you would have a still more forcible illustration of the
fact that religious meetings, were they never so solemn, can in nowise
alter the nature of the hours on which they occur, let me call your
attention to the day of the ascension (Acts 1). Here is an occasion of
transcendent glory. If the statements in the sacred narrative of events,
which transpired during its hours, could only be predicated of either
one or the other of the first-day meetings of Christ with his disciples,
it would at least be with an increased show of reason that they could be
woven into the tissue of a Sabbatic argument. Here are found many of the
elements essential to the idea of religions services, of which the
instances in question are so remarkably destitute.
In the first place, those who followed our Lord to the place of meeting
were intelligent believers in the fact of his resurrection.
In the second place, the assembly was not confined to a mere handful of
individuals, seeking for retiracy within an upper room where they were
in the habit of eating, drinking, and sleeping; but it transpired in the
open air, where Jesus was in the habit of meeting with his followers.
In the third place, the congregation was made up of persons whom the
Holy Spirit had thus brought together for the purpose of becoming the
honored witnesses of the resurrection and ascension of Christ.
In the fourth place, it was graced by the visible forms of holy angels
in glistering white, who participated in the services.
In the fifth place, Jesus himself addressed them at length, lifted up
his hands to heaven, and brought down its benediction upon them, and in
the sight of the assembled multitude, steadily and majestically rising
above them, he floated upward, until a cloud received him out of their
sight.
In the sixth place, it is said, in so many words, that the “_people
worshiped_ him there.”
Now, suppose, for the sake of the argument, that some modern sect should
endeavor to transform our unpretending Thursday, which was really the
day of the ascension, since it was the fortieth after the resurrection,
into one of peculiar dignity, claiming, in defense of their position,
the example of Christ, and urging that the course which he pursued could
only be satisfactorily explained on the ground that he was laying the
foundation for its future Sabbatic observance, how would our friends
meet them in such an emergency? Deny the facts, they could not, for the
record is ample. There would, therefore, be but one alternative left.
If transactions of this character are of a nature such that they
_necessarily_ exalt the days upon which they occur to the rank of holy
days, then Thursday is one, and should be treated as such. No line of
argument, however ingenious, could evade this conclusion, so long as the
premises in question were adhered to. Planting himself squarely upon
them, with the consent of modern Christendom, the advocate of the newly
discovered holy day, finding the record perfectly free from
embarrassments in the nature of transactions which would appear to be
incompatible with the notion that everything which Christ and his
apostles did was in harmony with his view, if possessed of that skill
and ability which has marked the efforts of some modern theologians in
such
|
ers' Arms Norwich
The Hunters' Arms Middleton
The Hufflers' Arms Wilmington
The Hoste Arms Burnham Market
The Herschel Arms Slough
The Harewood Arms Northallerton
The Hare Arms Stow Bardolph
The Hoskins Arms Oxted
The Hardwicke Arms Arrington
The Havelock Arms Hertford Heath
The Ince Arms Euxton
The Ivor Arms Brynnsadler
The Ipswich Arms Ipswich
The Ironmongers' Arms Norwich
The Jubilee Arms Islington
The Joiners' Arms Thwaite
The Jerningham Arms Shifnal
The Keigwin Arms Mousehole
The Kimberley Arms Norwich
The King's Arms Woodbridge
The Lord Arran's Arms New Bond Street
The Lord Conyers' Arms Wales
The Lord Monson's Arms Tottenham Street
The Lord Howe's Arms Leicester
The Lord Somers' Arms Stibbington Street
The Lady Owen's Arms Goswell Road
The Leathersellers' Arms Watford
The Lovat Arms Beauly
The Lytton Arms Knebworth
The Lowther Arms Penrith
The Lincoln Arms King's Cross
The Lillie Arms West Brompton
The Leicester Arms Penshurst
The Luttrell Arms Dunster
The Lygon Arms Broadway
The Leeds Arms Cleethorpes
The Duke of Leeds' Arms Dewsbury
The Lansdowne Arms Calne
The Liverpool Arms Norbiton
The Lyttleton Arms Hagley
The Montagu Arms Langley, Bucks
The Montague Arms Blackburn
The Millers' Arms Healey
The Minders' Arms Oldham
The Miners' Arms Gunnerside (_e_)
The Masons' Arms Louth
The Mariners' Arms King's Lynn
The Mechanics' Arms Glossop
The Merton Arms Cambridge
The Manners' Arms Grantham
The Manvers' Arms Lincoln
The Navy Arms Truro
The Norfolk Arms Burwood Place
The Norwich Arms King's Lynn
The Northumberland Arms Putney
The Needlemakers' Arms Ilkeston
The Oddfellows' Arms Stoke
The Oilmillers' Arms Grimsby
The Osney Arms Oxford
The Orleans Arms Esher
The Offord Arms Caledonian Road
The Orford Arms Norwich
The Oxford Arms Kington
The Ordnance Arms York Road
The Princes' Arms Boxmoor
The Prince of Wales' Feathers East Tuddenham
The Painters' Arms Belgrave Mews
The Printers' Arms Crayford
The Papermakers' Arms Plaxtol
The Potters' Arms Poole
The Porters' Arms High Wycombe
The Platelayers' Arms Hatfield
The Plumbers' Arms Limpsfield
The Pencutters' Arms Waterloo
The Parker Arms Chorley
The Parkers' Arms Colne
The Portsmouth Arms Hurstbourne
The Pocock Arms Caledonian Road
The Poulett Arms Chard
The Portland Arms King's Lynn
The Portman Arms Millbank Street
The Queen's Arms Fendall Street
The Quarryman's Arms Blackburn
The Royal Arms Peterborough
The Royal Naval Arms Keyham
The Royal Essex Arms Brentwood
The Rockingham Arms Sheffield
The Rutland Arms Newmarket
The Redcliffe Arms Fulham Road
The Railway Arms West Drayton
The Rifle Arms Sudbury
The Rifleman's Arms Ely
The Stockton Arms East Hartburn
The Scutchers' Arms Long Melford, _note_ 27
The Sportsman's Arms Menheniot
The Shepherds' Arms Cowcliffe
The Skinners' Arms Cannon Street
The Soldiers' Arms Warleggan
The Shipwrights' Arms Ipswich
The Spinners' Arms Bury
The Stonemasons' Arms Devonport
The Shard Arms Kent Road
The Stanhope Arms Brasted
The Seymour Arms East Knoyle
The Somerset Arms Praed Street
The Sergison Arms Haywards Heath
The Spencer Arms Barnes
The Sussex Arms Hammersmith
The Stradbroke Arms Darsham
The Tregonwell Arms Bournemouth
The Tharp Arms Chippenham
The Trevor Arms Knightsbridge
The Townsend Arms Hertford Heath
The Telegraph Arms Putney
The Tailors' Arms Comberton
The Turners' Arms Mortimer
The Tanners' Arms Great Yarmouth
The Thatchers' Arms Great Warley
The Trinity Arms Norwich
The Unthank Arms Norwich
The Unwin Arms Hornsey
The Union Arms Panton Street
The University Arms Oxford
The Uxbridge Arms Burton-on-Trent
The Victoria Arms Battersea
The Volunteer Arms Sunbury
The Volunteers' Arms Blackburn
The Verulam Arms St. Albans
The Vane Arms Stockton-on-Tees
The Vernon Arms Southrepps
The Wine Cooper's Arms Norwich
The Weavers' Arms Stoke Newington
The Waterman's Arms Hersham
The Welldiggers' Arms Petworth
The Woodcutters' Arms Eastwood
The Woodman's Arms Normandy
The Woodman's Arms Newton
The Worsteddealers' Arms Oldham
The Wrestlers' Arms Newmarket
The Wharncliffe Arms Tintagel
The Wharton Arms Bedlington
The Windham Arms Norwich
The Wyndham Arms Bridgend
The Willoughby Arms Parham
The Wake Arms Epping
The Yarmouth Arms Thames Street
The Yachtsman's Arms Wivenhoe
The Zetland Arms South Kensington
ASTRONOMICAL
The Sun Eton
The Rising Sun Datchet, _note_ 28
The Noon Sun Rochdale
The Sun Rising Tewkesbury
The Sun in Wood Ashmore Green
The Sun in Sands Shooters Hill
The Sun in Splendour Portobello Road
The Full Moon Bath
The Half Moon Reeth*
The Moon and Stars Norwich
The Half Moon and Star Ipswich
The Half Moon and Seven Stars Brentford, _note_ 29
The Star Wenhaston
The Morning Star Datchet
The Glittering Star Darlington
The Rising Star Darlington
The North Star Slough
The South Star Yarmouth
The Star in East Blackwall
The Star of India Gordon Road
The Rainbow Fleet Street, _note_ 30
The Eclipse Pimlico
The Magnet Addlestone
The Compass Exeter
The Compasses Wenhaston
The Rule and Compasses Thurleigh
The Square and Compasses Carnforth
The Mariner's Compass King's Lynn
The Scales Cambridge
BIRDS
The Bird Barforth
The Sea Birds Bridlington
The Blackbird Bagnor
The Blackbirds Hertford
The Bullfinch Riverhead
The Bustard South Rouceby
The Black Cock Falstone
The Cock Epping
The Fighting Cocks St. Albans*
The Cock and Magpie Hammersmith
The Cock and Pye Ipswich
The Cock and Pymat Wittington, _note_ 31
The Choughs Yeovil
The Crane Yarmouth
The Cuckoo Ashwell
The Crow St. Albans
The Crow on Gate Crowborough
The Royston Crow Ware
The Cygnet Norwich
The Duck in the Pond Stanmore
The Dove Ipswich
The Doves Hammersmith
The Eagle Boston
The Eaglet Seven Sisters Road
The Spread Eagle Bengeo
The Falcon Rushmere
The Gull Framingham Pigott
The Hawk Halesworth
The Sparrowhawk Burnley
The Hen and Chickens Canterbury
The Moor Cock Hawes Junction
The Moorhen Littletown
The Magpie Stonham*
The Magpies Lincoln
The Nightingale Canterbury
The Ostrich Wherstead*
The Owl Highbeach
The Pelican Leicester
The Pyewipe Lincoln, _note_ 32
The Pigeon Spalding
The Plover Eversley
The Parrot St. Ives, Hunts
The Peacock Ely
The Peahen St. Albans
The Pheasant Great Shefford
The Pheasant Cock Norwich
The Robin Anerley
The Raven Borden
The Swallow Swallow Street
The Swallows Cley
The Stork Birmingham
The Skylark Headingley
The Swan Fittleworth, _note_ 33
The Swan and Nest Wellingborough
The Swan with Two Necks Lad Lane, _note_ 34
The Swan with Two Nicks Swavesey
BOTANY
The Garden Sunderland
The Garden Gate Histon
The Angel Gardens New Catton
The Orchard Gardens North Walsham
The Orchard Askew Road
The Vineyard Rochester
The Vintage Wellington
The Nursery Norwich
The Bower Landbeach
The Havering Bower Stepney
The Cherry Arbour Sparkhill
The Flower of the Forest Blackfriars
The Flowers of the Forest Deptford
The Flower of Kent Lewisham
The Blossoms Chester
The Flower Pot Hertford
The Pot of Flowers Stowmarket
The Gurnon Bushes Coopersale
The Bush Farnham
The Elder Bush Soham
The Furze Bush Aldermaston
The Holly Bush Bewdley
The Hollies Moordown
The Ivy Bush Caermarthen
The May Bush Stowmarket (_e_)
The Hop Bine Cambridge
The Hop Pole Worcester
The Hop Poles Tewkesbury
The Würtemberger Hop Stepney, _note_ 35
The Malt and Hops Soham
The Tree Bude
The Trees Ripon
The Apple Tree Carlisle
The Aspen Tree York Town
The Ash Ash Hill
The Mountain Ash Ipswich
The Bay Tree Roman Road
The Beech Tree Bromley
The Beechwood Harrogate
The Birch Tree Coalville
The Box Tree Gravel Lane
The Crab Tree Fulham, _note_ 36
The Cherry Tree Bromeswell
The Chestnut Tree West Wratting
The Chestnuts Colwyn Bay
The Cedar Tree Putney
The Cedars West Kensington
The Cotton Tree Bury
The Elm Tree Oxford
The Elm Norwich
The Elms Estcourt Road
The Queen's Elm Fulham Road, _note_ 37
The Wych Elm Norbiton
The Elder Tree Spitalfields
The Fig Tree Peterborough
The Fir Tree Wanstead
The Firs Malvern
The Holly Tree Southwark
The Laurel Tree Brick Lane
The Laurels Bromley
The Lemon Tree Bedfordbury
The Myrtle Tree Taunton
The Myrtle Ipswich
The Mulberry Tree Ipswich
The Oak Tree Richmond, Surrey
The Orange Tree Euston Road
The Plane Tree Burnley
The Pound Tree Sparkhill
The Palm Tree Palm Street
The Pear Tree West Row
The Sycamore Tree Thornsett
The Thorn Tree Derby
The Thorn Burnley
The Walnut Tree Norwich
The Willow Tree Eton, _note_ 38
The Withy Trees Bambor Bridge
The Yew Tree Cannock
The Acorn Nicholas Passage
The Oak Sudbury
The Oak Shades Norwich
The British Oak Berry Brow
The Broad Oak Strelley
The Cuckoo Oak Wadderley
The Gospel Oak Kentish Town
The King's Oak High Beech
The Round Oak Padworth
The Royal Oak Epping
The Oak and Acorn Taunton
The Oak and Ivy Walmer, _note_ 39
The Oak Branch Warrington
The Olive Branch Inkpen
The Rosemary Branch Lewisham
The Barleycorn Euston
The Barley Sheaf Dogdyke
The Oat Sheaf Whittlesea
The Sedge Sheaf Burnt Fen
The Wheat Sheaf Ide Hill
The Rosemary Norwich
The Rose Old Bailey
The Blooming Rose Hunslet
The Little Rose Cambridge
The Handford Rose Ipswich
The Moss Rose Preston
The Rose Bud Accrington
The Rose in June Margate
The Rose of Kent Deptford
The Rose of Lee Catford
The Rose and Shamrock Chester le Street
The Rose and Thistle Burnley
The Rose, Shamrock and Thistle Eton
The Rose and Lily Bermondsey
The Daisy Knightsbridge
The Fleur de Lis Stoke under Ham
The Fleur de Lys St. Albans
The Blooming Fuchsia Ipswich
The Heartsease Norwich
The Honeysuckle Gateshead
The Lily Hull
The Pansy Goodge Street
The Primrose Bishopsgate
The Tulip Shenfield
The Virginia Plant Great Dover Street, _note_ 40
The Virginia Planter Bethnal Green
The Water Lily Ipswich
The Woodbine South Shields
The Clachan Sherborne Lane
The Shamrock Bath
The Scotch Thistle Birkenhead
The Vine Mile End
The Vine and Ivy Stow Bardolph
The Ivy Lincoln
The Ivy Leaf Ipswich
The Olive Leaf Ipswich
The Grapes Rochester
The Bunch of Grapes Brompton Road
The Artichoke Farringdon Street
The Cabbage Kingsclere
The Cauliflower Ilford
The Coconut Kingston-on-Thames
The Carrots Hampton Bishop
The Pineapple Lambeth
The Rhubarb Bristol
CLOTHING
The Plume Hungerford
The Feathers Waterloo Road
The Plume of Feathers Tewin
The Cape Billingsley
The Cardinal's Cap Norwich
The Cardinal's Hat Harleston
The Hat and Feather Downham
The Hat and Feathers Sutton St. James
The Cap and Feathers Tillingham
The Wig Redisham
The Buckle Seaford
The Buffcoat Norwich
The Tabard Turnham Green, _note_ 41
The Boot Great Bealings, _note_ 42
The Shoe Wroxall
The Boot and Shoe March
The Boot and Slipper Benwick
The Bonnie Cravat Ashford, _note_ 43
The Leather Gaiters Hauxton
COLOURS
_Black._
The Black Boy Alfreton, _note_ 44
The Black Boys Aylsham
The Black Bell Ipswich, _note_ 45
The Black Bull Fulham
The Black Bear Tewkesbury
The Black Chequers Norwich
The Black Dog Sunbury, _note_ 46
The Black Dog and Duck Bury
The Black Eagle Norwich
The Black Friar Queen Victoria Street
The Black Goose King's Lynn
The Black Goats Lincoln
The Black Griffin Canterbury
The Black Hart Ringsend
The Black Hatchet Silchester
The Black Horse Sheen
The Black Jack Clare Market, _note_ 47
The Black Joke King's Lynn
The Black Lion Stockton, _note_ 48
The Black Prince Norwich
The Black Rabbit Littlehampton
The Black Raven Bishopsgate
The Black Swan Winchester
_White._
The White Bear Fickles Hole, _note_ 49
The White Bull Ribchester
The White Bell Southery
The White Cottage Norwich
The White Cross Richmond, Surrey
The White Elm Monk Soham
The White Friars Norwich
The White Horn Bow*
The White Horse Framlingham, _note_ 50
The Great White Horse Ipswich, _note_ 51
The White House Faversham
The White Heifer Scorton
The White Hart Windsor
The White Lion Cobham
The Little White Lion Cobham, _note_ 52
The White Lodge Attleborough
The White Rose Norwich
The White Raven Bedford Street
_Green._
The Island Green Edinburgh
The Green Bushes Stockton-on-Tees
The Green Bank Falmouth
The Green Coat Boy Westminster
The Green Gardens Rochdale
The Green Gate City Road
The Green Gates Bethnal Green
The Green Hill Histon
The Green Hills Norwich
The Green Market Penzance
The Green Man Tunstall, _note_ 53
The Green Shutter Sunderland
The Green Tree Darlington
_Blue._
The Blue Anchor Southport
The Blue Boy Hertford
The Blue Boar Lincoln, _note_ 54
The Blue Bell Crookham
The Blue Ball Bruton
The Blue Bull Grantham
The Blue Coat Boy Ipswich
The Blue Cow South Witham
The Blue Dog Stainby
The Blue Eyed Maid Southwark
The Blue Fox Gunby
The Blue House Sunderland
The Blue Horse Great Ponton
The Blue Last Dorset Street
The Blue Lion East Witton, _note_ 55
The Blue Man Grantham
The Blue Pig Bellerby
The Blue Posts Cork Street
The Blue Peter Portsea
The True Blue Cambridge
_Red._
The Red Bull Gray's Inn Road
The Red Cat Norwich
The Red Cow Hammersmith
The Red Cross Crowborough
The Red Deer Hersham
The Red Dragon Kirby Lonsdale, _note_ 56
The Red House Caxton
The Red Horse Stratford-on-Avon, _note_ 57
The Red Hart March
The Red Lion Martlesham, _note_ 58
The Original Red Lion Brentford
The Carved Red Lion Essex Road
The Red Lodge Scriveton
The Red Well Barnard Castle
_Various_
The Grey Bull Stanhope
The Grey Eagle Grey Eagle Street
The Grey Friar Chawton
The Grey Friars King's Lynn
The Grey Goat Penrith
The Grey Horse West Rounton
The Grey Mare Northchurch
The Dapple Grey Lower Park Road, _note_ 59
The Maldon Grey Chilton
The Scotch Grey King's Lynn
The Yorkshire Grey Piccadilly
The Bay Horse York, _note_ 60
The Bay Malton Great Portland Street
The Brown Cow Accrington
The Brown Jug Barnard Castle
The Brown Bear Barbican
The Dun Cow Old Kent Road
The Dun Horse St. Ives, Hunts
The Pied Bull Sibsey
The Pied Calf Spalding, _note_ 61
The Pied Horse Finsbury
The Spotted Cow Cambridge
The Spotted Dog Willesden
The Spotted Horse Putney
The Chestnut Horse Great Finborough
The Roan Horse Pollard Street
The Sorrel Horse Barham, _note_ 62
BELLS AND COMPOUNDS
The Bell Hertford, _note_ 63
The Bow Bells Bow Road
The Bells of Ouseley Runnymede
The Bell and Anchor Hammersmith
The Bell and Birdcage Wood Street
The Bell and Crown Peterborough
The Bell and Feathers Sawbridgeworth
The Bell and Horns Brompton
The Bell and Mackerel Mile End
The Bell and Oak Peterborough
The Bell and Swan Ware
CROWNS AND COMPOUNDS
(_Note_ 64)
The Crown Kenton
The Crown and Anchor Ipswich
The Crown and Anvil Minories
The Crown and Angel Norwich
The Crown and Apple Tree Berwick Street
The Crown and Cushion Eton
The Crown and Column Devonport
The Crown and Castle Orford
The Crown and Compasses Cambridge
The Crown and Dolphin Royston
The Crown and Falcon Puckeridge
The Crown and Glove Chester, _note_ 65
The Crown and Grapes Southwick
The Crown and Harp Cambridge
The Crown and Hundred House Munstow
The Crown and Horns East Ilsley
The Crown and Horseshoe Bristol
The Crown and Horseshoes Edmonton
The Crown and Leek Mile End
The Crown and Liver Hawarden
The Crown and Mitre King's Lynn
The Crown and Punchbowl Horningsea
The Crown and Raven Bridgnorth
The Crown and Shears Minories
The Crown and Shuttle Shoreditch
The Crown and Stirrup Lyndhurst
The Crown and Seven Stars Royal Mint Street
The Crown and Sugarloaf Garlick Hill
The Crown and Sceptre Brompton
The Crown and Treaty House Uxbridge
The Crown and Thistle Leicester, _note_ 66
The Crown and Two Chairmen Soho
The Crown and Woolpack Stamford
CURIOUS COMPOUNDS
The Anchor and Hope Dartford
The Anchor of Hope King's Lynn
The Apple Tree and Mitre Cursitor Street
The Boy and Barrel Wakefield
The Barn and Barrel Tenbury
The Barrel and Grapes Trimdon Grange
The Buck and Bell Long Itchington
The Bird and Gate Uckfield
The Bush Thrush and Blackbird East Peckham
The Black Boy and Still Brentford
The Bell and Bowl Whaplode
The Boat and Gun Skeldyke
The Bull and Anchor Holborn
The Bull and Bell Ropemaker Street
The Bull and Butcher Norwich
The Bull and Chain Lincoln
The Bull and Gate Camden Town
The Bull and Horseshoes Latton
The Bull and Last Highgate
The Bull and Mouth Holborn
The Bull and Pump Shoreditch
The Bull and Stars Putney
The Bull and Swan Stamford
The Bull and Stirrup Chester
The Bear and Bells Beccles
The Bear and Billet Chester
The Bear and Crown Clare
The Bear and Cross Great Kimble
The Bear and Pole Romsey
The Bear and Ragged Staff Charing Cross Road
The Bear and Rummer Mortimer Street, _note_ 67
The Cow and Snuffers Llandaff, _note_ 68
The Cross Daggers Coldaston
The Cross Foxes Boughton
The Castle and Plough Bristol
The Castle and Ball Marlborough
The Castle and Falcon Newark
The Castle and Anchor Stockton
The Castle and Keys Devonport
The Cat and Fiddle Hinton Admiral, _note_ 69
The Cat and Mutton London Fields
The Cat and Bagpipes East Harlsey, _note_ 70
The Cat and Custard Pot Paddlesworth, _note_ 71
The Cat and Wheel Bristol
The Cat and Cage Drumcondra
The Coach and Dogs Oswestry, _note_ 72
The Coach and Bell Romford
The Cock and Anchor Gateshead
The Cock and Bell Romford
The Cock and Bull Gadstone
The Cock and Bottle Cannon Street
The Cock and Castle Mansford Street
The Cock and Flower Pot St. Albans
The Cock and Hoop Hampstead
The Cock and Lion Wigmore Street
The Cock and Neptune St. George Street
The Cock and Woolpack Finch Lane
The Dog and Pot Windsor
The Dog and Bell Stokesley
The Donkey and Buskins Layer-de-la-Haye
The Drum and Monkey Wakefield
The Elephant and Castle Kennington
The Eagle and Child Alderley (_e_)
The Eagle and Lamb Ely, _note_ 73
The Eagle and Wheatsheaf Connaught Street
The Fish and Anchor Harrington
The Fish and Duck Ely
The Fish and Ring Stepney
The Feathers and Exchange Reading
The Five Bells and Bladebone Limehouse
The Fountain and Star Coleman Street
The French Horn and Half Moon Wandsworth
The Fox and Anchor Charterhouse Street
The Fox and Ball Kentford
The Fox and Barrel Chester
The Fox and Crown Highgate
The Fox and French Horn Clerkenwell
The Fox and Pheasant Great Massingham
The Goat and Boot Colchester
The Goat and Compasses Marylebone, _note_ 74
The George and Angel Crowland
The George and Vulture George Yard
The George and Horn Kingsclere
The George and Devonshire Chiswick
The George and Gate Gracechurch Street
The George and Guy Brick Lane
The George and Thirteen Cantons Soho, _note_ 75
The Gun and Magpie Edmonton
The Grapes and Anchor Liverpool
The Globe and Engine Sittingbourne
The Green Man and Black's Ashbourne
Head and Royal
The Green Man and French Horn St. Martin's Lane
The Green Man and Still Oxford Street
The Hare and Billet Blackheath
The Hare and Bell Edmonton
The Half Moon and Crown Twickenham
The Hog and Chequers Huntingdon
The Horns and Chequers Limehouse
The Horns and Horseshoes Harlow
The Hope and Anchor Keighley
The Hat and Tun Hatton Garden
The Hoop and Grapes Farringdon Street
The Horse and Gate Fen Drayton
The Horse and Dolphin St. Martin's Street
The Horse and Trumpet Derby
The Horse and Wells Woodford Wells
The Horseshoe and Colt Windmill Hill
The Horseshoe and Castle Cooling
The Horseshoe and Magpie Great Bath Street
The Horseshoe and Wheatsheaf Melior Street
The Jolly Sailors and Cable Street
Little Billet
The Key and Castle Norwich
The Kings and Keys Fleet Street
The King and Tinker Enfield, _note_ 76
The King's Arms and Hand Bermondsey
The King's Arms and Lamb Upper Thames Street
The King's Head and Eight Bells Cheyne Row
The Lamb and Lark Printing House Lane
The Lamb and Lion Bath
The Lamb and Flag Batheaston, _note_ 77
The Lamb and Star Ditton
The Lion and Castle Norwich
The Lion and Crown Guildford
The Lion and Fiddle Hilperton*
The Lion and French Horn Pollen Street
The Lion and Snake Lincoln
The Lion and Swan Congleton
The Lion and Wheatsheaf Ware
The Maund and Bush Shifnal, _note_ 78
The Mermaid and Fountain Lynn
The Mawson Arms and Fox Chiswick
and Hounds
The Maid and Magpie Stepney
The Magpie and Stump Fetter Lane
The Magpie and Crown Brentford
The Magpie and Punchbowl Bishopsgate
The Plough and Sail Snape
The Plough and Shuttle Marsham
The Plough and Duck Burnt Fen
The Parrot and Punchbowl Aldringham
The Pig and Whistle Burnt Fen, _note_ 79
The Peacock and Royal Boston
The Queen and Artichoke Albany Street
The Queen's Head and French Horn Little Britain
The Raven and Sun Woolwich
The Rose and Crown Sudbury
The Rose and Portcullis Butleigh
The Rose and Three Tuns Little Earl Street
The Royal Oak and Railway Windsor
The Ram and Magpie Bethnal Green
The Ram and Teazle Islington, _note_ 80
The Red Lion and Ball Red Lion Street
The Red Lion and French Horn Clerkenwell
The Red Lion and Key Battle Bridge Lane
The Red Lion and Sun Highgate
The Red Lion and Spread Eagle Whitechapel
The Red Lion and Still Drury Lane
The Still and Star Limehouse
The Ship and Star Sudbury
The Ship and Castle Bishopsworth
The Ship and Horns Louth
The Ship and Shovel Barking
The Ship and Blue Ball Shoreditch
The Stork and Castle Stockton-on-Tees
The Swan and Castle Buckingham
The Swan and Mitre Bromley
The Swan and Bottle Uxbridge
The Swan and Pyramids Finchley
The Swan and Sugarloaf Fetter Lane, _note_ 81
The Serpent and Eagle Kinlet
The Stag and Pheasant Stamford
The Salmon and Ball Shoreditch
The Salmon and Compasses Peterborough
The Sun and Anchor Steeple
The Sun and Thirteen Cantons Soho
The Sun and York Chatham
The Sun and Woolpack Cheshunt
The Sun and Whalebone Harlow
The Star and Garter Pall Mall
The Star and Fleece Kelvedon
The Star and Anchor Chelsea
The Star and Windmill Bermondsey
The Three Pigeons and Star Hatfield Street
The Thistle and Crown Great Peter Street, _note_ 82
The Talbot and Falcon Wakefield
The White Horse and Cross Keys Goswell Road
The White Horse and Half Moon Borough (_e_)
The Woman and Trumpet Brigg
The Wheelbarrow and Castle Radford
The Wheel and Compass Ashley
The Wagon and Lamb Chichester
The Windmill and Bells Romford
DWELLING PLACES
The Castle Windsor
The Alwyne Castle St. Paul's Road
The Arundel Castle Brighton
The King Arthur's Castle Tintagel
The Belinda Castle Hatton Road
The Carnarvon Castle Chester
The Denbigh Castle Stoke-on-Trent
The Durham Castle Seven Sisters Road
The Dover Castle Lambeth
The Dreghorn Castle Queen's Crescent
The Dublin Castle Chester
The Dartmouth Castle Hammersmith
The Devonshire Harrow Road
The Edinburgh Castle Sheffield
The Hawarden Castle Gower Place
The Job's Castle Norton Folgate
The Jack Straw's Castle Hampstead
The Kett's Castle Norwich
The Lambton Castle Herrington
The Norwich Castle Gray's Inn Road
The Pembroke Castle Gloucester Road
The Raby Castle Wynyard Terrace
The Rochester Castle Tottenham
The Samson's Castle Bermondsey
The Stirling Castle London Wall
The Warwick Castle Clacton
The Windsor Castle Victoria Street
The House of Commons Cambridge
Our House Southport
The Arabian House Norwich
The Assembly House Kentish Town
The Allsopp House Baker Street
The Bath House Dean Street
The Ball House Fishtoft
The Bridge House Eton
The Brookfield House Cambridge
The Club House Norwich
The Country House Exeter
The Cellar House Norwich
The Customs House King's Lynn
The Festival House Norwich
The Garden House Hales
The Glass House Kentish Town
The Gate House Norwich
The Heath House Weybread
The Highbridge House Lakenheath
The Halfway House Staines
The Irish House Strand
The Lock House Ellingham
The Manor House Datchet
The Market Place Covent Garden
The Mansion House Kennington
The North Country House Portsmouth
The Punch House Norwich
The Rye House Hoddesdon
The Ridgeway House Enfield
The Stone House Old Street
The Sessions House Clerkenwell
The Summer House Wolverhampton
The Thatched House Epping
The Toll House Coggeshall
The Tom Brown House Yarm, _note_ 83
The Trouble House Tetbury, _note_ 84
The Wine House Ware
The Warren House Hertford
The Watch House Bungay
The Cottage Barton
The Cottage of Content Betchworth
The Eaton Cottage Norwich
The Fern Cottage Oldham
The Flint Cottage High Wycombe
The Handford Cottage Ipswich
The Ivy Cottage Maltishall
The Ivy Cot Castleford
The Rose Cottage Wendling
The Spring Cottage Walsall
The Swiss Cottage Chelsea
The Woodbine Cottage Hartley
The Flyman's Home Brighton
The Happy Home Welney
The Stranger's Home Bradfield
The Sailors' Home Kessingland
The Hut Wisley
The Deer's Hut Bramshott
The Kisby's Hut Papworth Everard
The Shepherd's Hut Eton Wick
The Winterslow Hut Winterslow, _note_ 85
The Gipsy's Tent Hagley
The Jack's Booth Sulhamstead Abbots
The Beehive Grantham, _note_ 86
The Beehive Abingdon, _note_ 87
The Falcon's Nest Isle of Man
The Monkey's Nest Cockfield
The Kite's Nest Hereford
The Rest Kenton
The Angler's Rest Staines
The Cricketer's Rest Norwich
The Drover's Rest King's Lynn
The Huntsman's Rest Sheffield
The Miner's Rest Long Ashton
The Rambler's Rest East Dereham
The Shepherd's Rest Sowerby Bridge
The Traveller's Rest Hertford
The Cloth Hall Leeds
The Lilliput Hall Jamaica Road
The Town Hall Kensington
The West End Titchfield
The Mayfair Brick Street
The Chalk Farm Regent's Park
The Highbury Barn Great Cornard
The Lattice Barn Ipswich
The Bank Norwich
The Bank of England Paddington
The Bank of Friendship Mile End, _note_ 88
The Corn Exchange Norwich
The Crystal Palace Watford
The Guildhall Gresham Street
The Inns of Court Holborn
The London Stone Cannon Street
The London Hospital Whitechapel
The Monument King William Street
The Nelson Monument Yarmouth
The Nelson's Monument Norwich
The Mall Woodhall
The Mount Pleasant Dawlish
The Obelisk Harrogate
The Pleasant Retreat Walton le Dale
The Post Office Reading
The Royal Exchange Middlesbrough
The Tower Westminster Bridge Road
The Temple Bar Walworth
The Whittington Stone Highgate
The Bow Bridge Leicester
The Fulham Bridge Knightsbridge
The London Bridge Borough
The Moorgate Finsbury
The Storey's Gate Westminster
The Duchy Princetown
The Cosy Corner Bridlington
The Caxton Gibbet Caxton
The Cemetery Burmantofts
The Duke's Palace Norwich
The Windsor Castle Victoria
The Round Tower Windsor
The Savoy Palace Savoy Street
The Balmoral Edinburgh
The Hampton Court Palace Crampton Street
The Buckingham Palace Stevenage
The Osborne Stroud Green
ECCLESIASTICAL
The Ark Thetford
The Angel Islington
The Angel and Trumpet Stepney
The Abbey St. John's Wood
The Abbey in the West Lincoln
The Cross Boxted
The Priory Pendleton
The Cathedral Manchester
The Chapel Coggeshall
The Temple Roydon
The Chinese Temple Bradford
The Hermit Bedford Street
The Hermitage Acle
The Hermit's Cave Camberwell
The George and Dragon Wargrave
The George and Dragon Dragon's Green, _note_ 89
The Saint George and Dragon Snailwell
The Saint Anne's St. Anne's-on-Sea
The Saint Anne's Cross Faversham
The Saint Ann's Buxton
The Saint Andrew Baker Street
The Saint Bartholomew Norwich
The Saint Clement's Poole
The Saint Cuthbert's Scorton
The Saint James New Cross
The Saint
|
"He
couldn't be afraid, that creature. No soul. I dare ten thousand times
as much to overcome my fear as that man would dare to win the V.C. When
I go out on listening patrol I am always furthest out. I feel if I'm a
yard behind the front man he'll consider me a coward, so I get out a
yard ahead of him and I tremble all the time.
"God! I had a bad dream last night," Fitzgerald remarked swinging from
one topic to another. "I dreamt I saw a woman dressed in black looking
into an empty grave."
"That's a bad sign," said the sergeant. "You'll be damned unlucky the
next time yer go up to the trenches. Ye'll never come back. Ye'll get
done in."
"Oh, I'll come back safe and sound," Fitzgerald replied in all
seriousness. "The dream was a bad one and portended some evil."
"And is it not bad enough to get done in?" asked Benners.
"There are things worse than death," was Fitzgerald's answer. "Death is
not the supreme evil. But women! It's not good to dream of them
especially if they're red-haired. Did you ever dream of red-haired
women, Bowdy?"
Bowdy laughed but did not speak. Women apparently did not attract him
much and in their company he was shy and diffident. Wanting to get away
as quickly as possible from their presence he would rake up some
imaginary appointment from the back of his head, ask to be excused and
disappear. Behaviour of this kind though natural to Bowdy Benners was
quite inexplicable to his mates. Fitzgerald having had a drop of wine
was now in a mood to discuss womanhood.
"You're too damned modest, Bowdy," he said. "And you don't shine in the
company of the fair, dear women. You know the natural mission of woman
is to please man, and man, no matter what he feels, should try and look
pleased when in her company. If he looks bored what does that signify,
Bowdy Benners? Eh? It means that he has found her ugly. That's an
insult to the sex, to feminine charms and womanly qualities. For myself
I'd much sooner sin and please a woman than pose as a saint and annoy
her. Women don't like saints; what they want most in life is Love."
"Love! Love is the only allurement in existence," said Fitzgerald
rising to his feet. "It is the essence of life. Love, free and
unrestrained, not tied to the pillars of propriety by the manacles of
marriage. (That's a damned smart phrase, isn't it, Spudhole?) Love is
sacred, marriage is not, marriage is governed by laws, love is not.
Nature has given us love. It is an instinct and we shouldn't fight
against it too much. Why should we fight against a gift from God? Some
sacrilegious fool tried to improve on God's handiwork and made laws to
govern love. It's like man to poke his nose in where it's not wanted.
He'd give the Lord soda water at the Last Supper."
Snoggers laughed boisterously, Bubb chuckled and a lazy smile spread
over Bowdy's face. The gestures of the excited Irishman amused them. He
sat down, took a deep breath, then went on to speak in a calmer voice.
"Love sweetens life," he said. "It is like sugar in children's physic.
Here, Spudhole, were you ever in love?"
"Blimey, not arf," Spudhole answered and winked. "I'm not arf a beggar
wiv the birds. I'm...."
"That wench down at the farm, that girl Fifi is a nice snug parcel o'
love," Snoggers interrupted, "I 'aven't arf got my 'and in down that
quarter. Wot d'ye fink o' 'er, Fitz?"
"Who?" asked Fitzgerald. He had become suddenly alert.
"'Ear 'im," said Bubb, winking at the Sergeant. "Old Fitz ain't arf a
dodger; one o' the nuts that's wot 'e is."
"Fifi, the girl at the farm," said Snogger in answer to Fitzgerald's
question. "Yer don't say much when you're down there and 'er in the
room but your eyes are never off 'er.... I wouldn't say nothin' against
rollin' 'er in the straw.... This mornin'... a funny thing... she
came up to me and told me to put my 'and in 'ers. I obliged 'er. Then
she said to me: 'Two sous for your thoughts.' I didn't tell 'er wot I
was finkin' of, but I didn't arf fink."
Snogger laughed loudly; Fitzgerald was silent.
"Bet yer, yer wos finkin' somefing wot wasn't good, sarg," said Bubb.
"Aye; and old Fitz is gwine dotty on the wench," said the sergeant. "I
see it in his eyes."
"Botheration," Fitzgerald remarked. "I know the girl by sight and I
know she makes good café-au-lait, but I didn't even know her name until
now."
"Sing a song, Fitz," Bubb called out. "A good rousin' song wiv 'air
on't."
"I pay no heed to that creation, his tap-room wit and yokel humour,"
muttered Fitzgerald, turning to Benners. "But if you desire it...."
"Give us a bit o' a song, Fitz," Benners replied.
"Give me a cigarette and I'll sing you a song that I love very much,"
Fitzgerald said. "It was sung in Ireland by the old women in the famine
times when they were dying of starvation. You must picture the
famine-stricken leaning over their turf fires and singing their songs
of desolation. (God! I think it was the turf-fires that kept the race
alive.)"
CHAPTER II
THE LONE ROAD
"I want to go 'ome,
I want to go 'ome,
I don't want to go to the trenches no more,
Where the bullets and shrapnel do whistle and roar,
I want to go over the sea,
Where the Alley man can't get at me;
Oh, my!
I don't want to die,
I want to go 'ome!"
(_A Trench Song._)
A strange glow overspread Fitzgerald's face and he rose from his seat
by the stove and sat down again on a bench in a corner and spread out
his hands timorously towards an imaginary fire. He bent his head
forward until it drooped almost to his knees and his whole attitude
took on a semblance of want and woe beset with an overpowering fear.
Benners gasped involuntarily as he waited for the song.
A long, drawn out, hardly audible note that wavered like a thread of
smoke quivered out into the evil atmosphere of the apartment, it was
followed by a second and a third. A strange effect was produced on all
the listeners by the trembling voice of the singer. Bubb gaped
stupidly, his eyes fixed on the roof, as he rubbed his chin with the
fingers of his right hand. The sergeant drew himself up and listened,
fascinated. Fitzgerald's song was the song of a soul condemned to
inevitable sorrow; there was not a relieving touch, not a glow of hope,
it was the song of a damned soul.
"Oh, the praties they are small
Over here.
Oh, the praties they are small
Over here.
The praties they are small
And we ate them skins and all,
Aye, and long afore the Fall,
Over here.
No help in hour of need
Over here.
And God won't pay much heed
Over here.
Then whisht! Or He'll take heed
And He'll rot the pratie seed
And send other mouths to feed
Over here.
I wish I was a duck
Over here.
To be eating clay and muck
Over here.
I'd sooner... sooner... I'd sooner...."
"My God, I've forgotten it, Benners, forgotten the rest of the song,"
Fitzgerald exclaimed, throwing his unlighted cigarette on the floor and
gripping his hair with both hands as if going to pull it out of his
head. Then, as if thinking better of it, he brought both his hands to
his sides and sat down on his original seat, his whole face betokening
extreme self-pity.
"My memory!" he exclaimed. "My memory! Why was I brought into being?"
A minute's silence followed, then an eager glow lit up Fitzgerald's
face. A happy inspiration seemed to have seized hold of him. "Benners!"
he exclaimed in an eager voice. "Have you a cigarette to spare,
Benners?"
"Gorblimey!" laughed Bubb. "Listen to 'im. 'E's always on the 'ear-'ole
for fags, an' 'e throws arf of 'em away. 'E's not arf a nib, ole Fitz."
"Good Heavens, how can I endure such remarks from a damned Sassenach!
(I beg your pardon, Bubb)" Fitzgerald exclaimed, gripping with both
fingers the cigarette which Benners had given him and breaking it in
two. "You don't understand me, Bubb, you can't. I don't bear you any
malice, but, heavens! you are trying at times.... By the way," he
added, "can you give us one of your songs?"
Bubb looked at Fitzgerald for a moment then lit a cigarette and got to
his feet.
"Wot about Ole Skiboo?" he asked, addressing the remark to all in the
room.
The soldiers knew that he was going to oblige and applauded with their
hands.
Bubb fixed his eyes on the patronne and started:
"Madame, 'ave yer any good wine?
Skiboo! Skiboo!
Madame, 'ave yer any good wine?
Skiboo!
Madame, 'ave yer any good wine
Fit for a rifleman o' the line?
Skiboo! Skiboo! Skiboolety bill skiboo!
"Madame, 'ave yer a daughter fair?
Skiboo! Skiboo!
Madame, 'ave yer a daughter fair?
Skiboo!
Madame, 'ave yer a daughter fair?
And I will take her under my care,
Skiboo! Skiboo! Skiboolety bill skiboo!
"Madame, I've got money to spend,
Cinq sous! Cinq sous!
Madame, I've got money to spend,
Cinq sous!
Madame, I've got money to spend,
Seldom the case with your daughter's friend,
Cinq sous! Cinq sous, cinq slummicky slop! Cinq sous!"
The song, an old one probably, but adapted to suit modern
circumstances, was lustily chorused by the soldiers in the room. Bubb
having finished sat down, but presently rose to his feet again.
"'Oo'l whistle the chorus of 'It's a long way to Tipperary'?" he asked.
"Everybody do it together and the one that does it froo I'll stand 'im
a drink. Nobody to laugh. And the one that's not able to do it will
stand me a drink. Is that a bargain? Nobody to laugh, mind."
The men agreed to Bubb's terms and started whistling. But they did not
get far. They had drunk quite a lot and Bubb's final injunction tickled
them. One smiled, then another. Bowdy Benners lay back and roared with
laughter. He tried to form his lips round a note but the effort was
futile. It was impossible to laugh and whistle at the same time.
Fitzgerald was making a sound that reminded the listeners of an angry
cat spitting. His cheeks were puffed out and his nose was sinking out
of sight. The landlord rolled from side to side choking almost, even
the patronne was smiling. The little ragged girl came across the floor
and stood in front of Fitz, her hands behind her back. For a moment she
stood thus, then she ran away giggling and hid behind the counter.
Fitzgerald got to his feet.
"Bubb, Spudhole or whatever the devil they call you, you've won," he
said. "What a queer creature that child is, boys," he muttered, looking
at the youngster which was peeping slyly out from behind the counter.
"Is it a boy or a girl?"
Bubb approached the counter and drank the glass of vin rouge which
Benners had paid for; then he thrust his hands in his trouser pockets
and began to sing "Sam Hall."
"My name is Samuel Hall,
Tiddy fol lol, tiddy fol lol!"
"Bowdlerise it, you fool," Fitzgerald exclaimed sitting down again.
"Bowdlerise the song or stop singing. Bad taste, Bubb, bad taste. Drink
doesn't improve your morals."
Bubb ceased singing, not on Fitzgerald's behest, but because the
sergeant was standing him a drink. Old Jean Lacroix who was slowly
recovering from his fit of laughter turned to Fitzgerald.
"The Bosche broke through up by Souchez last night," he said, pointing
a fat thumb towards the locality of the firing line. "He broke through
in hundreds. He is unable to get back now and he is roving all over the
country."
"They haven't been captured?" said Fitzgerald.
"Some of them," said Jean. "Most of them perhaps, but not all. Last
night they were about here."
"Here?" enquired Fitzgerald. "Did you see them?"
"Have I seen them?" asked Jean, shivering with laughter. "They can't be
seen. They disguise themselves as turnips, as bushes, as English
soldiers.... Last night two of your countrymen, soldiers, left here at
nine o'clock; and got killed."
Jean paused.
"Where were they killed?" asked Fitzgerald.
"You are billeted at Y---- Farm, are you not?" enquired the innkeeper.
"You are. Then you came along the road to-night coming here. Did you
see a ruined cottage on your right, a little distance back from the
road?"
"A mile from here?" said Fitzgerald. "Yes, we saw it."
"That is where it happened," said Jean Lacroix. "The two soldiers were
found there this morning with their throats cut, lying on the floor."
Fitzgerald got to his feet and entered an outer room. There he found a
copy of an English magazine lying on a chair. He picked it up and
presently was deep in an article which tried to prove that war would be
a thing of the past if Prussia ceased to exist. When he had finished
reading he came back to the man by the stove and found him sitting
there all alone, his eyes fixed on the flames. Benners was not there,
he had left, accompanied by Spudhole and the sergeant. The farm in
which their company was billeted was some two miles off.
Fitzgerald looked at his watch and saw that it was nine o'clock.
"Nine o'clock," he said aloud, and something familiar in the words
struck him. Two soldiers left the wine shop the night previous at nine
o'clock and next morning they were discovered lying in a ruined cottage
with their throats cut. None of the men now in the inn were billeted at
Y---- Farm. Fitzgerald had to go home alone. He swung his bandolier
over his shoulder, lifted his rifle from the table and went out into
the night. The story which Jean Lacroix had told affected Fitzgerald
strongly. A stranger in a new locality he was ready to give credence to
any tale.
Fitzgerald had seen very little of trench warfare. True, he had come
out to France with his regiment in March of 1915 but then he got
wounded on his first journey to the trenches and was sent back to
England. He came out again in time to take part in the battle of Loos
and got gassed in the charge. Followed a few weeks in the hospital at
Versailles and then he was sent back to the trenches. He had seen a
fortnight's trench warfare, done turns in listening patrol and
sentry-go, before coming back with his battalion to Y---- Farm near the
town of Cassel. So now, although first battalion man, he was in many
ways a "rooky," one who was not as yet versed in the practices of
modern warfare. Now, on the way back to his billet he thought of Jean
Lacroix's story and a strange fit of nervousness laid hold of him. What
might happen in the darkness he could not tell, and he wished that his
mates had not gone leaving him to come back alone. They ought to have
looked him up. He was annoyed with them. He was angry.
The road stretched out in front a dull streak of grey, lined with
ghostly poplars, that lost itself in the darkness ahead. The night was
gloomy and chilly, a low weird wind crooned in the grass and a belated
night-bird shrieked painfully in the sky above. Far out in front the
carnage was in full swing, the red fury of war lit the line of battle
and darts of flame, ghastly red, pierced the clouds in a hasty
succession of short vicious stabs. Round Fitzgerald was the flat
dead country, black and limitless, and over it from time to time
swift flashes of light would rise and tremble in the gloom like
will-o'-the-wisps over a churchyard. The sharp penetrating odour of
dung was in the air, the night-breath of the low-lying land of
Flanders.
The shadows gathered round the man silently. One rushed in from the
fields and took on an almost definite form on the roadway in front. He
could not help gazing round from time to time and staring back along
the road. What might be following! He was all alone, apart from his
kind, isolated. One hand gripped tightly on his rifle and the fingers
of the other fumbled at his bandolier. He ran his hand over the
cartridges, counting them aloud. Fifty rounds. But he had none in the
magazine of his rifle. He should have five there. But he would not put
them in now. He would make too much noise.
He walked at a good steady pace; and hummed a tune under his breath,
trying thus to keep down any disposition to shiver. His eyes becoming
accustomed to the darkness could now take stock of the roadway, the
grassy verge and the ditch on either side. The poplars rose high and
became one with the sombre darkness of the sky. Shadows lurked in the
ditches, bundled together and plotting some mischief towards him. His
imagination conceived ghastly pictures of men lying flat in the shadows
staring at the heavens with glazed, unseeing eyes, their throats cut
across from ear to ear.... What a row his footsteps created! The noise
he kicked up must have echoed across the world. He hummed a tune
viciously and stared intensely into the remoter darkness of the
unknown.
The breeze whimpered amidst the poplar leaves and its sigh was carried
ever so far away. Again a shadow swept up from the fields and took
shape on the road in front. Fitzgerald advanced towards it quickly and
collided with a solid mass, a living form.
"I am sorry," he muttered.
"Good evening," said a voice with a queer strange note in it. "You are
out late."
"I am going back to my billet now," Fitzgerald said, and asked: "Where
are you going?" There was a moment's hesitation before the stranger
replied, saying: "I'm going to the next village."
Fitzgerald could now see that the man was dressed as an English soldier
in a khaki uniform, a rifle over his shoulder and a bandolier round his
chest. Germans often disguise themselves as British soldiers, Jean
Lacroix said....
"What do you belong to?" Fitzgerald asked, stepping off after the
momentary halt. The man accompanied him.
"The Army Service Corps," he answered readily enough, but his accent
struck Fitzgerald as being strangely unfamiliar; in his low guttural
tones there was something foreign. English could not have been his
mother tongue. For a while there was silence, but suddenly as if
overcome by a sense of embarrassment due to the silence, the man spoke.
"Have you been long in France?" he asked.
"I have been here for some time," Fitzgerald answered.
"What is your regiment?"
Being warned against giving any information to strangers, Fitzgerald
gave an evasive reply.
"Oh, a line regiment," he said.
The man chuckled. "Looks like it," he said. "Are you billeted here?"
"I'm billeted at...." Fitzgerald stopped and asked "Where are you
billeted?"
"Oh, at the next village," said the man. "A number of the A.S.C. are
billeted there."
Again a long silence. Their boots crunched angrily on the roadway and
ahead the lights of war lit up the horizon.
"They're fighting like hell up there," said the man. "There's a big
battle on now. Has your regiment been called up?"
As he spoke he pulled his rifle forward across his chest and fumbled
with the bolt. Fitzgerald stared at him fascinated, his nerves strained
to an acute pitch.
"What are you doing with your rifle?" he asked.
"Oh, nothing," the stranger answered and slung the weapon over his left
shoulder. Had the man a round in the breech? Fitzgerald wondered. For
himself he had not even a cartridge in the magazine. What a fool he had
been not to take the precaution of being prepared for emergencies....
The stranger came close to his side and his shoulder almost touched
Fitzgerald's. The Rifleman moved to the left, close to the verge of the
road and his hand slipped towards his bandolier.
"It's very dark to-night," he said as his fingers closed on a
cartridge.
"Very dark," said the man.
"There's no moon," Fitzgerald remarked as he slipped the bolt of his
rifle back. Then with due caution he pressed the cartridge into the
mouth of the magazine. As far as he could judge the stranger had not
noticed the action.
"No, there's no moon," he said in answer to Fitzgerald's remark.
"How far is it to the next village?" asked Fitzgerald and shoved the
rounds into the magazine. The cartridge-clip clattered on to the
cobbles.
"You've dropped something," said the stranger. "What was it?"
"I've dropped nothing," the Irishman replied. "I must have hit my boot
against something."
He glanced at the stranger's face. White and ghostly it looked, with a
protruding jowl and a dark moustache that drooped over the lips. As
Fitzgerald spoke he pressed the bolt home and now felt a certain
confidence enter his being. There was the round snug in the breech of
his rifle. One touch of the trigger....
"Did you think I dropped a shilling?" he laughed. "Wish I had one to
throw away."
"Many a one would wish the same," said the man gruffly.
Then he whistled a tune through his teeth, a contemplative whistle as
if he were considering something.
"You're at Y---- Farm, of course," he suddenly remarked. "There are a
number of soldiers billeted there. You know the way to it?"
"I know the way," Fitzgerald answered.
"You leave the road at a ruined cottage along here and cross the
fields," said the man. "I'm going that way myself."
"I leave the road further along," the Irishman said hastily.
"Nonsense," said the man. "Past the ruined cottage is the best way."
"I'm not going that way," Fitzgerald said.
"Not going that way," repeated his companion. "Why not?"
"I don't know the road through the fields there."
"But I know the way."
"I prefer to go further along," said Fitzgerald. "Two of my mates are
just ahead."
"Where are they?" asked the stranger in a tone of surprise. "I thought
you were all alone."
"They are just a few hundred yards on in front," was the answer. "Not
so far away."
"Oh!" said the man. "Then that is why you're in such a hurry."
"I'm in no particular hurry," said Fitzgerald. "But it is wise to be
back before 'Lights out.'"
He could see the ruined cottage in front now, a black blur against the
night. The limitless levels stretched out on either side, frogs croaked
in the ponds, now and then a light shot up from the fields, trembled in
air for a moment and died away. The breezes of the night, the "unseen
multitude," as the ancients called them, capered by, crooning wearily.
In front, far ahead, the artillery fire redoubled in intensity and the
sky was lit by the brilliance of day.
"Hell's loose out there," said the stranger. "It's not good to be
there; it's not good to die."
The stranger turned off the road and walked a few yards down a lane in
the direction of the cottage.
"I'm not going that way," said Fitzgerald coming to a halt. His
companion stopped.
"Afraid?" he said.
"Afraid! H'm! I'm not afraid," the Irishman answered, nettled at the
word. "All right, you go ahead. I'll follow."
The man did not move. He fumbled in his pocket and brought something
out, something dark, small and tipped at the points as if with silver.
Fitzgerald imagined it to be a revolver and he slid his rifle forward
so that its muzzle pointed at the man's body.
"Hold your weapon up, you fool," said the stranger, and a note of
concern was in his voice. "I've a pocket lamp here. We'll get off into
the fields now and I'll light the way with this. The place is full of
ponds and drains. Last night I fell into a hole somewhere about this
place... you get off in front."
"I'll follow," said Fitzgerald. "You lead the way."
"All right," the man meekly responded. "Now we get off the road."
He slipped into the field and the Irishman followed. Both were now near
the cottage and they could see its bare rafters and ruined walls
clearly. It looked gloomy and forbidding.... As Fitzgerald gazed at the
cottage he saw a light close to the dark ground; a tremulous flame
gleamed for a moment and was gone.
"Did you see that?" asked the Irishman. "A light near the cottage?"
"I saw nothing," said his companion.
"You didn't see the flame. There's somebody in front. Friends of yours
maybe."
"I've no friends here.... You saw a light?... Nonsense!"
"There, what is that?" asked the Irishman as he heard a thud as of
somebody falling over a hurdle. "Did you not hear it?"
"Yes, what is it?" asked the stranger extinguishing his torch. "I heard
something. Shall I shout?"
"Why?"
"Why?" exclaimed the man. "Only to find out who's there. Hallo!" he
yelled.
Somebody answered with a loud "hallo!" and again a light gleamed in the
darkness.
"Who's there?" shouted the stranger.
"It's us," came the answer. "Blurry well lost in this blurry 'ole. 'Oo
are yer?"
"Spudhole!" Fitzgerald shouted in a glad voice for he recognised the
voice of his mate. "Is Bowdy and the sergeant with you?"
"Oh! It's old Fitz," Spudhole exclaimed. "We're lost, the three o' us,
and we don't know where we are. D'you know the way to the farm?"
"We'll soon get there," Fitzgerald replied. "I've somebody with me who
knows the way."
"Bring 'im along 'ere then," said Bubb.
Fitzgerald turned to his companion who had just moved to one side, but
now he could not see him. On his right a dark form became one with the
night and lost itself.
"Hi!" Fitzgerald shouted. But there was no reply.
"Hi there!" he cried in a louder voice, but no answer came back.
"There was somebody with me but he's gone now," he said to Bubb when he
reached him where he stood along with Benners and the sergeant beside a
dark pond near the ruined cottage.
"Well, we had better try and get back to our billet," the sergeant
remarked. "Damn these beastly fields! We'll be damned unlucky if we
don't get out o' 'em."
They got into the farmhouse at eleven o'clock. All their mates were in
bed and the watch-dog at the gate bit Bubb in the upper part of the
thigh as he came in.
CHAPTER III
IN LOVE
As I was going up the road
Ma'selle said, "_Voulez vous_
Come in and have some _pain et beurre_
And _café au lait_ for two."
So now I hope the war won't end;
I'll never go away
And leave my little Madamoiselle
Who sells good _café au lait_.
I hope the war will never end,--
A curse upon the day
That takes me away from Madamoiselle,
Who sells good _café au lait_.
(_From "The Love of an Hour."_)
Fitzgerald made his way to the barn, which was above the byre, sat down
in the straw but did not unloosen his puttees or boots.
A lamp swinging from a beam lit up the apartment, showing the straw
heaped in the corners, the sickles and spades hanging from the rafters,
the sleepers lying in all conceivable positions, the bundles of
equipment, the soldiers' rifles which stood piled in the corners out of
the way. Now and again a rat glided across the straw, stood for a
moment in the light, peered cautiously round, and disappeared. The air
was full of the smell of musty wood, of straw, and of the byre
underneath. All was very quiet, little could be heard save the
breathing of the men, the noise of the restless cattle as they lay down
or got up again. Snoggers and Benners laid themselves on the straw,
Bowdy curled up like a dog, Snoggers stretched out as stiffly as a
statue. Bubb undressed and Fitzgerald, getting to his feet, applied
sticking plaster to the dog's bite.
"You'll go mad, you know," said Fitzgerald. "The only thing that can
save you is to get three hairs of the dog that bit you and put them on
here."
Having performed his job Fitzgerald sat down and Bubb dressed again.
Then he lay on the straw, both hands in his overcoat pockets, one leg
across the other and a cigarette in his mouth.
"Get down to it, Fitz," Snogger shouted. "Ye're damned slow o' showin'
a leg in the mornin', you woman."
"It's all right, Sergeant," the Irishman replied. "I'm just goin' to
look at a paper. I'll be in bed in a twinkling."
"Douse the glim 'fore you kip, then," said the sergeant. "Night!"
Fitzgerald fumbled in his pocket, brought out a newspaper and looked at
it. His thoughts seemed to be elsewhere, for his eye, scanning the
printed columns of an advertisement page, turned from time to time and
rested on the face of Sergeant Snogger.
"I think it's safe now," said Fitzgerald, when five minutes had passed.
"Old Snogger is snoring."
The sergeant was indeed asleep, but had not lost his military pose. He
might have been frozen stiff while standing to attention on the parade
ground and carried from there into the barn and placed down just as he
had been standing. Bowdy was fighting Germans in his dreams. Bubb's
cigarette had fallen on his clothes and the smell of burning pervaded
the barn.
Fitzgerald got to his feet, dropped the newspaper, lifted the fag-end
from Bubb's overcoat and turned out the lamp. Then, stepping across the
sleepers, he made his way cautiously to the door and descended the
steps leading to the farmyard. The night was very quiet; and very dark.
The lights were out in the farmhouse; no doubt the occupants were all
in bed.
"What am I doing out here?" Fitz asked himself. "I'm drunk, that's
why." He stood still and he could feel his heart beating. Something was
moving in the midden and grunting.
"It's a pig, I suppose," said the Irishman. "They're all over the
place." Then he thought of the dog that had bit Bubb. "Will it bite
me?" he questioned and moved hurriedly across the farmyard towards the
gable end of the building. He stood there for a second to draw breath,
then he went round to the back of the house.
All were not yet in bed, a light burned behind a small four-paned
window and the shadow of a girl showed on the blind. Standing a little
distance from the window, Fitzgerald stared at the shadow, watching its
movements. For a moment he had a view of a face in profile, then of a
head bent down and an arm stretching out as if pulling a needle from a
piece of cloth. The girl no doubt was mending some clothes.
"That's Fifi," said Fitzgerald in a whisper. His voice was husky and a
lump rose in his throat. "She's very graceful bending over her work....
Damn it! I'm in love with her.... If not that, I have a great respect
for her ever since I saw her for the first time.... I suppose I have
been a gay Don Juan, but Fifi.... Well, I've never felt like this
before.... Probably I'm drunk and to-morrow.... But all to-day and
yesterday I felt the same.... I don't think I am drunk for I put the
bandage on with a firm hand.... If she would open the window and look
out only for a moment.... I want to see her; I must see her.... Suppose
she spoke to me and then told Snogger in the morning, told him that I
was hanging about her bedroom window all night, what would he say?...
Oh! damn Snogger, he's a fool.... I'll tap on the pane, anyway."
Fitzgerald went up to the window, pressed his hand softly against the
pane, but drew it quickly away.
"I can't," he muttered under his breath. "My God, why have I not more
courage... a gay Don Juan.... But perhaps she'd do something awful,
throw a tin of water or.... A gay Don Juan," he repeated, in a louder
voice, and then added: "It doesn't matter. I'll let her know I'm here."
He raised his hand and tapped lightly on the pane, then turned, walked
off for a distance of a few yards and stopped. Looking back he saw the
light turned down and heard the window open. The girl looked out into
the darkness.
"Who is there?" she called in a low voice. "What do you want?"
Moving quietly, Fitzgerald made his way back to the window again. The
girl could see him now and apparently recognised him.
"English soldier, you should be asleep," she said, in a voice charged
with laughter. "Go away. What do you want?"
"I want nothing," said Fitzgerald in a hoarse whisper.
In the shadows he could see the outline of her face, which looked
strangely white. "I was up at the Café," he said. "Coming back I saw
the light, so I tapped.... Is it not time for you to be in bed?"
"Listen to him!" said the girl, speaking in a whisper, and bringing her
face close to the man's. "Time to be in bed, indeed! What does it
matter to you when I go to bed? And I have work to do. You English
soldiers never work.... Go away!"
"You are always working, Fifi," said Fitzgerald, without moving from
where he stood.
"Always working," repeated the girl. "We are not like English girls;
they never work. They have too much money. But I must go to bed," she
said, making as though to shut the window. "Au revoir, English
soldier."
"Not yet, not yet!" said Fitzgerald, speaking hurriedly. "I want to
speak to you."
"What are you going to say?" asked the girl in a hesitating voice.
Fitzgerald was silent. He had so much to say, but in reality he said
nothing at all. He merely coughed, unbuttoned the pockets of his tunic
and buttoned them up again. He looked at the girl, and her
|
traitors
among them? You know what spies there are in the University here. O
Alexis, you must go! You see how desperate suffering has made us. There
is no room here for a nature like yours. You must not come again.
ALEX. Why do you think so poorly of me? Why should I live while my
brothers suffer?
VERA. You spake to me of your mother once. You said you loved her. Oh,
think of her!
ALEX. I have no mother now but Russia, my life is hers to take or give
away; but to-night I am here to see you. They tell me you are leaving
for Novgorod to-morrow.
VERA. I must. They are getting faint-hearted there, and I would fan the
flame of this revolution into such a blaze that the eyes of all kings in
Europe shall be blinded. If martial law is passed they will need me all
the more there. There is no limit, it seems, to the tyranny of one man;
but there shall be a limit to the suffering of a whole people.
ALEX. God knows it, I am with you. But you must not go. [15]The police
are watching every train for you.[15] When you are seized they have
orders to place you without trial in the lowest dungeon of the
palace.[16] I know it--no matter how. [17]Oh, think how without you the
sun goes from our life, how the people will lose their leader and
liberty her priestess.[17] Vera, you must not go!
VERA. If you wish it, I will stay. I would live a little longer for
freedom, a little longer for Russia.
ALEX. When you die then Russia is smitten indeed; when you die then I
shall lose all hope--all.... Vera, this is fearful news you
bring--martial law--it is too terrible. I knew it not, by my soul, I
knew it not!
VERA. How could you have known it? It is too well laid a plot for that.
This great White Czar, whose hands are red with the blood of the people
he has murdered, whose soul is black with his iniquity, is the cleverest
conspirator of us all. Oh, how could Russia bear two hearts like yours
and his!
ALEX. Vera, the Emperor was not always like this. There was a time when
he loved the people. It is that devil, whom God curse, Prince Paul
Maraloffski who has brought him to this. To-morrow, I swear it, I shall
plead for the people to the Emperor.
VERA. Plead to the Czar! Foolish boy, it is only those who are
sentenced to death that ever see our Czar. Besides, what should he care
for a voice that pleads for mercy? The cry of a strong nation in its
agony has not moved that heart of stone.
ALEX. (_aside_). Yet shall I plead to him. They can but kill me.
PROF. Here are the proclamations, Vera. Do you think they will do?
VERA. I shall read them. [18]How fair he looks?[18] Methinks he never
seemed so noble as to-night. Liberty is blessed in having such a lover.
ALEX. Well, President, what are you deep in?
MICH. We are thinking of the best way of killing bears. (_Whispers to
PRESIDENT and leads him aside._)
PROF. (_to VERA_). And the letters [19]from our brothers at Paris and
Berlin. What answer shall we send to them?[19]
VERA (_takes them mechanically_). Had I not strangled nature, sworn
neither to love nor be loved, methinks[20] I might have loved him. Oh, I
am a fool, a traitor myself, a traitor myself! But why did he come
amongst us with his bright[21] young face, his heart aflame for liberty,
his pure white soul? Why does he make me feel at times as if I would
have him as my king, Republican though I be? Oh, fool, fool, fool! False
to your oath! weak as water! Have done! Remember what you are--a
Nihilist, a Nihilist!
PRES. (_to MICHAEL_). But you will be seized, Michael.
MICH. I think not. I will wear the uniform of the Imperial Guard, and
the Colonel on duty is one of us. It is on the first floor, you
remember; so I can take a long shot.
PRES. Shall I tell the brethren?
[22]MICH. Not a word, not a word! There is a traitor amongst us.
VERA. Come, are these the proclamations? Yes, they will do; yes, they
will do. Send five hundred to Kiev and Odessa and Novgorod, five
hundred to Warsaw, and have twice the number distributed among the
Southern Provinces, though these dull Russian peasants care little for
our proclamations, and less for our martyrdoms. When the blow is struck,
it must be from the town, not from the country.
MICH. Ay, and by the sword not by the goose-quill.
VERA. Where are the letters from Poland?
PROF. Here.
VERA. Unhappy Poland! The eagles of Russia have fed on her heart. We
must not forget our brothers there.[22]
PRES. Is this true, Michael?
MICH. Ay, I stake my life on it.
PRES. [23]Let the doors be locked, then.[23] Alexis Ivanacievitch
entered on our roll of the brothers as a Student of the School of
Medicine at Moscow. Why did you not tell us of this bloody scheme[24] of
martial law?
ALEX. I, President?
MICH. Ay, you! You knew it, none better. Such weapons as these are not
forged in a day. Why did you not tell us of it? A week ago there had
been time [25]to lay the mine, to raise the barricade, to strike one
blow at least for liberty.[25] But now the hour is past. It is too late,
[26]it is too late![26] Why did you keep it a secret from us, I say?
ALEX. Now by the hand of freedom, Michael, my brother, you wrong me. I
knew nothing of this hideous law. By my soul, my brothers, I knew not of
it! How should I know?
MICH. Because you are a traitor! Where did you go when you left us the
night of our last meeting here?
[27]ALEX. To mine own house, Michael.[27]
MICH. Liar! I was on your track. You left here an hour after midnight.
Wrapped in a large cloak, you crossed the river in a boat a mile below
the second bridge, and gave the ferryman a gold piece, you, the poor
student of medicine! You doubled back twice, and hid in an archway so
long that I had almost made up my mind to stab you at once, only that I
am fond of hunting. So! you thought that you had baffled all pursuit,
did you? Fool! I am a bloodhound that never loses the scent. I followed
you from street to street. At last I saw you pass swiftly across the
Place St. Isaac, whisper to the guards the secret password, enter the
palace by a private door with your own key.
CONSPIRATORS. The palace!
VERA. Alexis!
MICH. I waited. All through the dreary watches of our long Russian night
I waited, that I might kill you with your Judas hire still hot in your
hand. But you never came out; you never left that palace at all. I saw
the blood-red sun rise through the yellow fog over the murky town; I saw
a new day of oppression dawn on Russia; but you never came out. So you
pass nights in the palace, do you? You know the password for the guards!
you have a key to a secret door. Oh, you are a spy--you are a spy! I
never trusted you, [28]with your soft white hands, your curled hair,
your pretty graces.[28] You have no mark of suffering about you; you
cannot be of the people. You are a spy--[29]a spy--traitor.[29]
OMNES. Kill him! Kill him! (_draw their knives_.)
VERA (_rushing in front of ALEXIS_). Stand back, I say, Michael! Stand
back all! [30]Do not dare[30] lay a hand upon him! He is the noblest
heart amongst us.
OMNES. Kill him! Kill him! He is a spy!
VERA. Dare to lay a finger on him, and I leave you all to yourselves.
PRES. Vera, did you not hear what Michael said of him? He stayed all
night in the Czar's palace. He has a password and a private key. What
else should he be but a spy?
VERA. Bah! I do not believe Michael. It is a lie! It is[31] a lie!
Alexis, say it is a lie!
ALEX. It is true. Michael has told what he saw. I did pass that night in
the Czar's palace. Michael has spoken the truth.
VERA. Stand back, I say; stand back! Alexis, I do not care. I trust you;
you would not betray us; you would not sell the people for money. You
are honest, true! Oh, say you are no spy!
ALEX. Spy? You know I am not. I am with you, my brothers, to the death.
MICH. Ay, to your own death.
ALEX. Vera, you[32] know I am true.
VERA. I know it well.
PRES. Why are you here, traitor?
ALEX. Because I love the people.
MICH. Then you can be a martyr for them?
VERA. You must kill me first, Michael, before you lay a finger on him.
PRES. Michael, we dare not lose Vera. It is her whim to let this boy
live. We can keep him here to-night. Up to this he has not betrayed us.
(_Tramp of soldiers outside, knocking at door._)[33]
VOICE. Open in the name of the Emperor!
MICH. He _has_ betrayed us. This is your doing, spy!
PRES. Come, Michael, come. We have no time to cut one another's throats
while we have our own heads to save.
VOICE. Open in the name of the Emperor!
PRES. Brothers, be masked all of you. [34]Michael, open the door. It is
our only chance.[34]
(_Enter GENERAL KOTEMKIN and soldiers._)
GEN. All honest citizens should be in their own houses at an hour before
midnight, and not more than five people have a right to meet privately.
Have you not noticed the proclamation, fellows?
MICH. Ay, you have spoiled every honest[35] wall in Moscow with it.
VERA. Peace, Michael, peace. Nay, Sir, we knew it not. We are a company
of strolling players travelling from Samara to Moscow to amuse His
Imperial Majesty the Czar.
GEN. But I heard loud voices before I entered. What was that?
VERA. We were rehearsing a new tragedy.
GEN. Your answers are too _honest_ to be true. Come, let me see who you
are. Take off those players' masks. By St. Nicholas, my beauty, if your
face matches your figure, you must be a choice morsel! Come, I say,
pretty one; I would sooner see your face than those of all the others.
PRES. O God! if he sees it is Vera, we are all lost!
GEN. No coquetting, my girl. Come, unmask, I say, or I shall tell my
guards to do it for you.
ALEX. Stand back, I say, General Kotemkin!
GEN. Who are you, fellow, that talk with such a tripping tongue to your
betters? (_ALEXIS takes his mask off_.) His Imperial Highness the
Czarevitch!
OMNES. The Czarevitch! [36]It is all over![36]
[37]PRES. He will give us up to the soldiers.[37]
MICH. (_to VERA_). Why did you not let me kill him? Come, we must fight
to the death for it.
VERA. Peace! he will not betray us.
ALEX. A whim of mine, General! You know how my father keeps me from the
world and imprisons me in the palace. I should really be bored to death
if I could not get out at night in disguise sometimes, and have some
romantic adventure in town. I fell in with these honest folks a few
hours ago.
GEN. But, your Highness--
ALEX. Oh, they are excellent actors, I assure you. If you had come in
ten minutes ago, you would have witnessed a most interesting scene.
GEN. Actors, are they, Prince?
ALEX. Ay, and very ambitious actors, too. They only care to play before
kings.
GEN. I' faith, your Highness, I was in hopes I had made a good haul of
Nihilists.[38]
ALEX. Nihilists in Moscow, General! with you as head of the police?
Impossible!
GEN. So I always tell your Imperial father. But I heard at the council
to-day that that woman Vera Sabouroff, the head of them, had been seen
in this very city. The Emperor's face turned as white as the snow
outside. I think I never saw such terror in any man before.
ALEX. She is a dangerous woman, then, this Vera Sabouroff?
GEN. The most dangerous in all Europe.
ALEX. Did you ever see her, General?
GEN. Why, five years ago, when I was a plain Colonel, I remember her,
your Highness, a common waiting girl in an inn. If I had known then what
she was going to turn out, I would have flogged her to death on the
roadside. She is not a woman at all; she is a sort of devil! For the
last eighteen months I have been hunting her, and caught sight of her
once last September outside Odessa.
ALEX. How did you let her go, General?
GEN. I was by myself, and she shot one of my horses just as I was
gaining on her. If I see her again I shan't miss my chance. The Emperor
has put twenty thousand roubles on her head.
ALEX. I hope you will get it, General; but meanwhile you are frightening
these honest people out of their wits, and disturbing the tragedy. Good
night, General.
GEN. Yes; but I should like to see their faces, your Highness.
ALEX. No, General; you must not ask that; you know how these gipsies
hate to be stared at.
GEN. Yes. But, your Highness--
ALEX. (_haughtily_). General, they are my friends, that is enough. And,
General, not a word of this little adventure here, you understand. I
shall rely on you.
GEN. I shall not forget, Prince. But shall we not see you back to the
palace? The State ball is almost over and you are expected.
ALEX. I shall be there; but I shall return alone. Remember, not a word
about my strolling players.
GEN. Or your pretty gipsy, eh, Prince? your pretty gipsy! I' faith, I
should like to see her before I go; she has such fine eyes through her
mask. Well, good night, your Highness; good night.
ALEX. Good night, General.
(_Exit GENERAL and the soldiers._)
VERA (_throwing off her mask_). Saved! and by you!
ALEX. (_clasping her hand_). Brothers, you trust me now?
TABLEAU.
END OF ACT I.
ACT II.
SCENE.--_Council Chamber in the Emperor's Palace, hung with yellow
tapestry. Table, with chair of State, set for the Czar; window behind,
opening on to a balcony. As the scene progresses the light outside gets
darker._
_Present._--PRINCE PAUL MARALOFFSKI, PRINCE PETROVITCH, COUNT ROUVALOFF,
BARON RAFF, COUNT PETOUCHOF.
PRINCE PETRO. So our young scatter-brained Czarevitch has been forgiven
at last, and is to take his seat here again.
PRINCE PAUL. Yes; if that is not meant as an extra punishment. For my
own part, at least, I find these Cabinet Councils extremely exhausting.
PRINCE PETRO. Naturally; you are always speaking.
PRINCE PAUL. No; I think it must be that I have to listen sometimes.
COUNT R. Still, anything is better than being kept in a sort of prison,
like he was--never allowed to go out into the world.
PRINCE PAUL. My dear Count, for romantic young people like he is, the
world always looks best at a distance; and a prison where one's allowed
to order one's own dinner is not at all a bad place. (_Enter the
CZAREVITCH. The courtiers rise._) Ah! good afternoon, Prince. Your
Highness is looking a little pale to-day.
CZARE. (_slowly, after a pause_). I want change of air.
PRINCE PAUL (_smiling_). A most revolutionary sentiment! Your Imperial
father would highly disapprove of any reforms with the thermometer in
Russia.
CZARE. (_bitterly_). My Imperial father had kept me for six months in
this dungeon of a palace. This morning he has me suddenly woke up to see
some wretched Nihilists hung; it sickened me, the bloody butchery,
though it was a noble thing to see how well these men can die.
PRINCE PAUL. When you are as old as I am, Prince, you will understand
that there are few things easier than to live badly and to die well.
CZARE. Easy to die well! A lesson experience cannot have taught you,
whatever you may know of a bad life.
PRINCE PAUL (_shrugging his shoulders_). Experience, the name men give
to their mistakes. I never commit any.
CZARE. (_bitterly_). No; crimes are more in your line.
PRINCE PETRO. (_to the CZAREVITCH_). The Emperor was a good deal
agitated about your late appearance at the ball last night, Prince.
[1]COUNT R. (_laughing_). I believe he thought the Nihilists had broken
into the palace and carried you off.
BARON RAFF. If they had you would have missed a charming dance.[1]
PRINCE PAUL. And[2] an excellent supper. Gringoire really excelled
himself in his salad. Ah! you may laugh, Baron; but to make a good salad
is a much more difficult thing than cooking accounts. To make a good
salad is to be a brilliant diplomatist--the problem is so entirely the
same in both cases. To know exactly how much oil one must put with one's
vinegar.
BARON RAFF. A cook and a diplomatist! an excellent parallel. If I had a
son who was a fool I'd make him one or the other.
PRINCE PAUL. I see your father did not hold the same opinion, Baron.
But, believe me, you are wrong to run down cookery. For myself, the only
immortality I desire is to invent a new sauce. I have never had time
enough to think seriously about it, but I feel it is in me, I feel it is
in me.
CZARE. You have certainly missed your _metier_,[3] Prince Paul; the
_cordon bleu_ would have suited you much better than the Grand Cross of
Honour. But you know you could never have worn your white apron well;
you would have soiled it too soon, your hands are not clean enough.
PRINCE PAUL (_bowing_). Que voulez vous? I manage your father's
business.
CZARE. (_bitterly_). You mismanage my father's business, you mean! Evil
genius of his life that you are! before you came there was some love
left in him. It is you who have embittered his nature, poured into his
ear the poison of treacherous counsel, made him hated by the whole
people, made him what he is--a tyrant!
(_The courtiers look significantly at each other._)
PRINCE PAUL (_calmly_). I see your Highness does want change of air. But
I have been an eldest son myself. (_Lights a cigarette._) I know what it
is when a father won't die to please one.
(_The CZAREVITCH goes to the top of the stage, and leans against the
window, looking out._)
PRINCE PETRO. (_to BARON RAFF_). Foolish boy! [4]He will be sent into
exile, or worse, if he is not careful.[4]
BARON RAFF. Yes.[5] What a mistake it is to be sincere!
PRINCE PETRO. The only folly you have never committed, Baron.
BARON RAFF. One has only one head, you know, Prince.
PRINCE PAUL. My dear Baron, your head is the last thing any one would
wish to take from you. (_Pulls out snuffbox and offers it to PRINCE
PETROVITCH._)
PRINCE PETRO. Thanks, Prince! Thanks!
PRINCE PAUL. Very delicate, isn't it? I get it direct from Paris. But
under this vulgar Republic everything has degenerated over there.
"Cotelettes à l'impériale" vanished, of course, with the Bourbon, and
omelettes went out with the Orleanists. La belle France is entirely
ruined, Prince, through bad morals and worse cookery. (_Enter the
MARQUIS DE POIVRARD._) Ah! Marquis. I trust Madame la Marquise is well.
MARQUIS DE P. You ought to know better than I do, Prince Paul; you see
more _of_ her.
PRINCE PAUL (_bowing_). Perhaps I see more _in_ her, Marquis. Your wife
is really a charming woman, so full of _esprit_, and so satirical too;
she talks continually of you when we are together.
PRINCE PETRO. (_looking at the clock_). His Majesty is a little late
to-day, is he not?
PRINCE PAUL. What has happened to you, my dear Petrovitch? you seem
quite out of sorts. You haven't quarrelled with your cook, I hope? What
a tragedy that would be for you; you would lose all your friends.
PRINCE PETRO. I fear I wouldn't be so fortunate as that. You forget I
would still have my purse.[6] But you are wrong for once; my chef and I
are on excellent[7] terms.
PRINCE PAUL. Then your creditors or Mademoiselle Vera Sabouroff have
been writing to you? I find both of them such excellent correspondents.
But really you needn't be alarmed. I find the most violent proclamations
from the Executive Committee, as they call it, left all over my house. I
never read them; they are so badly spelt as a rule.
PRINCE PETRO. Wrong again, Prince; the Nihilists leave me alone for some
reason or other.
PRINCE PAUL (_aside_). Ah! true. I forgot. Indifference is the revenge
the world takes on mediocrities.
PRINCE PETRO. I am bored with life,[8] Prince. Since the opera season
ended I have been a perpetual martyr to ennui.
PRINCE PAUL. The maladie du siècle! You want a new excitement, Prince.
Let me see--you have been married twice already; suppose you
try--falling in love, for once.
BARON R. Prince, I have been thinking a good deal lately--
PRINCE PAUL (_interrupting_). You surprise me very much, Baron.
BARON R. I cannot understand your nature.
PRINCE PAUL (_smiling_). If my nature had been made to suit your
comprehension rather than my own requirements, I am afraid I would have
made a very poor figure in the world.
COUNT R. There seems to be nothing in life about which you would not
jest.
PRINCE PAUL. Ah! my dear Count, life is much too important a thing ever
to talk seriously about it.
CZARE. (_coming back from the window_). I don't think Prince Paul's
nature is such a mystery. He would stab his best friend for the sake of
writing an epigram on his tombstone, or experiencing a new sensation.
PRINCE PAUL. Parbleu! I would sooner lose my best friend than my worst
enemy. To have friends, you know, one need only be good-natured; but
when a man has no enemy left there must be something mean about him.
CZARE. (_bitterly_). If to have enemies is a measure of greatness, then
you must be a Colossus, indeed, Prince.
PRINCE PAUL. Yes, I know I'm the most hated man in Russia, except your
father, [9]except your father, of course,[9] Prince. He doesn't seem to
like it much, by the way, but I do, I assure you. (_Bitterly._) I love
to drive through the streets and see how the canaille scowl at me from
every corner. It makes me feel I am a power in Russia; one man against a
hundred millions! Besides, I have no ambition to be a popular hero, to
be crowned with laurels one year and pelted with stones the next; I
prefer dying peaceably in my own bed.
CZARE. And after death?
PRINCE PAUL (_shrugging his shoulders_). Heaven is a despotism. I shall
be at home there.
CZARE. Do you never think of the people and their rights?
PRINCE PAUL. The people and their rights bore me. I am sick of both. In
these modern days to be vulgar, illiterate, common and vicious, seems to
give a man a marvellous infinity of rights that his honest fathers never
dreamed of. Believe me, Prince, in good democracy every man should be an
aristocrat; but these people in Russia who seek to thrust us out are no
better than the animals in one's preserves, and made to be shot at, most
of them.
CZARE. (_excitedly_). If they are[10] common, illiterate, vulgar, no
better than the beasts of the field, who made them so?
(_Enter AIDE-DE-CAMP._)
AIDE-DE-CAMP. His Imperial Majesty, the Emperor! (_PRINCE PAUL looks at
the CZAREVITCH, and smiles._)
(_Enter the CZAR, surrounded by his guard._)
CZARE. (_rushing forward to meet him_). Sire!
CZAR (_nervous and frightened_). Don't come too near me, boy! Don't come
too near me, I say! There is always something about an heir to a crown
unwholesome to his father. Who is that man over there? I don't know him.
What is he doing? Is he a conspirator? Have you searched him? Give him
till to-morrow to confess, then hang him!--hang him!
PRINCE PAUL. Sire, you are anticipating history. This is Count
Petouchof, your new ambassador to Berlin. He is come to kiss hands on
his appointment.
CZAR. To kiss my hand? There is some plot in it. He wants to poison me.
There, kiss my son's hand; it will do quite as well.
(_PRINCE PAUL signs to COUNT PETOUCHOF to leave the room. Exit PETOUCHOF
and the guards. CZAR sinks down into his chair. The courtiers remain
silent._)
PRINCE PAUL (_approaching_). Sire! will your Majesty--
CZAR. What do you startle me like that for? No, I won't. (_Watches the
courtiers nervously._) Why are you clattering your sword, sir? (_To
COUNT ROUVALOFF._) Take it off, I shall have no man wear a sword in my
presence (_looking at CZAREVITCH_), least of all my son. (_To PRINCE
PAUL._) You are not angry with me, Prince? You won't desert me, will
you? Say you won't desert me. What do you want? You can have
anything--anything.
PRINCE PAUL (_bowing very low_). Sire, 'tis enough for me to have your
confidence. (_Aside._) I was afraid he was going to revenge himself and
give me another decoration.
CZAR (_returning to his chair_). Well, gentlemen.
MARQ. DE POIV. Sire, I have the honour to present to you a loyal address
from your subjects in the Province of Archangel, expressing their horror
at the last attempt on your Majesty's life.
PRINCE PAUL. The last attempt but two, you ought to have said, Marquis.
Don't you see it is dated three weeks back?
CZAR. They are good people in the Province of Archangel--honest, loyal
people. They love me very much--simple, loyal people; give them a new
saint, it costs nothing. Well, Alexis (_turning to the CZAREVITCH_)--how
many traitors were hung this morning?
CZARE. There were three men strangled, Sire.
CZAR. There should have been three[11] thousand. I would to God that
this people had but one neck that I might strangle them with one noose!
Did they tell anything? whom did they implicate? what did they confess?
CZARE. Nothing, Sire.
CZAR. They should have been tortured then; why weren't they tortured?
Must I always be fighting in the dark? Am I never to know from what root
these traitors spring?
CZARE. What root should there be of discontent among the people but
tyranny and injustice amongst their rulers?
CZAR. What did you say, boy? tyranny! tyranny! Am I a tyrant? I'm not. I
love the people. I'm their father. I'm called so in every official
proclamation. Have a care, boy; have a care. You don't seem to be cured
yet of your foolish tongue. (_Goes over to PRINCE PAUL, and puts his
hand on his shoulder._) Prince Paul, tell me were there many people
there this morning to see the Nihilists hung?
PRINCE PAUL. Hanging is of course a good deal less of a novelty in
Russia now, Sire, than it was three or four years ago; and you know how
easily the people get tired even of their best amusements. But the
square and the tops of the houses were really quite crowded, were they
not, Prince? (_To the CZAREVITCH who takes no notice._)
CZAR. That's right; all loyal citizens should be there. It shows them
what to look forward to. Did you arrest any one in the crowd?
PRINCE PAUL. Yes, Sire, a woman for cursing your name. (_The CZAREVITCH
starts anxiously._) She was the mother of the two criminals.
CZAR (_looking at CZAREVITCH_). She should have blessed me for having
rid her of her children. Send her to prison.
CZARE. The prisons of Russia are too full already, Sire. There is no
room in them for any more victims.
[12]CZAR. They don't die fast enough, then. You should put more of them
into one cell at once. You don't keep them long enough in the mines. If
you do they're sure to die; but you're all too merciful. I'm too
merciful myself. Send her to Siberia.[12] She is sure to die on the way.
(_Enter an AIDE-DE-CAMP._) Who's that? Who's that?
AIDE-DE-CAMP. A letter for his Imperial Majesty.
CZAR (_to PRINCE PAUL_). I won't open it. There may be something in it.
PRINCE PAUL. It would be a very disappointing letter, Sire, if there
wasn't. (_Takes letter himself, and reads it._)
PRINCE PETRO. (_to COUNT ROUVALOFF_). It must be some sad news. I know
that smile too well.
PRINCE PAUL. From the Chief of the Police at Archangel, Sire. "The
Governor of the province was shot this morning by a woman as he was
entering the courtyard of his own house. The assassin has been seized."
CZAR. I never trusted the people of Archangel. It's a nest of Nihilists
and conspirators. Take away their saints; they don't deserve them.
PRINCE PAUL. Your Highness would punish them more severely by giving
them an extra one. Three governors shot in two months. (_Smiles to
himself._) Sire, permit me to recommend your loyal subject, the Marquis
de Poivrard, as the new governor of your Province of Archangel.
MARQ. DE POIV. (_hurriedly_). Sire, I am unfit for this post.
PRINCE PAUL. Marquis, you are too modest. Believe me, there is no man
in Russia I would sooner see Governor of Archangel than yourself.
(_Whispers to CZAR._)
CZAR. Quite right, Prince Paul; you are always right. See that the
Marquis's letters are made out at once.
PRINCE PAUL. He can start to-night, Sire. I shall really miss you very
much, Marquis. I always liked your taste in wines and wives extremely.
MARQ. DE POIV. (_to the CZAR_). Start to-night, Sire? (_PRINCE PAUL
whispers to the CZAR._)
CZAR. Yes, Marquis, to-night; it is better to go at once.
PRINCE PAUL. I shall see that Madame la Marquise is not too lonely while
you are away; so you need not be alarmed for her.
COUNT R. (_to PRINCE PETROVITCH_). I should be more alarmed for myself.
CZAR. The Governor of Archangel shot in his own courtyard by a woman!
I'm not safe here. I'm not safe anywhere, with that she devil of the
revolution, Vera Sabouroff, here in Moscow. Prince Paul, is that woman
still here?
PRINCE PAUL. They tell me she was at the Grand Duke's ball last night. I
can hardly believe that; but she certainly had intended to leave for
Novgorod to-day, Sire. The police were watching every train for her;
but, for some reason or other, she did not go. Some traitor must have
warned her. But I shall catch her yet. A chase after a beautiful woman
is always exciting.
CZAR. You must hunt her down with bloodhounds, and when she is taken I
shall hew her limb from limb. I shall stretch her on the rack till her
pale white body is twisted and curled like paper in the fire.
PRINCE PAUL. Oh, we shall have another hunt immediately for her, Sire!
Prince Alexis will assist us, I am sure.
CZARE. You never require any assistance to ruin a woman, Prince Paul.
CZAR. Vera, the Nihilist, in Moscow! O God,[13] were it not better to
die at once the dog's death they plot for me than to live as I live now!
Never to sleep, or, if I do, to dream such horrid dreams that Hell
itself were peace when matched with them. To trust none but those I have
bought, to buy none worth trusting! To see a traitor in every smile,
poison in every dish, a dagger in every hand! To lie awake at night,
listening from hour to hour for the stealthy creeping of the murderer,
for the laying of the damned mine! You are all spies! you are all spies!
You worst of all--you, my own son! Which of you is it who hides these
bloody proclamations under my own pillow, or at the table where I sit?
Which of ye all is the Judas who betrays me? O God! O God! methinks
there was a time once, in our war with England, when nothing could make
me afraid. (_This with more calm and pathos._) I have
|
as to the mode of
doing it.'
'Well--there is plenty of sympathy elsewhere! What does it matter what
dried-up officials like General Fenton choose to think about it?'
'Nothing--so long as there are no doubts inside to open the gates to the
General Fentons outside!'
He looked at her oddly--half smiling, half frowning.
'The doubts are traitors. Send them to execution!' He shook his head.
'Do you remember that sentence we came across yesterday in Chateaubriand's
letters "As to my career--I have gone from shipwreck to shipwreck." What if
I am merely bound on the same charming voyage?'
'I accept the comparison,' she said with vivacity. 'End as he did in
re-creating a church, and regenerating a literature--and see who will count
the shipwrecks!'
Her hand's disdainful gesture completed the sally.
Manisty's face dismissed its shadow.
As she stood beside him, in the rosy light--so proudly confident--Eleanor
Burgoyne was very delightful to see and hear. Manisty, one of the subtlest
and most fastidious of observers, was abundantly conscious of it. Yet she
was not beautiful, except in the judgment of a few exceptional people, to
whom a certain kind of grace--very rare, and very complex in origin--is of
more importance than other things. The eyes were, indeed, beautiful; so was
the forehead, and the hair of a soft ashy brown folded and piled round it
in a most skilful simplicity. But the rest of the face was too long; and
its pallor, the singularly dark circles round the eyes, the great thinness
of the temples and cheeks, together with the emaciation of the whole
delicate frame, made a rather painful impression on a stranger. It was
a face of experience, a face of grief; timid, yet with many strange
capacities and suggestions both of vehemence and pride. It could still
tremble into youth and delight. But in general it held the world aloof.
Mrs. Burgoyne was not very far from thirty, and either physical weakness,
or the presence of some enemy within more destructive still, had emphasised
the loss of youth. At the same time she had still a voice, a hand, a
carriage that lovelier women had often envied, discerning in them those
subtleties of race and personality which are not to be rivalled for the
asking.
To-night she brought all her charm to bear upon her companion's
despondency, and succeeded as she had often succeeded before. She divined
that he needed flattery, and she gave it; that he must be supported and
endorsed, and she had soon pushed General Fenton out of sight behind a
cloud of witness of another sort.
Manisty's mood yielded; and in a short time he was again no less ready to
admire the sunset than she was.
'Heavens!' she said at last, holding out her watch.--'Just look at the
time--and Miss Foster!'
Manisty struck his hand against the railing.
'How is one to be civil about this visit! Nothing could be more
unfortunate. These last critical weeks--and each of us so dependent on
the other--Really it is the most monstrous folly on all our parts that we
should have brought this girl upon us.'
'Poor Miss Foster!' said Mrs. Burgoyne, raising her eyebrows. 'But of
course you won't be civil!--Aunt Pattie and I know that. When I think of
what I went through that first fortnight--'
'Eleanor!'
'You are the only man I ever knew that could sit silent through a whole
meal. By to-morrow Miss Foster will have added that experience to her
collection. Well--I shall be prepared with my consolations--there's the
carriage--and the bell!'
They fled indoors, escaping through the side entrances of the salon, before
the visitor could be shown in.
* * * * *
'Must I change my dress?'
The voice that asked the question trembled with agitation and fatigue. But
the girl who owned the voice stood up stiffly, looking at Miss Manisty with
a frowning, almost a threatening shyness.
'Well, my dear,' said Miss Manisty, hesitating. 'Are you not rather dusty?
We can easily keep dinner a quarter of an hour.'
She looked at the grey alpaca dress before her, in some perplexity.
'Oh, very well'--said the girl hurriedly.--'Of course I'll change.
Only'--and the voice fluttered again evidently against her will--'I'm
afraid I haven't anything very nice. I must get something in Rome. Mrs.
Lewinson advised me. This is my afternoon dress,--I've been wearing it in
Florence. But of course--I'll put on my other.--Oh! please don't send for a
maid. I'd rather unpack for myself--so much rather!'
The speaker flushed crimson, as she saw Miss Manisty's maid enter the
room in answer to her mistress's ring. She stood up indeed with her hand
grasping her trunk, as though defending it from an assailant.
The maid looked at her mistress. 'Miss Foster will ring, Benson, if she
wants you'--said Miss Manisty; and the black-robed elderly maid, breathing
decorous fashion and the ways of 'the best people,' turned, gave a swift
look at Miss Foster, and left the room.
'Are you sure, my dear? You know she would make you tidy in no time. She
arranges hair beautifully.'
'Oh quite--quite sure!--thank you,' said the girl with the same eagerness.
'I will be ready,--right away.'
Then, left to herself, Miss Foster hastily opened her box and took out some
of its contents. She unfolded one dress after another,--and looked at them
unhappily.
'Perhaps I ought to have let cousin Izza give me those things in Boston,'
she thought. 'Perhaps I was too proud. And that money of Uncle Ben's--it
might have been kinder--after all he wanted me to look nice'--
She sat ruefully on the ground beside her trunk, turning the things over,
in a misery of annoyance and mortification; half inclined to laugh too
as she remembered the seamstress in the small New England country town,
who had helped her own hands to manufacture them. 'Well, Miss Lucy, your
uncle's done real handsome by you. I guess he's set you up, and no mistake.
There's no meanness about him!'
And she saw the dress on the stand--the little blonde withered head of the
dressmaker--the spectacled eyes dwelling proudly on the masterpiece before
them.--
Alack! There rose up the memory of little Mrs. Lewinson at Florence--of her
gently pursed lips--of the looks that were meant to be kind, and were in
reality so critical.
No matter. The choice had to be made; and she chose at last a blue and
white check that seemed to have borne its travels better than the rest. It
had looked so fresh and striking in the window of the shop whence she had
bought it. 'And you know, Miss Lucy, you're so tall, you can stand them
chancy things'--her little friend had said to her, when _she_ had wondered
whether the check might not be too large.
And yet only with a passing wonder. She could not honestly say that her
dress had cost her much thought then or at any other time. She had been
content to be very simple, to admire other girls' cleverness. There had
been influences upon her own childhood, however, that had somehow separated
her from the girls around her, had made it difficult for her to think and
plan as they did.
She rose with the dress in her hands, and as she did so, she caught the
glory of the sunset through the open window.
She ran to look, all her senses flooded with the sudden beauty,--when she
heard a man's voice as it seemed close beside her. Looking to the left, she
distinguished a balcony, and a dark figure that had just emerged upon it.
Mr. Manisty--no doubt! She closed her window hurriedly, and began her
dressing, trying at the time to collect her thoughts on the subject of
these people whom she had come to visit.
Yet neither the talk of her Boston cousins, nor the gossip of the Lewinsons
at Florence had left any very clear impression. She remembered well her
first and only sight of Miss Manisty at Boston. The little spinster, so
much a lady, so kind, cheerful and agreeable, had left a very favourable
impression in America. Mr. Manisty had left an impression too--that was
certain--for people talked of him perpetually. Not many persons, however,
had liked him, it seemed. She could remember, as it were, a whole track
of resentments, hostilities, left behind. 'He cares nothing about us'--an
irate Boston lady had said in her hearing--but he will exploit us! He
despises us,--but he'll make plenty of speeches and articles out of
us--you'll see!'
As for Major Lewinson, the husband of Mr. Manisty's first cousin,--she had
been conscious all the time of only half believing what he said, of holding
out against it. He must be so different from Mr. Manisty--the little smart,
quick-tempered soldier--with his contempt for the undisciplined civilian
way of doing things. She did not mean to remember his remarks. For after
all, she had her own ideas of what Mr. Manisty would be like. She had
secretly formed her own opinion. He had been a man of letters and a
traveller before he entered politics. She remembered--nay, she would never
forget--a volume of letters from Palestine, written by him, which had
reached her through the free library of the little town near her home.
She who read slowly, but, when she admired, with a silent and worshipping
ardour, had read this book, had hidden it under her pillow, had been
haunted for days by its pliant sonorous sentences, by the colour, the
perfume, the melancholy of pages that seemed to her dreaming youth
marvellous, inimitable. There were descriptions of a dawn at Bethlehem--a
night wandering at Jerusalem--a reverie by the sea of Galilee--the very
thought of which made her shiver a little, so deeply had they touched her
young and pure imagination.
And then--people talked so angrily of his quarrel with the Government--and
his resigning. They said he had been foolish, arrogant, unwise. Perhaps.
But after all it had been to his own hurt--it must have been for principle.
So far the girl's secret instinct was all on his side.
Meanwhile, as she dressed, there floated through her mind fragments of what
she had been told as to his strange personal beauty; but these she only
entertained shyly and in passing. She had been brought up to think little
of such matters, or rather to avoid thinking of them.
She went through her toilette as neatly and rapidly as she could, her mind
all the time so full of speculation and a deep restrained excitement that
she ceased to trouble herself in the least about her gown. As for her hair,
she arranged it almost mechanically, caring only that its black masses
should be smooth and in order. She fastened at her throat a small turquoise
brooch that had been her mother's; she clasped the two little chain
bracelets that were the only ornaments of the kind she possessed, and then
without a single backward look towards the reflection in the glass, she
left her room--her heart beating fast with timidity and expectation.
* * * * *
'Oh! poor child--poor child!--what a frock!'
Such was the inward ejaculation of Mrs. Burgoyne, as the door of the salon
was thrown open by the Italian butler, and a very tall girl came abruptly
through, edging to one side as though she were trying to escape the
servant, and looking anxiously round the vast room.
Manisty also turned as the door opened. Miss Manisty caught his momentary
expression of wonder, as she herself hurried forward to meet the new-comer.
'You have been very quick, my dear, and I am sure you must be hungry.--This
is an old friend of ours--Mrs. Burgoyne--my nephew--Edward Manisty. He
knows all your Boston cousins, if not you. Edward, will you take Miss
Foster?--she's the stranger.'
Mrs. Burgoyne pressed the girl's hand with a friendly effusion. Beyond her
was a dark-haired man, who bowed in silence. Lucy Foster took his arm, and
he led her through a large intervening room, in which were many tables and
many books, to the dining-room.
On the way he muttered a few embarrassed words as to the weather and
the lateness of dinner, walking meanwhile so fast that she had to hurry
after him. 'Good heavens, why she is a perfect chess-board!' he thought
to himself, looking askance at her dress, in a sudden and passionate
dislike--'one could play draughts upon her. What has my Aunt been about?'
The girl looked round her in bewilderment as they sat down. What a strange
place! The salon in her momentary glance round it had seemed to her all
splendour. She had been dimly aware of pictures, fine hangings, luxurious
carpets. Here on the other hand all was rude and bare. The stained walls
were covered with a series of tattered daubs, that seemed to be meant
for family portraits--of the Malestrini family perhaps, to whom the
villa belonged? And between the portraits there were rough modern doors
everywhere of the commonest wood and manufacture which let in all the
draughts, and made the room not a room, but a passage. The uneven brick
floor was covered in the centre with some thin and torn matting; many of
the chairs ranged against the wall were broken; and the old lamp that swung
above the table gave hardly any light.
Miss Manisty watched her guest's face with a look of amusement.
'Well, what do you think of our dining-room, my dear? I wanted to clean it
and put it in order. But my nephew there wouldn't have a thing touched.'
She looked at Manisty, with a movement of the lips and head that seemed to
implore him to make some efforts.
Manisty frowned a little, lifted his great brow and looked, not at Miss
Foster, but at Mrs. Burgoyne--
'The room, as it happens, gives me more pleasure than any other in the
villa.'
Mrs. Burgoyne laughed.
'Because it's hideous?'
'If you like. I should only call it the natural, untouched thing.'
Then while his Aunt and Mrs. Burgoyne made mock of him, he fell silent
again, nervously crumbling his bread with a large wasteful hand. Lucy
Foster stole a look at him, at the strong curls of black hair piled above
the brow, the moody embarrassment of the eyes, the energy of the lips and
chin.
Then she turned to her companions. Suddenly the girl's clear brown skin
flushed rosily, and she abruptly took her eyes from Mrs. Burgoyne.
Miss Manisty, however--in despair of her nephew--was bent upon doing her
own duty. She asked all the proper questions about the girl's journey,
about the cousins at Florence, about her last letters from home. Miss
Foster answered quickly, a little breathlessly, as though each question
were an ordeal that had to be got through. And once or twice, in the course
of the conversation, she looked again at Mrs. Burgoyne, more lingeringly
each time. That lady wore a thin dress gleaming with jet. The long white
arms showed under the transparent stuff. The slender neck and delicate
bosom were bare,--too bare surely,--that was the trouble. To look at her
filled the girl's shrinking Puritan sense with discomfort. But what small
and graceful hands!--and how she used them!--how she turned her neck!--how
delicious her voice was! It made the new-comer think of some sweet plashing
stream in her own Vermont valleys. And then, every now and again, how
subtle and startling was the change of look!--the gaiety passing in a
moment, with the drooping of eye and mouth, into something sad and harsh,
like a cloud dropping round a goddess. In her elegance and self-possession
indeed, she seemed to the girl a kind of goddess--heathenishly divine,
because of that mixture of unseemliness, but still divine.
Several times Mrs. Burgoyne addressed her--with a gentle courtesy--and Miss
Foster answered. She was shy, but not at all awkward or conscious. Her
manner had the essential self-possession which is the birthright of the
American woman. But it suggested reserve, and a curious absence of any
young desire to make an effect.
As for Mrs. Burgoyne, long before dinner was over, she had divined a great
many things about the new-comer, and amongst them the girl's disapproval of
herself. 'After all'--she thought--'if she only knew it, she is a beauty.
What a trouble it must have been first to find, and then to make that
dress!--Ill luck!--And her hair! Who on earth taught her to drag it back
like that? If one could only loosen it, how beautiful it would be! What
is it? Is it Puritanism? Has she been brought up to go to meetings and sit
under a minister? Were her forbears married in drawing-rooms and under
trees? The Fates were certainly frolicking when they brought her here! How
am I to keep Edward in order?'
And suddenly, with a little signalling of eye and brow, she too conveyed to
Manisty, who was looking listlessly towards her, that he was behaving as
badly as even she could have expected. He made a little face that only she
saw, but he turned to Miss Foster and began to talk,--all the time adding
to the mountain of crumbs beside him, and scarcely waiting to listen to the
girl's answers.
'You came by Pisa?'
'Yes. Mrs. Lewinson found me an escort--'
'It was a mistake--' he said, hurrying his words like a schoolboy. 'You
should have come by Perugia and Spoleto. Do you know Spello?'
Miss Foster stared.
'Edward!' said Miss Manisty, 'how could she have heard of Spello? It is the
first time she has ever been in Italy.'
'No matter!' he said, and in a moment his moroseness was lit up, chased
away by the little pleasure of his own whim--'Some day Miss Foster must
hear of Spello. May I not be the first person to tell her that she should
see Spello?'
'Really, Edward!' cried Miss Manisty, looking at him in a mild
exasperation.
'But there was so much to see at Florence!' said Lucy Foster, wondering.
'No--pardon me!--there is nothing to be seen at Florence--or nothing that
one ought to wish to see--till the destroyers of the town have been hung in
their own new Piazza!'
'Oh yes!--that is a real disfigurement!' said the girl eagerly. 'And
yet--can't one understand?--they must use their towns for themselves. They
can't always be thinking of them as museums--as we do.'
'The argument would be good if the towns were theirs,' he said, flashing
round upon her. 'One can stand a great deal from lawful owners.'
Miss Foster looked in bewilderment at Mrs. Burgoyne. That lady laughed and
bent across the table.
'Let me warn you, Miss Foster, this gentleman here must be taken with a
grain of salt when he talks about poor Italy--and the Italians.'
'But I thought'--said Lucy Foster, staring at her host--
'You thought he was writing a book on Italy? That doesn't matter. It's the
new Italy of course that he hates--the poor King and Queen--the Government
and the officials.'
'He wants the old times back?'--said Miss Foster, wondering--'when the
priests tyrannised over everybody? when the Italians had no country--and no
unity?'
She spoke slowly, at last looking her host in the face. Her frown of
nervousness had disappeared. Manisty laughed.
'Pio Nono pulled down nothing--not a brick--or scarcely. And it is a most
excellent thing, Miss Foster, to be tyrannised over by priests.'
His great eyes shone--one might even say, glared upon her. His manner was
not agreeable; and Miss Foster coloured.
'I don't think so'--she said, and then was too shy to say any more.
'Oh, but you will think so,'--he said, obstinately--'only you must stay
long enough in the country. What people are pleased to call Papal tyranny
puts a few people in prison--and tells them what books to read. Well!--what
matter? Who knows what books they ought to read?'
'But all their long struggle!--and their heroes! They had to make
themselves a nation--'
The words stumbled on the girl's tongue, but her effort, the hot feeling in
her young face became her.--Miss Manisty thought to herself, 'Oh, we shall
dress, and improve her--We shall see!'--
'One has first to settle whether it was worth while. What does a new nation
matter? Theirs, anyway, was made too quick,' said Manisty, rising in answer
to his aunt's signal.
'But liberty matters!' said the girl. She stood an instant with her hand on
the back of her chair, unconsciously defiant.
'Ah! Liberty!' said Manisty--'Liberty!' He lifted his shoulders
contemptuously.
Then backing to the wall, he made room for her to pass. The girl felt
almost as though she had been struck. She moved hurriedly, appealingly
towards Miss Manisty, who took her arm kindly as they left the room.
'Don't let my nephew frighten you, my dear'--she said--'He never thinks
like anybody else.'
'I read so much at Florence--and on the journey'--said Lucy, while her hand
trembled in Miss Manisty's--'Mrs. Browning--Mazzini--many things. I could
not put that time out of my head!'
CHAPTER II
On the way back to the salon the ladies passed once more through the large
book-room or library which lay between it and the dining-room. Lucy Foster
looked round it, a little piteously, as though she were seeking for
something to undo the impression--the disappointment--she had just
received.
'Oh! my dear, you never saw such a place as it was when we arrived in
March'--said Miss Manisty. 'It was the billiard-room--a ridiculous
table--and ridiculous balls--and a tiled floor without a scrap of
carpet--and the _cold_! In the whole apartment there were just two bedrooms
with fireplaces. Eleanor went to bed in one; I went to bed in the other.
No carpets--no stoves--no proper beds even. Edward of course said it was
all charming, and the climate balmy. Ah, well!--now we are really quite
comfortable--except in that odious dining-room, which Edward will have left
in its sins.'
Miss Manisty surveyed her work with a mild satisfaction. The table indeed
had been carried away. The floor was covered with soft carpets. The rough
uneven walls painted everywhere with the interlaced M's of the Malestrini
were almost hidden by well-filled bookcases; and, in addition, a profusion
of new books, mostly French and Italian, was heaped on all the tables. On
the mantelpiece a large recent photograph stood propped against a marble
head. It represented a soldier in a striking dress; and Lucy stopped to
look at it.
'One of the Swiss Guards--at the Vatican'--said Mrs. Burgoyne kindly. 'You
know the famous uniform--it was designed by Michael Angelo.'
'No--I didn't know'--said the girl, flushing again.--'And this head?'
'Ah, that is a treasure! Mr. Manisty bought it a few months ago from a
Roman noble who has come to grief. He sold this and a few bits of furniture
first of all. Then he tried to sell his pictures. But the Government came
down upon him--you know your pictures are not your own in Italy. So the
poor man must keep his pictures and go bankrupt. But isn't she beautiful?
She is far finer than most of the things in the Vatican--real primitive
Greek--not a copy. Do you know'--Mrs. Burgoyne stepped back, looked first
at the bust, then at Miss Poster--'do you know you are really very like
her--curiously like her!'
'Oh!'--cried Miss Foster in confusion--'I wish--'
'But it is quite true. Except for the hair. And that's only arrangement. Do
you think--would you let me?--would you forgive me?--It's just this band of
hair here, yours waves precisely in the same way. Would you really allow
me--I won't make you untidy?'
And before Miss Poster could resist, Mrs. Burgoyne had put up her deft
hands, and in a moment, with a pull here, and the alteration of a hairpin
there, she had loosened the girl's black and silky hair, till it showed the
beautiful waves above the ear in which it did indeed resemble the marble
head with a curious closeness.
'I can put it back in a moment. But oh--that is so charming! Aunt Pattie!'
Miss Manisty looked up from a newspaper which had just arrived.
'My dear!--that was bold of you I But indeed it _is_ charming! I think I
would forgive you if I were Miss Foster.
The girl felt herself gently turned towards the mirror that rose behind the
Greek head. With pink cheeks she too looked at herself for a moment. Then
in a shyness beyond speech, she lifted her hands.
'Must you'--said Mrs. Burgoyne appealingly. 'I know one doesn't like to
be untidy. But it isn't really the least untidy--It is only
delightful--perfectly delightful!'
Her voice, her manner charmed the girl's annoyance.
'If you like it'--she said, hesitating--'But it will come down!'
'I like it terribly--and it will not think of coming down! Let me show you
Mr. Manisty's latest purchase.'
And, slipping her arm inside Miss Foster's, Mrs. Burgoyne dexterously
turned her away from the glass, and brought her to the large central table,
where a vivid charcoal sketch, supported on a small easel, rose among the
litter of books.
It represented an old old man carried in a chair on the shoulders of a
crowd of attendants and guards. Soldiers in curved helmets, courtiers
in short velvet cloaks and ruffs, priests in floating vestments pressed
about him--a dim vast multitude stretched into the distance. The old man
wore a high cap with three lines about it; his thin and shrunken form was
enveloped in a gorgeous robe. The face, infinitely old, was concentrated
in the sharply smiling eyes, the long, straight, secret mouth. His arm,
supporting with difficulty the weight of the robe, was raised,--the hand
blessed. On either side of him rose great fans of white ostrich feathers,
and the old man among them was whiter than they, spectrally white from head
to foot, save for the triple cap, and the devices on his robe. But into
his emaciation, his weakness, the artist had thrown a triumph, a force
that thrilled the spectator. The small figure, hovering above the crowd,
seemed in truth to have nothing to do with it, to be alone with the huge
spaces--arch on arch--dome on dome--of the vast church through which it was
being borne.--
'Do you know who it is?' asked Mrs. Burgoyne, smiling.
'The--the Pope?' said Miss Foster, wondering.
'Isn't it clever? It is by one of your compatriots, an American artist
in Rome. Isn't it wonderful too, the way in which it shows you, not the
Pope--but the Papacy--not the man but the Church?'
Miss Foster said nothing. Her puzzled eyes travelled from the drawing to
Mrs. Burgoyne's face. Then she caught sight of another photograph on the
table.
'And that also?'--she said--For again it was the face of Leo
XIII.--feminine, priestly, indomitable--that looked out upon her from among
the books.
'Oh, my dear, come away,' said Miss Manisty impatiently. 'In my days the
Scarlet Lady _was_ the Scarlet Lady, and we didn't flirt with her as all
the world does now. Shrewd old gentleman! I should have thought one picture
of him was enough.'
* * * * *
As they entered the old painted salon, Mrs. Burgoyne went to one of the
tall windows opening to the floor and set it wide. Instantly the Campagna
was in the room--the great moonlit plain, a thousand feet below, with the
sea at its further edge, and the boundless sweep of starry sky above it.
From the little balcony, one might, it seemed, have walked straight into
Orion. The note of a nightingale bubbled up from the olives; and the scent
of a bean-field in flower flooded the salon.
Miss Foster sprang to her feet and followed Mrs. Burgoyne. She hung over
the balcony while her companion pointed here and there, to the line of the
Appian Way,--to those faint streaks in the darkness that marked the distant
city--to the dim blue of the Etrurian mountains.--
Presently, however, she drew herself erect, and Mrs. Burgoyne fancied that
she shivered.
'Ah! this is a hill-air,' she said, and she took from her arm a light
evening cloak, and threw it round Miss Foster.
'Oh, I am not cold!--It wasn't that!'
'What was it?' said Mrs. Burgoyne pleasantly. 'That you feel Italy too much
for you? Ah! you must get used to that.'
Lucy Foster drew a long breath--a breath of emotion. She was grateful for
being understood. But she could not express herself.
Mrs. Burgoyne looked at her curiously.
'Did you read a good deal about it before you came?'
'Well, I read some--we have a good town library--and Uncle Ben gave me
two or three books--but of course it wasn't like Boston. Ours is a little
place.'
'And you were pleased to come?'
The girl hesitated.
'Yes'--she said simply. 'I wanted to come.--But I didn't want to leave my
uncle. He is getting quite an old man.'
'And you have lived with him a long time?'
'Since I was a little thing. Mother and I came to live with him after
Father died. Then Mother died, five years ago.'
'And you have been alone--and very good friends?'
Mrs. Burgoyne smiled kindly. She had a manner of questioning that seemed to
Miss Foster the height of courtesy. But the girl did not find it easy to
answer.
'I have no one else--' she said at last, and then stopped abruptly.
'She is home-sick'--said Mrs. Burgoyne inwardly--'I wonder whether the
Lewinsons treated her nicely at Florence?'
Indeed as Lucy Foster leant over the balcony, the olive-gardens and
vineyards faded before her. She saw in their stead, the snow-covered farms
and fields of a New England valley--the elms in along village street,
bare and wintry--a rambling wooden house--a glowing fire, in a simple
parlour--an old man sitting beside it.--
It _is_ chilly'--said Mrs. Burgoyne--'Let us go in. But we will keep the
window open. Don't take that off.'
She laid a restraining hand on the girl's arm. Miss Foster sat down
absently not far from the window. The mingled lights of lamp and moon fell
upon her, upon the noble rounding of the face, which was grave, a little
austere even, but still sensitive and delicate. Her black hair, thanks to
Mrs. Burgoyne's devices, rippled against the brow and cheek, almost hiding
the small ear. The graceful cloak, with its touches of sable on a main
fabric of soft white, hid the ugly dress; its ample folds heightened the
natural dignity of the young form and long limbs, lent them a stately and
muse-like charm. Mrs. Burgoyne and Miss Manisty looked at each other, then
at Miss Foster. Both of them had the same curious feeling, as though a veil
were being drawn away from something they were just beginning to see.
'You must be very tired, my dear'--said Miss Manisty at last, when she
and Mrs. Burgoyne had chatted a good deal, and the new-comer still sat
silent--'I wonder what you are thinking about so intently?'
Miss Foster woke up at once.
'Oh, I'm not a bit tired--not a bit! I was thinking--I was thinking of that
photograph in the next room--and a line of poetry.'
She spoke with the _naïveté_ of one who had not known how to avoid the
confession. 'What line?' said Mrs. Burgoyne.
'It's Milton. I learnt it at school. You will know it, of course,' she
said timidly. 'It's the line about "the triple tyrant" and "the Babylonian
woe"'--
Mrs. Burgoyne laughed.
'Their martyred blood and ashes sow
O'er all the Italian fields, where still doth sway
The triple tyrant--
Was that what you were thinking of?'
Miss Foster had coloured deeply.
'It was the cap--the tiara, isn't it?--that reminded me,' she said faintly;
and then she looked away, as though not wishing to continue the subject.
'She wonders whether I am a Catholic,' thought Mrs. Burgoyne, amused, 'and
whether she has hurt my feelings.'--Aloud, she said--'Are you very, very
Puritan still in your part of America? Excuse me, but I am dreadfully
ignorant about America.'
'We are Methodists in our little town mostly'--said Miss Foster. 'There
is a Presbyterian church--and the best families go there. But my father's
people were always Methodists. My mother was a Universalist.'
Mrs. Burgoyne frowned with perplexity. 'I'm afraid I don't know what that
is?' she said.
'They think everybody will be saved,' said Miss Foster in her shy deep
voice. 'They don't despair of anybody.'
And suddenly Mrs. Burgoyne saw a very soft and tender expression pass
across the girl's grave features, like the rising of an inward light.
'A mystic--and a beauty both?' she thought to herself, a little scornfully
this time. In all her politeness to the new-comer so far, she had been like
a person stealthily searching for something foreseen and desired. If she
had found it, it would have been quite easy to go on being kind to Miss
Foster. But she had not found it.
At that moment the door between the library and the salon was thrown open,
and Manisty appeared, cigarette in hand.
'Aunt Pattie--Eleanor--how many tickets do you want for this function next
Sunday?'
'Four tribune tickets--we three'--Miss Manisty pointed to the other two
ladies--'and yourself. If we can't get so many, leave me at home.'
'Of course we shall have tribune tickets--as many as we want,' said Manisty
a little impatiently.--'Have you explained to Miss Foster?'
'No, but I will. Miss Foster, next Sunday fortnight the Pope celebrates
his 'Capella Papale'--the eighteenth anniversary of his coronation--in St.
Peter's. Rome is very full, and there will be a great demonstration--fifty
thousand people or more. Would you like to come?'
Miss Foster looked up, hesitating. Manisty, who had turned to go back
to his room, paused, struck by the momentary silence. He listened with
curiosity for the girl's reply.
'One just goes to see it like a spectacle?' she said at last, slowly. 'One
needn't do anything oneself
|
all the talk. But at
breakfast every one is only half awake, (especially when you rise so
airly as you do in this country,’ sais I, but the old critter couldn’t
see a joke, even if he felt it, and he didn’t know I was a funnin’.)
‘Folks are considerably sharp set at breakfast,’ sais I, ‘and not very
talkat_ive_. That’s the right time to have sarvants to tend on you.’
“‘What an idea!’ said he, and he puckered up his pictur, and the way he
stared was a caution to an owl.
“Well, we sot and sot till I was tired, so thinks I, ‘what’s next?’ for
it’s rainin’ agin as hard as ever.’ So I took a turn in the study
to sarch for a book, but there was nothin’ there, but a Guide to the
Sessions, Burn’s Justice, and a book of London club rules, and two or
three novels. He said he got books from the sarkilatin’ library.
“‘Lunch is ready.’
“‘What, eatin’ agin? My goody!’ thinks I, ‘if you are so fond of it, why
the plague don’t you begin airly? If you’d a had it at five o’clock this
morning, I’d a done justice to it; now I couldn’t touch it if I was to
die.’
“There it was, though. Help yourself, and no thanks, for there is no
sarvants agin. The rule here is, no talk no sarvants--and when it’s all
talk, it’s all sarvants.
“Thinks I to myself, ‘now, what shall I do till dinner-time, for it
rains so there is no stirrin’ out?--Waiter, where is eldest son?--he and
I will have a game of billiards, I guess.’
“‘He is laying down, sir.’
“‘Shows his sense,’ sais I, ‘I see, he is not the fool I took him to be.
If I could sleep in the day, I’de turn in too. Where is second son?’
“‘Left this mornin’ in the close carriage, sir.’
“‘Oh cuss him, it was him then was it?’
“‘What, Sir?’
“‘That woke them confounded rooks up, out o’ their fust nap, and kick’t
up such a bobbery. Where is the Parson?’
“‘Which one, Sir?’
“‘The one that’s so fond of fishing.’
“‘Ain’t up yet, Sir.’
“‘Well, the old boy, that wore breeches.’
“Out on a sick visit to one of the cottages, Sir.’
“When he comes in, send him to me, I’m shockin’ sick.’
“With that I goes to look arter the two pretty galls in the drawin’
room; and there was the ladies a chatterin’ away like any thing. The
moment I came in it was as dumb as a quaker’s meetin’. They all hauled
up at once, like a stage-coach to an inn-door, from a hand-gallop to a
stock still stand. I seed men warn’t wanted there, it warn’t the custom
so airly, so I polled out o’ that creek, starn first. They don’t like
men in the mornin’, in England, do the ladies; they think ‘em in the
way.
“‘What on airth, shall I do?’ says I, ‘it’s nothin’ but rain, rain,
rain--here in this awful dismal country. Nobody smokes, nobody talks,
nobody plays cards, nobody fires at a mark, and nobody trades; only
let me get thro’ this juicy day, and I am done: let me get out of this
scrape, and if I am caught agin, I’ll give you leave to tell me of
it, in meetin’. It tante pretty, I do suppose to be a jawin’ with
the butler, but I’ll make an excuse for a talk, for talk comes kinder
nateral to me, like suction to a snipe.’
“‘Waiter?’
“‘Sir.’
“‘Galls don’t like to be tree’d here of a mornin’ do they?’
“‘Sir.’
“‘It’s usual for the ladies,’ sais I, ‘to be together in the airly part
of the forenoon here, ain’t it, afore the gentlemen jine them?’
“‘Yes, Sir.’
“‘It puts me in mind,’ sais I, ‘of the old seals down to Sable
Island--you know where Sable Isle is, don’t you?’
“‘Yes, Sir, it’s in the cathedral down here.’
“‘No, no, not that, it’s an island on the coast of Nova Scotia. You know
where that is sartainly.’
“‘I never heard of it, Sir.’
“‘Well, Lord love you! you know what an old seal is?’
“‘Oh, yes, sir, I’ll get you my master’s in a moment.’
And off he sot full chisel.
“Cus him! he is as stupid as a rook, that crittur, it’s no use to tell
him a story, and now I think of it, I will go and smoke them black imps
of darkness,--the rooks.’
“So I goes up stairs, as slowly as I cleverly could, jist liftin’ one
foot arter another as if it had a fifty-six tied to it, on pupus to
spend time; lit a cigar, opened the window nearest the rooks, and
smoked, but oh the rain killed all the smoke in a minite; it didn’t even
make one on ‘em sneeze. ‘Dull musick this, Sam,’ sais I, ‘ain’t it? Tell
you what: I’ll put on my ile-skin, take an umbreller and go and talk to
the stable helps, for I feel as lonely as a catamount, and as dull as a
bachelor beaver. So I trampousses off to the stable, and says I to the
head man, ‘A smart little hoss that,’ sais I, ‘you are a cleaning of: he
looks like a first chop article that.’
“‘Y mae’,’ sais he.
“‘Hullo,’ sais I, ‘what in natur’ is this? Is it him that can’t speak
English, or me that can’t onderstand? for one on us is a fool, that’s
sartain. I’ll try him agin.
“So I sais to him, ‘He looks,’ sais I, ‘as if he’d trot a considerable
good stick, that horse,’ sais I, ‘I guess he is a goer.’
“Y’ mae, ye un trotter da,’ sais he.
“‘Creation!’ sais I, ‘if this don’t beat gineral trainin’. I have heerd
in my time, broken French, broken Scotch, broken Irish, broken Yankee,
broken Nigger, and broken Indgin; but I have hearn two pure gene_wine_
languages to-day, and no mistake, rael rook, and rael Britton, and I
don’t exactly know which I like wus. It’s no use to stand talkin’ to
this critter. Good-bye,’ sais I.
“Now what do you think he said? Why, you would suppose he’d say good-bye
too, wouldn’t you? Well, he didn’t, nor nothin’ like it, but he jist
ups, and sais, ‘Forwelloaugh,’ he did, upon my soul. I never felt so
stumpt afore in all my life. Sais I, ‘Friend, here is half a dollar for
you; it arn’t often I’m brought to a dead stare, and when I am, I am
willin’ to pay for it.’
“There’s two languages, Squire, that’s univarsal: the language of love,
and the language of money; the galls onderstand the one, and the men
onderstand the other, all the wide world over, from Canton to Niagara. I
no sooner showed him the half dollar, than it walked into his pocket, a
plaguy sight quicker than it will walk out, I guess.
“Sais I, ‘Friend, you’ve taken the consait out of me properly. Captain
Hall said there warn’t a man, woman, or child, in the whole of the
thirteen united univarsal worlds of our great Republic, that could speak
pure English, and I was a goin’ to kick him for it; but he is right,
arter all. There ain’t one livin’ soul on us can; I don’t believe they
ever as much as heerd it, for I never did, till this blessed day, and
there are few things I haven’t either see’d, or heern tell of. Yes,
we can’t speak English, do you take?’ ‘Dim comrag,’ sais he, which in
Yankee, means, “that’s no English,” and he stood, looked puzzled, and
scratched his head, rael hansum, ‘Dim comrag,’ sais he.
“Well, it made me larf spiteful. I felt kinder wicked, and as _I_ had
a hat on, and I couldn’t scratch my head, I stood jist like him, clown
fashion, with my eyes wanderin’ and my mouth wide open, and put my hand
behind me, and scratched there; and I stared, and looked puzzled too,
and made the same identical vacant face he did, and repeated arter him
slowly, with another scratch, mocking him like, ‘Dim comrag.’
“Such a pair o’ fools you never saw, Squire, since the last time you
shaved afore a lookin’ glass; and the stable boys larfed, and he larfed,
and I larfed, and it was the only larf I had all that juicy day.
“Well, I turns agin to the door; but it’s the old story over
again--rain, rain, rain; spatter, spatter, spatter,--‘I can’t stop
here with these true Brittons,’ sais I, ‘guess I’ll go and see the old
Squire: he is in his study.’
“So I goes there: ‘Squire,’ sais I, ‘let me offer you a rael gene_wine_
Havana cigar; I can recommend it to you.’ He thanks me, he don’t smoke,
but plague take him, he don’t say, ‘If you are fond of smokin’, pray
smoke yourself.’ And he is writing I won’t interrupt him.
“‘Waiter, order me a post-chaise, to be here in the mornin’, when the
rooks wake.’
“‘Yes, Sir.’
“Come, I’ll try the women folk in the drawin’-room, agin’. Ladies don’t
mind the rain here; they are used to it. It’s like the musk plant, arter
you put it to your nose once, you can’t smell it a second time. Oh what
beautiful galls they be! What a shame it is to bar a feller out such a
day as this. One on ‘em blushes like a red cabbage, when she speaks to
me, that’s the one, I reckon, I disturbed this mornin’. Cuss the rooks!
I’ll pyson them, and that won’t make no noise.
“She shows me the consarvitery. ‘Take care, Sir, your coat has caught
this geranium,’ and she onhitches it. ‘Stop, Sir, you’ll break this
jilly flower,’ and she lifts off the coat tail agin; in fact, it’s so
crowded, you can’t squeeze along, scarcely, without a doin’ of mischief
somewhere or another.
“Next time, she goes first, and then it’s my turn, ‘Stop, Miss,’ sais
I, ‘your frock has this rose tree over,’ and I loosens it; once
more, ‘Miss, this rose has got tangled,’ and I ontangles it from her
furbeloes.
“I wonder what makes my hand shake so, and my heart it bumps so, it has
bust a button off. If I stay in this consarvitery, I shan’t consarve
myself long, that’s a fact, for this gall has put her whole team on, and
is a runnin’ me off the road. ‘Hullo! what’s that? Bell for dressin’
for dinner.’ Thank Heavens! I shall escape from myself, and from this
beautiful critter, too, for I’m gettin’ spoony, and shall talk silly
presently.
“I don’t like to be left alone with a gall, it’s plaguy apt to set me a
soft sawderin’ and a courtin’. There’s a sort of nateral attraction like
in this world. Two ships in a calm, are sure to get up alongside of each
other, if there is no wind, and they have nothin’ to do, but look at
each other; natur’ does it. “Well, even, the tongs and the shovel, won’t
stand alone long; they’re sure to get on the same side of the fire,
and be sociable; one on ‘em has a loadstone and draws ‘tother, that’s
sartain. If that’s the case with hard-hearted things, like oak and
iron, what is it with tender hearted things like humans? Shut me up in
a ‘sarvatory with a hansum gall of a rainy day, and see if I don’t think
she is the sweetest flower in it. Yes, I am glad it is the dinner-bell,
for I ain’t ready to marry yet, and when I am, I guess I must get a gall
where I got my hoss, in Old Connecticut, and that state takes the shine
off of all creation for geese, galls and onions, that’s a fact.
“Well dinner won’t wait, so I ups agin once more near the rooks, to
brush up a bit; but there it is agin the same old tune, the whole
blessed day, rain, rain, rain. It’s rained all day and don’t talk of
stoppin’ nother. How I hate the sound, and how streaked I feel. I don’t
mind its huskin’ my voice, for there is no one to talk to, but cuss it,
it has softened my bones.
“Dinner is ready; the rain has damped every body’s spirits, and
squenched ‘em out; even champaign won’t raise ‘em agin; feedin’ is
heavy, talk is heavy, time is heavy, tea is heavy, and there ain’t
musick; the only thing that’s light is a bed room candle--heavens and
airth how glad I am this ‘_juicy day_’ is over!”
CHAPTER III. TYING A NIGHT-CAP.
In the preceding sketch I have given Mr. Slick’s account of the English
climate, and his opinion of the dulness of a country house, as nearly
as possible in his own words. It struck me at the time that they were
exaggerated views; but if the weather were unpropitious, and the company
not well selected, I can easily conceive, that the impression on his
mind would be as strong and as unfavourable, as he has described it to
have been.
The climate of England is healthy, and, as it admits of much out-door
exercise, and is not subject to any very sudden variation, or violent
extremes of heat and cold, it may be said to be good, though not
agreeable; but its great humidity is very sensibly felt by Americans and
other foreigners accustomed to a dry atmosphere and clear sky. That Mr.
Slick should find a rainy day in the country dull, is not to be wondered
at; it is probable it would be so any where, to a man who had so few
resources, within himself, as the Attache. Much of course depends on the
inmates; and the company at the Shropshire house, to which he alludes,
do not appear to have been the best calculated to make the state of the
weather a matter of indifference to him.
I cannot say, but that I have at times suffered a depression of spirits
from the frequent, and sometimes long continued rains of this country;
but I do not know that, as an ardent admirer of scenery, I would desire
less humidity, if it diminished, as I fear it would, the extraordinary
verdure and great beauty of the English landscape. With respect to my
own visits at country houses, I have generally been fortunate in the
weather, and always in the company; but I can easily conceive, that a
man situated as Mr. Slick appears to have been with respect to both,
would find the combination intolerably dull. But to return to my
narrative.
Early on the following day we accompanied our luggage to the wharf,
where a small steamer lay to convey us to the usual anchorage ground
of the packets, in the bay. We were attended by a large concourse of
people. The piety, learning, unaffected simplicity, and kind disposition
of my excellent friend, Mr. Hopewell, were well known and fully
appreciated by the people of New York, who were anxious to testify
their respect for his virtues, and their sympathy for his unmerited
persecution, by a personal escort and a cordial farewell.
“Are all those people going with us, Sam?” said he; “how pleasant it
will be to have so many old friends on board, won’t it?”
“No, Sir,” said the Attache, “they are only a goin’ to see you on
board--it is a mark of respect to you. They will go down to the “Tyler,”
to take their last farewell of you.”
“Well, that’s kind now, ain’t it?” he replied. “I suppose they thought
I would feel kinder dull and melancholy like, on leaving my native land
this way; and I must say I don’t feel jist altogether right neither.
Ever so many things rise right up in my mind, not one arter another, but
all together like, so that I can’t take ‘em one by one and reason ‘em
down, but they jist overpower me by numbers. You understand me, Sam,
don’t you?”
“Poor old critter!” said Mr. Slick to me in an under-tone, “it’s
no wonder he is sad, is it? I must try to cheer him up, if I can.
Understand you, minister!” said he, “to be sure I do. I have been that
way often and often. That was the case when I was to Lowel factories,
with the galls a taking of them off in the paintin’ line. The dear
little critters kept up such an everlastin’ almighty clatter, clatter,
clatter; jabber, jabber, jabber, all talkin’ and chatterin’ at once,
you couldn’t hear no blessed one of them; and they jist fairly stunned a
feller. For nothin’ in natur’, unless it be perpetual motion, can equal
a woman’s tongue. It’s most a pity we hadn’t some of the angeliferous
little dears with us too, for they do make the time pass quick, that’s
a fact. I want some on ‘em to tie a night-cap for me to-night; I don’t
commonly wear one, but I somehow kinder guess, I intend to have one this
time, and no mistake.”
“A night-cap, Sam!” said he; “why what on airth do you mean?”
“Why, I’ll tell you, minister,” said he, “you recollect sister Sall,
don’t you.”
“Indeed, I do,” said he, “and an excellent girl she is, a dutiful
daughter, and a kind and affectionate sister. Yes, she is a good girl is
Sally, a very good girl indeed; but what of her?”
“Well, she was a most a beautiful critter, to brew a glass of whiskey
toddy, as I ever see’d in all my travels was sister Sall, and I used to
call that tipple, when I took it late, a night-cap; apple jack and
white nose ain’t the smallest part of a circumstance to it. On such an
occasion as this, minister, when a body is leavin’ the greatest nation
atween the poles, to go among benighted, ignorant, insolent foreigners,
you wouldn’t object to a night-cap, now would you?”
“Well, I don’t know as I would, Sam,” said he; “parting from friends
whether temporally or for ever, is a sad thing, and the former is
typical of the latter. No, I do not know as I would. We may use these
things, but not abuse them. Be temperate, be moderate, but it is a sorry
heart that knows no pleasure. Take your night-cap, Sam, and then commend
yourself to His safe keeping, who rules the wind and the waves to Him
who--”
“Well then, minister, what a dreadful awful looking thing a night-cap is
without a tassel, ain’t it? Oh! you must put a tassel on it, and that
is another glass. Well then, what is the use of a night-cap, if it has
a tassel on it, but has no string, it will slip off your head the very
first turn you take; and that is another glass you know. But one string
won’t tie a cap; one hand can’t shake hands along with itself: you must
have two strings to it, and that brings one glass more. Well then, what
is the use of two strings if they ain’t fastened? If you want to keep
the cap on, it must be tied, that’s sartain, and that is another go; and
then, minister, what an everlastin’ miserable stingy, ongenteel critter
a feller must be, that won’t drink to the health of the Female Brewer.
Well, that’s another glass to sweethearts and wives, and then turn in
for sleep, and that’s what I intend to do to-night. I guess I’ll tie the
night-cap this hitch, if I never do agin, and that’s a fact.”
“Oh Sam, Sam,” said Mr. Hopewell, “for a man that is wide awake and
duly sober, I never saw one yet that talked such nonsense as you do. You
said, you understood me, but you don’t, one mite or morsel; but men
are made differently, some people’s narves operate on the brain
sens_itively_ and give them exquisite pain or excessive pleasure; other
folks seem as if they had no narves at all. You understand my words, but
you don’t enter into my feelings. Distressing images rise up in my mind
in such rapid succession, I can’t master them, but they master me. They
come slower to you, and the moment you see their shadows before you,
you turn round to the light, and throw these dark figures behind you.
I can’t do that; I could when I was younger, but I can’t now. Reason
is comparing two ideas, and drawing an inference. Insanity is, when you
have such a rapid succession of ideas, that you can’t compare them. How
great then must be the pain when you are almost pressed into insanity
and yet retain your reason? What is a broken heart? Is it death? I think
it must be very like it, if it is not a figure of speech, for I feel
that my heart is broken, and yet I am as sensitive to pain as ever.
Nature cannot stand this suffering long. You say these good people have
come to take their last farewell of me; most likely, Sam, it _is_ a last
farewell. I am an old man now, I am well stricken in years; shall I ever
live to see my native land again? I know not, the Lord’s will be done!
If I had a wish, I should desire to return to be laid with my kindred,
to repose in death with those that were the companions of my earthly
pilgrimage; but if it be ordered otherwise. I am ready to say with truth
and meekness, ‘Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace.’”
When this excellent old man said that, Mr. Slick did not enter into his
feelings--he did not do him justice. His attachment to and veneration
for his aged pastor and friend were quite filial, and such as to do
honour to his head and heart. Those persons who have made character a
study, will all agree, that the cold exterior of the New England
man arises from other causes than a coldness of feeling; much of the
rhodomontade of the attache, addressed to Mr. Hopewell, was uttered for
the kind purpose of withdrawing his attention from those griefs which
preyed so heavily upon his spirits.
“Minister,” said Mr. Slick, “come, cheer up, it makes me kinder dismal
to hear you talk so. When Captain McKenzie hanged up them three free and
enlightened citizens of ours on board of the--Somers--he gave ‘em three
cheers. We are worth half a dozen dead men yet, so cheer up. Talk to
these friends of ourn, they might think you considerable starch if
you don’t talk, and talk is cheap, it don’t cost nothin’ but breath, a
scrape of your hind leg, and a jupe of the head, that’s a fact.”
Having thus engaged him in conversation with his friends, we proceeded
on board the steamer, which, in a short time, was alongside of the great
“Liner.” The day was now spent, and Mr. Hopewell having taken leave of
his escort, retired to his cabin, very much overpowered by his feelings.
Mr. Slick insisted on his companions taking a parting glass with him,
and I was much amused with the advice given him by some of his young
friends and admirers. He was cautioned to sustain the high character
of the nation abroad; to take care that he returned as he went--a true
American; to insist upon the possession of the Oregon Territory; to
demand and enforce his right position in society; to negotiate the
national loan; and above all never to accede to the right of search
of slave-vessels; all which having been duly promised, they took an
affectionate leave of each other, and we remained on board, intending to
depart in the course of the following morning.
As soon as they had gone, Mr. Slick ordered materials for brewing,
namely: whisky, hot water, sugar and lemon; and having duly prepared in
regular succession the cap, the tassel, and the two strings, filled his
tumbler again, and said,
“Come now, Squire, before we turn in, let us _tie the night-cap_.”
CHAPTER IV. HOME AND THE SEA.
At eleven o’clock the next day the Tyler having shaken out her pinions,
and spread them to the breeze, commenced at a rapid rate her long and
solitary voyage across the Atlantic. Object after object rose in rapid
succession into distinct view, was approached and passed, until leaving
the calm and sheltered waters of the bay, we emerged into the ocean, and
involuntarily turned to look back upon the land we had left. Long after
the lesser hills and low country had disappeared, a few ambitious peaks
of the highlands still met the eye, appearing as if they had advanced
to the very edge of the water, to prolong the view of us till the last
moment.
This coast is a portion of my native continent, for though not a subject
of the Republic, I am still an American in its larger sense, having been
born in a British province in this hemisphere. I therefore sympathised
with the feelings of my two companions, whose straining eyes were still
fixed on those dim and distant specks in the horizon.
“There,” said Mr. Slick, rising from his seat, “I believe we have seen
the last of home till next time; and this I will say, it is the most
glorious country onder the sun; travel where you will, you won’t ditto
it no where. It is the toploftiest place in all creation, ain’t it,
minister?”
There was no response to all this bombast. It was evident he had not
been heard; and turning to Mr. Hopewell, I observed his eyes were
fixed intently on the distance, and his mind pre-occupied by painful
reflexions, for tears were coursing after each other down his furrowed
but placid cheek.
“Squire,” said Mr. Slick to me, “this won’t do. We must not allow him to
dwell too long on the thoughts of leaving home, or he’ll droop like any
thing, and p’raps, hang his head and fade right away. He is aged and
feeble, and every thing depends on keeping up his spirits. An old plant
must be shaded, well watered, and tended, or you can’t transplant it no
how, you can fix it, that’s a fact. He won’t give ear to me now, for
he knows I can’t talk serious, if I was to try; but he will listen to
_you_. Try to cheer him up, and I will go down below and give you a
chance.”
As soon as I addressed him, he started and said, “Oh! is it you, Squire?
come and sit down by me, my friend. I can talk to _you_, and I assure
you I take great pleasure in doing so I cannot always talk to Sam: he
is excited now; he is anticipating great pleasure from his visit to
England, and is quite boisterous in the exuberance of his spirits. I
own I am depressed at times; it is natural I should be, but I shall
endeavour not to be the cause of sadness in others. I not only like
cheerfulness myself, but I like to promote it; it is a sign of an
innocent mind, and a heart in peace with God and in charity with man.
All nature is cheerful, its voice is harmonious, and its countenance
smiling; the very garb in which it is clothed is gay; why then should
man be an exception to every thing around him? Sour sectarians, who
address our fears, rather than our affections, may say what they please,
Sir, but mirth is not inconsistent with religion, but rather an evidence
that our religion is right. If I appear dull, therefore, do not suppose
it is because I think it necessary to be so, but because certain
reflections are natural to me as a clergyman, as a man far advanced in
years, and as a pilgrim who leaves his home at a period of life, when
the probabilities are, he may not be spared to revisit it.
“I am like yourself, a colonist by birth. At the revolution I took no
part in the struggle; my profession and my habits both exempted me.
Whether the separation was justifiable or not, either on civil or
religious principles, it is not now necessary to discuss. It took place,
however, and the colonies became a nation, and after due consideration,
I concluded to dwell among mine own people. There I have continued, with
the exception of one or two short journeys for the benefit of my health,
to the present period. Parting with those whom I have known so long and
loved so well, is doubtless a trial to one whose heart is still warm,
while his nerves are weak, and whose affections are greater than his
firmness. But I weary you with this egotism?”
“Not at all,” I replied, “I am both instructed and delighted by your
conversation. Pray proceed, Sir.”
“Well it is kind, very kind of you,” said he, “to say so. I will explain
these sensations to you, and then endeavour never to allude to
them again. America is my birth-place and my home. Home has two
significations, a restricted one and an enlarged one; in its restricted
sense, it is the place of our abode, it includes our social circle, our
parents, children, and friends, and contains the living and the dead;
the past and the present generations of our race. By a very natural
process, the scene of our affections soon becomes identified with them,
and a portion of our regard is transferred from animate to inanimate
objects. The streams on which we sported, the mountains on which we
clambered, the fields in which we wandered, the school where we were
instructed, the church where we worshipped, the very bell whose pensive
melancholy music recalled our wandering steps in youth, awaken in
after-years many a tender thought, many a pleasing recollection, and
appeal to the heart with the force and eloquence of love. The country
again contains all these things, the sphere is widened, new objects are
included, and this extension of the circle is love of country. It is
thus that the nation is said in an enlarged sense, to be our home also.
“This love of country is both natural and laudable: so natural, that to
exclude a man from his country, is the greatest punishment that country
can inflict upon him; and so laudable, that when it becomes a principle
of action, it forms the hero and the patriot. How impressive, how
beautiful, how dignified was the answer of the Shunamite woman to
Elisha, who in his gratitude to her for her hospitality and kindness,
made her a tender of his interest at court. ‘Wouldst thou,’ said he, ‘be
spoken for to the king, or to the captain of the host?’--What an offer
was that, to gratify her ambition or flatter her pride!--‘I dwell,’ said
she, ‘among mine own people.’ What a characteristic answer! all history
furnishes no parallel to it.
“I too dwell ‘among my own people:’ my affections are there, and there
also is the sphere of my duties; and if I am depressed by the thoughts
of parting from ‘my people,’ I will do you the justice to believe, that
you would rather bear with its effects, than witness the absence of such
natural affection.
“But this is not the sole cause: independently of some afflictions of
a clerical nature in my late parish, to which it is not necessary to
allude, the contemplation of this vast and fathomless ocean, both
from its novelty and its grandeur, overwhelms me. At home I am fond
of tracing the Creator in his works. From the erratic comet in the
firmament, to the flower that blossoms in the field; in all animate, and
inanimate matter; in all that is animal, vegetable or mineral, I see His
infinite wisdom, almighty power, and everlasting glory.
“But that Home is inland; I have not beheld the sea now for many years.
I never saw it without emotion; I now view it with awe. What an emblem
of eternity!--Its dominion is alone reserved to Him, who made it.
Changing yet changeless--ever varying, yet always the same. How weak
and powerless is man! how short his span of life, when he is viewed
in connexion with the sea! He has left no trace upon it--it will not
receive the impress of his hands; it obeys no laws, but those imposed
upon it by Him, who called it into existence; generation after
generation has looked upon it as we now do--and where are they? Like
yonder waves that press upon each other in regular succession, they have
passed away for ever; and their nation, their language, their temples
and their tombs have perished with them. But there is the Undying one.
When man was formed, the voice of the ocean was heard, as it now is,
speaking of its mysteries, and proclaiming His glory, who alone lifteth
its waves or stilleth the rage thereof.
“And yet, my dear friend, for so you must allow me to call you, awful as
these considerations are, which it suggests, who are they that go down
to the sea in ships and occupy their business in great waters? The
sordid trader, and the armed and mercenary sailor: gold or blood is
their object, and the fear of God is not always in them. Yet the sea
shall give up its dead, as well as the grave; and all shall--
“But it is not my intention to preach to you. To intrude serious topics
upon our friends at all times, has a tendency to make both ourselves and
our topics distasteful. I mention these things to you, not that they are
not obvious to you and every other right-minded man, or that I think
I can clothe them in more attractive language, or utter them with more
effect than others; but merely to account for my absence of mind and
evident air of abstraction. I know my days are numbered, and in the
nature of things, that
|
truly typical, is Achilles. In Achilles,
Homer summed up and fixed forever the ideal of the Greek character. He
presented an imperishable picture of their national youthfulness, and
of their ardent genius, to the Greeks. The "beautiful human heroism"
of Achilles, his strong personality, his fierce passions controlled
and tempered by divine wisdom, his intense friendship and love that
passed the love of women, above all, the splendor of his youthful life
in death made perfect, hovered like a dream above the imagination of
the Greeks, and insensibly determined their subsequent development. At
a later age, this ideal was destined to be realized in Alexander. The
reality fell below the ideal: for _rien n'est si beau que la fable, si
triste que la vérité_. But the life of Alexander is the most convincing
proof of the importance of Achilles in the history of the Greek race.
If Achilles be the type of the Hellenic genius--radiant, adolescent,
passionate--as it still dazzles us in its artistic beauty and
unrivalled physical energy, Ulysses is no less a true portrait of the
Greek as known to us in history--stern in action, ruthless in his
hatred, pitiless in his hostility, subtle, vengeful, cunning; yet at
the same time the most adventurous of men, the most persuasive in
eloquence, the wisest in counsel, the bravest and coolest in danger.
The _Græculus esuriens_ of Juvenal may be said to be the caricature in
real life of the idealized Ulysses. And what remains to the present
day of the Hellenic genius in the so-called _Greek nation_ descends
from Ulysses rather than Achilles. If the Homeric Achilles has the
superiority of sculpturesque and dramatic splendor, the Homeric Ulysses
excels him on the ground of permanence of type.
Homer, then, was the poet of the heroic age, the poet of Achilles and
Ulysses. Of Homer we know nothing, we have heard too much. Need we ask
ourselves again the question whether he existed, or whether he sprang
into the full possession of consummate art without a predecessor? That
he had no predecessors, no scattered poems and ballads to build upon,
no well-digested body of myths to synthesize, is an absurd hypothesis
which the whole history of literature refutes. That, on the other hand,
there never was a Homer--that is to say, that some diaskeuast, acting
under the orders of Pisistratus, gave its immortal outline to the
colossus of the _Iliad_, and wove the magic web of the _Odyssey_--but
that no supreme and conscious artist working towards a well-planned
conclusion conceived and shaped these epics to the form they bear,
appears to the spirit of sound criticism equally untenable. The very
statement of this alternative involves a contradiction in terms; for
such a diaskeuast must himself have been a supreme and conscious
artist. Some Homer did exist. Some great single poet intervened between
the lost chaos of legendary material and the cosmos of artistic beauty
which we now possess. His work may have been tampered with in a
thousand ways, and religiously but inadequately restored. Of his age
and date and country we may know nothing. But this we do _know_, that
the fire of moulding, fusing, and controlling genius in some one brain
has made the _Iliad_ and _Odyssey_ what they are.[2]
The epic poet merges his personality in his poems, the words of which
he ascribes to the inspiration of the muse. The individual is nowhere,
is forgotten in the subject and suppressed, while the luminous forms of
gods and heroes move serenely across the stage, summoned and marshalled
by the maidens of Helicon. In no other period of Greek literature shall
we find the same unconsciousness of self, the same immersion in the
work of art. In this respect the poetry of the heroic age answers to
the condition of prehistoric Hellas, where as yet the elements of the
Greek race remain still implicit in the general mass and undeveloped.
We hear in Homer of no abrupt division between Dorians and Ionians.
Athens and Sparta have not grown up into prominence as the two
leaders of the nation. Argos is the centre of power; but Phthiotis,
the cradle of the Hellenes, is the home of Achilles. Ulysses is an
islander. In the same way in Homer the art of the Greeks is still a
mere potentiality. The artistic sentiment, indeed, exists in exquisite
perfection; but it is germinal, not organized and expanded as it will
be. We hear of embroidery for royal garments, of goldsmith's work for
shields and breastplates, of stained ivory trappings for chariots
and horses. But even here the poet's imagination had probably outrun
the fact. What he saw with his fancy, could the heroic artisans have
fashioned with their tools? Is not the shield of Achilles, like Dante's
pavement of the purgatorial staircase, a forecast of the future?
Architecture and sculpture, at any rate, can scarcely be said to exist.
Ulysses builds his own house. The statues of the gods are fetiches.
But, meanwhile, the foundation of the highest Greek art is being laid
in the cultivation of the human body. The sentiment of beauty shows
itself in dances and games, in the races of naked runners, in rhythmic
processions, and the celebration of religious rites. This was the
proper preparation for the after-growth of sculpture. The whole race
lived out its sculpture and its painting, rehearsed, as it were, the
great works of Pheidias and Polygnotus in physical exercise before it
learned to express itself in marble or in color. The public games,
which were instituted in this first period, further contributed to the
cultivation of the sense of beauty which was inherent in the Greeks.
The second period is one of transition--in politics, in literature, in
the fine arts. Everywhere the old landmarks are being broken up, and
the new ones are not yet fixed. The heroic monarchies yield first of
all to oligarchies, and then to tyrannies; the tyrannies in their turn
give place to democracies, or to constitutional aristocracies. Argos,
the centre of heroic Hellas, is the first to change. Between 770 and
730 B.C. Pheidon usurps the sovereign power, and dies, leaving no
dynasty behind him.[3] Between 650 and 500 we find despots springing
up in all the chief Greek cities. At Corinth the oligarchical family
of the Bacchiadæ are superseded by the tyrants Cypselus and Periander.
At Megara the despot Theagenes is deposed and exiled. At Sicyon the
Orthagoridæ terminate in the despot Cleisthenes, whose reign is marked
by an attempt to supersede the ancient Doric order of government by
caste. At Mitylene, Pittacus becomes a constitutional autocrat, or
dictator, for the public safety. At Samos, Polycrates holds a post of
almost Oriental despotism. At Athens we find the great family of the
Pisistratidæ, who supersede the dynastic tyranny in commission of the
house of Codrus. What is the meaning of these changes? How does the
despot differ from the heroic monarch, who held, as we have seen, his
power by divine right, but who also had to depend for his ascendency on
personal prowess? Gradually the old respect for the seed of Zeus died
out. Either the royal families abused their power or became extinct,
or, as in the case of Athens and Sparta, retained hereditary privileges
under limitations. During this decay of the Zeus-born dynasties the
cities of Greece were a prey to the quarrels of great families; and
it often happened that one of these obtained supreme power--in which
case a monarchy, based not on divine right, but on force and fear, was
founded; or else a few of the chief houses combined against the State
to establish an oligarchy. The oligarchies, owing their authority to
no true, legal, or religious fount of honor, were essentially selfish,
and were exposed to the encroachments of the more able among their
own families. The cleverest man in an oligarchy tended to draw the
power into his own hands; but in this he generally succeeded by first
flattering and then intimidating the people. Thus in one way or another
the old type of dynastic government was superseded by despotisms, more
or less arbitrary, tending to the tyranny of single individuals, or
to the coalition of noble houses, and bringing with them the vices of
greed, craft, and servile cruelty. The political ferment caused a vast
political excitement. Party strove against party; and when one set
gained the upper hand, the other had to fly. The cities of Hellas were
filled with exiles. Diplomacy and criticism occupied the minds of men.
Personal cleverness became the one essential point in politics. But
two permanent advantages were secured by this anarchy to the Greeks.
The one was a strong sense of the equality of citizens; the other, a
desire for established law, as opposed to the caprice of individuals
and to the clash of factions in the State. This, then, is the first
point which marks the transitional period. The old monarchies break up,
and give place to oligarchies first, and then to despotism. The tyrants
maintain themselves by violence and by flattering the mob. At last they
fall, or are displaced, and then the states agree to maintain their
freedom by the means of constitutions and fixed laws. The despots are
schoolmasters, who bring the people to _Nomos_ as their lord.
Three other general features distinguish this period of transition.
The first is colonization. In the political disturbances which attend
the struggle for power, hundreds of citizens were forced to change
their residence. So we find the mother cities sending settlers to
Italy, to Sicily, to Africa, to the Gulf of Lyons, to Thrace, and to
the islands. In these colonies the real life and vigor of Hellas show
themselves at this stage more than in the mother states. It is in
Sicily, on the coast of Magna Græcia, on the seaboard of Asia Minor,
in the islands of the Ægean, that the first poets and philosophers and
historians of Greece appear. Sparta and Athens, destined to become
the protagonists of the real drama of Hellas, are meanwhile silent and
apparently inert. Secondly, this is the age of the Nomothetæ. Thebes
receives a constitution from the Corinthian lovers and law-givers
Philolaus and Diocles. Lycurgus and Solon form the states of Sparta
and Athens. It is not a little wonderful to think of these three great
cities, successively the leaders of historic Hellas, submitting to the
intellect each of its own lawgiver, taking shape beneath his hands,
cheerfully accepting and diligently executing his directions. Lastly,
it is in this period that the two chief races of the Greeks--the
Ionians and the Dorians--emerge into distinctness. Not only are Athens
and Sparta fashioned to the form which they will afterwards maintain;
but also in the colonies two distinct streams of thought and feeling
begin to flow onward side by side, and to absorb, each into its own
current, those minor rivulets which it could best appropriate.
What happens to literature in this period of metamorphosis, expansion,
and anarchy? We have seen that Homer covers the whole of the first
period of literature; and in the Homeric poems we saw that the
interests of the present were subordinated to a splendid picture of the
ideal past, that the poet was merged in his work, that the individual
joys and sorrows of the artist remained unspoken, and that his words
were referred immediately to the Muse. All this is now to be altered.
But meanwhile, between the first and second period, a link is made by
Hesiod. In his _Works and Days_ he still preserves the traditions of
the epic. But we no longer listen to the deeds of gods and heroes; and
though the Muse is invoked, the poet appears before us as a living,
sentient, suffering man. We descend to earth. We are instructed in
the toils and duties of the beings who have to act and endure upon
the prosaic stage of the world, as it exists in the common light of
the present time. Even in Hesiod there has therefore been a change.
Homer strung his lyre in the halls of princes who loved to dwell on the
great deeds of their god-descended ancestors. Hesiod utters a weaker
and more subdued note to the tillers of the ground and the watchers of
the seasons. In Homer we see the radiant heroes expiring with a smile
upon their lips as on the Æginetan pediment. In Hesiod we hear the low,
sad outcry of humanity. The inner life, the daily loss and profit, the
duties and the cares of men are his concern. Homer, too, was never
analytical. He described the world without raising a single moral or
psychological question. Hesiod poses the eternal problems: What is
the origin and destiny of mankind? Why should we toil painfully upon
the upward path of virtue? How came the gods to be our tyrants? What
is justice? How did evil and pain and disease begin? After Hesiod the
epical impulse ceases. Poets, indeed, go on writing narrative poems
in hexameters. But the cycle, so called by the Alexandrian critics,
produced about this time, had not innate life enough to survive the
wear and tear of centuries. We have lost the whole series, except in
the tragedies which were composed from their materials. Literature had
passed beyond the stage of the heroic epic. The national ear demanded
other and more varied forms of verse than the hexameter. Among the
Ionians of Asia Minor was developed the pathetic melody of the elegiac
metre, which first apparently was used to express the emotions of love
and sorrow, and afterwards came to be the vehicle of moral sentiment
and all strong feeling. Callinus and Tyrtæus adapted the elegy to
songs of battle. Solon consigned his wisdom to its couplets, and used
it as a trumpet for awakening the zeal of Athens against her tyrants.
Mimnermus confined the metre to its more plaintive melodies, and made
it the mouthpiece of lamentations over the fleeting beauty of youth and
the evils of old age. In Theognis the elegy takes wider scope. He uses
it alike for satire and invective, for precept, for autobiographic
grumblings, for political discourses, and for philosophical
apophthegms. Side by side with the elegy arose the various forms of
lyric poetry. The names of Alcæus and Sappho, of Alcman, Anacreon,
Simonides, Bacchylides, Stesichorus, Arion, instantly suggest
themselves. But it must be borne in mind that lyric poetry in Greece at
a very early period broke up into two distinct species. The one kind
gave expression to strong personal emotion, and became a safety-valve
for perilous passions; the other was choric and complex in its form;
designed for public festivals and solemn ceremonials, it consisted
chiefly of odes sung in the honor of gods and great men. To the former,
or personal species, belong the lyrics of the Ionian and Æolian
families; to the latter, or more public species, belong the so-called
Dorian odes. Besides the elegy and all the forms of lyric stanza, the
iambic, if not invented in this period, was now adapted of set purpose
to personal satire.[4] Archilochus is said to have preferred this
metre, as being the closest in its form to common speech, and therefore
suited to his unideal practical invective. From the lyric dithyrambs of
Arion, sung at festivals of Dionysus, and from the iambic satires of
Archilochus, recited at the feasts of Demeter,[5] was to be developed
the metrical structure of the drama in the third period. As yet, it
is only among the Dorians of Sicily and of Megara that we hear of any
mimetic shows, and these of the simplest description.
In this period the first start in the direction of philosophy was made.
The morality which had been implicit in Homer, and had received a
partial development in Hesiod, was condensed in proverbial couplets
by Solon, Theognis, Phocylides, and Simonides. These couplets formed
the starting-points for discussion. Many of Plato's dialogues turn on
sayings of Theognis and Simonides. Many of the sublimer flights of
meditation in Sophocles are expansions of early gnomes. Even the ethics
of Aristotle are indebted to their wisdom. The ferment of thought
produced by the political struggles of this age tended to sharpen
the intellect and to turn reflection inward. Hence we find that the
men who rose to greatest eminence in state-craft as tyrants or as
law-givers are also to be reckoned among the primitive philosophers of
Greece. The aphorisms of the Seven Sages, two of whom were Nomothetæ,
and several of whom were despots, contain the kernel of much that
is peculiar in Greek thought. It is enough to mention these: #mêden
agan; metron ariston; gnôthi seauton; kairon gnôthi; anankêi d' oude
theoi machontai#--which are the germs of subsequent systems of ethics,
metaphysics, and theories of art.[6] Solon, as a patriot, a modeller of
the Athenian constitution, an elegiac poet, one of the Seven Sages, and
the representative of Greece at the court of Croesus, may be chosen as
the one most eminent man in a period when literature and thought and
politics were, to a remarkable extent, combined in single individuals.
Meanwhile philosophy began to flourish in more definite shape among
the colonists of Asia Minor, Italy, and Sicily. The criticism of
the Theogony of Hesiod led the Ionian thinkers--Thales, Anaximenes,
Anaximander, Heraclitus--to evolve separate answers to the question
of the origin of the universe. The problem of the physical #archê#,
or starting-point, of the world occupied their attention. Some more
scientific theory of existence than mythology afforded was imperatively
demanded. The same spirit of criticism, the same demand for accuracy,
gave birth to history. The Theogony of Hesiod and the Homeric version
of the Trojan war, together with the genealogies of the heroes, were
reduced to simple statements of fact, stripped of their artistic
trappings, and rationalized after a rude and simple fashion by the
annalists of Asia Minor. This zeal for greater rigor of thought was
instrumental in developing a new vehicle of language. The time had come
at length for separation from poetry, for the creation of a prose style
which should correspond in accuracy to the logical necessity of exact
thinking. Prose accordingly was elaborated with infinite difficulty
by these first speculators from the elements of common speech. It was
a great epoch in the history of European culture when men ceased to
produce their thoughts in the fixed cadences of verse, and consigned
them to the more elastic periods of prose. Heraclitus of Ephesus was
the first who achieved a notable success in this new and difficult art.
He for his pains received the title of #ho skoteinos#, the obscure--so
strange and novel did the language of science seem to minds accustomed
hitherto to nothing but metre. Yet even after his date philosophy
of the deepest species was still conveyed in verse. The Eleatic
metaphysicians Xenophanes and Parmenides--Xenophanes, who dared to
criticise the anthropomorphism of the Greek Pantheon, and Parmenides,
who gave utterance to the word of Greek ontology, #to on#, or being,
which may be significantly contrasted with the Hebrew I am--wrote
long poems in which they invoked the Muse, and dragged the hexameter
along the pathway of their argument upon the entities, like a pompous
sacrificial vestment. Empedocles of Agrigentum, to whom we owe the
rough-and-ready theory of the four elements, cadenced his great work on
Nature in the same sonorous verse, and interspersed his speculations on
the cycles of the universe with passages of brilliant eloquence.
Thus the second period is marked alike by changes in politics and
society, and by a revolution in the spirit of literature. The old
Homeric monarchies are broken up. Oligarchies and tyrannies take their
place. To the anarchy and unrest of transition succeeds the demand for
constitutional order. The colonies are founded, and contain the very
pith of Hellas at this epoch: of all the great names we have mentioned,
only Solon and Theognis belong to Central Greece. The Homeric epos has
become obsolete. In its stead we have the greatest possible variety
of literary forms. The elegiac poetry of morality and war and love;
the lyrical poetry of personal feeling and of public ceremonial; the
philosophical poetry of metaphysics and mysticism; the iambic, with its
satire; prose, in its adaptation to new science and a more accurate
historical investigation--are all built up upon the ruins of the epic.
What is most prominent in the spirit of this second period is the
emergence of private interests and individual activities. No dreams of
a golden past now occupy the minds of men. No gods or heroes fill the
canvas of the poet. Man, his daily life, his most crying necessities,
his deepest problems, his loves and sorrows, his friendships, his
social relations, his civic duties--these are the theme of poetry. Now
for the first time in Europe a man tells his own hopes and fears, and
expects the world to listen. Sappho simply sings her love; Archilochus,
his hatred; Theognis, his wrongs; Mimnermus, his _ennui_; Alcæus, his
misfortunes; Anacreon, his pleasure of the hour; and their songs find
an echo in all hearts. The individual and the present have triumphed
over the ideal and the past. Finally, it should be added that the
chief contributions to the culture of the fine arts in this period are
architecture, which is carried to perfection; music, which receives
elaborate form in the lyric of the Dorian order; and sculpture, which
appears as yet but rudimentary upon the pediments of the temples of
Ægina and Selinus.
Our third period embraces the supremacy of Athens from the end of the
Persian to the end of the Peloponnesian war. It was the struggle with
Xerxes which developed all the latent energies of the Greeks, which
intensified their national existence, and which secured for Athens, as
the central power on which the scattered forces of the race converged,
the intellectual dictatorship of Hellas. No contest equals for interest
and for importance this contest of the Greeks with the Persians. It was
a struggle of spiritual energy against brute force, of liberty against
oppression, of intellectual freedom against superstitious ignorance,
of civilization against barbarism. The whole fate of humanity hung
trembling in the scales at Marathon, at Salamis, at Platæa. On the one
side were ranged the hordes of Asia--tribe after tribe, legion upon
legion, myriad by myriad--under their generals and princes. On the
other side stood forth a band of athletes, of Greek citizens, each one
himself a prince and general. The countless masses of the herd-like
Persian host were opposed to a handful of resolute men in whom the
force of the spirit of the world was concentrated. The triumph of the
Greeks was the triumph of the spirit, of the intellect of man, of
light-dispersing darkness, of energy repelling a dead weight of matter.
Other nations have shown a temper as heroic as the Greeks. The Dutch,
for instance, in their resistance against Philip, or the Swiss in their
antagonism to Burgundy and Austria. But in no other single instance has
heroism been exerted on so large a scale, in such a fateful contest
for the benefit of mankind at large. Had the Dutch, for example, been
quelled by Spain, or the Swiss been crushed by the House of Hapsburg,
the world could have survived the loss of these athletic nations.
There were other mighty peoples who held the torch of liberty and of
the spirit, and who were ready to carry it onward in the race. But if
Persia had overwhelmed the Greeks upon the plains of Marathon or in the
straits of Salamis, that torch of spiritual liberty would have been
extinguished. There was no runner in the race to catch it up from the
dying hands of Hellas, and to bear it forward for the future age. No;
this contest of the Greeks with Persia was the one supreme battle of
history; and to the triumph of the Greeks we owe whatever is most great
and glorious in the subsequent achievements of the human race.
Athens rose to her full height in this duel. She bore the brunt of
Marathon alone. Her generals decided the sea-fight of Salamis. For
the Spartans it remained to defeat Mardonius at Platæa. Consequently
the olive-wreath of this more than Olympian victory crowned Athens.
Athens was recognized as Saviour and Queen of Hellas. And Athens, who
had fought the battle of the spirit--by spirit we mean the greatness
of the soul, liberty, intelligence, civilization, culture--everything
which raises men above brutes and slaves, and makes them free beneath
the arch of heaven--Athens, who had fought and won this battle of the
spirit, became immediately the recognized impersonation of the spirit
itself. Whatever was superb in human nature found its natural home and
sphere in Athens. We hear no more of the colonies. All great works of
art and literature now are produced in Athens. It is to Athens that
the sages come to teach and to be taught. Anaxagoras, Socrates, Plato,
the three masters of philosophy in this third period, are Athenians.
It is, however, noticeable and significant that Anaxagoras, who forms
a link between the philosophy of the second and third period, is a
native of Clazomenæ, though the thirty years of his active life are
spent at Athens. These thinkers introduce into speculation a new
element. Instead of inquiries into the factors of the physical world
or of ontological theorizing, they approach all problems which involve
the activities of the human soul--the presence in the universe of a
controlling spirit. Anaxagoras issues the famous apophthegm: #nous
pantôn kratei#, "intelligence disposes all things in the world."
Socrates founds his ethical investigation upon the Delphian precept:
#gnôthi seauton#; or, "the proper study of mankind is man." Plato,
who belongs chronologically to the fourth period, but who may here
be mentioned in connection with the great men of the third, as
synthesizing all the previous speculations of the Greeks, ascends to
the conception of an ideal existence which unites truth, beauty, and
goodness in one scheme of universal order.
At the same time Greek art rises to its height of full maturity.
Ictinus designs the Parthenon, and Mnesicles the Propylæa; Pheidias
completes the development of sculpture in his statue of Athene, his
pediment and friezes of the Parthenon, his chryselephantine image of
Zeus at Olympia, his marble Nemesis upon the plain of Marathon. These
were the ultimate, consummate achievements of the sculptor's skill; the
absolute standards of what the statuary in Greece could do. Nothing
remained to be added. Subsequent progression--for a progression there
was in the work of Praxiteles--was a deflection from the pure and
perfect type.
Poetry, in the same way, receives incomparable treatment at the hands
of the great dramatists. As the epic of Homer contained implicitly
all forms of poetry, so did the Athenian drama consciously unite them
in one supreme work of art. The energies aroused by the Persian war
had made action and the delineation of action of prime importance to
the Greeks. We no longer find the poets giving expression to merely
personal feeling, or uttering wise saws and moral precepts, as in the
second period. Human emotion is indeed their theme; but it is the
phases of passion in living, acting, and conflicting personalities
which the drama undertakes to depict. Ethical philosophy is more than
ever substantive in verse; but its lessons are set forth by example
and not by precept--they animate the conduct of whole trilogies. The
awakened activity of Hellas at this period produced the first great
drama of Europe, as the Reformation in England produced the second. The
Greek drama being essentially religious, the tragedians ascended to
mythology for their materials. Homer is dismembered, and his episodes
or allusions, together with the substance of the Cyclic poems, supply
the dramatist with plots. But notice the difference between Homer and
Æschylus, the epic and the drama. In the latter we find no merely
external delineation of mythical history. The legends are used as
outlines to be filled in with living and eternally important details.
The heroes are not interesting merely as heroes, but as the types and
patterns of human nature; as representatives on a gigantic scale of
that humanity which is common to all men in all ages, and as subject
to the destinies which control all human affairs. Mythology has
thus become the text-book of life, interpreted by the philosophical
consciousness. With the names of Æschylus, Sophocles, Euripides,
must be coupled that of Aristophanes. His comedy is a peculiarly
Athenian product--the strongest mixture of paradox and irony and broad
buffoonery and splendid poetry, designed to serve a serious aim, the
world has ever seen. Here the many-sided, flashing genius of the Ionian
race appears in all its subtlety, variety, suppleness, and strength.
The free spirit of Athens runs riot and proclaims its liberty by
license in the prodigious saturnalia of the wit of Aristophanes.
It remains to be added that to this period belong the histories of
Herodotus, the Halicarnassean by birth, who went to Thurii as colonist
from Athens, and of Thucydides, the Athenian general; the lyrics
of Pindar the Theban, who was made the public guest of Athens; the
eloquence of Pericles, and the wit of Aspasia. This brief enumeration
suffices to show that in the third period of Greek literature was
contained whatever is most splendid in the achievements of the genius
of the Greeks, and that all these triumphs converged and were centred
upon Athens.
The public events of this period are summed up in the struggle for
supremacy between Athens and Sparta. The race which had shown itself
capable of united action against the common foe now develops within
itself two antagonistic and mutually exclusive principles. The age
of the despots is past. The flowering-time of the colonies is over.
The stone of Tantalus in Persia has been removed from Hellas. But it
remains for Sparta and Athens to fight out the duel of Dorian against
Ionian prejudices, of oligarchy against democracy. Both states have
received their definite stamp, or permanent #êthos#--Sparta from
semi-mythical Lycurgus; Athens from Solon, Cleisthenes, and Pericles.
Their war is the warfare of the powers of the sea with the powers
of the land, of Conservatives with Liberals, of the rigid principle
of established order with the expansive spirit of intellectual
and artistic freedom. What is called the Peloponnesian war--that
internecine struggle of the Greeks--is the historical outcome of
this deep-seated antagonism. And the greatest historical narrative
in the world--that of Thucydides--is its record. To dwell upon the
events of this war would be superfluous. Athens uniformly exhibits
herself as a dazzling, brilliant, impatient power, led astray by the
desire of novelty, and the intoxicating sense of force in freedom.
Sparta proceeds slowly, coldly, cautiously; secures her steps; acts
on the defensive; spends no strength in vain; is timid, tentative,
and economical of energy; but at the decisive moment she steps in
and crushes her antagonist. Deluded by the wandering fire of the
inspiration of Alcibiades, the Athenians venture to abandon the
policy of Pericles and to contemplate the conquest of Syracuse. A
dream of gigantic empire, in harmony with their expansive spirit, but
inconsistent with the very conditions of vitality in a Greek state,
floated before their imaginations. In attempting to execute it, they
overreached themselves and fell a prey to Sparta. With the fall of
Athens faded the real beauty and grandeur of Greece. Athens had
incarnated that ideal of loveliness and sublimity. During her days of
prosperity she had expressed it in superb works of art and literature,
and in the splendid life of a free people governed solely by their own
intelligence. Sparta was strong to destroy this life, to extinguish
this light of culture. But to do more she had no strength. Stiffened
in her narrow rules of discipline, she was utterly unable to sustain
the spiritual vitality of Hellas, or to carry its still vigorous energy
into new spheres. It remained for aliens to accomplish this.
Just before passing to the fourth period of comparative decline, we
may halt a moment to contemplate the man who represents this age of
full maturity. Pericles, called half in derision by the comic poets
the Zeus of Athens, called afterwards, with reverence, by Plutarch,
the Olympian--Pericles expresses in himself the spirit of this age.
He is the typical Athenian who governed Athens during the years in
which Athens governed Greece, who formed the taste of the Athenians
at the time when they were educating the world by the production
of immortal works of beauty. We have seen that the conquest of the
Persians was the triumph of the spirit, and that after the conquest
the spirit of humanity found itself for the first time absolutely and
consciously free in Athens. This spirit was, so to speak, incarnated in
Pericles. The Greek genius was made flesh in him, and dwelt at Athens.
In obedience to its dictates, he extended the political liberties
of the Athenians to the utmost, while he controlled those liberties
with the laws of his own reason. In obedience to the same spirit, he
expended the treasures of the Ionian League upon the public works
which formed the subsequent glory of Hellas, and made her august even
in humiliation. "That," says Plutarch, "which now is Greece's only
evidence that the power she boasts of and her ancient wealth are no
romance or idle story was his construction of the public and sacred
buildings." It was, again, by the same inspiration that Pericles
divined the true ideal of the Athenian commonwealth. In the Funeral
Oration he says: "We love the beautiful, but without ostentation or
extravagance; we philosophize without being seduced into effeminacy;
we are bold and daring, but this energy in action does not prevent us
from giving to ourselves a strict account of what we undertake. Among
other nations, on the contrary, martial courage has its foundation in
deficiency of culture. We know best how to distinguish between the
agreeable and the irksome; notwithstanding which we do not shrink
from perils." In this panegyric of the national character, Pericles
has rightly expressed the real spirit of Athens as distinguished from
Sparta. The courage and activity of the Athenians were the result of
open-eyed wisdom, and not of mere gymnastic training. Athens knew that
the arts of life and the pleasures of the intellect were superior to
merely physical exercises, to drill, and to discipline.
While fixing our thoughts upon Pericles as the exponent of the
mature spirit of free Hellas, we owe some attention to his master,
the great Anaxagoras, who first made reason play the chief part in
the scheme of the universe. Of the relations of Anaxagoras to his
pupil Pericles, this is what Plutarch tells us: "He that saw most
of Pericles, and furnished him most especially with
|
speech may have made on your mind, I
am sure I need not suggest to you that the best chance of doing this
will be to endeavour coolly to lay before him the case as it really is,
unmixed as far as possible with any topics of soreness, which evidently
were not absent from his mind on Canning's motion. I certainly, on the
whole, judge much more favourably of his general intentions on the
whole subject (or, I should rather say, of his probable conduct) than
you do. But I admit that one part of his speech was as unsatisfactory
as possible. This I really believe proceeded in a great measure from
the evident embarrassment and distress under which he was speaking,
and which I am persuaded prevented him from doing any justice to his
own ideas. I may deceive and flatter myself, but tho' I know we shall
be far from obtaining all that you and I wish, I really think there is
much chance of great real and substantial ground being gained towards
the ultimate and not remote object of total abolition next session.
This is far from a reason for not endeavouring, if possible, to prevent
the aggravation of the evil in the meantime, and I heartily wish you
may be successful in the attempt.
"Ever affy. yrs.,
"W. P."
"WALMER CASTLE,
"_September 22, 1802_.
"MY DEAR WILBERFORCE, I am much obliged to you for your kind letter of
inquiry. My complaint has entirely left me, I am recovering my strength
every day, and I have no doubt of being in a very short time as well
as I was before the attack. Farquhar, however, seems strongly disposed
to recommend Bath before the winter, and if you make your usual visit
thither, I hope it is not impossible we may meet. Perhaps you will let
me know whether you propose going before Parliament meets, and at what
time. I hardly imagine that the session before Christmas can produce
much business that will require attendance. I ought long since to have
written to you on the subject of our friend Morritt. It would give me
great pleasure to see him come back to Parliament, tho' I hardly think
the occasion was one on which I
[Rest of letter torn off.]
"BATH,
"_October 31, 1802_.
"MY DEAR WILBERFORCE,--As you are among the persons to whom the author
of the enclosed high-flown compliments refers for his character for
a very important purpose, I shall be much obliged to you if you will
tell me what you know of him. A man's qualifications to give a dinner
certainly depend more on the excellence of his cook and his wine, than
on himself but I have still some curiosity to know what sort of company
he and his guests are likely to prove; and should therefore be glad
to know a little more about them than I collect from his list of the
_dramatis personæ_, which for instruction might as well have been taken
from any old play-bill. In the meantime I have been obliged out of
common civility, _provisoirement_ to accept his invitation. I was very
sorry that I had too little time to spare in passing thro' town to try
to see you. I should have much wished to have talked over with you the
events which have been passing and the consequences to which they seem
to lead. You know how much under all the circumstances I wished for
peace, and my wishes remain the same, if Bonaparte can be made to feel
that he is not to trample in succession on every nation in Europe. But
of this I fear there is little chance, and without it I see no prospect
but war.
"I have not yet been here long enough to judge much of the effect of
these waters, but as far as I can in a few days, I think I am likely
to find them of material use to me. I mean to be in town by the 18th
of next month. Paley's work, which you mentioned in your last letter,
I had already read on the recommendation of my friend Sir W. Farquhar,
who had met with it by accident, and was struck with its containing the
most compendious and correct view of anatomy which he had ever seen.
I do not mean that he thought this its only merit. It certainly has a
great deal, but I think he carries some of his details and refinements
further than is at all necessary for his purpose, and perhaps than will
quite stand the test of examination.
"Ever affy. yrs.,
"W. P."
"WALMER CASTLE,
"_August 8, 1803_ (?).
"MY DEAR WILBERFORCE,--Not having returned from a visit to some of my
corps on the Isle of Thanet till Friday evening, I could not answer
your letter by that day's post, and I was interrupted when I was going
to write to you yesterday. It was scarce possible for me, consistent
with very material business in this district, to have reached town
to-day; and besides, I confess, I do not think any great good could
have been done by anything I could say in the House on any of the
points you mention. I feel most of them, however, and some others of
the same sort, as of most essential importance; and I have thoughts of
coming to town for a couple of days (which is as much as I can spare
from my duties here) towards the end of the week, to try whether I
cannot find some channel by which a remedy may be suggested on some
of the points which are now most defective. I think I shall probably
reach town on Saturday morning, and I should wish much if you could
contrive to meet me in Palace Yard or anywhere else, to have an
hour's conversation with you. I will write to you again as soon as I
can precisely fix any day. We are going on here most rapidly, and in
proportion to our population, most extensively, in every species of
local defence, both naval and military, and I trust shall both add
very much to the security of essential points on this coast, and set
not a bad example to other maritime districts.
"Ever affy. yours,
"W. P."
"WALMER CASTLE,
"_January 5, 1804_.
"MY DEAR WILBERFORCE--Your letter reached me very safe this morning,
and I thank you very much for its contents. I hope it will not be long
before I have an opportunity of talking over with you fully the subject
to which it relates. From what I have heard since I saw you, it will be
necessary for me pretty soon to make up my mind on the line to pursue
under the new state of things which is approaching. In the meantime,
I shall not commit myself to anything without looking to _all_ the
consequences as cautiously as you can wish; and before I form any final
decision, I shall much wish to consult yourself and a few others whose
opinions I most value. If no new circumstance arises to revive the
expectation of the enemy, I mean to be in town the beginning of next
week, and will immediately let you know. Perhaps I may be able to go on
to Bath for a fortnight.
"Ever affy. yours,
"W. P."
Two examples are here given of Wilberforce's letters to Pitt. The
first is written in the character of a country member and political
friend. The second is one in reference to his work on Practical
Religion.[9] They are both, as is generally the case with his letters
to Pitt, undated, but the post-mark of the second bears "1797."
_Mr. Wilberforce to Right Hon. William Pitt._
"MY DEAR PITT,--My head and heart have been long full of some thoughts
which I wished to state to you when a little less under extreme
pressure than when Parliament is sitting. But my eyes have been very
poorly. I am now extremely hurried, but I will mention two or three
things as briefly as possible that I may not waste your time. First,
perhaps even yet you may not have happened to see an Order in Council
allowing, notwithstanding the War, an intercourse to subsist between
our West Indian Colonies and those of Spain, in which negro slaves are
the chief articles we are to supply. I know these commercial matters
are not within your department, and that therefore your assent is
asked, if at all, when your mind is full of other subjects. But let me
only remind you, for it would be foolish to write what will suggest
itself to your own mind, that the House of Commons did actually pass
the Bill for abolishing the foreign slave trade; and that if contracts
are made again for supplying Spain for a term of years, it may throw
obstacles in the way of a foreign slave-trade abolition. It would give
me more pleasure than I can express to find any further measures, or
even thoughts, on this to me painful subject, for many reasons, by
hearing the order was revoked. Second, I promised by compulsion (I
mean because I dislike to bore you) to state to you on the part of the
Deputy Receiver General for the North and East Ridings of Yorkshire
and Hull that it would tend materially both to facilitate and cheapen
the collection of the new assessed taxes to let them be collected at
the same time as the old ones. This will make the rounds four times
per annum instead of ten, and he says the expense of collecting, if
incurred six times per annum, will amount to full one-half of all the
present salaries of the Receivers General in the Kingdom. As he is a
most respectable man, I ought to say that he gives it as his opinion
that the Receivers General are not overpaid, all things considered.
But for my own opinion let me add that his principal really has none
of the labours of the office, and the deputy even finds his securities
for him. Third, surely there ought at the Bank to be a distinction
between what is paid for assessed taxes and what as free donation, when
the subscription includes both: your own and those of many others are
under that head. Fourth, I suppose you are now thinking of your taxes.
Do, I beseech you, let one of them be a tax on all public diversions
of every kind, including card-playing. I can't tell you how much their
not being taxed has been mentioned with censure, and I promised to
send you the enclosed letter from a very respectable man. I am sorry I
did, but now have no option. But my first great object in writing to
you is most earnestly to press on your attention a manuscript, which I
have been desired to lay before you, relative to Naval Discipline. You
must allow the writer to express himself with some perhaps unpleasant
idea of self-importance. But he clearly foresaw the late Mutiny, and
most strongly urged the adoption of preventive measures, which, had
they been taken, I verily believe the greatest misfortune this country
ever suffered would not have happened. That nothing was done is in my
mind--But I need not run on upon this to me most painful topic, because
it often suggests doubts whether I have not been myself to blame, who
perused the scheme two years ago. Let me earnestly entreat you, my dear
Pitt, to peruse it most seriously and impartially, and then let Dundas
read it. If you judge it proper, then either send it Lord Spencer or
to the writer, who is a good deal nettled at his former communications
to Lord Spencer not being attended to. I will send the manuscript by
to-morrow's mail.
"Yours ever sincerely,
"W. W.
"Every one is calling out for you to summon the nation to arm itself
in the common defence. You hear how nobly my Yorkshire men are acting.
I must have more discussion on that head, for they still wish you to
impose an equal rate on all property."
"BATH, _Easter Sunday_.
"MY DEAR PITT,--I am not unreasonable enough to ask you to read my
book: but as it is more likely that when you are extremely busy than at
any other time you may take it up for ten minutes, let me recommend it
to you in that case to open on the last section of the fourth chapter,
wherein you will see wherein the religion which I espouse differs
practically from the common orthodox system. Also the sixth chapter
has almost a right to a perusal, being the basis of all politics, and
particularly addressed to such as you. At the same time I know you will
scold me for introducing your name. May God bless you. This is the
frequent prayer of your affectionate and faithful.
"W. W."
[Postmarked 1797.]
Here ends the hitherto unpublished correspondence between Pitt and
Wilberforce. On the occasion of Pitt's death, his brother, Lord
Chatham, writes with regard to his funeral:
_Lord Chatham to Mr. Wilberforce._
"DOVER STREET,
"_February 15, 1806_.
"I have many thanks to offer you for your very kind letter which I
received this morning. Knowing, as I do, how truly the sentiments of
friendship and affection you express, were returned on the part of my
poor brother towards you, I can only assure you that it will afford me
a most sensible gratification that you should have, as an old, intimate
friend, some particular situation allotted to you in the last sad
tribute to be paid to his memory. Believe me, with sincere regard, my
dear sir,
"Yours very faithfully,
"CHATHAM."
Pitt was one of the few men whose lives have affected the destiny
of nations. The actions of such men are so far-reaching, and the
possibilities of the might-have-been so great, that history hardly
ever passes a final verdict upon them. Wilberforce had unexampled
opportunities of gauging the character and motives of Pitt, and
certainly had no strong partisan bias to warp his judgment. His matured
estimate of Pitt cannot fail therefore to be of peculiar interest. It
was written in 1821, sixteen years after Pitt's death, and is printed
exactly as Wilberforce left it. It will no doubt recall to the mind of
the reader Scott's well-known lines:
"With Palinure's undaunted mood,
Firm at his dangerous post he stood;
Each call for needful rest repelled
With dying hand the rudder held
Till, in his fall, with fateful sway
The steerage of the realm gave way!"[10]
_SKETCH OF PITT BY W. WILBERFORCE_
SKETCH OF PITT BY W. WILBERFORCE.
Considering the effect of party spirit in producing a distrust of all
that is said in favour of a public man by those who have supported
him, and the equal measure of incredulity as to all that is stated of
him by his opponents, it may not be without its use for the character
of Mr. Pitt to be delineated by one who, though personally attached
to him, was by no means one of his partisans; who even opposed him on
some most important occasions, but who, always preserving an intimacy
with him, had an opportunity of seeing him in all circumstances and
situations, and of judging as much as any one could of his principles,
dispositions, habits, and manners.
It seems indeed no more than the payment of a debt justly due to
that great man that the friend who occasionally differed from him
should prevent any mistake as to the grounds of those differences;
and that as he can do it consistently with truth, he should aver,
as in consistency with truth he can aver, that in every instance
(with perhaps one exception only) in which his conscience prompted
him to dissent from Mr. Pitt's _measures_, he nevertheless respected
Mr. Pitt's _principles_; the differences arose commonly from a
different view of facts, or a different estimate of contingencies and
probabilities. Where there was a difference of political principles, it
scarcely ever was such as arose from moral considerations; still less
such as was produced by any distrust of Mr. Pitt's main intention being
to promote the well-being and prosperity of his country.
Mr. Pitt from his early childhood had but an indifferent constitution;
the gouty habit of body which harassed him throughout his life, was
manifested by an actual fit of that disorder when he was still a boy.
As early as fourteen years of age he was placed at Pembroke Hall,
Cambridge; he had even then excited sanguine expectations of future
eminence. His father had manifested a peculiar regard for him; he had
never, I believe, been under any other than the paternal roof, where
his studies had been superintended by a private tutor; and besides
a considerable proficiency in the Greek and Latin languages, he had
written a play in English, which was spoken of in high terms by those
who had perused it. I am sorry to hear that this early fruit of genius
is not anywhere to be found.
While he was at the University his studies, I understand, were carried
on with steady diligence both in classics and mathematics, and though
as a nobleman he could not establish his superiority over the other
young men of his time by his place upon the tripos, I have been assured
that his proficiency in every branch of study was such as would have
placed him above almost all competitors. He continued at the University
till he was near one-and-twenty, and it was during the latter part of
that period that I became acquainted with him. I knew him, however,
very little till the winter of 1779-80, when he occupied chambers in
Lincoln's Inn, and I myself was a good deal in London. During that
winter we became more acquainted with each other; we used often to meet
in the Gallery of the House of Commons, and occasionally at Lady St.
John's and at other places, and it was impossible not to be sensible of
his extraordinary powers.
On the calling of a new Parliament in the beginning of September,
1780, I was elected one of the Members for Hull. Mr. Pitt, if I
mistake not, was an unsuccessful candidate for the University of
Cambridge; but about Christmas 1780-81, through the intervention of
some common friends (more than one have claimed the honour of the
first suggestion, Governor Johnston, the Duke of Rutland, &c.), he
received and accepted an offer of a seat in Parliament made to him in
the most handsome terms by Sir James Lowther. From the time of his
taking his seat he became a constant attendant, and a club was formed
of a considerable number of young men who had about the same time left
the University and most of them entered into public life. The chief
members were Mr. Pitt, Lord Euston, now Duke of Grafton, Lord Chatham,
the Marquis of Graham, now Duke of Montrose, the Hon. Mr. Pratt, now
Marquis of Camden, the Hon. St. Andrew St. John, Henry Bankes, Esq.,
the Hon. Maurice Robinson, now Lord Rokeby, Lord Duncannon, now Lord
Besborough, Lord Herbert, postea Earl of Pembroke, Lord Althorp, now
Lord Spencer, Robert Smith, Esq., now Lord Carrington, Mr. Bridgeman,
Mr. Steele, several others, and myself. To these were soon afterwards
added Lord Apsley, Mr. Grenville, now Lord Grenville, Pepper Arden,
afterwards Lord Alvanley, Charles Long, afterwards Lord Farnborough,
Sir William Molesworth, &c. &c. Of the whole number Mr. Pitt was
perhaps the most constant attendant, and as we frequently dined,
and still more frequently supped together, and as our Parliamentary
attendance gave us so many occasions for mutual conference and
discussion, our acquaintance grew into great intimacy. Mr. Bankes
and I (Lord Westmoreland only excepted, with whom, on account of his
politics, Mr. Pitt had little connection) were the only members of
the society who had houses of their own, Mr. Bankes in London, and I
at Wimbolton[11] in Surrey. Mr. Bankes often received his friends to
dinner at his own house, and they frequently visited me in the country,
but more in the following Parliamentary session or two. In the spring
of one of these years Mr. Pitt, who was remarkably fond of sleeping in
the country, and would often go out of town for that purpose as late as
eleven or twelve o'clock at night, slept at Wimbolton for two or three
months together. It was, I believe, rather at a later period that he
often used to sleep also at Mr. Robert Smith's house at Hamstead.[12]
Mr. Pitt was not long in the House of Commons before he took a part
in the debates: I was present the first time he spoke, and I well
recollect the effect produced on the whole House; his friends had
expected much from him, but he surpassed all their expectations,
and Mr. Hatsell, the chief clerk and a few of the older members who
recollected his father, declared that Mr. Pitt gave indications of
being his superior. I remember to this day the great pain I suffered
from finding myself compelled by my judgment to vote against him on
the _second_ occasion of his coming forward, when the question was
whether some Commissioners of public accounts should, or should not,
be members of Parliament: indeed I never can forget the mixed emotions
I experienced when my feelings had all the warmth and freshness of
early youth, between my admiration of his powers, my sympathy with his
rising reputation, and hopes of his anticipated greatness, while I
nevertheless deemed it my duty in this instance to deny him my support.
Mr. Pitt was a decided and warm opponent of Lord North's
administration; so indeed were most of our society, though I
occasionally supported him. From the first, however, I concurred with
Mr. Pitt in opposing the American War, and we rejoiced together in
putting an end to it in about March, 1782, when Lord North's ministry
terminated; and after a painful, and I think considerable, interval,
during which it was said the King had even talked of going over to
Hanover, and was supposed at last to yield to the counsels of the
Earl of Mansfield, a new administration was formed consisting of the
Rockingham and Shelburne parties, the Marquis of Rockingham being
First Lord of the Treasury, and Lord Shelburne and Mr. Fox the two
Secretaries of State. But though the parties had combined together
against their common enemy, no sooner had he been removed than mutual
jealousies immediately began to show themselves between the Rockingham
and Shelburne parties. I well remember attending by invitation at Mr.
Thomas Townshend's, since Lord Sydney, with Mr. Pitt and most of the
young members who had voted with the Opposition, when Mr. Fox with
apparent reluctance stated that Lord Rockingham had not then been
admitted into the King's presence, but had only received communications
through Lord Shelburne; and little circumstances soon afterwards arose
which plainly indicated the mutual distrust of the two parties. Lord
Rockingham's constitution was much shaken, and after a short illness
his death took place before the end of the session of Parliament, about
the middle of June, 1782.[13] Mr. Pitt had taken occasion to declare
in the House of Commons that he would accept no subordinate situation,
otherwise there is no doubt he would have been offered a seat at the
Treasury Board, or indeed any office out of the Cabinet; but on Lord
Rockingham's death, notwithstanding Mr. Fox's endeavour to prevent a
rupture by declaring that _no disunion existed_,[14] the disagreement
between the parties, of which so many symptoms had before manifested
themselves, became complete and notorious. Lord Shelburne being invited
by the King to supply Lord Rockingham's place, Mr. Fox with most of the
Rockingham's party retired from office, and Mr. Pitt accepted the offer
made him by Lord Shelburne of becoming Chancellor of the Exchequer: he
had completed his twenty-third year the 28th of May preceding.
There was more than one day of debate even during that session, in
which Mr. Pitt indicated that gravity and dignity which became the high
station which he had assumed at so early an age. He continued in office
till the ensuing winter, when, after peace had been made both with
America and her continental allies France and Spain, Lord Shelburne's
administration was removed through the unprincipled coalition between
Lord North and Mr. Fox and their respective parties. It was supposed to
have been brought about in a great degree through the influence of Lord
North's eldest son, who had maintained a friendly acquaintance with
Mr. Fox, a man the fascination of whose manners and temper was such as
to render it impossible for any one to maintain a personal intercourse
with him without conceiving for him sincere and even affectionate
attachment. I seconded the motion for the address on the peace, and I
well remember a little before the business began writing a note in my
place with a pencil to Bankes, who was, I saw, at a little distance,
inquiring of him whether a union between North and Fox was really
formed, and whether I might publicly notice it; "Yes," he replied, "the
more strongly the better." Mr. Pitt on that night was very unwell; he
was obliged to retire from the House into Solomon's Porch by a violent
sickness at the very moment when Mr. Fox was speaking. He himself
afterwards replied in a speech of some hours' length, but he certainly
on that night fell short of our expectations; a second discussion,
however, took place a few days after, and his speech on that occasion
was one of the finest that was ever made in Parliament, both in point
of argument and power of oratory. I never shall forget the impression
produced by that part of it in which he spoke of his own retirement,
closing with that passage out of Horace, "Laudo manentem," &c., though
I must add that I retain no recollection whatever of the circumstance
mentioned by Sir N. Wraxall; indeed I cannot but be strongly persuaded
that he must have been misinformed. Well also do I remember our all
going to Mr. Pitt's from the House of Commons after our defeat about
eight in the morning, where a dinner had been waiting for us from
eleven or twelve the preceding night, and where we all laughed heartily
at some characteristic traits exhibited by Lord Stanhope,[15] then
Lord Mahon. An administration was then formed of which the Duke of
Portland was at the head, and Lord North and Mr. Fox joint Secretaries
of State. It was in the autumn of this year, 1783, during the recess of
Parliament, that I accompanied Mr. Pitt and Mr. Eliot, who afterwards
became his brother-in-law, to France: our plan was to spend a few weeks
in a provincial town, there to acquire something of the language,
and afterwards to make a short stay at Paris. Accordingly we went to
Rheims, where we continued for about six weeks. It was not until we
were on the point of going abroad (when Mr. Eliot came out of Cornwall,
Mr. Pitt from seeing his mother in Somersetshire, and I met them
both at Sittingbourne) that we recollected that we were unprovided
with letters of recommendation, which each of the party had perhaps
trusted to the other for obtaining. Accordingly we requested Mr. Smith
to obtain them for us of Mr. Thellusson, afterwards Lord Rendlesham,
who, we knew, had correspondencies all over France. Thellusson replied
that he would gladly do his best for us, but that he rather conceived
from circumstances that his correspondent at Rheims was not a person
of any commercial distinction. We, however, abided by our decision
in favour of Rheims. The day after we arrived there, having sent our
letter of recommendation the preceding evening to the person to whom
it was addressed, we were waited upon by a very well-behaved man with
a velvet coat, a bag, and sword, who conversed with us for a short
time. The next day we repaid his visit, and were a good deal surprised
to find that he was a very little grocer, his very small shop being
separated by a partition from his very small room. But he was an
unaffected, well-behaved man, and he offered to render us every service
in his power, but stated distinctly that he was not acquainted with
the higher people of the place and neighbourhood. For a few days we
lived very comfortably together, but no French was learned except from
the grammar, we not having a single French acquaintance. At length we
desired our friend the _épicier_ to mention us to the Lieutenant of
Police, who, I think we had made out, had been employed to collect
evidence in the great Douglas cause, and was therefore likely to
know something of our country and its inhabitants. This expedient
answered its intended purpose, though somewhat slowly and by degrees.
The Lieutenant of Police, Du Chatel, an intelligent and apparently
a respectable family man, came to visit us, and he having stated to
the Archbishop of Rheims, the present Cardinal de Perigord, whose
palace was about a mile from the city, that three English Members of
Parliament were then residing in it, one of whom was Mr. Pitt, who had
recently been Chancellor of the Exchequer, his Grace sent his Grand
Vicaire, the Abbé de la Garde, to ascertain the truth or falsehood of
this statement. The Abbé executed his commission with great address,
and reporting in our favour, we soon received an invitation to the
Archbishop's table, followed by the expression of a wish that during
the remainder of our stay at Rheims we would take up our residence in
his palace. This we declined, but we occasionally dined with him, and
from the time of our having been noticed by the Lieutenant we received
continual invitations, chiefly to supper, from the gentry in and about
the place. They were chiefly persons whose land produced the wine of
the country, which, without scruple, they sold on their own account.
And I remember the widow of the former Marshal Detrée intimating a wish
that Mr. Pitt would become her customer.
Thence we went to Paris, having an opportunity during that time of
spending four or five days at Fontainebleau, where the whole Court
was assembled. There we were every evening at the parties of one or
other of the French Ministers, in whose apartments we also dined--the
Queen being always among the company present in the evening, and
mixing in conversation with the greatest affability; there were also
Madame la Princesse de Lamballe, M. Segur, M. de Castres, &c. Mr.
George Ellis, who spoke French admirably, was in high favour for the
elegance of his manners and the ease and brilliancy of his wit; and
Mr. Pitt, though his imperfect knowledge of French prevented his doing
justice to his sentiments, was yet able to give some impression of
his superior powers--his language, so far as it did extend, being
remarkable, I was assured, for its propriety and purity. There M. le
Marquis de la Fayette appeared with a somewhat affected simplicity of
manner, and I remember the fine ladies on one occasion dragging him
to the card-table, while he shrugged up his shoulders and apparently
resisted their importunities that he would join their party: very few,
however, played at cards, the Queen, I think, never. During our stay
at Paris we dined one day with M. le Marquis de la Fayette with a very
small party, one of whom was Dr. Franklin; and it is due to M. le
Marquis de la Fayette to declare that the opinion which we all formed
of his principles and sentiments, so far as such a slight acquaintance
could enable us to form a judgment, was certainly favourable, and his
family appeared to be conducted more in the style of an English house
than any other French family which we visited. We commonly supped in
different parties, and I recollect one night when we English manifested
our too common indisposition to conform ourselves to foreign customs,
or rather to put ourselves out of our own way, by all going together
to one table, to the number of twelve or fourteen of us, and admitting
only one Frenchman, the Marquis de Noailles, M. de la Fayette's
brother-in-law, who spoke our own language like an Englishman, and
appeared more than any of the other French to be one of ourselves.
We, however, who were all young men, were more excusable than our
Ambassador at the Court of France, who, I remember, joined our party.
It was at Paris, in October, that Mr. Pitt first became acquainted
with Mr. Rose, who was introduced to him by Lord Thurlow, whose
fellow-traveller he was on the Continent; and it was then, or
immediately afterwards, that it was suggested to the late Lord Camden
by Mr. Walpole, a particular friend of M. Necker's, that if Mr. Pitt
should be disposed to offer his hand to Mademoiselle N., afterwards
Madame de Staël, such was the respect entertained for him by M. and
Madame Necker, that he had no doubt the proposal would be accepted.
We returned from France about November. Circumstances then soon
commenced which issued in the turning out of the Fox administration,
the King resenting grievously, as was said, the treatment he
experienced from them, especially in what regarded the settlement
of the Prince of Wales. I need only allude to the long course of
political contention which took place in the winter of 1783-84, when
at length Mr. Pitt became First Lord of the Treasury; and after a
violent struggle, the King dissolved the Parliament about March, and
in the new House of Commons a decisive majority attested the truth of
Mr. Pitt's assertion that he possessed the confidence of his country.
In many counties and cities the friends of Mr. Fox were turned out,
thence denominated Fox's Martyrs.[16] I myself became member for
Yorkshire in the place of Mr. Foljambe, Sir George Savile's nephew, who
had succeeded that excellent public man in the representation of the
county not many weeks before. I may be allowed to take this occasion of
mentioning a circumstance honourable to myself, since it is much more
honourable to him, that some years after he came to York on purpose to
support me in my contest for the county. It is remarkable that Lord
Stanhope first foresaw the necessity there would be for Mr. Pitt's
continuing in office notwithstanding his being out-voted in the House
of Commons, maintaining that the Opposition would not venture to refuse
the supplies, and that at the proper moment he should dissolve the
Parliament.[17]
And now having traced Mr. Pitt's course from childhood to the period
when he commenced his administration of sixteen or seventeen years
during times the most stormy and dangerous almost ever experienced
by this country, it may be no improper occasion for describing his
character, and specifying the leading talents, dispositions, and
qualifications by which he was distinguished. But before I proceed to
this delineation it may be right to mention that seldom has any man had
a better opportunity of knowing another than I have possessed of being
thoroughly acquainted with Mr. Pitt. For weeks and months together I
have spent hours with him every morning while he was transacting his
common business with his secretaries. Hundreds of times, probably,
I have called him out of bed, and have, in short, seen him in every
situation and in his most unreserved moments. As he knew I should not
ask anything of him, and as he reposed so much confidence in me as to
be persuaded that I should never use any information I might obtain
from him for any unfair purpose, he talked freely before me of men and
things, of actual, meditated, or questionable appointments and plans,
projects, speculations, &c., &c. No man, it has been said, is a hero to
his _valet de chambre_, and if, with all the opportunities I enjoyed
of seeing Mr. Pitt in his most inartificial and unguarded moments, he
nevertheless appeared to me to be a man of extraordinary intellectual
and moral powers, it is due to him that it should be known that this
opinion was formed by one in whose instance Mr. Pitt's character was
subjected to its most severe test, which Rochefoucault appeared to
think could be stood by no human hero.
Mr. Pitt's intellectual powers were of the highest order, and in
private no less than in public, when he was explaining his sentiments
in any complicated question and stating the arguments on both sides,
it was impossible not to admire the clearness of his conceptions, the
precision with which he contemplated every particular object, and a
variety of objects, without confusion. They who have had occasion
to discuss political
|
setops.
Memphis had eaten and drunk and, sheltered behind her screens, waited
for the noon to pass.
Mentu, the king's sculptor, however, had not availed himself of the
hour of ease. He did not labor because he must, for his house stood in
the aristocratic portion of Memphis, and it was storied, galleried,
screened and topped with its breezy pavilion. Within the hollow space,
formed by the right and left wings of his house, the chamber of guests
to the front, and the property wall to the rear, was a court of
uncommon beauty. Palm and tamarisk, acacia and rose-shrub, jasmine and
purple mimosa made a multi-tinted jungle about a shadowy pool in which
a white heron stood knee-deep. There were long stretches of sunlit
sod, and walks of inlaid tile, seats of carved stone, and a single
small obelisk, set on a circular slab, marked with measures for
time--the Egyptian sun-dial. On every side were evidences of wealth
and luxury.
So Mentu labored because he loved to toil. In a land languorous with
tropical inertia, an enthusiastic toiler is not common. For this
reason, Mentu was worth particular attention. He towered a palm in
height over his Egyptian brethren, and his massive frame was entirely
in keeping with his majestic stature. He was nearly fifty years of
age, but no sign of the early decay of the Oriental was apparent in
him. His was the characteristic refinement of feature that marks the
Egyptian countenance, further accentuated by self-content and some
hauteur. The idea of dignity was carried out in his dress. The kilt
was not visible, for the kamis had become a robe, long-sleeved,
high-necked and belted with a broad band of linen, encompassing the
body twice, before it was fastened with a fibula of massive gold.
That he was an artisan noble was another peculiarity, but it was proof
of exceptional merit. He had descended from a long line of royal
sculptors, heightening in genius in the last three. His grandsire had
elaborated Karnak; his father had decorated the Rameseum, but Mentu had
surpassed the glory of his ancestors. In the years of his youth, side
by side with the great Rameses, he had planned and brought to
perfection the mightiest monument to Egyptian sculpture, the
rock-carved temple of Ipsambul. In recognition of this he had been
given to wife a daughter of the Pharaoh and raised to a rank never
before occupied by a king's sculptor. He was second only to the
fan-bearers, the most powerful nobles of the realm, and at par with the
market, or royal architect, who was usually chosen from among the
princes. And yet he had but come again to his own when he entered the
ranks of peerage. In the long line of his ancestors he counted a king,
and from that royal sire he had his stature.
He sat before a table covered with tools of his craft, rolls of
papyrus, pens of reeds, pots of ink of various colors, horns of oil,
molds and clay images and vessels of paint. Hanging upon pegs in the
wooden walls of his work-room were saws and the heavier drills, chisels
of bronze and mauls of tamarisk, suspended by thongs of deer-hide.
The sculptor, rapidly and without effort, worked out with his pen on a
sheet of papyrus the detail of a frieze. Tiny profile figures, quaint
borders of lotus and mystic inscriptions trailed after the swift reed
in multitudinous and bewildering succession. As he worked, a young man
entered the doorway from the court and, advancing a few steps toward
the table, watched the development of the drawings with interest.
Those were the days of early maturity and short life. The Egyptian of
the Exodus often married at sixteen, and was full of years and ready to
be gathered to Osiris at fifty-five or sixty. The great Rameses lived
to the unheard-of age of seventy-seven, having occupied the throne
since his eleventh year.
This young Egyptian, nearly eighteen, was grown and powerful with the
might of mature manhood. A glance at the pair at once established
their relationship as father and son. The features were strikingly
similar, the stature the same, though the young frame was supple and
light, not massive.
The hair was straight, abundant, brilliant black and cropped midway
down the neck and just above the brows. There was no effort at
parting. It was dressed from the crown of the head as each hair would
naturally lie and was confined by a circlet of gold, the token of the
royal blood of his mother's house. The complexion was the hue of a
healthy tan, different, however, from the brown of exposure in that it
was transparent and the red in the cheek was dusky. The face was the
classic type of the race, for be it known there were two physiognomies
characteristic of Egypt.
The forehead was broad, the brows long and delicately penciled, the
eyes softly black, very long, the lids heavy enough to suggest serenity
rather than languor. The nose was of good length, aquiline, the
nostril thin and sharply chiseled. The cut of the mouth and the warmth
of its color gave seriousness, sensitiveness and youthful tenderness to
the face.
Egypt was seldom athletic. Though running and wrestling figured much
in the pastime of youths, the nation was languid and soft. However,
Seti the Elder demanded the severest physical exercise of his sons, and
Rameses II, who succeeded him, made muscle and brawn popular by
example, during his reign. Here, then, was an instance of
king-mimicking that was admirable.
Originally the young man had been gifted with breadth of shoulder,
depth of chest, health and vigor. He would have been strong had he
never vaulted a pole or run a mile. To these advantages were added the
results of wise and thorough training, so wise, so thorough, that
defects in the national physique had been remedied. Thus, the calves
were stanch and prominent, whereas ancient Egypt was as flat-legged as
the negro; the body was round and tapered with proper athletic rapidity
from shoulder to heel, without any sign of the lank attenuation that
was characteristic of most of his countrymen.
The suggestion of his presence was power and bigness, not the
good-natured size that is hulking and awkward, but bigness that is
elegant and fine-fibered and ages into magnificence.
He wore a tunic of white linen, the finely plaited skirt reaching
almost to the knees. The belt was of leather, three fingers in breadth
and ornamented with metal pieces, small, round and polished. His
sandals were of white gazelle-hide, stitched with gold, and, by way of
ornament, he had but a single armlet, and a collar, consisting of ten
golden rings, depending by eyelets from a flexible band of the same
material. The metal was unpolished and its lack-luster red harmonized
wonderfully with the bronze throat it clasped.
Diminutive Isis in profile had emerged part-way from the background of
papyrus, and the sculptor lifted his pen to sketch in the farther
shoulder as the law required. The young man leaned forward and
watched. But as the addition was made, giving to the otherwise shapely
little goddess an uncomfortable but thoroughly orthodox twist, he
frowned slightly. After a moment's silence he came to the bench.
"Hast thou caught some great idea on the wing or hast thou the round of
actual labor to perform?" he asked.
His attention thus hailed, the sculptor raised himself and answered:
"Meneptah hath a temple to Set[1] in mind; indeed he hath stirred up
the quarries for the stone, I am told, and I am making ready, for I
shall be needed."
The older a civilization, the smoother its speech. Age refines the
vowels and makes the consonants suave. They spoke easily, not hastily,
but as oil flows, continuously and without ripple. The younger voice
was deep, soft enough to have been wooing and as musical as a chant.
"Would that the work were as probable as thou art hopeful," the young
man said with a sigh.
"Out upon thee, idler!" was the warm reply. "Art thou come to vex me
with thy doubts and scout thy sovereign's pious intentions?" The young
man smiled.
"Hath the sun shone on architecture or sculpture since Meneptah
succeeded to the throne?" he asked.
Mentu's eyes brightened wrathfully but the young man laid a soothing
palm over the hand that gripped the reed.
"I do not mock thee, father. Rather am I full of sympathy for thee.
Thou mindest me of a war-horse, stabled, with his battle-love
unsatisfied, hearing in every whimper of the wind a trumpet call. Nay,
I would to Osiris that the Pharaoh's intents were permanent."
Somewhat mollified, Mentu put away the detaining hand and went on with
his work. Presently the young man spoke again.
"I came to speak further of the signet," he said.
"Aye, but what signet, Kenkenes?"
"The signet of the Incomparable Pharaoh."
"What! after three years?"
"The sanctuary of the tomb is never entered and it is more than worth
the Journey to Tape[2] to search for the scarab again."
"But you would search in vain," the sculptor declared. "Rameses has
reclaimed his own."
Kenkenes shifted his position and protested.
"But we made no great search for it. How may we know of a surety if it
be gone?"
"Because of thy sacrilege," was the prompt and forcible reply. "Osiris
with chin in hand and a look of mystification on his brow, pondering
over the misdeeds of a soul! Mystification on Osiris! And with that,
thou didst affront the sacred walls of the royal tomb and call it the
Judgment of the Dead. Not one law of the sculptor's ritual but thou
hadst broken, in the sacrilegious fresco. Gods! I marvel that the
rock did not crumble under the first bite of thy chisel!"
Mentu fell to his work again. While he talked a small ape entered the
room and, discovering the paint-pots, proceeded to decorate his person
with a liberal hand. At this moment Kenkenes became aware of him and,
by an accurately aimed lump of clay, drove the meddler out with a show
of more asperity than the offense would ordinarily excite. Meanwhile
the sculptor wetted his pen and, poising it over the plans, regarded
his drawings with half-closed eyes. Then, as if he read his words on
the papyrus he proceeded:
"Thou wast not ignorant. All thy life hast thou had the decorous laws
of the ritual before thee. And there, in the holy precincts of the
Incomparable Pharaoh's tomb, with the opportunity of a lifetime at
hand, the skill of thy fathers in thy fingers, thou didst execute an
impious whim,--an unheard-of apostasy." He broke off suddenly,
changing his tone. "What if the priesthood had learned of the deed?
The Hathors be praised that they did not and that no heavier punishment
than the loss of the signet is ours."
"But it may have caught on thy chisel and broken from its fastening.
Thou dost remember that the floor was checkered with deep black
shadows."
"The hand of the insulted Pharaoh reached out of Amenti[3] and stripped
it off my neck," Mentu replied sternly. "And consider what I and all
of mine who come after me lost in that foolish act of thine. It was a
token of special favor from Rameses, a mark of appreciation of mine
art, and, more than all, a signet that I or mine might present to him
or his successor and win royal good will thereby."
"That I know right well," Kenkenes interrupted with an anxious note in
his voice, "and for that reason am I possessed to go after it to Tape."
The sculptor lifted a stern face to his son and said, with emphasis:
"Wilt thou further offend the gods, thou impious? It is not there,
and vex me no further concerning it."
Kenkenes lifted one of his brows with an air of enforced patience, and
sauntered across the room to another table similarly equipped for
plan-making. But he did not concern himself with the papyrus spread
thereon. Instead he dropped on the bench, and crossing his shapely
feet before him, gazed straight up at the date-tree rafters and
palm-leaf interbraiding of the ceiling.
Though the law of heredity is not trustworthy in the transmission of
greatness, Kenkenes was the product of three generations of heroic
genius. He might have developed the frequent example of decadence; he
might have sustained the excellence of his fathers' gift, but he could
not surpass them in the methods of their school of sculpture and its
results. There was one way in which he might excel, and he was born
with his feet in that path. His genius was too large for the limits of
his era. Therefore he was an artistic dissenter, a reformer with noble
ideals.
Mimetic art as applied to Egyptian painting and sculpture was a curious
misnomer. Probably no other nation of the world at that time was so
devoted to it, and certainly no other people of equal advancement of
that or any other time so wilfully ignored the simplest rules of
proportion, perspective and form. The sculptor's ability to suggest
majesty and repose, and at the same time ignore anatomical
construction, was wonderful. To preserve the features and individual
characteristics of a model and obey the rules of convention was a feat
to be achieved only by an Egyptian. There was no lack of genius in
him, but he had been denied liberty of execution until he knew no other
forms but those his fathers followed generations before.
All Egypt was but a padding that the structural framework of religion
supported. Science, art, literature, government, commerce, whatever
the member, it was built upon a bone of religion. The processes and
uses of sculpture were controlled by the sculptor's ritual and woe unto
him who departed therefrom in depicting the gods! The deed was
sacrilege.
In the portrait-forms the limits were less severely drawn. There were
a dozen permissible attitudes, and, the characteristic features might
be represented with all fidelity; but there were boundaries that might
not be overstepped. The result was an artistic perversion that
well-nigh perpetrated a grotesque slander on the personal appearance of
the race.
After the manner of Egyptians it was understood that Kenkenes was to
follow his father's calling, and ahead of him were years of labor laid
in narrow lines. If he rebelled, he incurred infinite difficulty and
opposition, and yet he could not wholly submit. He had been an apt and
able pupil during the long process of his instruction, but when the
moment of actual practice of his art arrived, he had rebelled. His
first work had been his last and, in the estimation of his father, had
entailed a grievous loss. Thereafter he had been limited to copying
the great sculptor's plans, the work of scribes and underlings.
Thus, he had passed three years that chafed him because of their
comparative idleness and their implied rebuke. The pressure finally
became too great, and he began to weigh the matter of compromise. If
he could secretly satisfy his own sense of the beautiful he might
follow the ritual with grace.
His cogitations, as he sat before his table, assumed form and purpose.
Presently Mentu, raising his head, noted that the shadows were falling
aslant the court. With an interested but inarticulate remark, he
dropped his pen among its fellows in an earthenware tray, his plans
into an open chest, and went out across the court, entering an opposite
door.
With his father's exit, Kenkenes shifted his position, and the
expression of deep thought grew on his face. After a long interval of
motionless absorption he sprang to his feet and, catching a wallet of
stamped and dyed leather from the wall, spread it open on the table.
Chisel, mallet, tape and knife, he put into it, and dropped wallet and
all into a box near-by at the sound of the sculptor's footsteps.
The great artist reentered in court robes of creamy linen, stiff with
embroidery and gold stitching.
"Har-hat passes through Memphis to-day on his way to Tape, where he is
to be installed as bearer of the king's fan on the right hand. He is
at the palace, and nobles of the city go thither to wait upon him."
"The king was not long in choosing a successor to the lamented Amset,"
Kenkenes observed. "Har-hat vaults loftily from the nomarchship of
Bubastis to an advisership to the Pharaoh."
"Rather hath his ascent been slower than his deserts. How had the Rebu
war ended had it not been for Har-hat? He is a great warrior, hath won
honor for Egypt and for Meneptah. The army would follow him into the
jaws of Tuat,[4] and Rameses, the heir, need never take up arms, so
long as Har-hat commands the legions of Egypt. But how the warrior
will serve as minister is yet to be seen."
"Who succeeds him over Bubastis?"
"Merenra, another of the war-tried generals. He hath been commander
over Pa-Ramesu. Atsu takes his place over the Israelites."
"Atsu?" Kenkenes mused. "I know him not."
"He is a captain of chariots, and won much distinction during the Rebu
invasion. He is a native of Mendes."
Left alone, Kenkenes crossed the court to the door his father had
entered and emerged later in a street dress of mantle and close-fitting
coif. He took up the wallet and quitted the room. Passing through the
intramural park and the chamber of guests, he entered the street. It
was a narrow, featureless passage, scarcely wide enough to give room
for a chariot. The brown dust had more prints of naked than of
sandaled feet, for most men of the young sculptor's rank went abroad in
chariots.
Once out of the passage, he turned across the city toward the east.
Memphis had pushed aside her screens and shaken out her tapestries
after the noon rest and was deep in commerce once again. From the low
balconies overhead the Damascene carpets swung, lending festivity to
the energetic traffic below. The pillars of stacked ware flanking the
fronts of pottery shops were in a constant state of wreckage and
reconstruction; the stalls of fruiterers perfumed the air with crushed
and over-ripe produce; litters with dark-eyed occupants and fan-bearing
attendants stood before the doorways of lapidaries and booths of
stuffs; venders of images, unguents, trinkets and wines strove to
outcry one another or the poulterer's squawking stall. Kenkenes met
frequent obstructions and was forced to reduce his rapid pace.
Curricles and chariots and wicker chairs halted him at many crossings.
Carriers took up much of the narrow streets with large burdens;
notaries and scribes sat cross-legged on the pavement, surrounded by
their patrons and clients, and beggars and fortune-tellers strove for
the young man's attention. The crowd thickened and thinned and grew
again; pigeons winnowed fearlessly down to the roadway dust, and a
distant yapping of dogs came down the slanting street. At times
Kenkenes encountered whole troops of sacred cats that wandered about
the city, monarchs over the monarch himself. By crowding into doorways
he allowed these pampered felines to pass undisturbed.
In the district near the lower edge of the city he met the heavy carts
of rustics, laden with cages of geese and crates of produce, moving
slowly in from the wide highways of the Memphian nome. The broad backs
of the oxen were gray with dust and their drivers were masked in grime.
The smell of the river became insistent. In the open stalls the
fishmongers had their naked brood keeping the flies away from the stock
with leafy branches. The limits of Memphis ended precipitately at a
sudden slope. In the long descent to the Nile there were few permanent
structures. Half-way down were great lengths of high platform built
upon acacia piling. This was the flood-tide wharf, but it was used now
only by loiterers, who lay upon it to bask dog-like in the sun. The
long intervening stretch between the builded city and the river was
covered with boats and river-men. Fishers mending nets were grouped
together, but they talked with one another as if each were a furlong
away from his fellow. Freight bearers, emptying the newly-arrived
vessels of cargo, staggered up toward the city. Now and again sledges
laden with ponderous burdens were drawn through the sand by yokes of
oxen, oftener by scores of men, on whom the drivers did not hesitate to
lay the lash.
River traffic was carried on far below the flood-tide wharf. Here the
long landings of solid masonry, covered with deep water four months of
the year, were lined with vessels. Between yard-arms hanging aslant
and over decks, glimpses of the Nile might be caught. It rippled
passively between its banks, for it was yet seven months before the
first showing of the June rise. Here were the frail papyrus bari,
constructed like a raft and no more concave than a long bow; the huge
cedar-masted cangias, flat-bottomed and slow-moving; the ancient dhow
with its shapeless tent-cabin aft; the ponderous cattle barges and
freight vessels built of rough-hewn logs; the light passenger skiffs;
and lastly, the sumptuous pleasure-boats. These were elaborate and
beautiful, painted and paneled, ornamented with garlands and sheaves of
carved lotus, and spread with sails, checkered and embroidered in many
colors. From these emerged processions of parties returning from
pleasure trips up the Nile. They came with much pomp and following,
asserting themselves and proceeding through paths made ready for them
by the obsequious laboring classes.
Presently there approached a corps of servants, bearing bundles of
throw-sticks, nets, two or three fox-headed cats, bows and arrows,
strings of fish and hampers of fowl. Behind, on the shoulders of four
stalwart bearers, came a litter, fluttering with gay-colored hangings.
Beside it walked an Egyptian of high class. Suddenly the bearers
halted, and a little hand, imperious and literally aflame with jewels,
beckoned Kenkenes from the shady interior of the litter.
He obeyed promptly. At another command the litter was lowered till the
poles were supported in the hands of the bearers. The curtains were
withdrawn, revealing the occupant--a woman.
This, to the glory of Egypt! Woman was defended, revered, exalted
above her sisters of any contemporary nation. No haremic seclusion for
her; no semi-contemptuous toleration of her; no austere limits laid
upon her uses. She bared her face to the thronging streets; she
reveled beside her brother; she worshiped with him; she admitted no
subserviency to her lord beyond the pretty deference that it pleased
her to pay; she governed his household and his children; she learned,
she wrote, she wore the crown. She might have a successor but no
supplanter; an Egyptian of the dynasties before the Persian dominance
could have but one wife at a time; none but kings could be profligate,
openly. So, while Babylonia led her maidens to a market, while
Ethiopia ruled hers with a rod, while Arabia numbered hers among her
she-camels, Egypt gloried in national chivalry and spiritual love.
This was the sentiment of the nation, by the lips of Khu-n-Aten, the
artist king:
"Sweet love fills my heart for the queen; may she ever keep the hand of
the Pharaoh."
Whatever Egypt's mode of worshiping Khem and Isis, nothing could set at
naught this clean, impulsive, sincere avowal.
Here, then, openly and in perfect propriety was a woman abroad with her
suitor.
She might have been eighteen years old, but there was nothing girlish
in her gorgeous beauty. She was a red rose, full-blown.
Her robes were a double thickness of loose-meshed white linen, with a
delicate stripe of scarlet; her head-dress a single swathing of scarlet
gauze. She wore not one, but many kinds of jewels, and her anklets and
armlets tinkled with fringes of cats and hawks in carnelian. Her hair
was brilliant black and unbraided. Her complexion was transparent, and
the underlying red showed deeply in the small, full-lipped mouth; like
a stain in the cheeks; like a flush on the brow, and even faintly on
the dainty chin. Her eyes were large and black, with the amorous lid,
and lined with kohl beneath the lower lash. Her profile showed the
exquisite aquiline of the pure-blooded Egyptian.
Aside from the visible evidences of charm there was an atmosphere of
femininity that permeated her immediate vicinity with a witchery little
short of enchantment. She was the Lady Ta-meri, daughter of Amenemhat,
nomarch[5] of Memphis.
The Egyptian accompanying the litter was nearly thirty years of age.
He was an example of the other type of the race, differing from the
classic model of Kenkenes. The forehead retreated, the nose was long,
low, slightly depressed at the end; the mouth, thick-lipped; the eye,
narrow and almond-shaped; the cheek-bones, high; the complexion, dark
brown. Still, the great ripeness of lip, aggressive whiteness of teeth
and brilliance of eye made his face pleasant. He wore a shenti of
yellow, over it a kamis of white linen, a kerchief bound with a yellow
cord about his head, and white sandals.
He was the nephew of the king's cup-bearer, who had died without issue
at Thebes during the past month. His elder brother had succeeded his
father to a high office in the priesthood, but he, Nechutes, was a
candidate for the honors of his dead uncle.
Kenkenes gave the man a smiling nod and bent over the lady's fingers.
"Fie!" was her greeting. "Abroad like the rabble, and carrying a
burden." She filliped the wallet with a pink-stained finger-nail.
"Sit here," she commanded, patting the cushioned edge of the litter.
The sculptor declined the invitation with a smile.
"I go to try some stone," he explained.
"Truly, I believe thou lovest labor," the lady asserted accusingly.
"Ah, but punishment overtakes thee at last. Behold, thou mightst have
gone with me to the marshes to-day, but I knew thou wouldst be as deep
in labor as a slave. And so I took Nechutes."
Kenkenes shot an amused glance at her companion.
"I would wager my mummy, Nechutes, that this is the first intimation
thou hast had that thou wert second choice," he said.
"Aye, thou hast said," Nechutes admitted, his eyes showing a sudden
light. He had a voice of profound depth and resonance, that rumbled
like the purring of the king's lions. "And not a moment since she
swore that it was I who made her sun to move, and that Tuat itself were
sweet so I were there."
"O Ma[6]," the lady cried, threatening him with her fan. "Thou
Defender of Truth, smite him!"
Kenkenes laughed with delight.
"Nay, nay, Nechutes!" he cried. "Thou dost betray thyself. Never
would Ta-meri have said anything so bald. Now, when she is moved to
give me a honeyed fact, she laps it with delicate intimation, layer on
layer like a lotus-bud. And only under the warm interpretation of my
heart will it unfold and show the gold within."
Nechutes stifled a derisive groan, but the lady's color swept up over
her face and made it like the dawn.
"Nay, now," she protested, "wherein art thou better than Nechutes, save
in the manner of telling thy calumny? But, Kenkenes," she broke off,
"thou art wasted in thy narrow realm. They need thy gallant tongue at
court."
The young sculptor made soft eyes at her.
"If I were a courtier," he objected, "I must scatter my small eloquence
among many beauties that I would liefer save for one."
She appropriated the compliment at once.
"Thou dost not hunger after even that opportunity," she pouted. "How
long hath it been since the halls of my father's house knew thy steps?
A whole moon!"
"I feared that I should find Nechutes there," Kenkenes explained.
During this pretty joust the brows of the prospective cup-bearer had
knitted blackly. The scowl was unpropitious.
"Thou mayest come freely now," he growled, "The way shall be clear."
The lady looked at him in mock fear.
"Come, Nechutes," the sculptor implored laughingly, "be gracious.
Being in highest favor, it behooves thee to be generous."
But the prospective cup-bearer refused to be placated. He rumbled an
order to the slaves and they shouldered the litter.
Ta-meri made a pretty mouth at him, and turned again to Kenkenes.
"Nay, Kenkenes," she said. "It was mine to say that the way shall be
clear--but I promise it."
She nodded a bright farewell to him, and they moved away. The
sculptor, still smiling, continued down to the river.
At the landing he engaged one of the numerous small boats awaiting a
passenger, and directed the clout-wearing boatman to drop down the
stream.
Directly opposite his point of embarkation there were farm lands,
fertile and moist, extending inland for a mile. But presently the
frontier of the desert laid down a gray and yellow dead-line over which
no domestic plant might strike its root and live.
But the arable tracts were velvet green with young grain, the verdant
level broken here and there by a rustic's hut, under two or three
close-standing palms. Even from the surface of the Nile the checkered
appearance of the country, caused by the various kinds of products, was
noticeable. Egypt was the most fertile land in the world.
However, as the light bari climbed and dipped on the little waves
toward the north the Arabian hills began to approach the river. Their
fronts became abrupt and showed the edges of stratum on stratum of
white stone. About their bases were quantities of rubble and gray dust
slanting against their sides in slides and drifts. Across the
narrowing strip of fertility square cavities in rows showed themselves
in the white face of the cliffs. The ruins of a number of squat hovels
were barely discernible over the wheat.
"Set me down near Masaarah," Kenkenes said, "and wait for me." The
boatman ducked his head respectfully and made toward the eastern shore.
He effected a landing at a bedding of masonry on which a wharf had once
been built. The rock was now over-run with riotous marsh growth.
The quarries had not been worked for half a century. The thrifty
husbandman had cultivated his narrow field within a few feet of the
Nile, and the roadway that had once led from the ruined wharf toward
the hills was obliterated by the grain.
Kenkenes alighted and struck through the wheat toward the pitted front
of the cliffs. Before him was a narrow gorge that debouched into the
great valley over a ledge of stone three feet in height. After much
winding the ravine terminated in a wide pocket, a quarter of a mile
inland. Exit from this cul-de-sac was possible toward the east by a
steep slope leading to the top of one of the interior ridges of the
desert. Kenkenes did not pause at the cluster of houses. The roofs
had fallen in and the place was quite uninhabitable. But he leaped up
into the little valley and followed it to its end. There he climbed
the sharp declivity and turned back in the direction he had come, along
the flank of the hill that formed the north wall of the gorge. The
summit of the height was far above him, and the slope was covered with
limestone masses. There had been no frost nor rain to disturb the
original rock-piling. Only the agencies of sand and wind had
disarranged the distribution on which the builders of the earliest
dynasty had looked. And this was weird, mysterious and labyrinthine.
At a spot where a great deal of broken rock encumbered the ground,
Kenkenes unslung his wallet and tested the fragments with chisel and
mallet. It was the same as the quarry product--magnesium limestone,
white, fine, close-grained and easily worked. But it was broken in
fragments too small for his purpose. Above him were fields of greater
masses.
"Now, I was born under a fortunate sign," he said aloud as he scaled
the hillside; "but I fear those slabs are too long for a life-sized
statue."
On reaching them he found that those blocks which appeared from a
distance to weigh less than a ton, were irregular cubes ten feet high.
He grumbled his disappointment and climbed upon one to take a general
survey of his stoneyard. At that moment his eyes fell on a block of
proper dimensions under the very shadow of the great cube upon which he
stood. It was in the path of the wind from the north and was buried
half its height in sand.
Kenkenes leaped from his point of vantage with a cry of delight.
"Nay, now," he exclaimed; "where in this is divine disfavor?" He
inspected his discovery, tried it for solidity of position and purity
of texture. Its location was particularly favorable to secrecy.
It stood at the lower end of an aisle between great rocks. All view of
it was cut off, save from that position taken by Kenkenes when he
discovered it. A wall built between it and the north would bar the
sand and form a nook, wholly closed on two sides and partly closed at
each end by stones. All this made itself plain to the mind of the
young sculptor at once. With a laugh of sheer content, he turned to
retrace his steps and began to sing.
Then was the harsh desolation of the hills startled, the immediate
echoes given unaccustomed sound to undulate in diminishing volume from
one to another. He sang absently, but his preoccupation did not make
his tones indifferent. For his voice was soft, full, organ-like,
flexible, easy with illimitable lung-power and ineffable grace. When
he ceased the silence fell, empty and barren, after that song's
unaudienced splendor.
[1] Set--the war-god.
[2] Thebes.
[3] Amenti--The realm of Death.
[4] Tuat--The Egyptian Hades.
[5] Nomarch--governor of a civil division called a nome. A high office.
[6] Ma--The goddess of truth.
CHAPTER
|
ully
through the silence like a roll of muffled drums.
Sleighs like the one that Hawtrey drove are not common on the prairie,
where the farmer generally uses the humble bob-sled when the snow lies
unusually long. It had been made for use in Montreal, and bought back
East by a friend of Hawtrey's, who was possessed of some means, which is
a somewhat unusual thing in the case of a Western wheat-grower. This man
also had bought the team--the fastest he could obtain--and when the
warmth came back to the horses Hawtrey and the girl became conscious of
the exhilaration of the swift and easy motion. The sleigh was light and
narrow, and Hawtrey, who drew the thick driving-robe higher about Sally,
did not immediately draw the mittened hand he had used back again. The
girl did not resent the fact that it still rested behind her shoulder,
nor did Hawtrey attach any particular significance to the fact. He was a
man who usually acted on impulse. How far Sally understood him did not
appear, but she came of folk who had waged a stubborn battle with the
wilderness, and there was a vein of grim tenacity in her.
She was, however, conscious that there was something beneath her feet
which forced her, if she was to sit comfortably, rather close against
her companion; and it seemed expedient to point it out.
"Can't you move a little? I can't get my feet fixed right," she said.
Hawtrey looked down at her with a smile. "I'm afraid I can't unless I
get right outside. Aren't you happy there?"
It was the kind of speech he was in the habit of making, but there was
rather more color in the girl's face than the stinging night air brought
there, and she glanced at the bottom of the sleigh.
"It's a sack of some kind, isn't it?" she asked.
"Yes," Hawtrey answered, "it's a couple of three-bushel bags. Some
special seed Lorton sent to Winnipeg for. Ormond brought them out from
the railroad. I promised I'd take them along to him."
"You should have told me. It's most a league round by Lorton's place,"
Sally returned with reproach in her voice.
"That won't take long with this team. Have you any great objections to
another fifteen minutes' drive with me?"
Sally looked up at him, and the moonlight was on her face, which was
unusually pretty in the radiance of the brilliant night.
"No," she admitted, "I haven't any."
She spoke demurely, but there was a perceptible something in her voice
which might have warned the man, had he been in the habit of taking
warning from anything, which, however, was not the case. It was one of
his weaknesses that he seldom thought about what he did until he was
compelled to face the consequences; and it was, perhaps, to his credit
that he had after all done very little harm, for there was hot blood in
him.
"Well," he responded, "I'm not going to grumble about those extra three
miles, but you were asking what land I meant to break this spring. What
put that into your mind?"
"Our folks," Sally replied candidly. "They were talking about you."
This again was significant, but Hawtrey did not notice it.
"I've no doubt they said I ought to tackle the new quarter section," he
suggested.
"Yes," assented Sally. "Why don't you do it? Last fall you thrashed out
quite a big harvest."
"I certainly did. There, however, didn't seem to be many dollars left
over when I'd faced the bills."
The girl made a little gesture of impatience. "Oh, Bob and Jake and
Jasper sowed on less backsetting," she said, "and they're buying new
teams and plows. Can't you do what they do, though I guess they don't go
off for weeks to Winnipeg?"
The man was silent. He had an incentive for hard work about which she
was ignorant, and he had certainly done much, but the long, iron winter,
when there was nothing that could be done, had proved too severe a test
for him. It was very dreary sitting alone evening after evening beside
the stove, and the company of the somnolent Sproatly was not cheerful.
Now and then his pleasure-loving nature had revolted from the barrenness
of his lot when, stiff and cold, he drove home from an odd visit to a
neighbor, and arriving in the dark found the stove had burned out and
water had frozen hard inside the house. These were things his neighbors
patiently endured, but Hawtrey had fled for life and brightness to
Winnipeg.
Sally glanced up at him with a little nod. "You take hold with a good
grip. Everybody allows that," she observed. "The trouble is you let
things go afterwards. You don't stay with it."
"Yes," assented Hawtrey. "I believe you have hit it, Sally. That's very
much what's the matter with me."
"Then," said the girl with quiet insistence, "won't you try?"
A faint flush crept into Hawtrey's face. Sally was less than
half-taught, and unacquainted with anything beyond the simple, strenuous
life of the prairie. Her greatest accomplishments consisted of some
skill in bakery and the handling of half-broken teams; but she had once
or twice given him what he recognized as excellent advice. There was
something incongruous in the situation, but, as usual, he preferred to
regard it whimsically.
"I suppose I'll have to, if you insist. If ever I'm the grasping owner
of the biggest farm in this district I'll blame you," he answered.
Sally said nothing further on that subject, and some time later the
sleigh went skimming down among the birches in a shallow ravine. Hawtrey
pulled the horses up when they reached the bottom of the ravine, and
glanced up at a shapeless cluster of buildings that showed black amid
the trees.
"Lorton won't be back until to-morrow, but I promised to pitch the bags
into his granary," he said. "If I hump them up the trail here it will
save us driving round through the bluff."
He got down, and though the bags were heavy, with Sally's assistance he
managed to hoist the first of them on to his shoulders. Then he
staggered with it up the steep foot-trail that climbed the slope. He was
more or less accustomed to carrying bags of grain between store and
wagon, but his mittened hands were numbed, and his joints were stiff
with cold. Sally noticed that he floundered rather wildly. In another
moment or two, however, he vanished into the gloom among the trees, and
she sat listening to the uneven crunch of his footsteps in the snow,
until there was a sudden crash of broken branches, and a sound as of
something falling heavily down a declivity. Then there was another
crash, and stillness again.
Sally gasped, and clenched her mittened hands hard upon the reins as she
remembered that Lorton's by-trail skirted the edge of a very steep bank,
but she lost neither her collectedness nor her nerve. Presence of mind
in the face of an emergency is probably as much a question of experience
as of temperament, and, like other women in that country, she had seen
men struck down by half-trained horses, crushed by collapsing
strawpiles, and once or twice gashed by mower blades. This was no doubt
why she remembered that the impatient team would probably move on if she
left the sleigh, and therefore drove the horses to the first of the
birches before she got down. Then she knotted the reins about a branch,
and called out sharply.
No answer came out of the shadows, and her heart beat unpleasantly fast
as she plunged in among the trees, keeping below the narrow trail that
went slanting up the side of the declivity, until she stopped, with
another gasp, when she reached a spot where a ray of moonlight filtered
down. A limp figure in an old skin coat lay almost at her feet, and she
dropped on her knees beside it in the snow. Hawtrey's face showed an
unpleasant grayish-white in the faint silvery light.
"Gregory," she cried hoarsely.
The man opened his eyes, and blinked at her in a half-dazed manner.
"Fell down," he said. "Think I felt my leg go--and my side's stabbing
me. Go for somebody."
Sally glanced round, and noticed that the grain bag lay burst open not
far away. She fancied that he had clung to it after he lost his footing,
which explained why he had fallen so heavily, but that was not a point
of any consequence now. There was nobody who could help her within two
leagues of the spot, and it was evident that she could not leave him
there to freeze. Then she noticed that the trees grew rather farther
apart just there, and rising swiftly she ran back to bring the team. The
ascent was steep, and she had to urge the horses, with sharp cries and
blows from her mittened hand, among shadowy tree trunks and through
snapping undergrowth before she reached the spot where Hawtrey lay. He
looked up at her when at last the horses stood close beside him.
"You can't turn them here," he told her faintly.
Sally was never sure how she managed it, for the sleigh drove against
the slender trunks, and the fiery beasts, terrified by the snapping of
the undergrowth, were almost unmanageable; but at last they were facing
the descent again, and she stooped and twined her arms about the
shoulders of Hawtrey, who now lay almost against the sleigh.
"It's going to hurt, Gregory, but I have got to get you in," she warned
him.
Then she gasped, for Hawtrey was a man of full stature, and it was a
heavy lift. She could not raise him wholly, and he cried out once when
his injured leg trailed in the snow. Still, with the most strenuous
effort she had ever made she moved him a yard or so, and then staggering
fell with her side against the sleigh. She felt faint with the pain of
it, but with another desperate lift she drew him into the sleigh, and
let him sink down gently upon the bag that still lay there. His eyes had
shut again, and he said nothing now.
It required only another moment or two to wrap the thick driving-robe
about him, and after that, with one hand still beneath his neck, she
glanced down. It was clear that he was quite unconscious of her
presence, and stooping swiftly she kissed his gray face. She settled
herself in the driving-seat with only a blanket coat to shelter her from
the cold, and the horses went cautiously down the slope. She did not
urge them until they reached the level, for the trail that wound up out
of the ravine was difficult, but when the wide white expanse once more
stretched away before them she laid the biting whip across their backs.
That was quite sufficient. They were fiery animals, and when they broke
into a furious gallop the rush of night wind struck her tingling cheeks
like a lash of wires. All power of feeling went out of her hands, her
arms grew stiff and heavy, and she was glad that the trail led smooth
and straight to the horizon. Hawtrey, who had moved a little, lay
helpless across her feet. He did not answer when she spoke to him.
The team went far at the gallop. A fine mist of snow beat against the
sleigh, but the girl leaning forward, a tense figure, with nerveless
hands clenched upon the reins, saw nothing but the blue-gray riband of
trail that steadily unrolled itself before her. At length a blurred
mass, which she knew to be a birch bluff, grew out of the white waste,
and presently a cluster of darker smudges shot up into the shape of a
log-house, sod stables, and straw-pile granary. A minute or two later,
she pulled the team up with an effort, and a man, who flung the door of
the house open, came out into the moonlight. He stopped, and gazed at
her in astonishment.
"Miss Creighton!" he said.
"Don't stand there," cried Sally. "Take the near horse's head, and lead
them right up to the door."
"What's the matter?" the man asked stupidly.
"Lead the team up," ordered Sally. "Jump, if you can."
It was supposed that Sproatly had never moved with much expedition in
his life, but that night he sprang towards the horses at a commanding
wave of the girl's hand. He started when he saw his comrade lying in the
bottom of the sleigh, but Sally disregarded his hurried questions.
"Help me to get him out," she said, when he stopped the team. "Keep his
right leg as straight as you can. I don't want to lift him. We must
slide him in."
They did it somehow, though the girl was breathless before their task
was finished, and the perspiration started from the man. Then Sally
turned to Sproatly.
"Get into the sleigh, and don't spare the team," she said. "Drive over
to Watson's, and bring him along. You can tell him your partner's broke
his leg, and some of his ribs. Start right now!"
Sproatly did her bidding, and when the door closed behind him she flung
off her blanket coat and thrust plenty of wood into the stove. She
looked for some coffee in the cupboard, and put on a kettle, after which
she sat down on the floor by Hawtrey's side. He lay still, with the
thick driving-robe beneath him, and though the color was creeping back
into his face, his eyes were shut, and he was apparently quite
unconscious of her presence. For the first time she was aware of a
distressful faintness, which, as she had come suddenly out of the
stinging frost into the little overheated room that reeked with tobacco
smoke and a stale smell of cooking, was not astonishing. She mastered
her dizziness, however, and presently, seeing that Hawtrey did not move,
glanced about her with some curiosity, for it was the first time she had
entered his house.
The room was scantily furnished, and, though very few of the bachelor
farmers in that country live luxuriously, she fancied that Sproatly, who
had evidently very rudimentary ideas on the subject of house-cleaning,
had not brought back all the sundries he had thrown out into the snow.
It contained a table, a carpenter's bench, and a couple of chairs. There
were still smears of dust upon the uncovered floor. The birch-log walls
had been rudely paneled half-way up, but the half-seasoned boards had
cracked with the heat, and exuded streaks of resin to which the grime
and dust had clung. A pail, which contained potato peelings, stood amid
a litter of old long-boots and broken harness against one wall. The
floor was black and thick with grease all round the rusty stove. A pile
of unwashed dishes and cooking utensils stood upon the table, and the
lamp above her head had blackened the boarded ceiling.
Sally noticed it all with disgust, and then, seeing that Hawtrey had
opened his eyes, she made a cup of coffee and persuaded him to drink it.
After that he smiled at her.
"Thanks," he said feebly. "Where's Sproatly? My side stabs me."
Sally raised one hand. "You're not to say a word," she cautioned.
"Sproatly's gone for Watson, and he'll soon fix you up. Now lie quite
still, and shut your eyes again."
Hawtrey obeyed her injunction to lie still, but his eyes were not more
than half-closed, and she could not resist the temptation to see what he
would do if she went away. She had half risen, when he stretched out a
hand and felt for her dress, and she sank down again with a curious
softness in her face. Then he let his eyes close altogether, as if
satisfied, and by and by she gently laid her hand on his.
He did not appear to notice it, and, though she did not know whether he
was asleep or unconscious, she sat beside him, watching him with
compassion in her eyes. There was no sound but the snapping of the birch
billets in the rusty stove. She was anxious, but not unduly so, for she
knew that men who live as the prairie farmers do usually more or less
readily recover from such injuries as had befallen him. It would not be
very long before assistance arrived, for it was understood that the man
for whom she had sent Sproatly had almost completed a medical course in
an Eastern city before he became a prairie farmer. Why he had suddenly
changed his profession was a point he did not explain, and, as he had
always shown himself willing to do what he could when any of his
neighbors met with an accident, nobody troubled him about the matter.
By and by Sproatly brought Watson to the homestead, and he was busy with
Hawtrey for some time. Then they got him to bed, and Watson came back to
the room where Sally was anxiously waiting.
"Hawtrey's idea about his injuries is more or less correct, but we'll
have no great trouble in pulling him round," he said. "The one point
that's worrying me is the looking after him. One couldn't expect him to
thrive upon slabs of burnt salt pork, and Sproatly's bread."
"I'll do what I can," said Sproatly indignantly.
"You!" replied Watson. "It would be criminal to leave you in charge of a
sick man."
Sally quietly put on her blanket coat. "If you can stay a few hours,
I'll be back soon after it's light," she said. She turned to Sproatly.
"You can wash up those dishes on the table, and get a brush and sweep
this room out. If it's not quite neat to-morrow you'll do it again."
Sproatly grinned as she went out. A few moments later the girl drove
away through the bitter frost.
CHAPTER III
WYLLARD ASSENTS
Sally, who returned with her mother, passed a fortnight at Hawtrey's
homestead before Watson decided that his patient could be entrusted to
Sproatly's care. Afterwards she went back twice a week to make sure that
Sproatly, in whom she had no confidence, was discharging his duties
satisfactorily. With baskets of dainties for the invalid she had driven
over one afternoon, when Hawtrey, whose bones were knitting well, lay
talking to another man in his little sleeping-room.
There was no furniture in the room except the wooden bunk in which he
lay, and a deerhide lounge chair he had made. The stove-pipe from the
kitchen led across part of one corner, and then up again into the room
beneath the roof above. It had been one of Sproatly's duties since the
accident to rise and renew the fire soon after midnight, and when Sally
arrived he was outside the house, whip-sawing birch-logs and splitting
them, an occupation he profoundly disliked.
Spring had come suddenly, as it usually does on the prairie, and the
snow was melting fast under a brilliant sun. The bright rays that
streamed in through the window struck athwart the glimmering dust motes
in the little bare room, and fell, pleasantly warm, upon the man who sat
in the deerhide chair. He was a year or two older than Hawtrey, though
he had scarcely reached thirty. He was a man of average height, and
somewhat spare of figure. His manner was tranquil and his lean, bronzed
face attractive. He held a pipe in his hand, and was looking at Hawtrey
with quiet, contemplative eyes, that were his most noticeable feature,
though it was difficult to say whether their color was gray or
hazel-brown, for they were singularly clear, and there was something
which suggested steadfastness in their unwavering gaze. The man wore
long boots, trousers of old blue duck, and a jacket of soft deerskin
such as the Blackfeet dress so expertly; and there was nothing about him
to suggest that he was a man of varied experience, and of some
importance in that country.
Harry Wyllard was native-born. In his young days he had assisted his
father in the working of a little Manitoban farm, when the great grain
province was still, for the most part, a wilderness. A prosperous
relative on the Pacific slope had sent him to Toronto University, where
after a session or two he had become involved in a difference of opinion
with the authorities. Though the matter was never made quite clear, it
was generally believed that Wyllard had quietly borne the blame of a
comrade's action, for there was a vein of eccentric generosity in the
lad. In any case, he left Toronto, and the relative, who was largely
interested in the fur business, next sent him north to the Behring Sea.
The business was then a hazardous one, for the skin buyers and pelagic
sealers had trouble with the Alaskan representatives of American trading
companies, upon whose preserves they poached, as well as with the
commanders of the gunboats sent up north to protect the seals.
Men's lives were staked against the value of a fur, edicts were lightly
contravened, and now and then a schooner barely escaped into the
smothering fog with skins looted on forbidden beaches. It was a perilous
life, and a strenuous one, for every white man's hand was against the
traders; there were rangers in fog and gale, and the reefs that lay in
the tideways of almost uncharted waters; but Wyllard made the most of
his chance. He kept the peace with jealous skippers who resented the
presence of a man they might command as mate, but whose views they were
forced to listen to when he spoke as supercargo. He won the good-will of
sea-bred Indians, and drove a good trade with them; he not infrequently
brought his boat loaded with reeking skins back first to the plunging
schooner.
He fell into trouble again when they were hanging off the Eastern Isles
under double reefs, watching for the Russians' seals. A boat's crew from
another schooner had been cast ashore, and, as the men were in peril of
falling into the Russians' hands, Wyllard led a reckless expedition to
rescue them. He succeeded, in so far that the wrecked sailors were taken
off the beach through a tumult of breaking surf; but as the relief crews
pulled seaward the fog shut down on them, and one boat, manned by three
men, never reached the schooners. The vessels blew horns all night, and
crept along the smoking beach next day, though the surf made landing
impossible. Then a sudden gale drove them off the shore, and, as it was
evident that their comrades must have perished, they reluctantly sailed
for other fishing grounds. As one result of this, Wyllard broke with his
prosperous relative when he went back to Vancouver.
After that he helped to strengthen railroad bridges among the mountains
of British Columbia. He worked in logging camps, and shoveled in the
mines, and, as it happened, met Hawtrey, who, tempted by high wages, had
spent a winter in the Mountain Province. Wyllard's father, who had taken
up virgin soil in Assiniboia, died soon after Wyllard went back to him,
and a few months later the relative in Vancouver also died. Somewhat to
Wyllard's astonishment, his kinsman bequeathed him a considerable
property, most of the proceeds of which he sank in acres of virgin
prairie. Willow Range was now one of the largest farms between Winnipeg
and the Rockies.
"The leg's getting along satisfactorily?" Wyllard inquired at length.
Hawtrey, who appeared unusually thoughtful, admitted that it was.
"Anyway, it's singularly unfortunate that I'm disabled just now," he
added. "There's the plowing to begin in a week or two, and besides that
I was thinking of getting married."
Wyllard was somewhat astonished at this announcement. For one thing, he
was more or less acquainted with the state of his friend's finances.
During the next moment or two he glanced meditatively through the open
door into the adjoining room, where Sally Creighton was busy beside the
stove. The sleeves of the girl's light bodice were rolled up well above
the elbow, and she had pretty, round arms, which were just then partly
immersed in dough.
"I don't think there's a nicer or more capable girl in this part of
Assiniboia," he remarked.
"Oh, yes," agreed Hawtrey. "Anybody would admit that. Still, since you
seem so sure of it, why don't you marry her yourself?"
Wyllard looked at his comrade curiously. "Well," he said, "there are
several reasons that don't affect Miss Sally and only concern myself.
Besides, it's highly improbable that she'd have me." Before he looked up
again he paused to light his pipe, which had gone out. "Since it
evidently isn't Sally, have I met the lady?" he asked.
"You haven't. She's in England."
"It's four years, isn't it, since you were over there?"
Hawtrey lay silent a minute, and then made a little confidential
gesture.
"I'd better tell you all about the thing," he said. "Our folks were
people of some little standing in the county. In fact, as they were far
from rich, they had just standing enough to embarrass them. In most
respects, they were ultra-conventional with old-fashioned ideas, and,
though there was no open break, I'm afraid I didn't get on with them
quite as well as I should have done, which is why I came out to Canada.
They started me on the land decently, and twice when we'd harvested
frost and horse-sickness, they sent along the draft I asked them for.
That is one reason why I'm not going to worry them, though I'd very much
like another now. You see, there are two girls, as well as Reggie, who's
reading for the Bar."
"I don't think you have mentioned the lady yet."
"She's a connection of some friends of ours. Her mother, so far as I
understand it, married beneath her--a man her family didn't like. The
father and mother died, and Agatha, who was brought up by the father's
relations, was often at the Grange, a little, old-fashioned,
half-ruinous place, a mile or two from where we live in the North of
England. The Grange belongs to her mother's folks, but I think there was
still a feud between them and her father's people, who had her trained
to earn her living. We saw a good deal of each other, and fell in love,
as boy and girl will. Well, when I went back, one winter, after I'd been
here two years, Agatha was at the Grange again, and we decided then that
I was to bring her out as soon as I had a home to offer her."
Hawtrey broke off for a moment, and there was a trace of embarrassment
in his manner when he went on again. "Perhaps I ought to have managed it
sooner," he added. "Still, things never seem to go quite as one would
like with me, and you can understand that a dainty, delicate girl reared
in comfort in England would find it rough out here."
Wyllard glanced round the bare room in which he sat, and into the other,
which was also furnished in a remarkably primitive manner.
"Yes," he assented, "I can quite realize that."
"Well," said Hawtrey, "it's a thing that has been worrying me a good
deal of late, because, as a matter of fact, I'm not much farther forward
than I was four years ago. In the meanwhile, Agatha, who has some talent
for music, was in a first-class master's hands. Afterwards she gave
lessons, and got odd singing engagements. A week ago, I had a letter
from her in which she said that her throat was giving out."
He stopped again for a moment, with trouble in his face, and then
fumbling under his pillow produced a letter, which he carefully folded.
"We're rather good friends," he observed. "You can read that part of
it."
Wyllard took the letter, and a suggestion of quickening interest crept
into his eyes as he read. Then he looked up at Hawtrey.
"It's a brave letter--the kind a brave girl would write," he commented.
"Still, it's evident that she's anxious."
For a moment or two there was silence, which was broken only by Sally
clattering about the stove.
Dissimilar in character, as they were, the two men were firm friends,
and there had been a day when, as they worked upon a dizzy railroad
trestle, Hawtrey had held Wyllard fast when a plank slipped away. He had
thought nothing of the matter, but Wyllard was one who remembered things
of that kind.
"Now," said Hawtrey, after a long pause, "you see my trouble. This place
isn't fit for her, and I couldn't even go across for some time yet. But
her father's folks have died off, and there's nothing to be expected
from her mother's relatives. Any way, she can't be left to face the blow
alone. It's unthinkable. Well, there's only one course open to me, and
that's to raise as much money on a mortgage as I can, fit the place out
with fixings brought from Winnipeg, and sow a double acreage with
borrowed capital. I'll send for her as soon as I can get the house made
a little more comfortable."
Wyllard sat silent a moment or two, and then leaned forward in his
chair.
"No," he objected, "there are two other and wiser courses. Tell the girl
what things are like here, and just how you stand. She'd face it
bravely. There's no doubt of that."
Hawtrey looked at him sharply. "I believe she would, but considering
that you have never seen her, I don't quite know why you should be sure
of it."
Wyllard smiled. "The girl who wrote that letter wouldn't flinch."
"Well," said Hawtrey, "you can mention the second course."
"I'll let you have $1,000 at bank interest--which is less than any
land-broker would charge you--without a mortgage."
Again Hawtrey showed a certain embarrassment. "No," he replied, "I'm
afraid it can't be done. I had a kind of claim upon my people, though it
must be admitted that I've worked it off, but I can't quite bring myself
to borrow money from my friends."
Wyllard who saw that he meant it, made a gesture of resignation. "Then
you must let the girl make the most of it, but keep out of the hands of
the mortgage man. By the way, I haven't told you that I've decided to
make a trip to the Old Country. We had a bonanza crop last season, and
Martial could run the range for a month or two. After all, my father was
born yonder, and I can't help feeling now and then that I should have
made an effort to trace up that young Englishman's relatives, and tell
them what became of him."
"The one you struck in British Columbia? You have mentioned him, but, so
far as I remember, you never gave me any particulars about the thing."
Wyllard seemed to hesitate, which was not a habit of his.
"There is," he said, "not much to tell. I struck the lad sitting down,
played out, upon a trail that led over a big divide. It was clear that
he couldn't get any further, and there wasn't a settlement within a good
many leagues of the spot. We were up in the ranges prospecting then.
Well, we made camp and gave him supper--he couldn't eat very much--and
afterwards he told me what brought him there. It seemed to me he had
always been weedy in the chest, but he had been working waist-deep in an
icy creek, building a dam at a mine, until his lungs had given out. The
mining boss was a hard case and had no mercy on him, but the lad, who
had had a rough time in the Mountain Province, stayed with it until he
played out altogether."
Wyllard's face hardened as he mentioned the mining boss, and a curious
little sparkle crept into his eyes, but after a pause he proceeded
quietly:
"We did what we could for the boy. In fact, it rather broke up the
prospecting trip, but he was too far gone. He hung for a week or two,
and one of us brought a doctor out from the settlements, but the day
before we broke camp Jake and I buried him."
Hawtrey made a sign of comprehension. He was reasonably well acquainted
with his comrade's character, and fancied he knew who had brought the
doctor out. He knew also that Wyllard had been earning his living as a
railroad navvy or chopper then, and, in view of the cost of provisions
brought by pack-horse into the remoter bush, the reason why he had
abandoned his prospecting trip after spending a week or two taking care
of the sick lad was clear enough.
"You never learned his name?" Hawtrey asked.
"I didn't," answered Wyllard. "I went back to the mine, but several
things suggested that the name upon the pay-roll wasn't his real one. He
began a broken message the night he died, but the hemorrhage cut him off
in the middle of it. The wish that I should tell his people somehow was
in his eyes."
Wyllard broke off for a moment with the deprecatory gesture, which in
connection with the story was very expressive.
"I have never done it, but how could I? All I know is that he was a
delicately brought up young Englishman, and the only clew I have is a
watch with a London maker's name on it and a girl's photograph. I've a
very curious notion that I shall meet that girl some day."
Hawtrey, who made no comment, lay still for a minute or two, but his
face suggested that he was considering something.
"Harry," he said presently, "I shall not be fit for a journey for quite
a while yet, and if I went over to England I couldn't get the plowing
done and the crop in; which, if I'm going to be married, is absolutely
necessary."
There was no doubt about the truth of the statement, for the small
Western farmer has very seldom a balance in hand, and for that matter,
is not infrequently in debt to the nearest storekeeper. He must, as a
rule, secure a harvest or abandon his holding, since as soon as the crop
is thrashed the bills pour in. Wyllard made a sign of assent.
"Well," Hawtrey went on, "if you're going to England you could go as my
deputy. You could make Agatha understand what things are like here, and
bring her out to me. I'll arrange for the wedding to be soon as she
arrives."
Wyllard was not a conventional person, but he pointed out several
objections. Hawtrey overruled them, however, and eventually Wyllard
reluctantly assented.
"As it happens, Mrs. Hastings is going over, too, and if she comes back
about the same time the thing might be managed," he said. "I believe
she's in Winnipeg just now, but I'll write to her. By the way, have you
a photograph of Agatha?"
"I haven't," Hawtrey answered. "She gave me one, but somehow it got
mislaid on house-cleaning. That's rather an admission, isn't it?"
It occurred to Wyllard that it certainly was. In fact, it struck him as
a very curious thing that Hawtrey should have lost the picture which the
girl with whom he was in love had given him. He sat silent for a moment
or two, and then stood up.
"When I hear from Mrs. Hastings, I'll drive around again. Candidly, the
thing has somewhat astonished me. I always had a fancy it would be
Sally."
Hawtrey laughed. "Sally?" he replied. "We're first-rate friends, but I
never
|
by the bar; so he pushed along, and his
movement brought another into a similar position. Seeing how the case
was, the rogues kept the capstan going, in spite of the commands of the
officers, until two thirds of the gang had dropped into the steerage.
It was finally suspended by the efforts of the excited officers, who
took hold of the bars with their own hands, and counteracted the
efforts of the rogues.
The young rascals in the steerage pretended to be hurt more seriously
than they were, though some of them had struck the steps or the floor
below with force enough to make them feel a little sore. They began to
limp, and to rub their shins and shoulders, their heads and arms, very
vigorously, as though they believed that friction was a sovereign
remedy for aching bones.
"Why didn't you stop, Hunter, when I ordered you to do so?" demanded
Leavitt, indignantly.
"I couldn't, sir," replied the lamb, speaking only the simple truth.
"Yes, you could! I will report you for disobedience."
"I was right over the hatch, and I had either to go down or jump over:
I couldn't stop there."
"And you did the same thing, Hyde," added the officer.
"I couldn't help it, sir," replied he. "When Hunter got over, he
dragged me so far that I couldn't stop."
"Why didn't you let go, then?" demanded Leavitt, angrily.
"I was afraid the next bar would hit me in the head."
Both of these boys were ordinarily models of propriety, and they had
not, for an instant, intended to do anything out of order. The real
culprits were all at the foot of the stairs, rubbing their limbs and
making the most terrible contortions, as though their legs, arms, and
heads were actually broken. The officers had all seen Hunter and Hyde
pushing along the bars after the order had been given to stop. They
seemed to be guilty, and they were required to report at the mainmast
to the first lieutenant, for discipline. The second lieutenant then
went down the fore-hatch, where the appalling spectacle of a crowd of
sufferers was presented to his view.
"Are you hurt, Little?" he asked, turning to the most prominent victim
of the catastrophe.
"Yes, sir," groaned Little, twisting his back-bone almost into a hard
knot, and trying to reach the seat of his injury with both hands at the
same time.
"How happened you to fall through?" inquired Leavitt, more gently than
he had spoken on deck, for the sight of all this misery evidently
affected him.
"I don't know, sir," answered Little, with one of his most violent
contortions. "I was looking up at the fore-yard arm, and--ugh!--the
first thing I knew, I was--O, dear!--I was down here, with
that--ugh!--with that plank on top of me."
"Are you much hurt?"
"I don't know. It aches first rate," cried Little, with a deep,
explosive sigh.
"Well, go aft, and report to the surgeon."
"I don't want to go to the surgeon. He mauls me about to death. I shall
be better soon."
"On deck, all who are able to do so!" added Leavitt. "Bennington, you
will ask Dr. Winstock to attend to those who are hurt, and report to
the first lieutenant."
But it did not appear that any one was so much injured as to require
the services of the surgeon, for the whole party went on deck at the
order. Little still writhed and twisted. Howe rubbed his knee, and
Spencer nursed his elbow. Commodore Kendall, who had witnessed the
whole affair, did not see how it was possible for them to tumble down
the hatchway without injuring themselves, and he was willing to believe
that the appearance was not deceitful. He had kept his eyes fixed upon
the crew as they walked round the capstan, but he was unable to
determine whether the mishap was the result of accident or intention.
Again the captain came forward; but after consulting with Paul, he
returned to the quarter-deck without making any comments. The two lambs
had reported to the first lieutenant, and the matter had gone to
Captain Shuffles, who directed the culprits to be sent to the
principal. They went into the steerage, and knocking at the door of the
main cabin, Mr. Lowington came out, and heard their statement. They
were ordered to their mess-rooms to await an investigation.
The hatchway was closed, and the order to man the capstan was given a
third time. The injured seamen had in a measure recovered the use of
their limbs, and though they still limped and squirmed, they took their
places in the line. Either their will or their ingenuity to do mischief
failed them, the third time, for the form of heaving up the anchor to a
short stay was regularly accomplished. The commodore and all the
officers in the forward part of the ship watched the operation with the
keenest scrutiny, and when it was successfully finished, they hoped the
end of all the mishaps had come.
"Pawl the capstan! Unship the bars! Stations for loosing sail!"
continued the first lieutenant. "Lay aloft, sail-loosers!"
The nimble young tars, whose places were aloft, sprang up the rigging.
"Man the boom-tricing lines!"
But the boom-tricing lines appeared to be in a snarl, and it was some
time before they were ready for use, being manipulated by some of the
mischief-makers.
"Trice up!" shouted Goodwin, the executive officer.
Up went the inner ends of the studding-sail booms.
"Lay out!" added Goodwin.
"Lay out!" repeated the midshipmen in the tops; and the seamen ran out
on the foot-ropes to their several stations for loosing sail.
At the same time, the forecastle hands were loosing the fore-topmast
staysail, jib, and flying jib, and the after-guard, or quarter-deck
hands, were clearing away the spanker.
"Loose!" said the executive officer; and the hands removed the gaskets,
stoppers, and other ropes, used to confine the sails when furled.
"Stand by--let fall!" was the next order.
At this command all the square sails should have dropped from the yards
at the same instant, but as a matter of fact, not half of them did
drop. Sheets, buntlines, bowlines, lifts, reef-pendants, and halyards
were fearfully snarled up. Some of the seamen on the yards were pulling
one way, and some another; some declared the snarl was in one place,
others in another place. The rogues had realized an undoubted success
in the work they had undertaken. Vainly the midshipmen in the tops
tried to bring order out of confusion. Those who were actually laboring
to untangle the ropes only increased the snarl.
The condition of affairs was duly reported to the captain, who had
become very impatient at the long delay. The masters were then sent
aloft to help the midshipmen unravel the snarl, but they succeeded no
better. It was evident enough to all the officers that this confusion
could not have been created without an intention to do it. An accident
might have happened on the main or the mizzen-mast, but not on every
yard on all three of the masts.
"What are you about?" asked Perth, who had been sent into the main-top,
as he met Howe.
"We have come to the conclusion that Bob Shuffles can't handle this
ship," whispered the ringleader of the mischief, with a significant
wink.
"You are getting us into a scrape."
"Well, we all are in the same boat."
"Don't carry it too far," suggested Master Perth.
"Carry what too far?" demanded Robinson, the midshipman in the top, who
had heard a word or two of the confidential talk--enough to give him an
idea of what was in the wind.
"Dry up, old fellow," said Perth, with some confusion, as Howe, who had
come down from the yard to cast off a line, sprang back to his place.
"What did you mean by that remark of yours?" inquired the midshipman.
"I told Howe not to carry the end of the buntline too far. It was wound
three times around the topsail sheet."
"Was that what you meant?" asked Robinson, suspiciously.
"Don't you see that buntline?" replied Perth. "It is fouled in the
sheet, and he was pulling it through farther, so as to snarl it up
still worse."
"All right," replied the inferior, who, however, was far from being
satisfied with the explanation.
"All right!" retorted Perth, smartly. "Is that the way you address your
superior officer. One would think I was responsible to you for my words
and actions."
"I didn't mean that," added Robinson.
"What did you mean?"
"I only said all right to your explanation."
"You did--did you?" said Perth, severely. "Then you called me to an
account, and now you acquit me!"
"I beg your pardon. Whatever I said, I did not mean anything
disrespectful," pleaded Robinson.
"Is this the kind of discipline among the officers? If it is, I don't
wonder that the crew get snarled up. I don't like to blow on a fellow,
but I'm tempted to send you to the mainmast."
"I didn't mean anything."
Master Perth turned from his abashed inferior, ascended the main
rigging, and with a few sharp orders, compelled the topmen to unsnarl
the ropes. He was afraid the midshipman would report what he had said
to the captain, and he had attempted to intimidate him into silence by
threatening him with a similar fate.
"On deck!" hailed Perth from the top. "All ready in the main-top, sir,"
he added, when the third lieutenant answered his hail from the waist.
After a delay of half an hour, a like report came down from the fore
and mizzen-tops. The masters returned to their stations on deck, and
everything was in readiness to continue the manoeuvre. Captain Shuffles
was in earnest conversation with Commodore Kendall. A more unsatisfactory
state of things could not exist than that which prevailed on board of
the Young America. The conduct of the crew amounted almost to mutiny.
Those who had maliciously made the mischief, and those who had been
engaged in it from a love of fun, had succeeded in confounding those
who meant to do their duty. It was impossible to tell who were guilty
and who were innocent; for three quarters, at least, of the crew seemed
to be concerned in the confusion.
"It is clear enough that they are hazing me," said Captain Shuffles,
sadly. "I don't know that I have done anything to set the fellows
against me."
"Certainly not," replied Paul, warmly. "You have only done your duty. I
have no doubt those fellows who ran away in the Josephine are at the
bottom of it. If I am not very much mistaken, I saw Howe, on the
main-topsail yard, tangling up the buntlines and sheets."
"I have heard that these fellows intended to get even with me," added
Shuffles, with a smile, as though he had not much fear of them.
"I should keep the crew at work until they did their duty. I would keep
them at it night and day, till they can get the ship under way without
any confusion," added Paul, earnestly.
"I intend to do that, but I do not like to be hard upon them."
"There is no danger of your being too hard."
"Whether I am hard or not, I'm going to have the work done in
ship-shape style, if we drill till morning. All hands, furl sails,"
said he to the first lieutenant.
The boatswain's call sounded through the ship. The necessary orders
were given in detail, and after considerable confusion, the sails were
all furled, and the ship restored to its original condition.
"Pipe to muster," continued the captain.
Under this order all the officers assembled on the quarter-deck.
Captain Shuffles addressed them in the mild tones in which he usually
spoke, as though he was not seriously disturbed by the ill conduct of
the crew. Assigning a lieutenant, a master, and a midshipman to each
mast, he directed them to set each sail separately, without regard to
others. They were to set the topsails first, then the other sails up to
the royals. Other officers were directed to drill the seamen stationed
at the head sails and the spanker.
During this conference Howe and his associates were congratulating
themselves upon the success of their vicious schemes, and encouraging
each other to persevere if another drill was ordered. They were curious
to know what the captain was doing with the officers on the
quarter-deck; but they concluded that it was only a meeting to "howl"
over the miserable discipline of the ship. But their wonderings were
soon set at rest by the boatswain's call of "All hands, make sail,
ahoy!"
They sprang to their stations as zealously as though they had no
thought but for the honor of the ship. They soon discovered that a new
order of proceeding had been introduced. The masters and midshipmen
perched themselves in the rigging, where they could see the movements
of every seaman. The adult forward officers--Peaks, the boatswain,
Bitts, the carpenter, and Leech, the sailmaker--also went aloft, and
stationed themselves on the topmast-stays, so that, besides the
lieutenants on deck, the commodore, and the past officers, there were
three pairs of sharp eyes aloft to inspect the operations on each sail.
Howe and his associates were not a little disconcerted at this array of
inspectors, and still more so when the order was given to loose only
the topsails. Peaks, on the main topmast-stay, caught Howe in the very
act of passing the gasket through the bight of the buntline. The
veteran tar came down upon him with such a torrent of sea slang, that
he did not attempt to repeat the act. The topsails were then set as
smartly and as regularly as ever before. After the inspectors had seen
all the sails set and furled in detail, the topsails, top-gallant
sails, and courses, with the jib and spanker, were set as usual, when
the vessel got under way.
By the time the routine in detail had been practised two or three
times, the officers began to know where to look for the
mischief-makers. Peaks had exposed the ringleader, and the conspirators
were finally beaten at their own game. But Captain Shuffles was not
satisfied; and when the crew were dismissed from muster, he hastened to
the main cabin to consult with the principal.
The conspirators, at close quarters, had lost the day, and discipline
was triumphant.
CHAPTER III.
A GATHERING STORM.
"Mr. Lowington, I should like to go to sea for a day or two," said
Captain Shuffles, when he had obtained the ear of the principal.
"Go to sea!" exclaimed Mr. Lowington. "Why, I thought you were all in a
hurry to go down the Rhine."
"I am not at all satisfied with the discipline of the ship," answered
the new captain. "It requires about as many officers as seamen to
execute any manoeuvre, and I think we need more practice in ship's duty
before we make any more tours on shore."
"How did you succeed in your second drill?"
"We went through with it after a while; but it was only with two
officers in each top, and the adult forward officers on the stays, that
we could set a single sail."
"Have you ascertained who is at the root of the mischief?"
"Howe, for one."
"The runaways, probably," added Mr. Lowington, thoughtfully.
"I have no doubt all of them were concerned in it; but at least half
the crew took part in the mischief. We finally went through all the
forms with tolerable precision. Two or three days' service at sea will
enable us to put everything in good working order. The officers also
ought to have a little practice in their new stations."
"When do you wish to go to sea?"
"Immediately, sir," replied Shuffles.
"To-night?"
"Yes, sir. I think any delay would be injurious to discipline. The crew
have been hazing the officers now for two hours, and have had the best
of it most of the time. If we went to sea without any delay, I think it
would be understood."
"You are right, Captain Shuffles. Where is Commodore Kendall?"
"In the after cabin, sir."
"Send for him, if you please."
The commander sent one of the waiters to call Paul, who presently
appeared.
"Captain Shuffles wishes to go to sea to-night," said Mr. Lowington,
with a smile, as the young commodore entered the cabin; "and I think he
takes a correct view of the situation."
"To-night!" exclaimed Paul, whose thought immediately flashed from the
ship to the Hôtel de l'Europe, in Havre, where Mr. and Mrs. Arbuckle
and Grace were domiciled, having come down from Paris by the morning
train, to be in readiness to start with the ship's company for the
Rhine.
"I know what you are thinking about, Paul," laughed the principal. "You
may go on shore, and invite the Arbuckles to join us; or, as we can
work the ship very well without a commodore, you may stay on shore with
them until our return."
"Invite them to go with us," suggested Shuffles. "I think the presence
of our friends will have a good effect upon the crew."
"I should be very glad to have them go with us," replied Paul.
"It is a little doubtful whether we return to Havre again, for Brest
would be a better place for the vessels to lie during our absence in
Germany," said Mr. Lowington.
"We cannot sail at once--can we?" asked Paul.
"We can get off this evening," replied Mr. Lowington. "Let the stewards
of the ship and the consort go on shore, and get a supply of fresh
provisions. The commodore, in the mean time, can wait on the Arbuckles.
I see no difficulty in getting off by sunset."
"It will be rather short notice for the Arbuckles," suggested Paul.
"They are ready to go to Germany at an hour's notice, and it will
require no more preparation for this voyage. You can go on shore at
once, Commodore Kendall. Captain Shuffles, you will hoist the signal
for sailing; send a boat to the Josephine, and I will give you a letter
for Mr. Fluxion."
The arrangement agreed upon, Captain Shuffles went on deck, and
directed the first lieutenant to pipe away the commodore's barge. The
third lieutenant was detailed to serve in this boat. As its crew went
over the side, Captain Shuffles saw that Howe, Spencer, and four others
of the runaways were of its number, under the new station bill. This
fact induced him to send Peaks with the lieutenant in charge, so as to
guard against any mischief. The third cutter was sent to the Josephine,
with the principal's letter. In this boat, Little was the only runaway.
The first cutter soon after left the ship with the steward, to bring
off a load of fresh provisions.
As the third cutter was obliged to wait for Mr. Fluxion to write an
answer to Mr. Lowington's letter, the crew were allowed to go on board
of the Josephine. The sight of the signal for sailing, which had been
hoisted on board of the Young America, caused no little excitement in
the consort, as, in fact, it did on board of the ship. It looked like a
very sudden movement, for all were anticipating their departure for
Germany by the next or the following day. The principal had told them
they would leave in a few days, and not a word had been said about
going to sea in the interim.
"What's up?" asked Greenway, one of the runaways, who had been
transferred to the Josephine, as Little came on deck.
"I don't know--only that we are going to sea," replied Little. "We have
had high times on board of the ship."
"What have you been doing?"
"Hazing Shuffles," said Little, in a whisper.
"And I'll bet that is the reason why we are going to sea, instead of
going to Germany," answered Greenway, with something like disgust in
his looks and in the tones of his voice.
"No matter; we have proved that Shuffles can't handle the ship. He had
to call on old Peaks to help him before he could get the main-topsail
set."
"But if you play these games we shall be left on board while the rest
of the fellows go down the Rhine."
"Not much! Fluxion is going to Marseilles to see his grandmother, or
somebody else, and if we only make mischief enough, Lowington won't
dare to leave us on board."
Little explained the views of Howe, which he had adopted as his own, to
the effect that the more mischief they made, the better would be their
chances of joining the excursion to Germany. Greenway was foolish
enough to take the same view of the question. If the vice-principal was
obliged to go away, Mr. Lowington would not dare to leave the runaways
with any other person.
"But we don't want to go to Germany," added Little.
"Why not?"
"Simply because we have not been to Paris and Switzerland," replied the
little villain, as he led his companion to the forecastle, where no one
could overhear them. "We are going to have the time we bargained for
when we sailed in the Josephine. If we go with the rest of the fellows,
we intend to take French leave of them as soon as we find an
opportunity to do so. On the whole, I had just as lief stay if Fluxion
is not to have the care of us, for we can slip through the hands of any
other man in the squadron."
"There is some money in Paris waiting for me," said Greenway.
"There is some waiting for a lot of our fellows," replied Little. "I
intend to claim mine as soon as the party begin to go down the Rhine."
"What's the plan? How are the fellows to get off?" asked Greenway.
"Every one must manage that to suit himself. We had better go in little
parties of three or four."
"O, no; it's better to keep together," protested Greenway.
"I don't think so. If we attempt to do anything together again, we
shall be watched. We must look out for our chances."
"But our fellows are separated now, and we can't do anything alone."
"Yes, you can. When you see a good opportunity to start for Paris,
start. That's all you have to do."
"I don't like this way."
"It's the best way. Don't you see that when we are missed we can all be
caught in a bunch again. If we go in a dozen different squads, they
will to chase us in as many different directions. If we start with the
fellows for Germany, we shall step out as we have the chance to do so.
I don't believe in more than two or three going together."
"But some of us may not have any money," suggested Greenway.
"Then they must borrow some of those who have it."
"Lowington got hold of two or three drafts, or bills, sent to the
fellows."
"Only two or three," replied Little, lightly. "Those fellows can either
borrow, or go with the lambs."
The Knights of the Red Cross, afterwards of the Golden Fleece, had
written to their fathers, asking them for remittances to be sent to
Paris, where, after sailing around to Marseilles in the Josephine, and
going the rest of the way by railroad, they were to get their letters.
Most of their parents had complied with the request, but two or three
of them had taken the precaution to inform the principal of the fact,
and the bills had been cashed, the proceeds being placed to the credit
of the students in whose favor they had been drawn. As long as the boys
wrote home, the fathers and mothers seldom communicated with the
principal. Most of the rogues had been informed in their letters from
home that the money wanted had been remitted, and awaited their order
in Paris. The runaways, therefore, would be in funds sufficient for
their stolen excursion as soon as they could reach their destination.
The only thing that disturbed them was the difficulty of obtaining
enough in the beginning to pay their railroad fare to Paris.
While Little was instructing Greenway in the programme for the future,
the crew of the third cutter were called away, and the conference was
abruptly closed. The purport of the letter which the officer in charge
of the boat bore to the principal, was, that Mr. Fluxion did not desire
to leave the consort for his visit to Marseilles until the close of the
week. Howe was perhaps nearer the truth than he really believed when he
declared that Mr. Lowington would not dare to leave the runaways on
board of either vessel in charge of any other person than the
vice-principal. He had been strongly inclined to grant the petition of
Shuffles in their favor; but when it was almost proved that the party
were the cause of all the confusion which had occurred on board of the
ship during the afternoon, that they were in a mutinous frame of mind,
he was not willing to encourage their insubordination. He was much
disturbed by the difficult problem thus thrust upon him. Dr. Carboy,
the professor of natural philosophy and chemistry, who had spent
several years in Germany, had volunteered to take charge of the
runaways, and he seemed to be the only person who was available for
this duty. He was no sailor, and only a fair disciplinarian, and Mr.
Lowington had not entire confidence in his ability to manage thirty of
the wildest boys in the squadron--discontented under the punishment to
which they were subjected.
Though everything was orderly on board of the ship, there was a great
deal of suppressed excitement, not to say indignation, for the crew did
not like the idea of keeping watch and reefing topsails, instead of
voyaging down the beautiful Rhine. The movement looked like a
punishment, and many of the crew felt themselves to be entirely
innocent of the blunders and failures made in handling the ship. They
had done their best, and thought it was not fair to punish the innocent
with the guilty. Doubtless it was not fair; but it was a question which
related to the discipline of the crew, as a whole, and not a dozen of
those who had made the mischief could be identified, even by the seamen
who had worked in the rigging with them, much less by the officers.
The mischief-makers themselves did all they could to foment this spirit
of discontent among those who were ordinarily well disposed. They
assumed the responsibility of declaring that the trip into Germany had
been indefinitely postponed. Probably, with the self-conceit incident
to human nature, they really believed they were no worse than the best
of the crew, and they desired to involve all their shipmates in the
odium of the insubordination which had taken place.
"No Rhine, except pork rind," said Little, as he met Raymond in the
waist, after the latter had expressed his dissatisfaction at the new
order of things.
"Do you think so?" asked Raymond, who had read enough of the splendid
scenery of the Rhine to make him very anxious to see it.
"A fellow that isn't blind can see--can't he?--if he opens his eyes,"
demanded Little. "What did the new captain do this afternoon, the very
minute the crew were dismissed from their stations?"
"I don't know. What did he do?" inquired Raymond, curiously.
"Didn't he rush down into the main cabin? Didn't he have a long talk
with Lowington? Then, wasn't the signal for sailing hoisted at once? I
tell you this is all Shuffles's doings."
"Why should Shuffles want to go to sea any more than the rest of us?"
asked Raymond.
"Why should he? Isn't he the captain of the ship now? Doesn't he want
to try on his new authority, and see how it fits? Don't he want to
punish the crew because they didn't drill well this afternoon? I
believe you are a little deaf in one eye, Raymond, or else you can't
hear in the other. It's all as plain as the figure-head on a French
frigate," continued Little, with enthusiasm enough to convince any
dissatisfied seaman.
"Perhaps it is as you say."
"I know it is."
"The drill was very bad. Every fellow knows that."
"What if it was? Whose fault was it?"
"I don't know whose fault it was; but everything went wrong, and I
suppose the new captain is not satisfied with the state of discipline
on board. I should not be, if I were he."
"Two of your little lambs are cooped up in their state-rooms now for
disobedience of orders."
"Who are they?"
"Hunter and Hyde."
"Two of the best fellows in the ship--never got a black mark in their
lives," said Raymond.
"O, well! The new captain will put you pious fellows through a course
of sprouts that will open your eyes. Shuffles is a liar and a
hypocrite. He has his reward, while an honest fellow, like me, will
stick to his bunk in the steerage till the end of the cruise."
"I don't believe Shuffles is a liar, or a hypocrite. You don't like him
because he broke up your cruise in the Josephine."
"That's not the reason. I am willing to obey the orders of all the
officers, but I don't like to see the crowd punished for nothing,"
replied Little, leading the auditor back to the original topic.
Raymond was not yet a good subject for the mischief-maker to work upon,
though, like a majority of the crew, he was dissatisfied with the
change in the programme. Going to sea meant strict discipline; and
after making up their minds to have a good time on shore, it was not
pleasant to think of hard work and hard study for the next week or two.
[Illustration: THE ARRIVAL OF THE ARBUCKLES.--Page 52.]
"There comes the commodore's barge," continued Little, as he pointed to
the boat, which was rapidly approaching the ship. "The Arbuckles are on
board, with all their trunks. What do you think of that, Raymond?"
The mischief-maker looked triumphant. The pile of baggage in the boat
seemed to furnish sufficient testimony to clinch the argument he had
used.
"That looks like a long cruise, certainly. I suppose they are going
with us," replied Raymond, with a sorrowful and disappointed look.
"To be sure they are. In my opinion we are going to sail for Belfast,
to convey the Arbuckles home. You won't see any Rhine, except a pork
rind, on this cruise. If the fellows have any spunk at all, they won't
stand this thing."
"Stand it! What can they do?" asked Raymond, who really believed the
crew to be unfairly treated.
"Don't you know what they can do? Who works the ship?"
"We do, of course."
"Who would work her if we did not?"
"Well, I suppose she would not be worked at all," replied Raymond,
smiling.
"Then, if all the fellows respectfully refuse to man the capstan, or to
unloose a sail, till they have their rights, who will get the ship
under way?"
"We are not going to do anything of that sort," answered Raymond,
rather indignantly. "It would be mutiny."
"You needn't call it by that name, if you don't wish to. Lowington
promised the fellows a trip down the Rhine. Now, because the new
captain could not handle the ship, we are to be sent off to sea. If the
fellows had any grit at all in their bones, they would show Lowington
that they are not slaves to him, or any other man."
"I think we won't talk any more about that," said Raymond, as he moved
off, for the bold speech of the mischief-maker alarmed him, and caused
him to realize that he was listening to one of the ringleaders of the
runaways.
The commodore's barge came up to the gangway. The ladies were assisted
up the steps, and the trunks hoisted on board and stowed away in the
after cabin. The two state-rooms, which had been built for the use of
the commodore and the past officers, were appropriated to their use.
If Raymond, and such as he, were not willing to listen to the mutinous
counsels of the runaways, he was not the less dissatisfied and
discontented. The arrival of the Arbuckles, with their baggage,
indicated that the trip to the Rhine had been abandoned. Perhaps the
well-disposed students could have submitted to this disappointment, if
it had not been inflicted upon them as a punishment. It seemed to them
that they were to suffer for a whim of Shuffles. The runaways had taken
pains to disseminate this idea among the crew, as they had also
succeeded in involving the whole of them in the mischief which induced
the principal to go to sea that night.
All over the deck and throughout the steerage, the boys were grumbling
and growling like regular old salts, whose prerogative it is to find
fault. When Howe and Spencer returned in the barge, they readily
perceived the state of feeling on board. Little told them what he had
said and done, and convinced them that the whole crew were ripe for a
strike. The entire ship's company were discussing their grievances, and
even a large portion of the officers were dissatisfied. Very likely the
sudden elevation of Shuffles had created a feeling of jealousy in the
minds of a portion of them.
The mischief-makers were prompt in taking advantage of this state of
feeling in the crew. They fanned the flame of discontent, and it was
not difficult to convince their shipmates that they were very hardly
used; that the new captain was imposing a heavy burden upon them. Some
of the best disposed of them were in favor of waiting upon the
principal, and representing their view of the case to him; but the more
impetuous ones laughed at this plan. Shuffles was the principal's pet,
and he would support his _protégé_ against everybody else on board. The
students talked as boys talk, and acted as boys act. At that moment
Shuffles was the most unpopular fellow on board, for it was understood
that he had proposed and advocated the obnoxious measure. The ship's
company were willing to believe that Mr. Lowington had yielded his
assent to please the new captain, rather than because he deemed it
necessary to go to sea himself.
By the time the first cutter returned, a large majority of the students
had decided that something should be done. They could not agree upon
the precise step to be taken. Some advocated a protest, others a
respectful refusal to do duty; and a few went in for a square mutiny.
The provisions were transferred from the cutter to the ship, and the
boat was hoisted up before the perplexing question could be settled.
"After supper, let every fellow go to his mess-room. Don't answer the
boatswain's call to weigh anchor," said Raymond, who had made
considerable progress in rebellion since his conversation with Little.
"Ay, ay! That's the talk!" responded half a dozen of the group, who had
been anxiously discussing the question.
"No, no!" added half a dozen others.
"Why not?" demanded Raymond of the opponents of the plan.
"Because the Arbuckles are on board, for one reason, and because it
will be mutiny, for the second," said Tremere, who volunteered to be
spokesman for the opposition. "Mr. Arbuckle has taken us through
Switzerland, and paid all the bills, and has invited us to another
excursion on the same terms. Now, when he comes on board with his
family, to take a little sail with us, we refuse to do duty. It looks
like contempt and ingratitude to him."
"It has nothing to do with him," replied Raymond, warmly. "Here is the
whole matter in a nutshell. Mr. Arbuckle invited us to take a trip into
Germany, and Mr. Lowington promised that we should go. Then, because we
don't drill quite as well as the new captain wishes, he insists upon
going to sea. The cruise down the Rhine is given up, and we are to
carry the Arbuckles to Belfast."
"Who says we are
|
a downward glance along the encasement of
the outer man. Silk shirt, a very pure white; bright tie, very new;
white flannels, very spick and span; silken hose and low white ties.
This garb for Ben Gaynor the lumberman, who felt not entirely at his
ease, hence the sheepish grin; a fond father decked out by his daughter
as King well guessed; hence that gleam of tenderness.
"Gloria's doings," he chuckled. "Sent ahead from San Francisco with
explicit commands. I guess I'd wear a monkey-jacket if she said so,
Mark." But none the less his eyes, as they appraised the rough garb of
his guest, were envious. "I can breathe better, just the same, in boots
like yours," he concluded. He stretched his long arms high above his
head. "I wish I could get out into the woods for a spell with you,
Mark."
And he did not know, did not in the least suspect, that he was failing
the minutest iota in his loyalty to Gloria and her mother. He was
thinking only of their guests, whom he could not quite consider his own.
"The very thing," said King eagerly. "That's just what I want."
But Gaynor shook his head and his thin, aristocratic face was briefly
overcast, and for an instant shadows crept into his eyes.
"No can do, Mark," he said quietly. "Not this time. I've got both hands
full and then some."
King leaned forward in his chair, his hand gripping Gaynor's knee.
"Ben, it's there. I've always known it, always been willing to bet my
last dollar. Now I'd gamble my life on it."
Gaynor's mouth tightened and his eyes flashed.
"Between you and me, Mark," he said in a voice which dropped
confidentially, "I'd like mighty well to have my share right now. I've
gone in pretty deep here of late, a little over my head, it begins to
look. I've branched out where I would have better played my own game and
been content with things as they were going. I----" But he broke off
suddenly; he was close to the edge of disloyalty now. "What makes you so
sure?" he asked.
"I came up this time from Georgetown. You remember the old trail, up by
Gerle's, Red Cliff and Hell Hole, leaving French Meadows and Heaven's
Gate and Mount Mildred 'way off to the left. I had it all pretty much
my own way until I came to Lookout Ridge. And who do you suppose I found
poking around there?"
"Not old Loony Honeycutt!" cried Gaynor. Then he laughed at himself for
allowing an association of ideas to lead to so absurd a thought. "Of
course not Honeycutt; I saw him last week, as you wanted me to, and he
is cabin-bound down in Coloma as usual. Can't drag his wicked old feet
out of his yard. Who, then, Mark?"
"Swen Brodie then. And Andy Parker."
Gaynor frowned, impressed as King had been before him.
"But," he objected as he pondered, "he might have been there for some
other reason. Brodie, I mean. Remember that the ancient and
time-honoured pastimes of the Kentucky mountains have come into vogue in
the West. Everybody knows, and that includes even the government agents
in San Francisco, that there is a lot of moonshine being made in
out-of-the-way places of the California mountains. There's a job for
Swen Brodie and his crowd. There's talk of it, Mark."
"Maybe," King admitted. "But Brodie was looking for something, and not
revenue men, at that. He and Parker were up on the cliffs not a
quarter-mile from the old cabin. They stood close together, right at the
edge. Parker fell. Brodie looked down, turned on his heel and went off,
smoking his stinking pipe, most likely. I buried Parker the next
morning."
"Poor devil," said Gaynor. Then his brows shot up and he demanded:
"You mean Brodie did for him? Shoved him over?"
"That's exactly what I mean. But I can't tie it to Brodie, not so that
he couldn't shake himself free of it. Parker didn't say so in so many
words; I saw the whole thing from the mountain across the lake, too far
to swear to anything like that. But this I can swear to: Brodie was in
there for the same thing we've been after for ten years. And what is
more, it's open and shut that he was of a mind to play whole-hog and
pushed Andy Parker over to simplify matters. In my mind, even though I
can't hope to ram that down a jury."
"How do you _know_ what Brodie and Parker were after?"
"Andy Parker. He was sullen and tight-mouthed for the most part until
delirium got him. Then he babbled by the hour. And all his talk was of
Gus Ingle and the devil's luck of the unlucky Seven, with every now and
then a word for Loony Honeycutt and Swen Brodie."
"If there is such a thing as devil's luck," said Gaynor with a sober
look to his face, "this thing seems plastered thick with it."
King grunted his derision.
"We'll take a chance, Ben," he said. "And, after all, one man's bane is
another man's bread, you know. Now I've told you my tale, let's have
yours. You saw Honeycutt; could you get anything out of him?"
"Only this, that you are dead right about his knowing or thinking that
he knows. He is feebler than he was last fall, a great deal feebler both
in body and mind. All day he sits on his steps in the sun and peers
through his bleary eyes across the mountains, and chuckles to himself
like an old hen. 'Oh, I know what you're after,' he cackles at me,
shrewd enough to hit the nail square, too, Mark. 'And,' he rambles on,
'you've come to the right man. But am I goin' to blab now, havin' kept a
shut mouth all these years?' And then he goes on, his rheumy-red eyes
blinking, to proclaim that he is feeling a whole lot stronger these
days, that he is getting his second wind, so to speak; that come
mid-spring he'll be as frisky as a colt, and that then he means to have
what is his own! And that is as close as he ever comes to saying
anything. About this one thing, I mean. He'll chatter like a magpie
about anything else, even his own youthful evil deeds. He seems to know
somehow that no longer has the law any interest in his old carcass, and
begins to brag a bit of the wild days up and down the forks of the
American and of his own share in it all; half lies and the other half
blood-dripping truth, I'd swear. It makes a man shiver to listen to the
old cut-throat."
"He can't live a thousand years," mused King. "He is eighty now, if he's
a day."
"Eighty-four by his own estimate. But when it's a question of that, he
sits there and sucks at his toothless old gums and giggles that it's the
first hundred years that are the hardest to get through with and he's
gettin' away with 'em."
"He knows something, Ben."
"So do we, or think we do. So does Brodie, it would seem. Does old
Honeycutt know any more than the rest of us?"
"We are all young men compared with Loony Honeycutt, all
Johnny-come-lately youngsters. Gus Ingle and his crowd, as near as we
can figure, came to grief in the winter of 1853. By old Honeycutt's own
count he would have been a wild young devil of seventeen then. And
remember he was one of the roaring crowd that made the country what it
was after '49. He knows where the old cabin was on Lookout; he swears he
knows who built it in that same winter of '53. And----"
"And," cut in Gaynor, "if you believe the murderous old rascal, he knows
with sly, intimate knowledge how and why the man in the lone cabin was
killed. All in that same winter of '53!"
King pricked up his ears.
"I didn't know that. What does he say?"
"He talks on most subjects pretty much at random. He knows that the
sheriff only laughs at him, since who would want to snatch the old
derelict away from his mountains after all these years and try to fix a
crime of more than half a century ago on him? But as the law laughs and
at least pretends to disbelieve, his pride is hurt. So he has grown into
the way of wild boasting. You ought to hear him talk about the affair at
Murderer's Bar! It makes a man shiver to stand there in the sunshine and
hear him. And, with the rest of his drivelling braggadocio, to hear him
tell it, hinting broadly it was a boy of seventeen who, carrying nothing
but an axe, did for the poor devil in the cabin."
"And I, for one, believe him! What is more, I am dead certain--call it
a hunch, if you like--that if he had had the use of his legs all these
years, he'd have gone straight as a string where we are trying to get."
He began to pace up and down, frowning. "Brodie has been hanging around
him lately, hasn't he?"
"Yes. Brodie and Steve Jarrold and Andy Parker and the rest of Brodie's
worthless crowd of illicit booze-runners. They hang out in the old
McQuarry shack, cheek by jowl with Honeycutt. I saw them, thick as
flies, while I was there last week. Brodie, it seems, has even been
cooking the old man's meals for him."
"There you are!" burst out King. "What more do you want? Imagine Swen
Brodie turning over his hand for anybody on earth if there isn't
something in it all for Swen Brodie. And I'll go bond he's giving
Honeycutt the best, most nourishing meals that have come his way since
his mother suckled him--Swen Brodie bound on keeping him alive until he
gets what he's after. When he'd kick old Honeycutt in the side and leave
him to die like a dog with a broken back."
"Well," demanded Gaynor, "what's to be done? With all his jabberings,
Honeycutt is sly and furtive and is obsessed with the idea that there is
one thing he won't tell."
"Will you go and see him one more time?"
"What's the good, Mark? If he does know, he gets lockjaw at the first
word. I've tried----"
"There's one thing we haven't tried. Old Honeycutt is as greedy a miser
as ever gloated over a pile of hoardings. We'll get a thousand
dollars--five thousand, if necessary--in hard gold coin, if we have to
rob the mint for it. You'll spread it on the table in his kitchen.
You'll let it chink and you'll let some of it drop and roll. If that
won't buy the knowledge we want----But it will!"
"I've known the time when five thousand wasn't as much money as it is
right now, Mark----"
"I've got it, if I scrape deep. And I'll dig down to the bottom."
"And if we draw a blank?"
But there was a step at the door, the knob was turning. Mark King
turned, utterly unconscious of the quick stiffening of his body as he
awaited the introduction to Ben's wife.
_Chapter IV_
At first, King was taken aback by Mrs. Ben's youthfulness. Or look of
youth, as he understood presently. He knew that she was within a few
years of Ben's age, and yet certainly she showed no signs of it to his
eyes, which, though keen enough, were, after a male fashion,
unsophisticated. She was a very pretty woman, _petite_, alert, and
decidedly winsome. He understood in a flash why Ben should have been
attracted to her; how she had held him to her own policies all these
years, largely because they were hers. She was dressed daintily; her
glossy brown hair was becomingly arranged about the bright, smiling
face. She chose to be very gracious to her husband's life-long friend,
giving him a small, plump hand in a welcoming grip, establishing him in
an instant, by some sleight of femininity which King did not plumb, as a
hearthside intimate most affectionately regarded. His first two
impressions of her, arriving almost but not quite simultaneously, were
of youthful prettiness and cleverness.
She slipped to a place on the arm of Gaynor's chair, her hand, whose
well-kept beauty caught and held King's eyes for a moment, toying with
her husband's greying hair.
"She loves old Ben," thought King. "That's right."
Mrs. Ben Gaynor was what is known as a born hostess very charming.
Hostess to her husband, of whom she saw somewhat less each year than of
a number of other friends. She had always the exactly proper meed of
intimacy to offer each guest in accordance with the position he had come
to occupy, or which she meant him to occupy, in her household. Akin to
her in instinct were those distinguished ladies of the colourful past
of whom romantic history has it that in the salons of their doting lords
and masters they gave direction, together with impetus or retardation,
to muddy political currents. Clever women.
Not that cleverness necessarily connotes heartlessness. She adored Ben;
you could see that in her quick dark eyes, which were always animated
with expression. If she was not more at his side, the matter was simply
explained; she adored their daughter Gloria no less, and probably
somewhat more, and Gloria needed her. Surely Gaynor's needs, those of a
grown man, were less than those of a young girl whose budding youth must
be perfected in flower. And if Mrs. Ben was indefatigable in keeping
herself young while Ben quietly accepted the gathering years, it was
with no thought of coquetting with other men, but only that she might
remain an older sister to her daughter, maintain the closer contact, and
see that Gloria made the most of life. Any small misstep which she
herself had made in life her daughter must be saved from making; all of
her unsatisfied yearnings must be fulfilled for Gloria. She constituted
herself cup-bearer, wine-taster and handmaiden for their daughter. If it
were necessary to engrave another fine line in old Ben's forehead in
order to add a softer tint to Gloria's rose petals, she was sincerely
sorry for Ben, but the desirable rose tints were selected with none the
less steady hand.
Ben Gaynor's eyes followed his wife pridefully when, at the end of
fifteen pleasant, sunny minutes, she left them, and then went swiftly to
his friend's face, seeking approbation. And he found it. King had risen
as she went out, holding himself with a hint of stiffness, as was his
unconscious way when infrequently in the presence of women; now he
turned to Ben with an odd smile.
"Pretty tardy date to congratulate you, old man," he said with a laugh.
"Don't believe I ever remembered it before, did I?"
Ben glowed and rubbed his long hands together in rich contentment.
"She's a wonder, Mark," he said heartily.
Mark nodded an emphatic approval. Words, which Ben perhaps looked for,
he did not add. Everything had been said in the one word "congratulate."
"Sprang from good old pioneer stock, too, Mark," said Gaynor. "Wouldn't
think now, to look at her, that she was born at Gold Run in a family as
rugged as yours and mine, would you? With precious few advantages until
she was a girl grown, look at what she has made of herself! While you
and I and the likes of us have been content to stay pretty much in the
rough, she hasn't. There's not a more accomplished, cultured little
woman this or the other side Boston, even if she did hail from Gold Run.
And as for Gloria, all her doing; why," and he chuckled, "she hasn't the
slightest idea, I suppose, that she ever had a grandfather who sweated
and went about in shirt-sleeves and chewed tobacco and swore!"
"Have to go all the way back to a grandfather?" laughed King.
"Look at me!" challenged Gaynor, thrusting into notice his immaculate
attire. He chuckled. "One must live down his disgraceful past for his
daughter, you know."
From without came a gust of shouts and laughter from the Gaynor guests
skylarking along the lake shore.
"Come," said Ben. "You'll have to meet the crowd, Mark. And I want you
to see my little girl; I've told her so many yarns about you that she's
dying of curiosity."
King, though he would have preferred to tramp ten miles over rough
trails, gleaning small joy from meeting strangers not of his sort who
would never be anything but strangers to him, accepted the inevitable
without demur and followed his host. He would shake hands, say a dozen
stupid words, and escape for a good long talk with Ben. Then, before the
lunch-hour, he would be off.
Gaynor led the way toward a side door, passing through a hallway and a
wide sun-room. Thus they came abreast of a wide stairway leading to the
second storey. Down the glistening treads, making her entrance like the
heroine in a play, just at the proper instant, in answer to her cue,
came Gloria.
"Gloria," called Gaynor.
"Papa," said Miss Gloria, "I wanted----Oh! You are not alone!"
Instinctively King frowned. "Now, why did she say that?" he asked within
himself. For she had seen him coming to the house. Straight-dealing
himself, circuitous ways, even in trifles, awoke his distrust.
"Come here, my dear," said Ben. "Mark, this is my little girl. Gloria,
you know all about this wild man. He is Mark King."
"Indeed, yes!" cried Gloria. She came smiling down the stairway, a
fluffy pink puffball floating fairy-wise. Her two hands were out,
ingenuously, pretty little pink-nailed hands which had done little in
this world beyond adorn charmingly the extremities of two soft round
arms. For an instant King felt the genial current within him frozen as
he stiffened to meet the girl he had watched in the extravagant dance
down to the lake.
Then, getting his first near view of her, his eyes widened. He had never
seen anything just like her; with that he began realizing dully that he
was straying into strange pastures. He took her two hands because there
was nothing else to do, feeling just a trifle awkward in the
unaccustomed act. He looked down into Gloria's face, which was lifted so
artlessly up to his. Hers were the softest, tenderest grey eyes he had
ever looked into. He had the uneasy fear that his hard rough hands were
rasping the fine soft skin of hers. Yet there was a warm pleasurable
thrill in the contact. Gloria was very much alive and warm-bodied and
beautiful. She was like those flowers which King knew so well, fragrant
dainty blossoms which lift their little faces from the highest of the
old mountains into the rarest of skies, growths seeming to partake of
some celestial perfection; hardy, though they clothed themselves in an
outward seeming of fragile delicacy. _Physically_--he emphasized the
word and barricaded himself behind it as though he were on the defence
against her!--she came nearer perfection than he had thought a girl
could come, and nowhere did he find a conflicting detail from the
tendril of sunny brown hair touching the curve of the sweet young face
to the little feet in their clicking high-heeled shoes. Thus from the
beginning he thought of her in superlatives. And thus did Gloria, like
the springtime coquetting with an aloof and silent wilderness, make her
bright entry into Mark King's life.
"I have been acting-up like a Comanche Indian outside," laughed Gloria.
It was she who withdrew her hands; King started inwardly, wondering how
long he had been holding them, how long he would have held them if she
had not been so serenely mistress of the moment. "My hair was all
tumbling down and I had to run upstairs to fight it back where it
belongs. Isn't a girl's hair a terrible affliction, Mr. King? One of
these days, when papa's back is turned, I'm going to cut it off short,
like a boy's."
An explanation of her presence in the house while her guests were still
in the yard; why explain so trifling a matter? A suggestion that she
retained that lustrous crown of hair just to please her papa, whereas
one who had not been told might have been mistaken in his belief that
this should be one of her greatest prides. Two little fibs for Miss
Gloria; yet, certainly, very small fibs which hurt no one.
Gloria's eyes, despite their soft tenderness, were every whit as quick
as Mark King's when they were, as now, intrigued. Of course both she and
King had heard countless references, one of the other, from Ben Gaynor,
but neither had been greatly interested. King had known that there was a
baby girl, long ago; that fact had been impressed on him with such rare
eloquence that it had created a mental picture which, until now, had
been vivid and like an indelible drawing; he had known, had he ever
paused for reflection, which he had not, that a baby would not stay such
during a period of eighteen years. She had heard a thousand tales of "my
good friend, Mark." Mark, thus, had been in her mind a man of her
father's age, and about such a young girl's romantic ideas do not flock.
But from the first glimpse of the booted figure among the trees she had
sensed other things. King would have blushed had he known how
picturesque he bulked in her eyes; how now, while she smiled at him so
ingenuously, she was doing his thorough-going masculinity full tribute;
how the ruggedness of him, the very scent of the resinous pines he bore
along with him, the clear manlike look of his eyes and the warm dusky
tan of face and hands--even the effect of the careless, worn boots and
the muscular throat showing through an open shirt-collar--put a
delicious little shiver of excitement into her.
Miss Gloria had a pretty way of commanding, half beseeching and yet
altogether tyrannical. King, having agreed to stay to luncheon, was in
the bathroom off Gaynor's room, shaving. Gloria had caught her father
and dragged him off into a corner. "Oh, papa, he is simply magnificent!
Why didn't you _tell_ me? Why, he isn't a bit old and----" And she made
him repaint for her the high lights of an episode of Mark King making a
name for himself and a fortune at the same time in the Klondike country.
She danced away, singing, to her abandoned friends, who were returning
to the house. "It's _the_ Mark King, my dears!" she told them
triumphantly, not unconscious of the depressing result of her
disclosures upon a couple of boys of the college age who adored openly
and with frequent lapses from glorious hope to bleak despair. "The man
who made history in the Klondike. The man who fought his way alone
across fifteen hundred miles of snow and ice and won--oh--I don't know
_what_ kind of a fight. Against all kinds of odds. The very Mark King!
He's papa's best friend, you know."
"Let him be your dad's friend, then," said the young fellow with the
pampered pompadour, his eyes showing a glint of sullen jealousy. "That's
no reason----"
"Why, Archie!" cried Gloria. "You are making yourself just horrid. You
don't want to make me sorry I ever invited you here, do you?" And a
brief half-hour ago Archie had flattered himself that Gloria's dancing
had been chiefly for him.
They were all of Gloria's "set" with one noteworthy exception. Him she
called "Mr. Gratton" while the others were Archie and Teddy and Georgia
and Evelyn and Connie. It was to this "Mr. Gratton" that she turned,
having made a piquant face at the dejected college youth.
"_You_ will like him immensely, I know," she said, while the ears of
poor Archie reddened even as he was being led away by the not very
pretty but extremely comforting Georgia. "He's a real man, every inch of
him." ["Every inch a King!" she thought quickly, unashamed of the pun.]
"A big man who does big things in a big way," she ran on, indicating
that she, too, after that brief meeting had been lured into
superlatives.
"Mr. Gratton," smiled urbanely. For his own part he might have been
called every inch a concrete expression of suavity. He was clad in the
conventional city-dweller's "outdoor rig." Shining puttees lying bravely
about the shape of his leg; brown outing breeches, creased, laced at
their abbreviated ends; shirt of the sport effect; a shrewd-eyed man of
thirty-five with ambitions, a chalky complexion, and a very weak mouth
with full red lips.
"Miss Gloria," he whispered as he managed to have her all to himself a
moment, "you'll make me jealous."
She was used to him saying stupid things. Yet she laughed and seemed
pleased. Gratton egotistically supposed her thought was of him; King
would have been amazed to know that she was already watching the house
for his coming. And he would have been no end amazed and bristling with
defence had he glimpsed the astonishing fact that Gloria already fully
and clearly meant to parade him before her summer friends as her latest
and most virile admirer. Gratton's heavy-lidded pale eyes trailed over
her speculatively.
That forenoon King shook hands with Archie, Teddy, Gratton, and the
rest, made his formal bows to Gloria's girl friends, and felt relief
when the inept banalities languished and he was free to draw apart.
Gratton, with slender finger to his shadowy moustache, bore down upon
him. King did not like this suave individual; he had the habit of
judging a man by first impressions and sticking stubbornly to his snap
judgment until circumstance showed him to be in error. He liked neither
the way Gratton walked nor talked; he had no love for the cut of his
eye; now he resented being approached when there was no call for it.
Never was there a more friendly man anywhere than Mark King when he
found a soul-brother; never a more aloof at times like this one.
"I have been tremendously interested," Gratton led off ingratiatingly,
"in the things I have heard of you, Mr. King. By George, men like you
live the real life."
The wild fancy came booming upon King to kick him over the verandah
railing.
"Think so?" he said coolly, wondering despite himself what "things"
Gratton had heard of him. And from whom? His spirit groaned within him
at the thought that old Ben Gaynor had been lured into paths along which
he should come to hobnob with men like Gratton. He was sorry that he had
promised to stay to lunch. His thoughts all of a sudden were restive,
flying off to Swen Brodie, to Loony Honeycutt, to what he must get done
without too much delay. Gratton startled him by speaking, bringing his
thoughts back from across the ridges to the sunny verandah overlooking
Lake Gloria.
Gratton was nobody's fool, save his own, and both marked and resented
King's attitude. His heavy lids had a fluttering way at times during
which his prominent eyes seemed to flicker.
"What's the chance with Gus Ingle's 'Secret' this year, Mr. King?" he
demanded silkily.
King wheeled on him.
"What do you know about it?" he said sharply. "And who has been talking
to you?"
Gratton laughed, looked wise and amused, and strolled away.
At luncheon Mrs. Gaynor placed her guests at table out on the porch,
conscious of her daughter's watchful eye. When all were seated, Mark
King found himself with Miss Gloria at his right and an unusually plain
and unattractive girl named Georgia on his left. Everybody talked, King
alone contenting himself with brevities. Over dessert he found himself
drifting into _tête-á-tête_ with Miss Gloria. They pushed back their
chairs; he found himself still drifting, this time physically and still
with Gloria as they two strolled out through the grove at the back of
the log house. There was a splendid pool there, boulder-surrounded; a
thoroughly romantic sort of spot in Gloria Gaynor's fancies, a most
charming background for springtime loitering. The gush and babble of the
bright water tumbling in, rushing out, filled the air singingly. Gloria
wanted to ask Mr. King about a certain little bird which she had seen
here, a little fellow who might have been the embodiment of the stream's
joy; she knew from her father that King was an intimate friend of wild
things and could tell her all about it. They sat in Gloria's favourite
nook, very silent, now and then with a whisper from Gloria, awaiting the
coming of the bird.
_Chapter V_
"But, my darling daughter," gasped Mrs. Gaynor, "you don't in the least
understand what you are about!"
"But, my darling mother," mimicked Miss Gloria, light of tone but with
all of the calm assurance of her years, "I do know exactly what I am
about! I always do. And anyway," with a Frenchy little shrug which she
had adopted and adapted last season, "I am going."
"But," exclaimed her mother, already routed, as was inevitable, and now
looking toward the essential considerations, "what in the world will
every one say? And think?"
In the tall mirror before her Gloria regarded her boots and
riding-breeches critically. Then her little hat and the blue flannel
short. Too mannish? Never, with Gloria in them, an expression in very
charming curves of triumphant girlhood.
"What in the world was Mark King thinking of?" demanded her mother.
"What do you suppose?" said Gloria tranquilly "He would have been very
rude if he hadn't been thinking of your little daughter. Besides, he had
very little to do with the matter."
"Gloria!"
"And, what is more, there was a moon. Remember that, mamma." She tied
the big scarlet silk handkerchief about her throat and turned to be
kissed. Mrs. Gaynor looked distressed; there were actually tears trying
to invade her troubled eyes, and her hands were nervous.
"But you will be gone all day!"
"Oh, mamma!" Gloria began to grow impatient. "What if I am? Mr. King is
a gentleman, isn't he? He isn't going to eat me, is he? Why do you make
such a fuss over it all? Do you want to spoil everything for me?"
"You know I don't! But----"
"We've had nothing but 'buts' since I told you. I should have left you a
note and slipped out." She bestowed upon the worried face a pecking
little kiss and tiptoed to the door.
"Wait, Gloria! What shall I tell every one? They're your _guests_, after
all----"
"Tell them I asked to be excused for the day. Beyond that you are rather
good at smoothing out things. I'll trust you."
"But--I mean _and_--and Mr. Gratton?"
"Oh, tell him to go to the devil!" cried Gloria. "It will do him no end
of good." And while Mrs. Gaynor stared after her she closed the door
softly and went tiptoeing downstairs and out into the brightening dawn,
where Mark King awaited her with the horses.
From behind a window-curtain Gloria's mother watched the girl tripping
away through the meadow to the stable, set back among the trees. King
was leading the saddled horses to meet her; Gloria gave him her
gauntleted hand in a greeting the degree of friendliness of which was
gauged by the clever eyes at the window; friendliness already arrived at
a stage of intimacy. King lifted Gloria into her saddle; Gloria's little
laugh had in it a flutter of excitement as her cavalier's strength took
her by delighted surprise and off her feet. They rode away through the
thinning shadows. Mrs. Gaynor, despite the earliness of the hour, went
straight to her husband, awoke him mercilessly, and told him everything.
"Oh," he said when she had done and he had turned over for another hour
or so of sleep, "that's all right. Mark told me about it last night."
"And you didn't say a word to me!"
"Forgot," said Ben. "But don't worry. Mark'll take care of her."
She left him to his innocent slumbers and began dressing. Already she
was busied with planning just what to say and how to say it; Gloria
knew, she thought with some complacency, that her mother could be
depended upon in any situation demanding the delicate touch. She would
be about, cool and smiling, when the first guest appeared; it would be
supposed that she and Gloria and Mr. King had been quite a merry trio as
the morning adventure was being arranged. That first guest stirring
would be Mr. Gratton on hand to pounce on Gloria and get her out of the
house for a run down to the lake, a dash in a canoe, or a brief stroll
across the meadow before the breakfast-gong. Instead of Gloria's terse
message for him, she had quite an elaborate and laughing tale to tell.
After all, Gloria usually did know what she was about, and if Mr.
Gratton meant all that he looked--Mrs. Gaynor had cast up a rough draft
of everything she would say that morning before she opened the door to
go downstairs. And for reasons very clear to her and which she had no
doubt would be viewed with equal clarity by Gloria after this "escapade"
of hers was done with, she meant to be very tactful indeed with Mr.
Gratton.
* * * * *
Never had Mark King known pleasanter companionship than Gloria Gaynor
afforded this bright morning. They passed up the trail, over the first
ridge, dropped down into a tiny wild little valley, and had the world
all alone to themselves. Only now was the sun up, and there in the
mountains, blazing forth cheerily, it seemed to shine for them alone.
When they rode side by side Gloria chatted brightly, athrill with
animation, vivid with her rioting youth. When the narrow trail demanded
and she rode ahead, bright little snatches of lilting song or broken
exclamations floated back to the man whose eyes shone with his enjoyment
of her. On every hand this was all a bright new world to her; she had
never run wild in the hills as her mother had done through her girlhood;
she had never been particularly interested in all of this sprawling
ruggedness. Now she had a hundred eager questions; she saw the shining
splendour of the solitudes through King's eyes; she turned to him with
full confidence for the name of a flower, the habit of a bird, even
though the latter, unseen among the trees, had only announced himself by
a half-dozen enraptured notes.
Yesterday, surrendering her volatile self to a very natural and quite
innocent feminine instinct, Gloria had fully determined to parade Mark
King before her envious friends as very much her own property. It was
merely a bit of the game, the old, old game at which she, being richly
favoured by nature, was as skilful as a girl of eighteen or nineteen
could possibly be. In
|
ishes
her altogether; whilst levity and ingratitude, when she is in a
beneficent mood, soon causes her to escape. Moderation is the only
chance of securing her constant presence. In short, fortune, or luck,
is a phenomenon, the ground and essence whereof is to a great degree
inexplicable. For the most part we know it only from its effects, and
can give no certain account either of its nature or of its mode of
action, and of the always increasing or diminishing greatness of it. To
the gambler fortune appears to be an occult power, the aid of which is
not infrequently invoked by means of various fanciful fetishes, which
for the moment acquire a real virtue, as being likely to propitiate the
invisible influence which presides over speculation.
The movements of fortune have been well compared to those of the
sea, which for the most part seems to affect a serene and smiling
aspect, broken only by tranquil ripples. From time to time, however,
furious tempests and storms disturb its surface, calm being often
re-established as quickly and suddenly as it was originally broken.
Like the sea, Fortune would at heart appear to be inclined towards
tranquillity, though her fury, when roused, is inclined to conceal this
tendency.
Whilst Fortune generally seems to distribute her favours in a somewhat
haphazard way, there is no doubt that those who study the so-called
laws of chance are the most likely to receive them. For although chance
is generally considered to be effect without design, this is not
strictly true. Throughout the universe of nature, indeed, all events
appear in the end to be governed by immutable laws which have existed
from the beginning of time, no matter what partial irregularities may
arise at certain periods.
In any game, for instance, equality in play is likely to restore the
players in a series of events to the same state in which they began;
while inequality, however small, has a contrary effect, and the longer
the game be continued, the greater is likely to be the loss of the one
player and the gain of the other. As has been very soundly said, this
"more or less," in play, runs through all the ratios between equality
and infinite difference, or from an infinitely little difference till
it comes to an infinitely great one. The slightest of advantages,
whether arising from skill or chance, will as surely "materialise"
in the course of play as does the carefully calculated profit of a
commercial expert.
An event either will happen or will not happen; this constitutes
a certainty. Some events are dependent, others independent. The
difference is very important. Independent events have no connection,
their happenings neither forwarding nor obstructing one another.
Choosing a card from each of two distinct packs includes two
independent events; for the taking of a card from the first pack does
not in any way affect the taking of a card from the second--the chances
of drawing, or of not drawing, any particular card from the second pack
being neither lessened nor increased. On the other hand, the taking of
a second card from a pack from which one has already been drawn is a
dependent event, as the composition of the pack has been altered by the
abstraction of one particular card.
The surprising way in which an apparently small advantage operates may
be judged from the following example:--A and B agree to play for one
guinea a game until one hundred guineas are lost or won. A possesses
an advantage on each game amounting to 11 chances to 10 in his favour.
Mathematical analysis of this advantage proves that B would do well to
give A upwards of ninety-nine guineas to cancel the agreement.
Further, many speculative events, which at first sight seem to
be advantageous to one side, are demonstrated by mathematical
investigation to be of an exactly contrary nature. A bets B thirty-two
guineas to one that an event does not happen, and also bets B thirty
guineas even that it does happen in twenty-nine trials. Besides this
A gives B one thousand guineas to play in this manner six hours a day
for a month. Here B would appear to have some advantage. Mathematical
investigation, however, proves that in reality the advantage of A is
so great that B ought not only to return the thousand guineas to A,
but give him, in addition, another ten thousand guineas to cancel the
agreement.
Every game of chance presents two kinds of chances which are very
distinct--namely, those relating to the person interested (the
player) and those inherent in the combinations of the game. That is
to say, there is either "good luck" or "bad luck," which at different
times gives the player a "run" of good or bad fortune. But besides
this, there is the chance of the combinations of the game, which
are independent of the player and which are governed by the laws of
probability. Theoretically, chance is able to bring into any given game
all the possible combinations; but it is a curious fact that there are,
nevertheless, certain limits at which it seems to stop. A proof of this
is that a particular number at roulette does not turn up ten or a dozen
times in succession. In reality there would be nothing astounding about
such a run, but it is supposed never to have happened. On the other
hand, the numbers in one column at roulette have been known not to turn
up during seventeen successive coups.
All the same, extraordinary runs do occur at all games. In 1813, a
well-known betting man of the name of Ogden laid one thousand guineas
to one guinea, that calling seven as the main, a player would not throw
that number ten times successively from the dice-box. Seven was thrown
nine times in direct sequence! Mr. Ogden then offered four hundred and
seventy guineas to be let off the bet, but the thrower refused. He took
the box again but threw only twice more--nine--so that Mr. Ogden just
saved his thousand guineas.
In a game of chance, the oftener the same combination has occurred in
succession the nearer we are to the certainty that it will not recur at
the next coup. It would almost appear, in fact, as if there existed an
instant, prescribed by some unknown law, at which the chances become
mature, and after which they begin to tend again towards equalisation.
This is the secret of the pass and the counter-pass, and also of the
strange persistence which certain numbers at roulette sometimes show
in recurring--they are merely making up for lost time. At the end of a
year all the numbers on a roulette board would be found to have come up
about the same number of times--provided, of course, that the wheel is
kept in proper working order, a state of affairs which is assured at
Monaco by scrupulous daily inspection.
The considerations set forth above apply more especially to games like
roulette and trente-et-quarante played at public tables, where all
players have an equal chance against the bank, and where the personal
element, which is so important in private play, is to a large extent
eliminated. It is at public tables that the real gambler finds his
best chance. There, whilst having a fair field and no favour, he may,
if lucky, win very large sums with the certainty of being immediately
paid; and he is not exposed to various unfavourable influences, which
tell against men of his disposition when gambling amongst acquaintances
and even friends. Wherever a number of careless, inattentive people
possessed of money chance to be assembled, a few wary, cool, and shrewd
men will be found, who know how to conceal real caution and design
under apparent inattention and gaiety of manner; who push their luck
when fortune smiles and refrain when she changes her disposition; and
who have calculated the chances and are thoroughly master of every game
where judgment is required.
Occasionally men of this stamp have been known to have accumulated a
fortune, more often a respectable competency, at play. If they had
been interrogated as to the exact means by which they had made their
success, they would, had they been desirous of speaking the truth, have
replied in the words of the wife of the Maréchal d'Ancre, who, when
she was asked what charm she had made use of to fascinate the mind of
the queen, "The charm," she replied, "which superior abilities always
exercise over weaker minds."
The minor forms of gambling, which serve to gratify the speculative
instincts of ordinary mortals, have generally possessed little
attraction for great men, whose minds would seem to have been occupied
by more ambitious, though perhaps in essence not less speculative,
designs. Napoleon, for example, was a very poor card-player, and from
all accounts never indulged in any serious gambling. The great Duke
of Wellington, though he was once accused of being much addicted to
playing hazard, would also seem to have entertained no particular
fondness for play. In the course of a letter which he wrote in 1823 to
a Mr. Adolphus, who had publicly referred to his supposed love of play,
the great Captain wrote "that never in the whole course of his life had
he ever won or lost £20 at any game, and that he had never played at
hazard or any game of chance in any public place or club, nor been for
some years at all at any such place." Nevertheless, the Duke became an
original member of Crockford's in 1827, though there is no record of
his ever having played there.
Another great soldier, on the other hand, repeatedly lost large sums
at play. This was Blücher, who was inordinately fond of gambling. Much
to his disgust this passion was inherited by his son, who had often
to be rebuked by his father for his visits to the gaming-table, and
was given many a wholesome lecture upon his youth and inexperience,
and the consequent certainty of loss by coming in contact with older
and more practised gamblers. One morning, however, young Blücher
presented himself before his father, and exclaimed with an air of joy,
"Sir, you said I knew nothing about play, but here is proof that you
have undervalued my talents," pulling out at the same time a bag of
roubles which he had won the preceding night. "And I said the truth,"
was the reply; "sit down there, and I'll convince you." The dice were
called for, and in a few minutes old Blücher won all his son's money;
whereupon, after pocketing the cash, he rose from the table observing,
"Now you see that I was right when I told you that you would never win."
If, however, it would seem to be the case that few, if any, of the
world's very greatest minds have been addicted to gambling, it is no
less true that outside this select band all classes have been, and are,
equally subject to the passion. Nothing, indeed, is more extraordinary
than the fact that it has been observed to exercise the same
fascination on men of the most diverse characters and dispositions--on
rich and poor, educated and uneducated, young and old, learned and
ignorant.
Moreover, unlike other passions, the love of gambling generally remains
unimpaired by age, and instances of people of advanced years expending
their few remaining energies at the card-table are not rare. There
is the story of the venerable old north-country lady whom a visitor
found looking very red-eyed and weary. "I fear you are suffering from
a bad cold?" he inquired, solicitously. "Eh, I'se gat na cauld," was
the reply; "some friends kem from Kendal on Tuesday that love a game
a whist dearly, and I'se bin carding the morn and e'en, the e'en an'
the morn, twa days." "Indeed, and what might you have won?" "Eh," she
replied, with considerable satisfaction, "it mun be a shilling."
At first sight, also, one would think that avarice and passion for
play were absolutely incompatible; yet there are not a few striking
instances of the two vices being combined--by men to whom the spending
of a few shillings was agony, but who would risk thousands at cards
with comparative equanimity. Such an one was the celebrated Mr. Elwes,
who combined a passion for gambling with habits of the greatest penury.
He was originally a Mr. Meggot, the name of Elwes being assumed under
the terms of the will of his uncle. Sir Harvey Elwes.
Sir Harvey was himself the perfect type of a miser. Timid, shy, and
diffident in the extreme, he kept his household, which consisted of
one man and two maid-servants, chiefly upon game from his own land
and fish from his own ponds; the cows which grazed before his door
furnished milk, cheese, and butter for the establishment; and what fuel
he burned his own woods supplied. As he had no acquaintances and no
books, the hoarding-up and the counting of his money was his greatest
delight. Next to that came partridge catching--or setting, as it was
then called--at which he was so great an adept that he was known to
take five hundred brace of birds in one season. What partridges were
not consumed by his household he turned out again, as he never gave
anything away. At all times he wore a black velvet cap much over his
face, a worn-out, full-dress suit of clothes, and an old great-coat,
with worsted stockings drawn up over his knees. He rode a thin
thoroughbred horse, and the horse and his rider looked as if a gust of
wind would have blown them away together.
At the time Mr. Meggot succeeded to the name and fortune of his uncle
he was over forty, having for about fifteen years previously been
well-known in the most fashionable circles of the West End. He was a
gambler at heart, and only late in life did he succeed in obtaining any
mastery over his passion for play. His losses were great, but this was
mainly because while he himself always paid when he lost, his opponents
were not always so scrupulous, and it was notorious that the sums
owed to him in this way were very considerable. But he professed the
quixotic theory that "it was impossible to ask a gentleman for money";
and to his honour, but financial disadvantage, he adhered strictly to
this rule throughout his life.
The acquaintances which he had formed at Westminster School and at
Geneva, together with his own large fortune, all conspired to introduce
Mr. Elwes (then Mr. Meggot) into whatever society he best liked.
He was at once admitted a member of the club at Arthur's, and of
various other similar institutions; and as a proof of his notoriety
as a gambler, it may be mentioned that he, Lord Robert Bertie, and
some others, are noticed in a scene in _The Adventures of a Guinea_
for the frequency of their midnight orgies. Few men, even on his own
acknowledgment, had played deeper than himself, or with such varying
success. He once played two days and a night without intermission;
and the room being a small one, the company were nearly up to their
knees in cards. He lost some thousands at that sitting. The Duke of
Northumberland was of the party--another man who never would quit the
gaming-table while any hope of winning remained.
Even at this period, Mr. Elwes' passion for gaming was equalled by
his avarice, and in a curious manner he contrived to mingle small
attempts at saving with pursuits of the most unbounded dissipation.
After sitting up a whole night playing for thousands with the
most fashionable and profligate men of the time--in ornate and
brilliantly-lighted salons, with obsequious waiters attendant upon his
call--he would walk out about four in the morning, not towards his
home, but into Smithfield, to meet his own cattle, which were coming up
to market from Thaydon Hall, a farm of his in Essex. There would this
same man, forgetful of the scenes he had just left, stand in the cold
or rain, haggling with a carcass butcher for a shilling. Sometimes
when the cattle did not arrive at the hour he expected, he would walk
on in the mire to meet them; and more than once he actually trudged
the whole way to his farm, seventeen miles from London--a tedious walk
after sitting up the whole of the night at play!
Though he never engaged personally upon the Turf, Mr. Elwes was in
the habit of making frequent excursions to Newmarket, and a kindness
which he once performed there is worthy of recollection. Lord Abingdon,
who was slightly known to Mr. Elwes, had made a match for £7000 which
it was supposed he would be obliged to forfeit from an inability
to produce the sum--though the odds were greatly in his favour.
Unsolicited, Mr. Elwes made him an offer of the money; he accepted it,
and won the engagement.
On the day this match was to be run a clerical neighbour had agreed to
accompany Mr. Elwes to Newmarket. As was the latter's custom they set
out on their journey at seven in the morning, and, with the hope of a
substantial breakfast at Newmarket, the clergyman took no refreshment
before starting. They reached Newmarket about eleven, and Mr. Elwes
busied himself in inquiries and conversation till twelve, when the
match was decided in favour of Lord Abingdon. The divine then fully
expected that they should move off to the town for breakfast; but Elwes
still continued riding about on one business or another. Eventually
four o'clock arrived; and by this time his reverence had become so
impatient that he murmured something about the "keen air of Newmarket
heath" and the comforts of a good dinner. "Very true," replied Elwes,
"have some of this," offering him at the same time a piece of old,
crushed pancake from his great-coat pocket. He added that he had
brought it from his house at Marcham two months before, but "that it
was as good as new." The sequel of the story was that they did not
reach home till nine in the evening, when the clergyman was so tired
that he gave up all other refreshment for rest. On the other hand,
Elwes, who had hazarded seven thousand pounds in the morning, retired
happily to bed with the pleasing recollection of having saved three
shillings.
In later life Mr. Elwes was elected to Parliament, where he
proved himself an independent country member and exhibited great
conscientiousness. During this time he had the greatest admiration for
Mr. Pitt, and was wont to declare that in all the statesman's words
there were "pounds, shillings, and pence." When he quitted Parliament,
he was, in the common phrase, "a fish out of water." He had for some
years been a member of a card-club, at the Mount Coffee-House, and it
was there that he consoled himself for the loss of his seat. The play
was moderate, and he enjoyed the fire and candles which were provided
at the expense of the Club; but fortune seemed resolved to force from
him that money which no power could persuade him to bestow. He still
retained his fondness for play, and imagined that he had no small skill
at piquet. It was his ill-luck on one occasion to meet a gentleman who
had the same idea of his own powers in this direction, and on much
better grounds; for after a contest of two days and a night, in which
Elwes continued with the perseverance which avarice will sometimes
inspire, he rose the loser of no less than three thousand pounds. The
debt was paid by a draft on Messrs. Hoare, which was duly honoured the
next morning.
This is said to have been the last bout of gaming indulged in by
Mr. Elwes, and not long afterwards he retired to his country seat
at Stoke, remarking that "he had lost a great deal of money very
foolishly, but that a man grew wiser by time." After this no gleam of
pleasure or amusement broke through the gloom of a penurious life,
and his insatiable desire of saving became uniform and systematic. He
still rode about the country on an old brood mare (which was all he
had left); but then he rode her very economically, on the soft turf
adjoining the road, so as to avoid the cost of shoes. His household
expenses were reduced to a minimum, his few wants being attended to by
a man who became almost as celebrated as his master. This extraordinary
servant acted as butler, coachman, gardener, huntsman, groom, and
valet; and was, according to Mr. Elwes, "a d----d idle rascal" into the
bargain.
Mr. Elwes died in 1789 and left an enormous fortune for that day,
about five hundred thousand pounds being divided between his two
natural sons.
Mr. Elwes' record of having played piquet for two days and a night
(thirty-six successive hours) was a remarkable one, for the physical
strain involved by playing for such a long period is very considerable.
Yet the fascination of remaining at the gaming-table for a long stretch
of time frequently takes possession of those addicted to play. As a
rule it is not by any means caused solely by the consideration of the
stakes played for; it would rather seem that the players become mere
automatic gaming machines, the mechanism of which runs steadily on.
Several years ago a noticeable instance of this occurred in a London
Club, where, on a certain evening, a small party had been playing
écarté for fairly moderate stakes. The game began about eleven o'clock;
some three or four hours later only two players remained. As the time
went on, fine after fine was incurred by this couple, but still they
continued playing--until they passed the hour when expulsion was the
penalty exacted from any member still remaining in the Club-house.
They were still playing when morning broke, and though horrified and
sleepy-eyed waiters informed them that they could no longer continue,
their only answer was to stop the clock, an irritating reminder of
the fleeting hours. In this fashion they continued till one o'clock
the next afternoon, when, having realised that their escapade was a
serious one, they strolled through a crowd of outraged members into
the brilliant sunlight which, as if in irony, chanced that morning to
be flooding the street. It should be added that before leaving the
Club-house--for ever, as it turned out--the two culprits prudently
wrote out their resignations. The curious thing was that the stakes
during this sitting were by no means high, and the sums which changed
hands were consequently comparatively small.
Rowlandson, the artist, who was a well-known figure at most of the
fashionable gaming-houses of his time, frequently played through a
night and the next day. On one occasion he remained at the hazard table
for thirty-six hours without a break, the only refreshment which he
took being brought to him in the gambling-room. Rowlandson, who was a
most honourable man, was generally unlucky, and lost several legacies
at play. His imperturbability was remarkable, and he never exhibited
the slightest emotion whether he won or lost.
At the Roxburgh Club in St. James's Square--at the time when it was
kept by Raggett, the well-known proprietor of White's--Hervey Combe,
Tippoo Smith, Mr. Ward (a member of Parliament), and the distinguished
Indian General, Sir John Malcolm, once sat from Monday evening till
Wednesday morning at eleven o'clock, playing whist. Even then, they
would very likely have continued playing, had not Hervey Combe been
obliged to attend the funeral of one of his partners. Combe, who had
won thirty thousand pounds from Sir John Malcolm, jocularly told him
that he could have his revenge whenever he liked. "Thank you," replied
Sir John, "another sitting like this would oblige me to return to India
again!"
In all probability, however, the longest duel at cards which ever
took place occurred in the eighteenth century at Sulzbach, where the
famous adventurer, Casanova, made the acquaintance of an officer,
d'Entragues by name, who was very fond of piquet. For four or five
days in succession the Venetian and this officer played after dinner.
At the end of that time, however, Casanova declined to play any more,
having come to the conclusion that his opponent made a regular practice
of rising from the table directly he had won ten or twelve louis. He
adhered to this resolution for a day or two, but d'Entragues became
quite importunate in offers to give him his revenge.
"I do not care to play," was the reply of Casanova, given with some
effrontery. "We are not the same kind of gamblers. I play only for my
pleasure and because the game amuses me, whilst you play merely to win."
"If I understand you rightly," was the retort, "this is deliberate
rudeness!"
"I did not mean to be rude; but every time we have played you have left
me in the lurch at the end of an hour."
"A proof of my solicitude for your pocket, for as you are a worse
player than I, you would have lost a great deal had we continued."
"Possibly, but I don't believe it."
Eventually it was agreed that they should resume their contest, but
that the player who was the first to rise from the piquet-table should
forfeit fifty louis to his opponent. The stakes were five louis a
hundred points, ready money only to be played for.
The game began at three in the afternoon; at nine d'Entragues proposed
supper. Casanova said he was not hungry; whereupon his opponent
laughed, and the game was continued. The onlookers, who were fairly
numerous, went to supper, afterwards returning to remain till midnight,
when the players were left alone with a croupier who attended to the
accounts, the only utterances heard being those connected with the game.
From six in the morning, when the visitors who were taking the Sulzbach
waters began to be about, the contest excited the greatest public
interest. Casanova was now losing a hundred louis, though his luck had
not been very bad.
At nine o'clock a lady, Madame Saxe by name, to whom d'Entragues
was very devoted, arrived upon the scene and persuaded each of the
combatants to partake of a cup of chocolate. D'Entragues was the first
to consent to this; he believed that his opponent was near to giving in.
"Let us agree," he proposed, "that whoever asks for food, leaves the
room for more than a quarter of an hour, or goes to sleep in his
chair, shall be deemed the loser."
"I take you at your word," was Casanova's reply; "and shall be ready to
hold to any other irritating conditions you may suggest."
The game proceeded. At twelve o'clock another meal was announced,
but both players still declared that they were not hungry; at four,
however, they took some soup. Towards supper-time the onlookers began
to think that matters were going too far. Madame Saxe then made a
suggestion that the stakes should be divided, but to this proposal
Casanova firmly declined to consent. At this moment d'Entragues
might have risen from the table a winner even after having paid
the forfeit, for besides being the better player luck had favoured
him. Nevertheless, his pride prevented him from abandoning what had
degenerated into a mere contest of endurance. His appearance had become
that of a corpse which had been disinterred, in striking contrast to
the still normal looks of Casanova, who, to the remonstrances of Madame
Saxe, replied that he would only give up the struggle by falling down
dead.
The night wore on, and once more the players were left alone. By this
time d'Entragues was showing evident signs of complete exhaustion,
which was increased by an altercation about some trifling point
raised by Casanova with the express purpose of further weakening his
opponent's resistance.
At nine o'clock next morning Madame Saxe arrived to find her lover
losing, and so dazed that he could hardly shuffle the cards, count,
or properly discard. Once more she appealed to Casanova, pointing out
to him that he could now rise a winner. In a tone of great gallantry
the latter replied that he would agree to abandon the struggle if the
forfeit were declared void, a condition to which d'Entragues declined
to assent. The latter, though very weak, showed considerable annoyance
at the manner in which Casanova had spoken to Madame Saxe, and declared
that for his part he should not leave the table till either he or his
opponent lay dead upon the floor.
In due course of time soup was again brought to the players, but
d'Entragues, who was now in the last stage of weakness, fell down in
a dead faint almost immediately after the cup had been raised to his
lips, and in this condition he was carried away to bed. On the other
hand, Casanova, after having given half a dozen louis to the croupier
(who had been awake for forty-two consecutive hours), leisurely put
the gold he had won in his pockets, and strolled out to a chemist's
where he purchased a mild emetic. He then went to bed and slept lightly
for a few hours, getting up about three o'clock in the afternoon with
an excellent appetite. His opponent did not appear till the next
day, when, much to his credit, he told Casanova that he bore him no
ill-will, and was on the contrary grateful to him for a lesson which he
should remember all the days of his life.
Casanova was not always as successful as this in his gambling
enterprises, which indeed occasionally involved him in unpleasant
situations; but like most adventurers of his type and age he was seldom
depressed by losses. He would appear to have generally dominated
other gamesters whom he met--a state of affairs which was probably
not unconnected with the Venetian's well-known truculence. Besides,
he was, as a rule, not over-burdened with money, a circumstance which
perhaps made him the more ready to engage in a contest. People who are
over-prosperous are not given to exhibiting any particular spirit in
such affairs. A gentleman, who had been fortunate at cards, was asked
to be a second in a duel, at a period when the seconds engaged as
heartily as the principals. "I am not," replied he, "the man for your
purpose at this time; but go and apply to a friend of mine from whom I
won a thousand guineas last night, and I warrant you he will fight like
any devil!"
Though ready to resent any slight, and tenacious of keeping up a
reputation for being "cock of the walk" in the circles in which he
moved, Casanova was possessed of great self-control, and always made
a point of being urbane, even whilst sustaining a severe reverse--a
pleasing characteristic which, he declared, obtained him access to
much pleasant society. It was his constant practice to hold a bank
at the various resorts of the pleasure-loving world which he visited
during his adventurous career. At Aix in Savoy (which is still a
place in high favour with the votaries of chance owing to its two
Casinos), Casanova was once particularly successful. He himself, with
all a gambler's superstition, attributed his good fortune on this
occasion to the appearance of three Englishmen--one of them Fox (then
on the threshold of his career), who borrowed fifty louis of the great
adventurer, whom he had previously met at Geneva.
From his earliest years Charles James Fox had been accustomed to
gambling, having been elected a member of Brooks's when but sixteen
years old. At that time the Club in question, now so decorous and
staid, was the head-quarters of the fashionable London gamester,
and the high-spirited youth fully availed himself of the excellent
opportunities for dissipating a fortune which were here at easy
command. On one occasion Fox sat playing at hazard for twenty-two
consecutive hours, with the result that he rose the loser of eleven
thousand pounds. At twenty-five he was a ruined man, his father having
paid for him one hundred and forty thousand pounds out of his own
property.
[Illustration: _The SPENDTHRIFT_
Deaf to his aged Sire's advice,
And biggotted to Cards and Dice;
With many a horrid Oath and Curse,
He loudly wails his empty Purse.
From an Eighteenth-Century Print.]
Though a most unsuccessful gambler. Fox played whist and piquet
exceedingly well, it being generally agreed at Brooks's that he might
have made about four thousand a year at these games had he but confined
himself to them. His misfortunes arose from playing at games of chance,
particularly at faro, of which he was very fond. As a rule after
eating and drinking plentifully, he would repair to the faro table,
almost invariably rising a loser. Once indeed, and only once, he
won about eight thousand pounds in the course of a single evening;
part of this money he paid away to his creditors, and the remainder he
lost again almost immediately in the same manner. Mr. Boothby, also an
irreclaimable gamester and an intimate friend of Fox, speaking of the
latter said, "He was unquestionably a man of first-rate talents, but so
deficient in judgment as never to have succeeded in any object during
his whole life. He loved only three things: women, play, and politics.
Yet at no period did he ever form a creditable connection with a woman;
he lost his whole fortune at the gaming-table; and with the exception
of about eleven months he remained always in opposition."
Before he attained his thirtieth year, Fox had completely dissipated
every shilling that he could either command or procure by the most
ruinous expedients. During his career he experienced, at times, many
of the severest privations attached to the vicissitudes which mark
a gamester's progress, and frequently lacked money to defray common
expenses of the most pressing nature. Topham Beauclerk--himself a
man of pleasure and of letters--who lived much in Fox's society at
that period of his life, used to say that no man could form an idea
of the extremities to which his friend had been driven in order to
raise money, after losing his last guinea at the faro table. For days
in succession he was reduced to such distress as to be under the
necessity of having recourse to the waiters of Brooks's Club to lend
him assistance--even sedan-chairmen, whom he was unable to pay, used to
clamour at his door.
Notwithstanding the numerous petty claims which at times made Fox's
life unbearable, he could never resist high play, which seems to have
completely destroyed his judgment as to the value of money, and prided
himself upon the largeness of his stakes. The Duke of Devonshire, who,
much to his honour, made a point of never touching a card, went one day
out of curiosity to the Thatched House Club to see the gambling. After
some time, finding himself awkward at being the only person in the
rooms who was not participating in the play, he proposed a bet of fifty
pounds on the odd trick to Charles Fox. "You'll excuse me, my Lord
Duke," replied Charles, "I never play for pence." "I assure you, sir,"
answered his Grace, "you do, as often as I play for fifty pounds."
Fox, whilst a gambler of the most hopeless description, and extravagant
almost beyond words, had, as is well known, many good points. Amongst
them was hatred of meanness, which was an abomination of the worst sort
in his eyes.
Finding himself on one occasion in considerable funds owing to a run of
luck at faro, he remembered an old gambling debt due to Sir John Lade,
familiarly known at that time as Sir John Jehu, and accordingly wrote,
desiring an appointment so that he might pay what he owed. When they
met, Charles produced the money, which Sir John no sooner saw, than
calling for a pen and ink, he very deliberately began to reckon up the
interest.
"What are you doing now?" cried Charles.
"Only calculating what the interest amounts to," replied the other.
"Oh, indeed!" returned Fox with great coolness, at the same time
pocketing the cash, which he had already thrown upon the table. "Why, I
thought, Sir John, that my debt to you was a debt of honour; but as you
seem to view it in another light, and seriously mean to make a trading
debt
|
Klondyke River, B 8
Klondyke District, B 8
Dyea, C 8
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote A: Money Order Offices.]
[Footnote B: Post Offices not located on Map.]
[Illustration: [Drawn from a rough sketch made on June 18 by G. W. F.
Johnson at Dawson City.]]
[Illustration]
[Illustration: BIRD'S-EYE VIEW OF SITKA--FROM BARANOFF CASTLE.]
GOLDEN ALASKA.
ROUTES TO THE YUKON GOLD-FIELDS.
The gold-fields of the Yukon Valley, at and near Klondike River, are
near the eastern boundary of Alaska, from twelve to fifteen hundred
miles up from the mouth of the river, and from five to eight hundred
miles inland by the route across the country from the southern Alaskan
coast. In each case an ocean voyage must be taken as the first step; and
steamers may be taken from San Francisco, Portland, Ore., Seattle,
Wash., or from Victoria, B. C.
The overland routes to these cities require a word.
1. To San Francisco. This city is reached directly by half a dozen
routes across the plains and Rocky Mountains, of which the Southern
Pacific, by way of New Orleans and El Paso; the Atchison & Santa Fé and
Atlantic & Pacific by way of Kansas City, and across northern New Mexico
and Arizona; the Burlington, Denver & Rio Grande, by way of Denver and
Salt Lake City; and the Union and Central Pacific, by way of Omaha,
Ogden and Sacramento, are the principal ones.
2. To Portland, Oregon. This is reached directly by the Union Pacific
and Oregon Short Line, via Omaha and Ogden; and by the Northern Pacific,
via St. Paul and Helena, Montana.
3. To Seattle, Wash. This city, Tacoma, Port Townsend and other ports on
Puget Sound, are the termini of the Northern Pacific Railroad and also
of the Great Northern Railroad from St. Paul along the northern boundary
of the United States. The Canadian Pacific will also take passengers
there expeditiously by rail or boat from Vancouver, B. C.
4. To Vancouver and Victoria, B. C. Any of the routes heretofore
mentioned reach Victoria by adding a steamboat journey; but the direct
route, and one of the pleasantest of all the transcontinental routes, is
by the Canadian Pacific Railway from Montreal or Chicago, via Winnipeg,
Manitoba, to the coast at Vancouver, whence a ferry crosses to Victoria.
Regular routes of transportation to Alaska are supplied by the Pacific
Coast Steamship Company, which has been dispatching mail-steamships once
a fortnight the year round from Tacoma to Sitka, which touch at Juneau
and all other ports of call. They also maintain a service of steamers
between San Francisco and Portland and Puget Sound ports. These are
fitted with every accommodation and luxury for tourist-travel; and an
extra steamer, the Queen, has been making semi-monthly trips during
June, July and August. These steamers would carry 250 passengers
comfortably and the tourist fare for the round trip has been $100.
The Canadian Pacific Navigation Company has been sending semi-monthly
steamers direct from Victoria to Port Simpson and way stations the year
round. They are fine boats, but smaller than the others and are
permitted to land only at Sitka and Dyea.
Such are the means of regular communication with Alaskan ports. There
has been no public conveyance north of Sitka, except twice or thrice a
year in summer, in the supply-steamers of the Alaskan commercial
companies, which sailed from San Francisco to St. Michael and there
transferred to small boats up the Yukon.
Whether any changes will be made in these schedules for the season of
1898 remains to be seen.
Special steamers.--As the regular accommodations were found totally
inadequate to the demand for passage to Alaska which immediately
followed the report of rich discoveries on Klondike Creek, extra
steamers were hastily provided by the old companies, others are fitted
up and sent out by speculative owners, and some have been privately
chartered. A score or more steamships, loaded with passengers, horses,
mules and burros (donkeys) to an uncomfortable degree, were thus
despatched from San Francisco, Puget Sound and Victoria between the
middle of July and the middle of August. An example of the way the
feverish demand for transportation is found in the case of the
Willamette, a collier, which was cleaned out in a few hours and turned
into an extemporized passenger-boat. The whole 'tween decks space was
filled with rough bunks, wonderfully close together, for "first-class"
passengers; while away down in the hold second-class arrangements were
made which the mind shudders to contemplate. Yet this slave-ship sort of
a chance was eagerly taken, and such space as was left was crowded with
animals and goods. Many persons and parties bought or chartered private
steamers, until the supply of these was exhausted by the end of August.
Two routes may be chosen to the gold-fields.
1. By way of the Yukon River. This is all the way by water, and means
nearly 4,500 miles of voyaging.
2. By way of the seaports of Dyea or Shkagway, over mountain passes,
afoot or a-horseback, and down the upper Yukon River and down the lakes
and rivers by raft, skiff and steamboat.
[Illustration: GLACIER BAY. STEAMSHIP QUEEN.]
To describe these routes is the next task--first, that by the way of St.
Michael, and second--up the Yukon River.
Route, via St. Michael and the Yukon River.--This begins by a
sea-voyage, which may be direct, or along the coast. The special
steamers (and future voyages, no doubt) usually take a direct course
across the North Pacific and through the Aleutian Islands to St.
Michael, in Norton Sound, a bight of Bering Sea. The distance from San
Francisco is given as 2,850 miles; from Victoria or Seattle, about 2,200
miles. The inside course would be somewhat longer, would follow the
route next to be described as far as Juneau and Sitka, then strike
northwest along the coast to St. Michael.
This town, on an island near shore in Norton Sound, was established in
1835 by Lieut. Michael Tébenkoff, of the Russian navy, who named it
after his patron saint. Though some distance to the mouth of the Yukon
entrance, St. Michael has always been the controlling center and base of
supplies for the great valley. The North American Trading and
Transportation Company and the Alaska Commercial Company have their
large warehouses here, and provide the miners with tools, clothing and
provisions. Recently the wharf and warehouse accommodations have been
extended, and the population has increased, but if, as is probable, any
considerable number of men are stopped there this fall by the freezing
of the river, and compelled to pass the winter on the island, they will
find it a dreary, if not dangerous experience.
The vessels supplying this depot can seldom approach the anchorage of
St. Michael before the end of June on account of large bodies of
drifting ice that beset the waters of Norton Sound and the straits
between St. Lawrence and the Yukon Delta.
A temporary landing-place is built out into water deep enough for loaded
boats drawing five feet to come up at high tide, this is removed when
winter approaches, as otherwise it would be destroyed by ice. The shore
is sandy and affords a moderately sloping beach, on which boats may be
drawn up. A few feet only from high water mark are perpendicular banks
from six to ten feet high, composed of decayed pumice and ashes, covered
with a layer about four feet thick of clay and vegetable matter
resembling peat. This forms a nearly even meadow with numerous pools of
water, which gradually ascends for a mile or so to a low hill, of
volcanic origin, known as the Shaman Mountain.
Between the point on which St. Michael is built and the mainland, a
small arm of the sea makes in, in which three fathoms may be carried
until the flagstaff of the fort bears west by north, this is the
best-protected anchorage, and has as much water and as good bottom as
can be found much farther out.
The excitement of the summer of 1897 caused an enlargement of facilities
and the erection of additional buildings, forming a nucleus of traffic
called Fort Get There. Here will be put together in the autumn or winter
at least three, and perhaps more, new river steamboats, of which only
two or three have been running on the lower river during the last two or
three years. These are taken up, in pieces, by ships and fitted together
at this point. All are flat-bottomed, stern-wheeled, powerfully engined
craft, the largest able to carry perhaps 250 tons, such as run on the
upper Missouri, and they will burn wood, the cutting and stacking of
which on the river bank will furnish work to many men during the coming
winter. To such steamers, or smaller boats, all the persons and cargoes
must be transferred at St. Michael.
For the last few years there has been no trader here but the agent of
the Alaska Commercial Company, and a story is told of the building of a
riverboat there in 1892, which illustrates what life on the Yukon used
to be. In that year a Chicago man, P. B. Weare, resolved to enter the
Alaskan field as a trader. He chartered a schooner, and placed upon it a
steamboat, built in sections and needing only to be put together and
have its machinery set up, and for this purpose he took with him a force
of carpenters and machinists. On reaching St. Michael Weare was refused
permission to land his boat sections on the land of the Commercial
Company's post, and was compelled to make a troublesome landing on the
open beach, where he began operations. Suddenly his ship carpenters
stopped work. They had been offered, it was said, double pay by the
rival concern if they would desist from all work. Weare turned to the
Indians, but with the same ill-success. The Indians were looking out for
their winter grub. Here was the Chicago man 2,500 miles from San
Francisco and only two weeks left to him in which to put his boat
together and then hope for a chance to ascend the river before winter
came on. There was no time in which to get additional men from San
Francisco. In the midst of his trouble Weare one day espied the revenue
cutter Bear steaming into the roadstead. On board of her was Captain
Michael A. Healy. That officer, on going ashore and discovering the
condition of affairs, threatened to hang every carpenter and mechanic
Weare had brought up if they failed to immediately commence work. The
men went to work, and with them went a gang of men from the Bear. The
little steamer was put together in a few days, and the Bear only went to
sea after seeing the P. B. Weare steaming into the mouth of the Yukon.
[Illustration: STEAMER PORTUS B. WEARE.]
The Weare was enabled that summer to land her stores along the Yukon,
and was the only vessel available for the early crowds of miners going
to Klondike.
The mouth of the Yukon is a great delta, surrounded by marsh of
timber--a soaking prairie in summer, a plain of snow and ice in winter.
The shifting bars and shallows face out from this delta far into Bering
Sea, and no channel has yet been discovered whereby an ocean steamer
could enter any of the mouths. Fortunately the northernmost mouth,
nearest St. Michael and 65 miles from it, is navigable for the light
river steamers, and this one, called Aphoon, and marked by its unusual
growth of willows and bushes is well known to the local Russian and
Indian pilots. It is narrow and intricate, and the general course up
stream is south-southeast. Streams and passages enter it, and it has
troublesome tidal currents. The whole space between the mouth is a
net-work, indeed, of narrow channels, through the marshes.
Kutluck, at the outlet of the Aphoon, on Pastol Bay, is an Indian
village, long celebrated for its manufacture of skin boats (bidars), and
there the old-time voyagers were accustomed to get the only night's
sleep ashore that navigation permits between St. Michael and Andraefski.
On the south bank of the main stream, at the head of the delta, is the
Roman Catholic mission of Kuslivuk; and a few miles higher, just above
the mouth of the Andraefski River, is the abandoned Russian trading
post, Andraefski, above which the river winds past Icogmute, where there
is a Greek Catholic mission. The banks of the river are much wooded, and
the current even as far down as Koserefski averages over three knots an
hour. Above Koserefski (the Catholic Mission station), the course is
along stretches of uninviting country, among marsh islands and
"sloughs," the current growing more and more swift on the long reach
from Auvik, where the Episcopal mission is situated, to Nulato.
The river here has a nearly north and south course, parallel with the
coast of Norton Sound and within fifty miles or so of it. Two portages
across here form cut-offs in constant use in winter by the traders,
Indians and missionaries. The first of these portages starts from the
mainland opposite the Island of St. Michael, and passes over the range
of hills that defines the shore to the headwaters of the Anvik River.
This journey may be made in winter by sledges and thence down the Auvik
to the Yukon, but it is a hard road. Mr. Nelson, the naturalist, and a
fur trader, spent two months from November 16, 1880, to January 19,
1891, in reaching the Yukon by this path.
The other portage is that between Unalaklik, a Swedish mission station
at the mouth of the Unalaklik River, some fifty miles north of St.
Michael, and a stream that enters the Yukon half way between Auvik and
Nulato. In going from St. Michael to Unalatlik there are few points at
which a boat can land even in the smoothest weather; in rough weather
only Major's Cove and Kegiktowenk before rounding Tolstoi Point to
Topánika, where there is a trading post. Topánika is some ten miles from
Unalaklik, with a high shelving beach, behind which rise high walls of
sandstone in perpendicular bluffs from twenty to one hundred feet in
height. This beach continues all the way to the Unalaklik River, the
bluff gradually decreasing into a marshy plain at the river's mouth,
which is obstructed by a bar over which at low tide there are only a few
feet of water except in a narrow and tortuous channel, constantly
changing as the river deposits fresh detritus. Inside this bar there are
two or three fathoms for a few miles, but the channel has only a few
feet, most of the summer, from the mouth of the river to Ulukuk.
Trees commence along the Unalaklik River as soon as the distance from
the coast winds and salt air permit them to grow; willow, poplar, birch
and spruce being those most frequently found.
The Unalaklik River is followed upward to Ulukuk, where begins a
sledging portage over the marshes to the Ulukuk Hills, where there is a
native village known as Vesolia Sopka, or Cheerful Peak, at an altitude
of eight hundred feet above the surrounding plain. This is a well-known
trapping ground, the fox and marten being very plentiful. From Sopka
Vesolia (Cheerful Peak) it is about one day's journey to Beaver Lake,
which is only a marshy tundra in winter, but is flooded in the spring
and summer months. From the high hills beyond the lake one may catch a
first glimpse of the great Yukon sweeping between its splendid banks.
[Illustration: OLD RUSSIAN BLOCK HOUSE AT SITKA.]
The natives call Nulato emphatically a "hungry" place, and it was once
the scene of an atrocious massacre. Capt. Dall, from whose book much of
the information regarding this part of Alaska is derived, describes the
Indians here as a very great nuisance. "They had," he explains, "a
great habit of coming in and sitting down, doing and saying nothing, but
watching everything. At meal times they seemed to count and weigh every
morsel we ate, and were never backward in assisting to dispose of the
remains of the meal. Occasionally we would get desperate and clean them
all out, but they would drop in again and we could do nothing but resign
ourselves."
The soil on the banks of the Yukon and that of the islands probably
never thaws far below the surface. It is certain that no living roots
are found at a greater depth than three feet. The soil, in layers that
seems to mark annual inundations, consists of a stratum of sand overlaid
by mud and covered with vegetable matter, the layers being from a half
inch to three inches in thickness. In many places where the bank has
been undermined these layers may be counted by the hundred. Low bluffs
of blue sandstone, with here and there a high gravel bank, characterize
the shores as far as Point Sakataloutan, and some distance above this
point begin the quartzose rocks.
The next station on the river is the village of Nowikakat, on the left
bank. Here may be obtained stores of dried meat and fat from the
Indians. The village is situated upon a beautiful bay or Nowikakat
Harbor, which is connected by a narrow entrance with the Yukon. "Through
this a beautiful view is obtained across the river, through the numerous
islands of the opposite shore, and of the Yukon Mountains in the
distance. The feathery willows and light poplars bend over and are
reflected in the dark water, unmixed as yet with Yukon mud; every island
and hillside is clothed in the delicate green of spring, and luxuriates
in a density of foliage remarkable in such a latitude."
Nowikakat is specially noted for the excellence of its canoes, of which
the harbor is so full that a boat makes its landing with difficulty
among them. It is the only safe place on the lower Yukon for wintering a
steamer, as it is sheltered from the freshets which bring down great
crushes of ice in the spring.
At Nuklukahyet there is a mission of the Episcopal church and a trading
store, but there may or may not be supplies of civilized goods, not to
speak of moose meat and fat. This is the neutral ground where all the
tribes meet in the spring to trade. The Tananah, which flows into the
Yukon at this point, is much broader here than the Yukon, and it is here
that Captain Dall exclaims in his diary: "And yet into this noble river
no white man has dipped his paddle." Recently, however, the Tananah has
been more or less explored by prospectors with favorable results
towards the head of the river, which is more easily reached overland
from Circle City and the Birch Creek camps.
Leaving Nuklukahyet, the "Ramparts" are soon sighted, and the Yukon
rapids sweep between bluffs and hills which rise about fifteen hundred
feet above the river, which is not more than half a mile wide and seems
almost as much underground as a river bed in a canyon. The rocks are
metaphoric quartzites, and the river-bed is crossed by a belt of
granite. The rapid current has worn the granite away at either side,
making two good channels, but in the center lies an island of granite
over which the water plunges at high water, the fall being about twelve
feet in half a mile.
Beyond the mouth of the Tananah the Yukon begins to widen, and it is
filled with small islands. The mountains disappear, and just beyond them
the Totokakat, or Dall River of Ketchum, enters the Yukon from the
north. Beyond this point the river, ever broadening, passes the "Small
Houses," deserted along the bank at the time, years ago, when the
scarlet fever, brought by a trading vessel to the mouth of the Chilkat,
spread to the Upper Yukon and depopulated the station. This place is
noted for the abundance of its game and fish.
The banks of the river above this point become very low and flat, the
plain stretching almost unbroken to the Arctic Ocean.
The next stream which empties into the Yukon is Beaver Creek, and
farther on the prospector bound for Circle City may make his way some
two hundred miles up Birch Creek, along which much gold has already been
discovered, to a portage of six miles, which will carry him within six
miles of Circle City on the west.
Meanwhile the Yukon passes Porcupine River and Fort Yukon, the old
trading-post founded in 1846-7, about a mile farther up the river than
the present fort is situated. The situation was changed in 1864, owing
to the undermining of the Yukon, which yearly washed away a portion of
the steep bank until the foundation timbers of the old Redoubt over-hung
the flood.
Many small islands encumber the river from Fort Yukon to Circle City,
and the river flows along the rich lowland to the towns and mining
centers of the new El Dorado, an account of which belongs to a future
chapter.
This voyage can be made only between the middle of June and the middle
of September, and requires about forty days, at best, from San Francisco
to Circle City or Forty Mile.
[Illustration: INDIAN TOTEM POLE, FORT SIMPSON.]
Route via Juneau, the Passes and down the Upper Yukon River. The
second and more usual, because shorter and quicker course, is that to
the head of Lynn Canal (Taiya Inlet) and overland. This coast voyage may
be said to begin at Victoria, B. C. (since all coast steamers gather and
stop there), where a large number of persons prefer to buy their
outfits, since by so doing, and obtaining a certificate of the fact,
they avoid the custom duties exacted at the boundary line on all goods
and equipments brought from the United States. Victoria is well supplied
with stores, and is, besides, one of the most interesting towns on the
Pacific coast. The loveliest place in the whole neighborhood is Beacon
Hill Park, and is well worth a visit by those who find an hour or two on
their hands before the departure of the steamer. It forms a
half-natural, half-cultivated area of the shore of the Straits of Fuca,
where coppices of the beautiful live oak, and many strange trees and
shrubs mingled with the all-pervading evergreens.
Within three miles of the city, and reached by street cars, is the
principal station in the North Pacific of the British navy, at
Esquimault Bay. This is one of the most picturesque harbors in the
world, and a beginning is made of fortifications upon a very large scale
and of the most modern character. This station, in many respects, is the
most interesting place on the Pacific coast of Canada.
Leaving Victoria, the steamer makes its way cautiously through the
sinuous channels of the harbor into the waters of Fuca Strait, but this
is soon left behind and the steamer turns this way, and that, at the
entrance to the Gulf of Georgia, among those islands through which runs
the international boundary line, and for the possession of which England
and the United States nearly went to war in 1862. The water at first is
pale and somewhat opaque, for it is the current of the great Fraser
gliding far out upon the surface, and the steamer passes on beyond it
into the darker, clearer, salter waters of the gulf. Then the prow is
headed to Vancouver, where the mails, freight and new railway passengers
are received.
From Vancouver the steamer crosses to Nanaimo, a large settlement on
Vancouver Island, where coal mines of great importance exist. A railway
now connects this point with Victoria, and a wagon road crosses the
interior of the island to Alberni Canal and the seaport at its entrance
on Barclay Sound. This is the farthest northern telegraph point. The
mines at Nanaimo were exhausted some time ago, after which deep
excavations were made on Newcastle Island, just opposite the town. But
after a tremendous fire these also were abandoned, and all the workings
are now on the shores of Departure Bay, where a colliery village named
Wellington has been built up. A steam ferry connects Nanaimo with
Wellington; and while the steamer takes in its coal, the passengers
disperse in one or the other village, go trout fishing, shooting or
botanizing in the neighboring woods, or trade and chaffer with the
Indians. Nanaimo has anything but the appearance of a mining town. The
houses do not stretch out in the squalid, soot-covered rows familiar to
Pennsylvania, but are scattered picturesquely, and surrounded by
gardens.
Just ahead lie the splendid hills of Texada Island, whose iron mines
yield ore of extraordinary purity, which is largely shipped to the
United States to be made into steel. The steamer keeps to the left,
making its way through Bayne's Sound, passing Cape Lazaro on the left
and the upper end of Texada on the right, across the broadening water
along the Vancouver shore into Seymour Narrows. These narrows are only
about 900 yards wide, and in them there is an incessant turmoil and
bubbling of currents. This is caused by the collision of the streams
which takes place here; the flood stream from the south, through the
Strait of Fuca and up the Haro Archipelago being met by that from Queen
Charlotte Sound and Johnstone straits. These straits are about 140
miles long, and by the time their full length is passed, and the maze of
small islands on the right and Vancouver's bulwark on the left are
escaped together, the open Pacific shows itself for an hour or two in
the offing of Queen Charlotte's Sound, and the steamer rises and falls
gently upon long, lazy rollers that have swept all the way from China
and Polynesia. Otherwise the whole voyage is in sheltered waters, and
seasickness is impossible. The steamer's course now hugs the shore,
turning into Fitz Hugh Sound, among Calvert, Hunter's and Bardswell
islands, where the ship's spars sometimes brush the overhanging trees.
Here are the entrances to Burke Channel and Dean's Canal that penetrate
far amid the tremendous cliffs of the mainland mountains. Beyond these
the steamer dashes across the open bight of Milbank Sound only to enter
the long passages behind Princess Royal, Pit and Packer islands, and
coming out at last into Dixon Sound at the extremity of British
Columbia's ragged coast line.
[Illustration: STREET IN SITKA.]
The fogs which prevail here are due to the fact that this bight is
filled with the waters of the warm Japanese current and the gulf stream
of the Pacific from which the warm moisture rises to be condensed by the
cool air that descends from the neighboring mountains, into the dense
fogs and heavy rain storms to which the littoral forest owes its
extraordinary luxuriance. During the mid-summer and early autumn,
however, the temperature of air and water become so nearly equable that
fog and rain are the exception rather than the rule.
Crossing the invisible boundary into Alaska the steamer heads straight
toward Fort Tougass, on Wales Island, once a military station of the
United States, but now only a fishing place. Between this point and Fort
Wrangel another abandoned military post of the United States, two or
three fish canneries and trading stations are visited and the ship goes
on among innumerable islands and along wide reaches of sound to Taku
Inlet (which deeply indents the coast, and is likely in the near future
to become an important route to the gold fields), and a few hours later
Juneau City is reached.
Juneau City has been lately called the key to the Klondike regions, as
it is the point of departure for the numberless gold hunters who, when
the season opens again, will rush blindly over incalculably rich ledges
near the coast to that remote inland El Dorado of their dreams.
Juneau has for seventeen years been supported by the gold mines of the
neighboring coast. It is situated ten miles above the entrance of
Gastineau Channel, and lies at the base of precipitous mountains, its
court house, hotels, churches, schools, hospital and opera house forming
the nucleus for a population which in 1893 aggregated 1,500, a number
very largely increased each winter by the miners who gather in from
distant camps. The saloons, of which in 1871 there were already
twenty-two, have increased proportionately, and there are, further, at
least one weekly newspaper, one volunteer fire brigade, a militia
company and a brass band in Juneau. The curio shops on Front and Seward
streets are well worth visiting, and from the top of Seward Street a
path leads up to the Auk village, whose people claim the flats at the
mouth of Gold Creek. A curious cemetery may be seen on the high ground
across the creek, ornamented with totemic carvings and hung with
offerings to departed spirits which no white man dares disturb.
FROM JUNEAU TO THE GOLD FIELDS.
The few persons who formerly wished to go to the head of Lynn Canal did
so mainly by canoeing, or chartered launches, but now many opportunities
are offered by large steamboats. Most of the steamers that bring miners
and prospectors from below do not now discharge their freight at Juneau,
however, but go straight to the new port Dyea at the head of the canal.
Lynn Canal is the grandest fiord on the coast, which it penetrates for
seventy-five miles. It is then divided by a long peninsula called
Seduction Point, into two prongs, the western of which is called Chilkat
Inlet, and the eastern Chilkoot. "It has but few indentations, and the
abrupt palisades of the mainland shores present an unrivalled panorama
of mountains, glaciers and forests, with wonderful cloud effects. Depths
of 430 fathoms have been sounded in the canal, and the continental range
on the east and the White Mountains on the west rise to average heights
of 6,000 feet, with glaciers in every ravine and alcove." No Cameron
boundary line, which Canada would like to establish, would cut this
fiord in two, and make it useless to both countries in case of quarrel.
The magnificent fan-shaped Davidson glacier, here, is only one among
hundreds of grand ice rivers shedding their bergs into its waters. At
various points salmon canneries have long been in operation; and the
Seward City mines are only the best among several mineral locations of
promise. A glance at the map will show that this "canal" forms a
straight continuation of Chatham Strait, making a north and south
passage nearly four hundred miles in length, which is undoubtedly the
trough of a departed glacier.
Dyea, the new steamer landing and sub-port of entry, is at the head of
navigation on the Chilkoot or eastern branch of this Lynn Canal, and
takes its name, in bad modern spelling, from the long-known Taiya
Inlet, which is a prolongation inland for twenty miles of the head of
the Chilkoot Inlet. It should continue to be spelled Tiaya. This inlet
is far the better of the two for shipping, Chilkat Inlet being exposed
to the prevalent and often dangerous south wind, so that it is regarded
by navigators as one of the most dangerous points on the Alaskan coast.
A Presbyterian mission and government school were formerly sustained at
Haines, on Seduction Point, but were abandoned some years ago on account
of Indian hostility.
The Passes.--Three passes over the mountains are reached from these two
inlets,--Chilkat, Chilkoot and White.
[Illustration: HEAD WATERS, DYEA RIVER.]
Chilkat Pass is that longest known and formerly most in vogue. The
Chilkat Indians had several fixed villages near the head of the inlet,
and were accustomed to go back and forth over the mountains to trade
with the interior Indians, whom they would not allow to come to the
coast. They thus enjoyed not only the monopoly of the business of
carrying supplies over to the Yukon trading posts and bringing out the
furs, and more recently of assisting the miners, but made huge profits
as middle-men between the Indians of the interior and the trading posts
on the coast. They are a sturdy race of mountaineers, and the most
arrogant, treacherous and turbulent of all the northwestern tribes, but
their day is nearly passed. The early explorers--Krause, Everette and
others--took this pass, and it was here that E. J. Glave first tried (in
1891) to take pack horses across the mountains, and succeeded so well as
to show the feasibility of that method of carriage, which put a check
upon the extortion and faithlessness of the Indian carriers. His account
of his adventures in making this experiment, over bogs, wild rocky
heights, snow fields, swift rivers and forest barriers, has been
detailed in The Century Magazine for 1892, and should be read by all
interested. "No matter how important your mission," Mr. Glave wrote,
"your Indian carriers, though they have duly contracted to accompany
you, will delay your departure till it suits their convenience, and any
exhibition of impatience on your part will only remind them of your
utter dependency on them; and then intrigue for increase of pay will at
once begin. While en route they will prolong the journey by camping on
the trail for two or three weeks, tempted by good hunting or fishing. In
a land where the open season is so short, and the ways are so long, such
delay is a tremendous drawback. Often the Indians will carry their loads
some part of the way agreed on, then demand an extravagant increase of
pay or a goodly share of the white man's stores, and, failing to get
either, will fling down their packs and return to their village, leaving
their white employer helplessly stranded."
The usual charge for Indian carriers is $2 a day and board, and they
demand the best fare and a great deal of it, so that the white man finds
his precious stores largely wasted before reaching his destination.
These facts are mentioned, not because it is now necessary to endure
this extortion and expense, but to show how little dependence can be
placed upon the hope of securing the aid of Indian packers in carrying
the goods of prospectors or explorers elsewhere in the interior, and the
great expense involved. This pass descends to a series of connected
lakes leading down to Lake Labarge and thence by another stream to the
Lewes; and it requires twelve days of pack-carrying--far more than is
necessary on the other passes. As a consequence, this pass is now rarely
used except by Indians going to the Aksekh river and the coast ranges
northward.
Chilkoot, Taiya or Parrier Pass.--This is the pass that has been used
since 1885 by the miners and others on the upper Yukon, and is still a
route of travel. It starts from the head of canoe navigation on Taiya
inlet, and follows up a stream valley, gradually leading to the divide,
which is only 3,500 feet above the sea. The first day's march is to the
foot of the ascent, and over a terrible trail, through heavy woods and
along a steep, rocky and often boggy hillside, broken by several deep
gullies. The ascent is then very abrupt and over huge masses of fallen
rock or steep slippery surfaces of rock in place. At the actual summit,
which for seven or eight miles is bare of trees or bushes, the trail
leads through a narrow rocky gap, and the whole scene is one of the most
complete desolation. Naked granite rocks, rising steeply to partly
snow-clad mountains on either side. Descending the inland or north slope
is equally bad
|
fair and stout people, with thin and delicate skin, ulcerates easily
as the result of friction or even of simple pressure, and bursæ and
callosities form. See what happens to the skin on the dorsum and outer
side of the foot in the case of talipes equino varus. The muscles of
the flap will not remain over the bone in the condition of muscular
tissue, they become fibrous--but they are useful because:
1. They interpose a fibrous layer of greater or less thickness between
the bone and the skin, so that the latter remains movable over the end
of the bone and is not directly compressed;
2. They adhere to the cut section of the bone forming a tendinous
insertion, which renders their action on the bony lever more powerful.
A flap bears weight badly when the muscles have retracted around the
bone, over which there is then nothing but skin. It is the same when
the flap is stretched tightly across the end of the bone, _the soft
parts must remain soft and free_.
Among the hundreds of cases of amputation of the leg or thigh that
have passed before us in being fitted at the _Fédération des Mutilés_,
there were many in which the presence of a terminal scar rendered the
fitting of an apparatus difficult; we have never found this the case
with a lateral scar; we have never seen the latter ulcerate rapidly as
the result of pressure or friction in a properly made wooden bucket.
So that it cannot be admitted that the proper covering of a stump is
ever a matter of secondary importance.
Consequently we should consider, as a matter of principle, the
circular method of amputating only as a last resort, and we ought to
arrange the section of the soft parts so as to cover the end of bone
as adequately as possible, and to bring the scars to one side.
We realise that in practice war surgery often necessitates deviations
from the ideal. We often find ourselves in a dilemma--either the stump
must be good but too short; or, being long, must be poor or even bad.
In the special case of the thigh, circular amputation in the lower
third when it is carried out through healthy tissue and has not
suppurated can be trimmed and sutured in such a way as to give an
excellent scar, which is transverse and slightly posterior. In this
situation after these routine amputations, a linear scar which is
supple and has healed by first intention, separated from the bone
by a good cushion of muscular and fibrous tissue, causes little
embarrassment, whatever its position; at the end of a few months it
stands pressure and friction without harm. But we are considering
war surgery and consequently we are often called upon to fit stumps
in which the cicatrix is large, hard, and more or less irregular, in
which the bone has suppurated and in which the neighbouring soft parts
are indurated and scarred. These stumps are not, however, the results
of the work of the worst surgeon.
Amputating through infected parts, resigning himself to healing by
granulation and subsequent trimming by operation, he must take time
and trouble to attain in the end a result which is good functionally,
although at first sight unsightly. But it is this surgeon who is on
the right road, rather than he who sends us good stumps which have not
suppurated, because he has amputated through the thigh for a wound of
the middle of the leg, or through the leg for a wound of the foot or
even of the front of the foot.
It is clear, that for the stump effectually to play its part of a
lever in its bucket, a certain definite length is necessary; and we
ought to do everything possible to secure a length of at least 15 to
20 centimetres in a thigh stump, or 10 to 12 centimetres in a leg
stump. But when this length is secured, there is no great functional
difference between, for example, an amputation of the leg in the
lower third or in the lower quarter, particularly if the fitter
understands how to utilise direct end bearing. The knowledge of this
is of capital importance to the surgeon called upon to carry out
secondary operations upon imperfect stumps, in determining whether
it is possible to put an immediate stop to suppuration by drastic
shortening, or whether he must preserve length and lose time by
curretting the foci of inflammation in the bone.
_CHAPTER III_
ARTIFICIAL LIMBS FOR AMPUTATIONS THROUGH THE THIGH
There are two entirely different modes of fitting:
I. For amputations above the condyles, in which weight must always be
borne upon the tuberosity of the ischium through the top of the bucket.
II. For amputations through the condyles (or for disarticulation of
the knee) in which a direct end bearing may suffice.
I. Apparatus with Bearing upon the Ischium
(_Amputation above the condyles._)
In the construction of an artificial limb for amputation through the
thigh two entirely different principles may be used, according as it
is desired to make the patient walk upon a rigid shaft, that is to say
upon a peg, or upon an artificial leg proper, in which the knee bends
in walking (known as the American leg).
But whichever principle is adopted, whatever material is chosen, wood
or leather, and however exact the fit in the bucket may be, certain
common rules govern:--
1. The shape of the top of the bucket by which it is fitted to the
top of the thigh and its bearing upon the ischium.
2. The attachment of the limb to the trunk.
To begin with we shall consider these two questions, and then
temporary and permanent apparatus, the peg leg and the full artificial
limb, will be described.
I. THE SHAPE OF THE TOP OF THE BUCKET
The tuberosity of the ischium is the sole bony point which can prevent
the ascent of the limb when weight is applied. This tuberosity is
situated in the posterior part of the perineum (Fig. 1), the anterior
part of which is unable to stand pressure. It is necessary, therefore,
to clear this part by cutting down the inner border in its anterior
part, forming a _perineal concavity_, which rises posteriorly against
the ischium (Fig. 3).
It is essential that the ischium should not be able to slip inside
the bucket, otherwise the inner border will come in contact with the
perineum: therefore the diameter of the bucket must be less than that
of the limb, so that the ischium may rest upon its upper edge.
If the bucket is too large, the patient abducts the stump, so as
to lower the inner border and prevent pressure on the perineum; he
carries the leg away from the side as he walks, and this is both
unsightly and fatiguing.
When an apparatus is completed, it is very easy to ascertain the site
of the pressure on the ischium. The limb being put on, the ischium
is fixed between the thumb and first finger, and it can then be
ascertained whether it rests on the edge of the bucket or lies within
it. This can be determined more exactly, if whilst the fingers which
mark the position of the ischium are kept within the bucket, the
patient is told to raise his stump.
If the bucket is sufficiently narrow, it may be circular without the
excavation for the perineum (Fig. 2). But this shape is unsatisfactory
for another reason, because it results in a tendency for the limb to
rotate inwards.
At the moment when the artificial limb is coming in contact with the
ground as it takes a step, the pelvis is oblique (the iliac spine of
the sound side lying posterior to that of the amputated side). The
sound limb as it executes its step is carried forwards, and the pelvis
which was oblique in one direction now becomes oblique in the opposite
direction. This movement is transmitted to the femur in the stump, so
that the artificial limb turns inwards relatively to the stump. With
each step this rotation becomes little by little more perceptible,
and after a time the patient is obliged to correct it by turning the
artificial limb with his hand.
If, on the other hand, the front of the upper border of the bucket
slopes downwards and inwards at an angle of about 45 degrees, when as
a result of its weight the bucket turns inwards as the limb is swung,
the base of the stump will come against a higher part of bucket; but
when the pressure of the weight of the body returns, the stump, being
forced into the bucket, will descend again along this slope, that
is to say a passive external rotation of the artificial limb will
be brought about, correcting at every step the tendency to internal
rotation.
[Illustration: AMPUTATIONS THROUGH THE THIGH
FIG. 1.
FIG. 2.
FIG. 3.
In the upright position the rami of the pubis and ischium, between
which stretches the perineum, slope downwards and backwards at an
angle of about 45° with the horizontal. The tuberosity of the ischium
bounds the perineum posteriorly, and is its lowest point. The rami
of the pubis and ischium, corresponding to the genito-crural fold,
mark the boundary between the thigh and the perineum. These bones are
unable to stand the pressure of an artificial limb.
If the top of the bucket is narrower than the circumference of the
top of the limb, measured below the ischium, it may be circular and
still give support to the ischium, which will not slip into it. If
the ischium does slip into the bucket, the result will be that it no
longer serves as the support, the pressure coming instead upon the
rami of the pubis and ischium and upon the perineum.
The constriction thus exerted upon the top of the stump may easily
become insupportable. The correct solution of the problem is to cut
down the upper border of the bucket opposite the perineum, letting it
rise again posteriorly beneath the tuberosity of the ischium, and
gain a good support there.]
The same slope may be given to both edges of the bucket (Fig. 5).
This obliquity in the posterior part serves no useful purpose: it is
better on the contrary to lower the posterior border combining this
semioblique fitting with a rise beneath the ischium and a depression
under the perineum (Fig. 6).
These conditions are easily carried out in a well-made wooden bucket,
represented in figures 8 and 9, in which it may further be seen that
from the front it is convex outwards; from the side, convex forwards
(Fig. 9). This form, which is that of some good American appliances,
ought to be generally used.
_The curve outwards_, by drawing away the soft parts from it, frees
the region of the ischium and allows the tuberosity of the ischium to
press upon the bucket (Fig. 8).
_If the thigh piece is curved forwards_, and particularly if the limb
is built with a very slight flexion of the knee, the stump remains
slightly flexed at the hip and the patient feels as if he is sitting
in the apparatus.
When the thigh piece is straight, an uncomfortable pressure is
produced by the edge of the bucket against the ischium. It may be
added that extension of the hip is very often impaired, particularly
in patients with a short stump: The extensor muscles being divided,
the flexors cause contraction into a flexed position, the more so the
shorter the stump is. If the thigh piece is straight, the short stump
cannot follow the movement of extension necessary in walking; it slips
out of the bucket if the anterior lip of the latter is too low.
The principles are the same for the leather bucket, known as the
_French pattern_.
[Illustration: FIG. 4.
FIG. 5.
FIG. 6.
FIG. 7.
FIG. 8.
FIG. 9.
Figure 4 shows the circular bucket (almost always too large) of the
poor man's peg leg, attached to the body by a belt which is fastened
to a projection upwards from the outer side of the bucket.
Figure 5 shows the oblique bucket, with symmetrical anterior and
posterior borders. Figure 6 one with the anterior border oblique, the
posterior border being cut away. Figure 7 shows the double obliquity,
downwards and backwards, of the bucket. The convexities of the bucket
and thigh piece, in the type which we consider to be the best, are
shown in figure 8 (convexity outwards), and figure 9 (convexity
forwards).]
In this the thigh piece is strengthened by two lateral steels (to the
lower end of which is fixed the leg piece) joined posteriorly by a
semicircular cross piece on which the ischium should rest (Fig. 13).
[Illustration: FIG. 10.]
[Illustration: FIG. 11.]
The usual form hitherto has been that shown in figure 10. The cross
piece was horizontal and formed simply a posterior semicircle; the
lateral steels were straight. Consequently in this pattern these
steels form a cone, in which the soft parts are not compressed on
the inner side, nor drawn outwards, as in the apparatus previously
described. Further, as long as the stump is not shrunken, the ischium
covered on its inner side by soft parts sinks into the bucket, and it
is the perineum which becomes the point of pressure (Fig. 11). Made
of leather, the perineal concavity soon loses its shape and really
no longer exists. Finally the bucket is circular, with the faults
inseparable from that shape (Fig. 12).
In cases where it is felt necessary to employ leather, all these
faults are easily corrected, by giving the cross piece the shape
which we have described for the wooden bucket, and by prolonging it
forwards through two-thirds of the corresponding circumference, in
the shape of an oblique bucket. (Dotted line in Fig. 12.)
If it is not strengthened, an oblique border of leather gives way, and
after a few months' use allows rotation. The leather which extends
from the termination of the metal ascends very steeply towards the
trochanter, whilst the posterior border of the bucket, which is
horizontal, curves downwards on the inner side to form the perineal
concavity.
[Illustration: FIG. 12.
FIG. 13.
FIG. 14.
The ordinary leather bucket is mounted upon two lateral steels, which
are joined by a posterior cross piece (Fig. 13). This framework is
shown in figure 10, and covered with leather in figure 12. If the
lateral steels are straight and divergent, this has all the defects
of the straight circular bucket. The concavity for the perineum, cut
out of the leather, soon loses its shape. It is, however, easy to
shape the cross piece as shown in figure 14, with a perineal concavity
and the anterior border oblique, following the dotted line in figure
12. By doing this and curving the steel uprights appropriately, the
correct form of the wooden bucket can be copied exactly in a leather
and steel apparatus. Such a correct apparatus is shown in figures 15
to 18.]
In figure 14 is seen the metal framework; in figures 15 and 16 that
of the apparatus covered with leather; in figure 17 the support upon
the ischium; and the possibility of making this appliance identical
with the wooden bucket will be observed (Fig. 18).
[Illustration: FIG. 15.]
[Illustration: FIG. 16.]
[Illustration: FIG. 17.]
[Illustration: FIG. 18.]
II. MODE OF SUSPENSION
_Suspension of the thigh piece_ is essential, and is all the more
important when the stump is short and consequently more liable to
slip out of the bucket. For this purpose support may be taken either
from the waist, upon the _prominence of the iliac crests_, or from
the _shoulders_ by means of braces. In the case of a long stump
(amputation below the middle of the thigh) only one of these methods
is necessary, we shall describe the usual methods:
_The waist belt_ (French system) for leather appliances.
_Braces_ (American system) for appliances of wood.
If the stump is short a combination of the two methods is best.
[Illustration: FIGS. 19 and 20.--Simple pelvic suspension,
with details of the joint at the hip.]
A. SUSPENSION BY MEANS OF A WAIST BELT.--_For the peg leg
made of leather_ the best method consists in placing a pelvic plate,
which is attached to the hip steel, below the iliac crest (Figs. 20 to
24). A belt attached to the extremities of this plate surrounds the
pelvis and passes above the iliac crest on the other side. The thigh
piece is attached to this support, on the outer side, by articulation
of the outer femoral steel with the hip steel; on the inner side, by
a perineal strap. Braces complete the method of suspension of the
apparatus (Fig. 21).
[Illustration: FIG. 21.]
The axis of the metal joint between the outer femoral steel and the
lower end of the T piece should be directly above the great trochanter
(Fig. 20).
The femoral steel often breaks in the neighbourhood of this joint
(Fig. 23); we have got over this difficulty by adding immediately
beneath it a joint which allows of abduction (Fig. 19). A perineal
strap limits this movement.
[Illustration: FIG. 22.
FIG. 23.
_Suspension from the pelvis._
A metal hip piece is fixed below the iliac crest and held in place
by a belt which passes above the iliac crest of the opposite side
(Figs. 20 to 24). This piece is attached to the thigh bucket by a
joint shown in figure 19 (see also Fig. 22), which allows both flexion
and abduction of the hip, and which forms the suspension of the
outer side of the limb. The inner border is suspended by means of a
perineal strap, shown in figures 21 and 22. In figure 21 is shown how
a suspending brace may be easily added. Figure 23 shows the action of
a single hinge joint, allowing only flexion and extension at the hip
joint. On page 27 will be seen similar joints which, however, move on
the pelvic attachment as well as on the thigh piece. The object of
this is to prevent the pinching of the abdominal wall by the top of
the thigh bucket when the patient sits. It is indispensable in short
stumps. On page 21 will be seen a joint which allows abduction of the
hip, and thus relieves the strain upon the hinge joint; without it the
latter is easily broken.]
B. SUSPENSION BY MEANS OF BRACES (American method).--The
American method of suspension has the advantage of leaving the pelvis
free; the patient does not feel the pull of the hip piece. Besides,
when the belt is used, if the patient sits down, the buttock on
the side of the stump is raised, to an extent corresponding to the
thickness of the bucket, an obliquity of the pelvis, which is both
uncomfortable and unsightly, being produced. The braces being relaxed
in the sitting posture, the patient can avoid this inconvenience; for
the stump may be slipped partly out of its bucket, the upper extremity
of which is then beyond the level of the edge of the chair. This
position is very comfortable, because it is normal, but the patient
must replace his stump in the bucket whenever he stands up.
[Illustration: FIG. 24.
FIG. 25.
Braces composed of straps passing over the shoulders and down the
front, attached to the bucket by buckles. Posteriorly they are joined
together by a cross strap between the scapulæ, and beyond this are
continued in the form of elastic straps.]
This form of suspension is essential for those artificial limbs with a
free knee-joint, in which, as we shall see, the braces serve to extend
the joint.
We illustrate here two methods of attaching the braces to the thigh
piece, that which we use in the limb supplied by the Fédération (Figs.
24 and 25) and that which is used in the American limb of Marks
(Figs. 26 and 27).
[Illustration: FIG. 26.
FIG. 27.
FIG. 26.--Braces which end below in looped thongs of leather.
FIG. 27.--These loops, held in to the thigh piece by passing
beneath a loop of leather, pass over two pulleys about the middle of
the inner and outer sides of the thigh piece respectively. The outer
brace tends to abduct the limb if it is tightened.]
C. COMBINED METHOD OF SUSPENSION.--_If the stump is short_
the artificial limb must be attached both by a belt and by braces; the
latter should be 5 to 6 centimetres wide.
[Illustration: FIG. 28.
_Combined suspension for short stumps._
FIG. 28.--Complete appliance.
FIG. 29 and 30 show the value of a flexion pivot between the
hip piece and the pelvic plate. If there is no such pivot, the T piece
undoubtedly rotates upon the belt, but not to a sufficient extent to
prevent the thigh piece in rising and pinching the abdominal wall
(Fig. 29). If there is a double joint the hip piece becomes oblique,
thrusting the thigh piece forward and allowing the patient to sit
erect (Fig. 30).]
In these cases also, to prevent the stump escaping from the bucket
when the hip is flexed, the front of the thigh piece is carried as
high as possible; but if the appliance is furnished with a metal T
piece, such as has been described (Fig. 29, see also Fig. 23), then
this raised border prevents flexion of the hip by coming in contact
with the abdominal wall when the patient sits down. This difficulty
can be got over by making the top of the T piece movable; when the
patient sits down the vertical piece of the T becomes oblique, the
thigh piece comes forward, allows the stump to escape a little way and
no longer presses against the abdominal wall (Fig. 30).
The belt may also be replaced by a leather corselet, having fixed to
it the hip piece that we have just described.
[Illustration: FIG. 29.]
The braces by themselves are a poor method of attachment for a short
stump.
[Illustration: FIG. 30.]
In the sitting position the stump easily escapes from the bucket.
When the patient is standing the stump remains abducted, whilst the
apparatus, as the result of its own weight hangs vertically, in this
swaying position the lower extremity of the stump presses against the
outer side of the bucket, whilst the inner edge of the bucket cuts
into the flesh at the top of the thigh.
III. WALKING ON A PEG LEG AND SIMILAR APPLIANCES
_The rigid peg and the jointed peg._--The peg leg is a rigid rod,
ending in a slight enlargement, which transmits the weight of the
body, resting by means of the ischium upon the top of the bucket,
directly to the ground.
The erect position is thus very secure, and stability in walking is
also very good throughout the time when the artificial limb bears the
weight.
To raise the limb from the ground and carry it forwards, the patient
uses at the same time both flexion of the stump at the hip and
movements of the pelvis (elevation, then rotation inwards) varying to
some extent with his proficiency and with the length of the stump.
_The old-fashioned peg leg_, called the "poor man's peg," consists
of a bucket continued into a rigid peg. If the support beneath the
ischium is well made according to the principles described above,
it is an excellent temporary limb.[3] This bucket of common wood,
which is not specially shaped to the stump, is very economical; its
imperfect fit is an advantage in that the stump, which is still
enlarged, cannot bear friction; as the stump assumes its true shape
and diminishes in size, the bucket is packed. We would add that every
patient, who is not rich enough to possess two complete artificial
limbs should have in reserve an emergency peg leg, for occasions when
the artificial limb requires repair.
[3] A number of temporary limbs have been designed, with buckets
of lattice work or of plaster. The old-fashioned wooden peg, which
is easily obtained, avoids all this additional work without any
disadvantage.
As a permanent apparatus, with accurately fitted bucket, the rigid
peg leg has two defects: it has not the appearance of a leg and
foot, and when the patient is sitting the rigid peg is unsightly and
inconvenient to him and to his neighbours. We have therefore designed
and completed a _jointed peg leg_, the principle of which is as
follows:
Below the thigh piece the peg is attached by a transverse joint,
this joint being locked in the extended position when the patient is
upright. The patient sets it free by manipulating the lock through the
trousers, when he sits down; when he gets up again the locking in the
extended position is automatic.
The fitting of this transverse joint may be carried out in two ways.
1. The upper end of the peg ends in a stirrup-shaped fork and the bolt
passes through the two ends of this fork and through the lower end of
the thigh piece (Figs. 31 to 33).
2. The lower extremity of the thigh piece has cut in it a central
mortise into which fits a vertical plate, prolonged upwards from the
middle of the leg piece. The bolt passes through this artificial
tibial spine and through the two sides of the mortise in the thigh
piece. If the hole in the tibial spine through which this bolt passes
is square the hinge works securely (Figs. 34 to 36).
In this form the axle turns with the leg, in the first form this is
also possible. But most often when the forked attachment is used it is
fixed to a leather thigh piece, and each end of the fork is jointed
independently to the corresponding end of the lateral steels of the
thigh piece, without any complete transverse bolt. It is then the fork
that revolves around these two joints.
[Illustration:
FIGS. 31 to 33.--Fixation of the stirrup of the leg (Fig. 31)
by a transverse bolt (Fig. 33), the aperture for which in the thigh
piece is seen in Fig. 32. Double lock (Fig. 32).]
[Illustration:
FIGS. 34 to 36.--Attachment by mortise and tenon, with a
bolt, square in section, passing through the knee. Single lock on the
outer side.]
If there is a complete transverse bolt, the joint can be securely
locked by a single lock at one of its extremities (at the outer
extremity) (Figs. 36 to 39).
If there are two lateral joints the single lock is insufficient, both
joints must be fixed at once; unless this is done, that which is not
fixed has a certain amount of play and is strained.
It is, however, simple, by means of a posterior semicircle, to joint
the two locks and to work them together by a single movement (Fig. 32).
For æsthetic reasons the wooden leg piece may be made in the shape of
a leg and foot. But if the principle of the peg leg has been adopted,
for an agricultural labourer for example, on account of its stability,
it is better to use an appliance in which a "show leg" is fitted
around the simple peg on days when appearance is more important than
work (Figs. 37 to 45). The limb is thus rendered lighter, for the
false calf consists of a simple layer of felt and it is very easy to
replace the enlarged lower end of the peg by a foot.
[Illustration: FIGS. 37 to 40.--Attachment by a mortise, and
show foot.]
We show later two models of this sort, one with an American thigh
piece of wood and a single lock upon a transverse axle, the other with
a leather thigh piece and a double lock. The first (Figs. 37 to 40) is
shown with an attachment by braces, and the second (Figs. 41 to 47)
with an attachment by means of a waist belt; we have already explained
when these two must be combined.
[Illustration: FIG. 41. FIGS. 42 to 47.
_Leather and steel peg leg, with show foot._
Figures 41 to 47 (leather appliance) should be compared with figures
37 to 40 (wooden appliance) which complete them in certain points. It
is unnecessary to refer further to the method of fitting the bucket to
the suspension, or to the method of attaching and locking the knee.
The peg--attached above by a stirrup or by a mortise, it does not
matter which--ends below in a rectangular tenon which fits into a
corresponding excavation in the upper surface of the terminal piece,
whether peg or foot (Figs. 38 and 44). A transverse bolt, square in
section, with a head at one end and a thread at the other, fixes these
two parts together. By taking out this bolt the peg can be replaced by
the foot or _vice versâ_.
If the attachment of the foot is made in the heel, a fixed foot is
used (Figs. 43 and 45), but it is easy, by making the attachment
higher, to use a foot with movable ankle joint (Fig. 40).
The attachment of the show calf piece around the peg is shown in
figures 43 and 45.]
Most often the wooden thigh piece is to be preferred; the limb is
lighter and may last four or five years instead of about two years.
We may add that leather loses its shape and the bucket becomes
enlarged, producing inconveniences already described on page 18.
But _leather_--indespensable for certain stumps which cannot stand
a wooden bucket--has the advantage that it can be employed as a
_temporary fitting_. During the first weeks, sometimes even for the
first months, the shrinking of the stump can be accommodated by lacing
up the bucket, and, when shrinkage is complete, the leg part of this
first apparatus can be attached to a wooden bucket which the improved
condition of the stump now renders possible.
This form is a little more expensive (80 frs.) than "the poor man's
leg," but I believe a great deal more comfortable. It may be added,
that it is easy when the foot is fitted at the end of the apparatus
to render flexion of the knee free and to attain the "American walk,"
of which we shall speak later. All that is necessary is to attach in
front an artificial muscle of indiarubber, reaching from the thigh to
the leg and an extending sling like that in the American limbs (see
page 47).
This appliance which we call the "Fédération Leg," because we designed
it at the _Fédération des Mutilés_, has already been imitated without
its origin being acknowledged.
IV. WALKING WITH FREE FLEXION OF THE KNEE
A. _Design._--The oldest type, which will suffice for studying the
general conditions of stability, is that of Marks, with a fixed
foot shaped out of the same piece of wood as the leg: the ankle
joint--several types of which we shall describe later--does not affect
the question of stability.
The appliance is made entirely of wood; it is strong and light.
Nothing need be added to the description already given of the fitting
and method of attachment of the thigh piece, which ends below in a
curved "condyle,"[4] which fits into the top of the leg piece. It
is transfixed by a metal bolt, from each end of which a metal plate
descends and is riveted into a corresponding groove in the leg.[5]
This forms the axle which rotates in the thigh piece when the knee
flexes or extends. Flexion of the knee is free. Extension is stopped
just short of the straight line (see p. 16).
[4] The bucket and the condylar portion are made of two separate
pieces of wood.
[5] The hole through which the bolt passes being cut in soft wood
(willow or lime), must be strengthened by a cylinder of metal, of
leather, or of harder wood (beech or service tree) in which the axle
revolves.
[Illustration: FIG. 48.--Marks leg with fixed foot.]
[Illustration: FIG. 49.--Construction of the foot.]
The foot is in equinus at an angle of 25° to 30° so that the heel
is 2 or 3 centimetres from the ground (the usual height of the heel
of a boot). The piece of wood which forms the instep and which is
continuous with the leg stops at a point corresponding to the middle
of the metatarsus, and is only half the thickness of the foot. The
rest of the foot is shaped of indiarubber stuck on to the instep
piece; the wood and rubber being enclosed in a sheath of leather.
The foot should also point slightly outwards, as in the normal
standing position.
_To ascertain whether the limb is built so as to ensure equilibrium_,
a thread is stretched against its side so as to pass through the axes
of the knee and ankle joints, if this cuts the ischial bearing point
at its centre the equilibrium of the patient is assured. Equilibrium
will be better still if the cord lies entirely behind the ischial
bearing point, leaving in front of it the greater part of the thigh
piece. The best method of ascertaining if the foot is properly mounted
is to hold the limb in front of one by the thigh piece, with the knee
bent at a right angle; it can then be seen whether the foot turns
outwards at the correct angle.
It is not necessary to say anything more about the shape of the thigh
piece (page 17).
The metal bolt which transfixes the knee must not allow any play; the
hole through which it passes must be lined with hard wood or leather.
The indiarubber sole should be reinforced with several layers of
canvas incorporated in the rubber, as the latter if not so reinforced
perishes and cracks.
The appliance must further be examined after it is applied. The level
of the iliac spines must be compared: the spine on the side of the
amputation should be 2 cm. below that of the sound side.
Examine the position of the point of the foot. Make the patient sit
down, see if the knees are on the same horizontal plane; if the
sound knee is the higher the leg piece is too short. The foot being
fixed in the equinus position the patient must wear boots while the
examination is being carried out.
B. _Mechanism of walking._--In walking, a step being taken with the
artificial leg, the toe of the foot is the last to leave the ground,
the heel being raised and the knee straight. The limb is swung forward
and raised by flexion of the hip: active flexion of the knee is
impossible, but passive flexion occurs, owing to the weight of the leg
piece, as the thigh is raised.
At this moment the leg piece is vertical, forming an angle with the
thigh, from this position it must pass into one in which it is oblique
forwards and downwards, in a straight line with the thigh, _so that
the knee may be fully extended when weight is again borne by the limb_
as the foot meets the ground. If at this moment the knee is flexed the
limb will double up under the weight of the body.
The first contact of the limb with the ground should be at the heel
with, as we have already said, the knee extended. Afterwards as the
limb, which at first points obliquely forward and downwards, passes
into the vertical position in which it must be at the period when it
bears the whole of the weight, this complete extension becomes locked
and transforms the limb into a rigid
|
. With the
exception of the vicarage there was no other house, worthy the name, in
the coombe; all the rest were fishermen's cots. The nearest inn and
shops were on the fringe of the moor behind and beyond the Lorton's
cottage; the nearest house of any consequence was that of the local
squire, three miles away. The market town of Shallop was eight miles
distant, and the only public communication with it was the carrier's
cart, which went to and fro twice weekly. In short, Shorne Mills was out
of the world, and will remain so until the Railway Fiend flaps his
coal-black wings over it and drops, with red-hot feet, upon it to sear
its beauty and destroy its solitude. It had got its name from a flour
and timber mill which had once flourished halfway down the coombe or
valley; but the wheels were now silent, the mills were falling to
pieces, and the silver stream served no more prosaic purpose than
supplying the fishing folk with crystal water which was pure as the
stars it reflected. This stream, as it ran beside the road or meandered
through the sloping meadows, made soft music, day and night, all through
the summer, but swelled itself into a torrent in the winter, and roared
as it swept over the smooth bowlders to its bridegroom, the sea;
sometimes it was the only sound in the valley, save always the murmur of
the ocean, and the shrill weird cry of the curlew as it flew from the
sea marge to the wooded heights above.
Nell loved the place with a great and exceeding love, with all the love
of a girl to whom beauty is a continual feast. She knew every inch of
it; for she had lived in the cottage on the hill since she was a child
of seven, and she was now nearly twenty-one. She knew every soul in the
fishing village, and, indeed, for miles around, and not seldom she was
spoken of as "Miss Nell, of Shorne Mills;" and the simple folk were as
proud of the title as was Nell herself. They were both fond and proud of
her. In any cottage and at any time her presence was a welcome one, and
every woman and child, when in trouble, flew to her for help and comfort
even before they climbed to the vicarage--that refuge of the poor and
sorrowing in all country places.
As she swung to the little gate behind her this morning, she paused and
looked round at the familiar scene; and its beauty, its grandeur, and
its solitude struck her strangely, as if she were looking at it for the
first time.
"One could be so happy if mamma--and if Dick could find something to
do!" she thought; and at the thought her eyes grew sadder and the sweet
lips drooped still more at the corner; but as she went up the hill, the
fine rare air, the brilliant sunshine acted like an anodyne, and the
eyes grew brighter, the lips relaxed, so that Smart's--the
butcher's--face broadened into a smile of sympathy as he touched his
forehead with a huge and greasy finger.
"Sweetbreads! No, no, miss; I've promised the cook up at the
Hall----There, bless your heart, Miss Nell, don't 'ee look so
disappointed. I'll send 'em--yes, in half an hour at most. Dang me if it
was the top brick off the chimney I reckon you'd get 'ee, for there
ain't no refusin' 'ee anything!"
Nell thanked him with a smile and a grateful beam from her gray eyes,
and then, still lighter-hearted, went on to Mrs. Porter's. By great good
luck not only had the toilet vinegar arrived from London, but a copy of
the _Fashion Gazette_; and with these in her hand Nell went homeward.
But at the bend of the road near the cottage she paused. Mrs. Lorton
would not want the vinegar or the paper for another hour. Would there be
time to run down to the jetty and look at the sea? She slipped the paper
and the bottle in the hedge, and went lightly down the road. It was so
steep that strangers went cautiously and leaned on their sticks, but
Nell nearly ran and seemed scarcely to touch the ground; for she had
toddled down that road as a child, and knew every stone in it; knew
where to leave it for the narrow little path which provided a short cut,
and where to turn aside for the marvelous view of the tiny harbor that
looked like a child's toy on the edge of the opal sea.
Women and children came out of the cottages as she went swiftly past,
and she exchanged greetings with them; but she was in too great a hurry
to stop, and one child followed after her with bitter complaint.
She stood for a moment or two talking to some of the men mending their
nets on the jetty, called down to Dick, who was lying--he was always
reclining on something--basking in the stern of his anchored boat; then
she went, more slowly, up the hill again.
As she neared the cottage, a sound rose from the house and mingled with
the music of the stream. It was the yelp of staghounds. She stopped and
listened, and wondered whether the stag would run down the hill, as it
sometimes did; then she went on. Presently she heard another sound--the
tap, tap of a horse's hoofs. Her quick ear distinguished it as different
from the slow pacing of the horses which drew the village carts, and she
looked up the road curiously. It was not the doctor's horse; she knew
the stamp, stamp of his old gray cob. This was a lighter, more nervous
tread.
Within twenty paces of the cottage she saw the horse and horseman. The
former was a beautiful creature, almost thoroughbred, as she knew; for
every woman in the district was a horsewoman by instinct and
association. The latter was a gentleman in a well-made riding suit of
cords. He was riding slowly, his whip striking against his leg absently,
his head bent.
That he was not one of the local gentry Nell saw at the first glance. In
that first glance also she noted a certain indescribable grace, an air
of elegance, which, as a rule, was certainly lacking in the local
gentry. She could not see his face, but there was something strange,
distinguished in his attitude and the way he carried himself; and,
almost unconsciously, her pace slackened.
Strangers in Shorne Mills were rare. Nell, being a woman, was curious.
As she slowly reached the gate, the man came almost alongside. And at
that moment a rabbit scuttled across the road, right under the horse's
nose. With the nervousness of the thoroughbred, it shied. The man had it
in hand in an instant, and touched it with his left spur to keep it away
from the girl. The horse sprang sideways, set its near foot on a stone,
and fell, and the next instant the man was lying at Nell's feet.
CHAPTER II.
For a moment Nell was too startled to do anything but cry out; then, as
the man did not move, she knelt beside him, and still calling for Molly,
almost unconsciously raised his head. He had fallen on his side, but had
turned over in the instant before losing consciousness; and as Nell
lifted his head she felt something wet trickle over her hand, and knew
that it was blood.
She was very much frightened--with the exception of Dick's boyish falls
and cuts, it was the first accident at which she had "assisted"--and she
had never longed for any one as she longed for Molly. But neither Molly
nor any one else came, and Nell, in a helpless, dazed kind of fashion,
wiped the blood from the wound.
Then suddenly she thought of water, and setting his head down as gently
as she could, she ran to the stream, saturated her handkerchief, and,
returning, took his head on her lap again, and bathed his forehead.
While she was doing this she recovered her presence of mind sufficiently
to look at him with something like the desire to know what he was like;
and, with all a woman's quickness of perception, saw that he was
extremely good-looking; that he was rather dark than fair; that though
he was young--twenty-nine, thirty, flashed through her mind--the hair on
his temples was faintly flecked with gray.
But something more than the masculine beauty of the face struck her,
struck her vaguely, and that was the air of distinction which she had
noticed in his bearing as he came down the road, and an expression of
weariness in the faint lines about the mouth and eyes.
She was aware, without knowing why, that he was extremely well dressed;
she saw that the ungloved hand was long and thin--the hand of a
well-bred man--and that everything about him indicated wealth and the
gentleman.
All these observations required but a second or two--a man would only
have got at them after an hour--and, almost before they were made, he
opened his eyes with the usual dazed and puzzled expression which an
individual wears when he has been knocked out of time and is coming back
to consciousness.
As his eyes opened, Nell noticed that they were dark--darker than they
should have been to match his hair--and that they were anything but
commonplace ones. He looked up at her for an instant or two, then
muttered something under his breath--Nell was almost certain that he
swore--and aloud, in the toneless voice of the newly conscious, said:
"I came off, didn't I?"
"Yes," said Nell.
She neither blushed nor looked shy. Indeed, she was too frightened, too
absorbed by her desire for his recovery to remember herself, or the fact
that this strange man's head was lying on her knee.
"I must have been unconscious," he said, almost to himself. "Yes, I've
struck my head."
Then he got to his feet and stood looking at her; and his face was, if
anything, whiter than it had been.
"I'm very sorry. Permit me to apologize, for I must have frightened you
awfully. And"--he looked at her dress, upon which was a large wet patch
where his head had rested--"and I've spoiled your dress. In short, I've
made a miserable nuisance of myself."
Nell passed his apology by.
"Are you hurt?" she asked anxiously.
"No; I think not," he replied. "I can't think how I managed to come off;
I don't usually make such an ass of myself."
He went for his hat, but as he stooped to pick it up he staggered, and
Nell ran to him and caught his arm.
"You are hurt!" she said. "I--I was afraid so!"
"I'm giddy, that's all, I think," he said; but his lips closed tightly
after his speech, and they twitched at the corners. "I expect my horse
is more damaged than I am," he added, and he walked, very slowly, to
where the animal stood looking from side to side with a startled air.
"Yes; knees cut. Poor old chap! It was my fault--my fau----"
He stopped, and put his hand to his head as if he were confused.
Nell went and stood close by him, with a vague kind of idea that he was
going to fall and that she might help him, support him.
"You are in pain?" she asked, her brow wrinkled with her anxiety, her
eyes darkened with her womanly sympathy and pity.
"Yes," he admitted frankly. "I've knocked my head, and"--he touched his
arm--"and, yes, I'm afraid I've broken my arm."
"Oh!"--cried Nell, startled and aghast--"oh! you must come into the
house at once--at once."
He glanced at the cottage.
"Your house?"
"Yes," said Nell. "Oh, come, please. You may faint again----"
"Oh, no, I shan't."
"But you may--you may! Take my arm; lean on me----"
He took her arm, but did not lean on her, and he smiled down at her.
"I don't look it, but I weigh nearly twelve stone, and I should bear you
down," he said.
"I'm stronger than I look," said Nell. "Please come!"
"I'll put the bridle over the gate first," he said.
"No, no; I will do it. Lean against the gate while I go."
He rested one hand on the gate. She got the horse--he came as quietly as
his master had done--and hitched the bridle on the post; then she drew
the man's arm within hers, and led him into the house and into the
drawing-room.
"Sit down," she said; "lean back. I won't be a moment. Oh, where is
Molly? But perhaps I'd better not leave you."
"I'm all right. I assure you that I've no intention of fainting again,"
he said; and there was something like a touch of irritation in his tone.
Nell rang the bell and stood looking down at him anxiously. There was
not a sign of self-consciousness or embarrassment in her face or manner.
She was still thinking only of him.
"I'm ashamed of myself for giving you so much trouble," he said.
"It is no trouble. Why should you be ashamed? Oh, Molly! don't cry out
or scream--it is all right! Be quiet now, Molly! This gentleman has been
thrown from his horse, and----Oh, bring me some brandy; and, Molly,
don't tell--don't frighten mamma."
Molly, with her mouth still wide open, ran out of the room, and Nell's
eyes returned to the man.
He sat gazing at the carpet for a while, his brow knit with a frown, as
if he found the whole affair a hideous bore, his injured arm across his
knee. There was no deprecating smile of the nervous man; he made no more
apologies, and it seemed to Nell that he had quite forgotten her, and
was only desirous of getting rid of her and the situation generally. But
he looked up as Molly came fluttering in with the brandy; and as he took
the glass from Nell's hand--for the first time it shook a little--he
said:
"Thanks--thanks very much. I'm all right now, and I'll hasten to take
myself off."
He rose as he spoke, then his hand went out to the sofa as if in search
of support, and with an articulate though audible "Damn!" he sank down
again.
"I'm afraid I'll have to wait for a few minutes," he said, in a tone of
annoyance. "I can't think what's the matter with me, but I feel as giddy
and stupid as an owl. I'll be all right presently. Is the inn near
here?"
"No," said Nell; "the inn is a long way from here; too far----"
He did not let her finish, but rather impatiently cut in with:
"Oh, but there must be some place where I can go----"
"You must not think of moving yet," she said. "I don't know much--I have
not seen many accidents--but I am sure that you have hurt yourself; and
you say that you have broken your arm?"
"I'm afraid so, confound it! I beg your pardon. I'll get to the inn--I
have not broken my leg, and can walk well enough--and see a doctor."
Mrs. Lorton's step was heard in the passage, and the voice of that lady
was heard before she appeared in the doorway, demanding, in an injured
tone:
"Eleanor, what does this mean? Why do you want brandy, and at this time
of the day? Are you ill? I have always told you that some day you would
suffer from this continual rushing about----"
Then she stopped and stared at the two, and her hand went up to her hair
with the gesture of the weakly vain woman.
"Who is it, Nell? What does it mean?" she demanded.
The man rose and bowed, and his appearance, his self-possession and
well-bred bow impressed Mrs. Lorton at once.
"I beg your pardon," she said, in her sweetest and most ingratiating
manner, with a suggestion of the simper which used to be fashionable
when she was a girl. "There has been an accident, I see. Are you very
much hurt? Eleanor, pray do not stand like a thing of stock or stone;
pray, do not be so useless and incapable."
Nell blushed and looked round helplessly.
"Please sit down," went on Mrs. Lorton. "Eleanor, let me beg of you to
collect your senses. Get that cushion--sit down. Let me place this at
your back. Do you feel faint? My smelling salts, Eleanor!"
The man's lips tightened, and the frown darkened the whole of his face.
Nell knew that he was swearing under his breath and wishing Mrs. Lorton
and herself at the bottom of the sea.
"No, no!" he said, evidently struggling with his irritation and his
impatience of the whole scene. "I'm not at all faint. I've fallen from
my horse, and I think I've smashed my arm, that's all."
"All!" echoed Mrs. Lorton, in accents of profound sympathy and anxiety.
"Oh, dear, dear! Nell, we must send for the doctor. Will you not put
your feet up on the sofa? It is such a relief to lie at full length."
He rose with a look of determination in his dark eyes.
"Thank you very much, madame, but I cannot consent to give you any
further trouble. I am quite capable of walking to anywhere, and I
will----" He broke off with an exclamation and sank down again. "I must
be worse than I thought," he said suddenly, "and I must ask you to put
up with me for a little while--half an hour."
Mrs Lorton crossed the room with the air of an empress, or a St. Teresa
on the verge of a great mission, and rang the bell.
"I cannot permit you to leave this house until you have recovered--quite
recovered," she said, in a stately fashion. "Molly, get the spare room
ready for this gentleman. Eleanor, you might assist, I think! I will see
that the sheets are properly aired--nothing is more important in such a
case--and we will send for the doctor while you are retiring."
Molly plunged out, followed by Nell, and Mrs. Lorton seated herself
opposite the injured man, and, folding her hands, gazed at him as if she
were solely accountable for his welfare.
"I'm very much obliged to you, madame," he said, at last, and by no
means amiably. "May I ask to whom I am indebted for so much--kindness?"
"My name is Lorton," said the dear lady, as if she had picked him up and
brought him in and given him brandy; "but I am a Wolfer."
He looked at her as if he thought she were mad, and Mrs. Lorton hastened
to explain.
"I am a near relative of Lord Wolfer."
"Oh, yes, yes; I beg your pardon," he said, with a touch of relief. "I
didn't understand for a moment."
"Perhaps you know Lord Wolfer?" she asked sweetly.
He shook his head.
"I've heard of him."
"Of course," she assented blandly. "He is sufficiently well known, not
to say famous. And your name--if I may ask?"
He frowned, and was silent for an instant.
"Vernon," he said reluctantly, "Drake Vernon."
"Indeed! The name seems familiar to me. Of the Northumberland Vernons, I
suppose?"
"No," he replied, rather shortly.
"No? There are some Vernons in Warwickshire, I remember," she suggested.
He shook his head.
"I'm not connected with any of the Vernons," he said with a grim courtesy.
Mrs. Lorton looked rather disappointed, but only for a moment; for,
foolish as she was, she knew a gentleman when she saw one, and this Mr.
Vernon, though not one of the Vernons, was evidently a gentleman and a
man of position. She smiled at him graciously.
"Sometimes one scarcely knows with whom one is connected," she said. "If
you will excuse me, I will go and see if your room is prepared. We have
only one servant--now," she sighed plaintively, "and my daughter is
young and thoughtless."
"She is not the latter, at any rate," he said, but coldly enough. "Your
daughter displayed extraordinary presence of mind----"
"My stepdaughter, I ought to explain," broke in Mrs. Lorton, who could
not endure the praise of any other than herself. "My late husband--I am
a widow, Mr. Vernon--left me his two children as a trust, a sacred
trust, which I hope I have discharged to the best of my ability. I will
rejoin you presently."
He rose and bowed, and then leaned back and closed his eyes, and swore
gently but thoroughly.
Mrs. Lorton returned in a few minutes with Molly.
"If you will come now? We have sent for the doctor."
"Thank you, thank you!" he said, and he went upstairs with them; but he
would not permit them to assist him to take off his coat, and sat on the
edge of the bed waiting with a kind of impatient patience for the
doctor.
By sheer good luck it was just about the time old Doctor Spence made his
daily appearance in Shorne Mills, and Nell, running up to the crossway,
caught him as he was ambling along on his old gray cob.
"Eh? what is it, my dear? That monkey of a brother got into mischief
again?" he said, laying his hand on her shoulder. "What? Stranger? Broke
his arm? Come, come; you're frightened and upset. No need, no need!
What's a broken arm! If it had been his neck, now!"
"I'm not frightened, and I'm not upset!" said Nell indignantly, but with
a smile. "I'm out of breath with running."
"And out of color, too, Nell. No need to run back, my dear. I'll hurry
up and see what's wrong."
He spoke to the cob, who understood every word and touch of his master,
and jolted down the steep road, and Nell followed slowly. She was rather
pale, as he had noticed, but she was not frightened. In all her
uneventful life nothing so exciting, so disturbing had happened as this
accident. It was difficult to realize it, to realize that a great strong
man had been cast helpless at her feet, that she had had his head on her
lap; she looked down at the patch on her dress and shuddered. Was she
glad or sorry that she had chanced to be near when he fell? As she asked
herself the question her conscience smote her. What a question to arise
in her mind! Of course she should be glad, very glad, to have been able
to help him. Then the man's face rose before her, and appealed to her by
its whiteness, by the weary, wistful lines about the lips and eyes.
"I wonder who he is?" she asked herself, conscious that she had never
seen any one like him, that he was in some way different to any one of
the men she had hitherto met.
As she walked slowly, thoughtfully down the road, a strange feeling came
upon her; it was as if she had touched, if only with the finger tips,
the fringe of the great unknown world.
The doctor, breaking away from the lengthy recountal of Mrs. Lorton,
went upstairs to the spare room, where still sat Mr. Drake Vernon on the
edge of the bed, very white, but very self-contained.
"How do you do, doctor?" he said quietly. "I've come a cropper and
knocked my head and broken some of my bones. If you'll be so good----"
"Take off your coat. My good sir, why didn't you let them help you to
undress?" broke in the old man, with the curtness of the country doctor,
who, as a rule, is no respecter of persons.
"I've given these good people trouble enough already," was the reply.
"Thanks; no, you don't hurt me--not more than can be helped. And I'm not
going to faint. Thanks, thanks."
He got undressed and into bed, and the doctor "went over" him. As he got
to the injured arm, Mr. Vernon drew his signet ring from his finger and
slipped it in his pocket.
"Rather nasty knock on the head; broken arm--compound fracture,
unfortunately."
"Oh! just patch me up so that I can get away at once, will you?"
The old man shook his head.
"Sorry, Mr. Vernon; but that is rather too large an order. Frankly, you
have knocked yourself about rather more seriously than you think. The
head----And you are not a particularly 'good patient,' I'm afraid. Been
living rather--rapidly, eh?"
Vernon nodded.
"I've been living all the time," was the grim assent.
"I thought so. And you pay the usual penalty. Nature is inexorable, and
never lets a man off with the option of a fine. If one of my fishermen
had injured himself as you have done, I could let him do what he
pleased; but you will have to remain here, in this room--or, at any
rate, in this house--for some little time."
"Impossible!" said Vernon. "I am a stranger to these people. I can't
trespass on their good nature; I've been nuisance enough already----"
"Oh, nonsense," retorted the doctor calmly. "We are not savages in these
parts. They'd enjoy nursing and taking care of you. The good lady of the
house is just dying for some little excitement like this. It's a quiet
place; you couldn't be in a better; and whether you could or couldn't
doesn't matter, for you've got to stay here for the present, unless you
want brain fever and the principal part in a funeral."
Drake Vernon set his lips tight, then shrugged his shoulders, and in
silence watched the doctor's preparations for setting the arm.
It is a painful operation, but during its accomplishment the patient
gave no sign, either facial or vocal, of the agony endured. The doctor
softly patted the splintered arm and looked at him keenly.
"Been in the service, Mr. Vernon?" he said.
Vernon glanced at him sharply.
"How did you know that?" he demanded reluctantly.
"By the way you held your arm," replied the doctor. "Was in the service
myself, when a young army doctor. Oh, don't be afraid; I am not going to
ask questions; and--and, like my tribe, I am as discreet as an owl. Now,
I'll just give you a sleeping draft, and will look in in the evening, to
see if it has taken effect; and to-morrow, if you haven't brain fever,
you will be on the road to recovery. I'm candid, because I want you to
understand that if you worry yourself----"
"Make the draft a strong one; I'm accustomed to narcotics," interrupted
Vernon quietly.
"Opium, or chloral, or what?"
"Chloral," was the reply.
"Right. Comfortable?"
"Oh, yes. Wait a moment. I was hunting with the Devon and Somerset
to-day. I know scarcely any one--not one of the people, I may say;
but--well, I don't want a fuss. Perhaps you won't mind keeping my
accident, and my presence here to yourself?"
"Certainly," said the doctor. "There is no friend--relative--you would
like sent for?"
"Good Lord, no!" responded Mr. Vernon. "I shall have to get away in a
day or two."
"Will you?" grunted the old doctor to himself, as he went down the
stairs.
The day passed slowly. The little house was filled with an air of
suppressed excitement, which was kept going by Mrs. Lorton, who,
whenever Nell or Molly moved, appeared from unexpected places, attired
in a tea gown, and hissed a rebuking and warning "Hush!" which
penetrated to the remotest corner of the house, and would certainly have
disturbed the patient but for the double dose of sulphonal which the
doctor; had administered.
About the time she expected Dick to return, Nell went down the road to
meet him, fearing that he might enter singing or whistling; and when she
saw him lounging up the hill, with a string of fish in his hand, she ran
to him, and, catching his arm, began to tell her story in a whisper, as
if the injured Mr. Vernon were within hearing.
Dick stared, and emitted a low whistle.
"'Pon my word, you've been a-going of it, Nell! Sounds like a play: 'The
Mysterious Stranger and the Village Maiden.' Scene one. Enter the
stranger: 'My horse is weary; no human habitation nigh. Where to find a
resting place for my tired steed and my aching head! Ah! what is this? A
simple child of Nature. I will seek direction at her hands.' Horse takes
fright; mysterious stranger is thrown. Maiden falls on her knees: 'Ah,
Heaven! 'tis he! 'tis he!'"
Nell laughed, but her face crimsoned.
"Dick, don't be an idiot, if you can help it. I know it is
difficult----"
"Spare your blushes, my child," he retorted blandly. "The Mysterious S.
will turn out to be a commercial traveler with a wife and seven
children. But, Nell, what does mamma say?"
"She likes it," said Nell, with a smile. "She is happier and more
interested than I have ever seen her."
Dick struck an attitude and his forehead.
"Can it be--oh, can it be that the romance will end another way? Are we
going to lose our dear mamma? Grateful stranger--love at first
sight----"
"Dick, you are the worst kind of imbecile! He is years younger than
mamma--young enough to be her son. Now, Dick, dry up, and don't make a
noise. He is really ill. I know it by the way the old doctor smiles. He
always smiles and grins when the case is serious. You'll be quiet, Dick,
dear?"
"This tender solicitude for the sufferer touches me deeply," he
whimpered, mopping his eyes. "Oh, yes, I'll be quiet, Nell. Much as I
love excitement, I'm not anxious for a funeral, and a bereaved and
heartbroken sister. Shall I take my boots off before entering the abode
of sickness, or shall I walk in on my head?"
The day passed. Dick, driven almost mad by the enforced quietude, and
the incessant "Hushes!" of Mrs. Lorton, betook himself to his tool shed
to mend his fishing rod--and cut his fingers--and then to bed. Molly
went to the sick room in the capacity of nurse, and Mrs. Lorton, after
desiring everybody that she should be called if "a change took place,"
retired to the rest earned by pleasurable excitement; and Nell stole
past the spare-room door to her nest under the roof.
As she undressed slowly, she paused now and again to listen. All was
quiet; the injured man was still sleeping. She went to the open window
and looked out seaward. Something was stirring within her, something
that was like the faint motion of the air before a storm. Is it possible
that we have some premonition of the first change in our lives; the
change which is to alter the course of every feeling, every action? She
knew too little of life or the world to ask herself the question; but
she was conscious of a sensation of unrest, of disquietude. She could
not free herself from the haunting presence of the handsome face, of the
dark and weary, wistful eyes. The few sentences he had spoken kept
repeating themselves in her ear, striking on her brain with soft
persistence. The very name filled her thoughts. "Drake Vernon, Drake
Vernon!"
At last, with an impatient movement, with a blush of shame for the way
in which her mind was dwelling on him, she left the window and fell on
her knees at the narrow bed to say her prayers.
But his personality intruded even on her devotions, and, half
unconsciously, she added to her simple formula a supplication for his
recovery.
Then she got into bed and fell asleep. But in a very little while she
started awake, seeing the horse shy and fall, feeling the man's head
upon her lap. She sat up and listened. His room was beneath hers--the
cottage was built in the usual thin and unsubstantial fashion--and every
sound from the room below rose to hers. She heard him moan; once, twice;
then his voice, thick and husky, called for water.
She listened. The faint cry rose again and again. She could not endure
it, and she got out of bed, put on her dressing gown, and slipped down
the stairs. She could hear the voice more plainly now, and the cry was
still, "Water! water!"
She opened the door, and, pausing a moment, her face crimson, stole
toward the bed. Molly was in her chair, with her head lolling over the
back, as if it were a guillotine, her huge mouth wide open, fast asleep.
Nell stood and looked down at the unconscious man. The dark-brown hair
was tangled, the white face drawn with pain, the lips dry with fever,
one hand, clenched, opening and shutting spasmodically, on the
counterpane.
That divine pity which only a woman can feel filled and overran her
heart. She poured some water into a glass and set it to his lips. He
could not drink lying down, and, with difficulty, she raised his head on
her bosom. He drank long and greedily; then, as she slowly--dare one
write "reluctantly"?--lowered his head to the pillow, he muttered:
"Thanks, thanks, Luce! That was good!"
CHAPTER III.
"Luce!"
It was a strange name--the name of a woman, of course. Nell wondered
whether it was his sister--or sweetheart? Perhaps it was his wife?
She waited for some minutes; then she woke Molly, and returned to her
own room.
Drake Vernon was unconscious for some days, and Nell often stole in and
stood beside the bed; sometimes she changed the ice bandages, or gave
him something to drink. He wandered and talked a great deal, but it was
incoherent talk, in which the names of the persons he whispered or
shouted were indistinguishable. On the fourth day he recovered
consciousness, but was terribly weak, and the doctor would not permit
Mrs. Lorton to enter the room.
He put his objection very cleverly.
"I have to think of you, my dear madame," he said. "I don't want two
patients on my hands in the same house. Talk him back into delirium!" he
added to himself.
All these days Mrs. Lorton continued to "hush," Nell went about with a
grave air of suspense, and Dick--it is not given to this historian to
describe the state of mind into which incessant repression drove that
youth.
On the sixth day, bored to death, and somewhat curious, he strolled into
the sick room. Drake Vernon, propped up by pillows, was partaking of
beef tea with every sign of distaste.
"How are you getting on, sir?" asked Dick.
The sick man looked at the boy, and nodded with a faint smile.
"I'm better, thanks; nearly well, I devoutly trust."
"That's all right," commented Dick cheerfully. "Thought I'd just look
in. Shan't upset you, or disturb you, shall I, sir?"
"Not in the very least," was the reply. "I'm very glad to see you. Won't
you sit down? Not there, but some place where I can see you."
Dick sat on the end of the bed and leaned against the rail, with his
hands in his pockets.
"I ought to introduce myself, I suppose. I'm what is called in the
novels 'the son of the house'; I'm Nell's brother, you know."
Mr. Vernon nodded.
"So I see, by the likeness."
|
made of heavy wax cloth, with
cane ribs, and was a ponderous article.
R.R.
* * * * *
EMANCIPATION OF THE JEWS.
(VOL. I, PP. 474, 475.)
From a scarce collection of pamphlets concerning the naturalisation
of the Jews in England, published in 1753, by Dean Tucker and others,
I beg to send the following extracts, which may be of some use in
replying to the inquiry (Vol. i., p. 401.) respecting the Jews during
the Commonwealth.
Dean Tucker, in his _Second Letter to a Friend concerning
Naturalisation_, says (p. 29.):--
"The Jews having departed out of the realm in the year 1290,
or being expelled by the authority of parliament (it matters
not which), made no efforts to return till the Protectorship
of Oliver Cromwell; but this negotiation is known to have
proved unsuccessful. However, the affair was not dropped, for
the next application was to King Charles himself, then in his
exile at Bruges, as appears by a copy of a commission dated
the 24th of September, 1656, granted to Lt.-Gen. Middleton, to
treat with the Jews of Amsterdam:--'That whereas the Lt.-Gen.
had represented to his Majesty their good affection to him,
and disowned the application lately made to Cromwell in their
behalf by some persons of their nation, as absolutely without
their consent, the king empowers the Lt.-Gen. to treat with
them. That if in that conjunction they shall assist his
Majesty by any money, arms, or ammunition, they shall find,
when God should restore him, that he would extend that
protection to them which they could reasonably expect, and
abate that rigour of the law which was against them in his
several dominions, and repay them."
This paper, Dean Tucker says, was found among the original papers of
Sir Edward Nicholas, Secretary of State to King Charles I. and II.,
and was communicated to him by a learned and worthy friend. The Dean
goes on to remark, that the restoration of the royal family of the
Stuarts was attended with the return of the Jews into Great Britain;
and that Lord Chancellor Clarendon granted to many of them letters of
denization under the great seal.
From another pamphlet in the same collection, entitled, _An Answer
to a Pamphlet entitled Considerations on the Bill to permit Persons
professing the Jewish Religion to be naturalized_, the following, is
an extract:--
"There is a curious anecdote of this affair," (about the Jews
thinking Oliver Cromwell to be the Messiah,) "in Raguenet's
_Histoire d'Oliver Cromwell_, which I will give the reader
at length. About the time Rabbi Manasseh Ben Israel came to
England to solicit the Jews' admission, the Asiatic Jews sent
hither the noted Rabbi Jacob Ben Azahel, with several others
of his nation, to make private inquiry whether Cromwell was
not that Messiah, whom they had so long expected. (Page 33.--I
leave the reader to judge what an accomplished villain he will
then be.) Which deputies upon their arrival pretending other
business, were several times indulging the favour of a private
audience from him, and at one of them proposed buying Hebrew
books and MSS. belonging to the University of _Cambridge_[4],
in order to have an opportunity, under pretence of viewing
them, to inquire amongst his relations, in Huntingdonshire,
where he was born, whether any of his ancestors could be
proved of Jewish extract. This project of theirs was very
readily agreed to (the University at that time being under a
cloud, on account of their former loyalty to the King), and
accordingly the ambassadors set forwards upon their journey.
But discovering by their much longer continuance at Huntingdon
than at Cambridge, that their business at the last place was
not such as was pretended, and by not making their enquiries
into Oliver's pedigree with that caution and secresy which was
necessary in such an affair, the true purpose of their errand
into England became quickly known at London, and was very much
talked of, which causing great scandal among the _Saints_, he
was forced suddenly to pack them out of the kingdom, without
granting any of their requests."
J.M.
[Footnote 4: Query: May not this be another version of the same story,
quoted by your correspondent, B.A., of Christ Church, Oxford, from
Monteith, (in Vol. i. p. 475.), of the Jews desiring to buy the
Library of _Oxford_?]
* * * * *
REPLIES TO MINOR QUERIES.
_Wellington, Wyrwast, and Cokam_ (Vol. i., p. 401.).--The garrison in
Wellington was, no doubt, at the large house built by Sir John Topham
in that town, where the rebels, who had gained possession of it by
stratagem, held out for some time against the king's forces under
Sir Richard Grenville. The house, though of great strength, was much
damaged on that occasion, and shortly fell into ruin. Cokam probably
designates Colcombe Castle, a mansion of the Courtenays, near Colyton,
in Devonshire, which was occupied by a detachment of the king's troops
under Prince Maurice in 1644, but soon after fell into the hands of
the rebels. It is now in a state of ruin, but is in part occupied as a
farm-house. I am at a loss for _Wyrwast_, and should doubt the reading
of the MS.
S.S.S.
_Sir William Skipwyth_ (Vol. i., p. 23.).--Mr. Foss will find some
notices of Will. Skipwyth in pp. 83, 84, 85, of _Rotulorum Pat. &
Claus. Cancellariæ Hib. Calendarium_, printed in 1828.
R.B.
Trim, May 13. 1850.
_Dr. Johnson and Dr. Warton_ (Vol. i., p. 481.).--Mr. Markland is
probably right in his conjecture that Johnson had Warton's lines
in his memory; but the original source of the allusion to _Peru_ is
Boileau:
"De tous les animaux
De Paris au _Pérou_, du Japon jusqu'à Rome,
Le plus sot animal, à mon avis, c'est l'homme."
Warton's Poems appeared in March, 1748. Johnson's _Vanity of Human
Wishes_ was published the 9th January, 1749, and was written probably
in December or November preceding.
C.
_Worm of Lambton_ (Vol. i., p. 453.).--See its history and legend in
Surtees' _History of Durham_, vol. ii. p. 173., and a quarto tract
printed by Sir Cuthbert Sharp.
G.
"A.C." is informed that there is an account of this "Worme" in _The
Bishoprick Garland_, published by the late Sir Cuthbert Sharpe in
1834; it is illustrated with a view of the Worm Hill, and a woodcut
of the knight thrusting his sword with great _nonchalance_ down the
throat of the Worme. Only 150 copies of the _Garland_ were printed.
W.N.
_Shakspeare's Will_ (Vol. i., pp. 213, 386, 403, 461, and 469.).--I
fear if I were to adopt Mr. Bolton Corney's _tone_, we should
degenerate into polemics. I will therefore only reply to his
question, "_Have_ I wholly mistaken the whole _affair_?" by one
word, "_Undoubtedly_." The question raised was on an Irish edition of
Malone's _Shakspeare_. Mr. Bolton Corney reproved the querists for not
consulting original sources. It appears that Mr. Bolton Corney had not
himself consulted _the edition_ in question; and by his last letter
I am satisfied that he has not _even yet_ seen it: and it is not
surprising if, in these circumstances, he should have "_mistaken
the whole affair_." But as my last communication (Vol. i., p. 461.)
explains (as I am now satisfied) the blunder and its cause, I may take
my leave of the matter, only requesting Mr. Bolton Corney, if he still
doubts, to follow his own good precept, and look at _the original
edition_.
C.
_Josias Ibach Stada_ (Vol. i., p. 452.).--In reply to G.E.N., I would
ask, is Mr. Hewitt correct in calling him Stada, an Italian artist?
I have no hesitation in saying that Stada here is no personal
appellation at all, but the name of a town. The inscription "_Fudit
Josias Ibach Stada Bremensis_" is to be read, Cast by Josias Ibach,
_of the town of Stada, in the duchy of Bremen_. All your readers,
particularly mercantile, will know the place well enough from the
discussions raised by Mr. Hutt, member for Gateshead, in the House
of Commons, on the oppressive duties levied there on all vessels and
their cargoes sailing past it up the Elbe; and to the year 1150 it was
the capital of an independent graffschaft, when it lapsed to Henry the
Lion.
WILLIAM BELL.
_The Temple, or A Temple._--I have had an opportunity of seeing the
edition of Chaucer referred to by your correspondent P.H.F. (Vol.
i., p. 420.), and likewise several other black-letter editions (1523,
1561, 1587, 1598, 1602), and find that they all agree in reading "the
temple," which Caxton's edition also adopts. The general reading of
"temple" in the _modern_ editions, naturally induced me to suspect
that Tyrwhitt had made the alteration on the authority of the
manuscripts of the poem. Of these there are no less than ten in the
British Museum, all of which have been kindly examined for me. One
of these wants the prologue, and another that part of it in which the
line occurs; but in _seven_ of the remaining eight, the reading is--
"A gentil maunciple was ther of _a_ temple;"
while _one_ only reads "the temple." The question, therefore, is
involved in the same doubt which I at first stated; for the subsequent
lines quoted by P.H.F. prove nothing more than that the person
described was a manciple in _some_ place of legal resort, which was
not disputed.
EDWARD FOSS.
_Bawn_ (Vol. i., p. 440.).--If your Querist regarding a "Bawn" will
look into Macnevin's _Confiscation of Ulster_ (Duffy: Dublin, 1846,
p. 171. &c.), he will find that a Bawn must have been a sort of
court-yard, which might be used on emergency as a fortification
for defence. They were constructed either of _lime_ and _stone_, of
_stone_ and _clay_, or of _sods_, and twelve to fourteen feet high,
and sometimes inclosing a dwelling-house, and with the addition of
"flankers."
W.C. TREVELYAN.
"_Heigh ho! says Rowley_" (Vol. i., p. 458.).--The burden of "_Heigh
ho! says Rowley_" is certainly _older_ than R.S.S. conjectures; I will
not say how much, but it occurs in a _jeu d'esprit_ of 1809, on the
installation of Lord Grenville, as Chancellor, at Oxford, as will be
shown by a stanza cited from memory:--
"Mr. Chinnery then, an M.A. of great parts,
Sang the praises of Chancellor Grenville.
Oh! he pleased all the ladies and tickled their hearts;
But, then, we all know he's a Master of Arts,
With his rowly powly,
Gammon and spinach,
Heigh ho! says Rowley."
CHETHAMENSIS.
Wimpole Street, May 11. 1850.
_Arabic Numerals_.--As your correspondent E.V. (Vol. i., p. 230.)
is desirous of obtaining any instance of Arabic numerals of early
occurrence, I would refer him, for one at least, to _Notices of the
Castle and Priory of Castleacre_, by the Rev. J.H. Bloom: London;
Richardson, 23. Cornhill, 1843. In this work it appears that by the
acumen of Dr. Murray, Bishop of Rochester, the date 1084 was found
impressed in the plaster of the wall of the priory in the following,
form:--
1
4 × 8
0
The writer then goes on to show, that this was the regular order of
the letters to one crossing himself after the Romish fashion.
E.S.T.
_Pusan_ (Vol. i., p. 440.)--May not the meaning be a collar in the
form of a serpent? In the old Roman de Blanchardin is this line:--
"Cy guer _pison_ tuit Apolin."
Can _Iklynton_ again be the place where such an ornament was made?
Ickleton, in Cambridgeshire, appears to have been of some note in
former days, as, according to Lewis's _Topog. Hist._, a nunnery was
founded there by Henry II., and a market together with a fair granted
by Henry III. As it is only five miles from Linton, it may have
formerly borne the name of Ick-linton.
C.I.R.
"_I'd preach as though_" (Vol. i., p. 415.).--The lines quoted by
Henry Martyn are said by Dr. Jenkyn (Introduction to a little vol.
of selections from Baxter--Nelson's _Puritan Divines_) to be Baxter's
"own immortal lines." Dr. J. quotes them thus:--
"I preached as never sure to preach again,
And as a dying man to dying men."
ED. S. JACKSON.
May 18.
"_Fools rush in_" (Vol. i., p. 348.).--The line in Pope,
"For fools rush in where angels fear to tread,"
it has been long ago pointed out, is founded upon that of Shakspeare,
"For wrens make wing where eagles dare not perch."
I know not why that line of Pope is in your correspondent's list. It
is not a proverb.
C.B.
_Allusion in Friar Brackley's Sermon_ (Vol. i., p. 351.)--It seems
vain to inquire who the persons were of whom stories were told in
medieval books, as if they were really historical. See the _Gesta
Romanorum_, for instance: or consider who the Greek king Aulix was,
having dealings with the king of Syria, in the 7th Story of the
_Novelle Antiche_. The passage in the sermon about a Greek king, seems
plainly to be still part of the extract from the _Liber Decalogorum_,
being in Latin. This book was perhaps the _Dialogi decem_, put into
print at Cologne in 1472: Brunet.
C.B.
_Earwig_ (Vol. i., p. 383.).--This insect is very destructive to the
petals of some kinds of delicate flowers. May it not have acquired the
title of "couchbell" from its habit of couching or concealing itself
for rest at night and security from small birds, of which it is a
favourite food, in the pendent blossoms of bell-shaped flowers? This
habit is often fatal to it in the gardens of cottagers, who entrap it
by means of a lobster's claw suspended on an upright stick.
S.S.S.
_Earwig_ (Vol. i., p. 383.).--In the north of England the earwig is
called _twitchbell_. I know not whether your correspondent is in error
as to its being called in Scotland the "coach-bell." I cannot afford
any explanation to either of these names.
G. BOUCHIER RICHARDSON.
_Sir R. Haigh's Letter-book_ (Vol. i, p. 463.).--This is incorrect; no
such person is known. The baronet intended is _Sir Roger Bradshaigh,
of Haigh_; a very well-known person, whose funeral sermon was
preached by Wroe, the warden of Manchester Collegiate Church, locally
remembered as "silver-mouthed Wroe."
This name is correctly given in Puttick and Simpson's Catalogue of
a Miscellaneous Sale on April 15, and it is to be _hoped_ that Sir
Roger's collection of letters, ranging from 1662 to 1676, _may have_
fallen into the hands of the noble earl who represents him, the
present proprietor of Haigh.
CHETHAMENSIS.
_Marescautia_ (Vol. i., p. 94.).--Your correspondent requests
some information as to the meaning of the word "marescautia."
_Mareschaucie_, in old French, means a stable. Pasquier (_Recherches
de la France_, l. viii. ch. 2.) says,--
"Pausanias disoit que Mark apud Celtas signifioit un cheual
... je vous diray qu'en ancien langage allemant Mark se
prenoit pour un cheual."
In ch. 54. he refers to another etymolygy of "maréchal," from
"maire," or "maistre," and "cheval," "comme si on les eust voulu dire
maistre de la cheualerie." "Maréchal" still signifies "a farrier."
_Maréchaussée_ was the term applied down to the Revolution to the
jurisdiction of Nosseigneurs les Maréchaux de France, whose orders
were enforced by a company of horse that patrolled the _high_ways,
la _chaussée_, generally raised above the level of the surrounding
country. Froissart applies the term to the Marshalsea prison in
London. In D.S.'s first entry there may, perhaps, be some allusion
to another meaning of the word, namely, that of "_march_, limit,
boundary."
What the nature of the tenure per serjentiam marescautiæ may be I am
not prepared to say. May it not have had some reference to the support
of the royal stud?
J.B.D.
_Memoirs of an American Lady_ (Vol. i., p. 335.).--If this work cannot
now be got it is a great pity,--it ought to go down to posterity; a
more valuable or interesting account of a particular state of society
now quite extinct, can hardly be found. Instead of saying that "it is
the work of Mrs. Grant, the author of this and that," I should say of
her other books that they were written by the author of the _Memoirs
of an American Lady_. The character of the individual lady, her way
of keeping house on a large scale, the state of the domestic slaves,
threatened, as the only known punishment and most terrible to them,
with being sold to Jamaica; the customs of the young men at Albany,
their adventurous outset in life, their practice of robbing one
another in joke (like a curious story at Venice, in the story-book
called _Il Peccarone_, and having some connection with the stories of
the Spartan and Circassian youth), with much of natural scenery, are
told without pretension of style; but unluckily there is too much
interspersed relating to the author herself, then quite young.
C.B.
_Poem by Sir E. Dyer_ (Vol. i., p. 355.).--"My mind to me," &c.
Neither the births of Breton nor Sir Edward Dyer seem to be known;
nor, consequently, how much older the one was than the other. Mr. S.,
I conclude, could not mean much older than Breton's tract, mentioned
in Vol. i., p. 302. The poem is not in England's _Helicon_. The
ballad, as in Percy, has four stanzas more than the present copy, and
one stanza less. Some of the readings in Percy are better, that is,
more probable than the new ones.
"I see how plenty _surfeits_ oft."--_P._
suffers.--_Var._
"I grudge not at another's _gain_".--_P._
pain.--_Var._
"No worldly _wave_ my mind can toss."--_P._
wants.--_Var._
These seem to me to be stupid mistranscriptions.
"I brook that is another's pain."--_P._
"My state at one doth still remain."--_Var._
Probably altered on account of the slight obscurity; and possibly a
different edition by the author himself.
"They beg, I give,
They lack, I _lend_."--_P._
leave.--_Var._
In this verse,
"I fear no foe, I _scorn_ no friend."--_P._
fawn.--_Var._
I think the new copy better.
"To none of these I yield as thrall,
For why my mind _despiseth_ all."--_P._
doth serve for.--_Var._
The var. much better.
In this--
"I never seek by bribes to please,
Nor by _dessert_ to give offence."--_P._
deceit.--_Var._
I cannot understand either.
So very beautiful and popular a song it would be well worth getting in
the true version.
C.B.
_Monumental Brasses_.--In reply to S.S.S. (Vol. i., p. 405.), I beg to
inform him that the "small dog with a collar and bells" is a device of
very common occurrence on brasses of the fifteenth and latter part of
the fourteenth centuries. The Rev. C. Boutell's _Monumental Brasses of
England_ contains engravings of no less than twenty-three on which it
is to be found; as well as two examples without the usual appendages
of collar, &c. In addition to these, the same work contains etchings
of the following brasses:--Gunby, Lincoln., two dogs with plain
collars at the bottom of the lady's mantle, 1405. Dartmouth, Devon.,
1403. Each of the ladies here depicted has two dogs with collars and
bells at her feet.
The same peculiarities are exemplified on brasses at Harpham, York.,
1420; and Spilsby, Lincoln., 1391. I will not further multiply
instances, as my own collection of rubbings would enable me to do. I
should, however, observe, that the hypothesis of S.S.S. (as to "these
figures" being "the private mark of the artist") is untenable: since
the twenty-three examples above alluded to are scattered over sixteen
different counties, as distant from each other as Yorkshire and
Sussex. Two examples are well known, in which the dog so represented
was a favourite animal:--Deerhurst, Gloc., 1400, with the name,
"Terri," inscribed; and Ingham, Norfolk, 1438, with the name "Jakke."
This latter brass is now lost, but an impression is preserved in the
British Museum. The customary explanation seems to me sufficient: that
the dog was intended to symbolise the fidelity and attachment of the
lady to her lord and master, as the lion at _his_ feet represented his
courage and noble qualities.
W. SPARROW SIMPSON.
Queen's College, Cambridge, April 22. 1850.
_Fenkle Street_.--A street so called in Newcastle-upon-Tyne, lying in
a part of the town formerly much occupied by garden ground, and _in
the immediate vicinity of the house of the Dominican Friars there_.
Also, a way or passage inside the town wall, and leading between that
fortification and the _house of the Carmelites or White Friars_, was
anciently called by the same name. The name of _Fenkle_ or _Finkle
Street_ occurs in several old towns in the North, as Alnwick,
Richmond, York, Kendal, &c. _Fenol_ and _finugl_, as also _finul_, are
Saxon words for _fennel_; which, it is very probable, has in some way
or other given rise to this name. May not the _monastic institutions_
have used fennel extensively in their culinary preparations, and thus
planted it in so great quantities as to have induced the naming of
localities therefrom? I remember a portion of the ramparts of the
town used to be called _Wormwood Hill_, from a like circumstance. In
Hawkesworth's _Voyages_, ii. 8., I find it stated that the town of
Funchala, on the island of Madeira, derives its name from _Funcko_,
the Portuguese name for _fennel_, which grows in great plenty upon the
neighbouring rocks. The priory of Finchale (from _Finkel_), upon the
Wear, probably has a similar origin; _sed qu._
G. BOUCHIER RICHARDSON.
Newcastle-upon-Tyne, May 12. 1850.
_Christian Captives_ (Vol. i., p. 441.)--In reply to your
correspondent R.W.B., I find in the papers published by the Norfolk
and Norwich Archæological Society, vol. i. p. 98., the following
entries extracted from the Parish Registers of Great Dunham,
Norfolk:--
"December, 1670.
£ s. d.
Collected for the redemption of y'e English
Captives out of Turkish bondage 04 05 06
Feb. 13. p'd the same to M'r. Swift, Minister
of Milcham, by the Bhps appointm't.
October, 1680.
Collected towards the redemption of English
Captives out of their slavery and
bondage in Algiers 3 16 0
Which sum was sent to Mr. Nicholas Browne, Registrar under Dr.
Connant, Archdeacon of Norwich, Octr. 2d. 1680."
Probably similar entries will be found in other registers of the same
date, as the collections appear to have been made by special mandate,
and paid into the hands of the proper authorities.
E.S.T.
_Passage in Gibbon_ (Vol. i., p. 348.).--The passage in Gibbon I
should have thought was well known to be taken from what Clarendon
says of Hampden, and which Lord Nugent says in his preface to
_Hampden's Life_ had before been said of Cinna. Gibbon must either
have meant to put inverted commas, or at least to have intended to
take nobody in.
C.B.
_Borrowed Thoughts_ (Vol. i., p. 482.)--_La fameuse_ La Galisse is an
error. The French pleasantly records the exploits of the celebrated
_Monsieur_ de la Galisse. Many of Goldsmith's lighter poems are
borrowed from the French.
C.
_Sapcote Motto_ (Vol. i., pp. 366. and 476.).--Taking for granted that
solutions of the "Sapcote Motto" are scarce, I send you what seems to
me something nearer the truth than the arbitrary and unsatisfactory
translation of T.C. (Vol. i, p. 476.).
The motto stands thus:--
"sco toot × vinic [or umic]
× poncs."
Adopting T.C.'s suggestion that the initial and final _s_ are mere
flourishes (though that makes little difference), and also his
supposition that _c_ may have been used for _s_, and as I fancy, not
unreasonably conjecturing that the × is intended for _dis_, which
is something like the pronunciation of the numeral X, we may then
take the _entire_ motto, without garbling it, and have sounds
representing _que toute disunis dispenses_; which, grammatically and
orthographically corrected, would read literally "all disunions cost,"
or "destroy," the equivalent of our "Union is strength." The motto,
with the arms, three dove-cotes, is admirably suggestive of family
union.
W.C.
_Lines attributed to Lord Palmerston_ (Vol. i., p. 382.).--These lines
have also been attributed to Mason.
S.S.S.
_Shipster_ (Vol. i., p. 339.).--That "ster" is a feminine termination
is the notion of Tyrwhitt in a note upon Hoppesteris in a passage of
Chaucer (_Knight's Tale_, l. 2019.); but to ignorant persons it seems
not very probable. "Maltster," surely, is not feminine, still less
"whipster;" "dempster," Scotch, is a judge. Sempstress has another
termination on purpose to make it feminine.
I wish we had a dictionary, like that of Hoogeven for Greek, arranging
words according to their terminations.
C.B.
* * * * *
MISCELLANIES.
_Blue Boar Inn, Holborn_.--The reviewer in the last "Quarterly" of Mr.
Cunningham's _Handbook for London_, makes an error in reference to the
extract from Morrice's _Life of Lord Orrery_, given by Mr. Cunningham
under the head of "Blue Boar Inn, Holborn," and transcribed by the
reviewer (_Qu. Rev._ vol. lxxxvi., p. 474.). Morrice, Lord Orrery's
biographer, relates a story which he says Lord Orrery had told him,
that he had been told by Cromwell and Ireton of their intercepting a
letter from Charles I. to his wife, which was sewn up in the skirt
of a saddle. The story may or may not be true; this authority for it
is not first-rate. The Quarterly reviewer, in transcribing from Mr.
Cunningham's book the passage in Morrice's _Life of Lord Orrery_,
introduces it by saying,--"Cromwell, in a letter to Lord Broghill,
narrates circumstantially how he and Ireton intercept, &c." This is
a mistake; there is no letter from Cromwell to Lord Broghill on the
subject. (Lord Broghill was Earl of Orrery after the Restoration.)
Such a letter would be excellent authority for the story. The mistake,
which is the Quarterly reviewer's, and not Mr. Cunningham's, is of
some importance.
C.H.
_Lady Morgan and Curry_.--An anecdote in the last number of the
_Quarterly Review_, p. 477., "this is the first set down you have
given me to-day," reminds me of an incident in Dublin society
some quarter of a century ago or more. The good-humoured and
accomplished--Curry (shame to me to have forgotten his christened name
for the moment!) had been engaged in a contest of wit with Lady Morgan
and another female _célébrité_, in which Curry had rather the worst
of it. It was the fashion then for ladies to wear very short sleeves;
and Lady Morgan, albeit not a young woman, with true provincial
exaggeration, wore none, a mere strap over her shoulders. Curry was
walking away from her little coterie, when she called out, "Ah! come
back Mr. Curry, and acknowledge that you are fairly beaten." "At any
rate," said he, turning round, "I have this consolation, you can't
laugh at me in your sleeve!"
SCOTUS.
_Sir Walter Scott and Erasmus_.--Has it yet been noticed that the
picture of German manners in the middle ages given by Sir W. Scott, in
his _Anne of Geierstein_ (chap. xix.), is taken (in some parts almost
verbally) from Erasmus' dialogue, _Diversoria_? Although Sir Walter
mentions Erasmus at the beginning of the chapter, he is totally silent
as to any hints he may have got from him; neither do the notes to my
copy of his works at all allude to this circumstance.
W.G.S.
_Parallel Passages_.--A correspondent in Vol. i., p. 330, quoted some
parallels to a passage in Shakspeare's _Julius Cæsar_. Will you allow
me to add another, I think even more striking than those he cited. The
full passage in Shakspeare is,
"There is a tide in the affairs of man,
Which taken at the flood leads on to fortune.
Omitted, all the voyage of their lives
Is bound in shallows and in miseries."
In Bacon's _Advancement of Learning_, book 2, occurs the following:--
"In the third place, I set down reputation because of the
peremptory tides and currents it hath, which, if they be not
taken in due time, are seldom recovered, it being extreme hard
to play an after game of reputation."
E.L.N.
_Gray's Ode_.--In return for the information about Gray's _Ode_, I
send an entertaining and very characteristic circumstance told in Mrs.
Bigg's (anonymous) _Residence in France_ (edited by Gifford):--
"She had a copy of Gray when she was arrested in the Reign
of Terror. The Jacobins who searched her goods lighted on the
line--
'Oh, tu severi religio loci,'
and said, 'Apparemment ce livre est quelque chose de
fanatique.'"
My informant tells me that the monk he saw was the same as the one
mentioned by your correspondent, and that he had a motto from Lord
Bacon over his cell.
C.B.
_The Grand Style_.--Is it not extremely probable that Bonaparte
plagiarised the idea of the centuries observing the French army from
the pyramids from these lines of Lucan?--
"_Sæcula_ Romanos nunquam tacitura labore, _Attendunt,
oevumque sequens speculatur_ ab omni Orbe ratem."--_Phars._
viii. 622.
One of the recent French revolutionists (I think Rollin) compared
himself with the victim of Calvary. Even this profane rant is a
plagiarism. Gracchus Baboeuf, who headed the extreme republican party
against the Directory, exclaimed, on his trial, that his wife, and
those of his fellow-conspirators, "should accompany them _even to
Calvary_, because the cause of their punishment should not bring them
to shame."--_Mignet's French Revolution_, chap. xii.
J.F. BOYES.
_Hoppesteris_.--The "shippis _hoppesteris_," in Chaucer's _Knight's
Tale_, 2019., is explained by Tyrwhitt to mean _dancing_, and that in
the feminine--a very odd epithet. He tells us that the corresponding
epithet in Boccaccio is _bellatrici_. I have no doubt that Chaucer
mistook it for _ballatrici_.
C.B.
_Sheridan's Last Residence_ (Vol. i., p. 484.).--I wonder at any doubt
about poor Sheridan's having died in his own house, 17. Saville Row.
His remains, indeed, were removed (I believe for prudential reasons
which I need not specify) to Mr. Peter Moore's, in Great George
Street; but he was never more than a temporary, though frequent
visitor at Mr. Moore's.
C.
* * * * *
MISCELLANEOUS.
NOTES ON BOOKS, CATALOGUES, SALES, ETC.
The Devices and Mottoes of the later Middle Ages (_Die Devisen und
Motto des Späteren Mittelalters, von J.V. Radowitz_), just imported
by Messrs. Williams and Norgate, is one of those little volumes which
|
even
in the case of people who had been some months at sea! And by the help
of a land breeze we succeeded in gaining an offing. While becalmed here,
we measured the velocity of the current setting east, which we found to
be about three miles an hour.
The wind soon changed again to the S.S.W., and blew a gale. We had to
beat. We passed in sight of the islands of Diego Ramirez, and saw a
large schooner under their lee. The distance that we had run from New
York, was about 9,165 miles. We had frightful weather till the 24th,
when we found ourselves in 58° 16' of south latitude. Although it was
the height of summer in that hemisphere, and the days as long as they
are at Quebec on the 21st of June (we could read on deck at midnight
without artificial light), the cold was nevertheless very great and the
air very humid: the mercury for several days was but fourteen degrees
above freezing point, by Fahrenheit's thermometer. If such is the
temperature in these latitudes at the end of December, corresponding to
our June, what must it be in the shortest days of the year, and where
can the Patagonians then take refuge, and the inhabitants of the islands
so improperly named the Land of Fire!
The wind, which till the 24th had been contrary, hauled round to the
south, and we ran westward. The next day being Christmas, we had the
satisfaction to learn by our noon-day observation that we had weathered
the cape, and were, consequently, now in the Pacific ocean. Up to that
date we had but one man attacked with scurvy, a malady to which those
who make long voyages are subject, and which is occasioned by the
constant use of salt provisions, by the humidity of the vessel, and the
inaction.
From the 25th of December till the 1st of January, we were favored with
a fair wind and ran eighteen degrees to the north in that short space of
time. Though cold yet, the weather was nevertheless very agreeable. On
the 17th, in latitude 10° S., and longitude 110° 50' W., we took
several _bonitas_, an excellent fish. We passed the equator on the 23d,
in 128° 14' of west longitude. A great many porpoises came round the
vessel. On the 25th arose a tempest which lasted till the 28th. The wind
then shifted to the E.S.E. and carried us two hundred and twenty-four
miles on our course in twenty-four hours. Then we had several days of
contrary winds; on the 8th of February it hauled to the S.E., and on the
11th we saw the peak of a mountain covered with snow, which the first
mate, who was familiar with these seas, told me was the summit of
_Mona-Roah_, a high mountain on the island of _Ohehy_, one of those
which the circumnavigator Cook named the Sandwich Isles, and where he
met his death in 1779. We headed to the land all day, and although we
made eight or nine knots an hour, it was not till evening that we were
near enough to distinguish the huts of the islanders: which is
sufficient to prove the prodigious elevation of _Mona Roah_ above the
level of the sea.
CHAPTER IV.
Accident.--View of the Coast.--Attempted Visit of the
Natives.--Their Industry.--Bay of Karaka-koua.--Landing on the
Island.--John Young, Governor of Owahee.
We were ranging along the coast with the aid of a fine breeze, when the
boy Perrault, who had mounted the fore-rigging to enjoy the scenery,
lost his hold, and being to windward where the shrouds were taut,
rebounded from them like a ball some twenty feet from the ship's side
into the ocean. We perceived his fall and threw over to him chairs,
barrels, benches, hen-coops, in a word everything we could lay hands on;
then the captain gave the orders to heave to; in the twinkling of an eye
the lashings of one of the quarter-boats were cut apart, the boat
lowered and manned: by this time the boy was considerably a-stern. He
would have been lost undoubtedly but for a wide pair of canvass
overalls full of tar and grease, which operated like a life-preserver.
His head, however, was under when he was picked up, and he was brought
on board lifeless, about a quarter of an hour after he fell into the
sea. We succeeded, notwithstanding, in a short time, in bringing him to,
and in a few hours he was able to run upon the deck.
The coast of the island, viewed from the sea, offers the most
picturesque _coup d'oeil_ and the loveliest prospect; from the beach to
the mountains the land rises amphitheatrically, all along which is a
border of lower country covered with cocoa-trees and bananas, through
the thick foliage whereof you perceive the huts of the islanders; the
valleys which divide the hills that lie beyond appear well cultivated,
and the mountains themselves, though extremely high, are covered with
wood to their summits, except those few peaks which glitter with
perpetual snow.
As we ran along the coast, some canoes left the beach and came
alongside, with vegetables and cocoa-nuts; but as we wished to profit
by the breeze to gain the anchorage, we did not think fit to stop. We
coasted along during a part of the night; but a calm came on which
lasted till the morrow. As we were opposite the bay of Karaka-koua, the
natives came out again, in greater numbers, bringing us cabbages, yams,
_taro_, bananas, bread-fruit, water-melons, poultry, &c., for which we
traded in the way of exchange. Toward evening, by the aid of a sea
breeze that rose as day declined, we got inside the harbor where we
anchored on a coral bottom in fourteen fathoms water.
The next day the islanders visited the vessel in great numbers all day
long, bringing, as on the day before, fruits, vegetables, and some pigs,
in exchange for which we gave them glass beads, iron rings, needles,
cotton cloth, &c.
Some of our gentlemen went ashore and were astonished to find a native
occupied in building a small sloop of about thirty tons: the tools of
which he made use consisted of a half worn-out axe, an adze, about
two-inch blade, made out of a paring chisel, a saw, and an iron rod
which he heated red hot and made it serve the purpose of an auger. It
required no little patience and dexterity to achieve anything with such
instruments: he was apparently not deficient in these qualities, for his
work was tolerably well advanced. Our people took him on board with
them, and we supplied him with suitable tools, for which he appeared
extremely grateful.
On the 14th, in the morning, while the ship's carpenter was engaged in
replacing one of the cat-heads, two composition sheaves fell into the
sea; as we had no others on board, the captain proposed to the
islanders, who are excellent swimmers, to dive for them, promising a
reward; and immediately two offered themselves. They plunged several
times, and each time brought up shells as a proof that they had been to
the bottom. We had the curiosity to hold our watches while they dove,
and were astonished to find that they remained four minutes under the
water. That exertion appeared to me, however, to fatigue them a great
deal, to such a degree that the blood streamed from their nostrils and
ears. At last one of them brought up the sheaves and received the
promised recompense, which consisted of four yards of cotton.
Karaka-koua bay where we lay, may be three quarters of a mile deep, and
a mile and a half wide at the entrance: the latter is formed by two low
points of rock which appear to have run down from the mountains in the
form of lava, after a volcanic eruption. On each point is situated a
village of moderate size; that is to say, a small group of the low huts
of the islanders. The bottom of the bay terminates in a bold
_escarpment_ of rock, some four hundred feet high, on the top of which
is seen a solitary cocoa-tree.
On the evening of the 14th, I went ashore with some other passengers,
and we landed at the group of cabins on the western point, of those
which I have described. The inhabitants entertained us with a dance
executed by nineteen young women and one man, all singing together, and
in pretty good time. An old man showed us the spot where Captain Cook
was killed, on the 14th of February, 1779, with the cocoa-nut trees
pierced by the balls from the boats which the unfortunate navigator
commanded. This old man, whether it were feigned or real sensibility,
seemed extremely affected and even shed tears, in showing us these
objects. As for me, I could not help finding it a little singular to be
thus, by mere chance, upon this spot, on the 14th of February, 1811;
that is to say, thirty-two years after, on the anniversary of the
catastrophe which has rendered it for ever celebrated. I drew no
sinister augury from the coincidence, however, and returned to the ship
with my companions as gay as I left it. When I say with my companions, I
ought to except the boatswain, John Anderson, who, having had several
altercations with the captain on the passage, now deserted the ship,
preferring to live with the natives rather than obey any longer so
uncourteous a superior. A sailor also deserted; but the islanders
brought him back, at the request of the captain. They offered to bring
back Anderson, but the captain preferred leaving him behind.
We found no good water near Karaka-koua bay: what the natives brought us
in gourds was brackish. We were also in great want of fresh meat, but
could not obtain it: the king of these islands having expressly
forbidden his subjects to supply any to the vessels which touched there.
One of the chiefs sent a canoe to Tohehigh bay, to get from the governor
of the island, who resided there, permission to sell us some pigs. The
messengers returned the next day, and brought us a letter, in which the
governor ordered us to proceed without delay to the isle of Wahoo, where
the king lives; assuring us that we should there find good water and
everything else we needed.
We got under way on the 16th and with a light wind coasted the island as
far as Tohehigh bay. The wind then dropping away entirely, the captain,
accompanied by Messrs. M'Kay and M'Dougall, went ashore, to pay a visit
to the governor aforesaid. He was not a native, but a Scotchman named
John Young, who came hither some years after the death of Captain Cook.
This man had married a native woman, and had so gained the friendship
and confidence of the king, as to be raised to the rank of chief and
after the conquest of Wahoo by King Tamehameha, was made governor of
Owhyhee (Hawaii) the most considerable of the Sandwich Islands, both by
its extent and population. His excellency explained to our gentlemen the
reason why the king had interdicted the trade in hogs to the inhabitants
of all the islands: this reason being that his majesty wished to reserve
to himself the monopoly of that branch of commerce, for the augmentation
of his royal revenue by its exclusive profits. The governor also
informed them that no rain had fallen on the south part of Hawaii for
three years; which explained why we found so little fresh water: he
added that the north part of the island was more fertile than the south,
where we were: but that there was no good anchorage: that part of the
coast being defended by sunken rocks which form heavy breakers. In fine,
the governor dismissed our gentlemen with a present of four fine fat
hogs; and we, in return, sent him some tea, coffee, and chocolate, and
a keg of Madeira wine.
The night was nearly a perfect calm, and on the 17th we found ourselves
abreast of _Mona-Wororayea_ a snow-capped mountain, like _Mona-Roah_,
but which appeared to me less lofty than the latter. A number of
islanders came to visit us as before, with some objects of curiosity,
and some small fresh fish. The wind rising on the 18th, we soon passed
the western extremity of Hawaii, and sailed by Mowhee and Tahooraha, two
more islands of this group, and said to be, like the rest, thickly
inhabited. The first presents a highly picturesque aspect, being
composed of hills rising in the shape of a sugar loaf and completely
covered with cocoa-nut and bread-fruit trees.
At last, on the 21st, we approached Wahoo, and came to anchor opposite
the bay of _Ohetity_, outside the bar, at a distance of some two miles
from the land.
CHAPTER V.
Bay of Ohetity.--Tamehameha, King of the Islands.--His Visit to the
Ship.--His Capital.--His Naval Force.--His Authority.--Productions
of the Country.--Manners and Customs.--Reflections.
There is no good anchorage in the bay of Ohetity, inside the bar or
coral reef: the holding-ground is bad: so that, in case of a storm, the
safety of the ship would have been endangered. Moreover, with a contrary
wind, it would have been difficult to get out of the inner harbor; for
which reasons, our captain preferred to remain in the road. For the
rest, the country surrounding the bay is even more lovely in aspect than
that of Karaka-koua; the mountains rise to a less elevation in the
back-ground, and the soil has an appearance of greater fertility.
_Tamehameha_, whom all the Sandwich Isles obeyed when we were there in
1811, was neither the son nor the relative of Tierroboo, who reigned in
Owhyhee (Hawaii) in 1779, when Captain Cook and some of his people were
massacred. He was, at that date, but a chief of moderate power; but,
being skilful, intriguing, and full of ambition, he succeeded in gaining
a numerous party, and finally possessed himself of the sovereignty. As
soon as he saw himself master of Owhyhee, his native island, he
meditated the conquest of the leeward islands, and in a few years he
accomplished it. He even passed into _Atoudy_, the most remote of all,
and vanquished the ruler of it, but contented himself with imposing on
him an annual tribute. He had fixed his residence at Wahoo, because of
all the Sandwich Isles it was the most fertile, the most picturesque--in
a word, the most worthy of the residence of the sovereign.
As soon as we arrived, we were visited by a canoe manned by three white
men, Davis and Wadsworth, Americans, and Manini, a Spaniard. The last
offered to be our interpreter during our stay; which was agreed to.
Tamehameha presently sent to us his prime-minister, _Kraimoku_, to whom
the Americans have given the name of _Pitt_, on account of his skill in
the affairs of government. Our captain, accompanied by some of our
gentlemen, went ashore immediately, to be presented to Tamehameha. About
four o'clock, P.M., we saw them returning, accompanied by a double
pirogue conveying the king and his suite. We ran up our colors, and
received his majesty with a salute of four guns.
Tamehameha was above the middle height, well made, robust and inclined
to corpulency, and had a majestic carriage. He appeared to me from fifty
to sixty years old. He was clothed in the European style, and wore a
sword. He walked a long time on the deck, asking explanations in regard
to those things which he had not seen on other vessels, and which were
found on ours. A thing which appeared to surprise him, was to see that
we could render the water of the sea fresh, by means of the still
attached to our caboose; he could not imagine how that could be done.
We invited him into the cabin, and, having regaled him with some glasses
of wine, began to talk of business matters: we offered him merchandise
in exchange for hogs, but were not able to conclude the bargain that
day. His majesty re-embarked in his double pirogue, at about six o'clock
in the evening. It was manned by twenty-four men. A great chest,
containing firearms, was lashed over the centre of the two canoes
forming the pirogue; and it was there that Tamehameha sat, with his
prime-minister at his side.
In the morning, on the 22d, we sent our water-casks ashore and filled
them with excellent water. At about noon his sable majesty paid us
another visit, accompanied by his three wives and his favorite minister.
These females were of an extraordinary corpulence, and of unmeasured
size. They were dressed in the fashion of the country, having nothing
but a piece of _tapa_, or bark-cloth, about two yards long, passed round
the hips and falling to the knees. We resumed the negotiations of the
day before, and were more successful. I remarked that when the bargain
was concluded, he insisted with great pertinacity that part of the
payment should be in Spanish dollars. We asked the reason, and he made
answer that he wished to buy a frigate of his brother, King George,
meaning the king of England. The bargain concluded, we prayed his
majesty and his suite to dine with us; they consented, and toward
evening retired, apparently well satisfied with their visit and our
reception of them.
In the meantime, the natives surrounded the ship in great numbers, with
hundreds of canoes, offering us their goods, in the shape of eatables
and the rude manufactures of the island, in exchange for merchandise;
but, as they had also brought intoxicating liquors in gourds, some of
the crew got drunk; the captain was, consequently, obliged to suspend
the trade, and forbade any one to traffic with the islanders, except
through the first-mate, who was intrusted with that business.
I landed on the 22d, with Messrs. Pillet and M'Gillis: we passed the
night ashore, spending that day and the next morning in rambling over
the environs of the bay, followed by a crowd of men, women, and
children.
Ohetity, where Tamehameha resides, and which, consequently, may be
regarded as the capital of his kingdom, is--or at least was at that
time--a moderate-sized city, or rather a large village. Besides the
private houses, of which there were perhaps two hundred, constructed of
poles planted in the ground and covered over with matting, there were
the royal palace, which was not magnificent by any means: a public
store, of two stories, one of stone and the other of wood; two _morais_,
or idol temples, and a wharf. At the latter we found an old vessel, the
_Lady Bird_, which some American navigators had given in exchange for a
schooner; it was the only large vessel which King Tamehameha possessed;
and, besides, was worth nothing. As for schooners he had forty of them,
of from twenty to thirty tons burthen: these vessels served to transport
the tributes in kind paid by his vassals in the other islands. Before
the Europeans arrived among these savages, the latter had no means of
communication between one isle and another, but their canoes, and as
some of the islands are not in sight of each other, these voyages must
have been dangerous. Near the palace I found an Indian from Bombay,
occupied in making a twelve inch cable, for the use of the ship which I
have described.
Tamehameha kept constantly round his house a guard of twenty-four men.
These soldiers wore, by way of uniform, a long blue coat with yellow;
and each was armed with a musket. In front of the house, on an open
square, were placed fourteen four-pounders, mounted on their carriages.
The king was absolute, and judged in person the differences between his
subjects. We had an opportunity of witnessing a proof of it, the day
after our landing. A Portuguese having had a quarrel with a native, who
was intoxicated, struck him: immediately the friends of the latter, who
had been the aggressor after all, gathered in a crowd to beat down the
poor foreigner with stones; he fled as fast as he could to the house of
the king, followed by a mob of enraged natives, who nevertheless stopped
at some distance from the guards, while the Portuguese, all breathless,
crouched in a corner. We were on the esplanade in front of the palace
royal, and curiosity to see the trial led us into the presence of his
majesty, who having caused the quarrel to be explained to him, and heard
the witnesses on both sides, condemned the native to work four days in
the garden of the Portuguese and to give him a hog. A young Frenchman
from Bordeaux, preceptor of the king's sons, whom he taught to read, and
who understood the language, acted as interpreter to the Portuguese, and
explained to us the sentence. I can not say whether our presence
influenced the decision, or whether, under other circumstances, the
Portuguese would have been less favorably treated. We were given to
understand that Tamehameha was pleased to see whites establish
themselves in his dominions, but that he esteemed only people with some
useful trade, and despised idlers, and especially drunkards. We saw at
Wahoo about thirty of these white inhabitants, for the most part, people
of no character, and who had remained on the islands either from
indolence, or from drunkenness and licentiousness. Some had taken wives
in the country, in which case the king gave them a portion of land to
cultivate for themselves. But two of the worst sort had found means to
procure a small still, wherewith they manufactured rum and supplied it
to the natives.
The first navigators found only four sorts of quadrupeds on the Sandwich
islands:--dogs, swine, lizards, and rats. Since then sheep have been
carried there, goats, horned cattle, and even horses, and these animals
have multiplied.
The chief vegetable productions of these isles are the sugar cane, the
bread-fruit tree, the banana, the water-melon, the musk-melon, the
_taro_, the _ava_, the _pandanus_, the mulberry, &c. The bread-fruit
tree is about the size of a large apple-tree; the fruit resembles an
apple and is about twelve or fourteen inches in circumference; the rind
is thick and rough like a melon: when cut transversely it is found to
be full of sacs, like the inside of an orange; the pulp has the
consistence of water-melon, and is cooked before it is eaten. We saw
orchards of bread-fruit trees and bananas, and fields of sugar-cane,
back of Ohetity.
The _taro_ grows in low situations, and demands a great deal of care. It
is not unlike a white turnip,[E] and as it constitutes the principal
food of the natives, it is not to be wondered at that they bestow so
much attention on its culture. Wherever a spring of pure water is found
issuing out of the side of a hill, the gardener marks out on the
declivity the size of the field he intends to plant. The ground is
levelled and surrounded with a mud or stone wall, not exceeding eighteen
inches in height, and having a flood gate above and below. Into this
enclosure the water of the spring is conducted, or is suffered to escape
from it, according to the dryness of the season. When the root has
acquired a sufficient size it is pulled up for immediate use. This
esculent is very bad to eat raw, but boiled it is better than the yam.
Cut in slices, dried, pounded and reduced to a farina, it forms with
bread fruit the principal food of the natives. Sometimes they boil it to
the consistence of porridge, which they put into gourds and allow to
ferment; it will then keep a long time. They also use to mix with it,
fish, which they commonly eat raw with the addition of a little salt,
obtained by evaporation.
[Footnote E: Bougainville calls it "Calf-foot root."]
The _ava_ is a plant more injurious than useful to the inhabitants of
these isles; since they only make use of it to obtain a dangerous and
intoxicating drink, which they also call _ava_. The mode of preparing
this beverage is as follows: they chew the root, and spit out the result
into a basin; the juice thus expressed is exposed to the sun to undergo
fermentation; after which they decant it into a gourd; it is then fit
for use, and they drink it on occasions to intoxication. The too
frequent use of this disgusting liquor causes loss of sight, and a sort
of leprosy, which can only be cured by abstaining from it, and by
bathing frequently in the water of the sea. This leprosy turns their
skin white: we saw several of the lepers, who were also blind, or nearly
so. The natives are also fond of smoking: the tobacco grows in the
islands, but I believe it has been introduced from abroad. The bark of
the mulberry furnishes the cloth worn by both sexes; of the leaves of
the _pandanus_ they make mats. They have also a kind of wax-nut, about
the size of a dried plum of which they make candles by running a stick
through several of them. Lighted at one end, they burn like a wax taper,
and are the only light they use in their huts at night.
The men are generally well made and tall: they wear for their entire
clothing what they call a _maro_; it is a piece of figured or white
tapa, two yards long and a foot wide, which they pass round the loins
and between the legs, tying the ends in a knot over the left hip. At
first sight I thought they were painted red, but soon perceived that it
was the natural _color_ of their skin. The women wear a petticoat of the
same stuff as the _maro_, but wider and longer, without, however,
reaching below the knees. They have sufficiently regular features, and
but for the color, may pass, generally speaking, for handsome women.
Some to heighten their charms, dye their black hair (cut short for the
purpose) with quick lime, forming round the head a strip of pure white,
which disfigures them monstrously. Others among the young wear a more
becoming garland of flowers. For other traits, they are very lascivious,
and far from observing a modest reserve, especially toward strangers. In
regard to articles of mere ornament, I was told that they were not the
same in all the island. I did not see them, either, clothed in their war
dresses, or habits of ceremony. But I had an opportunity to see them
paint or print their _tapa_, or bark cloth, an occupation in which they
employ a great deal of care and patience. The pigments they use are
derived from vegetable juices, prepared with the oil of the cocoa-nut.
Their pencils are little reeds or canes of bamboo, at the extremity of
which they carve out divers sorts of flowers. First they tinge the cloth
they mean to print, yellow, green, or some other color which forms the
ground: then they draw upon it perfectly straight lines, without any
other guide but the eye; lastly they dip the ends of the bamboo sticks
in paint of a different tint from the ground, and apply them between the
dark or bright bars thus formed. This cloth resembles a good deal our
calicoes and printed cottons; the oils with which it is impregnated
renders it impervious to water. It is said that the natives of _Atowy_
excel all the other islanders in the art of painting the tapa.
The Sandwich-islanders live in villages of one or two hundred houses
arranged without symmetry, or rather grouped together in complete
defiance of it. These houses are constructed (as I have before said) of
posts driven in the ground, covered with long dry grass, and walled with
matting; the thatched roof gives them a sort of resemblance to our
Canadian barns or granges. The length of each house varies according to
the number of the family which occupies it: they are not smoky like the
wigwams of our Indians, the fireplace being always outside in the open
air, where all the cooking is performed. Hence their dwellings are very
clean and neat inside.
Their pirogues or canoes are extremely light and neat: those which are
single have an outrigger, consisting of two curved pieces of timber
lashed across the bows, and touching the water at the distance of five
or six feet from the side; another piece, turned up at each extremity,
is tied to the end and drags in the water, on which it acts like a
skating iron on the ice, and by its weight keeps the canoe in
equilibrium: without that contrivance they would infallibly upset. Their
paddles are long, with a very broad blade. All these canoes carry a
lateen, or sprit-sail, which is made of a mat of grass or leaves,
extremely well woven.
I did not remain long enough with these people to acquire very extensive
and exact notions of their religion: I know that they recognise a
Supreme Being, whom they call _Etoway_, and a number of inferior
divinities. Each village has one or more _morais_. These morais are
enclosures which served for cemeteries; in the middle is a temple,
where the priests alone have a right to enter: they contain several
idols of wood, rudely sculptured. At the feet of these images are
deposited, and left to putrify, the offerings of the people, consisting
of dogs, pigs, fowls, vegetables, &c. The respect of these savages for
their priests extends almost to adoration; they regard their persons as
sacred, and feel the greatest scruple in touching the objects, or going
near the places, which they have declared _taboo_ or forbidden. The
_taboo_ has often been useful to European navigators, by freeing them
from the importunities of the crowd.
In our rambles we met groups playing at different games. That of
draughts appeared the most common. The checker-board is very simple, the
squares being marked on the ground with a sharp stick: the men are
merely shells or pebbles. The game was different from that played in
civilized countries, so that we could not understand it.
Although nature has done almost everything for the inhabitants of the
Sandwich islands--though they enjoy a perpetual spring, a clear sky, a
salubrious climate, and scarcely any labor is required to produce the
necessaries of life--they can not be regarded as generally happy: the
artisans and producers, whom they call _Tootoos_, are nearly in the same
situation as the Helots among the Lacedemonians, condemned to labor
almost incessantly for their lord or _Eris_, without hope of bettering
their condition, and even restricted in the choice of their daily
food.[F] How has it happened that among a people yet barbarous, where
knowledge is nearly equally distributed, the class which is beyond
comparison the most numerous has voluntarily submitted to such a
humiliating and oppressive yoke? The Tartars, though infinitely less
numerous than the Chinese, have subjected them, because the former were
warlike and the latter were not. The same thing has happened, no doubt,
at remote periods, in Poland, and other regions of Europe and Asia. If
moral causes are joined to physical ones, the superiority of one caste
and the inferiority of the other will be still more marked; it is known
that the natives of Hispaniola, when they saw the Spaniards arrive on
their coast, in vessels of an astonishing size to their apprehensions,
and heard them imitate the thunder with their cannon, took them for
beings of a superior nature to their own. Supposing that this island had
been extremely remote from every other country, and that the Spaniards,
after conquering it, had held no further communication with any
civilized land, at the end of a century or two the language and the
manners would have assimilated, but there would have been two castes,
one of lords, enjoying all the advantages, the other of serfs, charged
with all the burdens. This theory seems to have been realized anciently
in Hindostan; but if we must credit the tradition of the
Sandwich-islanders, their country was originally peopled by a man and
woman, who came to Owyhee in a canoe. Unless, then, they mean that this
man and woman came with their slaves, and that the _Eris_ are descended
from the first, and the _Tootoos_ from the last, they ought to attribute
to each other the same origin, and consequently regard each other as
equals, and even as brothers, according to the manner of thinking that
prevails among savages. The cause of the slavery of women among most
barbarous tribes is more easily explained: the men have subjected them
by the right of the strongest, if ignorance and superstition have not
caused them to be previously regarded as beings of an inferior nature,
made to be servants and not companions.[G]
[Footnote F: The _Tootoos_ and all the women, the wives of the king and
principal chiefs excepted, are eternally condemned to the use of fruits
and vegetables; dogs and pigs being exclusively reserved for the table
of the _Eris_.]
[Footnote G: Some Indian tribes think that women have no souls, but die
altogether like the brutes; others assign them a different paradise from
that of men, which indeed they might have reason to prefer for
themselves, unless their relative condition were to be ameliorated in
the next world.]
CHAPTER VI.
Departure from Wahoo.--Storm.--Arrival at the Mouth of the
Columbia.--Reckless Order of the Captain.--Difficulty of the
Entrance.--Perilous Situation of the Ship.--Unhappy Fate of a part
of the Crew and People of the Expedition.
Having taken on board a hundred head of live hogs, some goats, two
sheep, a quantity of poultry, two boat-loads of sugar-cane, to feed the
hogs, as many more of yams, taro, and other vegetables, and all our
water-casks being snugly stowed, we weighed anchor on the 28th of
February, sixteen days after our arrival at Karaka-koua.
We left another man (Edward Aymes) at Wahoo. He belonged to a boat's
crew which was sent ashore for a load of sugar canes. By the time the
boat was loaded by the natives the ebb of the tide had left her aground,
and Aymes asked leave of the coxswain to take a stroll, engaging to be
back for the flood. Leave was granted him, but during his absence, the
tide haying come in sufficiently to float the boat, James Thorn, the
coxswain, did not wait for the young sailor, who was thus left behind.
The captain immediately missed the man, and, on being informed that he
had strolled away from the boat on leave, flew into a violent passion.
Aymes soon made his appearance alongside, having hired some natives to
take him on board; on perceiving him, the captain ordered him to stay in
the long-boat, then lashed to the side with its load of sugar-cane. The
captain then himself got into the boat, and, taking one of the canes,
beat the poor fellow most unmercifully with it; after which, not
satisfied with this act of brutality, he seized his victim and threw him
overboard! Aymes, however, being an excellent swimmer, made for the
nearest native
|
to
Carbery Chase, which is quite,’ he added with marked emphasis, ‘at my
own disposal, I have a large amount of personal property, and should
be willing to settle a considerable income on your wife—I say on your
wife, Jasper, because, unhappily, I cannot rely on your prudence where
money is concerned.’
‘I know I’ve made too strong running, know it well enough,’ answered
the ex-cavalry officer, stroking his yellow moustache; ‘and I don’t
deny, sir, that you have treated me very kindly as to money and that.
But really and seriously, sir, _can_ you wish me to marry Miss Willis?’
‘Really, my son, your pertinacity in cross-questioning me on the matter
is—I am sure most unwittingly—almost offensive,’ replied Sir Sykes
nervously. ‘Nor do I see what there would be so very wonderful in
your selection of an amiable and accomplished girl, domiciled in your
father’s house, and the daughter of—poor Willis!’ added the baronet in
conclusion, as though the memory of the deceased major had suddenly
recurred to him with unusual vividness.
Jasper, who remembered the conversation which he had overheard at _The
Traveller’s Rest_, fairly gasped for breath. His parent’s talent for
duplicity seemed to him to be something strange and shocking, as the
untruthfulness of an elder generation always does appear.
‘I should not have urged my views upon you as I have done,’ continued
Sir Sykes after a pause, ‘but that I have some idea that the young
lady who has been the unconscious subject of this conversation
entertains—what shall I say?—a preference for your society, which her
feminine tact enables her to hide from general notice. I feel assured
that it only rests with you to win the heart of Ruth Willis—a prize
worth the winning.’
We are all very vain. Jasper, fop and worldling though he was, felt
a thrill of gratified vanity run through him like an electric shock,
as his father’s artful suggestion sank into the depths of his selfish
mind. But he made haste to put in a disclaimer.
‘I’m afraid, sir, you are too partial a judge,’ he said, with an
involuntary glance at the Venice mirror opposite. ‘Miss Willis is too
sensible to care about a good-for-nothing fellow like me.’
‘I think otherwise, Jasper,’ returned Sir Sykes. ‘However, for the
present we have talked enough. My wishes, remember, and even—even my
welfare, for reasons not just now to be explained, are on the side of
this marriage. Think it over. To you it means easy circumstances, a
home of your own, the reversion of Carbery Chase, my cordial good-will,
and the society of a charming and high-principled wife. Think it over.’
‘I will think it over, sir,’ said Jasper, rising from his chair, and
lounging out of the library with the same listless swagger as that with
which he had lounged into it. ‘I should be glad of course to meet your
wishes, and that. Quite a surprise though.’
Left alone, Sir Sykes buried his face in his hands, and when he raised
it again it looked old, worn, and haggard. ‘That scoundrel Hold,’ he
said with a sigh, ‘makes me pay a heavy price for his silence, and even
now his motives are to me a problem that I cannot solve.’
(_To be continued._)
CURIOUS THEATRE CUSTOMS IN PARIS.
The visitor to Paris may witness a kind of theatrical performance which
is strikingly different from any that can be seen in Great Britain.
We refer to the Théâtre des Menus Plaisirs, in the Boulevard de
Strasbourg. Part of the entertainment here consists in certain of the
actors and actresses criticising the performances which are proceeding
upon the stage, from seats in various parts of the house—pit,
circle, and gallery—which they have quietly got into unobserved by
the audience. They assume the _rôle_ of ordinary spectators who
find themselves compelled in the interests of literature and art to
remonstrate in a rather extraordinary manner against what they see and
hear upon the stage; and the surprise of the uninitiated when the ball
is set rolling is considerable.
The manager comes upon the stage and begins a modest speech upon past
successes and future prospects; but he has not far advanced in his
speech when a gentleman rises in the stalls, with hat in hand, and in
the most respectful manner corrects him with regard to a word which he
declares to be ill chosen and misleading, at the same time obliging
the manager with the correct word. Here another gentleman introduces
himself into the dispute, and complicates matters by a new suggestion,
which involves the subject in inextricable confusion and absurdity.
Both gentlemen are extremely polite, but firm in denying the right of
the manager to that word; and the latter is driven frantic, and retires
from the stage glaring at his antagonists.
Silence for a few seconds succeeds this scene, when suddenly a man
in the front seat of the gallery starts up from his seat with a wild
cry, throws one leg over the gallery, hangs forward suspended from the
railing, and gazes towards the pit entrance of the theatre. He sees
something of absorbing interest, and with another cry he is about to
throw himself over the gallery. The people scream; and then he finds
he has been mistaken; he resumes a normal position, and looking round
upon the audience with a kindly smile, which strangely contrasts with
his late look of anxiety, he asks pardon for unnecessarily disturbing
their composure, and resumes his seat. A tenor singer now comes upon
the stage and commences a song; but the two critics in the stalls are
particular, and take exception to his style; they do so with manifest
regret, but the principles of art must be attended to. With profuse
apologies, and an expressed hope that he will proceed with his song
in the corrected form, the critics resume their seats. The tenor, at
first exasperated, becomes mollified by the courteous manners of the
gentlemen, and begins his song again; but almost immediately a lady
sitting in the front seat of the circle tells him that he is in danger
of dropping his moustache. This last is the final ‘straw’ on the back
of the vocalist, and he retires in high dudgeon.
By the side of the lady in the circle there sits a meek-looking old
gentleman, who being naturally shocked at the conduct of his wife,
puts on his hat as if to leave the theatre; but the better-half is
equal to the occasion, and knocks his hat over the meek old gentleman’s
eyes, and the meek old gentleman himself back into his seat. Presently
several actresses appear upon the stage, and one of them commences
to sing, with probably a pleasing sympathetic voice; but such is not
the opinion of the lady, who holds the singer up to ridicule. The
vocalist then stops, and engages in a verbal and violent encounter
with her persecutor, who from her place in the ‘circle’ returns the
badinage with interest, so that soon the other retires from the stage
vanquished. The victor is now asked herself to sing, a request with
which she readily complies, singing with abundant action and in good
voice an exceedingly catching song, and at the chorus, giving a royal
wave of the hands towards the gallery to join with her at that point.
The stranger will be surprised to learn that this disturbing element
in the audience, in reality comes from behind the scenes; the lady who
has just sung is the leading member of the company, and the gentlemen
critics are well-known and highly appreciated comedians. And though
the stranger may think that all this is an impromptu disturbance, it
is quite certain that all is rehearsed as carefully as any play that
is put upon the stage. How long such a performance would secure the
favour of a London audience, is doubtful; here, however, it is an
abiding success, is received with immense applause—the _claqueurs_ or
professional applauders being apparently altogether dispensed with—and
the audience is kept in continual hilarity by the humorous attack and
by the instant and witty reply.
Within the Parisian theatres the visitor may derive some amusement from
observing the operations of the _claqueurs_, who are employed at the
principal establishments to augment the enthusiasm of the audience.
The men who compose this body of professional applauders appear to
belong to the artisan class; they number from forty to fifty, that is
they are about a hundred hands all told. They occupy the front row of
seats in the second or third gallery, so that to observe them and their
movements it is necessary to occupy a place in one of the galleries.
Their leader sits in their midst, ever ready at the points marked for
him by author or manager to give the signal which ‘brings down the
house.’ As the moment arrives when _the_ bon-mot shall be uttered, the
_chef_ breathes upon his hands, then stretches them slightly upwards,
while he at the same time looks right and left along his ranks. This
is equivalent to ‘Attention’ or ‘Prepare to fire a volley.’ Each man
is now at the ‘ready,’ and waits anxiously upon the _chef_. When the
_mot_ is uttered, he brings his hands together with a frantic wave,
and the others simultaneously with him make a very respectable, even
enthusiastic show of applause. At the end of a song the leader starts
the cry _Ploo, ploo_ (plus, signifying more), in which all join; this,
which is equivalent to our ‘Encore,’ sounds in the stranger’s ears more
like hooting than aught else; but it is no doubt as welcome to the
French actor as a good British cheer is to an English one.
This little army, like all others, has its awkward squad. One evening
at the ‘Renaissance’ we observed the _chef_ to become very uneasy on
account of one who was exceedingly remiss in his duty; not only was the
amount of applause when given small in volume, but once when the signal
was given he entirely neglected to comply with it. This was gall and
wormwood to the leader, who really seemed a very earnest hard-working
man in his profession; so after finishing the round of applause, he
‘went for’ that awkward man, remonstrated with him, and even gave him
on the spur of the moment, a lesson on the correct method of clapping
hands. After this the pupil shewed marked improvement, and by the
end of the play performed his duty in such a satisfactory manner as
promised well for his future advancement in this handy profession. The
effect of this pernicious system upon the audience is very different,
we should think, from what was anticipated when it was first organised;
for finding that the applause is supplied by the establishment, just as
it supplies programmes or turns on the gas, the audience feel that they
are relieved from all obligations in the matter, and unless stirred by
an irresistible influence, seldom dream of applauding at all.
THE RIVAL LAIRDS.
In a recent article on Curling we endeavoured to give a sketch of the
history of this popular Scottish pastime, together with a brief outline
of the mode in which the game is usually played. The following story
of a match between two rival parishes, supposed to have been played
about the beginning of the present century, may give the reader a
further idea of the enthusiasm evoked on the ice whenever and wherever
curlers forgather. Let the non-initiated imagine himself standing
beside a frozen sheet of water, upon which are assembled a company of
men of various ranks from peer to peasant, each striving to do his
best to support the prowess and honour of his rink. The rink let it be
understood is a certain portion of ice, from thirty to forty yards in
length, apportioned off to the players. The players consist usually of
four on each side, and whereas in the well-known game of grass-bowls,
each player is provided with two wooden bowls which he drives towards
a small white ball called the Jack, each player on the ice has two
curling-stones shaped much like a Gouda cheese—with a handle atop—which
he propels or hurls towards a certain marked spot at each end of the
rink, called the tee; and round each tee is scratched a series of
concentric rings ranging from two to ten or twelve feet in diameter.
Standing at one end of the rink the man whose turn it is to play, waits
the bidding of his director or ‘skip’ who stands at the other end, and
then endeavours to act according to the directions that may be given by
that important personage. Each of the four players on one side plays
alternately against his antagonist, the main object being to send the
stone gliding up the ice so that it may eventually lie within the rings
and as near the tee as possible. Thus, when the ‘end’ is finished, the
side whose stones lie nearest the tee scores so many towards the game.
Sometimes when the ice is partially thawed the players have difficulty
in hurling their stones all the way to the tee; and sometimes they fail
to get them beyond a transverse mark called the ‘hog-score,’ two-thirds
down the rink—in which case the lagging stone is put off the ice and
cannot count for that ‘end.’ Besoms, however, with which each man is
armed, are here of great account, the laws of the game permitting each
player to sweep the ice in front of an approaching stone belonging to
his side, so as to accelerate its progress, if necessary. The shouts of
‘Sweep, sweep!’ or rather ‘_Soop, soop!_’ are of continual recurrence,
and are exceedingly amusing to strangers. The skip on each side first
directs his three men and then lastly plays himself. On his generalship
in skipping much depends, his efforts being mainly directed first to
get as many stones as possible near the tee, and then to get his men to
‘guard’ them from being driven off by those of the opposite side. Or
he may direct a player to aim at a certain stone already lying, with a
view to take an angle, or ‘wick’ as it is termed, and so land his own
stone near the tee. This wicking is a very pretty part of the game and
requires great delicacy of play.
The anxiety of the opposing skips is very amusing to watch, and the
enthusiasm of the several players when an unusually good shot is made,
is boundless. A good ‘lead’ or first player, though he is necessarily
debarred from the niceties of the game which fall to the lot of the
subsequent players, is a very important man in the game if he can
place his stones within the circles that surround the tee, or in
familiar parlance, ‘lie within the house.’ Second player’s post is
not so important; but ‘third stone’ is a position given usually to
an experienced player, as he has frequently to either drive off some
dangerous stone belonging to the other side, and himself take its
place; or has to guard a stone of his own side, which though in a good
position may lie open to the enemy. Thus proceeds with varying fortune
this ‘roaring game’ of give and take, stone after stone being driven
along the icy plain, till the skips themselves come to play and so
finish the ‘end.’
With these preliminary remarks we proceed to our tale.
* * * * *
Snow had fallen long and silently over all the high-lying districts
of the south of Scotland. It was an unusually bad year for the
sheep-farmers, whose stock was suffering severely from the protracted
storm and the snow which enveloped both hill and low-lying pasturage.
But while sheep-farmers were thus kept anxiously waiting for fresh
weather, curlers were in their glory, as day after day they forgathered
on the ice and followed up the ‘roaring game.’
The century was young, and the particular year of our story was that
known and spoken of for long afterwards as the ‘bad year.’ In these
days, there was no free-trade to keep down the price of corn or beef,
which during years of bad harvest in Great Britain, or long periods of
frost and snow, rose to famine prices, and were all but unprocurable by
the poorer classes. Oatmeal at half-a-crown a peck told a sad tale in
many a household, and especially on the helpless children—the bairns.
As we have said, curling had been enjoyed to the full; perhaps there
had even been a surfeit of it, if the real truth were told. Match
after match had been played by parish against parish, and county
against county. Rival rinks of choice players belonging to counties
such as Peebles had challenged those of the neighbouring counties of
Selkirkshire, or even Midlothian. Prizes, consisting of medals or
money, had been gained by various enthusiasts; and last though not
least, matches for suppers of beef and greens—the true curlers’ fare,
had been contested, the reckoning to be paid by the losing rinks. The
benedicts too had played the bachelors, and had as usual, beaten them.
Country squires had given prizes to be played for by their tenantry
versus adjoining tenantry, and had brought their fur-clad wives and
daughters to the ice to congratulate them on success, or condole with
them on defeat. In short, the sole occupation of the majority of the
adult male rural population of the south of Scotland in the year of
which we speak, seemed to be—curling.
Amongst other matches in the county of Peeblesshire there was one that
yet remained to come off, namely between the parishes of Tweedsmuir
and Broughton. In a series of matches—or bonspiels as they were
termed—between parish and parish, these two had stood unbeaten. It
therefore remained to be seen which parish should beat the other, and
thereby achieve the envied position of champion of the county.
When the honour of a _parish_ is at stake on the ice, the choice
of the men who are to play, is a matter of very grave import. In
a friendly match between two rinks, a little unskilfulness on the
part of one or more of the players is a very common affair and is
comparatively unheeded: but in a bonspiel between the two best parishes
in a celebrated curling county, the failure or even the occasional
uncertainty of any one man may be fraught with direst consequences.
Foremost among the promoters of the forthcoming match which was to
decide matters, were Robert Scott laird of Tweedsmuir, and Andrew
Murray laird of Broughton. These worthies had long been rivals on
other than ice-fields, and though on friendly enough terms at kirk
or market were each keenly alive to his own honour and prowess. Any
game, therefore, in which these rival lairds engaged, was sure to be
closely contested; and the result was at all times as eagerly watched
by interested spectators as it was keenly fought by the rival parties.
It is even said that the lairds had been rivals in love as well as in
other sports, the result of which was that Murray had carried off the
lady and Scott had remained a bachelor, with an old housekeeper named
Betty to take charge of him. But as the story of the love-match was but
the ‘clash’ of the country, it may be taken for what it is worth.
On the morning of the day fixed for the match (which was to come off
at Broughton and to consist of four men on each side), the laird of
Tweedsmuir was early astir, in order to see that the cart which was
to convey his own curling-stones and those of his men to Broughton—a
distance of some half-dozen miles—was ready, and that the men
themselves were prepared to accompany it. The cart having been duly
despatched with the schoolmaster of the parish, who was to be one of
the players, and the shepherd from Talla Linns, who was to be another,
Laird Scott ordered out his gig and himself prepared to start.
‘Now Betty,’ cried the laird to his old housekeeper, as he proceeded to
envelop himself in his plaid, ‘you’ll see and have plenty of beef and
greens ready by six o’clock, and a spare bed or two; for besides our
own men it’s likely enough I may bring back one or two of the beaten
lads to stop all night.’
‘’Deed laird, tak ye care the Broughton folk dinna get the better o’
_you_, and beat ye after a’: they tell me they’re grand curlers.’
‘Well Betty, I’m not afraid of them, with Andrew Denholm on my side.’
Thus assured, the stalwart laird seized the reins and took the road
for Broughton. On his way down the valley of the Tweed he called at
the humble cottage of the said Andrew Denholm, who usually played the
critical part of ‘third stone,’ and was one of his best supporters; and
whose employment, that of a mason, was for the nonce at a stand-still.
‘What! not ready yet Andrew?’ exclaimed the laird in a tone of
disappointment. ‘Bestir yourself man, or we’ll not be on the ice by ten
o’clock.’
‘I’m no’ gaun’ to the curlin’ the day sir,’ replied Andrew with an air
of dejection.
‘And what for no’?’ inquired the laird with uneasy apprehension. ‘You
know Andrew, my man, the game canna’ go on without you. The honour of
Tweedsmuir at stake too! there’s not another man I would risk in your
place on the ice this day.’
‘Get Wattie Laidlaw the weaver to tak’ my place laird; he’s a grand
curler, and can play up a stane as well as ony man in the parish; the
fact is sir, just now I have na’ the heart even to curl. Gang yer ways
yersell laird, and skip against the laird o’ Broughton, and there’s nae
fear o’ the result: and Wattie can play third stane instead o’ me.’
‘Wattie will play _nae_ third stane for me: come yourself Andrew, and
we’ll try to cheer you up; and you’ll take your beef and greens up bye
wi’ the rink callants and me in the afternoon.’
Denholm was considered one of the best curlers in that part of the
county, and was usually one of the first to be on the ice; to see
him, therefore, thus cast down and listless, filled the laird’s warm
heart with sorrow. He saw there was something wrong. He must rally the
dejected mason.
‘Do you think,’ continued the laird, ‘that I would trust Wattie to play
in your place; a poor silly body that can barely get to the hog-score,
let alone the tee? Na, na Andrew; rather let the match be off than be
beaten in that way.’
Seeing the laird thus determined to carry off his ‘third man’ to the
scene of the approaching conflict, the poor mason endeavoured still
further to remonstrate by a recital of his grievances.
‘Ye ken sir,’ he began, ‘what a long storm it has been. Six weeks since
I’ve had a day at my trade, though I have made a shilling or two now
and again up-bye at the homestead yonder. But wi’ the price o’ meal at
half-a-crown the peck, and no’ very good after a’; and nineteenpence
for a loaf of bread, we’ve had a sair time of it. But we wadna’ vex
oorsels about that, Maggie and me, if we had meal eneugh to keep the
bairns fed. Five o’ them dwining away before our eyes; it’s been an
unco job I assure you, laird. Indeed if it hadna been for Mag’s sister
that’s married upon the grieve o’ Drummelzier, dear knows what would
have become of us, wi’ whiles no a handfu’ o’ meal left in the girnel.
Even wi’ the siller to pay for it, it’s no’ aye to be gotten; and,’
faltered the poor fellow in conclusion, ‘there’s just meal eneugh in
the house to-day to last till the morn.’
‘Well, cheer up my man!’ cried the laird; ‘the longest day has an
end, and this storm cannot last much longer. In fact there’s a thaw
coming on or I’m far cheated. There’s a crown to Maggie to replenish
the meal-ark, and get maybe a sup o’ something better for the bairns.
And there’s cheese an’ bread in the gig here that will serve you and
me Andrew, till the beef and greens are ready for us up-bye in the
afternoon. Meanwhile, a tastin’ o’ the flask will no be amiss, and then
for Broughton.’
Thus invigorated and reassured, the mason took his seat beside the
laird, and amid blessings from the gudewife and well-wishings from the
bairns, the two sped on their journey.
Arrived at the pond, they found tees marked, distances measured, and
all in readiness for the play to begin. The usual salutations ensued.
Broughton and Tweedsmuir shook hands all round with much apparent
warmth; and the two sides, of four each, took their places in the
following order:
BROUGHTON. TWEEDSMUIR.
Wil. Elliot, shoemaker, lead; Mr Henderson, schoolmaster, lead;
Rev. Isaac Stevenson, 2d stone; Wattie Dalgleish, shepherd, 2d stone;
Tam Johnston, blacksmith, 3d stone; Andrew Denholm, mason, 3d stone;
Laird Murray, skip. Laird Scott, skip.
The play was begun and continued with varying fortune: sometimes
one side scored, sometimes the other. The match was to consist of
thirty-one points; and at one o’clock when a halt was called for
refreshments, the scoring was tolerably even. The frost was beginning
to shew a slight tendency to give way, but this only nerved the players
to further exertions in sweeping up the stones on the somewhat dulled
ice. The scene in the forenoon had been a very lively one: but as the
afternoon approached and the game was nearing an end, the liveliness
was tempered with anxiety, which amounted almost to pain, as shot
after shot was ‘put in’ by one side, only to be cleverly ‘taken’ by
the other. ‘Soop! soop!’ was the incessant cry of the skips as from
their point of vantage they descried a lagging stone; or ‘Haud up!
I tell ye; haud up!’ when from that same point they beheld one of
their players’ stones approaching with sufficient velocity to do all
that was wanted. Anxiety was nearing a crisis. At half-past three the
game stood: Broughton thirty, Tweedsmuir twenty-nine. The game was
anybody’s. Coats had been cast as needless encumbrances; besoms were
clutched with determined firmness: the skips slightly pale with the
terrible excitement of the occasion, and the stake that was as it were
hanging in the balance: want of nerve on their part to direct, or on
the part of any one man to play, might decide the fate of the day. The
last end had come to be played, and Broughton having won the previous
end, was to lead. The shoemaker’s stone is played, and lies well over
the hog-score in good line with the tee, and on the road to promotion.
Tweedsmuir’s leading man, the schoolmaster, passes the souter’s stone
and lies in ‘the house.’ ‘Well played dominie!’ cries Laird Scott to
his lead. And so proceeds the ‘end’ till it comes to our friend the
mason’s turn to play; the blacksmith having just played his first stone
with but indifferent effect.
‘What do ye see o’ that stane Andrew?’ roars Laird Scott from the tee,
pointing at the same time to the winning stone of the other side,
which, however, was partially ‘guarded.’
‘I see the half o’ t.’
‘Then,’ says the laird, ‘make sure of it: tak it awa’, and if you rub
off the guard there’s no harm done.’
For a moment the mason steadies himself, settles his foot in the
crampet, and with a straight delivered shot shaves the guard and wicks
out the rival stone, himself lying in close to the tee, and _guarded_
both at the side and in front by stones belonging to his side.
The effect of such a shot as this, at so critical a period of the game,
was electric, and is not easily to be described. Enthusiasm on the part
of Tweedsmuir, dismay on that of Broughton. But there are yet several
stones to come: the order may again be reversed, and Andrew’s deftly
played shot may be yet taken. We shall see. The blacksmith, the third
player on the Broughton side, follows with his second stone, and though
by adhering to the direction of his skip he might have knocked off the
guard and so laid open Andrew’s winner, over-anxiety causes him to
miss the guard and miss everything. Thus is his second and last stone
unfortunately played for Broughton.
The mason has his second stone still to play for Tweedsmuir, and
before doing so Laird Scott thus accosts him: ‘Andrew my man, we are
lying shot now; we want but another to be game; and for the honour o’
Tweedsmuir I am going to give you the shot that will give it to us: do
ye see this port?’ pointing to an open part of the ice (in curling
phraseology a port) to the left of the tee, with a stone on each side.
‘I see the port sir.’
‘Well then,’ continued the laird, ‘I want you to fill that port; lay a
stone there Andrew, and there’s _a lade o’ meal at your door to-morrow
morning_.’
The stone is raised just for one instant with an easy backward sweep
of hand and arm, and delivered with a twist that curls it on and on by
degrees towards the spot required. Not just with sufficient strength
perhaps, but aligned to the point. In an instant the skip is master of
the situation. ‘Soop lads! O soop! soop her up—s-o-o-o-p—there now;
let her lie!’ as the stone curls into the ‘port,’ and lies a provoking
impediment to the opposite players. The pressure on players of both
sides is now too great to admit of many outward demonstrations. Stern
rigour of muscle stiffens every face as the two skips themselves now
leave the tee and take their places at the other end. The silence bodes
a something that no one cares to explain away, so great is the strain
of half-hope half-fear that animates every breast.
Laird Murray is directed by his adviser at the tee (the blacksmith) to
break-off the guard in front, but misses. Scott his antagonist, by a
skilfully played stone, puts on another guard still, in order to avoid
danger from Laird Murray’s second and last stone. One chance only now
apparently remains for the laird of Broughton, who requires but one
shot to reverse the order of things and retrieve the game, and he tries
it. It is one of those very difficult shots known amongst curlers as
an outwick. A stone of his side has lain considerably to the right
of the tee short of it, which if touched on the outer side might be
driven in towards the centre and perhaps lie shot. The inwick would be
easier, but that the stone is unfortunately guarded for that attempt.
He knows that Denholm’s first stone still lies the shot, and is guarded
both in front and at the side; and that with another, Tweedsmuir will
be thirty-one and game. The shot is risked—after other contingencies
have been duly weighed—but without the desired effect: the outlying
stone is certainly touched, which in itself was a good shot, but is not
sufficiently taken on the side to produce the desired effect. The laird
of Broughton pales visibly as the shot is missed, and mutters something
between his clenched teeth anything but complimentary to things in
general.
The last stone now lies by the foot of our Tweedsmuir laird, who calmly
awaits the word of direction from Andrew at the other end.
‘Laird!’ shouts the anxious mason, ‘there’s but the one thing for it,
and I’ve seen ye play a dafter-like shot. What would ye say to try an
inwick aff my last stane and lift this ane a foot?’ pointing to a stone
of his side which lay near, though still not counting; ‘that would give
us another shot, and the game!’
‘Well Andrew, that’s why I asked you to fill the port, for I saw what
_they_ didna see, that a wick and curl-in would be left: I think it may
be done. At any rate I can but try.’
Silence reigns o’er the rink: the sweepers on each side stand in
breathless suspense: the wick taken, as given by Andrew in advice to
the Laird, may proclaim Broughton beaten and Tweedsmuir the champion
parish of the county!
‘Stand back from behind, and shew me the stone with your besom, Andrew;
there.’
The suspense is soon broken, the last stone has sped on its mission,
the wick has been taken, a stone on Laird Scott’s side that was lying
farther from the tee than one of the opponents’, is ‘lifted’ into
second place, which with the mason’s winner makes exactly the magic
score of thirty-one! Like the thaw which after this long-continued
storm will be welcomed by man and beast alike, so does the thaw
now melt the frozen tongues of the players. Hats fly up in frenzy
of delight, and the phenomenon is witnessed (only to be witnessed
on ice) of a Scottish laird and his humble tenant in ecstatic
embrace. Flasks are produced, hands shaken by rivals as well as by
friends—though chiefly by friends: preparations are made to carry home
the paraphernalia of the roaring game: and while Betty congratulates
the laird and his guests on their victory, there is happiness in store
for Andrew Denholm, whose prowess so notably contributed to secure the
honour of Tweedsmuir.
AN IRISH COUNTRY FUNERAL.
The difference between English and Irish as regards the funeral customs
of the peasantry in both countries is great. To have a large assemblage
at the ‘berrin’ is among the latter an object of ambition and pride to
the family; and the concourse of neighbours, friends, and acquaintances
who flock from all parts to the funeral is often immense. Even
strangers will swell the funeral cortège, and will account for doing so
by saying: ‘Sure, won’t it come to our turn some day, and isn’t a big
following—to do us credit at our latter end—what we’d all like? So why
shouldn’t we do what is dacent and neighbourly by one another?’
What a contrast there is between a quiet interment in an English
country parish, attended only by the household of the departed, and the
well-remembered scenes in the churchyard of Kilkeedy, County Limerick!
Here, in days gone by, a funeral was a picturesque and touching sight.
There was something very weird and solemn in the sound of the ‘keen,’
as it came, mournful and wild upon the ear, rising and falling with
the windings of the road along which the vast procession moved. In the
centre was the coffin, borne on the shoulders of relatives or friends,
and followed by the next of kin. Outside the churchyard gate, where was
a large open space, there was a halt. The coffin was laid reverently on
the ground, the immediate relatives of the dead kneeling round it.
And now on bended knees all in that vast assemblage sink down. Every
head is bowed in prayer—the men devoutly uncovered—every lip moves;
the wail of the keeners is hushed; you could hear a pin drop among
the silent crowds. It is a solemn and impressive pause. After a few
|
; these, as Mat explained
subsequently, belonging to ponies whose feet were shod.
The colt had pursued a very zigzag course in his efforts to find food
amongst the dry “sedge.”
In an hour’s time the searchers came to a deep dyke overgrown with
heather.
“I was afeard so,” muttered Mat, as he pointed to a spot where the
animal had fallen into the ditch, and a few hundred yards further on
they found the poor colt standing benumbed, with his coat all staring,
at the bottom of the drain.
By great efforts they induced him to walk along till the banks
became less steep, and here, with his axe, Mat levelled a bit of the
edge of the drain, cut down some saplings and furze, and so built a
temporary roadway, up which they managed at length to push and drag
the exhausted beast.
“Good work,” said the stranger, as he and Mat sat down for an instant
to recover their wind. “_This_ part of the business I understand, at
all events,” and taking a flask of brandy from his pocket, he poured
the contents down the throat of the colt.
They then made him up a bed of “sedge,” and cutting a quantity of the
best herbage they could find, placed it under his nose, and left him
lying comfortably down; Mat observing that he looked brighter, and
that he hoped “to get him home afore night.”
This incident occurred in Boldre Wood, and as the day was getting on,
the stranger said,—
“Take a straight line to Lyndhurst, and we’ll get something to eat and
then go out again.”
Mat acquiesced, and, leading the way through Mark Ash, brought his new
acquaintance in an hour’s time to Braken Lodge, outside Lyndhurst.
It is now time to introduce the stranger.
His name was “Stephen Burns.”
Three months only had elapsed since he was pursuing his studies,
or rather, perhaps, his sporting instincts, at Oxford, when he was
suddenly summoned home to Braken Lodge, the paternal seat.
His father had long been ailing, but the end came suddenly, and
Stephen was only just in time to see him before he died, and to find
himself an orphan, having lost his mother during his infancy, and
alone in the world, at all events the civilized world, for his only
relative, an elder brother, had emigrated to Australia some years
previous to this.
Braken Lodge he hardly looked upon as home, for he had left it early
for a preparatory school, and his father, whose sole aim and interest
in life consisted of betting and racing, was rather relieved to get
his two sons comfortably disposed of, that he might the better indulge
his favourite pursuits, which he continued until he left the estate
heavily mortgaged, as Stephen found when he returned to the Forest.
When Burns arrived at the lodge, piloted by Mat, he showed the latter
into a dilapidated smoking-room, where he told him to make himself at
home, whilst he sought the housekeeper, and bidding her take in some
refreshments, followed her into the room, then seating himself, he
prepared to learn more of the independent young Forester. With that
end in view, he remarked, “We have not much time to spare, either for
eating or talking, but, by-the-bye, what’s your name, and where do you
live?”
“My name’s Mat Stanley,” was the answer, “and we’re camped down to
Wootton.”
“Oh! gipsies, that’s a free life, any way.”
“Yes, pretty well, but I zeem to want a freer one.”
“More liberty than gipsies have?” returned Burns, “why, how do you
mean?”
“Do you know Squire Bell?” continued Mat. “No? well, he lives t’other
zide of Wootton, been all his life forrin—in Australia—and he says
as I should get on there well. He gave me two books, which I carries
about with me, they’re all about Australia, and I know ’em pretty nigh
by heart. I’ve had the whole run of his library and museum, and bin
over ’em times without number. And Joe Broomfield, that’s he as the
colt belongs to, he’s got a brother out there whot’s getting 1_l._ for
every colt as he breaks in, and plenty of grub found him besides. Fact
is, I’d like to go out if I had the money.”
The subject evidently appeared to excite the otherwise taciturn gipsy,
and kindled a certain amount of enthusiasm in Burns, who, however,
responded,—
“What, go and leave all your tribe, and live in the Bush amongst black
fellows?”
“Oh! I don’t mind leaving my tribe, I might zee ’em again some day,
and then they’re a-going to make new laws here, and not let gipsies
camp in one place more’n a few days together. I’d like to get away,
and the squire he says I _shall_, only I want to work a bit of money
together first to pay my passage out.”
CHAPTER II.
Squire Bell—Annie’s gift of a book—Shooting a New Forest
deer—Felony—Chased by a keeper—Capture—Escape—Fight with a
bloodhound.
We must now digress a little; the squire that was alluded to in the
last chapter, was no British squire at all, but born and bred a
colonial. In earlier days he was known as one of the wool kings of
Australia, and his “brand” was still to the fore in the home markets.
In his native district of “Liverpool Plains,” he was always spoken of
and recognized as “the Squire,” a title given him solely on account
of his personal appearance. In later years he had taken up additional
country to the north of the “Plains,” and a young man who went from
England to join him in this new country thus described him in a letter
home:—
“Bell calls himself a native, but I don’t believe it, there’s no
‘cornstalk’ look about _him_; everyone out here refers to him as ‘the
Squire,’ and truth to tell he is just like old Squire Mangles, of
Greenmount, same red face, hearty laugh, breeches, drab gaiters and
all.”
The “Squire,” then, having made a considerable fortune in wool, left
an agent to look after the property, came home, and settled down with
wife, son, and daughter, in the New Forest; but arriving there, he
soon found that it would take ten years or more before the Forest
aristocracy were likely to notice him or his wool-sacks; in fact, a
candid Irish friend, an old resident, told him that unless he had a
handle to his name, they would not notice him at all, but added, “If
ye _had_, me boy, they’d just jostle ye.” To which the squire replied
that he did not want to be either jostled or slighted, and that he
thought that anyhow, “before he suffered from either the coldness of
English society or that of another British winter, he had better get
back to his own country.”
During the period that he had been in Hampshire, he had interested
himself much concerning the Forest and its breed of ponies, and in
this way had come into contact with Mat. He took a great interest in
the young man, even to the extent of permitting him to take lessons
with his son’s tutor, besides interesting himself in the lad’s general
career; and Mat, who had always had a craving for improving his mind,
proved himself a ready and apt pupil.
Though this conduct on the part of Bell in taking up young Mat, and
admitting him to his home circle, may seem at first sight strange,
and indeed, as the squire observed, “It put the dead finish on to the
neighbouring gentry,” yet it must be borne in mind that he had little
in common with English habits and customs. Those who knew Australia in
the early days, before the Victorian gold-rush, and long _after_ that
period, will remember that it was not at all uncommon for a man who
had just taken up country, not only to be thrown into the society of
all sorts, but for him and his family to live with the station hands
all together, both in tent-life and afterwards when the station was
formed, sitting down to the same table and sleeping under the same
roof together, it being a rare exception when these same “hands” did
not act and behave as gentlemen, when properly treated.
The squire, though he did not take Mat for a gentleman bred and
born, yet saw, on making his further acquaintance, that he was one
by nature; and this was sufficient for Bell, who had had so much
experience amongst the same class of people. As he said,—
“Mat doesn’t speak the best English, but he doesn’t mind my teaching
him, and it’s a real pleasure; he’s so quick at picking anything up.”
And Mat found that his tasks were to his liking. What pleased him most
was the fact that he could give a return, in many little ways, for the
kindness shown him. One of his chief delights was teaching Master Tom,
the squire’s son, how to ride, and also to shoot,—tramping through the
forest, and beating up the game for him.
One day Mat and Tom were engaged in this way, when the latter, having
been wanted at home earlier than usual, Annie, his sister, was sent
after them on her pony. Having found them, she delivered her message,
and galloped home again.
Mat, coming in the back way soon afterwards, happened to meet the
gardener, who was a great friend of his, with a book in his hand,
walking towards his cottage.
“What book is that?” asked Mat.
“‘Robinson Crusoe,’” answered the man.
“Why, that’s the very book Master Tom told me to get and read; I wish
you’d lend it me.”
“I can’t,” answered the gardener, “it belongs to Miss Annie, and she
wants it back.”
“Oh! well, then, never mind,” answered Mat, as he passed into the
gun-room with the game-bag.
A few minutes later a young girl flew quickly into the room, and as
rapidly said in a breath,—
“Here, Jim says you want to borrow this book; it’s mine; I’ll _give_
it you; you’re so nice to Tom. I’ve written your name in it to show
it’s your very own. I’ll lend Jim another some day.”
Mat had only time to take off his cap and say, “Thank you, miss,”
blushing to his ears as he took the book, when the fair young
apparition was gone.
On recounting the circumstance to Tim afterwards, he said that he
could “only remember a girl out of breath, with eyes like a fawn, a
complexion like a rose, and hair all down her back, which was just
the colour of the tail of old Broomfield’s colt—the foxy one—and she
came and went a’most afore I could zay ‘knife.’”
“Well, she warn’t a beauty, then?” remarked Tim.
“Why, p’raps not, ’zactly; but I was that took aback I couldn’t see,
but you’ve no call to say she’s ugly.”
“I _didn’t_,” retorted Tim, “only you said her hair was the colour of
Broomfield’s colt.”
An old resident of the forest, a Mrs. Taplow, who, up to this time had
been doubting whether she should call on Mrs. Bell, and being reminded
by one of her neighbours that she had at length promised to go the
first fine day with the Miss Taplows, answered decidedly,—
“_No_, I have now _quite_ made up my mind; I don’t know, and I do not
_want_ to know, these Australians; _he_ lets his son go about all day
with a common forest gipsy, and _she_ sends this same gipsy books
and messages by her daughter; of course, the poor girl, never having
been in England before, knows no better. Fancy! dear Jane and Bella
consorting with the vulgar _herd_; yes, look in the dictionary—‘vulgar
crowd;’ Walker describes them exactly.”
* * * * *
“Ah! the Forest is not like it was when I was a girl,” broke in Bella
(aged 40).
And then the two Miss Taplows lifted up their noses, and sniffed
scornfully.
* * * * *
We will now return to Burns’ smoking-room, where we left the two young
men discussing emigration.
“It is curious,” said Burns, in answer to Mat’s remarks concerning the
colonies, “that you should get on this subject, for I know something
of Australia from my brother, who has been for a few years in New
South Wales, and that very map hanging there came from him last mail;
he sent it to show the boundaries of the new colony called Queensland,
in which his station will shortly be included. A ship named the _Young
Austral_ sails in a day or two from London to Moreton Bay. I daresay
that if you are in the same mind next trip, I could help you about the
passage. I know the skipper, and he is taking out a heap of things to
my brother for me. But now let us be off; I would like to get back to
the enclosure you called ‘Boldre Wood;’ there must be cock there.”
To Boldre Wood they then proceeded, and, striking into a thicket of
hollies, Mat proceeded to beat, with the result of putting up several
woodcock, which either flew the wrong side of the bushes for Burns,
or which he missed. Though usually a fair shot, this snap-shooting in
dense hollies was new to him; so, getting tired of missing, and the
light being worse here than in the open, he called to Mat, and stepped
out on to a furzy plain. No sooner were they in it than up sprang a
doe from her seat. Burns threw up his gun, and, in spite of the cries
of Mat, rolled her over with a charge of shot in the head.
“What the ‘limb’s’ to be done now?” quoth Mat, as he hurried up to the
fallen beast, at the same time casting a glance behind him. “My eye!
it _is_ a keeper. I zee’d zome one just as you throwed up yer gun.”
Burns, looking in the direction towards which his companion was
gazing, saw a man hurrying up from the hollies which they had just
quitted.
Instantly the gipsy gripped his companion by the arm, saying, “It’s
writ down felony to kill a deer, two years at least, quick! You go
that way, right through the enclosure on to the Lyndhurst road. Give I
the gun, and he’ll take after me.” Then grasping the gun, and giving
Burns a push that nearly sent him on to his face, Mat was gone.
“What a fuss about a deer,” thought Burns, as he plunged into the
thicket; “but I suppose the gipsy’s right, though if I did not see
honesty written on his face, I should have thought it a dodge to clear
off with my gun.”
Meanwhile the keeper, seeing Mat disappearing with the gun, shouted to
him to stop; but as no heed was paid to this summons, he started off
at a run to seize him. Mat no sooner perceived his intention than he
bounded into the hollies, and by doubling and dodging tried to throw
his pursuer off, but the latter was just as active as he was, and
drove him right through the thicket into the old beeches beyond, and
through them again on to a plain; and here commenced a terrific race;
but it was soon evident to Mat that he had met his match, for being
handicapped with the gun and bag of Burns, neither of which would he
part with, he felt that the keeper was gaining upon him.
“If I can only get over the Bratley Brook I’ll do him yet,” thought
Mat, who was getting his second wind, as he put on a spurt down the
hill; but, alas for his hopes! the brook was swollen by the recent
heavy rains, and as he rose to take the leap his pursuer was close
behind him. The opposite bank came down with him as he lit full and
fair upon it; he had just time to throw the gun on to the land as he
fell backwards into the water. At the same instant the keeper’s arms
encircled his neck, for the latter had, on seeing Mat’s mishap, jumped
up to his middle in the brook, and seized him with “Now then, my lad,
if you fight, down you go.”
Mat, who was half-drowned, and woefully out of breath, choked out,
“I’ve saved the gun so far, any way; and be hanged to you.”
“Have you, then, my young poacher?” returned the keeper. “I’ve got it,
and you too; and if you don’t go quietly, and without any ‘sarce,’
maybe you’ll get the contents of the weapon. I’ve got one on yer,
at any rate. Who was yer mate?” A question to which Mat did not
vouchsafe any answer.
“Never mind; we’ll soon find out, after I’ve changed my things at
the cottage, and when you go to Lyndhurst with me on a charge of
killing deer, I knows where the beast lays, and, hullo!” he cried,
as he examined the weapon, “stealing a gun, too; for I’ll swear this
‘Manton’ never belonged to you.”
Seeing that the game was up for the present, Mat stalked moodily along
in front of his captor to Boldre Cottage.
Arriving there, the keeper locked him in a back room, telling him that
he might jump out of the window if he liked; but that the bloodhound,
who had already about killed a former poacher, would make short work
of him if he did; adding, in a sneering tone, that _he_ would take
care of the gun and bag, and all that it contained.
Mat was now left to his own reflections, which were not of the
pleasantest.
Drenched to the skin, he paced the room for the best part of an hour,
to keep himself warm, revolving in his mind all manner of means of
escape, but only _with_ the gun. He had just concluded that if only
the keeper would leave the house for a few minutes, he would have a
chance, because, he argued, he _must_ think I’m a greenhorn to fear
the dog. Why, he ain’t even loose. I se’ed him chained in the shed,
a fine-looking beast too, and keeper he’ll—But here his meditations
were interrupted by a noise which sounded like the clinking of a
glass, and applying his eye to a chink in the logs, he saw his captor
with his legs stretched out before a turf fire, filling a glass from
Burns’ flask, which he had appropriated from the game-bag.
Mat could scarcely suppress his joy on witnessing this sight. He now
remembered that Burns had refilled his flask at the Lodge with old
whisky.
“Drink away, my fine fellow,” he almost whispered; “drink away; that’s
not public-house tipple. _I_ know the strength of that whisky, as I
drank Burns’ health with it.” And then he softly resumed his walk.
It was now quite dark, and shortly again applying his ear to the logs,
he could hear the keeper’s steady snore.
Now or never was his time. So cautiously getting out of the window,
Mat crept round to the front door, taking care to go round the
building on the side opposite to the shed of the bloodhound. In the
porch he saw the shimmer reflected on the barrels of Burns’ gun,
and might then have made straight off with it; but “No,” he said to
himself, “keeper didn’t ax me if _I’d_ like a drop, after all my hard
work, so I’ll just help myself.”
Gently opening the door, he dropped on his hands and knees, and guided
by the heavy breathing of the keeper, who was now in a drunken sleep,
he approached that worthy, reared himself up to the table, found the
flask, slipped it into his pocket, felt that the keeper was sitting on
the empty game-bag, so left it to keep that worthy man warm, retreated
as silently to the porch where he had left the gun, and picking it
up, he got clear out without disturbing man or dog, and with long
strides made off in the direction of Vinney Ridge, and in little
over an hour’s time was taking a breather under his old friends, the
great trees of the herons. Throwing himself down at full length, he
pulled the flask from his pocket, and was just finding fault with the
greediness of the keeper for having drunk so much of its contents,
when in the far distance he distinctly heard the baying of a hound!
“So soon!” angrily exclaimed Mat, as he jumped up. “Lucky it’s a still
night; but I’ve almost ‘drove it off’ too long. However, here’s my
health, and good luck,” as he applied the flask to his lips. “_Now_
for the stream, and the scheme, which I’ve been planning!”
In two minutes he was down to the river, and, knowing every inch of
the ground, quickly found the object of his search. This was a rude
bridge, formed of a couple of saplings, which spanned the swollen
stream. This he crossed, and, from the opposite side, threw the logs
in, when they were quickly carried away by the current. He then cut
down a very thin, whippy, seedling oak, and twisted it round and round
until he had a supple rope strong enough to hold an unbroken colt;
then, ensconcing himself behind a bush, he awaited events.
For the first time Mat felt a bit nervous—nervous as to the
approaching contest, which he knew now to be inevitable; and nervous
in that his body had been for hours in wet clothes. He could hardly
bear the tremendous strain of _waiting_. The tension was almost
overpowering, for he was aware that he had to deal with one of the
fiercest of the fierce breed of bloodhounds lately imported into the
forest.
Nearer and nearer came the bell-like notes of the hound, now
apparently dying away, then again breaking out into a deep roar, as
the intervening timber shut out the sounds or let them be heard again.
At last a most appalling roar, which seemed to Mat to thunder into his
very ear, told where the animal had come on to his resting-place on
the ridge, and then all was silent.
Mat took another little refresher from the flask, and had hardly
replaced it on the ground beside him when the great hound burst into
sight in the moonlight. “That’s a bit of luck,” thought Mat, as the
clouds cleared away, and allowed him to see the animal’s movements.
Coming to the water’s edge, the beast quested up and down, and then,
throwing his head up with another roar—of satisfaction, as it sounded
to Mat—prepared to spring into the river exactly opposite to where his
would-be prey was watching.
At this moment the hound was completely at Mat’s mercy; our forester
could have blown his head to atoms with the gun which was lying loaded
by his side, but no such thought crossed his mind. On the contrary,
his one idea for a brief second was, “What a noble beast!”
The next moment the animal plunged into the stream; but, before it
could rise to the surface, Mat, holding his rope in his teeth, with
a lightning-like bound was on to him, and, seizing the dog’s huge
throat, at first endeavoured to keep him under water, but the animal,
though taken at a disadvantage and half-choked, fought so with its
muscular paws that it knocked Mat off his legs, and, as he lay for
a second underneath, made a grab at his throat. Had he secured his
grip, then and there would our gipsy’s life have ended; but Mat was
too quick for him, by plunging his head under water. The beast thus
lost sight of this most vulnerable part of his foe, but gripped him
instead through his buskins and deep into his thigh. Mat felt during
this terrible struggle that his only chance of life was getting into
deeper water. The pain of the bloodhound’s teeth was excruciating;
but, securing a grasp of the loose skin of the dog’s throat, he never
let go, only struggled with his free leg to get into deeper water.
Thus locked in a deadly embrace, man and hound rolled down stream.
At length, by a lucky touch of his foot on the bottom, Mat got
uppermost, and by keeping his full weight on the dog, caused it at
last to open its jaws for a gasp. Had not the water rushed into that
gaping chasm of teeth, Mat’s chance would still have been small; but,
excited now to frenzy, and watching eagerly for the chance, he, by a
quick movement, bitted the animal with the rope, which he had held
on to with his teeth as if it had been the rope of a life-buoy, and
as quickly took a half-turn round the lower jaw, over the upper, and
had time to make all fast before the hound had sufficiently recovered
to prevent him. Then Mat crawled exhausted out of the water and lay
motionless, hardly caring whether the animal followed him or not,
so faint did he feel from loss of blood. But the beast came after
him, and, striking savagely with its heavy fore-feet, caused him to
get up once more. However, finding it could not use its teeth, it
acknowledged Mat as master for the time being, and made no further
attempt at fighting; but giving a shake, and with a last ferocious
glare out of its bloodshot eyes, turned and trotted sullenly off into
the moonlit glades.
Mat felt it an immense relief to hear his own voice, as he said in a
low tone, “Well, thank God, I’m out of that business! He’s tied up
like a ferret, and every knot is good. He’d have killed me if we’d
fought on the shore, that’s certain. The Bratley stream served me a
dirty trick a few hours ago, but the Blackwater saved my life this
night.” Pulling off his cotton handkerchief, he bound up the wound in
his thigh tightly, emptied his flask, and limped off at once before
his leg should get stiffer than it was, and to make good his way to
Lyndhurst ere the hound should have returned to the keeper, whom he
surmised had only been prevented from coming up to help his hound by
being too “boosy” to make his way quickly over the rough ground.
[Illustration: “He, by a quick movement, bitted the animal with the
rope.”]
CHAPTER III.
Mat bids farewell to the Forest—The _Young Austral_—Tim and
Jumper on board.
At length, shortly after midnight, as far as he could judge by the
moon, Mat arrived once again at Braken Lodge, and knocked up Burns,
who, though astonished to see him at that hour, immediately routed
out the old housekeeper to light a fire, brew some coffee, and get
provisions, whilst he found a change of clothes for Mat, and bound up
his wound with a healing ointment. And all these things he did without
asking our gipsy any useless questions, wherein he showed his sense.
After Mat had thoroughly refreshed himself, he said,—
“Now, Mr. Burns, I’ll just stretch out afore the fire—that’ll ease my
limb—and tell you all about it.”
He then related shortly but accurately every detail from the time of
their parting in Boldre Wood down to the termination of his fight with
the hound, adding that he was very sorry for the loss of the game-bag,
which Burns said did not matter a snuff.
“Perhaps not for itself,” continued Mat, “but they might trace you by
it.”
Burns listened with intense interest to the narrative, and remarked,—
“_I_ should have shot that hound, I know I should; but then, you see,
I would not have thought of that dodge of yours of tying him up;
besides, I could not have done it, I’m not so quick and handy.”
“And now,” went on Mat, “I’ll ask you a favour: help me to get away in
that ship you spoke of this very night, and the matter’ll blow over,
for they can’t really prove anything ’gin you.”
Burns looked at his watch; then pondered awhile over this suggestion.
At last, after several vigorous puffs at a black clay pipe which he
was smoking, he spoke:—
“It would be a very mean trick to send you out of England because _I_
have broken the law—for I find it’s true what you said,—were it not
that a few hours ago, before all this happened, you were wishing to be
off as soon as you could earn some money. Now promise, if I help you
to start, never to go back on me by saying, when you find what a hard
life it is out there, ‘If it had not been for Burns I might have been
home now.’”
“Yes, I promise,” answered Mat eagerly.
“Then I’ll start you fair. You shall have enough money to keep you
until you can look about, and the gun you stuck to so bravely is
yours. You must get more clothes in London, and I will write a line
to the captain for you to take; I will also send a letter to my
brother on the Darling Downs about you, and give you his address. And
now come round to the stable; you have no time to lose if you wish to
catch the mail at Southampton. You can leave the horse at the station
inn there.”
When bidding good-bye, the gipsy wrung Burns’ hand and said,—
“I thank you for what you’re doing for me; it’s just what I’ve set my
heart on this long time, and if hard work will do it, I shall make it
a first matter to pay you back the money as you’ve started me with.
And there’s one thing, let them know at my camp all about my going. It
won’t go no farther, anything you tell ’em; and bid good-bye for me to
my old dad, and mother and sister, and tell my brother—we’re twins,
you know—and I can’t abide not saying good-bye to him,—tell him all
about Broomfield’s colt, and—”
Here Mat’s feelings entirely failed him, wearied with pain both in
body and mind, he clambered stiffly on to the horse. Burns called out,—
“I’ll tell them all you say, and send your brother to see you off;
there’s time yet before she sails.”
“Thank you for that,” replied Mat. And, waving his arm, rode off, with
his gun on his back, and a bundle of things strapped to the bow of the
saddle.
As Mat rode along, he found plenty of time to ponder over the events
of the last few hours. Curiously enough, he first considered the
matter of the forsaken colt, and its owner, Broomfield.
“He’ll think it mean of me,” he mused, “when he finds I’ve bolted
clean away, and left the colt; but, after all, he ‘jacked out’ when we
once settled to work our way to Australia together. Burns he’s behaved
like a man, and I’m a lucky chap; ten guineas to start with, and
passage found me; yes, and I’ll work to pay him back, and send some
money to the old folk.”
Thus soliloquizing, he found himself at the station, and had just
time to put up his horse and feed him, when the train came in. Buying
a ticket, he jumped into an empty compartment, and though it was the
first time he had ever travelled by rail, his fatigue was so great
that he fell asleep at once, and only woke up as the train drew up at
the London terminus. Here he procured a cup of coffee, and then made
his way in a cab to the Docks, whilst the great city was still asleep.
With some difficulty the driver of his hackney carriage found the
_Young Austral_. On going on board Mat was told that the captain would
not be there for some hours, and that the ship would possibly leave
the docks next evening. So leaving his gun and bundle on board in
charge of a good-natured mate, and telling him that he was expecting
his brother, he hobbled out to get his leg dressed again, and to look
at the shops, which were just being opened.
Strolling down Wharfgate Street, Mat encountered an old man in the act
of taking down his shutters. Perceiving that it was a bookseller’s, he
asked the owner whether he had any good novels.
“Yes, plenty,” was the reply. “Come in; what will you have? Dickens,
Thackeray, or something racy?”
“Why, zomething what’s useful on a long voyage,” answered Mat, who was
somewhat puzzled for an answer.
“You don’t look much like a sailor,” remarked the shopkeeper, “more
like a youngster bolted from home.”
“Well, what if I have? I want some books all the same.”
“Here you are, then; take this second-hand lot for three shillings.”
So the bargain was concluded, and Mat found afterwards that the old
man had given him a liberal selection of all sorts of literature.
Strolling on he entered a second-hand clothes shop, where he concluded
his purchases with the addition of a few clothes and necessaries; and
some hours later returned to the ship, the mate of which accosted him
with,—
“Heart alive! If ’twasn’t for your ‘duds,’ I’d a thought you’d been
the same youngster that came here an hour ago, but he’s down below
overhauling the ship.”
So down jumped Mat, and found his brother and Jumper.
“Hullo, Tim,” he shouted, “this is splendid! How quick you’ve got
here—brought the old dog to take care of you, eh?”
“No, fact is, father thought you ought to have Jumper to take care of
_you_, amongst the niggers; and I’ve brought your clothes and some
tools, and I didn’t forget the axe, and the ‘print,’ that Garrett the
smith made for you; maybe you’ll want to print yer mark on to a horse
out there. And I got all the books the squire gave you, and a lot more
Mr. Burns shoved into a box for you. _He_ drove me to the station in
his own trap, else I’d never a’ caught the train.”
For the rest of the day, and indeed far into the night, the brothers
sat up; for Mat had not only much to relate concerning his late
adventures, but also many instructions to give Tim with regard to
colts, which he had undertaken to break in; besides, there were
innumerable messages to be conveyed to his family and friends, more
especially to the squire. At length their conversation was interrupted
by the voice of the mate singing out,—
“Now then, youngsters, turn in, you can find bunks in the emigrants’
quarters to-night.”
Whilst looking for these night quarters they passed the doctor’s
cabin, and Mat had his leg dressed; this he had forgotten to have
done ashore. The doctor, a kindly hearted Irishman, told him he must
lie up as much as possible for some days, or he would have—so Mat told
his brother afterwards—“hurryslippiness.”
Next morning the emigrants began crowding on board, and Mat and Tim
found plenty to occupy and amuse them in scanning the new arrivals,
and witnessing in particular the various farewell takings of the Irish
families.
“It’s pretty nigh time for us to part too,” said Mat, “for the day’s
wearing on, but I’ll write a letter home for you to take.”
Having finished this epistle, he gave it to his brother, and grasping
his hand said,—
“Good-bye, Tim, we’ve been long mates in t’vorest, mind and write to
me when I give you the address.”
Another grasp of the hand, and Tim walked slowly down the planks for
the shore, and Mat thought that he had seen the last of
|
pure Scottish gold with which the King
rewarded the best tilter. There gathered in Edinburgh, in the days of
James IV., not only the flower of chivalry, but men of science, and men
of art, and men of learning. Up at the Castle, Borthwick, the Master
Gunner, was forging the “Seven Sisters” under James’s supervision. Down
at Leith the King delighted in visiting the shipping yards, and seeing
the great progress of Scottish trade. At the Provost’s house at St.
Giles’s, young Gavin Douglas, son of the great Earl of Angus, was
translating Virgil into Scottish verse. In the city, Walter Chepman and
Andro Myllar were sending forth that new wonder into the land,--printed
books. James not only granted them a patent to print, but endowed their
types and bought their books; and in 1510 he granted the estate of
Priestfield[7] to Walter Chepman, who paid the crown suit for it by
“delivery of a pair of gloves on St. Giles’s day.”[8] Sir Andrew Wood,
that splendid old sailor and gallant figure in Scottish history, must
have been often seen about the streets of Edinburgh and at the Court,
and must often have held consultation with the King about James’s
darling scheme of a Scottish Navy. Lingering with groups of courtiers in
the beautiful precincts of Holyrood, there were many of the great
Scottish nobles whose town houses were in the Edinburgh closes,--Angus
and Argyle, Mar and Morton, and fifty more. There was the much-travelled
friar and Laureate, William Dunbar, “flyting” with his rival poet, “gude
Maister Walter Kennedy.” “As a courtier,” writes Mr. Oliphant Smeaton in
his _Life of Dunbar_,[9] “Dunbar boarded at the King’s expense, and
received each year his robe of red velvet fringed with costly fur. He
was required to be present at every public function, and, if it
presented scope for poetic treatment, to render it into verse. This was
the office of a ‘King’s Makar’ or Laureate.” There was Warbeck, the
pretended Duke of York, plotting in the shadows and wearying the
chivalry of James. There was Don Pedro de Ayala, the courtly Spanish
Ambassador (who had come on the pretext of offering James a Spanish
princess as his Queen, well aware that there was no Spanish princess),
and who was writing home to Ferdinand and Isabella enthusiastic
descriptions of King James, Scotland, and the Scottish people. “The
kingdom is very old, and very noble, and the king possesses great
virtues, and no defects worth mentioning.”[10] “An open and magnificent
court,” Drummond of Hawthornden acknowledges it; and Dunbar gives a
picture of the diversity of men that James IV.’s many interests brought
round him:--
Kirkmen, courtmen, and craftsmen fine,
Doctors in jure and medicyne:
Divinours, rhetours, and philosophours:
Astrologists, artists, and oratours:
Men of armes and valliant knights:
And mony other goodly wights:
Musicians, minstrels, and merry singers,
Chevalouris, callandaris, and flingars,
Cunyeours, carvours, and carpenters,
Builders of barks and ballingars,
Masouns, lying upon the land,
And ship wrights hewing upon the strand,
Glasing wrights, goldsmiths, and lapidaris,
Printers, paintours, and potingaris.
And the King who presided over all this, if but half of De Ayala’s
praises be true, was himself as skilled in the arts of peace as of war,
spoke eight languages, and said “all his prayers.”[11] Holbein’s
miniature is a witness of his personal beauty. All agree that he was a
fearless rider, a chivalrous knight, and a brave man. But he was
sensitive, subject to sudden fits of depression alternating with his gay
humour, and it is told of him that, though he had been but a boy when
his father’s estranged nobles had used him as a figure-head for their
rebellion, yet he always wore to the day of his death a hidden chain
round his body, in constant penance for his father’s death.
In his thirtieth year King James married little Margaret Tudor, daughter
of Henry VII. of England. The marriage was brought about by the
persistence of Henry VII., and was nowise according to the inclinations
of the Scottish King, who evaded it for several years after it was first
proposed to him. But State reasons prevailed, and at last James gave
way. The bridegroom was thirty and the bride was fourteen. But, if James
was a tardy wooer, the florid little Tudor had nothing to complain of in
the chivalry of the welcome she received from the courteous and
sensitive Stuart.
In August 1503 she was brought to Scotland, with a train of knights and
nobles, and James rode as far as Dalkeith to meet her, “gallantly
dressed in a jacket of crimson velvet bordered with cloth of gold.”[12]
Before the procession entered the city the King mounted in front of his
bride on her palfrey--his own charger being too restive to bear a double
burden--and so they rode into the decorated and expectant capital, where
the people filled the windows, and gaily dressed ladies thronged the
“fore-stairs”--open stairways outside the houses,--and all shouted or
waved their loyalty and their welcome. Tournaments and shows took place;
and, when they were alone, the king played to the little princess on the
virginal, and
[Illustration: HOLYROOD PALACE FROM THE PUBLIC GARDENS UNDER CALTON HILL
Holyrood Palace stretches across the picture east and west, and is
dominated by Arthur’s Seat and Salisbury Crags. The dark turret at the
west end of the nearest and north wing contains the private supper-room
of Queen Mary, the room from which the Italian Rizzio was taken to his
death. The end of the south wing shows beyond, and through a gap in the
mean buildings, occupying the foreground of the picture, is seen the
open space in front of the Palace, the restored fountain, and the
entrance to a carriage road called the Queen’s Drive. The conical roofs
of the towers of the Guard House appear to the extreme right. The gable
and east window of the Chapel Royal (part of the ancient Abbey),
together with the tower, show at the eastern extremity of the north
wing.]
then listened with bent knee and bared head whilst she sang and played
to him. The marriage took place at Holyrood with much magnificence; and
Dunbar the Laureate wrote “The Thristle and the Rois.” All this life and
poetry and splendour glowed in Holyrood, in a braver and a warmer time
than ours,--perhaps the brightest age Edinburgh has known. Little wonder
that Dunbar pitied his royal master when he had to leave it even for a
visit to Stirling, and wrote greeting to him from--
We that here in Hevenis glory
* * * * *
I mean we folk in Paradyis
In Edinburgh with all merriness.
But bright things come quickly to confusion. As always, the undoing of
the brave little land was brought about by England. Ten years after that
marriage day at Holyrood there gathered at midnight, in the moonshine at
the city Cross of Edinburgh, a spectral throng of heralds and
pursuivants. Trumpets sounded, and the terrified spectators heard a
ghostly voice read “the awful summons” to King James and to his Scottish
chivalry: the long death-roll of all who were to fall at Flodden.
Outside the city, on the Boroughmuir (part of the old hunting-ground of
the forest of Drumsheugh, now a built-over suburb, but whose every inch
is historic ground) lay the whole encamped host of the Scottish army.
When the sun next morning rose in the August sky, it lit up a thousand
pavilions white as snow, a thousand streamers flaunting over them, and
reared in their midst the huge royal banner of Scotland, with its “ruddy
lion ramped in gold,”--all in readiness to start on the fatal march
towards Flodden. The army moved on southward, leaving every home, from
the palace to the hovel, bereft of father and sons: and the women
waited.
Suddenly the stillness was broken, as the first wind whispers over the
land and troubles the trees with warning of a storm; and the people--the
women and the old men and the children--looked into one another’s
blanched faces and ran out into the street to learn the truth. One man,
escaped from the field of carnage, had brought the tidings to Edinburgh.
And then the storm burst.
Woe, and woe, and lamentation!
What a piteous cry was there!
Widows, maidens, mothers, children,
Shrieking, sobbing in despair!
Through the streets the death-word rushes,
Spreading terror, sweeping on--
“Jesu Christ! Our King has fallen--
O Great God, King James is gone!
Holy Mother Mary, shield us,
Thou who erst did lose thy Son!
O the blackest day for Scotland
That she ever knew before!
O our King--the good, the noble,
Shall we see him never more?
Woe to us, and woe to Scotland!
O our sons, our sons and men!
Surely some have ’scaped the Southron?
Surely some will come again?”
Till the oak that fell last winter
Shall uprear its shattered stem,
Wives and mothers of Dunedin,
Ye may look in vain for them![13]
All this Edinburgh has seen and known and felt. Remember it, as you walk
in her streets to-day--it is not good for us for the heroic to be
forgotten.
And how did Edinburgh take the blow? The first sound the people heard,
breaking through their cries of grief, was a Proclamation that “all
maner of personis... haue reddye thair fensible geir and wapponis for
weir,” for defence of the town, and that “wemen of gude pas to the kirk
and pray.”[14] An indomitable race, that nothing could crush! The arms
in readiness were not needed, however; England was too crippled to move.
After another long minority, such as had occurred with each of the
Jameses, the wax candles at Holyrood once again lit up Court scenes. The
royal palace, the building of which had been begun about 1503 by James
IV.,[15] had been inhabited in the interval by the Duke of Albany, the
Regent, during his sojourns in Scotland, who had, no doubt, brought his
French ideas of elegance to bear on it. James V.,--the “Red Tod” of so
many adventures,--who had been born within its walls, held his councils
and his Court there, and, between 1529 and 1535, completed the building
begun by his father, and spoilt by the English soldiers. To Holyrood,
when he was but two-and-twenty, James V. brought his fragile little
French bride, Madeleine, daughter of Francis I., whom he had married in
Nôtre Dame at Paris. The poet Ronsard was a twelve-year-old page in the
Queen’s train when she came to Holyrood; and another in her train was
the founder of the great Scottish family of Hope, including that Sir
Thomas Hope who was King’s Advocate in Charles I.’s time. The gentle
French princess, when she landed with James at Leith on the 19th of May
1537, was already dying of consumption. She stooped and kissed the
“Scottis eard” when she set foot on it; and seven weeks afterwards,
within Holyrood Abbey, she was laid pitifully beneath the same kindly
“Scottis eard.”
Thief! saw thou nocht the great preparatives
Of Edinburgh, the noble famous town?
Thou saw the people labouring for their lives
To mak triumph with trump and clarioun:
Sic pleasour never was in this regioun
As suld have been the day of her entrace,
With great propinis given to her Grace.
Provost, Bailies, and Lordis of the town,
The Senatours, in order consequent,
Cled into silk of purpur, black, and brown;
Syne the great Lordis of the Parliament,
With mony knichtly Baron and Banrent,
In silk and gold, in colours comfortable:
But thou, alas! all turnit into sable.[16]
James V. had not a happy reign. His boyhood had been one of restraint
under the tyranny of nobles; and, after eight years of putting his
kingdom into order and subduing the troublesome Douglases, his journey
to France to seek a bride had thus ended tragically in her death. The
vagaries of his mother, Margaret Tudor, who, after her husband’s fall at
Flodden, had emulated her brother Henry VIII. in her marriages and
divorcings and remarryings, must have made her a domestic trouble to her
son; and abroad, constant wars with England broke his spirit. Four years
after his second wife, Mary of Lorraine, had landed at Crail to become
Queen of Scotland, James V., though not yet thirty years old, was a
miserable, half demented, sorely stricken man, dragging himself home on
the tidings of the disastrous defeat of Solway Moss, first to Edinburgh,
and then to the greater seclusion of Falkland. There, hearing of the
last trouble of all, that the child to whom Mary of Lorraine had given
birth at Linlithgow was a daughter, he, like Ahab of old, turned his
face to the wall. “It cam’ wi’ a lass, and it’ll gang wi’ a lass,--and
the deil gang wi’ it!” he cried: and so the Red Tod died.
The next scene at Holyrood is twenty years after, and the palace in the
plain, and the Castle on the height, and the city between, are all
covered with a thick, heavy white mist, like that which shrouded Malcolm
Canmore’s children as they escaped from the Castle with their mother’s
coffin. The “haar” has crept up from the Firth of Forth, and the Firth
of Forth is lost in impenetrable fog; but this time it is not a
ferry-boat bearing a dead Queen across to Dunfermline, but a State
galley bringing a living Queen home from France.
Mary Stuart, surrounded by her Scottish and French retinue, and with
three of her French Guise and Lorraine uncles on board, and her four
Scottish Marys in attendance, sailed up the Firth of Forth on Tuesday,
19th of August 1561, in so dense a mist that none could see from the
stern of the vessel to her prow. “Si grand brouillard,” the horrified
Sieur de Brantôme called it. Truly, if Queen Margaret’s haar was
miraculous, Queen Mary’s haar was prophetic; for little indeed did the
Stuart Princess see of what lay before her in Scotland.
The people of Leith and Edinburgh were taken by surprise, not having
expected their Queen for another week, and nothing was ready for her
reception,--except the haar. She rode in state to Holyrood next day. The
“grand brouillard” would have prevented her from seeing anything except
a vista of mist and drizzle, and no doubt she was glad to dismount and
find herself in the light and warmth of the palace, with her four Marys
and her French-speaking courtiers gazing curiously about them at their
new surroundings.
It was not many hours before Queen Mary was to learn to how different a
Scotland she had come from the Catholic Scotland her father and
grandfathers had known. After she had supped, and whilst the bonfires
still burnt on Arthur’s Seat, and the crowds were dispersing home
through the foggy streets, the weary Queen wished to rest. Suddenly a
noise;--a crowd of about five hundred people had gathered below the
palace windows, and were serenading the Catholic Queen by singing her
Protestant psalms to the accompaniment of fiddles. “Vile fiddles and
rebecks,” Brantôme designates them; and adds that the crowds sang “so
ill and with such bad accord that there could be nothing worse. Ah! what
music, and what a lullaby for the night!” Yes, Sieur de Brantôme! And
what a different picture from that of James IV. kneeling bareheaded
before little Margaret Tudor whilst she played to him on the virginal!
So, with a “grand brouillard,” with a serenade of psalms ill sung to
fiddles, and with a riot in her chapel during Mass, Queen Mary’s life
and troubles at Holyrood began.
Although the first stress of the religious revolution had greatly
changed the daily life and the characters of the people, it had as yet
not spoilt Holyrood Abbey, and Queen Mary saw it as the royal Jameses
had seen it, in all its grandeur of size and its grace of early Norman
architecture, as it had been built by David I. The armies of Henry
VIII., it is true, had recently plundered and burnt it; but English fire
never made much impression on Scottish stone.
The palace of Holyrood adjoining the Abbey was built round a great
square court, with a towered and pinnacled frontage facing a huge outer
courtyard separating the palace precincts from the fringes of the town,
and at the back meeting the Abbey. The whole palace and its extensions
and smaller courts were set in walled grounds, stretching to the base
of Arthur’s Seat. These included pleasure gardens, plantations, and
buildings, among which was the quaint building still called “Queen
Mary’s Bath.” The north-west corner of the palace proper terminated in a
turreted tower which contained Queen Mary’s rooms, and this tower,
rebuilt by James V. on the foundations of James IV.’s building, still
forms part of the modern Holyrood, and in it, to-day, Mary’s life stands
revealed. In these rooms she moved and smiled, spoke and wept. Here it
was that she tried, with her beauty and her wit and her courtesy and her
wonderful power of forbearance, to soften her rude nobles and turn their
harsh disapproval into loyalty. Here, in the audience chamber, the first
two of her famous interviews with John Knox took place. In Queen Mary’s
day most of the ground now devoted to the formal grass and gravel of
unused palace gardens was covered by the great Abbey. It was at the High
Altar of this Abbey, where the Royal Jameses had led their very youthful
brides, that Queen Mary, dressed in a robe of black velvet, was married,
between five and six o’clock one Sunday morning in July, to her cousin
Lord Darnley, a dissipated boy of nineteen. It was in the tiny little
room leading off the Queen’s room, where the lifted tapestry still shows
the entrance to the secret stair between her room and Darnley’s, that
she sat at supper on the night of Riccio’s murder. With her were her
sister the Countess of Argyle, and several of the Household, including
the lay Abbot of Holyrood, and the Queen’s Secretary, the doomed Riccio.
Darnley entered and seated himself. At that signal suddenly there broke
in upon them the brutal Lord Ruthven, followed by the other assassins,
and seized the Italian favourite who was clinging to the Queen’s skirts
for protection and crying “Sauve ma vie, Madame! sauve ma vie!” The
table was thrown down on the Queen as they struggled, and one of the
murderers levelled a pistol at her. They dragged the bleeding body out,
across the Queen’s bedroom to the entrance of the presence chamber,
where they despatched him with “whingers and swords,” and the blood from
his fifty-six wounds soaked through the wooden floor. All that night the
outraged Queen was a captive in her own palace, whence the Earls of
Bothwell and Huntly had escaped by ropes from the back windows. The
Provost and town “caused ring their common bell,” and came to see to the
safety of their Queen; but the Queen was told by her lords, her
husband’s accomplices, that they would “cut her into collops and cast
her over the wall if she attempted to speak to them.” All this a few
months before the birth of her child.
Stern swords are drawn, and daggers gleam--her words, her prayers are vain--
The ruffian steel is in his heart--the faithful Rizzio’s slain!
Then Mary Stuart brushed aside the tears that trickling fell:
“Now for my father’s arm,” she said, “my woman’s heart, farewell!”[17]
A year later, on the night of Sunday, 9th February 1567, there were
doings grave and gay in Edinburgh. Darnley lay “full of small-pox in a
velvet-hung bed in an upper storey of the Prebendaries’ chamber at
Kirk-o’-Field. The infant Prince James slept in his carved cradle at
Holyrood. Bastian, one of the Queen’s servants, was celebrating his
marriage in the palace. The “Queen’s Grace” went from her husband’s
sick-room, afoot under a silken canopy, with a guard of Archers, “with
licht torches up the Blackfriar Wynd,” to attend the masque at Holyrood
in honour of the marriage. Lord Bothwell, disguised in “a loose cloak
such as the Swartrytters wear,”[18] skulked with his accomplices in the
shadows of the Cowgate. And then--“a little after two hours after
midnight, the house wherein the King was lodged was in an instant blown
in the air,”--and Darnley was dead.
It was to Holyrood that Darnley’s body was brought, and the Queen lay in
a darkened room and her voice sounded “very doleful.” Well it might, for
the vicious Darnley dead and embalmed was to prove a greater curse to
her than had proved the vicious Darnley living.
It was in the old Chapel at Holyrood, at two o’clock on a May morning
three months later, that Queen Mary was married to Bothwell, “not with
the Mass, but with preaching,” by Adam Bothwell, Bishop of Orkney. “At
this marriage there was neither pleasure nor pastime used, as use was
wont to be used when princes were married.”[19] There were at least two
causes and
[Illustration: THE APARTMENTS OF MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS IN HOLYROOD PALACE
An ancient bed hung with faded crimson silk stands in Queen Mary’s
bed-chamber, together with chairs and other furniture of a later date.
Under the raised tapestry on the far side of the room is an open door,
through which is entered the private supping-room of Queen Mary, and
from which the Italian Rizzio was dragged to his death by the
conspirators. They gained admittance to the apartments by the small door
closely adjoining the supping-room. The ceiling of the bedroom is of
wood, divided into panels, decorated with initials and coats-of-arms.]
just impediments why those two persons should not have been joined
together in holy Matrimony; but none declared them.
It was to Holyrood that Queen Mary was brought on foot at eight o’clock
on the evening of the day after the battle of Carberry Hill; after the
parting with Bothwell; after the hootings and hideous insults of the
mobs gathered in the windows and on the fore-stairs as she rode
vanquished through her capital. She had spent the night “in the
Provost’s lodging” in the town. Thence she was brought to Holyrood for a
wretched interval before she was forced to ride, “mounted on a sorry
hackney,” at a furious pace all the June night, between the coarse and
brutal Ruthven and Lindsay, “men of savage manners, even in that age,”
says Mignet, to Lochleven and captivity.
After the days of the hapless Queen Mary the history of Holyrood
consists only of a series of more or less dramatic scenes. The first
three of these are in James VI.’s reign, and end the days when Holyrood
was the home of a Royal race. James VI.’s two sons, Prince Henry,
afterwards the friend of Sir Walter Raleigh, and Prince Charles,
afterwards Charles I., were christened at Holyrood. All the earls of
James VI.’s creation were created at Holyrood. And it was into the
courtyard of Holyrood, on Saturday evening the 26th of March 1603, when
the King and Queen had supped and retired, and “the palace lights were
going out one by one,” that Sir Robert Carey clattered, half dead with
fatigue and excitement, having ridden from London to Edinburgh in three
days, and dropt on his knees before the King and cried, “Queen Elizabeth
is dead, and your Majesty is King of England.”
Did the shades of all the brave and splendid Scottish kings hover near
as the words were spoken? Bruce, who fought at Bannockburn--Bruce, whose
daughter Marjory was the mother of the first Stuart king; all the
Stuarts, down to the gallant James who had ridden into his capital with
his Tudor bride behind him on the palfrey, and had fallen on the field
of Flodden; their son who, with Tudor blood in his veins, had died
cursing England, and whose daughter the English Elizabeth had
beheaded--did all their shades hover near as the words were spoken in
Holyrood? James VI., eighth of the line from the High Steward of
Scotland, knew himself to be King of the “auld enemy”--and the lights of
Holyrood went out one by one.
But as, at the end of the play, the curtain is raised once or twice
after it has fallen, and the scene-shifters stand back in the wings
whilst the gaily dressed figures bow before an applauding audience, so
the curtain has been raised once or twice on Holyrood to the sound of
the multitude huzzaing. One such occasion was when Charles I. was
crowned at Holyrood. A brilliant day for Edinburgh--a revival of the
royal pageantries once so familiar in her streets; a long procession
from the Castle to Holyrood between lines of soldiers in white satin
doublets and black velvet breeches and plumed hats; a long procession of
nobles on horseback, of heralds and trumpeters, of bishops with lawn
sleeves, of civic dignitaries in scarlet and ermine; a flash of colour
winding down the mediæval street, as of old, from the Castle to the
Palace--and then Charles returned to England, and the curtain fell.
It was Charles II., the Merry Monarch, who rebuilt Holyrood and gave it
its present aspect. His own desire was to erect a large new palace, such
as Charles I. had contemplated building. In the Bodleian Library at
Oxford is a plan of the second storey, dated October 1663, and endorsed
“the surveyes and plat mead by John Mylne, his Majestie’s Mr. Massone,”
and to it is attached by sealing-wax a piece of paper, on which is
written: “This was his Majesties blessed fatheres intentione in anno
1633.”[20]
James VII., while Duke of York, held Court in Holyrood and restored the
Abbey Church, and had Mass celebrated in it for his Catholic subjects.
News of the landing of William of Orange gave lawlessness the leave, and
the Presbyterian mob sacked the Chapel, burnt the Altar and organ at the
City Cross, and desecrated the royal vault, tearing open the leaden
coffins of the dead Kings and Queens of Scotland. But in 1745 the
curtain rose once again, and for the last time, on the Stuart drama.
Edinburgh was filled with loyal Highlanders, was noisy with the skirling
of pipes and the din of bugles, and Edinburgh folk went decorated with
white cockades, and the air was charged with excitement. There rode up
to the door of Holyrood that “gallant and handsome young Prince, who
threw himself on the mercy of his countrymen, rather like a hero of
romance than a calculating politician.”[21] How did they receive him?--
As he cam’ marching doon the street,
The pipes played loud and clear;
And a’ the folk cam’ rinnin’ oot
To meet the Chevalier!
Oh, Charlie is my darling!...
Holyrood again sheltered a Stuart, and all was hope and enthusiasm. It
was in the long picture-gallery of Holyrood Palace that Scotland’s
capital gathered her beauty and her chivalry, and gave her ball in the
Prince’s honour,--that ball immortalised in _Waverley_.
Again the curtain fell, and the scene-shifters peopled the stage.
In the middle of the eighteenth century the ruinous roof of the Abbey,
ill repaired, fell in, carrying with it the ancient arches. The ruins
were desecrated, filled with rubbish and insulted, the coffins of the
dead were stolen, and the skulls and bones of kings and queens lay
exposed, exhibited--were carried away, and lost. Among them was the
gentle Madeleine who had kissed the “Scottis eard.” Holyrood Abbey had
survived over six centuries the invasions of the wanton English, only to
be laid in ruins by the citizens of Edinburgh themselves.
CHAPTER III
THE CHURCH OF ST. GILES:
GAVIN DOUGLAS, JOHN KNOX, AND JENNY GEDDES
Age to age succeeds,
Blowing a noise of tongues and deeds,
A dust of systems and of creeds.
TENNYSON.
There is a saying that no one who has suffered an Episcopalian childhood
knows the story of Jonah and the gourd, and that the reply given is
invariably, “Jonah and the gourd? The _gourd_? What about a gourd? I
know all about the _whale_, of course!” It is observable that the
ordinary tourist who visits Edinburgh associates St. Giles’s Church with
the one incident of Jenny Geddes throwing her stool at the dean--an
incident of which it might be submitted that, like the connection
between Jonah and the whale, it was perhaps not the most dignified,
though certainly an uncomfortably dramatic, moment of its history. The
Church of St. Giles, like the prophet, had had other experiences--which
is perhaps not wonderful when one recollects that it was in all
probability the parish church of “Edwinsburch” in the ninth century. It
was certainly there in the days of David I., when Edinburgh was a
cluster of huts, built of the wood and thatched with the boughs of the
forest of Drumsheugh, with its dominating fortress up on the rock, its
great Abbey down on the plain, and half-way on the slope between them
the beautiful little massive early Norman Church. From its belfry, as
the sun rose high over the Forth beyond the Calton Hill, the bell would
toll the pious Scots to Matins, or to Vespers when it sank red at the
back of their Castle.
This early parochial church--probably built on the site of a still older
church, and that again maybe on the site of some heathen temple--was, on
the 6th of October 1243, in the reign of Alexander II., dedicated to St.
Giles by David de Bernham, Norman Bishop of St. Andrews.[22] The church,
like all other buildings in Edinburgh, suffered much at the hands of the
English Edwards, of Richard II. of England, and of Henry VIII. of
England; and the marks of the flames of those ruthless invaders are
still visible on the pillars of the choir. If it was misused by the
“auld enemy,” it was--until the Reformation--well treated by its own
people. It was restored from Richard’s fire, and building went on until
Flodden. In 1387 five chapels were added on the south of the Nave,
“thekyt” with stone, by three well-paid Scottish masons, on the model
[Illustration: THE CHURCH OF ST. GILES FROM THE LAWNMARKET
The statue of the Duke of Buccleuch shows immediately under the tower of
the Cathedral, backed by the modernised west end of the building.
Farther down the High Street, to the east, is the Tron Church, while to
the right of the picture is a portion of the new County Hall. On the
extreme left is the entrance from Lawnmarket to Baxter’s Close, where
Burns once lodged. (See “Lady Stair’s Close.”)]
of a chapel at Holyrood. The Regent Albany founded chapels[23]; and
storks built nests in the roof. Every one seemed busy building in the
church.
In 1454 William Preston of Gorton bequeathed to St. Giles’s a
much-prized relic--“the arm-bone of Sanct Gele,” which he had procured
from France; and the Provost and magistrates built the “Preston Aisle”
as a mark of gratitude, with “a brass for his lair,” and a chaplain “to
sing at the altar from that time forth”; and the male representative of
the Preston family, until the Reformation, bore the sacred relic in all
processions.
In 1467 St. Giles’s was transformed from a parish church into a
collegiate church, having a Provost, a perpetual Vicar having care of
souls, a minister of the choir, fourteen canons or prebendaries, a
sacristan, a beadle, a secular clerk, and four choristers taught by the
best-qualified canon. By the time St. Giles’s became a collegiate
foundation it was rich in chaplainries and altarages; and afterwards
there were many more endowments. Each trade that formed into a Guild
maintained its own altar; and, as these Guilds were rich, this was a
great source of wealth. The last endowment before Flodden was an annuity
of twenty-three merks from Walter Chepman, the earliest Scottish
printer, to found a chaplaincy at the altar of St. John the Evangelist.
This was confirmed by charter of James IV., on the 1st of August
1513--eight days before Flodden.
Ah, the summer days of Edinburgh in the year 1513! The King reading the
poems of his Franciscan friar Dunbar, printed by the honoured and pious
Chepman, who endowed the altars of St. Giles’s, where the young
Poet-Provost, of the proud race of Douglas, walked at the end of the
chanting procession amid the stone pillars, and went home afterwards to
turn Virgil into Scottish verse....
Gavin Douglas had been made Provost by James IV. in 1501, when he was
but twenty-six, and it was whilst he was living in the Provost’s
dwelling, bounding the west side of the churchyard (where Parliament
House now stands), that he wrote _The Palace of Honour_ and _King Hart_,
and turned Virgil’s _Æneid_ into the vernacular. Gavin Douglas was the
third son of that grim old statesman, the Earl of Angus, who had earned
the sobriquet of “Archibald Bell-the-Cat” on the day when the haughty
Scottish nobles hanged all James III.’s plebeian favourites over the
bridge at Lauder.
Son of mine,
Save Gawain, ne’er could pen a line,
Scott makes the Earl of Angus say; but “Gawain” penned many a line, and
penned the
|
gifts and the sharing of choice possessions is very
common. The emotion in its earliest form introduces the element of
self-sacrifice for the loved one that is inseparable from the emotion
in all of its normal stages of development. It likewise introduces
the intense selfishness that comes from the desire to monopolize the
allegiance of the one loved. An only child, who as a rule is very
selfish and will not share any of his possessions with others,
readily gives up a liberal part to the lover. During the earlier
years of this stage the gift is appreciated for its inherent value;
it is good to eat, or pretty to look at, or has some other real
value. This inherent value continues to be an element of appreciation
in lovers's gifts throughout life. It is given by the lover as an
expression of his love, and so received and prized by the sweetheart.
Everything else being equal, the greater the real value the more
satisfactory is the love expression to both. In the 6th and 7th years
there appears unmistakable evidence of acquired value in the
presents. They become of value because the lover gave them and, on
account of their associations, are preserved as keepsakes. As early
as the 6th and 7th years presents are taken from their places of safe
keeping or where they are on exhibition as ornaments, and kissed and
fondled as expressions of love for the absent giver. This is
interesting as evidence of love-fetichism appearing in early
childhood.
The emotion otherwise affects the moods and disposition of children.
Refractory children, whose parents manage them with difficulty,
become docile and amiable under the influence of the sweetheart or
lover. Boys who, at other times, are cowards will fight with vigor
and courage when their love is concerned. Children that have a
sociable disposition sometimes become exclusive and abandon all other
playmates for the chosen one, and cannot be induced to play with any
one else. Ideas of marriage are often present, but they are vague and
are present through social suggestion. The general attitude is
represented by the testimony of one woman who stated that she had no
definite idea of marriage at the time of her earliest childish love
affair, but that she had a vague feeling that she and her little
lover would always be together, and this feeling was a source of
pleasure. Certainly children under eight have little foresight; they
are chiefly absorbed in the present whose engrossing emotions give no
premonition that they will ever change.
Beauty begins to be a factor in the choice of a sweetheart among the
children in this first stage. The most beautiful, charming, and
attractive little girls are the ones who are favored. This element
becomes much more conspicuous in the later stages. Jealousy is
present from the first. It is more pronounced in the cases of love
between children and adults of the opposite sex on account of the
child's being less able to monopolize the attention of the adult and
on account of the precocity of the child concerned in such cases. A
fuller discussion of jealousy belongs in another section of this
study.
TYPICAL CASES.
Case 1. Boy 3, girl 5. Love is mutual. When in a large company of
children they will always separate themselves from the others and
play together. Never tire of telling each other of their love.
Delight in kissing and embracing, and do not care who sees them.
Case 2. B. 5, g. 4. Began at ages given and still continues, two
years having gone. Are often seen hand-in-hand; are very jealous
of each other. Boy more backward than girl. Will not play with
other children when they can be together.
Case 3. B. 3, g. 3½. Have been deeply in love since their
third week in kindergarten. Rose not so jealous as Russel. She
always watches for his coming, and runs to meet him the moment he
enters the room. They sit together at the table and in the
circle, and cry if separated. They are very free and unrestrained
in showing their love by kissing, hugging, and by many little
attentions.
Case 4. B. 3, g. 3. My little nephew of three and a little
neighbor girl of the same age had a most affectionate love for
each other, and were not at all shy about it. They would kiss
each other when they met, and seemed to think it all right. The
little boy used to tell me that they would marry when grown. This
continued about two and a half years; then the girl's parents
moved away, much to the grief of both children. The little boy
would often climb up and take the girl's photograph from the
mantle and kiss it.
Case 5. B. 3, g. 3. My nephew of three manifested an ardent
passion for a small girl of about the same age. He followed her
about with dog-like persistence. Being an only child he was very
selfish, never sharing anything with other children. But Bessie
became the recipient of all his playthings. His hoard of
treasures was laid at her feet. Nothing was good enough for her,
nor could he be dressed fine enough when she was around. On one
occasion, a large boy picked Bessie up to fondle her, whereupon
her jealous lover seized a hatchet and attacked his rival. He
imperiously demanded a dollar from me one day in order that he
might buy Bessie and have her ‘all for his own.’ He is now six,
and loves her as much as ever.
Case 6. I know of two young people who have been lovers since
babyhood. As they grew up their love for each other assumed
different aspects. During the first seven years of their lives
their love was open and frank, showing no restriction of the
regard they felt. Caresses and embraces were indulged in as
freely and unrestrictedly as might have been between two little
girls. But when school life began and they became exposed to the
twits and teasings of their playmates there developed a shy
timidity and reserve when in the presence of others. Though they
have been separated for long periods at different times their
love has continued.
Case 7. Both about five years old when they first showed signs of
love that I observed. May have begun earlier. Lasted four years.
Broken up by girl's parents moving away. Love was mutual without
any signs of jealousy that I could see. Exchanged gifts, such as
candy, nuts, flowers, etc. Their actions at first very free
either when alone or in the presence of others. Later they became
somewhat shy in the presence of others, but free when alone. Upon
the girl's moving away the boy showed very deep feeling of
sorrow. Do not know about the girl.
Case 8. My little brother at the age of four was very much in
love with a little girl two years of age. He used to lead the
little girl around, caress her tenderly, and talk lovingly to
her. He always divided with her the playthings he most
appreciated. He often said he expected to marry her. While the
little girl did not object to his demonstrations, she seemed to
care more for a young man thirty-three years of age, and called
him her sweetheart. The little boy became jealous, and finally
gave her up. After they entered school together the little girl
became very fond of my brother, and always managed to sit or
stand next to him in the class if possible, but he had lost all
interest in her, and never cared for her again.
Case 9. B. 6, g. 5. They had been lovers for about two years.
They did not get to be together often since they lived in
different towns. Their families were relatives and exchanged
visits. Upon one occasion when of the age indicated above they
met at the home of Jeaness's grandfather. Edgar came late.
Jeaness was seated upon a hassock in the parlor where there were
several guests. Upon Edgar's entering the door, she saw him and,
as her little face beamed with evident delight, she arose and met
him in the middle of the room. They were immediately in each
others arms. Edgar's mother, seeing the vigor with which he was
hugging Jeaness, said to him with concern: “Why, Edgar, you will
hurt Jeaness.” Jeaness, who evidently was better able to judge,
archly turned her head and with a smile that meant much, said:
“No, he won't.”
Case 10. B. 2, g. 2. One afternoon last summer two of my little
cousins, Florence twenty-three months old and Harold two years
old, were spending the day at my home. They had never met until
that day. Florence is an only child and is inclined to have her
own way, and isn't willing to give up to other children. Harold
has rather a sunny disposition. They had not been with each other
more than an hour before they were sitting on the porch and
Florence had her arms around Harold. She was very willing to give
up to him and share all she had. They played together the
remainder of the day, and were very affectionate. Ever since then
they have been very devoted to each other, and it is very
beautiful to watch them in all their little ways of indicating
their love for each other.
Case 11. I attended a wedding last June which was the outcome of
a striking illustration of this love. I will tell the story as
the bride's mother told it to me. “This does not seem like a
marriage to me but just one more step in a friendship which began
when Minnie and Theo were babies. Before either could walk they
would sit on the floor and play with each other--never having any
trouble over playthings, but sharing everything alike. Theo would
break bits of cake and put in Minnie's mouth, and then both would
laugh as though it were a great joke. If they were separated both
would cry. As they grew up the friendship grew stronger, and Theo
always called Minnie his 'little wife.' At school they were
always lovers, and when we moved here it was understood that when
Minnie was twenty-one Theo should come for her. During their
entire lives I do not know of a single quarrel between them.”
Case 12. One bright morning I noticed a little boy sitting in
front of me who had not been there before. He turned around
occasionally to look at me, and presently smiled. Of course I
returned the smile, thinking that he was the sweetest little
fellow that I had ever seen. This was the beginning of a love
that lasted for several years. He was six, and I was the same
age. On the next day he brought me a pretty picture, and after
that paid so much attention to me that he was soon acknowledged
to be my lover. Neither of us was the least bit shy over it. He
did not care to play with the other boys and I did not care to
play with the girls. We were not contented unless we were
together. He freely confessed his love to me and confided all of
his joys and sorrows in me. For three years and more he seemed to
care as much for me as I did for him. When he came to our home to
play with my brothers he usually forgot them and played with me.
At dinner mamma always seated us side-by-side. We planned our
marriage; his father who was a minister was to perform the
ceremony. We discussed wedding dresses, bridesmaids and
breakfasts with great seriousness. One day,--the fatal one to my
childish happiness, a new girl came to school. I could not help
noticing how often his eyes turned from me to her, and feared a
rival from the first. He wanted her to play with us, and although
I far rather would have preferred being alone with him, I hid my
feelings and asked her. I tried to treat her kindly because I
knew that it would please him. One day he asked me with great
hesitation if I objected to his having two sweethearts. I
smothered my jealous feelings and replied that I did not if he
would marry _me_. He told me that he would, that he loved me,--in
a way that was a compensation for my sacrifice. For some time the
other girl and I got along very well as sister sweethearts; but I
soon saw that she was receiving all of the caresses, and I
concluded that I would not have it so. We had an interview. He
said that he still loved me, but he gave me plainly to understand
that he would be pleased to have me withdraw. Of course I did so,
but was determined never to let either of them know that I cared.
After a time they grew tired of each other, and he came to ask my
forgiveness and make up, but by that time I had an older and as I
thought better sweetheart; so he was left to repent his rash
action while sweetheart number two captured some one else more
suited to her taste.
CHARACTERISTICS OF THE SECOND STAGE.
The second stage in the development of the emotion of sex-love
extends in time from the eighth year to about the twelfth year in
girls and to the fourteenth year in boys. It is characterized by the
appearance of shyness, of modesty, especially in girls, of
self-consciousness and consequent efforts toward self-repression; by
the inhibition of the spontaneous, impulsive love-demonstrations so
freely indulged in during the previous stage. The boys are more
secretive than the girls, but the tendency to conceal the love is
present in both. This is the reason why fewer returns came for the
years eight to twelve than for the years before and after this
period. The children were to a degree successful in hiding their love
and so passed unobserved. To the observer who does not depend upon
the more demonstrative signs but who sees the less obvious but
equally indicative ones, the emotion is easily detected. There is a
conspicuous absence of pairing. The lover and sweetheart are not
often seen alone together. On the other hand, they are much confused
and embarrassed when circumstances do bring them into each other's
presence. Mutual confessions are seldom made,--at least, not
directly, face to face. Some confess to friends, but this is usually
done very reluctantly. Some confess through notes delivered by
friends, or passed in some secret way; some reveal it by defending
the sweetheart when she is being “talked about,” in many of which
cases boys fight most spiritedly for the honor of the one they love.
Some never confess,--neither to friends nor to lover. Some boys deny
that they are in love and speak slightingly about their sweetheart,
but afterwards confess. Then there are the revelations through gifts
that are nearly always delivered in some secret manner, in many
instances of which the giver leaves no clue that would reveal his
identity; in other instances cards or notes are left, but it is rare
to find lovers in this stage giving gifts face to face. Another
indication that will not escape the close observer and which the
confessions especially reveal, is that of the boy lover off at a
distance, “feasting his eyes” upon every movement of his “girl” who
may know absolutely nothing about his devotion. He may be seen
following her about the playground or along the street, always,
however, at a safe distance. Although modesty shows itself as a
characteristic trait of the girl even at this early age, she is on
the whole more aggressive in these early love affairs than the boy
and less guarded about revealing her secret. However, the impulse to
conceal the emotion,--to inhibit its direct manifestations--is
fundamental to this stage of the emotion's development in both sexes
and is, as we shall see later, of the deepest significance.
As in every other field of investigation, so here, we find that not
all of the facts conform to our classification. Thus occasionally
couples between eight and twelve or fourteen years of age are found
who enjoy each other's company and so pair off and freely express
their feelings as they do in the previous stage and also in the one
that follows. The boys of these couples are generally those of
effeminate tendencies who have been accustomed to play with girls
instead of with boys. They are never very highly respected by the
other boys, and later, at adolescence, are tolerated by the girls
rather than respected and sought by them. Again there are individuals
who are very timid in their general disposition, and are consequently
undemonstrative and inhibitive at all times.
We have emphasized the fact that children that have sex-love in this
second stage of its development, as a rule, avoid all direct
expressions of their feelings and that lovers are awkward,
embarrassed, self-conscious and ill-at-ease in each other's presence.
This is true when the conditions are such that their personalities
meet in mutual recognition without a third thing as a shield. They
are not yet in that stage of development wherein they, themselves,
become the chief objects of conversation and wherein endearments and
compliments become the chief stock-in-trade. However, the emotion has
its expression indirectly through games, plays and other incidents
that can be used as masks. Instead of direct contact of personalities
through the love confession as such, it is long-circuited through
some conventionality. In this regard the games of children are used
very effectively. The following games are the ones which I have
personally seen used oftenest: Post-office, Clap-in-clap-out,
Snap-and-catch-it, Skip-to-my-Lou, Way-down-in-the-Paw-Paw-Patch,
King-William, London-Bridge, Thread-the-Needle, Picking Grapes,
Digging-a-Well, Black-Man, Prison-Base, Tag, All-I-Want-is-a-Handsome-Man,
Green Gravel, Down-in-the-Meadow, All-Around-this-Pretty-Little-Maid.
These are merely the ones that have seemed favorites and by no means
exhaust the list of love games that I have seen used. Out of
eighty-three games of Washington (D. C.) children reported in the
American Anthropologist, by W. H. Babcock,[9] as many as thirty are love
games. In this, as in the previous stage, the embrace is the most
important love expression and stimulus. But in this stage it takes on
disguised forms or is excused by the ceremony of the games. Some are
kissing games, _e. g._, Post-Office, Paw-Paw-Patch, King William,
Picking Grapes, Digging-a-Well, etc.; some are hugging games, _e. g._,
London Bridge, Thread-the-Needle, etc., and some involve both hugging
and kissing, _e. g._, Green Grows the Willow Tree. The kiss is not the
frank love kiss given and received as such, but one called for by the
rules of the game. This makes the kissing relatively impersonal and
enables the young lovers thoroughly to enjoy the love communication
without the awkward embarrassment that would come to them if the
expression were not thus long-circuited through the game. The charm of
the whole thing is in the fact that under the guise of a ceremony love
has its way.
It will be helpful here to give a brief analysis of a few of the
games as types. King William is a choosing and kissing game,
involving among its details, the following lines:
King William was King James's son,
Upon a royal race he run;
Upon his breast he wore a star,
That was to all a sign of war.
Go look to the east, go look to the west
And choose the one that you love best,
If she's not there to take your part,
Choose the next one to your heart.
Down on this carpet you must kneel
As sure as the grass grows in the field.
Salute your bride and kiss her sweet,
Then rise again upon your feet.
The game is played by an equal number of couples and one odd boy who
is King William. With hands joined, all forming a circle with King
William in the center, the sentiment of the lines is acted out to
music, thereby adding the charm of rhythmic dance which is so
pleasurably intoxicating to the young and which has been taken
advantage of by lovers during all ages. At the conclusion of the
lines, King William joins the circle, leaving his bride to choose as
the lines are sung again, and so on. Post-Office is another one of
the most popular kissing games. It is an indoors game and requires
two rooms, one to be used as the post-office, the other as an
assembly room for the girls and boys. One of the number is chosen to
be postmaster, and is stationed at the door of the post-office;
another is elected to start the game by entering the post-office,
closing the door and indicating to the postmaster the one for whom
there are letters and the number of letters. This is then announced
in the assembly room by the postmaster, and the girl (if it was a boy
who started the game) is expected to respond by coming to the
post-office and getting her mail, which means granting a kiss for
each letter. She then remains in the post-office to indicate her
choice to the postmaster, while the boy joins the others in the
assembly room, and the game thus goes on indefinitely. The postmaster
is usually granted, as his fee, the privilege of kissing each girl
whose mail he announces. Picking Grapes is a game that calls for as
many kisses as there are bunches to be picked. It further involves
the holding of hands, and is not infrequently so arranged as to have
the boy's arms about the girl's waist. Digging a Well is similar to
Picking Grapes, and calls for as many kisses as there are feet in
depth to be dug. In competition games where forfeits are sold there
is no limit to the devices for indirect love expressions except the
fertility and ingenuity in invention of the young people, and every
one knows that in this particular regard their resources are well
nigh inexhaustible. London Bridge is made use of to satisfy the
hugging impulse. The game is played as follows. Two leaders agree
upon two objects, for example, a horse-and-carriage and a piano,--as
badges of their respective parties. Then they join hands and raise
them to form an archway that represents London Bridge. The others in
the game form a line and pass under this archway while all are
singing:
You stole my watch and broke my chain,
Broke my chain, broke my chain,
You stole my watch and broke my chain,
So fare you well my lady love.
Off to prison you must go,
You must go, you must go,
Off to prison you must go,
So fare you well, my lady love.
The leaders may at any time let their hands drop down and catch any
one in the line that is passing through. The procession then stops
and the prisoner is asked in a whisper, “Which would you rather have,
a horse-and-carriage or a piano?” According to the choice he or she
passes around and locks his hands about the leader's waist. The
second one who makes the same choice locks her hands about the first
one's waist, and so on till all have in turn been made captive and
have joined one or the other side. The two lines, whose leaders still
face each other with hands joined, are now ready for the struggle
that ends in the downfall of London Bridge. The following stanzas are
sung, at the conclusion of which the pulling begins that usually
results in a general downfall and tumbling over one another:
London Bridge is falling down,
Falling down, falling down,
London Bridge is falling down,
So fare you well, my lady love.
What will it take to build it up,
Build it up, build it up?
What will it take to build it up?
So fare you well, my lady love.
Lime and water will build it up,
Build it up, build it up.
Lime and water will build it up,
So fare you well, my lady love.
Blackman is a catching and clutching game, and furnishes the
opportunity for hugging long enough for saying, “One, two, three,
pretty good blackman for me;” and it often happens that this is not
said as rapidly as it could be,--especially if it be the favored one
who is caught. Of course there is much promiscuous catching, and the
game is satisfying other instincts than that of love, for instance
the instinct of pursuing and catching; but it is quite noticeable
that the boys have their favorite girls and catch them first, often
showing jealousy if the girls are caught by any one else. The girls
are often aggressive in selecting boys to catch in the event that
they themselves are caught first. Prison-Base and Handkerchief are
pursuing and touching games, and furnish opportunity for indirect
love confessions. Skip-to-My-Lou involves the choice of “My Lou”
together with skipping with her, which is done while holding her hand
or with arm about her waist as in round dancing. Green Grows the
Willow Tree, involves holding hands, hugging and kissing. It is a
ring game, with the one who does the choosing placed in the middle of
the ring. The following is the song that furnishes the suggestions
for the acting that accompanies it:
Green grows the willow tree,
Green grows the willow tree.
Come my love where have you been?
Come and sit at the side of me.
O, how she blushes so!
Kiss her sweet and let her go,
But don't you let her mother know.
Tag and I Spy are other games that furnish opportunities for love to
discriminate in favor of its chosen ones. In fact there is scarcely a
social game indulged in by both sexes wherein the incidents are not
turned to the emotion's account by the young lovers. It must not be
understood that all of the children who take part in these games are
to be considered as lovers. As was suggested above the games may
appeal to many other instincts and be indulged in on that account
rather than on account of the love sentiment that characterizes them.
On the other hand many of the games whose content does not suggest
love may be turned into a love opportunity and expression.
The routine of the school furnishes other opportunities that are
taken advantage of. Lovers will manage some way to sit or stand
together, and are thrilled by touching. One boy who sat behind his
sweetheart would place his arm along the back of the desk where she
would come in contact with it. Others carry on their courtship by
touching their feet under the desks, etc. It is common to see
favoritism in recitations wherein pupils make the corrections; the
lover seldom corrects the sweetheart, and _vice versa_. In contests
such as spelling, words are purposely misspelled in order to favor
the sweetheart or to keep from “turning her down.” The eye glance is
another means as efficacious with children as with adults. One pair
of young lovers, whose unsympathetic teacher forbade their looking at
each other, brought hand mirrors by means of which they continued to
exchange their “love messages.”
Few teachers complain of the love affairs of children in these first
two periods as interfering with school work,--except when one of the
lovers is absent. A score or more of the observers assert that during
the absence of one of the lovers, the other does not do as good work
and often becomes moody and irritable. On the other hand it very
materially quickens the efforts of many who want to appear well
before their lovers. One boy, nine years old, who had been quite lazy
and was looked upon as being rather dull, braced up and for two years
led his class, in order, as he said, “to win his Ottilia.” During the
adolescent stage that follows this the emotion becomes so intense and
all absorbing as to interfere very much with school work, or with
anything else that requires application.
Akin to the disturbance caused by the absence of the lover from
school is the grief that comes from being more or less permanently
separated, as by moving away or by the death of one. In some
instances the grief is very intense and protracted. Four cases of
attempts at suicide are reported: one boy eight years old; another
nine; a girl nine and another eleven. Six cases of nervous illness
are reported as due, either to separation or jilting. Ordinarily,
however, weaning is comparatively an easy matter.
Teasing breaks up many of these love affairs, and not infrequently
causes the lovers to hate each other; in which case they childishly
look upon each other as the cause instead of the occasion of the
torment. Also under the spur of the taunts of mates the lovers are
stimulated to say things to or about each other that lead to
estrangement. In some instances, however, the persecution is taken as
a sort of martyrdom and is enjoyed. Jealousy is another potent factor
in separating these young lovers. Teasing is not the primary cause of
the tendency to conceal the emotion.
The season of the year seems to have its effect upon the intensity of
the emotion of sex-love among children. One teacher from Texas, who
furnished me with seventy-six cases, said that he had noticed that
the matter of love among children seemed “fairly to break out in the
spring-time.” Many of the others who reported, incidentally mentioned
the love affairs as beginning in the spring. This also agrees with my
own observations. It may partly be accounted for by the fact that
during the winter months the children have much less freedom in
playing together, and hence fewer opportunities for forming and
showing preferences. On the other hand the suggestion inevitably
occurs that there is some connection between this and the pairing
season among animals and the sexual periodicity among primitive
peoples.
“Showing-off” as a method of courtship is not only as old as the
human race, but is perhaps the most common one used by animals. While
the complete discussion of this topic is reserved for the chapter
upon courtship, the picture of love as it is experienced by the young
people in this second stage would not be complete without at least a
passing reference to it. It constitutes one of the chief numbers in
the boy's repertory of love charms, and is not totally absent from
the girl's. It is a most common sight to see the boys taxing their
resources in devising means of exposing their own excellences, and
often doing the most ridiculous and extravagant things. Running,
jumping, dancing, prancing, sparring, wrestling, turning
hand-springs, somersaults,--backward, forward, double,--climbing,
walking fences, singing, giving yodels and yells, whistling,
imitating the movements of animals, “taking people off,” courting
danger, affecting courage, are some of its common forms. I saw a boy
upon one such occasion stand on the railroad track until by the
barest margin he escaped death by a passenger engine. One writer
gives an account of a boy who sat on the end of a cross-tie and was
killed by a passing train. This tendency to show off for love's sake,
together with the inability to make any direct declaration, is well
illustrated in the love affair of Piggy Pennington, King of
Boyville.[10] “Time and time again had Piggy tried to make some sign
to let his feelings be known, but every time he had failed. Lying in
wait for her at corners, and suddenly breaking upon her with a glory
of backward and forward somersaults did not convey the state of his
heart. Hanging by his heels from an apple tree limb over the sidewalk
in front of her, unexpectedly, did not tell the tender tale for which
his lips could find no words. And the nearest that he could come to
an expression of the longing in his breast was to cut her initials in
the ice beside his own when she came weaving and wobbling past on
some other boy's arm. But she would not look at the initials, and the
chirography of his skates was so indistinct that it required a key;
and, everything put together, poor Piggy was no nearer a declaration
at the end of the winter than he had been at the beginning of autumn.
So only one heart beat with but a single thought, and the other took
motto candy and valentines and red apples and picture cards and other
tokens of esteem from other boys, and beat on with any number of
thoughts, entirely immaterial to the uses of this narrative.” This
“showing-off” in the boy lover is the forerunner of the skillful,
purposive and elaborate means of self-exhibition in the adult male
and the charming coquetry in the adult female, in their love
relations.
Another kind of indirection that is very interesting is that of a boy
who ostensibly is talking to one, but everything which he is saying
is intended for another. This is sometimes extended into a sort of
pleasant teasing and scuffling in which the very one whom he wants to
touch is very carefully avoided. A further phase of the same thing is
shown by the embrace or caress that is given to one while the
emotional discharge goes out to some one else; as for example, a boy
under the influence of a meeting with the girl whom he had begun to
love but to whom he had made no confession, went home and walked up
to his sister, put his arms about her neck and kissed her. The action
was so unusual as both to surprise the sister and to arouse her
intelligent suspicions. Goethe makes much use of this type of
emotional discharge in his “Elective Affinities,” and Tennyson
alludes to it in the lines,
Dear as remembered kisses after death,
And sweet as those by hopeless fancy feigned
On lips that are for others.
Such manifestations are not far removed from those that are shown to
pet animals and to persons of the same sex, reference to which has
previously been made.
Previous to the age of about nine the girl is more aggressive than
the boy in love affairs. At this age her modesty, coyness and native
love for being wooed, come to the surface and thereafter characterize
her attitude toward the opposite sex.
TYPICAL CASES.
Case 1. A boy of eight confessed through a girl's friends his
love for the girl. Then on the playground he did little favors
for her as though they were matters of course. If attention was
in any way called to his acts of kindness he would lightly
dismiss the affair with “Oh, that's nothin',” always showing
embarrassment at the fact that his favoritism had been observed.
In writing about it the girl says: “I liked him very much and
enjoyed being near him on the playground, but was very much
embarrassed when he spoke to me; so about all the pleasure that I
got out of this little romance was in watching him as he would
try to gain my attention and good-will while we were all at
play.”
Case 2. In a case that continued from seven to thirteen the
writer says: “I wanted to stand by him in the game, but would
never make the effort to get the situation--although it always
came about. He sent me very pretty valentines, but was very
careful that I should not find out who sent them. When we met on
the street we would both blush, and a strange feeling would
possess me that I did not have on any other occasion. My bliss
was complete when I was walking down the street and he overtook
me--although we could say nothing to each other.”
Case 3. B. 9, g. 11. Boy very much annoyed by the fact that the
girl was two years older. He thought that the husband ought
always to be older, and “looked forward to the time when I should
make her my wife. It was in secret, however, and I was always
fearful lest some one should find it out. The girl probably never
bestowed a thought upon me. I was very shy in her presence, and
if she spoke to me or addressed me in any manner my tongue clove
to the roof of my mouth, making it almost impossible for me to
answer. I dreamed about her night after night, and upon hearing
her name mentioned I
|
he gained ever more
the attachment of the army that soon divided with him its adoration for
his mother.
The day finally arrived when Gaul, already almost independent, demanded
to share with Rome the government of our country. The power was then
divided between a Gallic and a Roman chief. Rome appointed Posthumus,
and our troops unanimously acclaimed Victorin as the Gallic chief and
general of the army. Shortly after, he married a young girl by whom he
was dearly loved. Unfortunately she died within the year, leaving him a
son. Victoria, now a grandmother, devoted herself to her son's child as
she had done before to himself, and surrounded the babe with all the
cares that the tenderest solicitude could inspire.
My early resolve was never to marry. I was nevertheless gradually
attracted by the modest graces and the virtue of the daughter of one of
the centurions of our army. She was your mother, Ellen, whom I married
five years ago.
Such has been my life until this day, when I start the narrative that is
to follow. Certain remarks of Victoria decided me to write it both for
your benefit and the benefit of our descendants. If the expectations of
my foster-sister, concerning several incidents in this narrative, are
eventually realized, those of our relatives who in the centuries to come
may happen to read this story will discover that Victoria, the Mother of
the Camps, was gifted, like Hena, the Virgin of the Isle of Sen, and
Velleda, the female druid and companion of Civilis, with the holy gift
of prevision.
What I am here about to narrate happened a week ago. In order to fix the
date with greater accuracy I certify that it is written in the city of
Mayence, defended by our fortified camp on the borders of the Rhine, on
the fifth day of the month of June, as the Romans reckon, of the seventh
year of the joint principality of Posthumus and Victorin in Gaul, two
hundred and sixty-four years after the death of Jesus of Nazareth, the
friend of the poor, who was crucified in Jerusalem under the eyes of our
ancestress Genevieve.
The Gallic camp, composed of tents and light but solid barracks, is
massed around Mayence, which dominates it. Victoria lodges in the city;
I occupy a little house not far from the one that she inhabits.
PART I.
FOREIGN FOES.
CHAPTER I.
SCHANVOCH AND SAMPSO.
The morning of the day that I am telling of, I quitted my bed with the
dawn, leaving my beloved wife Ellen soundly asleep. I contemplated her
for an instant. Her long loose hair partly covered her bosom; her sweet
and beautiful head rested upon one of her folded arms, while the other
reclined on your cradle, my son, as if to protect you even during her
sleep. I lightly kissed both your foreheads, fearing to awake you. It
required an effort on my part to refrain from tenderly embracing you
both again and again. I was bound upon a venturesome expedition;
perchance, the kiss that I hardly dared to give you was the last you
were ever to receive from me. I left the room where you slept and
repaired to the contiguous one to arm myself, to don my cuirass over my
blouse, and take my casque and sword. I then left the house. At our
threshold I met Sampso, my wife's sister, as gentle and beautiful as
herself. She held her apron filled with flowers of different colors;
they were still wet with the dew. She had just gathered them in our
little garden. Seeing me, she smiled and blushed surprised.
"Up so early, Sampso?" I said to her. "I thought I was the first one
stirring. But what is the purpose of these flowers?"
"Is it not to-day a year ago that I came to live with my sister Ellen
and you--you forgetful Schanvoch?" she answered with an affectionate
smile. "I wish to celebrate the day in our old Gallic fashion. I went
out for the flowers in order to garland the house-door, the cradle of
your little Alguen, and his mother's head. But you, where are you bound
to this morning in full armor?"
At the thought that this holiday might turn into a day of mourning for
my family I suppressed a sigh, and answered my wife's sister with a
smile that was intended to allay suspicion.
"Victoria and her son charged me yesterday with some military orders for
the chief of a detachment that lies encamped some two leagues from here.
It is the military custom to be armed when one has such orders in
charge."
"Do you know, Schanvoch, that you must arouse jealousy in many a
breast?"
"Because my foster-sister employs my soldier's sword during war and my
pen during truces?"
"You forget to say that that foster-sister is Victoria the Great, and
that Victorin, her son, entertains for you the respect that he would
have for his mother's brother. Hardly a day goes by without Victoria's
calling upon you. These are favors that many should envy."
"Have I ever sought to profit by these favors, Sampso? Have I not
remained a simple horseman, ever declining to be an officer, and
requesting the only favor of fighting at Victorin's side?"
"Whose life you have already twice saved when he was at the point of
perishing under the blows of those barbarous Franks!"
"I did but my duty as a soldier and a Gaul. Should I not sacrifice my
life to that of a man who is so necessary to our country?"
"Schanvoch, we must not quarrel; you know how much I admire Victoria;
but--"
"But I know your uncharitableness towards her son," I put in with a
smile, "you austere and severe Sampso!"
"Is it any fault of mine if disorderly conduct finds no favor in my
eyes--if I even consider it disgraceful?"
"Certes, you are right. Nevertheless I can not avoid being somewhat
indulgent towards the foibles of Victorin. A widower at twenty, should
he not be excused for yielding at times to the impulses of his age? Dear
but implacable Sampso, I let you read the narrative of my ancestress
Genevieve. You are gentle and good as Jesus of Nazareth, why do you not
imitate his charity towards sinners? He forgave Magdalen because she had
loved much. In the name of the same sentiment pardon Victorin!"
"There is nothing more worthy of forgiveness than love, when it is
sincere. But debauchery has nothing in common with love. Schanvoch, it
is as if you were to say to me that my sister and I could be compared
with those Bohemian girls who recently arrived in Mayence."
"In point of looks they might be compared with you or Ellen, seeing that
they are said to be ravishingly beautiful. But the comparison ends
there, Sampso. I trust but little the virtue of those strollers, however
charming, however brilliantly arrayed they may be, who travel from town
to town singing and dancing for public amusement--even if they indulge
not in worse practices."
"And for all that, I make no doubt that, when you least expect it, you
will see Victorin the general of the army, one of the two Chiefs of
Gaul, accompany on horseback the chariot in which these Bohemian girls
promenade every evening along the borders of the Rhine. And if I should
feel indignant at the sight of the son of Victoria serving as escort to
such creatures, you would surely say to me: 'Forgive the sinner, just as
Jesus forgave Magdalen the sinner.' Go to, Schanvoch, the man who can
delight in unworthy amours is capable of--"
But Sampso suddenly broke off.
"Finish your sentence," I said to her, "express yourself in full, I pray
you."
"No," she answered after reflecting a moment; "the time has not yet come
for that. I would not like to risk a hasty word."
"See here," I said to her, "I am sure that what you have in mind is one
of those ridiculous stories about Victorin that for some time have been
floating about in the army, without its being possible to trace the
slanders to their source. Can you, Sampso, you, with all your good sense
and good heart, make yourself the echo of such gossip, such unworthy
calumnies?"
"Adieu, Schanvoch; I told you I was not going to quarrel with you, dear
brother, on the subject of the hero whom you defend against all comers."
"What would you have me do? It is my foible. I love his mother as an own
sister. I love her son as if he were my own. Are you not as guilty as
myself, Sampso? Is not my little Alguen, your sister's son, as dear to
you as if he were your own child? Take my word for it, when Alguen will
be twenty and you hear him accused of some youthful indiscretion, you
will, I feel quite sure, defend him with even more warmth than I defend
Victorin. But we need not wait so long, have you not begun your role of
pleader for him, already? When the rascal is guilty of some misconduct,
is it not his aunt Sampso whom he fetches to intercede in his behalf? He
knows how you love him!"
"Is not my sister's son mine?"
"Is that the reason you do not wish to marry?"
"Surely, brother," she answered with a blush and a slight embarrassment.
After a moment's silence she resumed:
"I hope you will be back home at noon to complete our little feast?"
"The moment my mission is fulfilled I shall return. Adieu, Sampso!"
"Adieu, Schanvoch!"
And leaving his wife's sister engaged in her work of garlanding the
house-door, Schanvoch walked rapidly away, revolving in his mind the
topic of the conversation that Sampso had just broached.
CHAPTER II.
ON THE RHINE.
I had often asked myself why Sampso, who was a year older than Ellen,
and as beautiful and virtuous as my wife, had until then rejected
several offers of marriage. At times I suspected that she entertained
some secret love, other times I surmised she might belong to one of the
Christian societies that began to spread over Gaul and in which the
women took the vow of virginity, as did several of our female druids. I
also pondered the reason for Sampso's reticence when I asked her to be
more explicit concerning Victorin. Soon, however, I dropped all these
subjects and turned my mind upon the expedition that I had in charge.
I wended my way towards the advance posts of the camp and addressed
myself to an officer under whose eyes I placed a scroll with a few lines
written by Victorin. The officer immediately put four picked soldiers at
my disposal. They were chosen from among a number whose special
department was to manoeuvre the craft of the military flotilla that was
used in ascending or descending the Rhine in order, whenever occasion
required, to defend the fortified camp. Upon my recommendation the four
soldiers left their arms behind. I alone was armed. As we passed a clump
of oak trees I cut down a few branches to be placed at the prow of the
bark that was to transport us. We soon arrived at the river bank, where
we found several boats that were reserved for the service of the army,
tied to their stakes. While two of the soldiers fastened on the prow of
the boat the oak branches that I had furnished them with, the other two
examined the oars with expert eyes in order to assure themselves that
they were in fit condition for use. I took the rudder, and we left the
shore.
The four soldiers rowed in silence for a while. Presently the oldest of
them, a veteran with a grey moustache and white hair, said to me:
"There is nothing like a Gallic song to make time pass quickly and the
oars strike in rhythm. I should say that some old national refrain, sung
in chorus, renders the sculls lighter and the water more easy to cleave
through. Are we allowed to sing, friend Schanvoch?"
"You seem to know me, comrade?"
"Who in the army does not know the foster-brother of the Mother of the
Camps?"
"Being a simple horseman I thought my name was more obscure than it
seems to be."
"You have remained a simple horseman despite our Victoria's friendship
for you. That is why, Schanvoch, everybody knows and esteems you."
"You certainly make me feel happy by saying so. What is your name?"
"Douarnek."
"You must be a Breton!"
"From the neighborhood of Vannes."
"My family also comes from that neighborhood."
"I thought as much, your name being a Breton name. Well, friend
Schanvoch, may we sing a song? Our officer gave us orders to obey you
as we would himself. I know not whither you are taking us, but a song is
heard far away, especially when it is struck up in chorus by vigorous
and broad-chested lads. Perhaps we must not draw attention upon our
bark?"
"Just now you may sing--later not--we shall have to advance without
making any noise."
"Well, boys, what shall we sing?" said the veteran without either
himself or his companions intermitting the regular strokes of their
oars, and only slightly turning his head towards them, seeing that,
seated as he was on the first bench, he sat opposite to me. "Come, make
your choice!"
"The song of the mariners, will that suit you?" answered one of the
soldiers.
"That is rather long," replied Douarnek.
"The song of the Chief of the Hundred Valleys?"
"That is very beautiful," again replied Douarnek, "but it is a song of
slaves who await their deliverance; by the bones of our fathers, we are
now free in old Gaul!"
"Friend Douarnek," said I, "it was to the refrain of that slaves'
song--'Flow, flow, thou blood of the captive! Drop, drop, thou dew of
gore!' that our fathers, arms in hand, reconquered the freedom that we
enjoy to-day."
"That is true, Schanvoch, but that song is very long, and you warned us
that we were soon to become silent as fishes."
"Douarnek," one of the soldiers spoke up, "sing to us the song of Hena
the Virgin of the Isle of Sen. It always brings tears to my eyes. She is
my favorite saint, the beautiful and sweet Hena, who lived centuries and
centuries ago."
"Yes, yes," said the other soldiers, "sing the song of Hena, Douarnek!
That song predicts the victory of Gaul--and Gaul is to-day triumphant!"
Hearing these words I was greatly moved, I felt happy and, I confess it,
proud at seeing that the name of Hena, dead more than three hundred
years, had remained in Gaul as popular as it was at the time of Sylvest.
"Very well, the song of Hena it shall be!" replied the veteran. "I also
love the sweet and saintly girl, who offered her blood to Hesus for the
deliverance of Gaul. And you, Schanvoch, do you know the song?"
"Yes--quite well--I have heard it sung--"
"You will know it enough to repeat the refrain with us."
Saying this Douarnek struck up the song in a full and sonorous voice
that reached far over the waters of the Rhine:
"She was young, she was fair,
And holy was she.
To Hesus her blood gave
That Gaul might be free.
Hena her name!
Hena, the Maid of the Island of Sen!
"--Blessed be the gods, my sweet daughter,--
Said her father Joel,
The brenn of the tribe of Karnak.
--Blessed be the gods, my sweet daughter,
Since you are at home this night
To celebrate the day of your birth!--
"--Blessed be the gods, my sweet girl,--
Said Margarid, her mother.
--Blessed be your coming!
But why is your face so sad?--
"--My face is sad, my good mother;
My face is sad, my good father,
Because Hena your daughter
Comes to bid you Adieu,
Till we meet again.--
"--And where are you going, my sweet daughter?
Will your journey, then, be long?
Whither thus are you going?--
"--I go to those worlds
So mysterious, above,
That no one yet knows,
But that all will yet know.
Where living ne'er traveled,
Where all will yet travel,
To live there again
With those we have loved.--"
And myself and the three other oarsmen replied in chorus:
"She was young, she was fair,
And holy was she.
To Hesus her blood gave,
That Gaul might be free.
Hena her name!
Hena, the Maid of the Island of Sen!"
Douarnek then proceeded with the song:
"Hearing Hena speak these words,
Sadly gazed upon her her father
And her mother, aye, all the family,
Even the little children,
For Hena loved them very dearly.
"--But why, dear daughter,
Why now quit this world,
And travel away beyond
Without the Angel of Death having called you?--
"--Good father, good mother,
Hesus is angry.
The stranger now threatens our Gaul so beloved.
The innocent blood of a virgin
Offered by her to the gods
May their anger well soften.
Adieu, then, till we meet again,
Good father, good mother,
Adieu till we meet again,
All, my dear ones and friends.
These collars preserve, and these rings
As mementoes of me.
Let me kiss for the last time your blonde heads,
Dear little ones. Good bye till we meet.
Remember your Hena, she waits for you yonder,
In the worlds yet unknown.--"
And the other oarsmen and I replied in chorus to the rythmical sound of
the oars:
"She was young, she was fair,
And holy was she.
To Hesus her blood gave
That Gaul might be free.
Hena her name.
Hena, the Maid of the Island of Sen!"
Douarnek proceeded:
"Bright is the moon, high is the pyre
Which rises near the sacred stones of Karnak;
Vast is the gathering of the tribes
Which presses 'round the funeral pile.
"Behold her, it is she, it is Hena!
She mounts the pyre, her golden harp in hand,
And singeth thus:
"--Take my blood, O Hesus,
And deliver my land from the stranger.
Take my blood, O Hesus,
Pity for Gaul! Victory to our arms!--
And it flowed, the blood of Hena.
"O, holy Virgin, in vain 'twill not have been,
The shedding of your innocent and generous blood.
Bowed beneath the yoke, Gaul will some day rise erect,
Free and proud, and crying, like thee,
--Victory and Freedom!"
And Douarnek, along with the three other soldiers, repeated in a low
voice, vibrating with pious admiration, this last refrain:
"So it was that she offered her blood to Hesus,
To Hesus for the deliverance of Gaul!
She was young, she was fair,
And holy was she,
Hena her name!
Hena, the Maid of the Island of Sen!"
I alone did not join in the last refrain of the song. I was too deeply
moved!
Noticing my emotion and my silence, Douarnek said to me surprised:
"What, Schanvoch, have you lost your voice? You remain silent at the
close of so glorious a song?"
"Your speech is sooth, Douarnek; it is just because that song is
particularly glorious to me--that you see me so deeply moved."
"That song is particularly glorious to you? I do not understand you."
"Hena was the daughter of one of my ancestors."
"What say you!"
"Hena was the daughter of Joel, the brenn of the tribe of Karnak, who
died, together with his wife and almost all his family, at the great
battle of Vannes--a battle that was fought on land and water nearly
three centuries ago. From father to son, I descend from Joel."
"Do you know, Schanvoch," replied Douarnek, "that even kings would be
proud of such an ancestry?"
"The blood shed for our country and for liberty by all of us Gauls is
our national patent of nobility," I said to him. "It is for that reason
that our old songs are so popular among us."
"When one considers," put in one of the younger soldiers, "that it is
now more than three hundred years since Hena, the saintly maid,
surrendered her own life for the deliverance of the country, and that
her name still reaches us!"
"Although it took the young virgin's voice more than two centuries to
rise to the ears of Hesus," replied Douarnek, "her voice did finally
reach him, seeing that to-day we can say--Victory to our arms! Victory
and freedom!"
We had now arrived at about the middle of the river, where the stream is
very rapid.
Raising his oar, Douarnek asked me:
"Shall we enter the strong current? That would be a waste of strength,
unless we are either to ascend or descend the river a distance equal to
that that now separates us from the shore."
"We are to cross the Rhine in its full breadth, friend Douarnek."
"Cross it!" cried the veteran with amazement. "Cross the Rhine! And what
for?"
"To land on the opposite shore."
"Do you know what that means, Schanvoch? Is not the army of those
Frankish bandits, if one can honor those savage hordes with the name of
army, encamped on the opposite shore?"
"It is to those very barbarians that I am bound."
For a few moments all the four oars rested motionless in their oarlocks.
The soldiers looked at one another speechless, as if they could not
believe what they heard me say.
Douarnek was the first to break the silence. With a soldier's unconcern
he said to me:
"Is it, then, a sacrifice that we are to offer to Hesus by delivering
our hides to those hide-tanners? If such be the orders, forward! Bend to
your oars, my lads!"
"Have you forgotten, Douarnek, that we have a truce of eight days with
the Franks?"
"There is no such thing as a truce to those brigands."
"As you will notice, I have made the signal of peace by ornamenting the
prow of our bark with green boughs. I shall proceed alone into the
enemy's camp, with an oak branch in my hand."
"And they will slay you despite all your oak branches, as they have
slain other envoys during previous truces."
"That may happen, Douarnek; but when the chief commands, the soldier
obeys. Victoria and her son have ordered me to proceed to the Frankish
camp. So thither I go!"
"It surely was not out of fear that I spoke, Schanvoch, when I said that
those savages would not leave our heads on our shoulders, nor our skins
on our bodies. I only spoke from the old habit of sincerity. Well, then,
my lads, fall to with a will! Bend to your oars! We have the order from
our mother--the Mother of the Camps--and we obey. Forward! even if we
are to be flayed alive by the barbarians, a cruel sport that they often
indulge in at the expense of their prisoners."
"And it is also said," put in the young soldier with a less unperturbed
voice than Douarnek's, "it is also said that the priestesses of the
nether world who follow the Frankish hordes drop their prisoners into
large brass caldrons, and boil them alive with certain magic herbs."
"Ha! Ha!" replied Douarnek merrily, "the one of us who may be boiled in
that way will at least enjoy the advantage of being the first to taste
his own soup--that's some consolation. Forward! Ply your oars! We are
obeying orders from the Mother of the Camps."
"Oh! We would row straight into an abyss, if Victoria so ordered!"
"She has been well named, the Mother of the Camps and of the soldiers.
It is a treat to see her visiting the wounded after each battle."
"And addressing them with her kind words, that almost make the whole
ones regret that they have not been wounded, too."
"And then she is so beautiful. Oh, so beautiful!"
"Oh! When she rides through the camp, mounted on her white steed, clad
in her long black robe, her bold face looking out from under her casque,
and yet her eyes shining with so much mildness, and her smile so
motherly! It is like a vision!"
"It is said for certain that our Victoria knows the future as well as
she knows the present."
"She must have some charm about her. Who would believe, seeing her, that
she is the mother of a son of twenty-two?"
"Oh! If the son had only fulfilled the promise that his younger years
gave!"
"Victorin will always be loved as he has been."
"Yes, but it is a great pity!" remarked Douarnek shaking his head sadly,
after the other soldiers had thus given vent to their thoughts and
feelings. "Yes, it is a great pity! Oh! Victorin is no longer the child
of the camps that we, old soldiers with grey moustaches, knew as a baby,
rode on our knees, and, down to only recently, looked upon with pride
and friendship!"
The words of these soldiers struck me with deeper apprehension than
Sampso's words did a few hours before. Not only did I often have to
defend Victorin with the severe Sampso, but I had latterly noticed in
the army a silent feeling of resentment towards my foster-sister's son,
who until then, was the idol of the soldiers.
"What have you to reproach Victorin with?" I asked Douarnek and his
companions. "Is he not brave among the bravest? Have you not watched his
conduct in war?"
"Oh! If a battle is on, he fights bravely, as bravely as yourself,
Schanvoch, when you are at his side, on your large bay horse, and more
intent upon defending the son of your foster-sister than upon defending
yourself. '_Your scars would declare it, if they could speak through the
mouths of your wounds_,' as our old proverb says!"
"I fight as a soldier; Victorin fights as a captain. And has not that
young captain of only twenty-two years already won five great battles
against the Germans and the Franks?"
"His mother, well named Victoria, must have contributed with her counsel
towards his victories. He confers with her upon his plans of campaign.
But, anyhow, it is true, Victorin is a brave soldier and good captain."
"And is not his purse open to all, so long as there is anything in it?
Do you know of any invalid who ever vainly applied to him?"
"Victorin is generous--that also is true."
"Is he not the friend and comrade of the soldiers? Is he ever haughty?"
"No, he is a good comrade, and always cheerful. Besides, what should he
be proud about? Are not his father, his glorious mother and himself from
the Gallic plebs, like the rest of us?"
"Do you not know, Douarnek, that often it happens that the proudest
people are the very ones who have risen from the lowest ranks?"
"Victorin is not proud!"
"Does he not, during war, sleep unsheltered with his head upon the
saddle of his horse, like the rest of us horsemen?"
"Brought up by so virile a mother as his, he was bound to grow up a
rough soldier, as he is."
"Are you not aware that in council he displays a maturity of judgment
that many men of our age do not possess? In short, is it not his
bravery, his kindness, his good judgment, his rare military qualities as
a soldier and captain that caused him to be acclaimed general by the
army, and one of the two Chiefs of Gaul?"
"Yes, but in electing him, all of us knew that his mother Victoria would
always be near him, guiding him, instructing him, schooling him in the
art of governing men, without neglecting, worthy matron that she is, to
sew her linen near the cradle of her grandson, as is her thrifty habit."
"No one knows better than I how precious the advices of Victoria to her
son are to our country. But what is it, then, that has changed? Is she
not always there, watching over Victorin and Gaul that she loves with
equal and paternal devotion? Come, now, Douarnek, answer me with a
soldier's frankness. Whence comes the hostility that, I fear, is ever
spreading and deepening against Victorin, our young and brave general?"
"Listen, Schanvoch. I am, like yourself, a seasoned soldier. Your
moustache, although younger than mine, begins to show grey streaks. Do
you want to know the truth? Here it is: We are all aware that the life
of the camp does not make people chaste and reserved like young girls
who are brought up by our venerated female druids. We also know,
because we have emptied many a cup, that our Gallic wines throw us into
a merry and riotous humor. We know, furthermore, that when he is in a
garrison, the young soldier who proudly carries a cockade on his casque
and caresses his brown or blonde moustache, does not long preserve the
friendship of fathers who have handsome daughters, or of husbands who
have handsome wives. But, for all that, you will have to admit,
Schanvoch, that a soldier who is habitually intoxicated like a brute,
and takes cowardly advantage of women, would deserve to be treated to a
hundred or more stripes laid on well upon his back, and to be
ignominiously driven from camp. Is not that so?"
"That is all very true, but what connection has it with Victorin?"
"Listen, friend Schanvoch, and then answer me. If an obscure soldier
deserves such treatment for his shameful conduct, what should be done to
an army chief who disgraces himself in such fashion?"
"Do you venture to say that Victorin has offered violence to women and
that he is daily drunk?" I cried indignantly. "I say that you lie, or
those who carried such tales to you lied. So, these are the unworthy
rumors that circulate in the camp against Victorin! And can you be
credulous enough to attach faith to them?"
"Soldiers are not quite so credulous, friend Schanvoch, but they are
aware of the old Gallic proverb--'The lost sheep are charged to the
shepherd.' Now, for instance, you know Captain Marion, the old
blacksmith?"
"Yes, I know the brave fellow to be one of the best officers in the
army."
"The famous Captain Marion, who can carry an ox on his shoulders," put
in one of the soldiers, "and who can knock down the same ox with a blow
of his fist--his arm is as heavy as the iron mace of a butcher."
"And Captain Marion," added another oarsman, "is a good comrade, for all
that, despite his strength and military renown. He took a simple
soldier, a former fellow blacksmith, for his 'friend in war,' or, as
they used to say in olden times, took the 'pledge of brotherhood' with
him."
"I am aware of the bravery, modesty, good judgment and austerity of
Captain Marion," I answered him, "but why do you now bring in his name?"
"Have a little patience, friend Schanvoch, I shall satisfy you in a
minute. Did you see the two Bohemian girls enter Mayence a few days ago
in a wagon drawn by mules covered with tinkling bells and led by a Negro
lad?"
"I did not see the women, but have heard them mentioned. But I must
insist upon it, what has all this got to do with Victorin?"
"I have reminded you of the proverb--'The lost sheep are charged to the
shepherd.' It would be idle to attribute habits of drunkenness and
incontinence to Captain Marion, would it not? Despite all his
simpleness, the soldier would not believe a word of such slanders; not
so? While, on the other hand, the soldier would be ready to believe any
story of debauchery about the said Bohemian strollers, and he would
trust the narrator of the tale, do you understand?"
"I understand you, Douarnek, and I shall be frank in turn. Yes, Victorin
loves wine and indulges in it with some of his companions in arms. Yes,
having been left a widower at the age of twenty, only a few months
after his marriage, Victorin has occasionally yielded to the headlong
impulses of youth. Often did his mother, as well as myself, regret that
he was not endowed with greater austerity in morals, a virtue, however,
that is extremely rare at his age. But, by the anger of the gods! I, who
have never been from Victorin's side since his earliest childhood, deny
that drunkenness is habitual with him; above all I deny that he ever was
base enough to do violence to a woman!"
"Schanvoch, you defend the son of your foster-sister out of the goodness
of your heart, although you know him to be guilty--unless you really are
ignorant of what you deny--"
"What am I ignorant of?"
"An adventure that has raised a great scandal, and that everybody in
camp knows."
"What adventure?"
"A short time ago Victorin and several officers of the army went to a
tavern on one of the isles near the border of the Rhine to drink and
make merry. In the evening, being by that time drunk as usual, Victorin
violated the tavern-keeper's wife, who, in her despair, threw herself
into the river and was drowned."
"The soldier who misdemeaned himself in that manner," remarked one of
the oarsmen, "would speedily have his head cut off by a strict chief."
"And he would have deserved the punishment," added another oarsman. "As
much as the next man, I would find pleasure in bantering with the
tavern-keeper's wife. But to offer her violence, that is an act of
savagery worthy only of those Frankish butchers, whose priestesses,
veritable devil's cooks, boil their prisoners alive in their caldrons."
I was so stupefied by the accusation made against Victorin that I
remained silent for a moment. But my voice soon came to me and I cried:
"Calumny! A calumny as infamous as the act would have been. Who is it
dares accuse Victoria's son of such a crime?"
"A well informed man," Douarnek answered me.
"His name! Give me the liar's name!"
"His name is Morix. He was the secretary of one of Victoria's relatives.
He came to the camp about a month ago to confer upon grave matters."
"The relative is Tetrik, the Governor of Gascony," I said with increased
stupefaction. "The man is the incarnation of kindness and loyalty; he is
one of Victoria's oldest and most faithful friends."
"All of which renders the man's testimony all the more reliable."
"What! He, Tetrik! Did Tetrik confirm what you have just said?"
"He communicated it to his secretary, and confirmed the occurrence,
while deploring the shocking excesses of Victorin's dissoluteness."
"Calumny! Tetrik has only words of kindness and esteem for Victoria's
son."
"Schanvoch, I have served in the army for the last twenty-five years.
Ask my officers whether Douarnek is a liar."
"I believe you to be sincere; only you have been shamefully imposed
upon."
"Morix, the secretary of Tetrik, narrated the occurrence not to me only
but to other soldiers in the camp for whose wine he was paying. We all
placed confidence in his words, because more than once did I myself and
several others of my companions see Victorin and his friends heated with
wine and indulging in crazy
|
, and she was simply what the education of
society--her society--made her. Practically, fashion and _les
convenances_ were her gods. Those men or women who were not what she
generally termed "well-bred"--who were behind the times in social
matters, who had no place in her great world, nor any capacity for
making one--were not people to be received into her house, or to have
anything to do with. Her demeanour to such unfortunate individuals, when
she did happen to come into contact with them was, to say the least,
chilling.
Yet those who knew her best, declared that if any of these ineligibles
were to fall into great trouble, she would be the first to help and
befriend them if she could; and that if her husband were to lose his
fortune and suddenly plunge her into poverty again, she would set to
work to cook his dinners and mend his clothes with the same cheerful
willingness as of yore.
She sat in the warm firelight, toasting her feet, and her brain was busy
with projects. For some weeks past she had been troubled about her young
niece, on account of her too absurd innocence, and her ignorance of
social etiquette in many important details. The girl's manner and
carriage had been particularly easy and graceful, but she had constantly
counteracted the effect of this by a deplorable want of penetration as
to who was who, and of reticence concerning her own history and
experiences, which had been very mortifying to an aunt and _chaperon_
accustomed to better things; and her efforts to teach and train one who
seemed so gentle and pliant had been singularly unfruitful. Rachel was a
sweet child, and she was fond of her, and proud of her beauty;
nevertheless, she had declared to herself and to Beatrice more than
once, that she had never known a human creature so hopelessly dense and
stupid.
To-night, however, she took another view of the case. That rural
freshness had possibly found favour in the eyes of Mr. Kingston, who had
been the ideal son-in-law to so many mothers of so many polished
daughters. She was surprised, but she could understand it. For she knew
that men had all sorts of queer, independent, unaccountable ways of
looking at things--at women in particular; and she had already noticed
that they liked those ridiculous blushes--which to her mind showed a
painful want of culture and self-possession--in which the girl indulged
so freely.
What if she should be able to marry her to Mr. Kingston--who had foiled
the artifices of well-meaning matrons, and resisted the fascinations of
charming maidens exactly suited for him for so many years--after
marrying all her own children so well? That was the theme of her
meditations, and she found it deeply interesting. She longed for the
arrival of Beatrice, who was her eldest daughter and her chief
_confidante_ and adviser, to hear what she had to say about it.
She had been by herself about ten minutes, during which time a servant
had lit up the cut-glass chandelier, when there was a ring at the
door-bell, and Mr. and Mrs. Reade were ushered in. Mrs. Reade was a tiny
little dark woman, with a bright and clever, though by no means pretty,
face, in which no trace of the maternal features was visible.
She was beautifully dressed in palest pink, with crimson roses in her
hair, and delicate lace of great value about her tight skirt and her
narrow shoulders; and her distinguished appearance generally rejoiced
her mother's heart. Behind her towered her enormous husband, in whom
blue blood declined to manifest itself in the customary way. He was an
amiable, slow-witted, honest gentleman, with a large, weak face, rather
coarse and red, particularly towards bedtime, and heavy and awkward
manners; and he was as wax in the hands of the small person who owned
him.
"Ned," she said, looking back at him as she swept across the room, "you
go and find papa, and let mamma and me have a talk until the others come
in."
Ned obediently went--not to find his host, who was probably in the
dressing-room, but to read "The Argus" by the dining-room fire, while
the servants set the table. And the mother and daughter sat down
together to one of the confidential gossips that they loved. Mrs. Reade
began to unfold her little budget of news and scandal, but immediately
laid it by--to be resumed between the acts of the opera presently--while
she listened to Mrs. Hardy's account of the transactions of the
afternoon. It did not take that experienced matron long to explain
herself, and the younger lady was quick to grasp the situation. At first
she was inclined to scoff.
"Oh, we all know Mr. Kingston, mamma. He dangles after every fresh face,
but he never means anything. _He_ will never marry--at any rate, not
until he is too old to flirt any more."
"But, my dear, he is going to build his house."
"I don't believe a word of it," said Mrs. Reade. "He has been going to
build that house ever since I can remember. It is just one of his artful
devices. Whenever he wants to make a girl like him he tells her about
that house--just to set her longing to be the mistress of it. That is
the only use he will ever put it to. You'll see he will tell Rachel all
about it to-night. He will beg her to help him with her exquisite taste,
and so on. Oh, I know his ways. But he means nothing."
"He has already told Rachel," said Mrs. Hardy, laughing. "And, what is
more, he is going to bring the designs to show her, and he says he is
really going to put the work in hand at once."
"If so," said Mrs. Reade, gazing into the fire meditatively, "it looks
as if he had been proposing to settle himself--though I shall not
believe it till I see it. But then he must have made his plans before he
ever saw Rachel. It must be Sarah Brownlow he is thinking of, mamma."
"Sarah Brownlow passed him this afternoon, Beatrice, and he hardly
noticed her. While as for Rachel--well, I only wish you had been there
to see the way he looked at her, and the way he said good-bye. My
impression is that he thinks it is time to settle--as indeed it is,
goodness knows--and so has begun with his house; and that he is looking
about for a mistress for it, and that something in Rachel has struck
him. I am certain he is struck with Rachel."
Mrs. Reade gazed into the fire gravely, while she pondered over this
solemn announcement.
"It is possible," she said presently. "It is quite possible. All the men
are saying that she is the prettiest girl in Melbourne just now. An
elderly club man, who has seen much of the world, is very likely to
admire that kind of childish, simple creature. If it should be so," she
continued, musingly, "I wonder how Rachel will take it."
"Rachel," said Mrs. Hardy, with sudden energy, "is not so simple as she
seems. You mark my words, she will be as keen to make a good marriage as
anybody as soon as she gets the chance."
"Do you think so?" her daughter responded, looking up with her bright,
quick eyes. "Now that is not at all my notion of her."
"Nor was it mine at first, but I am getting new lights. It never does to
trust to that demure kind of shy manner. I assure you she made such use
of her opportunities this afternoon as surprised me, who am not easily
surprised. In about ten minutes--I could not have been in Alston's more
than ten minutes--they were on the most frank and friendly terms
possible, and she had given him a rose to wear in his button-hole."
"Nonsense!"
"I assure you, yes. And I know, by the look of him, that he never saw
through it. It is wonderful how even the cleverest men can be taken in
by that _ingénue_ manner. He evidently thought her a sweet and
unsophisticated child. Sweet she is--the most amiable little creature I
ever knew; but she knows what she is about perfectly well."
Mrs. Reade gazed into the fire again with thoughtful eyes; then after a
pause she said:
"I think you don't understand her, mamma. I think she really saw no more
in Mr. Kingston than she would have seen in any poor young man without a
penny."
"No, Beatrice. She talked about his new house, and all the money he was
going to spend on it, in a ridiculous way. She was completely fascinated
by the subject."
"I can't imagine little Rachel scheming to catch a rich husband," the
young lady exclaimed, with a mocking, but pleasant laugh.
"You don't see as much of her as I do, my dear Beatrice," her mother
replied, with dignity. "If you did, you would know that she is as fond
of money and luxury as any hardened woman of the world could be. She
quite fondles the ornaments I have put in her room. She goes into
raptures over the silver and china. A new dress sends her into
ecstacies. She annoys me sometimes--showing people so plainly that she
has never been used to anything nice. However, it will make it easier
for me to settle her than I at first thought it would be. It will be all
plain sailing with Mr. Kingston, you will see."
"Mother," said Mrs. Reade--she only said "mother" when she was very
much in earnest--"let me give you a word of advice. If you want to marry
Rachel to Mr. Kingston--and I hope you will, for it would be a capital
match--don't let her know anything about it; don't do anything to help
it on; don't let her see what is coming--leave them both alone. I think
I know her better than you do, and I have a pretty good idea of Mr.
Kingston; and any sort of interference with either of them would be most
injudicious--most dangerous. I shall see to-night--I'm sure I shall see
in a moment----"
There was a ring at the door-bell, and the stir of an arrival in the
hall, and the little woman did not finish what she wanted to say. She
rose from her chair, and shook out her pink train; and the mother to
whom she had laid down the law rose also, looking very majestic.
"Mr. Kingston," said the servant, throwing the drawing-room door open.
The great man entered with a springing step, bowing elaborately. His
glossy hair (some people said it was a wig, but it was not) was curled
to perfection; his moustaches were waxed to the finest needle-points; he
wore flashing diamond studs on an embroidered shirt front; and there was
a Marshal Neil rose in his button-hole, not very fresh, and too much
blown to be any ornament to a fine gentleman's evening toilet, hanging
its yellow head heavily from a weak and flabby stalk.
CHAPTER III.
MR. KINGSTON'S QUESTION.
While her aunt and cousin were discussing her downstairs, Miss
Fetherstonhaugh was dressing herself for dinner in her little chamber at
the top of the house. This was a part of the daily ceremonial of her new
life, in which she took a deep and delighted interest. The whole thing,
in fact, was charming to her. To come sweeping down the big staircase in
dainty raiment, all in the spacious light and warmth--to have the doors
held open for her as she passed in and out--to go into the dining-room
on her uncle's arm, and sit at dinner with flowers before her--seeing
and feeling nothing but softness and colour, and polish and order
everywhere--was at this time to realise her highest conception of
earthly enjoyment.
Her bedroom was not magnificent, but it had everything in it that she
most desired--the whitest linen, the freshest chintz and muslin, a fire
to dress by, an easy chair, and above all, a cheval glass, in which she
could survey her pretty figure from head to foot. She stood before this
cheval glass to-night a thoroughly happy little person. Hitherto, with a
mirror twelve inches by nine, that had a crack across it, she had seen
that her face was fair and fresh, and that her hair had a wonderful
red-gold lustre where the light fell upon it; but she was only now
coming to understand what perfection of shape and grace had developed
with her recent growth into womanhood, to make the _tout ensemble_
charming.
She looked at herself with deep content--no doubt with a stronger
interest than she would have looked at any other lovely woman, but in
much the same spirit, enjoying her beauty more for its own sake than for
what it would do for her--more because it harmonised herself to her
tastes and circumstances, than because it was a great arsenal of
ammunition for social warfare and conquest.
She was still in mourning for her father, and had put on a simple black
evening dress. Her natural sense of the becoming dictated simple
costumes, but education demanded that they should be made in the latest
fashion; and she regarded the tightness of her skirt in front, and the
fan of her train behind, with something more than complacency.
As yet the lust for jewels had not awakened in her, which was very
fortunate, for she had none. The tender, milky throat and the round
white arms were bare; and all the ornament that she wore, or wanted, was
a bouquet of white chrysanthemum and scarlet salvia on her bosom, and
another in her hair.
Pretty Rachel Fetherstonhaugh! If Roden Dalrymple could have seen her
that night, only for five minutes, what a deal of trouble she might have
been spared!
The dinner bell rang, and she blew out her candles hurriedly, and
flitted downstairs. On the landing below her she joined her uncle--a
small, thin, sharp-faced person, with wiry grey hair, and "man of
business" written in every line of his face--as he left his own
apartment; and they descended in haste together to the drawing-room,
where four people were solemnly awaiting them.
The first thing that Rachel saw when she entered was her Marshal Neil
rose. She glanced from that to its wearer's face, eagerly turned to meet
her, full of admiring interest; and, as a matter of course, she blushed
to a hue that put her scarlet salvias to shame.
Why she blushed she would have been at a loss to say; certainly not for
any of the reasons that the assembled spectators supposed. It was merely
from the vaguest sense of embarrassment at being in a position which she
had not been trained to understand.
An hour or two before, her aunt had made that rose the text of a
discourse in which many strange things had been suggested, but nothing
explained; and now they all looked at her, evidently with reference to
it, yet with painful ambiguity that perplexed her and made her uneasy;
and she could only feel, in a general way, that she was young and
ignorant and not equal to the situation. Much less than that was amply
sufficient to cover her with a veil of blushes.
At dinner she sat between Mr. Reade and her uncle, and, being on the
best of terms with both of them, she confined her conversation to her
own corner of the table, and scarcely lifted her eyes; but when dinner
was over--dinner and coffee, and the drive to the opera-house--then Mr.
Kingston, deeply interested in his supposed discovery of a new kind of
woman, and piqued by her shy reception of his generally much-appreciated
attentions, set himself to improve his acquaintance with her, and found
the task easy. They were standing on the pavement, in the glare of the
gaslight, with a lounging crowd about them.
Mrs. Hardy had dropped a bracelet, for which she and her son-in-law were
hunting in the bottom of the brougham, and Mrs. Reade was chatting to an
acquaintance, whose hansom had just deposited him beside her--a bearded
young squatter, enjoying his season in town after selling his wool high,
who stared very hard at Rachel through a pair of good glasses, as soon
as he had a favourable opportunity.
Mr. Kingston stood by the girl's side, staring at her without disguise.
The shadow of the street fell soft upon her gauzy raiment and her white
arms and the lustre of her auburn hair, but her face was turned towards
the gaslight--she was looking wistfully up the long passage which had
something very like fairy land at the end of it--and he thought he had
never seen any face so fresh and sweet.
"You like this kind of thing, don't you?" he said, gently, as if
speaking to a child, when in turning to look for her aunt she caught his
eye.
"Oh, yes," she replied, promptly, "I do, indeed! I like the whole thing;
not the singing and the acting only, but the place, and the people, and
the ladies' dresses, and the noise, and the moving about, and the
lights--everything. I should like to come to the opera every
night--except the nights when there are balls."
Mr. Kingston laughed, and said he should never have guessed from what he
had seen of her that she was such a very gay young lady.
"You don't understand," she responded quickly, looking up at him with
earnest, candid eyes; "it is not that I am gay--oh, no, I don't think it
is that! though perhaps I do enjoy a spectacle more than many people.
But it is all so new and strange. I have never had any sightseeing--any
pleasure like what I am having now, that is why I find it so
delightful."
"Come, my dear!" cried Mrs. Hardy sharply (she had found her bracelet
and overheard a part of this little dialogue), "don't stand about in the
wind with nothing over you. What have you done with your shawl?"
"It is here, aunt," replied Rachel meekly, lifting it from her arm.
Her cavalier hastened to take it from her and adjust it carefully over
her shoulders. During this operation Mrs. Hardy swept into the lobby,
taking the arm of her big son-in-law; and Mrs. Reade, having parted from
her friend, glanced round quickly, followed her husband, and put herself
also under his protection. Mr. Kingston, smiling to himself like
Mephistopheles under his waxed moustache, was left with Rachel in the
doorway.
"How _does_ it go?" he said, fumbling with a quantity of woolly fringe.
"All right--there's no hurry. It is not eight o'clock yet. Pray let me
do it for you."
She stood still, while he dawdled as long as he could over the
arrangement of her wrap, but she cast anxious looks after the three
receding figures, and she was the colour of an oleander blossom. He was
a little disconcerted at her embarrassment; it amused him, but it
touched him too.
Poor little timid child! Who would be so mean as to take advantage of
her inexperience? Not he, certainly. He gave her his arm and led her
into the house, with a deferential attentiveness that did not usually
mark his deportment towards young girls. On their way they were accosted
by a boy holding a couple of bouquets in each hand.
"Buy a bouquet for the opera, Sir?" said he, in his sing-song voice.
Mr. Kingston paused and put his glass in his eye. They were bright
little nosegays, and one of them, much superior to the other, had a
fringe of maiden hair fern and a rich red rose in the middle of it. He
took this from the boy's hand, and offered it to Rachel with his
elaborate bow.
"Permit me," he said, "to make a poor acknowledgment of my deep
indebtedness to you for _this_."
And he touched the drooping petals of the Marshal Neil bud, and imagined
he was paying her a delicate sentimental compliment.
If Rachel had been the most finished fine lady she could not have
undeceived him more gracefully.
"Thank you," she said, simply, and she smiled for half a second.
To be sure her red rose was not redder than she was, but she held her
head with a gentle air of maidenly dignity that quite counteracted the
weakness of that blush.
Mr. Kingston began to suspect, with some surprise, that she was not so
easy to get on with as she appeared. However, that did not lessen his
interest in her by any means.
"I am afraid you think I have taken a liberty," he suggested presently.
What had come to him to care what a bread-and-butter miss might think?
But somehow he did care.
"Oh, no," she said, "it is very kind of you. But you must not talk of
being indebted to me. Flowers are not--not presents, like other things."
By this time they had reached the top of the stairs, and Mrs. Reade was
sweeping out of the cloak-room, where she had been "settling" her hair,
and putting a little powder on her face.
"Mamma is gone in," she said, taking the girl's hand kindly; "there are
plenty of people here to-night, Rachel. You must look for a lady sitting
on the right of the Governor's box, in a high velvet dress. She is one
of our Melbourne beauties."
So they went in and took their seats; and Rachel found herself sitting
in the front tier, not very much to the left of the viceregal armchairs,
and her cousin Beatrice was on one side of her and Mr. Kingston on the
other.
She was perfectly contented now. She smiled at her flowers; she furled
and unfurled her fan; she looked round and round the house through her
glasses, whispering questions and comments to Mrs. Reade, who knew
everybody and everybody's history; and it made Mrs. Hardy quite uneasy
to see how thoroughly and evidently she enjoyed herself. Mr. Kingston
recovered his spirits which she had damped a little while ago.
He watched her face from time to time--generally when she was absorbed
in watching the stage; and the more he looked, the more charming he
found it. So fresh, so frank, so modest, so sweet, with those delicate
womanly blushes always coming and going, and that child-like fun and
brightness in her eyes. He had never been so "fetched," as he expressed
it, by a pretty face before; that is to say, he did not remember that he
ever had been.
It was, indeed, very seldom that he regarded a pretty face with such a
serious kind of admiration. He found himself wondering how it would
fare, how long it would keep its transparent innocence and candour in
the atmosphere of this new world--this second-rate Hardy set, which was
full of meretricious, manoeuvring, gossip-loving women--with a touch of
anxiety that was quite unselfish. He was sure now that she was not a
coquette; he was experienced enough to know, also, that, however humble
her origin and antecedents, she was a girl of thoroughly "good style;"
and it would be a thousand pities, he thought, if the influence of her
surroundings should spoil her.
When the curtain fell and the gas was turned up, he noticed that people
all round the house were turning their glasses upon her. Certainly she
made a charming study from an artistic point of view. What taste she had
shown in the grouping of her white chrysanthemums, and the way she had
mixed in those few velvety horns of red salvia. They were colours proper
to a brunette, but they seemed to accentuate the delicacy of her milky
complexion and the fine shade of her red-gold hair.
What a chin and throat she had! and what soft, yet strong, round
arms!--white, but warm, like blush rose petals that had unfolded in the
dews of dawn at summer time, against the black background of her dress.
And her shape and her colour were nothing compared with the expression
of utter content and happiness that shone out of her face, irradiating
her youth and beauty with a tender light and sweetness that, like
sunshine on a sleeping crater, gave no hint of the tragic trouble hidden
away for future years. No wonder people looked at her. Of course they
looked.
The glasses that she had been using belonged to Mrs. Reade, and now that
lady was busy with them, hunting for her numerous acquaintances. Mr.
Kingston held out his own, curious to see if she would discover what
attention she was receiving, and what the effect of such a discovery
would be.
"Thank you," said Rachel gratefully; and she settled herself back in her
seat, and proceeded to take a thorough survey of all the rank and
fashion that surrounded her. For a long time she gazed attentively,
shifting her glasses slowly round from left to right; and Mr. Kingston
watched her, leaning an elbow on the red ridge between them, and
twiddling one horn of his moustaches.
He expected to see the familiar blush stealing up over the whiteness of
her face and neck. But she remained, though deeply interested, quite
cool and calm. Presently she dropped her hands in her lap and drew a
long breath.
"There is a lady over there," she said in a whisper, "who has something
round her arm so bright that I think it must be diamonds. Do you see who
I mean? When she holds up her glasses again, tell me if they are real
diamonds in her bracelet."
Much amused, Mr. Kingston did as he was bidden.
"Oh, yes," he said, "they are real diamonds. That lady is particularly
addicted to precious stones. She walks about the street in broad day
with a Sunday school in each ear, as that fellow in _Piccadilly_ says.
Are you like the majority of your sex--a worshipper of diamonds? I
thought you did not care for jewellery."
"I do," she replied, smiling. "I don't worship jewels, but I should like
to have some. I should like to have some real diamonds _very_ much."
"I daresay you will have plenty some day, and very becoming they'll be
to you. Not more so, though, than the flowers you are wearing to-night,"
he added, looking at them admiringly.
Rachel touched up her ornaments with a thoughtful face.
"There is such a light about diamonds," she said musingly; "no coloured
stones seem so liquid and twinkling. I don't care in the least about
coloured stones. If I were very rich I would have one ring full of
diamonds, to wear every day, and one necklace to wear at night--a
necklace of diamond stars strung together--and perhaps a diamond
bracelet. And I wouldn't care for anything else."
"Should you like to be very rich?" asked her companion, smiling to
himself over these naïve confessions. He was gazing, not only into her
eyes, but at her lovely throat and arms, and imagining how they would
look with diamonds on them.
"Yes," said Rachel. "But the great thing I wish is not to be poor. I
hope--oh, I do hope--I shall never be poor any more!"
"I don't think you stand in the least danger of that," said Mr.
Kingston.
"I know all about it," continued the girl gravely; "and I don't think
you do, or you could not laugh or make a joke of it. You _cannot_ know
how much it means. _You_ never have debts, of course."
"Debts? Oh, dear, yes, I do--plenty."
"Yes, but I mean debts that you can't pay--that you have to apologise
for--that hang and drag about you always. I won't talk about it," she
added hurriedly, with a little shiver; "it will spoil my pleasure
to-night."
"_Don't_," said Mr. Kingston. He did not find it a congenial topic
either. "Tell me what you would do if you were rich."
"What I would do?" she murmured gently, smiling again. "Oh, all kinds of
things--I would pay ready money for everything, in the first place. Then
I would have a lovely house, with quantities of pictures. That is one
great fault in our house at Toorak--we have no nice pictures. And I
would wear black velvet dresses. And I would have a beautiful sealskin
jacket. And a thorough-bred horse to ride----"
"Oh, do you ride?" interposed Mr. Kingston, eagerly.
"I used to ride. I like it very much. My father gave me a beautiful mare
once; but afterwards he rode a steeplechase with her, and she fell and
broke her back. I can ride very well," she added, smiling and blushing.
"I can jump fences without being afraid. But Uncle Hardy keeps only
carriage horses, and none of the family ride."
"But you must have a horse, of course. I must speak to your uncle about
it," said Mr. Kingston. "Indeed, I think I have one that would suit you
admirably, and I'll lend him to you to try, with pleasure, if you'll
allow me."
"Oh, _will_ you? Oh, _how_ delightful! When will you let me try him? But
I forgot--I have no habit!"
"That is a difficulty soon got over. I'll speak to your aunt," said this
influential autocrat.
And here a bell rang, and the curtain rose upon a fresh scene. Mrs.
Reade and her mother had had an absorbing _tête-à-tête_, and now turned
to see what their charge was doing. Mr. Reade, redolent of something
that was not eau de cologne, came back to his seat; and Rachel began to
watch the proceedings of the prima donna, who was solemnly marching
across the stage. Mr. Kingston was aware, however, that the girl's
thoughts were not with the spectacle before her. She was evidently
preoccupied about those promised rides.
"I shall have no one to go with me," she whispered presently, in the
pauses of a song.
"I shall be proud to be your escort," he whispered back. "And there will
always be the groom, you know," he added, seeing the colour of the
oleander blossom suddenly appear. "Do not be anxious. I will manage it
all for you."
"You are _very_ kind," she said, looking up into his face with that shy
blush, and a charming friendliness in her eyes, "and I am very grateful
to you; but please do not try to persuade Aunt Elizabeth against her
wish." And she did not say much more to him. From this point she became
silent and thoughtful.
When they reached Toorak, however, Mr. Kingston redeemed his promise
faithfully in his own way, and at considerable trouble to himself. Mr.
and Mrs. Hardy both liked to do things, as they called it, "handsomely,"
but at the same time without any unnecessary expense; and neither of
them could see his proposal in the light of a paying enterprise.
Rachel was driven out in the carriage daily; she appeared at all places
of fashionable resort; she took abundant exercise. A riding-horse would
be expensive, and so would a saddle and habit, not to speak of the
addition to the stable necessities; and what would there be to show for
it? But while the uncle, and still more the aunt, were delicately
fencing with the proposition, Mrs. Reade struck in and swept all
objections away.
"Of course the child ought to ride if she has been used to riding," said
this imperious small person. "You send your horse here, Mr. Kingston,
and Ned shall come round and see what she can do with it." This was in
the hall, where he was supposed to be saying good-night; and Rachel had
gone upstairs to bed.
"Thank you, Mrs. Reade--if I may," he said, with an eager gratitude that
amused himself. "I am sure it would be a great pleasure to her--and it
would be so good for her health. Why don't _you_ ride too? It is such
splendid exercise."
"I would in a minute, if I had a figure like hers," laughed Mrs. Reade.
"Mamma, we must get her a good habit to set off that figure. I'll come
round in the morning, and go with you to have her measured. Are you
going, Mr. Kingston, without a cup of hot coffee? Good-night, then; mind
you send your horse."
The servant shut the door behind him; and he went out into the solemnity
of the autumn night. The wind was rustling and whispering through the
shrubberies round the house; it had the scent in it of untimely violets,
mingled with a faint fragrance of the distant sea.
Above, the stars were shining brilliantly; below, the teeming city lay
silent in the lap of darkness, with a thousand lamplights sprinkled
over it. In the foreground he could dimly see the lines of gravelled
paths and grassy terraces, and the gleam of great bunches of pale
chrysanthemums swaying to and fro in the cool air.
"It is a splendid site," he said to himself; "but I think, if anything,
mine is better."
He stood for some time, looking away over the illuminated valley to the
milky streak on the horizon where in three or four hours the waters of
Port Philip Bay would shine; and then he sauntered down to the lodge,
and found his hansom waiting for him.
"Go up to my land there, will you?" said he, pointing his thumb over his
shoulder as he got in. "I'm going to set the men on soon, and I want to
have a look at it."
The driver, wondering whether he had had more champagne than usual,
said, "All right, Sir," and drove him the few dozen yards that
intervened between Mr. Hardy's gates and the place where his own were
designed to be.
In the darkness he clambered over the fence, made his way to the highest
ground in the enclosure, and stood once more to look at the
lamp-spangled city and the dim and distant bay.
"Yes," he said, "I am higher here. I shall get a better view." And he
began to build his house in fancy--to see it towering over all his
neighbours', with great white walls and colonnades, and myriad windows
full of lights, and lovely gardens full of flowers and fountains. "I
must begin at once," he said. "I must see the contractors to-morrow. I
must not put it off any longer, or I shall be an old man before I can
begin to enjoy it."
And after long musing over the details of his project, he stumbled back,
through saplings, and tussocks, and broken bottles, to the fence; tore
his dress-coat on a nail getting over it; and subsiding into his cab,
lit a cheroot, and stared intently into vacancy all the way to his club.
When he reached this bachelor's home he did not know what to do with
himself. He thought he would write to a celebrated firm of contractors
to make an appointment for the morning; but it was past twelve o'clock,
and the letters had been collected.
Some men called him to come and play loo, but he was not in the mood for
cards. He tried billiards, and found his hand unsteady; he went into the
smoking-room, but it was hot and noisy. He had always liked his club,
and maintained against all comers that it was a glorious institution;
but now he began to see that after all a middle-aged gentleman of ample
fortune might find himself pleasanter lodgings. He went out of doors,
where the air was so sweet and cool, rustling up and down an ivied wall,
and over a strip of lawn that lay deep in shadow below it; and looking
at the clear dark sky and the clear pale stars, he put to himself a
momentous question, for which he had a half-shaped answer ready:
"Who shall I ask to be the mistress of my house?"
CHAPTER IV.
THE ANSWER.
A girl of eighteen is popularly supposed to be grown up--to have all
wisdom and knowledge necessary for her guidance and protection through
the supreme difficulties of a woman's lot. When
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ocation. The grief of his mother, and the lectures of Brother Paul
finally put an end to it, and he thought no more of becoming a martyr.
He had suffered an irreparable loss during his sojourn at Caen. Mme. de
Bayard was dead; there was no longer any one to pour peace into that
restless and sombre nature. It became more and more true that "all his
sensations developed at once into passions," and more than ever he
sought a refuge from reality in dreams which his age made dangerous.
Eager for solitude, isolated in the midst of his companions, he became
absorbed in his visionary projects, and expended upon the phantoms of
his imagination the vague emotions that oppressed him.
He sustained another loss equally calamitous to him though for very
different reasons. His mother died while he was finishing his studies
at Rouen, and with her disappeared the peaceful joys and sunshine of
the home, and her son was astonished to discover that at the first
vacation he had no longer any wish to return there.
The thought was new and painful. The following year he went to Paris,
with the intention of becoming an engineer, and when he had been there
a year, he heard that his father had married again and was no longer to
be counted upon to help his sons. One of them was a sailor, the other a
soldier. Bernardin found himself alone in the streets of Paris, without
money, and almost without friends. His real education was about to
commence. He was twenty-three, good-looking, very impressionable, with
a delicate, keen imagination, courage, and unstable character.
Almost all his biographers have deplored the use he made of his time
up to the age of thirty and after. It is true that in the eyes of
prudent people, who approve of a regulated career with promotion at
stated intervals, his entrance into the world must appear absurd, even
reprehensible. No one could make a worse bungle of his future than he
did, his excuse is that it was not intentional. On the contrary, he
took great pains to seek appointments, and believed himself to be a
model employé. But instinct, stronger than reason, constantly drove
him from a line which was not his own. He has very happily expressed
in one of his works[2] the combat which takes place under such
circumstances in a highly-endowed mind.
He has just said that among animals, it is upon the innate and
permanent instinct of each species that depend their character, their
manners and, perhaps, even their expression. "The instincts of animals,
which are so varied," he continues, "seem to be distributed in each one
of us in the form of secret inward impulses which influence all our
lives. Our whole life consists in nothing else but their development,
and it is these impulses, when our reason is in conflict with them,
which inspire us with immovable constancy, and deliver us up among
our fellows to perpetual conflicts with others and with ourselves."
Bernardin de Saint-Pierre knew of these struggles with instinct by
his own experience. Thanks to them he was so fortunate as to succeed
in nothing for twelve years, and to be in the end obliged to abandon
himself in despair to those "secret inward impulses," which predestined
him to take up the pen. But prudent people have never forgiven him for
his inability to settle down, and they have suggested that his conduct
was detestable.
He entered the army with the greatest ease, owing, as it happened, to
a misunderstanding. They were just in the middle of the Seven Years'
War, and a great personage to whom Bernardin had applied mistook him
for somebody else and without any further investigation gave him a
commission in the Engineers. He went through the campaign of 1760,
fell out with his superior officers, and was dismissed. On his return
to France, having been to see his father, his stepmother made him feel
that he was not wanted, and he returned to Paris as destitute and
lonely as it is possible to be. Youth takes these things to heart, and
by reason of them bears a grudge against the world and life.
The following year he succeeded in being sent to Malta, quarrelled with
his superiors and with his comrades, and was shelved. From his return
from Malta we may date the first of the innumerable memorials he wrote
upon all subjects--administrative, political, commercial, military,
moral, scientific, educational, philanthropic, and utopian--with which
he never ceased from that time to overwhelm the ministers and their
offices, his friends and protectors; in fact, the whole universe, and
which made many people look upon him as a plague. One cannot with
impunity undertake to be a reformer and to make the happiness of the
human race Bernardin was eager to point out to men in office the
mistakes and faults in their administration, and to suggest innovations
in the interests of the public good, and he was unaffectedly astonished
at their ingratitude. He claimed recompense for his good advice, and
received no answer; he insisted, got angry, and ended by exasperating
the most kindly disposed, even his old friend Hennin, Chief Clerk in
the Foreign Office, who was obliged to write to him one day: "You
deceive yourself sir, the King owes you nothing, because you have
not acted by his orders. Your memorials, however useful they may be,
do not in the least entitle you to ask favours from the King as a
matter of right." Such lessons, only too well deserved, irritated
the simple-minded petitioner, who had struck out the forgiveness of
injuries from amongst the duties of philanthropy. "I have always needed
the courage," he said, "to forgive an insult, do what I will the scar
remains, unless the occasion arises for returning good for evil;
for any one under an obligation to me is as sacred in my sight as a
benefactor." In the midst of his self-torment he began again, and his
affairs went from bad to worse.
Meanwhile he had to live. In the ministry they gave him no hope
whatever of being restored to his rank. He had written to all his
relations to ask for help, and had received nothing but refusals. He
had given lessons in mathematics and lost his pupils. The baker refused
to give him credit any longer, and his landlady threatened to turn him
out of doors. There was no other resource left to him but to found his
kingdom, which, upon reflection, he had converted into a republic. It
was to this that he devoted himself without further delay.
He no longer thought it essential that it should be an island; any
desert would suffice, provided it had a fertile soil and a good
climate. He fixed his choice upon the shores of the Sea of Aral, and
at once set about his preparations for departure; which consisted in
taking his books to the second-hand bookseller, and his clothes to the
old-clothes man, and in borrowing right and left a few crowns. He thus
scraped together a few sovereigns, and took the diligence to Brussels,
whence be counted on reaching Russia and the Sea of Aral. Why Russia?
Why the Sea of Aral? He has given his reasons in a pamphlet, in which
he goes back to the Scythian migration, to Odin and Cornelius Nepos,
and which explains nothing, unless it is that Bernardin de Saint-Pierre
became almost a visionary when his hobby was in question. Here are
the reasons which he gives for his choice: "If there were some place
upon earth, under a bright sky, where one could find at one and the
same time, honour, riches, and society, all due to the security of
possession, that place would soon be filled with inhabitants. _This
happy country is to be found on the east coast of the Caspian Sea_;
but the Tartars who inhabit it have only made of it a desert." That
is all. On the other hand, a note at the bottom of the page shows us
where the future legislator had sought his models, reserving to himself
the liberty to improve upon them. "The English peopled Pennsylvania
with no other invitation than this: _He who shall here plant a tree
shall gather the fruits thereof. That is the whole spirit of the law._"
This note was the reply to a famous apostrophe in the _Discours sur
l'inégalité_ of J. J. Rousseau.
"The first man who, having enclosed a territory, ventured to say _this
is mine_, and who found people simple enough to believe him, was the
real founder of civil society. How many crimes, wars, murders, miseries
and horrors, would he not have spared the human race who should have
pulled up the stakes, filled in the ditch, and cried to his fellows,
'Beware of listening to this impostor; _you are lost if you forget that
the fruits of the earth are for all, and that the earth belongs to no
man_.'"
One might point out other disagreements between the _Discours sur
l'inégalité_ and the pamphlet upon the colony of the Sea of Aral, but
they all bear upon questions of detail. Jean Jacques and Bernardin
agree at bottom as to the end to aim at and the path to follow. Young
Saint-Pierre was already and for ever a disciple of Rousseau. He
steeped himself in his philosophy, in anticipation of the day when he
was to come to him for lessons in sentiment. Master and pupil both
believed that our ills come from society. Nature arranged everything
for our happiness, and man was good; if we are wicked and unhappy the
fault is in ourselves, who have provoked the evil by disregarding her
laws. One can easily see the consequences of these misanthropical
views. As we have been the authors of our own unhappiness and know
where we have been mistaken, there is certainly a remedy. It rests
with us to overcome most of our sufferings by reforming society, and
changing our laws and our morality. Humanity only needs a clear-sighted
and courageous guide, who would dare to fling in its face its follies
and cruelties--who would bring it back into the right path. Rousseau
was this guide in words and on paper; Saint-Pierre wished to become the
same in deed and in fact. He purposed to put into practice what his
century was dreaming of, and that is why he set out one fine night for
a fabulous country. One may maintain that he could have found other and
more useful ways of employing his time, but, at least, his way was not
commonplace or egotistical.
He travelled as an apostle, solely occupied with his mission, trusting
to Providence to bring him with his 150 francs to the feet of Peter
III.; for it was from the Emperor of Russia that he meant to ask
help and protection to found his ideal republic, by which should be
demonstrated the vast inferiority of monarchies. He never doubted but
that the Czar would share his zeal, then why disturb himself about the
means of accomplishing his design? Had he not in old times travelled
with brother Paul without money and without thought for the morrow? Had
he come to any harm from it? What people gave to the mendicant friar
for the love of God, they would give to him for the love of humanity.
And so it turned out. He arrived in Russia after having spent his last
crown at the Hague. His journey had been a perpetual miracle. One lent
him money, another lodged him, a third introduced him to others because
of his good looks. At Amsterdam they even offered him a situation
and a wife, which he did not think it right to accept because of his
republic. He felt that he owed a duty to his people.
He landed at St. Petersburg with six francs in his pocket, and the
miracle continued. He did not dine every day, thank heaven! or the
romance would have had no further interest. But on the eve of dying
of hunger he always encountered some generous person who, like his
godmother, thought him interesting. He must indeed have been charming,
this fine young fellow, full of fire and good faith, starting out from
his garret to regenerate the world. So much so indeed that, passed on
from one to another, from introduction to introduction, he arrived at
last in the train of a general at Moscow, where the court then was,
received a commission as sub-lieutenant of Engineers, and replaced the
clothes sold to the old-clothes man in Paris by a brilliant uniform.
When his new friends saw him in his scarlet coat with black facings,
his fawn-coloured waistcoat, his white silk stockings, his beautiful
plume, and his glittering sword, they foretold a great fortune for him.
One of them called him _cousin_, and offered to present him to the
Empress Catherine, whom the Revolution of 1762 had just placed upon
the throne. Bernardin de Saint-Pierre was transported with joy at this
proposal. It was only four months since he had quitted France, and he
already neared his goal. Providence evidently watched over his republic.
What remained for him to do appeared mere child's play after what he
had accomplished. His pamphlet upon his projected colony was ready--it
was the same from which we have quoted some fragments above--and it was
not too ill-conceived. In it the author spoke little of the happiness
of peoples, and much of the utility to Russia of securing a route to
the Indies. The settlement which he proposed to found on the Sea of
Aral lost under his pen its doubtful character as a philosophical
and humanitarian enterprise, to take on the innocent aspect of a
military colony intended to keep the Tartars in check, and to serve as
an emporium for merchandise from India. In fact he thought he ought
to support it with a speech, which he composed, his Plutarch in his
hand, and in which he celebrated "the happiness of kings who establish
republics." But this speech had no unpleasant consequences as we shall
see presently.
On the day appointed for the audience he put his pamphlet in his
pocket, glanced over his speech, and followed his guide to the palace.
They entered a magnificent gallery, full of great nobles glittering
with gold and precious stones, who inspired our young enthusiast on
the spot with keen repugnance. There they were those vile slaves of
monarchy, whose lying tongues knew no other language than that of
flattery! What would be their surprise, what their attitude, on hearing
a free man speak boldly of freedom to their sovereign? All at once the
door was thrown open with a loud noise, the Empress appeared, every one
was silent and remained motionless. The grand master of the ceremonies
presented M. de Saint-Pierre, who kissed her hand, and forgot his
pamphlet, his speech imitated from Plutarch, his republic, all mankind,
and only remembered how to reply gallantly to the great lady who
deigned to smile upon his youth and his beautiful blue eyes.
And thus was buried for ever the project of a colony by the Sea of
Aral. The author took it the next morning to the favourite of the
day, Prince Orloff, and explained its advantages to him without being
able to inspire him with the least interest. The Prince indeed seemed
relieved when they came to tell him that the Empress was asking for
him. "He waited upon her at once in his slippers and dressing-gown, and
left M. de Saint-Pierre profoundly distressed and in a mood to write
a satire against favourites."[3] He returned, intensely discomfited,
to his room at the inn, and took up the education of his manservant
while awaiting another opportunity of founding his ideal republic.
His servant was a poor devil of a moujik, who had been kidnapped from
his family and made a soldier, and who would sing, with tears in his
eyes, sweet and melancholy folk songs. He would put his master's shoes
into a bucket of water to clean them, only taking them out when they
were wanted. Bernardin de Saint-Pierre, having taught him how to brush
a coat, he was ready to throw himself at his feet and adore him as a
superior being.
Meanwhile his master remained inconsolable at having by his own fault
failed to accomplish the happiness of mankind. Russia had lost its
attraction, he now only saw in it matter for disgust and anger, and he
was angry with himself for having come so far simply to contemplate
"slaves" and "victims." His profession bored him. He had addressed to
the Russian government several memorials upon the military position and
means of defence of Finland, whither his duties as officer of Engineers
had called him, and his labours had met with no better fortune there
than in France; nobody paid any attention to it. Anger grew upon him,
then bitterness, and he seized upon the first pretext to send in his
resignation, and cross the frontier in order to seek elsewhere a "land
of liberty" where the antique virtues still lived. A happy inspiration
induced him with this idea to follow the road through Poland where
the people were at that time the most oppressed and most miserable in
Europe. At sight of Warsaw "he felt in his heart all the virtues of a
republican hero."
They did not remain with him long; other and more tender interests
were soon to replace them. Warsaw is the scene of the romance of his
youth, the adventure that his imagination as time went on turned into
a devouring passion, which he ended in believing in himself, and which
his biographers have related sometimes with virtuous indignation,
accusing him of having lived for more than a year at the expense of a
woman, sometimes with the respect due to great sufferings and unmerited
misfortunes. Unhappily or happily, some letters of his, published for
the first time thirty years ago,[4] show him to have been at once less
culpable and less worthy of compassion. These letters are addressed to
a friend in Russia, M. Duval, a Genevese merchant established at St.
Petersburg. In them Saint-Pierre speaks of his love affairs with the
indiscretion of youth and the vanity of a bourgeois anxious to announce
to the world that he has made a conquest of a princess. It is amusing
to compare this sincere report, confirmed by the _Correspondence_
published in his complete works,[5] with the official story no less
sincere, which the hero of the adventure liked to circulate in his old
age.
He arrived at Warsaw on the 17th of June, 1764, and was at once
received into the houses of several of the nobility. Some weeks passed
in festivities, which gave him more just views upon the subject of
Polish austerity, and the antique virtues of the country, and he very
soon wished to leave. On the 28th of July he wrote to his friend
Hennin: "You think my position here agreeable, so it appears from afar,
but if you only knew how empty is the world in which I wander; if you
knew how much these dances and grand repasts stupefy without amusing
me!" He then begs M. Hennin to use his interest for him at Versailles,
and to obtain for him a mission to Turkey, "the finest country in the
world as he has been told."
On the 20th of August there is another letter to M. Hennin, in which
he shows that he is more and more impatient to leave Poland: "If
nothing keeps me here I shall leave in the beginning of the month of
September for... Vienna, for I am tired of so much idleness, of which
the least evil is that I am growing accustomed to an indolent life."
This is certainly not the language of a man desperately in love, whose
heart would be broken if one tore him away from the spot where his
divinity breathed. But if we believe the legend, that was, however,
the moment in which Bernardin de Saint-Pierre surpassed the passion of
Saint-Preux, and lived the life of _The Modern Heloïse_, because it
was his fate to realise all that Rousseau had been content to write
about, as well in his romances as in his plans of social reform. This
is briefly what the legend tells us.
Among the persons who had thrown open their doors to him at Warsaw,
was a young princess named Marie Miesnik, remarkable for "her love
of virtue." We see that this is exactly the starting-point of _The
Modern Heloïse_, a plebeian falls in love with a patrician. "From the
first day," says Aimé Martin, "M. de Saint-Pierre felt the double
ascendancy of her genius and her beauty, and she became at once the
sole thought of his life." On her side the Julia of Poland did not
remain insensible. We pass over the emotions which filled and lacerated
their souls to the day blessed and fatal, when overtaken by a storm
in a lonely forest, they repeated the scene of the groves of Clarens,
adding thereto recollections of Dido's grotto. "She gave herself up
like Julia, and he was delirious with joy like Saint-Preux," continues
Aimé Martin, whose phrase proves how much the resemblance with _The
Modern Heloïse_ was part of the tradition. Long intoxication followed
these first raptures. _More than a year passed in forgetfulness of the
whole world_, but Princess Marie's family began, like Julia's, to be
irritated with the insolence of this plebeian who dared to make love to
a Miesnik, and the end of it was an order to depart, given by the lady
to her lover, like Rousseau again, and which was obeyed with the same
passionate lamentations.
That is what time and a little good-will made of the adventure of
Warsaw. Now for history.
We have seen just now that nothing bound Bernardin de Saint-Pierre
to Warsaw on the 20th of August, 1764. Fifteen days after, the 5th
of September, he writes to M. Duval at St. Petersburg: "I must tell
you, my dear friend, for I hide nothing from you, that I have formed
an attachment here which almost deserves to be called a passion. It
has had a good effect in that it has cured me of my humours. Love is
therefore a good remedy to recommend to you above all, love gratified.
I have had such a pleasant experience of it, that I impart it to you
as an infallible secret, which will be as useful to you as to me. My
hypochondria is almost cured.
"I might flatter my self-love by naming to you the object of my
passion, but you know I have more delicacy than vanity. I have then
found all that could attach me, graces without number, wit enough, and
reciprocal affection.
"Another time you shall know more, but be persuaded that with me love
does no wrong to friendship."
We are a long way from the genius, the intoxicating beauty, the
unheard-of delights. A young man, full of worries, finds distraction
and amuses himself with a lovely young lady who has "enough wit," and
who is not unkind to him. He is really in love with her, but in a
quite reasonable manner, for he writes the same day to Hennin, then at
Vienna, that the approach of the bad weather obliges him to make up his
mind, and that he will delay no longer in leaving Warsaw. In fact, on
the 26th of September he announces his departure to Duval in a letter
of which I give the essential passages:
"My very worthy friend, the offers which you make me, the interest
which you take in me, your tender attentions, are in my heart subjects
of everlasting attachment. I do not know what Heaven has in store for
me, but it has never before poured so much joy into my soul. It was
something to have given me a friend, love has left me nothing further
to desire; it is into your bosom that I pour out my happiness.
"I will not give you the name of the person who after you holds the
first place in my heart. Her rank is high above mine, her beauty not
extraordinary, but her graces and her wit merit all the homage which
I was not able to deny to them. I have received help from her which
prevents me from actually accepting your offers. It was pressed upon me
so tenderly, that I could not help giving it the preference. I beg you
to forgive me for it. I have accepted from her about the value of the
sum you offered me....
... "I am spending part of the night in writing to you. I start
to-morrow, and my trunks are not yet ready."
One is sorry to learn that he had accepted money from his Princess.
His excuse, if there were one for that sort of thing, will be found in
the letter of _The Modern Heloïse_, where Julia persuades her lover,
by means of eloquent invective, to receive money for a journey. "So I
offend your honour for which I would a thousand times give my life?
I offend thine honour, ungrateful one! who hast found me ready to
abandon mine to thee. Where is then this honour which I offend, tell
me, grovelling heart, soul without delicacy! Ah! how contemptible art
thou if thou hast but one honour of which Julia does not know," &c.
Saint-Preux had submitted to this torrent. Bernardin de Saint-Pierre
imitated his model in this also. See where literary loves lead one.
He left Warsaw on the 27th of September, after remaining there three
months and some days. Three months in which to meet, to love, to part,
was really the least one could allow. Certainly there was an epilogue,
but how transitory!
He had gone to rejoin M. Hennin at Vienna, where he received a letter
from the Princess M., who had thought proper to depict for him the
sufferings of absence. With his ordinary ingenuousness he took her at
her word, got into a carriage, returned to Warsaw unannounced, arrived
in the midst of a reception, was received with fiery glances and
insulting words, would take no denial, and after the departure of the
guests, wrested his pardon then and there. The next day when he awoke,
they gave him the following note:
"Your passion is a fury which I can no longer endure. Return to your
senses. Think of your position and your duties. I am just starting, I
am going to rejoin my mother in the Palatinate of X. I shall not return
until I hear that you are no longer here, and you will receive no
letters from me until such time as I can address them to you to France.
Marie M--."
She had in fact departed. Bernardin de Saint-Pierre felt outraged, and
never saw her again.
He returned to his vagrant excursions through Dresden, Berlin, and
Paris, to Havre, where he found only his old nurse. His father was
dead, his sister in a convent, his brothers far away. "Ah! sir," said
the good woman, upsetting her spinning-wheel in her emotion, "the times
are indeed changed. There is no one here to receive you but me!" She
invited him to dine in her bare lodging, beside her bed of straw, and
served up an omelet and a pitcher of cider. Then she opened her trunk,
and took out a chipped glass, which she placed gently beside her guest,
saying, "It was your mother's." They wept together, and then they
talked over the news of the country, of Brother Paul, who was dead, of
those who had left the town, of those who had made their fortunes. They
spoke also of Russia, of what they drank there, and of the price they
paid for bread. Above all things they talked of the happy times when
old Marie used to do up the children's hair in starched curl-papers,
admired their nonsense, and with her own money bought the class books
lost by Bernardin, so as to save him from a scolding. They wept
together again, kissed each other, and the young adventurer set out
once more, less discontented with humanity than usual. He was also less
satisfied with himself, after the lesson of resignation which he had
received from this poor old woman, who lived upon three pence a day,
and praised God for taking care of her.
Returned to Paris he again overwhelmed the ministers of the king,
Louis XV., with memorials which no one wanted, with complaints and
petitions. He continued to invent schemes on all sorts of subjects, and
to cover scraps of paper with a thousand scattered ideas. M. Hennin,
clearly discerning where his talent lay, persuaded him to write his
travels, but the time was not yet come, and the fragments of this
date which have been preserved to us contain nothing but information
upon political, commercial, and agricultural subjects. Bernardin de
Saint-Pierre himself felt that it was too soon. Announcing one day
to Hennin that he had conceived a new idea about the movement of the
earth, he added:
"You can see by that, that I grapple with everything, and that I leave
floating here and there threads, like the spider, until I can weave my
web....
"Give me time to lick my cub. Time, which ripens my intellect, will
make the fruits thereof more worthy of you." (Letter of the 9th of
July, 1767).
He had a sort of instinct that all those Northern scenes which he had
passed through were of no use to him. He tried to find employment in
the countries of the sun--in the East or West Indies--without knowing
himself why there more than anywhere else. It was the exotic that
sought him, and it came to him in a most unexpected manner in the
autumn of 1767.
It is hardly necessary to say that whoever knew him knew his project
of an ideal republic. To whom had he not mentioned it? He had never
ceased to believe in it--to be sure that people would come to it,
one day or another; but his ill-luck at Moscow had made his belief
less confident and less active. He resigned himself to await until
Humanity should call upon him to help it. Great then was his joy when
one of his patrons announced to him in confidence one fine day that
the French government, converted to his ideas, was going to send him
to Madagascar, under the command of a certain person from the Isle of
France, to found the colony of his dreams, and to attach the island to
France by "the power of wisdom" and "the example of happiness." There
was certainly some surprise mixed with his delight, but not sufficient
to make him ask himself whether his protector wished merely to get rid
of him, or for what reason an expedition entrusted solely to himself
had for leader a planter from the Isle of France. He only thought of
his preparations for his great enterprise.
His first care was to re-read Plato and Plutarch, and to determine the
legislation of his colony. He remained faithful to his first idea of a
state entirely free, under the control completely absolute, arbitrary,
and irresponsible, of M. de Saint-Pierre. Some one, of course, would
have to compel the people to be "subject only to virtue." That was the
system put in force later by the Jacobins.
He next drew out the plan of his chief town, and employed the small
inheritance which came to him from his father, in buying scientific
instruments and works upon politics, the navy, and natural history.
The expedition was to embark at Lorient. He hastened to rejoin it,
and was at first disappointed with its composition, for instead of
artisans and agriculturalists, the Commander-in-chief had collected
secretaries, valets, cooks, and a small troupe of comedians of both
sexes. However, Saint-Pierre took heart at once on learning that the
Commander-in-chief had amongst his luggage all the volumes that had
yet appeared of the _Encyclopædia_. He was, therefore, in spite of
all, "a true philosopher," and things were pretty evenly balanced. The
_Encyclopædia_ took the place of the artisans, and made the actresses
pass muster. Take note that Bernardin de Saint-Pierre always reproached
his contemporaries, especially the encyclopædists, with being mere
visionaries, destitute of practical sense. He flattered himself that he
was the practical man in this world of Utopians, but at the same time
he looked upon their work as a sort of supernatural book. Such is the
power of opinion.
The expedition set sail under the most promising auspices, but once on
the open sea, the Commander wished to bring Bernardin de Saint-Pierre
to a more reasonable view of the situation, and explained to him that
he had never had any other design than to sell his subjects. I leave to
the imagination the effects of this thunderclap. They were taking him
to join them in the slave trade of the people of Madagascar! The horror
of such a thought increasing the shame of having been duped, voyage,
companions, projects for the future, and the very name of Madagascar,
all became odious to him on the spot. His ship touched at the Isle
of France. He hastened to disembark, took a situation as engineer,
and left his Commander to go on alone to Madagascar, where, it may be
remarked by the way, the expedition perished of fever. For himself,
discouraged and justly embittered, he lived in a lonely little cottage
from which he could see nothing but the sea, arid plains, and forests.
Seated in front of his one window, he spent long hours in letting
his gaze wander aimlessly. Or, perhaps, a melancholy pedestrian, he
wandered about on the shore, in the mountains, in the depths of those
tropical forests which we picture to ourselves as so beautiful, and
which he found so sad, because nothing there recalled to him the
pleasant scenes of his own country, and because he saw the Isle of
France under such gloomy auspices.
"There is not a flower," he wrote, "in the meadows, which, moreover,
are strewn with stones, and full of an herb as tough as hemp; no
flowering plant with a pleasant scent. Among all the shrubs not
one worth our hawthorn. The wild vines have none of the charms of
honeysuckle or ground ivy. There are no violets in the woods, and as to
the trees, they are great trunks, grey and bare, with a small tuft of
leaves of a dull green. These wild regions have never rejoiced in the
songs of birds or the loves of any peaceable animal. Sometimes one's
ear is offended by the shrieks of the parroquet, or the strident cries
of the mischievous monkey."[6]
His melancholy lasted throughout his stay and was good for him: "One
enjoys agreeable things," he said afterwards, "and the sad ones make
one reflect." That was the lesson which the Isle of France had given
to him. He had been there much thrown back upon himself, and he had
gained at last a glimpse of the right road. Instead of continuing to
cram his notes of travel with technical details, good at most to adorn
his memorials to the ministers, he had set himself to note down what
he observed from his window, or during his walks. He made a note of
the lines and forms of the landscape, of its general appearance, the
formation of the ground, the structure of the rocks, the outlines of
the trees and plants. He observed their colours, their most subtle
shades, their variations according to the weather or time of day, their
smallest details, such as the red fissure on a grey stone, or the white
underside of a green leaf. He notes the sounds of his solitude, the
particular sound of the wind on a certain day in a certain place, the
murmur belonging to each kind of tree, the rhythm of a flight of birds,
the imperceptible rustling of a leaf moved by an insect. He noted the
movements of inanimate nature, the waving of the grass, the parts of a
circle described by the force of the wind in the tree tops, the swaying
of a leaf upon which a bird had perched itself, the flowing of the
streams, the tossing of the sea, the pace of the clouds.[7]
Sometimes he drew, and his sketches were only another form of notes.
During the crossing, while full of acute sorrow, he had drawn
numberless clouds. He studied their forms, their colour, their
foreground and background, their combinations, by themselves or
with the sea, the play of light upon them, with the attention and
conscientiousness of a painter of to-day, exacting in the matter of
truth.
This rage for taking notes seems a simple
|
said, "you have been helped." I had a little flagstaff in
front of the house and a red flag with the Union Jack in the corner. Every
night I pulled my flag down and folded it up and laid it on a shelf in my
bedroom, and one morning before breakfast I found it, though I knew I had
folded it up the night before, knotted round the bottom of the flagstaff
so that it was touching the grass. I must have heard the servants talking
of the faeries for I concluded at once that a faery had tied those four
knots and from that on believed that one had whispered in my ear. I have
been told, though I do not remember it myself, that I saw, whether once or
many times I do not know, a supernatural bird in the corner of the room.
Once too I was driving with my grandmother a little after dark close to
the Channel that runs for some five miles from Sligo to the sea, and my
grandmother showed me the red light of an outward-bound steamer and told
me that my grandfather was on board, and that night in my sleep I screamed
out and described the steamer's wreck. The next morning my grandfather
arrived on a blind horse found for him by grateful passengers. He had, as
I remember the story, been asleep when the captain aroused him to say they
were going on the rocks. He said, "have you tried sail on her?" and
judging from some answer that the captain was demoralised took over the
command and, when the ship could not be saved, got the crew and passengers
into the boats. His own boat was upset and he saved himself and some
others by swimming; some women had drifted ashore, buoyed up by their
crinolines. "I was not so much afraid of the sea as of that terrible man
with his oar," was the comment of a schoolmaster who was among the
survivors. Eight men were, however, drowned and my grandfather suffered
from that memory at intervals all his life, and if asked to read family
prayers never read anything but the shipwreck of St. Paul.
I remember the dogs more clearly than anyone except my grandfather and
grandmother. The black hairy one had no tail because it had been sliced
off, if I was told the truth, by a railway train. I think I followed at
their heels more than they did at mine, and that their journeys ended at a
rabbit-warren behind the garden; and sometimes they had savage fights, the
black hairy dog, being well protected by its hair, suffering least. I can
remember one so savage that the white dog would not take his teeth out of
the black dog's hair till the coachman hung them over the side of a
water-butt, one outside and one in the water. My grandmother once told the
coachman to cut the hair like a lion's hair and, after a long consultation
with the stable-boy, he cut it all over the head and shoulders and left
it on the lower part of the body. The dog disappeared for a few days and I
did not doubt that its heart was broken. There was a large garden behind
the house full of apple-trees with flower-beds and grass-plots in the
centre and two figure-heads of ships, one among the strawberry plants
under a wall covered with fruit trees and one among the flowers. The one
among the flowers was a white lady in flowing robes, while the other, a
stalwart man in uniform, had been taken from a three-masted ship of my
grandfather's called "The Russia," and there was a belief among the
servants that the stalwart man represented the Tsar and had been presented
by the Tsar himself. The avenue, or as they say in England the drive, that
went from the hall door through a clump of big trees to an insignificant
gate and a road bordered by broken and dirty cottages, was but two or
three hundred yards, and I often thought it should have been made to wind
more, for I judged people's social importance mainly by the length of
their avenues. This idea may have come from the stable-boy, for he was my
principal friend. He had a book of Orange rhymes, and the days when we
read them together in the hay-loft gave me the pleasure of rhyme for the
first time. Later on I can remember being told, when there was a rumour
of a Fenian rising, that rifles had been served out to the Orangemen and
presently, when I had begun to dream of my future life, I thought I would
like to die fighting the Fenians. I was to build a very fast and beautiful
ship and to have under my command a company of young men who were always
to be in training like athletes and so become as brave and handsome as the
young men in the story-books, and there was to be a big battle on the
sea-shore near Rosses and I was to be killed. I collected little pieces of
wood and piled them up in a corner of the yard, and there was an old
rotten log in a distant field I often went to look at because I thought it
would go a long way in the making of the ship. All my dreams were of
ships; and one day a sea captain who had come to dine with my grandfather
put a hand on each side of my head and lifted me up to show me Africa, and
another day a sea captain pointed to the smoke from the Pern mill on the
quays rising up beyond the trees of the lawn, as though it came from the
mountain, and asked me if Ben Bulben was a burning mountain.
Once every few months I used to go to Rosses Point or Ballisodare to see
another little boy, who had a piebald pony that had once been in a circus
and sometimes forgot where it was and went round and round. He was George
Middleton, son of my great-uncle William Middleton. Old Middleton had
bought land, then believed a safe investment, at Ballisodare and at
Rosses, and spent the winter at Ballisodare and the summer at Rosses. The
Middleton and Pollexfen flour mills were at Ballisodare, and a great
salmon weir, rapids and a waterfall, but it was more often at Rosses that
I saw my cousin. We rowed in the river mouth or were taken sailing in a
heavy slow schooner yacht or in a big ship's boat that had been rigged and
decked. There were great cellars under the house, for it had been a
smuggler's house a hundred years before, and sometimes three loud raps
would come upon the drawing room window at sun-down, setting all the dogs
barking, some dead smuggler giving his accustomed signal. One night I
heard them very distinctly and my cousins often heard them, and later on
my sister. A pilot had told me that, after dreaming three times of a
treasure buried in my uncle's garden, he had climbed the wall in the
middle of the night and begun to dig but grew disheartened "because there
was so much earth." I told somebody what he had said and was told that it
was well he did not find it for it was guarded by a spirit that looked
like a flat iron. At Ballisodare there was a cleft among the rocks that I
passed with terror because I believed that a murderous monster lived
there that made a buzzing sound like a bee.
It was through the Middletons perhaps that I got my interest in country
stories and certainly the first faery stories that I heard were in the
cottages about their houses. The Middletons took the nearest for friends
and were always in and out of the cottages of pilots and of tenants. They
were practical, always doing something with their hands, making boats,
feeding chickens, and without ambition. One of them had designed a steamer
many years before my birth and long after I had grown to manhood one could
hear it--it had some sort of obsolete engine--many miles off wheezing in
the Channel like an asthmatic person. It had been built on the lake and
dragged through the town by many horses, stopping before the windows where
my mother was learning her lessons, and plunging the whole school into
candle-light for five days, and was still patched and repatched mainly
because it was believed to be a bringer of good luck. It had been called
after the betrothed of its builder "Janet," long corrupted into the more
familiar "Jennet," and the betrothed died in my youth having passed her
eightieth year and been her husband's plague because of the violence of
her temper. Another who was but a year or two older than myself used to
shock me by running after hens to know by their feel if they were on the
point of dropping an egg. They let their houses decay and the glass fall
from the windows of their greenhouses, but one among them at any rate had
the second sight. They were liked but had not the pride and reserve, the
sense of decorum and order, the instinctive playing before themselves that
belongs to those who strike the popular imagination.
Sometimes my grandmother would bring me to see some old Sligo gentlewoman
whose garden ran down to the river, ending there in a low wall full of
wallflowers, and I would sit up upon my chair, very bored, while my elders
ate their seed-cake and drank their sherry. My walks with the servants
were more interesting; sometimes we would pass a little fat girl and a
servant persuaded me to write her a love-letter, and the next time she
passed she put her tongue out. But it was the servant's stories that
interested me. At such and such a corner a man had got a shilling from a
drill sergeant by standing in a barrel and had then rolled out of it and
shown his crippled legs. And in such and such a house an old woman had hid
herself under the bed of her guests, an officer and his wife, and on
hearing them abuse her, beaten them with a broomstick. All the well-known
families had their grotesque or tragic or romantic legends, and I often
said to myself how terrible it would be to go away and die where nobody
would know my story. Years afterwards, when I was ten or twelve years old
and in London, I would remember Sligo with tears, and when I began to
write, it was there I hoped to find my audience. Next to Merville where I
lived, was another tree-surrounded house where I sometimes went to see a
little boy who stayed there occasionally with his grandmother, whose name
I forget and who seemed to me kind and friendly, though when I went to see
her in my thirteenth or fourteenth year I discovered that she only cared
for very little boys. When the visitors called I hid in the hay-loft and
lay hidden behind the great heap of hay while a servant was calling my
name in the yard.
I do not know how old I was (for all these events seem at the same
distance) when I was made drunk. I had been out yachting with an uncle and
my cousins and it had come on very rough. I had lain on deck between the
mast and the bowsprit and a wave had burst over me and I had seen green
water over my head. I was very proud and very wet. When we got into Rosses
again, I was dressed up in an older boy's clothes so that the trousers
came down below my boots and a pilot gave me a little raw whiskey. I drove
home with the uncle on an outside car and was so pleased with the strange
state in which I found myself that for all my uncle could do, I cried to
every passer-by that I was drunk, and went on crying it through the town
and everywhere until I was put to bed by my grandmother and given
something to drink that tasted of black currants and so fell asleep.
III
Some six miles off towards Ben Bulben and beyond the Channel, as we call
the tidal river between Sligo and the Rosses, and on top of a hill there
was a little square two-storeyed house covered with creepers and looking
out upon a garden where the box borders were larger than any I had ever
seen, and where I saw for the first time the crimson streak of the
gladiolus and awaited its blossom with excitement. Under one gable a dark
thicket of small trees made a shut-in mysterious place, where one played
and believed that something was going to happen. My great-aunt Micky lived
there. Micky was not her right name for she was Mary Yeats and her father
had been my great-grandfather, John Yeats, who had been Rector of
Drumcliffe, a few miles further off, and died in 1847. She was a spare,
high-coloured, elderly woman and had the oldest looking cat I had ever
seen, for its hair had grown into matted locks of yellowy white. She
farmed and had one old man-servant, but could not have farmed at all, had
not neighbouring farmers helped to gather in the crops, in return for the
loan of her farm implements and "out of respect for the family," for as
Johnny MacGurk, the Sligo barber said to me, "the Yeats's were always very
respectable." She was full of family history; all her dinner knives were
pointed like daggers through much cleaning, and there was a little James
the First cream-jug with the Yeats motto and crest, and on her dining-room
mantle-piece a beautiful silver cup that had belonged to my
great-great-grandfather, who had married a certain Mary Butler. It had
upon it the Butler crest and had been already old at the date 1534, when
the initials of some bride and bridegroom were engraved under the lip. All
its history for generations was rolled up inside it upon a piece of paper
yellow with age, until some caller took the paper to light his pipe.
Another family of Yeats, a widow and her two children on whom I called
sometimes with my grandmother, lived near in a long low cottage, and owned
a very fierce turkeycock that did battle with their visitors; and some
miles away lived the secretary to the Grand Jury and Land Agent, my
great-uncle Mat Yeats and his big family of boys and girls; but I think
it was only in later years that I came to know them well. I do not think
any of these liked the Pollexfens, who were well off and seemed to them
purse-proud, whereas they themselves had come down in the world. I
remember them as very well-bred and very religious in the Evangelical way
and thinking a good deal of Aunt Micky's old histories. There had been
among our ancestors a Kings County soldier, one of Marlborough's generals,
and when his nephew came to dine he gave him boiled pork, and when the
nephew said he disliked boiled pork he had asked him to dine again and
promised him something he would like better. However, he gave him boiled
pork again and the nephew took the hint in silence. The other day as I was
coming home from America, I met one of his descendants whose family has
not another discoverable link with ours, and he too knew the boiled pork
story and nothing else. We have the General's portrait, and he looks very
fine in his armour and his long curly wig, and underneath it, after his
name, are many honours that have left no tradition among us. Were we
country people, we could have summarised his life in a legend.
Another ancestor or great-uncle had chased the United Irishmen for a
fortnight, fallen into their hands and been hanged, and the notorious
Major Sirr who betrayed the brothers Shears, taking their children upon
his knees to question them, if the tale does not lie, had been god-father
to several of my great-great-grandfather's children; while to make a
balance, my great-grandfather had been Robert Emmett's friend and been
suspected and imprisoned though but for a few hours. A great-uncle had
been Governor of Penang, and led the forlorn hope at the taking of
Rangoon, and an uncle of a still older generation had fallen at New
Orleans in 1813, and even in the last generation there had been lives of
some power and pleasure. An old man who had entertained many famous
people, in his 18th century house, where battlement and tower showed the
influence of Horace Walpole, had but lately, after losing all his money,
drowned himself, first taking off his rings and chain and watch as became
a collector of many beautiful things; and once to remind us of more
passionate life, a gun-boat put into Rosses, commanded by the illegitimate
son of some great-uncle or other. Now that I can look at their miniatures,
turning them over to find the name of soldier, or lawyer, or Castle
official, and wondering if they cared for good books or good music, I am
delighted with all that joins my life to those who had power in Ireland or
with those anywhere that were good servants and poor bargainers, but I
cared nothing as a child for Micky's tales. I could see my grandfather's
ships come up the bay or the river, and his sailors treated me with
deference, and a ship's carpenter made and mended my toy boats and I
thought that nobody could be so important as my grandfather. Perhaps, too,
it is only now that I can value those more gentle natures so unlike his
passion and violence. An old Sligo priest has told me how my
great-grandfather John Yeats always went into his kitchen rattling the
keys, so much did he fear finding some one doing wrong, and how when the
agent of the great landowner of his parish brought him from cottage to
cottage to bid the women send their children to the Protestant school and
all had promised till they came to one who cried, "child of mine will
never darken your door," he had said "thank you, my woman, you are the
first honest woman I have met to-day." My uncle, Mat Yeats, the Land
Agent, had once waited up every night for a week to catch some boys who
stole his apples and when he caught them had given them sixpence and told
them not to do it again. Perhaps it is only fancy or the softening touch
of the miniaturist that makes me discover in their faces some courtesy and
much gentleness. Two 18th century faces interest me the most, one that of
a great-great-grandfather, for both have under their powdered curling wigs
a half-feminine charm, and as I look at them I discover a something clumsy
and heavy in myself. Yet it was a Yeats who spoke the only eulogy that
turns my head. "We have ideas and no passions, but by marriage with a
Pollexfen we have given a tongue to the sea cliffs."
Among the miniatures there is a larger picture, an admirable drawing by I
know not what master, that is too harsh and merry for its company. He was
a connection and close friend of my great-grandmother Corbet, and though
we spoke of him as "Uncle Beattie" in our childhood, no blood relation. My
great-grandmother who died at ninety-three had many memories of him. He
was the friend of Goldsmith & was accustomed to boast, clergyman though he
was, that he belonged to a hunt-club of which every member but himself had
been hanged or transported for treason, and that it was not possible to
ask him a question he could not reply to with a perfectly appropriate
blasphemy or indecency.
IV
Because I had found it hard to attend to anything less interesting than my
thoughts, I was difficult to teach. Several of my uncles and aunts had
tried to teach me to read, and because they could not, and because I was
much older than children who read easily, had come to think, as I have
learnt since, that I had not all my faculties. But for an accident they
might have thought it for a long time. My father was staying in the house
and never went to church, and that gave me the courage to refuse to set
out one Sunday morning. I was often devout, my eyes filling with tears at
the thought of God and of my own sins, but I hated church. My grandmother
tried to teach me to put my toes first to the ground because I suppose I
stumped on my heels and that took my pleasure out of the way there. Later
on when I had learnt to read I took pleasure in the words of the hymn, but
never understood why the choir took three times as long as I did in
getting to the end; and the part of the service I liked, the sermon and
passages of the Apocalypse and Ecclesiastes, were no compensation for all
the repetitions and for the fatigue of so much standing. My father said if
I would not go to church he would teach me to read. I think now that he
wanted to make me go for my grandmother's sake and could think of no other
way. He was an angry and impatient teacher and flung the reading book at
my head, and next Sunday I decided to go to church. My father had,
however, got interested in teaching me, and only shifted the lesson to a
week-day till he had conquered my wandering mind. My first clear image of
him was fixed on my imagination, I believe, but a few days before the
first lesson. He had just arrived from London and was walking up and down
the nursery floor. He had a very black beard and hair, and one cheek
bulged out with a fig that was there to draw the pain out of a bad tooth.
One of the nurses (a nurse had come from London with my brothers and
sisters) said to the other that a live frog, she had heard, was best of
all. Then I was sent to a dame school kept by an old woman who stood us in
rows and had a long stick like a billiard cue to get at the back rows. My
father was still at Sligo when I came back from my first lesson and asked
me what I had been taught. I said I had been taught to sing, and he said,
"sing then" and I sang
"Little drops of water,
Little grains of sand,
Make the mighty ocean,
And the pleasant land"
high up in my head. So my father wrote to the old woman that I was never
to be taught to sing again, and afterwards other teachers were told the
same thing. Presently my eldest sister came on a long visit and she and I
went to a little two-storeyed house in a poor street where an old
gentlewoman taught us spelling and grammar. When we had learned our lesson
well, we were allowed to look at a sword presented to her father who had
led troops in India or China and to spell out a long complimentary
inscription on the silver scabbard. As we walked to her house or home
again we held a large umbrella before us, both gripping the handle and
guiding ourselves by looking out of a round hole gnawed in the cover by a
mouse. When I had got beyond books of one syllable, I began to spend my
time in a room called the Library, though there were no books in it that I
can remember except some old novels I never opened and a many volumed
encyclopaedia published towards the end of the 18th century. I read this
encyclopaedia a great deal and can remember a long passage considering
whether fossil wood despite its appearance might not be only a curiously
shaped stone.
My father's unbelief had set me thinking about the evidences of religion
and I weighed the matter perpetually with great anxiety, for I did not
think I could live without religion. All my religious emotions were, I
think, connected with clouds and cloudy glimpses of luminous sky, perhaps
because of some bible picture of God's speaking to Abraham or the like.
At least I can remember the sight moving me to tears. One day I got a
decisive argument for belief. A cow was about to calve, and I went to the
field where the cow was with some farm-hands who carried a lantern, and
next day I heard that the cow had calved in the early morning. I asked
everybody how calves were born, and because nobody would tell me, made up
my mind that nobody knew. They were the gift of God, that much was
certain, but it was plain that nobody had ever dared to see them come, and
children must come in the same way. I made up my mind that when I was a
man I would wait up till calf or child had come. I was certain there would
be a cloud and a burst of light and God would bring the calf in the cloud
out of the light. That thought made me content until a boy of twelve or
thirteen, who had come on a visit for the day, sat beside me in a hay-loft
and explained all the mechanism of sex. He had learnt all about it from an
elder boy whose pathic he was (to use a term he would not have understood)
and his description, given, as I can see now, as if he were telling of any
other fact of physical life, made me miserable for weeks. After the first
impression wore off, I began to doubt if he had spoken truth, but one day
I discovered a passage in the encyclopaedia, though I only partly
understood its long words, that confirmed what he had said. I did not know
enough to be shocked at his relation to the elder boy, but it was the
first breaking of the dream of childhood.
My realization of death came when my father and mother and my two brothers
and my two sisters were on a visit. I was in the Library when I heard feet
running past and heard somebody say in the passage that my younger
brother, Robert, had died. He had been ill for some days. A little later
my sister and I sat at the table, very happy, drawing ships with their
flags half-mast high. We must have heard or seen that the ships in the
harbour had their flags at half-mast. Next day at breakfast I heard people
telling how my mother and the servant had heard the banshee crying the
night before he died. It must have been after this that I told my
grandmother I did not want to go with her when she went to see old
bed-ridden people because they would soon die.
V
At length when I was eight or nine an aunt said to me, "you are going to
London. Here you are somebody. There you will be nobody at all." I knew at
the time that her words were a blow at my father, not at me, but it was
some years before I knew her reason. She thought so able a man as my
father could have found out some way of painting more popular pictures if
he had set his mind to it and that it was wrong of him "to spend every
evening at his club." She had mistaken, for what she would have considered
a place of wantonness, Heatherley's Art School.
My mother and brother and sister were at Sligo perhaps when I was sent to
England, for my father and I and a group of landscape painters lodged at
Burnham Beeches with an old Mr. and Mrs. Earle. My father was painting the
first big pond you come to if you have driven from Slough through Farnham
Royal. He began it in spring and painted all through the year, the picture
changing with the seasons, and gave it up unfinished when he had painted
the snow upon the heath-covered banks. He is never satisfied and can never
make himself say that any picture is finished. In the evening he heard me
my lessons or read me some novel of Fenimore Cooper's. I found delightful
adventures in the woods--one day a blind worm and an adder fighting in a
green hollow, and sometimes Mrs. Earle would be afraid to tidy the room
because I had put a bottle full of newts on the mantle-piece. Now and then
a boy from a farm on the other side of the road threw a pebble at my
window at daybreak, and he and I went fishing in the big second pond. Now
and then another farmer's boy and I shot sparrows with an old pepper box
revolver and the boy would roast them on a string. There was an old horse
one of the painters called the scaffolding, and sometimes a son of old
Earle's drove with me to Slough and once to Windsor, and at Windsor we
made our lunch of cold sausages bought from a public house. I did not know
what it was to be alone, for I could wander in pleasant alarm through the
enclosed parts, then very large, or round some pond imagining ships going
in and out among the reeds and thinking of Sligo or of strange seafaring
adventures in the fine ship I should launch when I grew up. I had always a
lesson to learn before night and that was a continual misery, for I could
very rarely, with so much to remember, set my thoughts upon it and then
only in fear. One day my father told me that a painter had said I was very
thick-skinned and did not mind what was said to me, and I could not
understand how anybody could be so unjust. It made me wretched to be idle
but one could not help it. I was once surprised and shocked. All but my
father and myself had been to London, and Kennedy and Farrar and Page, I
remember the names vaguely, arrived laughing and talking. One of them had
carried off a card of texts from the waiting room of the station and hung
it up on the wall. I thought "he has stolen it," but my father and all
made it a theme of merry conversation.
Then I returned to Sligo for a few weeks as I was to do once or twice in
every year for years, and after that we settled in London. Perhaps my
mother and the other children had been there all the time, for I remember
my father now and again going to London. The first house we lived in was
close to Burne Jones's house at North End, but we moved after a year or
two to Bedford Park. At North End we had a pear tree in the garden and
plenty of pears, but the pears used to be full of maggots, and almost
opposite lived a school-master called O'Neill, and when a little boy told
me that the school-master's great-grandfather had been a king I did not
doubt it. I was sitting against the hedge and iron railing of some
villa-garden there, when I heard one boy say to another it was something
wrong with my liver that gave me such a dark complexion and that I could
not live more than a year. I said to myself a year is a very long time,
one can do such a lot of things in a year, and put it out of my head. When
my father gave me a holiday and later when I had a holiday from school I
took my schooner boat to the round pond, sailing it very commonly against
the two cutter yachts of an old naval officer. He would sometimes look at
the ducks and say, "I would like to take that fellow home for my dinner,"
and he sang me a sailor's song about a coffin ship which left Sligo after
the great famine, that made me feel very important. The servants at Sligo
had told me the story. When she was moved from the berth she had lain in,
an unknown dead man's body had floated up, a very evil omen; and my
grandfather, who was Lloyds' agent, had condemned her, but she slipped out
in the night. The pond had its own legends; and a boy who had seen a
certain model steamer "burned to the water's edge" was greatly valued as a
friend. There was a little boy I was kind to because I knew his father had
done something disgraceful, though I did not know what. It was years
before I discovered that his father was but the maker of certain popular
statues, many of which are now in public places. I had heard my father's
friends speak of him. Sometimes my sister came with me, and we would look
into all the sweet shops & toy shops on our way home, especially into one
opposite Holland House because there was a cutter yacht made of sugar in
the window, and we drank at all the fountains. Once a stranger spoke to us
and bought us sweets and came with us almost to our door. We asked him to
come in and told him our father's name. He would not come in, but laughed
and said, "Oh, that is the painter who scrapes out every day what he
painted the day before." A poignant memory came upon me the other day
while I was passing the drinking-fountain near Holland Park, for there I
and my sister had spoken together of our longing for Sligo and our hatred
of London. I know we were both very close to tears and remember with
wonder, for I had never known anyone that cared for such momentoes, that I
longed for a sod of earth from some field I knew, something of Sligo to
hold in my hand. It was some old race instinct like that of a savage, for
we had been brought up to laugh at all display of emotion. Yet it was our
mother, who would have thought its display a vulgarity, who kept alive
that love. She would spend hours listening to stories or telling stories
of the pilots and fishing people of Rosses Point, or of her own Sligo
girlhood, and it was always assumed between her and us that Sligo was more
beautiful than other places. I can see now that she had great depth of
feeling, that she was her father's daughter. My memory of what she was
like in those days has grown very dim, but I think her sense of
personality, her desire of any life of her own, had disappeared in her
care for us and in much anxiety about money. I always see her sewing or
knitting in spectacles and wearing some plain dress. Yet ten years ago
when I was in San Francisco, an old cripple came to see me who had left
Sligo before her marriage; he came to tell me, he said, that my mother
"had been the most beautiful girl in Sligo."
[Illustration: _Mrs. Yeats from a drawing by J. B. Yeats made in 1867_]
The only lessons I had ever learned were those my father taught me, for he
terrified me by descriptions of my moral degradation and he humiliated me
by my likeness to disagreeable people; but presently I was sent to school
at Hammersmith. It was a Gothic building of yellow brick: a large hall
full of desks, some small class-rooms and a separate house for boarders,
all built perhaps in 1840 or 1850. I thought it an ancient building and
that it had belonged to the founder of the school, Lord Godolphin, who was
romantic to me because there was a novel about him. I never read the
novel, but I thought only romantic people were put in books. On one side,
there was a piano factory of yellow brick, upon two sides half finished
rows of little shops and villas all yellow brick, and on the fourth side,
outside the wall of our playing field, a brickfield of cinders and piles
of half-burned yellow bricks. All the names and faces of my school-fellows
have faded from me except one name without a face and the face and name of
one friend, mainly no doubt because it was all so long ago, but partly
because I only seem to remember things that have mixed themselves up with
scenes that have some quality to bring them again and again before the
memory. For some days, as I walked homeward along the Hammersmith Road, I
told myself that whatever I most cared for had been taken away. I had
found a small, green-covered book given to my father by a Dublin man of
science; it gave an account of the strange sea creatures the man of
science had discovered among the rocks at Howth or dredged out of Dublin
Bay. It had long been my favourite book; and when I read it I believed
that I was growing very wise, but now I should have no time for it nor for
my own thoughts. Every moment would be taken up learning or saying lessons
or walking between school and home four times a day, for I came home in
the middle of the day for dinner. But presently I forgot my trouble,
absorbed in two things I had never known, companionship and enmity. After
my first day's lesson, a circle of boys had got around me in a playing
field and asked me questions, "who's your father?" "what does he do?" "how
much money has he?" Presently a boy said something insulting. I had never
struck anybody or been struck, and now all in a minute, without any
intention upon my side, but as if I had been a doll moved by a string, I
was hitting at the boys within reach and being hit. After that I was
called names for being Irish, and had many fights and never, for years,
got the better of any one of them; for I was delicate and
|
she said, argumentatively, standing by the bed. "You're
in hysterics. That's what's the matter with you."
"I know I am," came in tones of muffled despair from the pillow.
"Well!" Tims was very stern and accented her words heavily,
"then--pull--yourself--together--dear girl. Sit up!"
Milly sat up, pressed her handkerchief over her face, and held her
breath. For a minute all was quiet; then another violent sob forced a
passage.
"It's no use, Tims," she gasped. "I cannot--cannot--stop. Oh, what
would--!" She was going to say, "What would Aunt Beatrice think of me if
she knew how I was giving way!" but a fresh flood of tears suppressed
her speech. "My head's so bad! Such a splitting headache!"
Tims tried scolding, slapping, a cold sponge, every remedy inexperience
could suggest, but the hysterical weeping could not be checked.
"Look here, old girl," she said at length, "I know how I can stop you,
but I don't believe you'll let me do it."
"No, not that, Tims! You know Miss Burt doesn't--"
"Doesn't approve. Of course not. Perhaps you think old B. would approve
of the way you're going on now. Ha! Would she!"
The sarcasm caused a new and alarming outburst. But finally, past all
respect for Miss Burt, and even for Lady Thomson herself, Milly
consented to submit to any remedy that Tims might choose to try.
She was assisted hurriedly to undress and put to bed. Tims knew the
whereabouts of the prize-medal which Milly had won at school, and
placing the bright silver disk in her hand, directed her to fix her eyes
upon it. Seated on her heels on the patient's bed, her crimson turban
low on her forehead, her face screwed into intent wrinkles, Tims began
passing her slight hands slowly before Milly's face.
The long slender fingers played about the girl's fair head, sometimes
pressed lightly upon her forehead, sometimes passed through her fluffy
hair, as it lay spread on the pillow about her like an amber cloud.
"Don't cry, M.," Tims began repeating in a soft, monotonous voice.
"You've got nothing to cry about; your head doesn't ache now. Don't
cry."
At first it was only by a strong effort that Milly could keep her
tear-blinded eyes fixed on the bright medal before her; but soon they
became chained to it, as by some attractive force. The shining disk
seemed to grow smaller, brighter, to recede imperceptibly till it was a
point of light somewhere a long way off, and with it all the sorrows and
agitations of her mind seemed also to recede into a dim distance, where
she was still aware of them, yet as though they were some one else's
sorrows and agitations, hardly at all concerning her. The aching tension
of her brain was relaxed and she felt as though she were drowning
without pain or struggle, gently floating down, down through a green
abyss of water, always seeing that distant light, showing as the sun
might show, seen from the depths of the sea.
Before a quarter of an hour had passed, her sobs ceased in sighing
breaths, the breaths became regular and normal, the whole face slackened
and smoothed itself out. Tims changed the burden of her song.
"Go to sleep, Milly. What you want is a good long sleep. Go to sleep,
Milly."
Milly was sinking down upon the pillow, breathing the calm breath of
deep, refreshing slumber. Tims still crouched upon the bed, chanting her
monotonous song and contemplating her work. At length she slipped off,
conscious of pins-and-needles in her legs, and as she withdrew, Milly
with a sudden motion stretched her body out in the white bed, as
straight and still almost as that of the dead. The movement was
mechanical, but it gave a momentary check to Tims's triumph. She leaned
over her patient and began once more the crooning song.
"Go to sleep, M.! What you want is a good long sleep. Go to sleep,
Milly!"
But presently she ceased her song, for it was evident that Milly Flaxman
had indeed gone very sound asleep.
CHAPTER III
Tims was proud of the combined style and economy of her dress. She was
constantly discovering and revealing to an unappreciative world the
existence of superb tailors who made amazingly cheap dresses. For two
years she had been vainly advising her friends to go to the man who had
made her the frock she still wore for morning; a skirt and coat of tweed
with a large green check in it, a green waistcoat with gilt buttons, and
green gaiters to match. In this costume and coiffed with a man's wig, of
the vague color peculiar to such articles, Tims came down at her usual
hour, prepared to ask Milly what she thought of hypnotism now. But there
was no Milly over whom to enjoy this petty triumph. She climbed to the
top story as soon as breakfast was over, and entering Milly's room,
found her patient still sleeping soundly, low and straight in the bed,
just as she had been the preceding night. She was breathing regularly
and her face looked peaceful, although her eyes were still stained with
tears. The servant came in as Tims was looking at her.
"I've tried to wake Miss Flaxman, miss," she said. "She's always very
particular as I should wake her, but she was that sound asleep this
morning, I 'adn't the 'eart to go on talking. Poor young lady! I expect
she's pretty well wore out, working away at her books, early and late,
the way she does."
"Better leave her alone, Emma," agreed Tims. "I'll let Miss Burt know
about it."
Miss Burt was glad to hear Milly Flaxman was oversleeping herself. She
had not been satisfied with the girl's appearance of late, and feared
Milly worked too hard and had bad nights.
Tims had to go out at ten o'clock and did not return until
luncheon-time. She went up to Milly's room and knocked at the door. As
before, there was no answer. She went in and saw the girl still sound
asleep, straight and motionless in the bed. Her appearance was so
healthy and natural that it was absurd to feel uneasy at the length of
her slumber, yet remembering the triumph of hypnotism, Tims did feel a
little uneasy. She spoke to Miss Burt again about Milly's prolonged
sleep, but Miss Burt was not inclined to be anxious. She had strictly
forbidden Tims to hypnotize--or as she called it, mesmerize--any one in
the house, so that Tims said no more on the subject. She was working at
the Museum in the early part of the afternoon, only leaving it when the
light began to fail. But after work she went straight back to Ascham.
Milly was still asleep, but she had slightly shifted her position, and
altogether there was something about her aspect which suggested a
slumber less profound than before. Tims leaned over her and spoke
softly:
"Wake up, M., wake up! You've been asleep quite long enough."
Milly's body twitched a little. A responsive flicker which was almost a
convulsion, passed over her face; but she did not awake. It was evident,
however, that her spirit was gradually floating up to the surface from
the depths of oblivion in which it had been submerged. Tims took off her
Tam-o'-Shanter and ulster, and revealed in the simple elegance of the
tweed frock with green waistcoat and gaiters, put the kettle on the
fire. Then she went down-stairs to fetch some bread and butter and an
egg, wherewith to feed the patient when she awoke.
She had not long left the room when the slumberer's eyes opened
gradually and stared with the fixity of semi-consciousness at a stem of
blossoming jessamine in the wall-paper. Then she slowly stretched her
arms above her head until some inches of wrist, slight and round and
white, emerged from the strictly plain night-gown sleeve. So she lay,
till suddenly, almost with a start, she pulled herself up and looked
about her. The gaze of her wide-open eyes travelled questioningly around
the quiet-toned room which two windows at right angles to each other
still kept light with the reflection of a yellow winter sunset. She
pushed the bedclothes down, dropped first one bare white foot, then the
other to the ground and looked doubtfully at a pair of worn felt
slippers which were placed beside the bed, before slipping her feet into
them. With the same air as of one assuming garments which do not belong
to her, she put on the faded blue flannel dressing-gown. Then she walked
to the southern window. None of the glories of Oxford were visible from
it; only the bare branches of trees through which appeared a huddle of
somewhat sordid looking roofs and the unimposing spire of St. Aloysius.
With the same air, questioning yet as in a dream, she turned to the
western window, which was open. Below, in its wintry dulness, lay the
garden of the College, bounded by an old gray wall which divided it from
the straggling street; beyond that, a mass of slate roofs. But a certain
glory was on the slate roofs and all the garden that was not in shadow.
For away over Wytham, where the blue vapor floated in the folds of the
hills, blending imperceptibly with the deep brown of the leafless woods,
sunset had lifted a wide curtain of cloud and showed between the gloom
of heaven and earth, a long straight pool of yellow light.
She leaned out of the window. A mild fresh air which seemed to be
pouring over the earth through that rift in heaven which the sunset had
made, breathed freshly on her face and the yellow light shone on her
amber hair, which lay on her shoulders about the length of the hair of
an angel in some old Florentine picture.
Miss Burt in galoshes and with a wrap over her head was coming up the
garden. She caught sight of that vision of gold and pale blue in the
window and smiled and waved her hand to Milly Flaxman. The vision
withdrew, trembling slightly as though with cold, and closed the
window.
Tims came in, carrying a boiled egg and a plate of bread and butter.
Tims put down the egg-cup and the plate on the table before she relaxed
the wrinkle of carefulness and grinned triumphantly at her patient.
"Well, old girl," she asked; "what do you say to hypnotism now? Put
_you_ to sleep, right enough, anyhow. Know what time it is?"
The awakened sleeper made a few steps forward, leaned her hands on the
table, on the other side of which Tims stood, and gazed upon her with
startling intentness. Then she began to speak in a rapid, urgent voice.
Her words were in themselves ordinary and distinct, yet what she said
was entirely incomprehensible, a nightmare of speech, as though some
talking-machine had gone wrong and was pouring out a miscellaneous stock
of verbs, nouns, adjectives and the rest without meaning or cohesion.
Certain words reappeared with frequency, but Tims had a feeling that the
speaker did not attach their usual meaning to them. This travesty of
language went on for what appeared to the transfixed and terrified
listener quite a long time. At length the serious, almost tragic,
babbler, meeting with no response save the staring horror of Tims's too
expressive countenance, ended with a supplicating smile and a glance
which contrived to be charged at once with pathos and coquetry. This
smile, this look, were so totally unlike any expression which Tims had
ever seen on Milly's countenance that they heightened her feeling of
nightmare. But she pulled herself together and determined to show
presence of mind. She had already placed a basket-chair by the fire
ready for her patient, and now gently but firmly led Milly to it.
"Sit down, Milly," she said--and the use of her friend's proper name
showed that she felt the occasion to be serious--"and don't speak again
till you've had some tea. Your head will be clearer presently, it's a
bit confused now, you know."
The stranger Milly, still so unlike the Milly of Tims's intimacy, far
from exerting the unnatural strength of a maniac, passively permitted
herself to be placed in the chair and listened to what Tims was saying
with the puzzled intentness of a child or a foreigner, trying to
understand. She laid her head back in its little cloud of amber hair,
and looked up at Tims, who, frowning portentously, once more with lifted
finger enjoined silence. Tims then concealing her agitation behind a
cupboard-door, reached down the tea-things. By some strange accident the
methodical Milly's teapot was absent from its place; a phenomenon for
which Tims was thankful, as it imposed upon her the necessity of leaving
her patient for a few minutes. Shaking her finger again at Milly still
more emphatically, she went out, and locked the door behind her. After a
moment's thought, she reluctantly decided to report the matter to Miss
Burt. But Miss Burt was closeted with the treasurer and an architect
from London, and was on no account to be disturbed. So Tims went up to
her own room and rapidly revolved the situation. She was certain that
Milly was not physically ill; on the contrary, she looked much better
than she had looked on the previous day. This curious affection of the
speech-memory might be hysterical, as her sobbing the night before had
been, or it might be connected with some little failure of circulation
in the brain; an explanation, perhaps, pointed to by the extraordinary
length of her sleep. Anyhow, Tims felt sceptical as to a doctor being of
any use.
She went to her cupboard to take out her own teapot, and her eye fell
upon a small medicine bottle marked "Brandy." Milly was a convinced
teetotaller; all the more reason, thought Tims, why a dose of alcohol
should give her nerves and circulation a fillip, only she must not know
of it, or she would certainly refuse the remedy.
Pocketing the bottle and flourishing the teapot, Tims mounted again to
Milly's room. Her patient, who had spent the time wandering about the
room and examining everything in it, as well as she could in the
fast-falling twilight, resumed her position in the chair as soon as she
heard a step in the passage, and greeted her returning keeper with an
attractive smile. Tims uttering words of commendation, slyly poured some
brandy into one of the large teacups before lighting the candles.
"Now, my girl," she said, when she had made the tea, "drink this, and
you'll feel better."
Milly leaned forward, her round chin on her hand, and looked intently at
the tea-service and at the proffered cup. Then she suddenly raised her
head, clapped her hands softly, and cried in a tone of delighted
discovery, "Tea!"
"Excuse me," she added, taking the cup with a little bow; and in two
seconds had helped herself to three lumps of sugar. Tims was surprised,
for Milly never took sugar in her tea.
"That's right, M., you're going along well!" cried Tims, standing on the
hearth-rug, with one hand under her short coat-tails, while she gulped
her own tea, and ate two pieces of bread and butter put together. Milly
ate hers and drank her tea daintily, looking meanwhile at her companion
with wonder which gradually gave way to amusement. At length leaning
forward with a dimpling smile, she interrogated very politely and quite
lucidly.
"Pardon me, sir, you are--? Ah, the doctor, no doubt! My poor head, you
see!" and she drew her fingers across her forehead.
Tims started, and grabbed her wig, as was her wont in moments of
agitation. She stood transfixed, the teacup at a dangerous angle in her
extended hand.
"Good God!" she ejaculated. "You are mad and no mistake, my poor old
girl."
The "old girl" made a supreme effort to contain herself, and then burst
into a pretty, rippling laugh in which there was nothing familiar to
Tims's ear. She rose from her chair vivaciously and took the cup from
Tims's hand, to deposit it in safety on the chimney piece.
"How silly I was!" she cried, regarding Tims sparklingly. "Do you know I
was not quite sure whether you were a man or a woman. Of course I see
now, and I'm so glad. I do like men, you know, so much better than
women."
"Milly," retorted Tims, sternly, settling her wig. "You are mad, you
need not be bad as well. But it's my own fault for giving you that
brandy. You know as well as I do that I hate men--nasty, selfish,
guzzling, conceited, guffawing brutes! I never wanted to speak to a man
in my life, except in the way of business."
Milly waved her amber head gracefully for a moment as though at a loss,
then returned playfully, "That must be because the women spoil you so."
Tims smiled sardonically; but regaining her sense of the situation, out
of which she had been momentarily shocked, applied herself to the
problem of calling back poor Milly's wandering mind.
"Sit down, my girl," she said, abruptly, putting her arm around Milly's
body, so soft and slender in the scanty folds of the blue dressing-gown.
Milly obeyed precipitately. Then drawing a small chair close to her,
Tims said in gentle tones which could hardly have been recognized as
hers:
"M., darling, do you know where you are?"
Milly turned on her a face from which the unnatural vivacity had fallen
like a mask; the appealing face of a poor lost child.
"Am I--am I--in a _maison de santé_?" she asked tremulously, fixing her
blue eyes on Tims, full of piteous anxiety.
"A lunatic asylum? Certainly not," replied Tims. "Now don't begin
crying again, old girl. That's how the trouble began."
"Was it?" asked Milly, dreamily. "I thought it was--" she paused,
frowning before her in the air, as though trying to pursue with her
bodily vision some recollection which had flickered across her
consciousness only to disappear.
"Well, never mind that now," said Tims, hastily; "get your bearings
right first. You're in Ascham College."
"A College!" repeated Milly vaguely, but in a moment her face
brightened, "I know. A place of learning where they have professors and
things. Are you a professor?"
"No, I'm a student. So are you."
Milly looked fixedly at Tims, then smiled a melancholy smile. "I see,"
she said, "we're both studying--medicine--medicine for the mind." She
stood up, locked her hands behind her head in her soft hair and wailed
miserably. "Oh, why won't some kind person come and tell me where I am,
and what I was before I came here?"
Tears of wounded feelings sprang to Tims's eyes. "Milly, my beauty!" she
cried despairingly, "I'm trying to be kind to you and tell you
everything you want to know. Your name is Mildred Flaxman and you used
to live in Oxford here, but now all your people have gone to Australia
because your father's got a deanery there."
"Have they left me here, mad and by myself?" asked Milly; "have I no one
to look after me, no one to give me a home?"
"I suppose Lady Thomson or the Fletchers would," returned Tims, "but you
haven't wanted one. You've been quite happy at Ascham. Do try and
remember. Can't you remember getting your First in Mods. and how you've
been working to get one in Greats? Your brain's been right enough until
to-day, old girl, and it will be again. I expect it's a case of collapse
of memory from overwork. Things will come back to you soon and I'll help
you all I can. Do try and recollect me--Tims." There was an unmistakable
choke in Tims's voice. "We have been such chums. The others are all
pretty nasty to me sometimes--they seem to think I'm a grinning, wooden
Aunt Sally, stuck up for them to shy jokes at. But you've never once
been nasty to me, M., and there's precious few things I wouldn't do to
help you. So don't go talking to me as though there weren't any one in
the world who cared a brass farthing about you."
"I'm sure I'm most thankful to find I have got some one here who cares
about me," returned Milly, meekly, passing her hand across her eyes for
lack of a handkerchief. "You see, it's dreadful for me to be like this.
I seem to know what things are, and yet I don't know. A little while ago
it seemed to me I was just going to remember something--something
different from what you've told me. But now it's all gone again. Oh,
please give me a handkerchief!"
Tims opened one of Milly's tidy drawers and sought for a handkerchief.
When she had found it, Milly was standing before the high
chimney-piece, over which hung a long, low mirror about a foot wide and
divided into three parts by miniature pilasters of tarnished gilt. The
mirror, too, was tarnished here and there, but it had been a good glass
and showed undistorted the blue Delft jars on the mantel-shelf, glimpses
of flickering firelight in the room, amber hair and the tear-bedewed
roses of a flushed young face. Suddenly Milly thrust the jars aside,
seized the candle from the table, and, holding it near her face, looked
intently, anxiously in the glass. The anxiety vanished in a moment, but
not the intentness. She went on looking. Tims had always perceived
Milly's beauty--which had an odd way of slipping through the world
unobserved--but had never seen her look so lovely as now, her eyes wide
and brilliant, and her upper lip curved rosily over a shining glimpse of
her white teeth.
Beauty had an extraordinary fascination for Tims, poor step-child of
nature! Now she stood looking at the reflection of Milly without
noticing how in the background her own strange, wizened face peered dim
and grotesque from the tarnished mirror, like the picture of a witch or
a goblin behind the fair semblance of some princess in a fairy tale.
"I do remember myself partly," said Milly, doubtfully; "and yet--somehow
not quite. I suppose I shall remember you and this queer place soon, if
they don't put me into a mad-house at once."
"They sha'n't," said Tims, decisively. "Trust to me, M., and I'll see
you through. But I'm afraid you'll have to give up all thought of your
First."
"My what," asked Milly, turning round inquiringly.
"Your First Class, your place, you know, in the Final Honors School,
Lit. Hum., the biggest examination of the lot."
"Do I want it very much, my First?"
"Want it? I should just think you do want it!"
Milly stared at the fire for a minute, warming one foot before she spoke
again. Then:
"How funny of me!" she observed, meditatively.
CHAPTER IV
Tims's programme happened to be full on the following day, so that it
was half-past twelve before she knocked at Milly's door and was
admitted. Milly stood in the middle of the room in an attitude of
energy, with her small wardrobe lying about her on the floor in
ignominious heaps.
"Tell me, Tims," said Milly, after the first inquiries, "are those
positively all the clothes I possess?"
"Of course they are, M. What do you want with more?"
"Are they in the fashion?" asked Milly, anxiously.
Tims stared.
"Fashion! Good Lord, M.! What does it matter whether you look the same
as every fool in the street or not?"
"Oh, Tims!" cried Milly, laughing that pretty rippling laugh so strange
in Tims's ears. "I was quite right when I made a mistake, you're just
like a man. All the better. But you can't expect me not to care a bit
about my clothes like you, you really can't."
Tims drew herself up.
"You're wrong, my girl, I'm a deal fonder of frocks than you are. I
always think," she added, looking before her dreamily, "that I was
meant to be a very good dresser, only I was brought up too economical."
Generally speaking, when Tims had uttered one of her deepest and truest
feelings, she would glance around, suddenly alert and suspicious to
surprise the twinkle in her auditor's eye. But in the clear blue of
Milly Flaxman's quiet eyes, she had ceased to look for that tormenting
twinkle, that spark which seemed destined to dance about her from the
cradle to the grave.
Presently she found herself hanging up Milly's clothes while Milly paid
no attention; for she alternately stood before the glass in the dark
corner, and kneeled on the hearth-rug, curling-tongs in hand. And the
hair, the silky soft amber hair, which could be twisted into a tiny ball
or fluffed into a golden fleece at will, was being tossed up and pulled
down, combed here and brushed there, altogether handled with a zeal and
patience to which it had been a stranger since the days when it had been
the pride of the nursery. Tims the untidy, as one in a dream, went on
tidying the room she was accustomed to see so immaculate.
"There!" cried Milly, turning, "that's how I wear it, isn't it?"
"Good Lord, no!" exclaimed Tims, contemplating the transformed Milly.
"It suits you, M., in a way, but it looks queer too. The others will all
be hooting if you go down-stairs like that."
Milly plumped into a chair irritably.
"How ever am I to know how I did my hair if I can't remember? Please do
it for me."
Tims smiled sardonically.
"I'll lend you my hair," she said; "the second best. But _do_ your hair!
You really are as mad as a hatter."
Milly shrugged her shoulders.
"You can't? Then I keep it like this," she said.
An argument ensued. Tims left the room to try and find a photograph of
Milly as she had been.
When she returned she found her friend standing in absorbed
contemplation of a book in her hand.
"This is Greek, isn't it?" she asked, holding it up. Her face wore a
little frown as of strained attention.
"Right you are," shrieked Tims in accents of relief. "Greek it is. Can
you read it?"
"Not yet," replied Milly, flushing with excitement, "but I shall soon, I
know I shall. Last night I couldn't make head or tail of the books. Now
I understand right enough what they are, and I know some are in Greek
and some in English. I can't read either yet, but it's all coming back
gradually, like the daylight coming in at the window this morning."
"Hooray! Hooray!" shouted Tims. "You'll be reading as hard as ever in a
week if I don't look after you. But see here, my girl, you've given me a
nasty jar, and I'm not going to let you break your heart or crack your
brain in a wild-goose chase. You can't get that First, you know; you're
on a fairly good Second Class level, and you'd better make up your mind
to stay there."
"A fairly good Second Class level!" repeated Milly, still turning the
leaves of the book. "That doesn't sound very exhilarating--and I rather
think I shall do as I like about staying there."
Tims began to heat.
"Well, that's what Stewart said about you. I don't believe I told you
half plain enough what Stewart did say, for fear of hurting your
feelings. He said you are a good scholar, but barring that, you weren't
at all clever."
Milly looked up from her book; but she was not tearful. There was a curl
in her lip and the light of battle in her eye.
"Stewart said that, did he? Now if I were a gentleman I should
say--'damn his impudence'--and 'who the devil is Stewart'; but then I'm
not. You can say it."
Tims stared. "Oh, come, I say!" she exclaimed. "I don't swear, I only
quote. But my goodness, when you remember who Stewart is, you'll
be--well, pained to think of the language you're using about him."
"Why?" asked Milly, her head riding disdainfully on her slender neck.
"Because he's your tutor and lecturer--and a regular tiptop man at Greek
and all that--and you--you respect him most awfully."
"Do I?" cried Milly--"did perhaps in my salad days. I've no respect
whatever for professors now, my good Tims. I know what they're like.
Here's Stewart for you."
She took up a pen and a scrap of paper and dashed off a clever ludicrous
sketch of a man with long hair, an immense brow, and spectacles.
"Nonsense!" said Tims; "that's not a bit like him."
She held the paper in her hand and looked fixedly at it. Milly had been
wont seriously to grieve over her hopeless lack of artistic talent and
she had never attempted to caricature. Tims was thinking of a young
fellow of a college who had lately died of brain disease. In the earlier
stages of his insanity, it had been remarked that he had an originality
which had not been his when in a normal state. What if her friend were
developing the same terrible disease? If it were so, it was no use
fussing, since there was no remedy. Still, she felt a desperate need to
take some sort of precaution.
"If I were you, M.," she said, "I'd go to bed and keep very quiet for a
day or two. You're so--so odd, and excited, they'd notice it if you went
down-stairs."
"Would they?" asked Milly, suddenly sobered. "Would they say I was mad?"
An expression of fear came into her face, and its strangely luminous
eyes travelled around the room with a look as of some trapped creature
seeking escape.
There was an awkward pause.
"I'm not mad," affirmed Milly, swallowing with a dry throat. "I'm
perfectly sensible, but any one would be odd and excited too who
was--was as I am--with a number of words and ideas floating in my mind
without my having the least idea where they spring from. Please, Tims
dear, tell me how I am to behave. I should so hate to be thought queer,
wanting in any way."
Tims considered.
"For one thing, you mustn't talk such a lot. You never have been one for
chattering; and lately, of course, with your overwork, you've been
particularly quiet. Don't talk, M., that's my advice."
"Very well," replied Milly, gloomily.
Tims hesitated and went on:
"But I don't see how you're going to hide up this business about your
memory. I wish you'd let me tell old B., anyhow."
"I won't have any one told," cried Milly. "Not a creature. If only
you'll help me, dear, dear Tims--you will help me, won't you?--I shall
soon be all right, and no one except you will ever know. No one will be
able to shrug their shoulders and say, whatever I do, 'Of course she's
crazy.' I should hate it so! I know I can get on if I try. I'm much
cleverer than you and that silly old Stewart think. Promise me, promise
me, darling Tims, you won't betray me!"
Tims was not weak-minded, but she was very tender-hearted and
exceedingly susceptible to personal charms. She ought not, she knew she
ought not, to have yielded, but she did. She promised. Yet in her
friend's own interest, she contended that Milly must confess to a
certain failure of memory from over-fatigue, if only as a pretext for
dropping her work for a while. It was agreed that Milly should remain in
bed for several days, and she did so; less bored than might have been
expected, because she had the constant excitement of this or that bit of
knowledge filtering back into her mind. But this knowledge was purely
intellectual. With Tims's help she had recovered her reading powers, and
although she felt at first only a vague recognition of something
familiar in the sense of what she read, it was evident that she was fast
regaining the use of the treasures stored in her brain by years of
dogged and methodical work. But the facts and personalities which had
made her own life seemed to have vanished, leaving "not a wrack behind."
Tims, having primed her well beforehand, brought in the more important
girls to see her, and by dint of a cautious reserve she passed very well
with them, as with Miss Burt and Miss Walker. Tims seemed to feel much
more nervous than Milly herself did when she joined the other students
as usual.
There were moments when Tims gasped with the certainty that the
revelation of her friend's blank ignorance of the place and people was
about to be made. Then Mildred--for so, despising the soft diminutive,
she now desired to be called--by some extraordinary exertion of tact and
ingenuity, would evade the inevitable and appear on the other side of
it, a little elated, but otherwise serene. It was generally marked that
Miss Flaxman was a different creature since she had given up worrying
about her Schools, and that no one would have believed how much prettier
she could make herself by doing her hair a different way.
Miss Burt, however, was somewhat puzzled and uneasy. Although Milly was
looking unusually well, it was evident that all was not quite right with
her, for she complained of a failure of memory, a mental fatigue which
made it impossible for her to go to lectures, and she seemed to have
lost all interest in the Schools, which had so lately been for her the
"be-all" as well as the "end-all here." Miss Burt knew Milly's only near
relation in England, Lady Thomson, intimately; and for that reason
hesitated to write to her. She knew that Beatrice Thomson had no
patience with the talk--often silly enough--about girls overworking
their brains. She herself had never been laid up in her life, except
when her leg was broken, and her views on the subject of ill-health were
marked. She regarded the catching of scarlet-fever or influenza as an
act of cowardice, consumption or any organic disease as scarcely, if at
all, less disgraceful than drunkenness or fraud, while the countless
little ailments to which feminine flesh seems more particularly heir she
condemned as the most deplorable of female failings, except the love of
dress.
Eventually Miss Burt did write to Lady Thomson, cautiously. Lady Thomson
replied that she was coming up to town on Thursday, and could so arrange
her journey as to have an hour and a half in Oxford. She would be at
Ascham at three-thirty. Mildred rushed to Tims with the agitating news
and both were greatly upset by it. However, Aunt Beatrice had got to be
faced sometime or other and Mildred's spirit rose to the encounter.
She had by this time provided herself with another dress, encouraged to
do so by the money in hand left by the frugal Milly the First. She had
got a
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